Q+A: Mayor Len Brown interviewed by Greg Boyed

Q + A
Episode 36
LEN BROWN
Interviewed by GREG BOYED

GREG First of all, a fantastic win for the All Blacks. Any plans for official welcome home in Auckland?

LEN Really hard to get the smile off your face. It was a brilliant performance. We should be making some final statements through the day. We are looking forward to the All Blacks team giving us some clear instruction. There will be a public celebration. It will be outstanding, and we hopefully will be able to conclude the deal for something on Wednesday.

GREG Excellent. All right, on to what Bill English had to say this morning – ‘a natural tension’. How have relations with central government been for you?

LEN I think that’s characterised well, although by and large the professional and personal relationships have been very good. Clearly my relationship with the Prime Minister was the optimum relationship, and he and I get on very well – respect for each other, obviously. I really have high regard for Bill in his role – Deputy Prime Minister but driver of policy. He does really well. So on a personal level, very good relationships. And of course there’s a tension – the government billing and generating energy around the nation. They’re nation-building; we are city-building. And sometimes those things don’t totally synergise.

GREG On that aspect, with big-ticket projects – I’m thinking the 2.8 billion for roading, etc – who has the final say? Because with most other situations, it’s fairly clearly delineated where the council steps in and where central government steps in. How does it work with the council like this?

LEN Actually, one of the main reasons why we’re actually going through a transport accord right now with the Minister of Transport, Simon Bridges, Bill, myself and Bill Cashmore in our council because there is a bit of confusion. But as a rule of thumb, anything to do with the motorways, the government pay 100%; anything to do with public transport, we share it 50/50. For example, with the city rail tunnel, much of the discussion– Although not finalised but hopefully soon. Much of the discussion around a 50/50 share of the work we do there.

GREG But the bottom line, though, with something like that is if they say no, which they have in some areas,…

LEN No.

GREG …that’s the end of it.

LEN On that project, they’ve said yes, it’s just when exactly do we finish it? And as I say, looking forward to a reasonably clear statement in the not too distant future.

GREG So who’s in charge? If you were to say, ‘Someone’s leading this; someone’s—‘?

LEN The Prime Minister is the head of our government and is the leader of this sovereign nation, and my role, local government is a construct of statute; it’s a part of law. And so we are– Even though we’re in a partnership, we are the junior partner.

GREG Mm-hm.

LEN And I recognise that. Ultimately the government will make decisions for the country as a whole. We are most certainly focused on making decisions to build a great city, which I think we’re doing quite well at at the moment.

GREG Let’s talk about housing, because living in that great city is getting nigh on impossible for many people. When you took up the job of super-city mayor, the median house price, $450,000. Five years later, REINZ statistics say $771,000. How much of that can be laid at your feet?

LEN Oh, we were sitting in the middle of a GFC, so we were right in the midst of a very very bad recession, and we’ve roared out of that recession. We are nearly at 4% GDP growth rate, or an extra $3 billion a year. So...

GREG I hear you, but one of that takes away from the house prices at the moment.

LEN …of course that was the case. And the second thing in the GFC, in over four years, we only built a thousand houses a year. So the private sector during that time only built a thousand houses a year as we were continuing to grow at 25,000 to 30,000 people a year. So we absolutely— And this is what happens in Auckland – this is just not this generation; it’s happened through generations. We do not build in the middle of recessions, and so what we’ve done now is we’ve worked strongly with the government to put a framework in place where we consent as quickly as we can. And so in the last year, we consented over 8500 new homes, over the last two or three months half of those consents have been for apartments, so we have got a significant pipeline going, but—

GREG In the last two months, though, building consents have been down – for two months on the trot.

LEN Yeah, and before that, but that’s still sitting at a record rate. I mean, over the last—

GREG That must be a worry, though. The two months, they have been down, that has to be a concern going ahead.

LEN There is a bit of cyclical behaviour that goes on, but, really, for all of the 12 months before that, they were operating at considerably higher percentage increases as against the previous months and the years before. So we have got the right level of momentum working. Working with the government through the Housing Accord has been a big help. So basically we’re setting up these special housing areas. Now, everyone, of course, wants houses in those now. It takes a year to actually get the houses on the sites. And it’s, of course, built with private. I am pleased to hear Bill say today that the government will play a stronger role in terms of front-forwarding some of the house-build, particularly in Tamaki and some of the other areas. We’re joining that. We’ve set up a developmental company called Panuku, who will also go to the market and look to develop some of the land that we hold that’s surplus that we believe we can put houses on of different types.

GREG If it keeps going this way, and we heard the numbers there – nine times the affordability, nine times the average income, which is ridiculous; for most people, getting into the Auckland housing market is just not something you can look at – are you hoping for a levelling off? Are you hoping that we’re going to avoid a crash? Which is not completely out of the question.

LEN No. The levelling-off is happening right now. Over the last two or three months, we’ve actually seen a plateauing of price increases. And I think that’s— As we see, the market’s started to just quieten a bit, and also we see the house-build that’s really generating some real pace. And also the apartment-build just in this area, in the downtown area round the station here, we’ve got six or seven apartment blocks coming out of the ground right now. And so we are seeing a very significant wave of build coming at us, and, of course, the biggest part of it will arrive maybe as we’re going into the next phase of a quieter cycle in our economy.

GREG Housing affordability we’ve touched on; transport we’ve touched on. Neither are great; neither optimum at this point – five years into the job.

LEN Oh, no, no. Look, I dispute that.

GREG They’re not. They’re not. Anyone who spends any time in central Auckland, stuck in traffic for hours knows that about traffic.

LEN And everyone knew. The dictum to me, the instruction to me as the first uniting mayor of Auckland was – ‘Fix the transport, and, in particular, sort out public transport.’ And if you can look at public transport and see that there’s been a 60% increase in public transport patronage every day—

GREG You drive, Len. You own a car; I own a car; all the people in this building own a car, and not one of them would say over the last five years, ‘Yeah, it’s got better. I can whizz into town now.’

LEN But I also get on the train, and I’m on the train at least twice a week. And when I’m on that train, I’m seeing the growing numbers there – an extra 9000 people on the trains every day – day and day.

GREG So five years on, has the super city been a success, in your view? Given what’s we’ve just spoken about.

LEN Absolutely. On the basis that it was set primarily up to give a single vision, to stop Aucklanders from arguing, and by and large that’s what’s happened. And by and large, people by and large agree with the direction forward and the vision that we’re taking and particularly as it applies to transportation and the economy. I mean, our economy has taken on 35,000 extra jobs over the last two or three years. We’re seeing big growth in areas like high-tech, where 13% to 14% of our economy is employing people in those, sort of, high-tech start-ups. That’s massive for our economy. So I’m pleased with how we’re going that far.

GREG Auckland city is different to the regions; we know that. Having said that, Wellington and Hawke’s Bay have both been presented with the idea of merges and super-city scenarios and both said no. What do you think that says about how the rest of the country views how the super city has run?

LEN I think what government did—So, of course, it was a government decision; it wasn’t a decision of the people of Auckland. It was a government decision, and they decided one, we cannot have a divided Auckland any more, because we’re not making enough progress; and secondly, we need a clear vision and a delivery on that vision in terms of infrastructure in particular; thirdly, it needs to be an international city focused out to the world. And I think on those three things, and particularly on the first two, we have been successful, and you can see it. Most Aucklanders would say, ‘Hey, has this city progressed?’ And they’d say, ‘Absolutely. We love our city, and it’s really going in the right direction and going at a considerable pace.’

GREG You’ve been in the job five years. Are you going to stand again as mayor or not?

LEN I’m going to be making a statement about that in the near future. And, you know, as you can imagine, there’s a fair amount of talk about that at the moment, but I’m just reflecting on that at the moment, listening to my family in particular and the community. And I will be making a statement in the very near future.

GREG You have been saying that for a while. You made your intentions fairly clear last time you ran, but why the delay this time?

LEN I said nothing about my intentions to run last time until probably April in the election year, and that was for obvious reasons. We were so flat out, and, to be fair, we have continued to be really focused and with a lot to do. So I’m now turning my mind to it, well and truly, and as I say, a decision and a comment will be made very shortly.

GREG How much of a bearing will Phil Goff putting his hat into the ring make into your decision-making?

LEN Oh, look, for Phil or anyone else putting their hat in this ring, I say to them the very best. Look, I’ve loved doing this job. It’s been really a great honour and really humbling, but it is also challenging, and it’s unique, and so to Phil or anyone else, the only comment I would make is, ‘The very best of luck to you.’

GREG That sounds like past tense, if you don’t mind me saying.

LEN I don’t think it’s— It’s probably not helpful to try and imply anything into what I’m saying here today. One, I’m reflecting very very positively on the events of this morning and looking forward to Wednesday; and secondly, I have made it pretty clear that a statement will be coming out in the very near future.

GREG All right, Len Brown. Thank you very much for your time.

LEN Pleasure.

ENDS

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