Why voting for City Vision (and other progressive groupings) really will make a difference
We keep being told by the current government and their allies that the work of local government is ’rates’, rubbish’ and ‘roads’.
Really? Is that all that we citizens expect? Or want? What kind of environment will we have if we ignore the many other needs of our living communities that make Auckland a really great place to live, work and enjoy life?
Retiring local board member Richard Northey shares his history of Auckland local politics and why voting for City Vision in the isthmus wards. and for other progressive groupings in the North, West and South, really matters in the 2025 elections.
The legacy left by over 70 years of C&R’s control over the old Auckland City Council was an underinvestment in vital infrastructure and a failure to plan for a growing city. C&R, originally Citizens & Ratepayers, more recently rebranded as Community & Residents, is the local wing of the National Party.
There was no real combined working opposition to them until 1998 when City Vision formed in the isthmus wards. Established as a unified progressive political force by active members of Labour and the Alliance, and later joined by like-minded independents and the Greens, many CV candidates were elected, ending the conservative, do-little, baked-in C&R majority on the Auckland City Council and on several of the then-island community boards.
Since 1998, under the old Auckland City Council, the City Vision organisation has stood candidates in the Auckland isthmus area who believe that we should be governed at the local level by people committed to progressive values such as equity, social justice, sustainability, community development and inclusiveness. The organisation has continued through to the new Auckland Council, established in 2010.
The unified Auckland Council, along with our local boards, has enabled City Vision elected members, working together, to achieve a great deal. The challenges we faced at the turn of the century continue, and we also face several compelling new problems and opportunities.
It is not just about ‘roads’ and ‘rubbish’. Our water supply—and disposal—is both a key asset and a heavy responsibility. Our current water problems date right back to 1979, when, purely to keep the rates below inflation, C&R voted to slow down underground water infrastructure to clean up the harbour “because you can’t see it”. C&R and other short-sighted people have taken an out-of-sight, out-of-mind approach for too many years and the resulting problems are now very apparent with the sudden storms and floods that are causing havoc and distress across the city.
Providing long-deferred water infrastructure has been a City Vision priority since we formed in 1998. The good news is that the Central Interceptor water project, which stretches across the isthmus to improve our water quality and address discharge problems, is nearing completion. City Vision members are also doing great work with community groups to clean up our streams and harbours, from the Hauraki Gulf to the Manukau.
Climate change presents a significant challenge, where we must act locally and be morally obligated to do our part in addressing an existential crisis. Some of our opponents argue that we need not take action because China and India emit significantly more greenhouse gases than we do. Yet an Aucklander, on average, creates so many more emissions than an average person from those and other countries. We really must act to do our share for the sake of future generations.
The old patterns of urban sprawl and of cars occupying so much of our public space must be changed. Young people and families cannot live isolated lives and be forced into a long, congested, petrol-fuelled commute to work, education, and fun. C&R and their allies are continuing to advocate for the failed policies of the 20th century, with remote suburbs located on prime horticultural land, free car parking and storage cluttering our major roads, more expensive motorways, accepting the government’s reversal of lower speed limits around schools, and exhibiting a real dog-in-the-manger attitude towards enabling cycling and active transport. The central rail link, frequent electric buses and ferries, cycleways, micromobility and safe walking are giving people a real choice. Well-planned and designed higher-density affordable housing in our area, accessible local community facilities and activities, prosperous and lively town centres, and walkable neighbourhoods are what City Vision advocates for and strives to bring to fruition.
Inequity, poverty, lack of opportunity and homelessness are increasing in Auckland. C&R and their allies regularly blame the homeless themselves for this rather than seeking changes to the heartless policies causing them. Waitematā Local Board C&R members voted in July against ensuring a living wage for the staff of Council contractors and for contracting out more Council services to multinational companies. We cannot just leave it to the market to provide access, opportunities, and the appropriate recreational, sporting, arts and community educational programmes needed for our diverse and disadvantaged communities. Providing the same programmes and opportunities, largely oriented to pale, hale, stale, male interests, is simply not equitable. We need to celebrate, embrace, and enable what provides joy, inclusion, and the appropriate development of their potential for Māori, ethnic groups, and people of all ages, abilities, genders, sexual orientations, backgrounds, and locations.
As elected members in our governance role, we in City Vision work to make the best decisions for our communities, using researched evidence, proven scientific data, the expertise of our committed Council staff, the views of the broad spectrum of our communities, including through participatory democracy, and, above all, the principles and policies we have agreed and campaigned on.
We have been faced by C&R and other regressive members just glancing at Board reports and rejecting thoroughly researched evidence in favour of anecdotes—usually from the well-off and change-resistant—claiming that majority views as submitted by representative samples of residents are not those of “The Community”. They appear to pursue no coherent vision, values or strategy. They are littered with one-off advocacy for the views of the loudest negative voices, and particularly for the vested interests of their mates.
City Vision has clear values that we believe in, and do our very best to pursue, including a belief in the equal and wonderful value of every human being; seeking equity, social fairness and full opportunity and access to develop their potential to the full, both for their own benefit and the gifts they can return for us all; fully respecting and valuing the diverse characteristics and cultures of all kinds of people.; truly valuing and protecting the other life forms we share our world with; recognising that competition has a valued place in sport and other activities, but that it is co-operation, collaboration and mutual respect that are the most ethical and productive means of achieving success in the economy and in most vital aspects of life. Firm adherence to ethical principles is a much the most certain way of arriving at truth and justice.
The Auckland Super-City was an exciting opportunity to work across the region to bring people together in prosperity and security as we took on all the challenges that would inevitably arise as the 21st century took shape. If that vision has been swamped by short-sightedness, then we need to vote to reignite it at these 2025 elections. Voting for City Vision and other progressive groups across the whole of Auckland really will make a difference.
