Will Council Push THE BIG RED BUTTON and Go Thermonuclear

Written by Ben Ross - Talking Auckland

Port continuing work against wishes of Auckland Council

The Port of Auckland saga keeps on going. News out this morning shows the Chair of Port of Auckland giving a long winded technocratic answer to what the Port will do next.

Which basically is run against the wishes of the Council (rightfully or wrongly) and essentially call the Deputy Mayor’s bluff in going Thermonuclear in handing the wider situation.

From Radio NZ

Council ‘close to edge’ – Ports of Auckland

Todd Niall, Auckland Correspondent – todd.niall@radionz.co.nz Updated 34 minutes ago

Ports of Auckland has confirmed it is likely to reject the call by its council owner to halt the controversial extension of two wharves nearly 100 metres into the harbour.

The port’s chairman, Graeme Hawkins, said a formal response could be a week away, and the politicians are close to crossing a line meant to keep them out of commercial business decisions.

The port company has been considering a council request to halt the $22 million project, to extend two arms of Bledisloe Wharf, for nearly four weeks.

Mr Hawkins said the board was finalising a detailed business case to quantify the commercial risk of not having the extensions, and of not being able to accommodate increasingly large ships.

However, all of that detail may not be shown to the politicians, whose relationship with the port company is via the council investment agency ACIL.

“The structure we work under is to keep politicians separate from our responsibilities as commercial directors. When we start to mix those two, that’s when the problems in the past have occurred,” he told Radio New Zealand.

Listen to Graeme Hawkins on Nine to Noon ( 27 min 10 sec )

……….

Source and full article: http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/regional/271971/council-‘close-to-edge’-ports-of-auckland

So the ball comes back to the Auckland Development Committee and whether it will drop that Hydrogen Bomb.

My commentary on the Future Port Study can be seen below:

My Interview on Port of Auckland

Talking Port Future Study – The Video

One thought on “Will Council Push THE BIG RED BUTTON and Go Thermonuclear”

  1. Methinks Graeme Hawkins is confused. Owners stipulate the direction they want any company to head in, they also set the groundrules. Directors work within the guidelines the owners set. When Directors assume more than their responsibilities actually are, “then we have problems”.

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