Free lunch off council menu

By Laura Kvigstad, Auckland Council reporter. Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air.

An Auckland Council committee chair has shown his colleagues there is no such thing as a free lunch under Council’s budget pressures.

At the Planning, Environment and Parks committee on March 2, chair Richard Hills cut the free lunch off the committee’s discretionary spending list. This followed a Governing Body resolution to encourage cuts to discretionary spending from council, council controlled organisations and local boards the week prior. At the time of last week’s resolution, Hills was concerned that councillors did not have a common view of what discretionary spending was.

Before going to lunch, Cr Wayne Walker, who moved the resolution to encourage cuts to discretionary spending, asked who made the decision to cut lunch.

Independent Māori Statutory Board member Tau Henare said to Walker, “Come on man, you get paid enough.”