When the circus comes to town

John Key is going to wish he’d never announced the Queens Wharf would be ‘party central’ for the Rugby World Cup.

Aucklanders are certainly regretting it. With that seemingly off the cuff announcement he began a shambolic process that has demonstrated both a lack of leadership, and an inability to work with Auckland. We have gone from party central to a $100 m iconic building to a cruise ship terminal and now a tent.

We are staring down the barrel of the Rugby World Cup, but there doesn’t seem to be much leadership on show.

Key and McCully are both AWOL. Aucklanders learn about this latest caper through some back door leak to the Herald.

I don’t for one minute buy the idea that the shambles is evidence of Auckland not being able to get its act together. Aucklanders have been quite clear that we want our waterfront opened up and developed. The Regional Council made Queens Wharf available. We didn’t want to be bounced by the Government into spending $100 m of our money on a project that might not fit properly within a long term plan for the whole waterfront.

But time after time the Government has announced a new plan for our waterfront with our money without getting Aucklanders on side.