Auckland mayor Wayne Brown's media strategy: Read my words

Thursday, 27 October 2022

Wayne Brown on his scarce media appearances since election

Todd Niall is the senior Auckland affairs reporter for Stuff.

OPINION: Auckland mayor Wayne Brown’s self-proclaimed fiscal mantra is “less is more”.

Brown’s approach to carving out some time for the media, and their audience, looks to be “less is likely”.

Auckland Council’s third mayor fronted media on Thursday for the first time in 18 days since vanishing into the council headquarters following his election on October 8.

His 14-minute appearance to present his freshly announced deputy Desley Simpson, led off with a question about his media shyness.

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“We’ve been issuing lots of statements every day about what we’re doing and where we are going with that,” was his opener.

“I am very busy and so the media strategy is to inform with written stuff every day so that you know what’s going on, and so that everyone knows what’s going on,” Brown said.

Wayne Brown hadn’t fronted media for 18 days since this arrival at the council offices following his election (File photo)

The mayor has been busy. He had a lot to say on the campaign trail. Now he has to try to match that up with reality, now that he is inside the building. Stuff asked whether his media-denying busy-ness might change.

“It’s possible that it will when my availability… even exists,” he replied, but given that in one of his two chosen media interviews since he was elected, he said he wasn’t really interested in interviews, change is far from certain.

Brown did appear to believe that issuing a written statement daily, about which he couldn’t be questioned, in some way counted as keeping everyone informed.

Auckland mayor Wayne Brown with his new deputy Desley Simpson at his first media conference for 18 days.

But his statements are often unclear, and his position on getting council agency boards to resign appears to have softened in statements, to increasingly acknowledge the processes involved.

On arrival at the council building on October 10, he expected them gone within weeks.

Weeks have passed, one director chose to go, but the others have pointed out their statutory responsibilities to keep their organisations functioning legally.

Brown’s ability to maintain total control over his messaging, in statements and letters crafted by his advisors, will inevitably dissolve.

Once council meetings begin, starting November 1, his own councillors will start to find their own voices, and Brown will be available publicly to be quizzed.

It’s a big job being the mayor of Auckland.

So is being prime minister, and Jacinda Ardern and her predecessors managed to front weekly post-Cabinet media conferences, run a weekly schedule of individual media interviews, and often daily stand-ups at events.

It’s part of being a democracy, and being the leader of the country’s biggest city.

Stuff has been promised an interview “in due course”.