Wayne Brown lets rip on councillors and low-rise suburbs
Thursday, 4 September 2025
Auckland mayor Wayne Brown has compared the debate over intensive housing in Mt Eden as “like Gaza”, says councillor Christine Fletcher frequently comes to him in tears and wants to allow more high rises in Devonport.
He made the comments at a colourful “meet the mayor” evening in Hobsonville on Tuesday, hosted by local MP Cameron Brewer.
Brown spoke and answered questions for more than an hour in front of a friendly business crowd appreciative of the chance to hear from the mayor, who is seeking re-election but is so far scheduled to take part in one debate.
“I’m not having many debates, but I’m happy to meet audiences,” Brown began.
He started by canvassing the focus and achievements of his first term, including reforming the council-controlled organisations ‒ especially Auckland Transport, on which a further government update is expected this week.
Brown also talked up his work on the Port of Auckland, for he brokered a deal to see it contribute $1.1b in profits to its council owner over the next 10 years.
“The port has suddenly become profitable. I’m very proud of that. I see that the ‘Albanians’ are claiming that they did it themselves. Morons.
“When I got in there, I discovered that the Port of Auckland has been run like the Salvation Army for many years, as a not-for-profit.”
By Albanians, Brown is referring to the two councillors for the Albany ward, John Watson and Wayne Walker, who he has clashed with a number of times over the term. Brown has hand-picked two candidates to endorse to run against the pair in an effort to unseat them.
Watson and Walker weren’t the only councillors to cop flak from Brown.
When he was talking about his lobbying to reform seismic rules in Auckland, which have led to stories of sky-rocketing body corporates for some owners, Brown took aim at Albert-Eden-Puketāpapa Ward councillor Christine Fletcher.
“A person came to me in tears and told me that ‒ [it] wasn't Mrs Fletcher, who comes in tears all the time ‒ it was a member of the public.”
Fletcher and Brown have clashed recently over Auckland’s new housing plan, with the city to make a decision about where to zone two million new homes by the end of September.
Fletcher has been approached for comment but hadn’t responded by deadline.
John Watson later spoke in Fletcher's defence, saying he found Brown's remarks distasteful.
'Councillor Fletcher is one of the strongest women, if not the strongest, on the Auckland Council and always has been … so the notion that she's someone who breaks into tears at the drop of a hat is entirely fanciful and couldn't be further from the truth.“
And in response to Brown calling him and Walker “morons”, Watson said: “Those sort of comments are just the measure of a man ‒ he’s abusive, he’s belittling and he especially doesn't like people who stand up to him. Hardly the qualities of leadership that will serve Aucklanders well.”
Back at the meeting, the housing debate, which is particular intense in the city-fringe suburb of Mt Eden, had Brown frustrated ‒ especially planning rules and the size of buildings around public transport corridors.
“And if you go to Mt Eden … it looks like Gaza in Mt Eden,” he said.
“This has been very frustrating, I'm a great believer in making more out of what you've got.”
The Post later asked Brown elaborate on the Gaza comment, but in response he said it was a joke, and wasn’t about high rises or the housing debate.
At the meeting he said the aim was to change the planning rules “so that we can really bulk up and put lots of very cool buildings all around where the railway stations are” because the stations cost a lot of money.
Brown told the Hobsonville crowd he was working on a plan to upzone Devonport because it was only a 10-minute ferry ride into the city.
The wealthy peninsula suburb has a large number of historic villas and has largely resisted intensification.
“We want the Devonport ferry to be marked up as a mainline transit so we can concentration of building design as you do in other high speed transit.”
“You’re not going to be building high rises in Devonport, are you? This is going to upset everyone,” Brewer challenged Brown.
“Yeah, but they deserve to be upset,” Brown responded.
If re-elected, Brown wants to use AI to improve traffic flows around the city, sell productive land held by the council, make better use of the Waitemata Harbour and will continue to push for a bridge across the harbour rather than the Government’s preferred option of tunnelling - which he said would never happen.