The man who’s investigating Wellington’s $600k library website fiasco ‒ for free
Friday, 3 July 2026
Former public service mandarin Colin MacDonald was in Europe on standby for granddad duties when he read Wellington City Council was planning to launch a probe into the $600,000 spend on the website of the recently re-opened central library.
There has been widespread criticism of the spend since The Post revealed it, including from mayor Andrew Little who called it “horrific”. A now-deleted link on the website directed users to a commercial enterprise based in the Bay of Islands selling Māori lunar calendars and offering online workshop packages and video lessons.
Now retired ‒ bar “a very small amount of paid work” ‒ MacDonald has lived in the city for 30 years since emigrating from Scotland 32 years ago. Acutely aware of the public debate around excessive council spending he emailed the council and offered to do the review ‒ for free.
He says he put his hand up for a mix of reasons, not the least of which was his own concern at the website’s eventual $595,801 price tag.
But there was also the likely potential cost to ratepayers of a consultant-led investigation and a desire to avoid further large costs being passed on to Wellingtonians.
“$600,000 for a website is a lot of money, there’s no doubt about that … but I could also see a review of this nature clocking up quite a large bill.
“If they'd [council] gone to an established provider, it could have ended up costing quite a lot of money. My gut reaction was that just [didn’t] seem quite right.”
An independent review called for by then mayor Andy Foster in 2012 following months of what he called “rancour and partisanship” that he said had eroded confidence in the council's ability to govern, cost ratepayers almost $92,000.
Business advisory BizBud says consultants can charge hourly rates ranging from $100 to $500 plus depending on their expertise and experience.
Right job, right time
Civic-mindedness aside it was also a task that perfectly fitted the technology expert’s wheelhouse.
MacDonald’s CV is impressive. He has a degree in computer science from Glasgow University and has done stints as chief executive of the Department of Internal Affairs and of Land Information. As Deputy Commissioner at Inland Revenue MacDonald was responsible for the implementation of KiwiSaver.
In 2012 he became the first Government Chief Information Officer. It would prove to be a prescient move by the then National Government.
Just months later MacDonald found himself overseeing an urgent review of 215 publicly accessible IT systems across 70 government agencies, following confidential breaches at the Earthquake Commission (EQC) and the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and after details of a major security flaw in the Ministry of Social Development's systems were exposed.
The review led to more powers for the office holder and a bigger budget as the Government sought to keep a lid on similar IT debacles.
His most recent role was as a director of ASB, a position he held until March this year.
MacDonald’s altruism has been a source of some puzzlement among commentators, with cynics suggesting a bit of volunteer work would be no hardship after a well paid career in the public service.
Yet that is also partly why he offered his services, he says, noting that the council had offered to pay him.
“I’m a retiree and an active grandfather, and somebody who does a small amount of paid work. I don’t feel the need to take a fee and this felt like something that would fit in well with the stage I’m at in my career.
“I’m always keen to do something that feels like giving something back, so it just felt like something I could do that would be giving something back to the city.”
He is unsure of exactly how much work will be involved, or the hours he might need to put in until he’s taken a deeper dive into the documentation but doesn’t expect it to be a huge undertaking, although that’s tempered with references to pieces of string.
He does, however, have a deadline, having been asked to report back to the council’s Audit and Risk Committee by mid-September.
“You never quite know what you're going to find. You don't know how many people you're going to have to talk to, you don't know how much documentation you're going to have to review.
“My experience of these things is that nothing is ever as black and white, or as straightforward, or as clean cut as it might look from the outside.
“There's always nuance, there's always complexity, there's always good and there's bad. The key thing for me is, is that, and this is also why I wanted to do it, was to be able to say to the council, here's how you could do this better next time.”
It was not, he stressed, a witch hunt. “That’s not something I’m interested in. What I am interested in is what lessons can be learned from this and how the council could do similar things better in future; the focus is absolutely on improvement, on what would need to change.”
Wellington City Council Chief Executive Matt Prosser said the council would cover any reasonable expenses MacDonald incurred, as well as any technical advice and report writing support required.
If MacDonald hadn’t offered to do the review pro bono, it would have negotiated a fee for the work.
The review would look into whether the website represented value for money, was defensible in terms of the outcomes sought, whether its procurement was in line with council policies, whether it was delivered efficiently and effectively, and was governed appropriately, Prosser said, adding that Wellingtonians were entitled to know how the website project came in at the cost it did.
“I am clear that a value-for-money lens must be placed over every decision and expenditure the council puts in place. This was a decision made in a different time, and we are already on the record as saying that such a project, if proposed today, would be unlikely to get approval.”