Wayne Brown: The truth about Auckland's rates, magic money, and political hypocrisy
Sunday, 7 June 2026
Wayne Brown is Auckland Mayor.
OPINION: Last week Auckland councillors survived a tortured debate about this year’s rates rise before they settled by a large majority on a rise of 7.9% as laid out a year ago in the Long Term Plan.
The rate rise exactly matches the cost of the new CRL or City Rail Link that is expected to open at long last quite soon, so in effect there is a zero rate rise plus a new train set.
This is quite an achievement and will require savings greater than the total budgets of over 60 other councils.
Councillors had to listen to all sorts of magic savings ideas promoted by the councillors who are most keen on spending more, and which included all the savings that are being made anyway, so these councillors could look like they were actually reducing the rise by 2%.
Some of the suggestions included putting off collecting depreciation which funds renewals, repairs and maintenance and which would almost certainly have led to a downgrade in our credit rating, which is already on negative watch due to our association with the negative watched Government. This in turn would have lifted interest costs more than the savings sought.
Wellington council has kept their rate rise at about the same as Auckland’s and that is just for Business As Usual and involves putting off depreciation in the city most in need of investment in pipes and sewer upgrades.
Council heard speeches from its sole CRL representative opposing depreciation while supporting it - however that can be done.
The budget is first considered by the budget committee whose members include the Independent Maori Statutory Board (IMSB) who voted for the increase, and the committee chairman who voted firstly for the defeated 2% reduction then abstained from the vote for the budget then 10 minutes later when the full council minus IMSB voted for the budget he voted for the full rates rise. Beat that for a dollar each way.
Soon after this the Government announced that no unelected officials could vote at council, which is aimed at Māori yet the new law allows our IMSB to carry on as before. Begging bowl groups like the Taxpayers’ Union shouted about a victory for democracy as did ACT and the Government. Some victory!
This new rule presumably has a problem with the health sector, which is also run by appointed people - as do the other big spenders like NZ Transport Authority.
Then various oddities rushed in to praise the the councillors chasing the imaginary 2% reduction and these included the Minister of Health - whose spending is hardly under control - and the ACT leader whose new department is only four times bigger than the one it replaces.
Such hypocrisy !
The only way council could have kept its rate rise to 5.9% was if CRL had been kept at $2b less than its cost, just like I campaigned for four years ago, pointing out that it was already $2b over budget - as the outgoing CEO of CRL Sean Sweeney admitted.
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