viv beck

A plea for whoever's in Government next month to address the worrying state of the events sector in Auckland.   

Auckland Unlimited has revealed to the council that no major events are confirmed in the city beyond August next year due to a lack of funding. 

Heart of the City Chief Executive Viv Beck told Tim Dower that it's a major international city, so this needs to be resolved.  

She says there's a big opportunity coming up for the incoming Government to really look at the whole funding mechanism for Auckland. 

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I sort of hate saying this because I actually really like Viv Beck, but I do think she needs to think very seriously about throwing in the towel in the Auckland mayoral race for the sake of the city.

John Banks has got a point in what he was saying in the Herald this morning.

At this rate, she can’t win. Her polls are slipping, her campaign is not good enough to lift those polls.

All she’s doing right now is splitting the vote between the two candidates on the right — herself and Wayne Brown — and ensuring Efeso Collins on the left gets into the mayoralty.

Have you seen Efeso Collins’ policies? Are you sure this is the guy you want as the mayor of Auckland?

There are three things I worry about:

1. He supports giving a lane on the Harbour Bridge to cyclists. Permanently. That’s gonna screw the traffic coming in from the North Shore big time when it’s already screwed up enough.

2. He supports building another harbour crossing that doesn’t allow cars on it. So just for the climate friendly transport. That’s not very smart for a city as jammed up as Auckland.

3. He supports light rail. Light rail is one of the dumbest transport ideas in its current design. It’s gonna cost us $30 billion. Complete waste of money.

Collins is basically a Labour guy just repeating the same stuff from the Labour guys in the Beehive.

So we might end up voting them out this time next year, but we’re still going to be stuck with their ridiculous ideas about transport in our biggest city because their guy Efeso Collins is the mayor.

One of the two candidates on the right needs to stand down and give the other one a fighting chance.

Viv’s polling is lower, which is why she probably needs to stand down.

She’s on 12.5 percent on the latest Ratepayers Alliance Curia poll. Wayne Brown is on quite a bit more on 18.6 percent, Efeso Collins is on 22.3 percent, but apparently he is a bit stuck in the mid-twenties, so he is beatable.

Leo Molloy pulled out last week to stop Efeso’s policies becoming reality. You can’t have Leo being more grown up than Viv here so she needs to do the same.

The worst thing for her to do would be to split the vote to ensure Efeso Collins wins and condemn Auckland to another three years of this nonsense. 

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Labour will hold a caucus meeting to discuss Gaurav Sharma.

Sharma has been vocal on Facebook about bullying within the party's caucus, including posting one just as Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was about to speak at a post-Cabinet press conference.

Viv Beck will not stand down from the Auckland mayoral race.

The latest polls have seen her fall to around 12 percent, well behind the other centre-right candidate Wayne Brown and frontrunner Efeso Collins.

A Warriors fan has been kicked out of Mt Smart Stadium for doing a shoey.

However, the fan, Calley Gibbons, says he'll be back for the team's final game in three weeks against the Cowboys.

Neale Jones and Sam Johnson joined Heather du Plessis-Allan on The Huddle

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