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Former Labour party president and former ARTA director Mike Williams has been appointed a director of Auckland Transport.
The new Auckland Council Appointments Sub-committee today appointed additional directors to the boards of Auckland Council’s CCOs.
The government had made the majority of appointments to the boards. The council has today made up the balance of the appointments.
Williams is presently involved with the anti-P drug Stellar Trust and also is a regular guest on TVNZ’s Q&A programme.
When standing recently for the council’s Henderson- Massey local board, (he missed out) his election message discussed roading:
As a former Labour Party President, I have the governance and leadership experience to serve the people of the Henderson−Massey Local Board into the future. I will make sure that local voices are not lost in the new super city, and I have a track record of getting myself heard. The ongoing development of our major transport links − the NW Motorway, Upper Harbour Motorway and the passenger rail service is crucial to the standard of living and property values in our district. While a director of Transit NZ, Ontrack and ARTA, I was instrumental in the improvement of all of these links, but local roads have not kept up, and I want to see no more use of noisy chip seal surfaces on our arterial roads. If the much quieter hot mix can be used on the current Auckland City arterials, then we can have it here too.
Former Labour Party president Mike Williams appointed
The full list of directors appointed by the council today is:
Auckland Transport
Mike Williams
Waterfront Development Agency
Evan Davies
Christine Caughey
Auckland Council Property
Neil Barr
Leigh Auton
Regional Facilities Auckland
John Robertson
John Avery
Gary Troup
Auckland Council Investments
Brian Corban
Pauline Winter
Auckland Tourism, Events and Economic Development
Franceska Banga
Richard Jeffery
15 Comments
I have mixed feelings about these appointments
heh Mike sure looks like the life of the party..
He is pretty well experienced, though not sure if that’s a good thing!
Shocking photo though!
I think he will be good. He really stirred things up when on the board of Transit. The rest of the board were horrified when he suggested Transit should be thinking about future rail links when building the Manukau Harbour crossing.
The Transit board used to be appalling road centric.
Lovely shot there
I would have preferred somebody with out any political allegiance. Somehow I can’t see Mike Williams and Steven Joyce sitting down around the table and discussing what is best for Aucklands transport needs.
@Scott at the end of the day everyone has political allegiances esp. public figures so the board would probably be empty if we excluded all of them.
“Mike Williams and Steven Joyce sitting down around the table and discussing what is best for Aucklands transport needs.”
Wait a moment - did you just SAY that it was inappropriate for a politician to negotiate with Steven Joyce? Who is a POLITICIAN himself? Of the National Party? If SJ objects to that, openly or secretly, it would be like the kettle calling the pot black!
I have no idea about Mike Williams, don’t know him, but I hope he’s the kind who doesn’t knuckle under quickly. I don’t want some admin person who is used to having to give in to political masters.
@ max. There is a difference between negotiation and discussion. I think a more positive relationship could have been formed between the transport minister and AT if somebody politically neutral had been chosen.
Scott, I am becoming more and more convinced that this minister cannot be negotiated with. The only thing one can do is apply levers and deflections with sufficient force to get some small course corrections.
Mmmmh. I swear it wasn’t my intention, but the above description also applies to something heavy rolling downhill towards a cliff (okay, the metaphor ran away with me, but still apt).
@Scott disagree, the government is not interested in negotiating on this. They have their vision of what they want Auckland to be and they are going to push that through.
It’s crystal clear they already know what they think is best for the transport future of Auckland and they are not interested in getting input from anyone or hearing opposing viewpoints regardless of people’s political affiliation. To believe otherwise is to ignore all the evidence at hand.
Agree absolutely Cam. Any pretence at negotiation or consideration by Joyce et al is clearly bad faith and simply a delaying tactic and a fudge aimed at defusing criticism.
The imaginary rocks he is piling in front of the CBDRL while lying like a flatfish about Puford is clear evidence of this.
Wow, lots of people disagree with me.
I think I might be overly optimistic but i think that having local and central government working together is the best option for everybody.
I hold out hope that this may happen soon. (perhaps it will take an oil shock or national to slide in the Auckland polls?)
Yes Scott working together is a great idea, but not if that means doing whatever the hayseed Minister of Trucking wants. he needs push back, not support.
Mike Williams is probably exactly the right kind of person for the current political environment. While he is strongly Labour aligned, he is a tough experienced strategist and negotiator. He is actually exactly the kind of person who can sit down and hammer out a deal with the government. I think it’s a good step in terms of getting major PT projects over the line.