Questions are being raised about why it took so long to release a report that investigated moving car imports away from Auckland.
The report commissioned by Auckland Council Investments Limited (ACIL) was made public in December last year, after Radio New Zealand (RNZ) requested it be released in July.
The NZIER report found the cost of moving Ports of Auckland’s car import operations to Whangarei or Tauranga would outweigh the benefits by about $1 billion.
“It is difficult to justify moving the vehicle imports from Auckland on either competitive or efficiency grounds,” the report says.
RNZ eventually complained to the Ombudsman’s office in September, which eventually ordered the report be released.
Reasons given for not releasing the report included ACIL didn’t have a report, that it was incomplete, and that it contained commercially sensitive information.
There were also concerns raised about releasing it during the general election campaign.
Some confusion about whether the report was complete is revealed in emails released by the council to RNZ.
Goff’s principal political adviser Nirupa George wrote on November 13 that “more work is being done on the report, and therefore it isn’t complete from our perspective”.
However ACIL chief executive John Crawford disagreed.
“From an ACIL perspective the report is complete – and NZIER are not planning to revisit it after discussions with council. Can you please call to discuss what further work is contemplated,” he replied via email.
Dean Knight, the co-director of Victoria University’s Centre for Public Law, questioned the delay in releasing the report when spoken to by RNZ.
“The Ombudsman’s eyebrow would be raised by the chain of correspondence.”
