After expressing “shock” at the amount his council spent with legal firms and consultants, the city’s mayor Wayne Brown is shown to have spent $91,000 on external lawyers in one month.
The mayoral office spend on legal advice since October 8 is just over $300,000 most of it with leading law firm Meredith Connell, from which Brown’s chief of staff Max Hardy hails.
Brown told a council meeting on July 27 he was shocked at council spending with big consultancies and law firms published in the news media, and implored councillors to apply a “reasonableness” test when calling for external advice.
“We are representatives of the public purse, and some of those things just don’t meet the reasonableness test,” Brown told the meeting.
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“A PWC commissioned report could have been replaced by a chat with a real estate agency and saved $90,000,” the mayor said.
He continued the theme in a media column he penned, on the New Zealand Herald website, and following that in an interview with RNZ.
Mayoral office accounts obtained from the council by Stuff, showed in May alone, $91,535 had been spent on “legal advice to the mayor’s office” with Meredith Connell, one of the law firms approved by the council.
Stuff understands much of the advice early in Brown’s term was around the powers of the mayor in dealing with council-controlled agencies – of which he had been highly critical.
Chris McKeen/Stuff
Auckland mayor Wayne Brown has criticised council spending on external contractors and law firms
Some of the earliest sums paid to Meredith Connell were for time spent in the mayor’s office by then-partner Max Hardy, before he joined the mayor’s staff.
In a statement, the mayor’s office said the $91,535 included the temporary secondment of a junior Meredith Connell staff member to the office, and included legal advice on the independent review of the January flood response, as well as on transport issues.
Soon after his inauguration in November, Brown in a statement told Stuff he would spend the $5.2 million provided for the mayoral office, as part of Auckland’s amalgamation legislation.
Famously frugal Goff was at pains not to spend money which was intended for independent research and exploring ideas for the city.
Ricky Wilson/Stuff
Auckland mayor Wayne Brown at a council meeting
“The law says my job as mayor is to articulate and promote a vision for Auckland, provide leadership to achieve objectives that will contribute to that vision,” Brown told Stuff in November.
“I take that seriously and have a big agenda.”
After referring to the $90,000 PWC report in his August 1 media column, Brown wrote: “This has to stop, and the exposure of this means it will.”
”It is often shocking but the more waste that is exposed the better the chance of stopping this drain on ratepayers and taxpayers,” Brown concluded.
Stuff unsuccessfully sought an interview with the mayor on the legal expenses
