Auckland businesses will be given preferential treatment over multinationals in regard to council procurement contracts when John Tamihere wins the mayoralty.
Tamihere said far too many contracts are given to multinational companies who “don’t pay their fair shareof tax.”
In his Council Procurement Policy, Tamihere wondered why no one had been held accountable for waiving the warranties on the purchase of the $55 million 26 storey ASB Building, which required an immediate ratepayer injection of $38 million for remediation work.
“If by any form of poor performance or incompetence the ratepayer suffers a major loss contractually, there must be consequences at senior management level,” Tamihere said.
Tamihere will also open the books to disclose terms and agreements of council contractors and consultants earning $50k or more. He also warned council staff who use their authority recklessly would face serious consequences.
“The veil where people hide behind commercial sensitivity must be lifted while we reset, refresh and cleanup the city in a fiscal sense,” Tamihere said.
“The biggest change of emphasis and requirement under a Tamihere mayoralty will be a stronger application to law applying to Council Controlled Organisations, such as Auckland Transport. There are six separate procurement offices running their own priorities – not the cities.”
Local businesses would also be looked upon favourably.
“An emphasis will be placed on the growth of scale for Auckland and New Zealand businesses with our annual purchasing clout, that means purchasing from Auckland and New Zealand domiciled companies,”Tamihere said.
“The number of multi nationals pulling out multimillion dollar contracts and not paying their fair share of tax must stop.”