BOOM!
Leo Molloy, the candidate written off by everyone as a joke, is now neck and neck with Efeso Collins…
The Ratepayers’ Alliance-Curia mayoral poll has Labour councillor Efeso Collins and restaurateur Leo Molloy each on 21.7 per cent, Heart of the City chief executive Viv Beck on 20.5 per cent and businessman Wayne Brown on 20.1 per cent.
Freelance media operator Craig Lord, who came third in the 2019 mayoral race, was four points behind the leading pack on 16 per cent.
…there is no way Molloy should be the lead contender alongside the Labour and Green backed Efeso Collins unless Molloy has captured a deep seated resentment against AT, Auckland City Council and Labour.
The fact he is now the lead contender shows Molloy HAS captured that zeitgeist and could very well win!
The woke frame Molloy as Trump so watch for the predictable Twitter outrage and shockwave of this Poll to roll over them. Expect panicked columns in the NZ section of the Guardian citing his rise as evidence of MAGA populism corroding Saint Jacinda.
This will be the most counter-productive response as the cultural backlash against wokeness will gain Molloy votes, not cost him.
The race is insanely tight, but Molloy shouldn’t be neck and neck with the lead Left candidate, the fact he is tells us Labour and the Greens are in trouble politically in Auckland and that there is a resentment populism that is ripe for political representation.
Molloy isn’t a joke, he’s a serious contender and the Left are going to have to change tactics urgently if they want Efeso to win.
Wayne Brown is doing what Bloomberg did in the Democratic Nominations for President and use his vast, vast, vast wealth to buy himself name recognition and place himself as a candidate with no actual team on the ground while Viv Beck keeps channeling all the blue female vote that won’t vote for Molloy.
This is a shockwave of a Poll and forces everyone to dump their presumptions. Molloy has been running an insanely powerful social media campaign that towers over all the other candidates combined.
This is a real race and EVERY vote is going to count.
Game on Auckland.
Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice – please donate here.
If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media
Nothing to do with importing hordes of right-wing voters and dumping the vast majority in Auckland. Nothing.
What?
How? Who do you refer to?
No point in conversing with Castro, Ada….he has been telling all who will listen for a few years that a civil war was ‘just around the corner’, he seems to have backed off that rhetoric now, but still a troubled youth it seems, blaming all his ills on anyone but his own bad life choices.
A little harsh?
As well as being a Cuban revolutionary Castro is human too . .
Oh, wait… you think all those small business owners and slumlords are voting for Efeso? And the Earth is flat, is it?
Imagine Castro is referring to Chinese immigrants?
Actually Castro could also be referring to the Filipinos. Of course its generalising but with a lot being Catholic they tend to be quite conservative. I would wager the large Korean population on the Northshore would be rather conservative too.
Who else can afford to live in Auckland apart from wealthy, right leaning supporters – the disenfanchised and much poorer left are forced to the periphery or out of town altogether as Auckland becomes the home for the wealthy (largely foreign) minority nationally but majority locally – Auckland, live USA, is on the down.
Given the other Bobs changed his name to Bob the First, can I suggest(having read your posts) you change your name to Bob The Great.
Castro Castro poor Castro all in denial.
Just face reality. It’s all to do with ‘right-wing’ voters showing an interest this time. Which is also reflected in the nationwide polls. Have you not notice where Labour is heading? It’d down. I supposed for those nationwide polls you’ll also say they ‘imported right wing voters’…what an idiot! Castro, truth is, people don’t like what’s happening and they’re coming out en masse to show it…by voting. I have never voted in the AKL mayor’s circus. But this time I will. And I said earlier that Collins appeared a good candidate – but until now he’s just been sitting there doing fuck all.
Poor coward, you complain about a left wing Auckland mayor and then admit you have never voted, you are a complete moron. No need to vote to come to that conclusion.
You don’t even live in Auckland so shut the fuck up.
Thats a good thing squire
I’m voting for Molloy because Auckland Council requires a fresh businesslike approach to take charge and begin to sort it out.
Meanwhile Collins can’t even be arsed to attend most council meetings and, as far as I recall, isn’t on any of the subcommittees: He’s a sleep walking councillor.
If he’s a sleepwalking councilor I certainly wouldn’t want to vote for him. How can we check the validity of your statement. Do they keep attendance records the public can view.
To me their are no appealing candidates.
Unfortunately “business like approach” usually translates to not providing things like decent transport options or having any vision at all . There is no way Auckland should have waited so long to be taking care of things like mass transport
Yes, I agree that “business-like approach” does sound a bit ominous.
Decent transport options? Most people have cars, even poor people. Who are all these people who’s biggest problem is lack of transportation?
Sounds a lot like most of the Labour MPs, all the Green Maps and a reasonable slice of the rest.
Business people as politicians is the reason this country is fucked up.
Current Labour Government business people?
The problem with Collins is outside of South and parts of West Auckland he is about as appealing as a 3-day old dog turd. Traditionally these areas also don’t get motivated to vote of local body elections. This is going to need A LOT of money and resources from the Labour machine that have fundraising issues, a hemorrhaging national vote and Collins isn’t one of the team, like say Richard Hills or Phil Goff.
Richard Hills??? Is that the one outraging about Luxon’s “basic tikanga’ for sitting on a school desk while talking to students? That Richard Hills? The one who doesn’t call out Jeremy Wells for having his dog’s paws leaning on his kitchen counter ignoring “basic tikanga’ because obviously it’s on the govt tv station. That Richard Hills? Richard Hills who?
Coward who?
I don’t come from Auckland, but you can’t choose Auckland to fight the Covid battle single handed for Twelve months, not get the rail to the airport started, try and build a cycle bridge across the harbour when the traffic is gridlocked and impose a special petrol tax just for them and expect the majority of Aucklanders to support a Labour Mayoral candidate. In fact, and totally unjustified, Collins may be seen by many as the continuation of race based politics. Auckland exists as a business environment for those that live there and Auckland businesses haven’t been treated well by this Labour Government in my opinion.
As an Aucklander New View thank you for your thoughtful comments – not sure you got the memo though that re the rest of country is supposed to hate us for . . being the largest city in NZ?
Go the Blues.
I agree New View I think Collins being Labour’s pick thought he would coast to victory,hence he’s done nothing since.
JB. I live in Hawkes Bay so go the Blues too. Auckland has put up with some shit over the last two years. ChCh is one eyed, Wellington doesn’t know what you mean and the rest is rural and so the big city is for visiting and not living. we don’t hate you but are bemused to why you would live there. If Auckland fails we fail. And Vice Versa.
My moneys on the Jockey!
Bustling Bill Skelton
No fan of yours Bob but now your talking my era and the great Skelton family, fond memories.
Brother Bob great jockey in the 2 mile races.
He knows the course well enough. Proven track record and not scared of sticking his elbows out in the tight bends if necessary.
Will go the distance!
He also know what populism is all about. As for the others.
They’re all tarnished with failed trainers and has been leaders.
Make the Crazy Jockey look good!
There’s a lot more to Molloy and in that respect on the community welfare side that doesn’t get mentioned.
But l agree, especially the anti AT and to a lesser extent anti council angles will be very productive. And in that respect Efeso is very status quo.
The wider picture is that FOUR centre right candidates are neck and neck with Efeso. Any one of them quits and endorses another, will lead to the others (probably) also rolling over, and suddenly its a 30 point lead.
Molloy is dirty, and a nasty bastard which will obviously suit certain voters and all the right wing pundits. There will be white people who while “not racist” will just not feel right having a brown Supercity Mayor.
Efeso just needs to turn out the vote like Len Brown did, including organising group voting sessions and mail ins.
If the right candidates all stay in Efeso will win imo. The worry is that the right candidates will tactically withdraw, although Wayne Brown’s ego will probably see him stay in.
The proverbial in the room is low turnout–32–38% in recent years. Post is just about dead, renting and transience of abode is a thing, so even white middle class people do not necessarily vote in Auck. local elections.
Turnout will be king in this Supercity election.
Yes yes yes of course Tiger….what else. Goes without saying that neither Labour nor Jacinda nor Roberston nor Mallard nor Mahuta nor Sepuloni nor anyone else on the left are dirty nasty left wing bastards. It’s all above board with the left wing. You are absolutely right TM. What you cannot see though is that AKL is sick and tired of your ‘clean as a whistle’ left wing council and mayors. They have systematically fucked up Auckland. In the same way Labour are systematically fucking up NZ.
What has bought Auckland to an impasse is largely unrestricted growth of population, and the Supercity legislation championed by ACT with its undemocratic corporatised CCOs.
The Council is hardly left wing when you look at the roster of ward members, maybe three mild lefties including Mr Collins. Desley Simpson and Linda Cooper would certainly not appreciate being tagged left! The 21 Local Boards do have some good people indeed, but they are largely kept at arms length from any real power.
The Council has too many $100,000 plus salaried positions and is mired in bureaucracy by Local Govt. Legislation.
It won’t change, no matter how many right wing shitheads are installed, until citizens and ratepayers actually participate in running their own city, like maybe more than 32–38% of them turning out to vote!
What has bought Auckland to an impasse IS THE 7 BILLION FUCKING CONES!!!! Someone stupid but regarding themselves as super-clever at AT and AKL CC decided to start every single road improvement project at once. There is not one single suburb that is not blocked or diverted or compromised. And here is the best bit TM…AKL council rents the cones from someone who is now a multimillionaire. Instead of purchasing a million cones, they rent them for….like 20 years!!! What a godamn waste of our money!
Good ole ACT and Hides 2010 super city, as Martyn and the Joker says “You get what you fucking deserve”!
you kind of missed the point that TM was making didn’t ya, weird how ya quickly changed the topic to road cones when fact checked…
Both Hills and Darby are ideologically blinkered left leaning.
The reason National won’t stand candidates in local government is because it’s a really bad idea for the country. Part of the job of local government is to act as a check and balance to central government (otherwise why not run it all out of Wellington?) so when we have a Labour government and an overtly Labour controlled council we get central government diktats passed straight into local regulations without scrutiny. However even a Labour hack like Goff choked on 3 Waters! It was THAT bad.
Agree JK it’s there for everyone to see.
You got it!
All the moaning and bitching but they won’t get out and vote. Oh, there’s “No-one on the list I Iike or want”? The mythology has it that ‘it’s easy to get things done, why don’t they?’
If it’s such a piece of piss get in, get the job and do it. The leader of the pack, the always got all the answers ‘Why Don’t They’? mob is Mike Hosking of course.
Correct, if you don’t vote, you can’t complain and you’re a moron. Sums up Hosking and supporters.
I’m giving my vote to Leo Molloy. It’s time we clean up the Auckland and permanently remove unwashed ferals from Auckland CBD. The CBD has become cesspit of the South Pacific.
Let’s drain the swamp and make Auckland great again . .
And remember too. The Labour brand is sooo toxic now. Nobody will touch it. Only paedos and shapeshifters will.
The same goes for the gweens.
Voting Molloy, just because it 1) riles up the people who have been screaming at anyone right-of-Stalin for the past six years that we are racist/homophobic/hateful people who deserve what we get and 2) fuck Auckland Transport.
AT will run ringsaround Malloy. And everyone else.
another day another poll…
A joke candidate? There’s a bit of a current precedent for “joke candidates” proving their worth, for example, you know, that bloke Zelensky. Has Molloy done Dancing with the Stars? (Speaking, as I am, as an ex-Aucklander, ex many years ago, who remembers the red rattler suburban train service out west, so not really qualified to comment.)
I don’t like any of them. Can we vote not to have a mayor?
It looks like Molloys to lose. He has Nationals backing( although typically National are denying this)plus big business money driving his campaign. To use Molloys own words ” the whole lot want me in”.
His style fits well with the National party, nasty, punative and at times corrupt.
Gosh Bert that’s raw even for you.
True though.
What, another change of name?
Beautiful isn’t it.
Corruption is beautiful coward.
Yep, he is a venal little shit–treated the Auckland restaurant scene as a personal money trench–just the guy for old school Auckland business community, and bonus point, he is white.
Efeso is in it to win it and will do if the right wing candidates stay on the ballot.
ds. What a wonderful idea, no mayor. Imagine no PM either, just the hopeful and the vicious wafting around the Beehive desperately wanting a journo to appear and ask them something, ask them anything at all.
No Parliamentary speaker either, just random pollie control via overhead sprinklers operated by the last emperor now employed pruning potatoes and sweeping the tui droppings at Bellamy’s back door where Chris Bishop’s dad doesn’t lurk dreaming of a hot sausage roll and no buses pass no more and none of the girls in black ever clean the backs of their shoes walking down Lambton Quay.
A general sort of politician abolishment to welcome the coming spring would be rather nice. Dancing in the streets.
Hearty!
Why shouldn’t they be neck and neck?
Goff has fucked everything up.
Goff? The whole place has been fucked since the council mergers. I take it you don’t live in Ak? Which is why you don’t know what you are talking about?
It was ACTs Rodney Hide and the super city Jays, don’t let your patch over your left eye hit you on the way out. He fucked it up, it’s been a hopeless case ever since.
I’d vote for a bald guy; at least he wouldn’t have a lot of hair to shine, brush and colour, taking up precious time, along with the make-up that today’s modern woman still seems attached to after the spirit of feminism has faded.
Molly will get the viaduct bars humming again.
Auckland! Meh!
What the usual suspects above are missing is that the Auckland Supercity was always set up for a corporatist takeover of the peoples assets. Unaccountable CCOs that just laugh at Councillors and the Mayor, and spit on community representatives.
Mr Collins has already advised he will address that, albeit needing a change in legislation to ultimately kick the bludgers out.
What a bunch of tory suck ups you are… Brown and proud–go Efeso!
I’ll second that.
” Molloy isn’t a joke, he’s a serious contender and the Left are going to have to change tactics urgently if they want Efeso to win ”
What left are you referring to Bomber ? The neo liberal third way kindness model we have now ? The last time I looked the ” left ” is just to the centre of the status quo.
Ha Ha tactics , what tactics you mean actually campaign on what ” left ” is meant to mean !
There is no divide between left and right economically they are one and the same with some variation like Fair pay agreements and reducing temporarily the tax on fuel.
So what does it mean when Claire Szabo gets the boot, I mean resigns as the labour party president? And looks like she’s gunna run in an Auckland burb/seat??
Panic mode, Effeso needs some help or she was useless as the prez?
Or she’s been busted for something and they’re gonna appoint ‘Mr Fixit’ skippy hipkins the leg spreader to that job too!?
God help us. Molloy is a dinosaur who never left the 80s. He offers a platform that is nothing more than greed, ego, more cars, self indulgent vanity projects and bad hair…..sound familiar?
Let’s remember Auckland is one of the largest local government areas in the the Southern Hemispere.
What’s Leo’s focus? Certainly not the people of Rodney, Franklin or the wider city.
No…surprise, surprise its the Waterfront…yawn.
So c’mon Auckland lets all pay to scrap the Port and build a stadium… just down the road from Leo’s restaurant…whilst he tirelessly “puts an end to the reckless spending” of AC’s faceless bureacratics.
Whilst we are at it, let’s just “park climate change”, ensure the Auckland motorist’s god given right to sit idly in congestion is paramount and irrationally fantasise about a fuel source that no one in the world has actually managed to roll out at scale.
Guess what Leo, a big part of most proposed Hydrogen infrastructure around the world generally involves a functional Port!
And then there’s his planned scourge of the Council Bureacracy, like some petulant Night of the Long Knives. Why vote for leadership, when we have unadulterated vengeance on offer? Nothing like draining the swamp to rark up a disillusioned voting public….sound familiar?
AC certainly needs better transparency and accountability but I doubt bullying the managerial elite into submission is the way to achieve it, coz let’s face it peeps, that’s the AC bureacracy’s modus operandi. They will eat him alive.
Besides, if Leo’s respect of the Courts and the Law, in relation to a recent high profile murder case is anything to go by… I suspect whatever Leo may save the ratepayer by gutting Council will likely be be lost to “gardening leave” and undisclosed settlements, given Leo clearly thinks he is above the law and can behave however he wants when it comes to due process…..sound familiar?
Seriously reading over his “Plan”, I don’t think this guy has a clue of what the Mayor’s actual role is, the limited power the position weilds or how the Council machine actually works…..sound familiar?
I’m sure if Aucklanders are stupid enough to vote him in, he wont be Making Auckland Great Again….he’ll simply turn it into a outdated backward, loud, garish nightmare, much like his taste in fashion.
Honestly the only difference between Molloy and America’s Orange Bafoon is, that clown didn’t actually dress like one.
Leo has my vote, finally get rid of the commie mayors like pants down brown and goff
Big Pharma backed “get ya shot” Molloy is exactly what Auckland deserves. Cuz dumb lives matter.
Keep voting for the greens & labour Tab. They need every vote they can get.
Auckland is about to be bought & sold off to Blackrock Asset, Fund management in partnership with investors like the NZ Superannuation fund and I bet you ACC and Kiwisaver will get in on some of the action.
And then other councils across the motu will follow because that is the only way that they can afford to fix their infrastructure that will cost hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars.
Eg; NZ Water Systems price tag of $185b+!
Auckland is about to be turned into Google Towns data centre. Buildings are going to be converted into apartments and living, work spaces and the Waitemata and the Hauraki Gulf will be for the rich and wealthy as a playground for them. All organised and managed by Panuku, Ak Councils Fire Sale’ experts and selling everything that’s not bolted down, cheap.
Beck looks like she’d be a female version of Goff, bland, vanilla, dollar each way and the malaise that is Auckland Council would happily continue and worsen. Heart of the City of stopped breathing a while back under get tenure although I don’t blame her for all the CBD’s issues.
Brown appears the type who would struggle to get on with
Low cost homes owned by the council and able to be bought by low income pensioners, sit empty in the middle of a housing crisis. The question is, why is local and central governments housing sitting empty while they accuse everyone else of why there is a housing crisis and not doing anything?
‘Top secret sell-off’: Council sells stake in millions of dollars of land behind closed doors
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/top-secret-sell-off-council-sells-stake-in-millions-of-dollars-of-land-behind-closed-doors/43BQXRTE25GHPCMNJOFNG2DGUM/
“She said when retirees died or moved out of their units, the units could sit empty for years without the council spending money to upkeep them or advertise them as being back for sale.”
Like transport there seems to be plenty of money around taken in taxes mostly from the middle class, then spent very poorly or sitting empty.
More than two thirds of Auckland’s $59m light rail spend is on consultants
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/more-than-two-thirds-of-aucklands-59m-light-rail-spend-is-on-consultants/5RKQQX4PHASBVADWDAXEJTTZX4/
That’ll be down to Panuku and their chairman P Majurey. ‘Fire Sale’.
He doesn’t do Social Housing. That’s why JT and Ak Council we’re in the HRT the other week.
Everything is up for sale in Auckland Council.
Nothing to say about Matt McCarten’s support for Molloy? Stop pretending this is a left wing blog Bomber. But I guess he pays to be on your page. And how about moderating some of these comments? They are truly, truly sick.
Hmmmm I thought blog moderating only belonged to our state run media namely NZ Herald and Stuff.
What’s the rates bills like in Auckland now….must be getting over two and a half , tree thousand dollars a year now…
Auckland like I imagine everywhere has its pros and cons but you often have an affinity with your home town or city that seems to mitigate some of the cons at least . . and yes you are right we are all New Zealanders before anything else.
Love Hospital Hill in Napier and your syrah as well.
Blues lost again.
Trump was written off as a joke candidate too. Never underestimate the number of people who don’t give a fuck about leftist values, and who just want a leader who’s willing to kick some ass and get the economy going
Why do only like 1/3 of my comments show up?
Decent transport options? Most people have cars, even poor people. Who are all these people who’s biggest problem is lack of transportation?
Freda keep it up I like the unpretentious style.
Train drivers?