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Speaker 1: Now eighteen prominent Wellingtonians have formed a group to try

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Speaker 1: to get the capital out of the doldrums. Sir Bob Jones,

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Speaker 1: Dames Patsy Ready and Kerry Prendergast, even our own fran

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Speaker 1: O'Sullivan are all members of the group. Vision for Wellington,

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Speaker 1: that's what they're calling themselves. Is being pitched as a

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Speaker 1: non partisan group that will consult the public to work

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Speaker 1: out ways of fixing Wellington's problems. And also part of

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Speaker 1: the group is Dame fran Wild who's with us now, Hafran.

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Speaker 2: How are you, Heather.

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Speaker 1: I'm very well and it's good to talk to you.

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Speaker 2: Now.

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Speaker 1: Tell me you've been around in Wellington for a while, right,

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Speaker 1: How does this particular low point, this slump rate in

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Speaker 1: terms of what you've seen? Is it the worst or

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Speaker 1: is it comparable to what you saw in the late

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Speaker 1: eighties early nineties.

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Speaker 2: It's pretty bad. When I took over as mayor in

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Speaker 2: the early nineties, it was Wellington was in the doldrums.

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Speaker 2: But we got a council and that were prepared to

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Speaker 2: work together and it was interesting. We had people of

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Speaker 2: so versus Rex Nichols on one side and too Kejuley,

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Speaker 2: who was Green and yes, they all had their views,

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Speaker 2: but there was a compromise enough to get big things done.

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Speaker 2: And we don't seem to be getting this with this

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Speaker 2: count Will your reckon has.

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Speaker 1: Gone wrong that they can't work together.

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Speaker 2: I think it's just been a slow slide into it

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Speaker 2: party politics, people just getting entrenched views and then personalizing issues.

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Speaker 2: It's just not working. Local government should be different from that.

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Speaker 1: So what does vision for Wellington's plan?

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Speaker 2: Well, we, first of all, it was just a few

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Speaker 2: of us who every now and again saw one another

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Speaker 2: and said, oh my god, you know it's pretty bad,

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Speaker 2: and then well, what are we going to do about it?

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Speaker 2: And so I'm glad you said there, Ateen, I thought,

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Speaker 2: oh my gosh, I don't even know how many people

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Speaker 2: there are, but there's a group. And we thought, why

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Speaker 2: don't we actually say something publicly and say we want

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Speaker 2: to provide a platform where Wellingtonians, whoever they are, can

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Speaker 2: come on board and be part of a conversation about

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Speaker 2: how we would like the city to be.

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Speaker 1: Will you put up candidates at the next election.

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Speaker 2: Not as a group, not that I'm aware of. We haven't,

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Speaker 2: certainly that's not been what our objective is. It's possible

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Speaker 2: people may stand, but the group will get quite big.

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Speaker 2: We think we've already had hundreds today contacting us. But

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Speaker 2: I think one big thing about the next election is

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Speaker 2: people have to vote. In the last by election, I

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Speaker 2: think it was down to only about a quarter of

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Speaker 2: the role voting. So frankly, I've always said, if you

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Speaker 2: don't vote, you can't complain about the What the buggers

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Speaker 2: do you know? Afterwards? You're disqualifying yourself from criticizing if

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Speaker 2: you don't vote.

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Speaker 1: Talking Talking is one thing, but I mean it would

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Speaker 1: probably help if you had money behind you.

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Speaker 2: Do you No, we don't. But actually we're hoping that

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Speaker 2: again this will be something which will be much more

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Speaker 2: generic crowdsource. This is not just a few wealthy people

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Speaker 2: saying we'll throw a whole lot of money at it.

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Speaker 2: We haven't even talked about that, frankly. But what we

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Speaker 2: have talked about quite recently, because it's all quite new,

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Speaker 2: is we try and get some groups together to talk

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Speaker 2: about different issues and come up with some great ideas

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Speaker 2: that we think Wellingtonians generally will buy into and present

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Speaker 2: them to the council.

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Speaker 1: Okay, I see what you're going to do there. So

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Speaker 1: how long have you guys been working together then, it.

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Speaker 2: Hasn't been that long. I've trying to work that out today.

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Speaker 2: As I've said, it's grown from a few of us

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Speaker 2: who saw each other every now and again too now

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Speaker 2: in the last few weeks saying that we have to

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Speaker 2: actually do something about this, and we probably should do

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Speaker 2: something publicly. So it's pretty recent.

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Speaker 1: There is a suggestion that some members of the group

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Speaker 1: had lobbied the government to get the government to intervene.

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Speaker 1: Is that true?

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Speaker 2: Well, I said, it's really interesting because I know we're

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Speaker 2: all accused of having met up with particularly simm Brown.

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Speaker 2: Last time I saw him was December last year, and

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Speaker 2: it was actually talking about all not Wellington.

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Speaker 1: But nothing wrong in Auckland.

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Speaker 2: Oh no, no, not perfect. But actually it is possible

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Speaker 2: people have talked to I mean, some of these people

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Speaker 2: talk to ministers a lot, they're working with them, so

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Speaker 2: I'm you know, yes, people will have talked to men.

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Speaker 2: This is but actually we certainly haven't had a you know,

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Speaker 2: any kind of formal lobby WITHOK.

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Speaker 1: So much informal not formally. Do you think the government's

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Speaker 1: done the right thing to.

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Speaker 2: Interven I certainly do. I think that the having a

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Speaker 2: Crown observer is will be. It's a big shot across

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Speaker 2: the bows. This is not just about the Mayor of Wellington.

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Speaker 2: This is about the whole councilor and Counselor of behavior

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Speaker 2: and so having somebody there watching how things are working,

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Speaker 2: being able to dig down a bit and see, you know,

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Speaker 2: what is behind decision making will be really critical.

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Speaker 1: Friend, thank you so much for talking us rough and

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Speaker 1: thanks also for stepping in to do something about the

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Speaker 1: city deserves it. Dame Frand Wild who's a vision for Wellington,

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Speaker 1: A Vision Wellington member. For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive,

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Speaker 1: listen live to news Talks. It'd be from four pm weekdays,

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