Diane Calvert: Wellington City Councillor on the Doctor Who exhibition joining the list of loss-makers for convention centre

A third major exhibition at Wellington's $180 million convention centre has failed to break even.

The City Council is refusing to quantify the deficit for the Doctor Who event, which ran from last June to October.

It also won't release specific visitor numbers, citing commercial sensitivity.

Councillor Diane Calvert says ratepayers have a right to know the exhibition's actual cost against the budget.

"Because if we don't deal with this openly, how can we look for improvements and how can we action those improvements that I'm sure we can do?"

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Three rate payer funded exhibitions at Wellington's one hundred and
eighty million dollar Convention Center. Yes, I did say that correctly.
Nearly two hundred million dollars for this thing have flopped.
The latest failed to break even. The Doctor Who Worlds
of Wonder ran from June to October, displaying props from
the show set. Wellington City coun Council documents show the

(00:22):
exhibit made a loss, but the council is refusing to
say how big the deficit was. It comes after a
Marvel and a Jurassic World exhibition earlier also failed to
break even or they missed their targets. Counselor Diane Colvert
is with me this evening. Diane, Hello, Hi Ryan, This
sounds like a bit of a sad story. Really.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, well, I mean I think it's sad also because
we're just trying to get information that should be available
publicly ort least some of us. I can understand some
of the commercial sensitivities about perhaps some of the visitor numbers,
but repairs, you know, have a right and to know
how much does it cost them against what was actually

(01:07):
originally budgeted for, Because if we don't deal with this openly,
how can we look for improvements and how can we
action those improvements that I'm sure you know we can do,
because look, I went to the Marvel one and I
was bitterly disappointed. I think it costs was about eighty
five dollars ahead, and yeah, it just it just was
not value for money.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
Okay, So you're saying the council has put some money
in at some stage to this doctor who thing to
make it to get it here.

Speaker 3 (01:36):
I believe so.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
But again, you know, we when we saw the news
article this morning, it obviously came to surprise to a
number of us, and so I know and others have
gone back asking for information and we're still trying to
obtain that.

Speaker 1 (01:51):
Yeah, I was surprised to see that as well. I
mean saying it's commercially sensitive to say how many people went.
I mean what implication would that have for a commit operation,
especially one that's already been held.

Speaker 3 (02:04):
Look, I can't answer that, but what I'd also be
asking is why why would we be agreeing to something
like that as well, especially when redpairs funds you know,
are a risk.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
So who how are they able to do this?

Speaker 3 (02:18):
You know?

Speaker 1 (02:19):
Laterally? Do they not have to ask for your permission
or do you are you giving them too big a
budget that they're able to throw money at doctor who?

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well you could you know, Look, I think we just
need to find out how these things get approved. I
know there was there's generally a small committee that will
approve these exhibitions. And look, sometimes you do take a
bit of a risk, but when you you know, if
things don't turn out, you need to be open about
saying what could we have done differently, what could we

(02:48):
have done better? And if we've had three exhibitions that
have not delivered, we really need to say what are
we not doing right in these things? And we really
we haven't had that conversation or even see the information.

Speaker 1 (03:03):
Diane, Thanks for your time doing covit the Wellington City
councilor on the convention Center and Wellington doing not so well.
But more importantly, the fact that the council thinks they
can just say commercial sensitivity like it's some magic wand
and you don't get to ask any questions about where
the money's going. That's not how it should be working.
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(03:25):
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