Tim Brown: Wellington Councillor on the council voting down a proposal to fence parts of the waterfront

Wellington councillors have voted against advice to fence parts of the waterfront.

They were considering a proposal to immediately spend $7 million installing fences on the Kumutoto and Queens Wharf precincts - without community consultation.

Councillor Tim Brown says he feels they've spent $8 million dollars improving lighting and other initiatives around the waterfront.

He says he feels they've met their safety responsibly.

"The best thing for us to do in terms of common sense approach was to sit back and have a look at the effect of what we've already done - before we decided we needed to do something additional."

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now common sense has prevailed in Wellington. Today, Wellington City
Council has voted down a plant defence off most of
the waterfront at Queen's Wolf and Komutoto around the tesB area.
Councilor Tim Brown is the chair of the Environment and
Infrastructure Committee. In with us right now, hate Tim good evening.
Why did you vote it down?

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Because I felt that we had met our responsibilities and
respective safety by spending the vicility of eight million dollars
to improve the lighting around the waterfront and a number
of other additiatives, and that the best thing for us
to in terms of, as you said, common sense approach,
was to sit back and have a look at the

(00:40):
effective of what we've already done before we do what,
before we decide if we'd need to do something additional.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Yeah, see if the lights work. Basically, what did you
make of the fact that the officials wanted you guys
to rush this through without talking to the public first.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
I think they were taking a very very through, very
risk averse approach, you know, which is reasonable because I
mean public servants are both local and central, are not
paid to take risks, and so they were taking a
very very low risk approach, which of course would mollycoddle
us to the maximum possible extent. And that's the road

(01:19):
cone problem that we all constantly encounter. So I mean,
it was perfectly reasonable for them to actually do that,
but I think that's where we had to apply a
slightly different lens.

Speaker 1 (01:29):
So do you think that, I mean, are you of
the view that there is a balance to be struck
here between Yeah, a reasonable amount of safety but also
personal responsibility.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
Not necessarily, I didn't really look at the personal responsibility thing.
I don't think that's a contributing factor to the thinking
I think it is. It is very much a case
of saying we've spent, as I say, about eight million
dollars improving the safety of the waterfront. Let's see if
what the effect of that is. I mean we're not
we don't really, we're not taking into account why people

(02:01):
fall into the sea. You know. It's but if they
still continue to fall into this c even if we've
now lit the place very well, then a obviously have
to do something differently. Oh okay, So I mean it's
not just and it's not just about lighting. I mean
we've also got things like CCTV. So if we if
we see behavior that is reckless or risky, we're not
going to say, oh my goodness, these people are being reckless.

(02:23):
Therefore that's a tough luck. We're still going to be
very concerned about anybody who might end up in dangering themselves.

Speaker 1 (02:29):
Tim, it's good to talk to you. Thank you, Tim Brown,
Wellington City councilor for more from Hither Douplassy Allen Drive,
listen live to news talks it'd be from four pm weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.