Govt paid consultants up to $325 per hour on Ihumātao
Advice on land row has cost taxpayer more than $150,000
The Government has shelled out more than $150,000 to consultants to provide advice regarding Auckland’s Ihumātao land dispute, with some being paid up to $325 an hour.
Despite the significant price tag, the public is still none the wiser about what is happening when it comes to the disputed land because the Government has stayed tight-lipped concerning any new developments.
Save Our Unique Landscape (Soul) cofounder Pania Newton said the fee was eyewateringly high and could have been avoided altogether if Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern had personally met with those affected at the Ihumātao site in Mangere, South Auckland.
National Party leader Judith Collins, however, said the Government should never have got involved in the dispute and taxpayers are now “picking up the tab”.
Repeated attempts by the Herald to gain information on the dispute via the Official Information Act ( OIA) have been knocked back.
But recently released records show the department which oversees the spending of the Prime Minister and her Cabinet spent $155,000 on consultants tasked with providing advice about the Ihumātao situation.
Rimu Road Consulting Limited — run by former MBIE (Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment) chief executive David Smol — was paid $86,316 to “provide advice, information/liaison services related to Ihumātao”.
That contract began on October 1 last year and ran until July 31 this year. The documents say the contract “may be extended”.
The maximum hourly rate of the Rimu Road contract is listed at $325 an hour. Hingston Mill Limited, another consultancy firm, was paid $68,174 to provide advisory and liaison services related to Ihumātao — its contract was also from November 1 last year but ran only until late April this year.
Like Rimu Road, Hingston’s contract may be extended.
Despite the money paid to the consultants, Newton said neither she nor anyone else at Soul had been approached by the Government-hired firms.
The Government has yet to make any decisions when it comes to the Ihumātao standoff, which started four years ago over a planned Fletcher Building housing development.
Collins said there has been “deafening silence” from the Government since the start of the saga.
“The decision should have been an easy one for the Prime Minister; she had no right to get involved in this dispute in the first place, National’s leader said.
“Now hard-working taxpayers are picking up the tab.”
A spokesman for Ardern said: “The Government continues to focus on supporting a resolution that respects all parties including the Crown, mana whenua and Fletchers.”
DPMC said the contracted services “provided for liaison between the parties involved and advice to help identify a way forward at Ihumātao”.
The contracts enabled the engagement of specialists at the most senior levels to work with Māori on these complex matters, a spokeswoman said.
In July last year, Ardern said any building work which was scheduled to take place on the land by Fletchers — which purchased the property in 2016 — would be halted until the dispute was resolved.
Groups such as Soul want the land returned to iwi. Since Ardern’s announcement, however, the Government has not revealed what progress — if any — has been made.
An OIA request to the Prime Minister’s office revealed that Fletcher sent a letter to Ardern on May 7, 2019.
However her chief of staff, Raj Nahna, declined to release the letter because it might “prejudice or disadvantage negotiations”.