High-calibre race for the Christchurch mayoralty

It’s the seasoned administrator versus the action man. Christchurch faces the energising spectacle of a head-to-head mayoralty battle between two immensely likeable and widely respected candidates.

Political philosophies aside, David Meates and Phil Mauger have both cultivated solid reputations as big-hearted, community-minded leaders.

Mauger has served his apprenticeship as a councillor, he can tout his business smarts and restless pragmatism. His weekend announcement on promising to create a roaming fix-it street crew personifies the man.

Notwithstanding his fraught financial wrangling with Wellington and the ongoing failure to deliver a hospital car park building, Meates was hugely instrumental in masterfully crafting Canterbury’s leading-edge integrated healthcare system, and adeptly leading through extreme adversity.

They both enjoy strong credentials as changemakers and passionate civic champions. The fact that Christchurch’s next mayor will most likely be one of these two high-calibre candidates is a very welcome prospect. (Unless a bombshell late entrant radically rewrites the narrative.)

Whoever ultimately takes out the race, Christchurch will have a capable, credible, wellintentioned captain skippering the good ship. Three months out from election day, this is surely the best quality, head-to head mayoral contest Christchurch has seen in decades.

Yes, Jim Anderton’s duel with Sir Bob Parker in 2010 was the last great tantaliser, until seismic intervention threw the incumbent an invincible political lifeline.

But prior to that, if you had to nominate a truly epic two-horse race for the mayoral chains, you might have to reach right back to 1974, when the great Sir Hamish Hay dethroned Neville Pickering in a squeaker.

Garry Moore’s 1998 election win was a close affair too, taking office with just 31% support, due to Morgan Fahy, Margaret Murray and Gordon Freeman cluelessly splitting the lion’s share of the vote.

But with just 10 weeks to go before postal voting papers arrive in your letterbox, Mauger has been running the long marathon, while Meates will have to race a rather steep sprint. The clock is indeed ticking and Meates has only given himself a short window of time to reintroduce himself to Christchurch as a mayoral candidate, after jetting back home from Britain.

The fact that the opening salvos to his mayoral campaign have been discharged via carefully curated press releases, without making himself available to take questions direct from the press or the public, from the word go, looked estranged, incredibly cautious and over-managed. Optics matter.

I can fully appreciate that if you are going to launch your campaign from the other side of the world, a press release is probably the safest bet – although a Zoom launch would have been very en vogue.

But the decision to then pump out a highly pasteurised press release to outline Meates’ stance on the stadium – once again without answering questions from the media – looked even more guarded and orchestrated. It is no secret that his campaign secretary is constantly on social media railing against the stadium like a fanatical activist.

Given his coterie of advisors, Meates needs to quickly demonstrate he’s his own man with his own views and his own voice – and not beholden to anyone’s ideological barrows. Are they campaign advisors or organ-grinders?

Meates needs to quickly demonstrate he’s his own man with his own views and his own voice ...

Ibelieve he’s made a misstep in calling for a pause on the stadium project at this point. With just a few left hours left before consultation ends, and with submissions at 25,000, surely Meates would have been better placed to hold his horses and simply affirm that he respects the right of the public to express their views first – and he reserves judgment.

I am confident that the epic turnout to this consultation process will result in an emphatic show of support for proceeding with the project, commanding 60-70% of the submissions, despite the estimated $150m cost increase. However, if I’ve badly misread the public mood and majority support wants to scrap or pause the already delay-plagued anchor project, the council will be obliged to honour that.

Given the opposing positions of Meates and Mauger, the submissions result will now inadvertently double as our first true taste of voter sentiment, ahead of the campaign proper. What a fascinating barometer that will be on the Christchurch zeitgeist.

Expect the big reveal later this week.