Shelly Bay: more to come, hints Jackson

Sir Peter Jackson is pushing Wellington City Council to open its books over Shelly Bay while accusing an iwi trust of questionable dealings.

Wellington Mayor Justin Lester said the council had been transparent as it could be. It had capped its Shelly Bay net cost at $2 million, and any extra infrastructure cost would be carried by developers – who could reveal expected costs if they wanted.

A spokeswoman for Jackson said he had ‘‘barely scratched the surface’’ of information he could release and ‘‘will continue to place relevant facts before the Wellington public’’.

Jackson published a lengthy missive against Lester and the council to his Facebook page, which is followed by more than 2 million people, on Saturday. Lester argued that many of Jackson’s facts were incorrect.

Jackson’s office said all information on his Facebook post came from council documents, independent reports and relevant emails. ‘‘This information raises questions that he would encourage Peter Jackson’s office

Justin to answer. He is simply seeking clarity on various issues relating to Shelly Bay.’’

The costs should be publicly released so they could be scrutinised and possibly peer reviewed, he said.

The council has previously said the extent that ratepayers would fund infrastructure to the development was capped at $10m but the net cost to ratepayers would be about $2m after $8m was made by selling or leasing council land at the site.

That was much better value for money for ratepayers than having to pay for necessary upgrades, council documents said.

Development director Earl Hope-Pearson was confident the infrastructure costs would not exceed $20m and the ratepayer component would not go past $10m. Supplying a breakdown of predicted costs was commercially sensitive.

Council chief executive Kevin Lavery confirmed the council’s contribution to the estimated $20m joint infrastructure fund would be capped at $10m.

Jackson’s office said the focus had been on a perceived stoush between him and Lester – who Jackson had no personal dislike of – but there needed to be more focus on the real infrastructure costs and to the sale of parcels of land at Shelly Bay.

Jackson said it looked like the iwi’s land had been sold ‘‘under very dubious circumstances for a fraction of its true value’’.

Jackson was referring to the four parcels of land owned by iwi at Shelly Bay.

When the Port Nicholson Block Settlement Trust (PNBST) went to sell the four parcels as one lot for the development to proceed it became a ‘‘major transaction’’, meaning 75 per cent of Taranaki Whanui members needed to vote in favour of it.

This vote failed but property records show the trust then sold the four parcels separately on the same day.

As separate transactions, they were not seen as ‘‘major’’ and did not need to be voted on.

‘‘This information raises questions that he would encourage Justin to answer.’’