It’s a thankless job, charged with wrangling a disparate group of councillors and a large and unwieldy organisation. The incumbent can’t decide if he still wants it, but there’s a growing list of candidates ready to take his place. 

While Aucklanders may only just be returning from sunning themselves on the beach, the race to become the city’s next mayor is already heating up. 

Over the last week, speculation has begun to swirl about who will run, and a number of candidates have already declared their candidacy, including current South Auckland councillor Fa’anana Efeso Collins and Auckland restaurateur Leo Molloy, while Richard Hills and Viv Beck are already considered strong contenders despite not confirming their intentions. 

So who is running, who’s still unsure and who’s definitely ruling themselves out, despite the rumours?

But first, what’s the incumbent up to?

As Phil Goff’s second term has got closer and closer to its end, the general consensus has been this will be his last year in politics, with suggestions he could become New Zealand’s next US ambassador.

Goff admits he’s still considering another term but the rumours of a diplomatic posting aren’t founded in reality. 

“I’m not going to Washington,” he says. “That has been a rumour that has developed its own momentum – but it doesn’t have substance. If I run, I’ll be running on my merits and I won’t be talking about my opponents, and if I don’t run, I won’t be setting out to denigrate particular people. I’ve got to think about it. I’ve done 40 years in politics, so as my wife says, do I ever want a life?” 

Despite recent stories suggesting he’s about to endorse Richard Hills, Goff says while the North Shore councillor is someone he’s got “a lot of time for”, he won’t be making any official endorsement,

“The electorate makes their decision and they don’t need to be told by the existing mayor who the future mayor might need to be.”

The declared

Fa’anana Efeso Collins

As outlined in Toby Manhire’s piece, Collins, a Labour politician and Manukau ward councilllor, announced this week he will seek the mayoralty with or without an endorsement from his own political party. 

He says his campaign and mayoralty will be rooted in “the politics of listening” and he hopes he can be “a mayor for all”, with a particular focus on making housing more affordable and public transport free.

“We’ve got to put Auckland first,” which he says starts by having a “courageous conversation” with voters about what it’s going to take to improve the city’s infrastructure.

“I think Aucklanders are up for it.”

Leo Molloy

Molloy is another high-profile candidate, who frequently makes headlines for his business successes and quickness with a cheeky quip – or a spray of vicious invective if someone’s crossed him.

“I’ve got that Irish thing, I can talk shit,” as he told The Spinoff in a 2019 profile. 

He was most recently in the news for driving a campaign to reopen the hospitality industry by December 1. The Headquarters restaurant owner says the election is like a marathon and by declaring early he feels he’s got a jump on his opponents. 

“We’re 5km into the race, while the rest of them are on their fat arses, scratching their whatever on holiday.”

He sees his main rivals as being Richard Hills and Viv Beck, but then questions their worthiness, saying “are they really opponents? It’s like two poodles versus a lion.”

Molloy has also come up with nicknames for the “poodles”, dubbing Hills as “little Phil” because, as he sees it, he’s Phil Goff’s “little run-around boy”. For Beck, he’s given her the moniker “Vanilla Viv”, questioning her effectiveness as Heart of the City chief executive. 

“She hasn’t stood up for the CBD during the evisceration of Queen Street, Albert Street and Pitt Street. The town has been shredded and she’s done nothing.”

When it comes to Collins, he’s far more effusive, saying he would consider offering him the deputy mayoralty if he was to win the main job. 

“I think he should have been given the opportunity to run on the Labour ticket and it’s a disgrace that they chose to ignore the southside of town.” 

Molloy says voters shouldn’t see his campaign as CBD-focused. “I can guarantee one thing. When I finish up in nine years’ time after three terms, this will be a lot better city.”

Craig Lord

Returning mayoral candidate Craig Lord came third in 2019 and he expects to exceed the 30,000 votes he got last time, given his name recognition has increased.

“People know me this time around,” the former engineer and media consultant says. “I’ve been able to establish myself much more in the digital world and that’s why I’ll have a much better go at it.”

He says he’ll be running a policy-free campaign “because a mayor is only one of 21 votes” – a reference to the 20 councillors elected alongside the mayor – but he does have goals for the city, which include getting council to focus on delivering core services and to cut spending on things like public art, “million-dollar footpaths” and contractors. 

He describes his campaign as being “focused on necessities over niceties”.

Jake Law

While Jake Law might be a newcomer to politics, you could say local government is in his blood, given he’s the grandson of former Rodney District mayor John Law. Law returned to New Zealand last September, after teaching at a private school in Shanghai for three years. He says after seeing how the council was dealing with issues like housing, public transport and climate change he was inspired to “go for it”. He will be running for both mayor and to be a councillor in the Albany ward, where he lives. 

“We need more young people and more future-focused voices on council,” says the 28-year-old. 

“We’ve had a lack of future planning on council, since the dawn of time basically and the creation of the supercity, and so we really need some youth and future-focused candidates.”

Ted Johnston

Another South Aucklander who has thrown his hat in the ring is lawyer Ted Johnston, who is promising to “clean up council, sort out the incompetence and failures of the current mayor and council”. 

He ran for mayor as an independent in 2019 with just $100 for marketing – check out his hoardings – and garnered 15,000 votes. But he’s now the co-leader of the New Conservative Party and is hoping with their backing he’ll be elected to be the “strong, competent and caring leader” Auckland needs. 

The potential contenders

Richard Hills

Of those who are yet to declare, Richard Hills is the most prominent. The two-term councillor says he is “just waiting for that call” from Goff, before deciding his next move. 

“It’s a really, really important, significant role for the city and over the past year I’ve had lots of people approach me, and had a lot of discussions about it – in the event Phil doesn’t stand.” 

He says if he was to run, his mayoralty would be focused on climate change and “delivering to communities right across the city”.

“At this stage my focus is just on serving the North Shore, leading the committee work and driving the recovery from Covid.” 

Viv Beck

Beck is another name that has been repeatedly linked to a run under the centre-right Communities and Residents ticket. But the Heart of the City chief executive says she’s still not ready to go public with her decision.  

“I’m definitely considering it but there are a range of things [to consider],” she says. “I’m still committed to my current role and obviously it’s a big decision. I’m not far away, but I’m not there yet.”

She says it would be an “absolute privilege” to run and her leadership would be “inclusive, cares about different views and then makes clear decisions once those views have been made”. 

And Molloy’s cheeky criticism isn’t off-putting in any way. 

“I think ultimately it comes down to what are the skills for the job, but people are entitled to their opinions, so it certainly doesn’t put me off.”

Rumoured but not interested

Paula Bennett

Rumours have abounded about whether the retired MP would enter the race, given her high profile and deep political experience as a minister in National-led governments. 

Bennett provided a curt but polite email: “I am not running and don’t have an opinion on who will be running.”

Maurice Williamson

Another former National minister with lengthy experience, Williamson responded with a phone call after I reached out over Twitter. 

“I got your tweet,” he started before launching into a colourful description of why he’s ruling out the mayoralty under any circumstances. 

“If I was to win the mayoralty, look for my name in the obituaries the next day, because my wife would kill me.”

However, he’s giving serious thought to running to be a councillor for the Howick ward, if the centre right was able to stand a number of strong candidates across the city.  

“Part of the decision-making process is what is the configuration of candidates elsewhere as I would have a damn good chance of winning here, given my name recognition.”

Whoever is to win, Goff says they better be prepared for the relentless 12-15 hour days, and dealing with opponents who are happy to vote for “every spending decision but are against every revenue-raising one”.

“If we’re going to make this city better for our kids and our grandkids it’s about leaving a legacy behind, and the frustrating thing is that there’s always a small group that never thinks about the future.”

But given future challenges like climate change have already started to make an impact, it will soon be in the voters’ hands to decide who will guide us through it. 

An introduction to the hair-raising and peculiarly edible concepts and characters in the scandal that could spell the end of the British PM, as commentated by Toby Manhire.

No one does political scandal quite like the British. The latest to engulf Westminster and leave Boris Johnson hanging by a zip-wire is at once sprawling and perilously simple: a series of parties held at Downing Street as the country was shackled in the most restrictive of lockdowns. The charge of hypocrisy is routine in all politics, but this was  no quotidian example of an elected representative getting stuff ordinary people can’t. The sacrifices of the past couple of years have left permanent personal and emotional scars: the indelible memories of families divided, funerals unattended, childbirth missed. 

Johnson’s excuses have swung from they were work events to I didn’t know they were happening to, most audaciously of all, I didn’t know what the rules that I made were. The most consistent refrain in the last few weeks, however, from the PM and his ministers, has been: we can’t say anything about it until we get the Sue Gray report. That report, from the formidable civil servant, is expected any moment (update, February 1: Gray’s report was finally published this morning)

The clangingly obvious lesson for leaders the world over, of course, is that if you’re going to oversee new rules that impose near unimaginable curbs on liberties, you’d better be damned sure to adhere to those rules yourself. What I’m trying to say is that Jacinda Ardern and Clarke Gayford should definitely not relocate their wedding to the Downing Street backyard. But in the meantime, here’s a crib sheet: a glossary of the crucial “partygate” component parts.

Critical concepts

Partygate 

The gate suffix has been cruelly rinsed of its power over the years by getting tacked on to the most trifling of skirmishes, but it earns its place here. At least 15, ahem, gatherings, within the offices of the PM and in the garden out the back, have been reported by the media, with varyingly outrageous and humiliating attendant detail, including a staff member breaking a child’s swing used by Johnson’s son, leaked photographs of what looked indubitably to be, well, parties, and video footage from December 2020 of a press secretary laughing while practising a response to hypothetical media questions about a No 10 Christmas party.

Probably the most conspicuous date: April 16 last year, when, according to reports, two leaving drinks events were held for departing staffers. A suitcase of booze was brought into the place by one person attending. There was a DJ. At the time, the country remained in lockdown with indoor gatherings forbidden. And in a painful bit of timing, the very next day the Queen would sit alone at Prince Philip’s funeral. 

Operation Save Big Dog

The name of the strategy, according to the Independent, to protect Boris Johnson by sacrificing various senior staff members and highlighting the prime minister’s achievements, such as “he got Brexit done”. The name was the brainchild, suggested the report, of Mr Dog himself. 

Operation Red Meat

A separate effort to alleviate pressure mounted by Downing Street was a government “policy blitz”, according to media reports. Not to be confused with the similar dead cat strategy, in which a major distraction is dropped like a dead cat on a dinner table, the red meat operation is designed to feed a Conservative backbench and voter base that had become increasingly emaciated after chewing too long on the deeply unnourishing partygate. The hope was that by loudly cracking down on terrible things like would-be migrants and the BBC, Boris’s aides might – thank you, Daily Mail – “save his bacon”.

The Pork Pie Plot

Big dog. Red meat. Bacon. And – I’m not making this up – pork pie. That’s the name reportedly given to a would-be coup being plotted by a group of around 20 Tory MPs who have worked for leadership change. The name is not, sadly, because the insurgents sat around wearing pork pie hats, but because the purported host of the meeting, Alicia Kearns, is MP for Rutland & Melton, birthplace of the famous Melton Mowbray pork pie. 

The Cake Ambush

According to a loyal Johnson minister, the latest reports of a birthday party for Johnson in Downing Street in June 2020 had been overblown. The PM’s wife and a group of officials had taken him unawares by belting out ‘Happy Birthday’ and plonking a cake (iced with a union jack flag, naturally) before him. “As far as I can see, he was, in a sense, ambushed with a cake,” said Conor Burns.

Dramatis personae

Boris Johnson

Mr B Dog. A lover of the classics, a lover of great historical leaders, a lover of Peppa Pig World, Johnson swept to power as the most prominent champion of Brexit, which he probably didn’t believe in, and now faces the prospect of being booted from the office he so coveted because of parties he probably didn’t want to attend. 

Johnson told parliament he was “heartily, heartily sorry for misjudgements that have been made in No 10” yet his excuses and apologies for the firehose of revelations have bounded around like, let’s say, a big dog, and by commissioning an inquiry he created a kind of sub judice way to avoid answering the endless questions, a safe word in the form of …

Sue Gray

A deeply serious senior civil servant in the Cabinet Office, Gray was once described by the BBC as “the most powerful person you’ve never heard of”. Everyone has heard of her now. Gray was tasked a fortnight ago with investigating from the Cabinet Office the myriad reports of lockdown-breaching No 10 parties. Regarded as uncompromising and incorruptible, Gray’s previous probes have seen a number of ministers lose their warrants, though this is another level, and Johnson is, after all, her boss. 

The report – based on a study of correspondence and interviews with everyone including Johnson and Dominic Cummings – is expected to land on the prime minister’s desk at any moment, and he’ll reportedly have a couple of hours to ruminate on the findings before releasing it, presumably with redactions. Any chance of it being a damp squib or a whitewash were made all the more unlikely by the news overnight from …

Cressida Dick

The most senior police officer in the country, Met commissioner Cressida Dick (whoever comes up with the character names for the soap opera of The British Establishment deserves a pay rise), announced yesterday that a police investigation had been launched into “potential breaches of Covid-19 regulations” at No 10 and Whitehall. That investigation was prompted by and will draw upon evidence unearthed by Gray’s inquiry, she said. Among those who gave evidence to to Gray is … 

Dominic Cummings

Behold, a personality stranger and more compelling than anything fiction could conjure – though if fiction were responsible, Cummings would unquestionably be played by a computer animated Andy Serkis. Cummings first came to prominence as mastermind of the Vote Leave campaign for Brexit, later becoming Johnson’s chief adviser, a self-styled iconoclast Svengali. That all went skew-whiff when he was found to have driven across large parts of the country and taken a lovely visit to Barnard Castle in apparent breach of the stringent March 2020 lockdown. 

Cummings survived that episode, but departed Downing Street in November 2020, and it wasn’t long before he became a thorn – a Shard-sized thorn – in the belly of Boris. Through every available medium, from blog post or tweet to select committee appearance or media briefing – Cummings seems to have become set upon vengeance with a dedication that would make Iago blush. His most recent contribution was to say that he insisted on providing written answers to Gray, so that Johnson couldn’t lie about what was said.

Christian Wakeford

The backbench Tory MP who defected to the Labour Party, humiliating Johnson in the minutes before he faced parliament for Prime Minister’s Questions. We’ll probably never hear of Wakeford again, however, unlike …

David Davis

A big beast of the Conservative Party, a former Brexit secretary and a man who came close himself once to being leader. He popped up from the backbench in PMQs on that same today, skewering his leader with the sort of thing that would in normal times make Johnson salivate: a political-historical quotation. “I expect my leaders to shoulder the responsibility for the actions they take,” said Davis. “So I will remind him of a quotation altogether too familiar to him, of Leo Amery to Neville Chamberlain: ‘You have sat there too long for all the good you have done, in the name of God, go!’”

The actions of Wakeford and Davis lifted the likelihood that we might hear from someone critical to Johnson’s fate, called …

Graham Brady

As chair of the “1922 committee” of Tory backbenchers, Sir Graham Brady is the man to whom MPs demanding a change in leadership are required to secretly write. Once he receives no-confidence letters from 15% of Conservative parliamentarians (in the current equation, 54 of them), Brady will announce a vote. Should more than half of all MPs want him gone, he’s gone; but if he survives, he wins an immunity from leadership challenge for a year. No booster shots are available. 

Timing is therefore of the essence. If the Gray report is damning, it’s highly likely the needle will tick over 54. With polls suggesting as many as two out of three voters want him gone, it doesn’t look sunny. For Boris and the machine, the big dog days are over.

Follow The Spinoff’s politics podcast Gone By Lunchtime on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite podcast provider.