Wealthy Jaffas to leave the rest of New Zealand behind?

It's a truism that we all fear change and clearly that's the case when it comes to how things will pan out with the incoming Auckland Council that will govern what's become known as the "Super City".

Will the Mayor act like a CEO and have executive powers? Will she/he be able to gain consensus across communities? How will 20 Councillors engage locally? How will local communities be heard? Will the Council Controlled Organisation's run rampant with ratepayer funds? All these and more are the concern of both those wanting to see a step change in Auckland governance and the detractors who tell us the sky is falling in (Henny Penny), or soon will be.

So it was fascinating to hear last night from a panel of six credible individuals - academics, politicians, concerned citizens all - that there is a glimmer of hope that things might just go well.

The Unitec Forum for the Future facilitated by Rod Oram focused on the new City structure and optimal outcomes. A few things stood out for me -notably that this is our moment: The audience heard that leafing back through Hansard shows that politicians have been trying to grapple with the hydra that is Auckland for 80 years or so; finally having tamed the beast we'll now be able to focus on the house, not just the housekeeping of roads, facilities and rubbish collection; The new Mayor will have an international and regional focus as well as local and the new Council will be a catalyst for propelling us into the realms of other world-class cities; If we really want to make it happen we have to balance social, cultural, environmental and economic improvements and take everyone along for the ride.

World-class cities have national importance and contribute to a country's prosperity. Cities do business with other great cities, more so than nations do with each other, and world class cities attract people for jobs, cultural and social reasons. But there was much debate about pitfalls and difficulties ahead, especially around the spatial plan, and how this was critical to get right. Stemming from the Royal Commission's "One Plan" environmental management, the assembled group heard, now offers us a key to economic advantage. We need to embrace the best-in-class vision of being clean, green and smart - a paradigm shift in planning which is a move towards local handling of energy, water and waste, rather than grand schemes.

What was concerning was the contention that Auckland may well surge ahead to GDP levels of 50-75% higher than the rest of New Zealand. We already know that there are only a handful of countries where the most GDP is earned by the biggest city, New Zealand among them. And what of Capital cities and their contribution? Normally they are the major earner for the nation, but not so in our case. Auckland is one of a tiny number of global cities where this is not true, along with Istanbul, Sydney and Zurich. I couldn't help wondering what this was going to do for our Jaffa status. Already poked at by the rest of the country, are we now to be clobbered for creating more wealth? Who knows?

Amidst the grumblings of the disgruntled and those who felt there hadn't been enough consultation, there seemed to be a view that we have to make the best of it, indeed there were positive pleas to give it a go. Consensus and leadership from the Councillors and the Mayor were considered key. We were encouraged to realise the Super City Mayor will need to be a Super Person, but be realistic and understanding that they may well not have every attribute required to pull of the virtually impossible balance required of keeping everybody happy.

For me I left wondering - yet again - why the tall poppy syndrome is so ingrained in our national psyche, and feeling pretty proud of where we've got to as a nation and a city. It's no mean feat to put the past behind us and aspire to have a world-class city in this fantastic nation of ours.

Give it a go I say. Best foot forward and let's back ourselves.