Former Wellington Mayor Justin Lester causes a stir ahead of local body elections - A Capital Letter

THREE KEY FACTS

Former Wellington mayor Justin Lester says while he doesn’t intend to run for the city’s top job again, Labour has approached him about his potential candidacy and he’d “never say never”.

Lester has caused a stir by refusing to rule out a comeback ahead of local body elections in October.

That agitation has been heightened by his launching of a new social media Facebook page called Wellington Alive to celebrate the good things happening in the city.

“Our beloved capital has had a rough run lately and sometimes local media hasn’t been all that kind to us,” Lester posted online about the new page.

A heavyweight candidate is yet to enter the mayoral race against incumbent Tory Whanau.

For as long as this is the case, moves like Lester’s will be scrutinised for any inklings of a soft launch for the mayoralty.

Asked by Newstalk ZB’s Wellington Mornings host Nick Mills whether anything should be read into the new social media page, Lester said: “There’s nothing more to it than a community move and engaging Wellingtonians.”

Lester said he had zero intention of running for the mayoralty.

However, when pressed, Lester said he’d never say never.

He said he is also conscious about spending time with his two daughters as they grow up.

“If Wellington got to a state where things were so bad and there were no good candidates, and my family came to me and said: ‘Well, Dad, look, we really want you to do something’, I might do it, consider it, but that is not my plan.”

Wellington’s rumour mill reliably goes into overdrive about potential mayoral candidates at the beginning of each local body election year.

There is arguably more at stake in this election after the Government appointed a Crown observer at Wellington City Council.

Whanau has had a rocky first term.

She admitted she upset her Green base by championing major policies she did not campaign on, including supporting a controversial deal to reopen the eyesore Reading Cinemas building and selling the council’s stake in the airport.

After admitting to having a drinking problem at the end of 2023, her personal life continued to make headlines last year.

Whanau’s office issued a press release earlier this month outlining her priorities for the year with the usual lines about investing a record $1.8 billion in water infrastructure and upgrading the council’s social housing stock.

Notably, she also described Wellington as a “leader in the protection of nature and climate action” and talked about reducing emissions from landfill and decarbonising the swimming pool network.

Removing private vehicles from the Golden Mile and “revitalising” it will be Whanau’s legacy project if she can get spades in the ground this year and protect it from any change in leadership should her re-election bid be unsuccessful.

Whanau has always maintained she wants another term as mayor, although she appeared to waver in that thought in November last year and said she’d be having conversations with family and friends when the time came.

The council has cooled a bit since Whanau made those comments and she has said the presence of the Crown Observer helped her colleagues work more collaboratively.

Current Wellington City councillor Ray Chung has also confirmed he is running for the mayoralty.

Predator-free champion Kelvin Hastie has also confirmed his candidacy.

It’s not unusual to have a lack of hats in the ring at this stage.

Former Rongotai MP Paul Eagle didn’t announce his bid until June 2022 last time around and Andy Foster waited until August in the 2019 elections.

Wellingtonians are disgruntled with their local leaders after booting Lester out of office after just one term and Foster after him.

Only time will tell whether they do the same to Whanau.

Potential mayoral candidates will surely be thinking long and hard about whether they actually want to do the job given the difficulties at Wellington City Council in recent years.

The council has gained a reputation for infighting, division and dysfunction. Hutt South MP and senior Cabinet minister Chris Bishop called it a “shemozzle” last year.

Just as there is no shortage of politics around the council table, the capital faces no shortage of issues.

Whoever leads the city beyond 2025 will have their work cut out for them.