Talking of Polls

A reader e-mailed me about a North Shore poll which is on the Shore Can website.

Now the poll doesn’t say who conducted it, so I presume it was done internally.  Now generally I am very sceptical of any publicly released poll conducted by the organisation it is done for (as its publication may be designed to become a sell fulfilling prophecy) but in this case none of the questions are about the Shore Can ticket, so I wil put aside my scepticism to note some interesting results:

• 43% say they will re-elect George Wood as Mayor with the next contender being down at 7%
• 54% support one super Council for Auckland, with a gender splt of 45% amongst women and 63% amongst men
• 67% think rate increases have been excessive
• 68% would support a toll on another harbour crossing
• Only 27% think Council debt is under control
• 75% support a inflation and population adjusted cap on rates
• 86% support there being a referendum on any significant rates increase

Personally I like the idea of ratepayers having to approve any increase in rates above inflation and population.