What’s Our Plan
We believe the Trusts can do more.
For too long, the Trusts have been slow to adapt. The structure has not kept pace with changing community and market needs, leaving hospitality underdeveloped and community expectations overlooked.
Our focus is simple: fix the structure in order to improve hospitality, and increase community giveback.
The Trusts should deliver two things: more great hospitality and more money back to the community. Right now, both are held back by outdated structures. With bold reform, the Trusts can emerge as a powerful model for West Auckland.
The current structure is costly, slow, and overly complex. It lacks aligned decision-making and isn’t responsive enough to changing community or market sentiments.
We will:
Amalgamate the two trusts to cut duplication, save costs and streamline decision making.
Restructure governance to be faster, clearer, and more accountable
Reduce central overhead costs
Support a referendum to give us a clear mandate going forward.
Fix the Structure
Community giveback enhances every aspect of our community, from arts to sports, children to seniors. But the current process is slow, ad-hoc, relies on political will, and places too much weight on commercial interests.
We will:
Establish a stand-alone community foundation with significant seed capital and a clear process for community give back.
Link Trust profits to an annual foundation contribution formula so locals know that when our businesses do well, the community does too.
Grow the fund into a long-term, permanent, predictable, and transparent source of community support.
Increase community giveback
Revive local Hospitality
Hospitality brings vibrancy to our communities. The current model isn’t built to deliver a variety of hospitality, lacking the nimble framework and strategic thinking needed to use the tavern licence ‘gift’ to positively impact West Auckland’s hospitality scene.
We will:
Overhaul the current hospitality model and create an operating model that can adapt to changing customer needs and market trends.
Think strategically and long-term by partnering with landlords, and local operators to create and grow vibrant hospitality precincts.
Push for legislative changes to remove tavern licence provisions to allow more operators into the area.
Run Retail Responsibly
How we run our retail liquor operations matters, we maintain high standards, grow wisely, balance profit with harm minimisation, and take responsibility for our impact on communities.
We will:
Keep our retail operations running at a high standard, ensuring we meet and exceed financial, regulatory and operational requirements.
Grow wisely by expanding retail sites and the network only when it makes commercial sense, while recognising the risks in high-deprivation areas.
Take responsibility for the impacts of our stores by maintaining the surrounding environment, investing in local crime prevention, and supporting local alcohol harm initiatives.