It’s the end of the second day of our judicial review hearing in the High Court in Queenstown, and we have just sent the following update to our members. We are sharing our update here with the wider community online too.

It’s been a long second day in court, but an important one.

In case you missed our message last night, here’s yesterday’s report from Crux which sums up the first day well. This morning, the ODT published their first article about the hearing.

Today, the second day of the hearing, WSG’s legal team continued with detailed submissions to the Court. Julian Miles QC worked through more of the team’s evidence contained in 20 affidavits, and then through some of the key documents before the court. He also reviewed the evidence provided by QAC CEO Colin Keel and QLDC CEO Mike Theelen.

In the afternoon, Bob Hollyman QC continued with a deep-dive into the key legislation and case law which are relevant to the case.  He will continue with the last part of our initial submissions tomorrow morning. 

During the day, Project Pure featured heavily in our submissions. If you missed the recent news about Council’s $2.7 million spend on moving upgrades away from the proposed runway (because of provisions in the lease) you can read it here. Yes, that spend is happening, and we know it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

As well as some of WSG’s core team who will attend all five days of the hearing, a contingent of Upper Clutha residents were in the public gallery to witness the hearing and show their support on day two. We were delighted to see them, and they may even appear in one of our local newspapers sometime soon – watch this space. We are truly grateful for this support.

This is a detailed and complex case involving over 10,000 pages of evidence. The amount of work undertaken by our legal team has been immense. We’ve been thoroughly impressed by the way the QCs have stepped through the complex details as the first two days have unfolded, and we’re eager to hear what QLDC’s and QAC’s legal teams have to say in reply as the hearing unfolds.

We expect that our team will wrap up their initial submissions tomorrow morning, and we’ll hear first from QLDC’s legal counsel and then from QAC’s team either later tomorrow or on Thursday.

We will of course keep you updated.

Thank you as ever for your support, and especially all of the emails we’ve been receiving.

Ngā mihi

Mark Sinclair, Deputy Chair
And the team at
Wānaka Stakeholders Group Inc.