David Benson-Pope is standing in the Octagon, just as he has on thousands of other occasions.
He’s being interviewed about major changes to the central Dunedin landmark. Wearing a white shirt, natty yellow-and-black tartan tie, and a dark trench coat to ward off the chilly breeze, he emphasises "how nice the Octagon is starting to look".
"We’re concentrating on making areas that people are going to enjoy and be able to use and that the city’s going to promote quite actively — music and theatre and so on. We want to create more usable spaces in the lower half as well."
This could easily be another example of Benson-Pope’s tireless advocacy for the city’s streetscapes, but those comments are actually from February 1989. Benson-Pope, nearing the end of his first term on an earlier iteration of the Dunedin City Council and as the chairperson of the Octagon Promotion Committee, was about to turn 39, and was explaining why the Star Fountain had to be shifted.
The 25-second interview was recorded for regional news show The South Tonight, old episodes of which are now archived on YouTube.
"Good God," the older and wiser Benson-Pope exclaims on being shown the clip of his younger self going into bat for Dunedin’s urban landscape. We’re waiting for the coffee to brew in the councillors’ temporary lounge above the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, their home while refurbishment of the Municipal Chambers continues.
"I do remember that. At that time, I got the job of trying to promote the Octagon, but simultaneously we were doing all the first set of works in George St, with the brick paving, for the same reason as just more recently — namely, the replacement of underground services.
After 25 years as a city councillor, Benson-Pope is very much part of the landscape of the city he loves. Politics runs deep, with nine years also spent in Parliament and in various ministerial roles in the Helen Clark Labour government.
He is also now something of a curiosity — the only remaining link on the city council to the days before the major 1989 restructuring of local government.
There have been plenty of highlights and lowlights over the decades, he says. He has quite a catalogue of both to share but does not want to get into the controversies in his later years in Parliament.
So, what advice would he give his earlier self, just embarking on a long career in the public eye?
"Rely on your principles."
His first election to the DCC was in October 1986 on a Labour Party ticket. He talks fondly of support from councillor colleagues Terry Scott, Josie Jones and Louise Rosson.
"We got a lot more done than four individuals could have. The fact there were four of us in a council of 12 meant you didn’t need too many fellow travellers — and there were always a couple who’d go with us, like Jean McLean or Brian Arnold. So, we had a practical majority on a lot of things.
"Brian was a lovely man. The normal lounge we’d be sitting in, instead of this one, over there is named for him."
Benson-Pope’s health has not been the best in recent years, with several bouts of Covid-19 and time in hospital. As well as that, seeing so many councillor friends and adversaries come and go was the impetus for his decision to retire.
"Richard Walls is dead, Dave Cull’s dead. That actually helped me decide to call it a day.
"That’ll do, I think."
Back in 1986, Benson-Pope went from being teacher to being taught. He left behind German, French, classics and outdoor education at Bayfield High School for his seat on the council and found himself under the watchful gaze of mayor Clifford Skeggs.
"I always got on well with most of the Tories, because they’re straight up. So, a big shout-out to Cliff. It’s sad that he’s passed, but he had an amazing life.
"Cliff sort of took me under his wing, and I was a pretty bolshie young 36-year-old who knew everything. We often clashed, but that didn’t bother him. He was always straight up, and if the knife was coming out you could see it."
There was a kind of inevitability the young Benson-Pope would gravitate towards politics. He had been active in student politics, as president of the Student Teachers’ Association of New Zealand and president of the Christchurch Teachers’ College (Secondary Division) Students’ Association.
"When election time in ’86 came around, and people started calling for nominations and talking about tickets and teams, which we did run then, I thought ‘why not?’. I’m really glad I did — I polled really well."
The city council expanded to 21 members after the 1989 local body reorganisation. There was an intention it might gradually reduce back to 12, but it has never had fewer than 15 councillors since, he says.
"It’s got to an equilibrium, because it’s a big city when you go all the way to Middlemarch. But I think it’s still a bit big.
"The increase to 21 led to lots of logistical problems. I was on a transition committee with Cliff and a couple of others, and there were two or three councillors from all the authorities to work out how it was all going to be done.
City architect Robert Tongue masterminded that work and was a force to be reckoned with, he says.
"You’d see him standing in the Octagon with a fag, looking around the place. Robert put in really long hours, working late into the night. One of my highlights of all those years was attending an urban design conference in Melbourne with Robert, which led to my enthusiasm, I guess, about urban design matters."
Benson-Pope also had a lot of respect for former city planner Bruce Duder, who was a key player in the Octagon redesign.
He highlights the work of city council planner and project director Glen Hazelton, who oversaw the recent George St redevelopment. This is the scheme he considers "the thing I’m most pleased with" out of all the DCC achievements he says he is proud of, in spite of "pushback by some reactionaries".
"We managed to hold the line on George St. Not only doing it, but having such high-quality design and finishes, doing it jointly with mana whenua, and successfully slowing the street down despite opposition."
He is also thrilled the council decided to develop the art gallery in the Octagon, in the face of strong opposition from some councillors, and proud of the DCC’s purchase of the Dunedin Railway Station building in 1991 and spending millions to restore it and the surrounding land.
Bringing the Second-Generation Dunedin City District Plan (2GP) to life was also "a real high point", working alongside former mayor Aaron Hawkins, former city councillor Jinty MacTavish and Otago regional councillor Kate Wilson.
"It took nearly three years of our lives, and it’s actually now almost completely operative. There were lots of zoning decisions to be made, lots of decisions to meet urban development rules and future development plans and government requirements about housing capacity. Lots of work needed to be done to make sure that wherever we approved further housing development that we could service it to keep the cost down as much as possible and prevent urban sprawl.
"One of the things you probably notice just looking around suburban Dunedin is the number of two-storey apartments and duplexes that have gone up — always on the main arterial transport routes. Logically, that’s where you put them, and those areas are zoned for higher intensity for that reason.
"The 2GP was a monstrous job, but I think we’ve got a really good outcome, and we’re sort of future-proofed and way ahead of some of the ideas the government’s coming up with now. Wouldn’t you want to help people get nicer, warmer, drier housing, instead of shitty old bungalows?"
Benson-Pope also reels off saving the Crown Clothing, heritage preservation work in Vogel St and Bond St, and encouraging development around the harbour.
"People love that interface with the water. The two cycleways with shared paths on both sides is a wonderful development, and I’m on record saying I think that is the most significant development of recent years in the city."
He sips his coffee.
"I sometimes think I’m a frustrated urban designer."
After 13 years as a city councillor, Benson-Pope was ready for a change. Dunedin South incumbent MP Michael Cullen’s imminent move to Hawke’s Bay provided the spark.
"A natural progression I guess, and I’d grown up and lived in the electorate, and it was half of Dunedin then. When Michael Cullen shifted to the list, a door opened."
Easily retaining the seat for Labour, he was off to Wellington as a shiny new MP.
"I still have this amazing recollection of walking down Molesworth St the first day I was going to Parliament after the election, and thinking, ‘how could I possibly have an office in there?’.
"That was very emotional, a very moving sort of moment."
Lessons from being a city councillor were extremely useful background for the way Parliament operates.
"It’s about working with groups of people. You can be effective as an individual but nowhere near as effective as if you’ve got support and a group. In Parliament, I had the remarkable experience of being a whip within my second year and having three terms in government, which is really unusual. I just lucked-in big time."
Working in the Whips’ Office was a "truly enlightening experience".
"When you get given the keys to the whips’ safe, which has been emptied, your predecessor always says this is going to teach you the very best and the very worst of your colleagues. And that’s true. You find out some amazing things that people are doing and you also have to sort issues, and I won’t get into the detail of any of that."
Being minister for the environment played to his strengths and was one of the two big portfolios he held.
"The other was social development, which was the biggest spend, including Winston’s Gold Card, which came out of my budget. They were great portfolios, as was the fisheries one, my first one, which I took over from Pete Hodgson."
He enjoyed being a minister "hugely" and says it is difficult to compare that side of work with the immediacy and intimacy of being a local councillor.
"It’s certainly true that working in a city is much more immediate than what happens out of Wellington. The old saying is, you know you’re going to hear about it if the water stops coming out of the taps.
"I recall one day there was a flood on the peninsula. The rain was pouring off and running down into the harbour. There was a huge torrent running down Highcliff Rd back this way a bit from the Soldiers’ Memorial. And there was an elderly guy trying to stop it going into his garage. So, I went and got a shovel and came back and helped divert it.
"That’s an example of how opportunities present themselves to support local people to a greater extent than is the case with being in Wellington."
Benson-Pope was not re-selected as the Dunedin South candidate for the 2008 election. Allegations had been made against him of misconduct, but these were dismissed by the State Services Commission, which said neither he nor his staff had acted inappropriately.
Then, after five years working as a qualified Resource Management Act commissioner hearing resource consent applications, mostly for the DCC, he was again elected as a city councillor in 2013.
He considers the importance of having good relationships with people and being well prepared were the qualities he brought back to the council from Parliament.
"Things like that reinforce the need to do the yards."
Benson-Pope is unequivocal he doesn’t want to "s***-bag individuals". But he says local-body politics has changed.
"It’s got extremely nasty. That’s one of the things that helped me decide to call it a day. There are lots of dimensions to the current council that make it not especially pleasant.
"On this council, for example, I wouldn’t have survived this long if I hadn’t had people [here] like Christine Garey, Steve Walker and Marie Laufiso. There might only be four of us, but it’s a big challenge because there’s 15 around the council table.
"They’re the people I rely on most for their feedback and criticism and advice. And there are a few other people who sometimes agree with us. I’m saying this because unless you’ve got support and people to use as a sounding board or to tell you when an idea is a really bad idea, you can’t be as effective as you otherwise might be."
Benson-Pope has always been annoyed by "out and out Tories" on the council who don’t want to be seen as aligned with the National Party.
"It’s more honest to say if you’ve got political views and state them. And then it’s like, ‘So? Big deal.’ But it’s being honest — more honest than these groups that set themselves up as independents to support each other getting elected but then they all disappear into the wilderness."
He is optimistic about the new Dunedin hospital being built but critical of mayor Jules Radich’s role in the fight.
"Everyone knows my view of the mayor and his repeated apologism for his political friends, but it was hard to get him to agree to a campaign, let alone a march, which was so successful.
"I’m pissed off with the Labour Party cuts and equally pissed off with the lack of movement since the election, because the hospital is seriously deteriorating. I’ve just been in there a couple of times recently and there’s paint peeling off the walls for God’s sake. But there’s some great gear and some wonderful staff. I’ve experienced the quality of care available in Dunedin Hospital and those staff deserve much better than they’re getting at the moment.
"The other big frustration about the hospital campaign was the lack of solidarity from other mayors in the region. The Central [Otago] people were incredibly self-focused and they said, ‘we can’t support your hospital in Dunedin because we want one’.
"In many ways, the hospital campaign turned into a New Zealand-wide campaign about inadequate health funding. And that certainly has got a long way to run, because we read on a daily basis of horrible bloody failures that are just not good enough."
He has been frustrated with the views and behaviour of some of his councillor colleagues in the most recent term.
"There’s an astonishing level of climate-change denial and what goes with it from some, and then there’s the white-anting of council decisions. There’s always things we don’t agree with, but to actively try to undermine decisions is behaviour that’s new. That’s not something I’ve ever seen before on this council.
"I won’t mention names, but we did have a long debate about the future of the one-ways and the council position to two-way both streets. And the losing councillors then wrote a letter to the minister disagreeing with the council decision. I mean, what?
"The associated problem is the constant revisiting of a lost argument. The number of times we’ve heard people arguing about cycleways — it’s just so tedious and so counter-productive."
One of his biggest disappointments as a city councillor was the impact of Covid-19 on the proposed Dunedin waterfront development.
"A lot of us had worked for years on that with various groups. It was all lined up and we had the government money. Land had been gifted by Port Otago for the university’s water research centre and earmarked for an apartment hotel. But foreign developers ain’t going to build hotels when the borders are shut, when Covid is running wild everywhere.
"Most of this was all designed. But we had to say ‘thanks but no thanks’. Something will come back — I’m sure waterfront development of some kind will have its day, but whether it will be the van Brandenburg version, I don’t know."
Other disappointments include the loss of heritage buildings over the years and "the old demolition by neglect". He cites the bulldozing of the Century Theatre and the Stock Exchange, which he says sharpened the council’s focus on heritage preservation.
Former Heritage New Zealand regional officer Lois Galer, who worked closely with Benson-Pope during the ’80s and ’90s, says "when the chips were down and demolition was advocated" he was always one of the first councillors to call for a building’s retention.
"An example was the Municipal Chambers and a long-fought battle with then mayor Cliff Skeggs, who initially wanted it demolished."
Garey and Walker say Benson-Pope has been a strong mentor.
"His advice and mentorship has been greatly appreciated in an otherwise very challenging triennium," Garey says.
"I’ve appreciated David’s wisdom and clarity about how to get things done as a councillor. His ability to strongly and firmly articulate the facts and rise above the noise with confidence has always been impressive.
"It’s true he doesn’t suffer fools gladly and can be very direct. He also has a wicked sense of humour and a compassionate and kind side to him that I have been fortunate to see — he’s one of the few colleagues who bothers to check you’re doing OK and ask after family.
"He always gives credit where it’s due, a rare thing in a highly charged political environment. He has certainly left the city in a better place than when he first entered local politics."
Walker says Benson-Pope’s departure from the council leaves a gap that will be near impossible to fill.
"Across the political spectrum, few would dispute his tireless advocacy for people and place. His legacy can be read in Ōtepoti’s streetscapes, its protected heritage and its people-focused urban design — outcomes that remain the envy of other centres."
Benson-Pope says he will miss a lot of the interactions and discussions at the council, though "I won’t miss losing arguments". As part of his retirement, he has been told he is project manager on his son’s new house.
He will also be keeping a weather eye on the new council.
"I hope the incoming council will include people who have a degree of vision, because we lost a great deal of that when Aaron Hawkins was defeated.
"I’d like to see some people of a much younger generation, some 21st century people, elected, and not just the re-election of a lot from the 20th century."
Fact file
Born: February 23, 1950, St Kilda, Dunedin.
Education: King’s High School, BA (Hons) at the University of Otago, Dip Tchg at Christchurch Teachers’ College (Secondary Division). President of the Student Teachers’ Association of New Zealand and president of the college’s students’ association.
Teaching career: Bayfield High School, teaching German, French, classics and outdoor education.
October 1986: Elected as a Labour Party representative to the Dunedin City Council. After three more full terms and a partial term, he resigned in 1999.
November 1999: Won Dunedin South for Labour. Held various positions in Helen Clark’s three-term government, including senior whip, fisheries minister, social development and employment minister, and environment minister. Served as a backbencher from 2007 after misconduct allegations.
2008-2013: Worked as a qualified RMA commissioner hearing resource consent applications, primarily for the DCC. Also regional PPTA chairman for several years.
October 2013: Elected as an independent councillor to the DCC and re-elected three more times. From 2013 to 2022 he was chairman of the planning and regulatory committee.
August 2025: Announces his retirement after this year’s local body elections.
