But Invercargill Mayor Nobby Clark — who was involved in a stoush with Cr Ian Pottinger at a council meeting earlier this week — says legally he could not have allowed the councillor to attend the meeting.
At the meeting earlier this week, Cr Pottinger questioned consultant costs on the new museum, but was rebutted by Mr Clark who criticised him for not attending key meetings on the museum, which was the time to make comments about costs.
Mr Pottinger contacted the Otago Daily Times yesterday and said he was holidaying overseas for a month at the time, but had wanted to still attend the meeting through video conference.
"I approached all the other chairs of the committees to attend meetings this way and they said that was fine."
"I know that is probably what he had to do as I was having a leave of absence but surely democracy should win out.
"It was not as though I wasn’t interested. I wanted to go to the meeting."
He was in the United States for a family holiday and could have done lots of other things that day in New Orleans but wanted to contribute to the council meeting.
"But the mayor made his decision and that was his choice.
"I just had to swallow it."
The council had a meeting in late October last year to consult on funding options for the new museum, which was one of the meetings Cr Pottinger missed.
Mr Clark said, when contacted, Cr Pottinger had taken a leave of absence which left him no ability to contribute to the meeting.
Mr Clark said he had made Cr Pottinger aware he could not attend the meeting.
Those were the rules, Mr Clark said.
He said he would be flexible if Cr Pottinger wanted to put an apology for the meetings, but a series of apologies would be seen as a leave of absence, by council rules.
Mr Clark said Cr Pottinger had often said the new museum was the mayor’s vanity project but this was simply not true.
