government intervention<\/a>, after rising tensions between elected members and a 2020 review finding a leadership void and saying Shadbolt was increasingly unable to do his job.<\/p>\nAt the time, Shadbolt said the report scapegoated him for the failings of council, which was not giving him enough support.<\/p>\n
Dutt said his colleagues should be ashamed.<\/p>\n
Former mayor and Shadbolt\u2019s deputy, Nobby Clark, disagreed that the long-serving mayor lacked support.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s not the truth at all,\u201d he said. \u201cHe had failing health and that\u2019s just the fact of it.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody in Invercargill knows that. He struggled through the last term, so you try and help.\u201d<\/p>\n
He believed most councillors supported him, and pointed to the findings of the 2020 independent Thomson report as evidence of the leadership issues they faced and the steps they sought to take.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe comments she made were inaccurate,\u201d Clark said. \u201cIt just showed that she was angry right till the very end, which is a shame, because Tim was not like that.<\/p>\n
\u201cTim was a really nice guy and a pleasure to sit with. He was a great orator.\u201d<\/p>\n
He described Shadbolt as a man who commanded the attention of everyone when he walked into a room and really connected with others, particularly people who were disadvantaged.<\/p>\n
Former councillor Peter Kett, who considered himself a true friend of Shadbolt, even before he became mayor, said Dutt\u2019s words were hard to hear.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really gutted at what she said,\u201d Kett said. \u201cSome councillors had blood on their hands, but the way it sounded that all of us had blood on our hands, like myself, I just wanted to help him.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Sir]()
Sir Tim Shadbolt’s funeral in Invercargill. Photo \/ Ben Tomsett<\/p>\n
Some councillors treated Shadbolt like rubbish, but he did have friends in the council chambers, he said.<\/p>\n
Kett was disappointed to be painted with the same brush.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust so sad that she had to say that, because she knows that I\u2019m a true friend of his and, when he went in to fulltime care, Asha gave me permission with the people at the rest home to go and visit Tim whenever I liked.\u201d<\/p>\n
He described seeing Shadbolt shuffle out of one difficult council meeting, before going into the mayoral lounge.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was crying and I put my arm around him. I said, \u2018Tim, what can I do?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cHe said, \u2018Oh, get me a sandwich or something\u2019. I said, \u2018There are some sandwiches and cakes in the committee room\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe said, \u2018I\u2019m not going back in there, would you bring me some food please?\u2019, so I went and got him some food, asked him if he wanted a drink and then I drove him home.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kett laid the lack of support and stress at the feet of then-chief executive Clare Hadley, saying she regularly met with committee chairs and deputy chairs, and decisions were made in those meetings, before being taken to council.<\/p>\n
In response, Hadley said she was happy to leave that term behind her and she had no comment.<\/p>\n
Former councillor Graham Lewis said he was surprised and hurt by Dutt\u2019s remarks.<\/p>\n
She did not mention that several councillors tried to help Shadbolt through some of the council agendas before meetings or that he would drive him home after meetings, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAsha was obviously going through a lot of grief and a lot of upset,\u201d Lewis said. \u201cI\u2019m not putting her down, I\u2019ve got a lot of respect for her and also had a huge amount of respect for Tim.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s basically all I can say. It was troubling times.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councillor Allan Arnold did not believe Shadbolt lacked support, but declined to describe his final term.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s water under the bridge, as far as I\u2019m concerned,\u201d he said. \u201cI have fond memories of Sir Tim personally.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councillor Ian Pottinger said his only comment was \u201cde mortuis nil nisi bonum – do not speak ill of the dead\u201d.<\/p>\n
The Invercargill City Council said it did not wish to make any comment.<\/p>\n
– RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"She described his final term as mayor \u2013 from 2019-22 \u2013 as truly awful and detailed accusations she…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":241720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6796,2562,26519,12513,2740,18390,10934,111,43,139,69,22053,133549,6795,8229,46001],"class_list":["post-241719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-brunton","tag-claims","tag-councillors","tag-failed","tag-former","tag-invercargill","tag-mayor","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-reject","tag-shadbolt","tag-tess","tag-they","tag-tim"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/241720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}