The public drop-in sessions arranged to discuss future Aurora power charges have been cancelled in Wanaka today (Wednesday, August 12) and in Queenstown tomorrow (Thursday August 13).

The Wanaka session was scheduled between 3:30pm-6:30pm at the Lake Wanaka Centre today but has been cancelled due to the COVID-19 announcement yesterday (August 11) and the change to Alert Level two at midday today.

Associate commissioner for the Commerce Commission John Crawford said they were unable to forecast the number of people who might come to the consultation but as Alert Level 2 restricted gatherings to a maximum of 100 people the decision was made to cancel the public session.   

“We have made this decision due to not being able to predict the number of attendees to our open public drop-in sessions and the requirements to organise social distancing and face masks at short notice,” he said.

“We also want to give our Auckland-based staff the time to return home as soon as possible.”

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“We apologise to those of you [who] have travelled or taken time off work to attend our sessions.”

Hearing directly from affected communities about their concerns in Dunedin and Central Otago in the past seven days had been “extremely valuable”, John said, and he regretted they would not be able to complete the remaining sessions at this time.

“We really want to hear the views of communities in Wanaka and Queenstown Lakes and we are exploring holding online sessions as an alternative. We will be back in touch to confirm details shortly.”

PHOTO: Wanaka App