TEC grant takes gloss off Tim's party

ROBYN EDIE/Southland Times/Image ID 119875

COMBINED EFFORT: Invercargill Mayor Tim Shadbolt and MP Eric Roy at last night's party.

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Invercargill Mayor Tim Shadbolt believes his "heal the wounds party" at the Civic Theatre last night was a success.

The party was intended to celebrate the region and clear the air following spats between himself and various people at the council in recent times.

However, it was focused mostly on the Tertiary Education Commission's announcement of its $6.5 million in funding for the Southern Institute of Technology.

The money is from the commission's Quality Reinvestment Fund and is separate to the funding cuts of up to $8 million announced last year.

SIT chief executive Penny Simmonds has said the $6.5 million does not make up for the money lost.

However, Mr Shadbolt has been claiming the announcement as a victory.

"This is a celebration night," he said.

There was still a long way to go because the TEC was still deciding the fate of the SIT's SIT2LRN courses, Mr Shadbolt said.

He said he had hoped to inform those at the party the outcome from SIT's council meeting held last night but it had run over time.

At the meeting, Friends of SIT co-founder and local public relations businessman Paddy Lewis said the $6.5 million was a "victory of sorts" .

It was ironic the money had turned up after the campaign started. SIT had its application for those funds in more than a year ago, he said.

Mr Shadbolt later told The Southland Times the party had been a success and he believed judging by the attendance wounds had been healed.

About 80 people attended the party including city councillors Darren Ludlow, Lindsay Thomas, Alan Dennis, Peter Kett and Neil Boniface.

There were also members of Mr Shadbolt's lobby group Friends of SIT.

The party was originally to be jointly funded by ratepayers from the mayoral budget and the democracy budget but Mr Shadbolt did a U-turn on Friday and announced corporate sponsors would foot the food and booze bills.

- © Fairfax NZ News