Thank you Brendon

commentary by Bill Demeter

Brendon Burns lost his seat in Parliament in an extremely close races with Nicky Wagner. Brendon also announced he would not seek re-election in the future but return to his profession as a journalist.

He will be missed in Christchurch. Our local members of Parliament from all parties have done an outstanding job supporting our local residents since the first earthquake. In fact, many people have commented they were doing the work that they assumed would be done by our elected city councilors, many of whom have seemed invisible.

Brendon led the charge in sorting out individual resident problems and issues and doing the hard yards of following up for residents and helping cut away the red tape. He did so, in my opinion, at the expense of putting more hours campaigning in what he knew was going to be a close and hard fought race. Was this a mistake or conscience decision by Brendon?

In my opinion Brendon knew exactly what he was doing and what the negative consequences might be of not stopping working with individual resident's problems and spending more time on the campaign trail. He probably asked himself a question many of us try to avoid: What is the right thing to do?

Brendon did the right thing and many of us are better off. Thank you, Brendon and the best to you and your family in the future.