It was recently put forward by ports of Auckland chairman Gary Judd that the company's owner, the Auckland Regional Council has removed him from the board.

As per the media reports, the council's firm Auckland Regional Holdings removed Queens Counsel Judd yesterday.

Reportedly, Judd, who also happens to be the chairman of ASB Bank, had been informed in the beginning of this month via a letter from Auckland Regional Holdings that his resignation was required by the end of the month. It should be noted that he had been chairman of POAL since July 2006.

Judd informed, "The reason given was that 'the ARH board has found your approach unhelpful and you have not sufficiently understood the needs of ARH as a shareholder/investor'."

He added further that on 6th May he had reverted, suggesting that resignation was a "voluntary act", that ARH was not permitted to require him to resign and that he "would not be resigning at that time".

He said sadly, "I asked for an explanation of what ARH meant by the reasons given by ARH. No explanation has been received."

He also informed that following this he was informed via a phone call from POAL yesterday that he had received a letter from ARH "removing me as a director of POAL".

Judd expressed that he had no communication from ARH advising him of its decision to remove him as a director.

Judd specified, "In the absence of any explanation, I can only speculate that in fulfilling my governance responsibilities I have given the shareholder information and advice it did not wish to receive."

It should be mentioned here that the sudden removal of Judd has come in the midst of a period of great turbulence for Ports of Auckland.

(via TopNews New Zealand. Contributed by Amiri Halberg)