A meet the council candidates evening at Tauranga Art Gallery has been cancelled after concerns it was unfair not to open it to all city candidates standing.

A statement from the gallery today confirms the planned meeting for Tuesday, September 24 will no longer go ahead.

A public forum at the Tauranga Art Gallery has been cancelled after criticism is was unfair by some candidates.

A public forum at the Tauranga Art Gallery has been cancelled after criticism is was unfair by some candidates.

The forum, which was jointly organised by the gallery, Creative Tauranga and Baycourt, aimed to give Tauranga's creative community a chance to hear candidate views on arts issues.

A statement from the organisers says they could not accommodate all 31 candidates because it would have amounted to five hour evening (at an average of 10 minutes speaking time each), without any time for questions from the floor. Instead they had selected 10 candidates by pulling names from a hat.

Tauranga Art Gallery Trust chair Phillida Perry says it was 'unfortunate” that they were forced to cancel the evening.

'This joint effort would have given valuable insight into candidate views on the future of the arts in Tauranga and facilitated further community discussion in this area.”

Tauranga Mayoral candidate John Robson, who was among candidates opposing the limited format, says he was in favour of the arts organisations holding a forum for the creative community to learn about candidate views – but says it needs to be fair to all.

'As a Council Controlled Organisation I believe they should abide by the policies of the council and one of the election policies of the Tauranga Council is that no assets of the council should be used to give an advantage to one candidate over another.”

Gallery director Penelope Jackson did not respond when asked about the issue, referring SunLive to a media statement. The decision to cancel the event was made by the three joint organisers.