The most important question 3 Waters can’t answer
Our water systems are a fucking joke!
Farmers have stolen it and polluted it for so long they believe they have a right to.
Maori have been impoverished for so long they jump at anyone with a few flash bucks to give them access to water.
City Council’s have kicked the can so far down the track in terms of upgrading their water issues that we have run out of track.
So I endorse the State just moving in and taking the entire country’s water systems under its control because the mix of incompetence and corruption is intolerable for such an important resource.
Yes, I agree 3 Waters is being pushed hard by Wellington Council because their feckless criminal negligence has allowed them to be the biggest water basket case and hence biggest benefactor of handing over power to the State, but you learn pretty quickly in NZ politics that you have to bribe Wellington first if you want to advance big ideas.
If you don’t think Labour won’t just seize all the water assets via the Public Works Act then you don’t know how passionate David Parker is about this reform!
The problem however is that the 3 Waters proposal can’t answer the most important question which is will it, once implemented, be able to stop water being taken by foreign companies!
What is the use of water reform if it can’t guarantee in a dangerously warming planet where fresh water will become scarce that overseas interests can’t simply steal our water like they do now?
Once a country becomes dependent on us for fresh water, do you think they will allow us to stop them taking it?
I’m all fine for taking water assets and running them by the State, but are they protecting our water for us or foreign interests?
We need to halt all foreign taking of water in NZ. The planet is burning, we have the water, let’s keep it for us!
Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice – please donate here.
If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media
Another problem caused by the neo-liberal monetarist policies introduced in the 1980s where public good was abandoned for the “free market”
Most of the water that falls in NZ flows out to sea.
Maybe we could capture some if we are short
The government could just buy up the council water assets of councils who refuse to hand them over – and then charge them for water use.
Jeez Mr Bradbury…..they won’t be run by the state.
Surely you know the playbook, the only one Mr Parker knows.
Funder provider split. 4 management heavy ‘public’ entities, staffed by a bunch of Randians from the UK, awarding 40 year contracts to operate to Veolia, Suez, Beijing waterworks, Nongfu and some pitiful crumbs for TOW ‘partners’.
Fucks sake, this is a means to privatise without saying so.
They are calling this a utility, same as electricity, same as telephones. Try drinking electricity.
Well put Syd, it is worth some of the parochialists like Whangārei District Council, and Kaipara to name two, putting a spanner in the works so that the exact nature of what the Labour Caucus is up to with 3 Waters can be more widely known and then opposed as necessary.
No one wants water than makes people sick–but privatisation by stealth is too high a price to pay, particularly when power generation and supply desperately need to be restored to full public ownership.
Completely agree with Bomber, but go further, nationalise all water and make it irrevocable in law so later governments can’t reverse it, at least easily.
The trouble is no one owns the water yet foreign companies can get a cheap long term deal under our councils bylaws and extract water and sell it back to us bottled. We are mugs and while the council might be paying for this water to be treated so it can be bottled, drunk and used by the general public, we are paying the councils rates. And to add to the mix, who has largely been in control of the councils and who has mainly been responsible or our drains and sewerage as they have let it get in such a state. Now councils like Auckland can moan as much as they like but they were draining the Waikato River and still are. And to add insult to the matter Auckland Council were paying their water man 800k a year when they had no water. Now how dumb is that. Some of our councils need a good kick up the proverbial backside.
The biggest outstanding question in my mind is why the media won’t present all the facts to voters — and especially that iwi will be given equal say to the rest of the nation in deciding how much we pay for water as consumers, and how much we will pay for infrastructure etc.
In the South Island around 100,000 Ngai Tahu representatives will have the same say as the more than a million non-Maori. No one is saying this out loud.
In part, it is a result of the govt’s $55 million media fund that stipulates a view of the Treaty as a partnership.
https://democracyproject.nz/2021/09/14/graham-adams-the-double-edged-sword-of-the-55m-government-journalism-fund-cuts-deep/?
And they’ll give the 4 corporations fucking Maori names like the woke PC fucksters are doing now.
Then the 12% Maori will have 50 % ownership of what we already own.
You want to see some nasty race problems coming to New Zealand – just wait 3 to 5 years … this is going to get fucking nasty.