The behaviour of the government toward any criticism of their proposed 3 Waters legislation has reminded me time and time again of Animal Farm by Georg Orwell. It was written as a fairy tale but it has become reality with the actions of this government. I thought the quote below summarised how the 3 Waters legislation has been handled. I’ll leave you to decide who is Napoleon and who is Boxer:
You do not appreciate, comrade, the mighty thing that we have done. The enemy was in occupation of this very ground that we stand upon. And now–thanks to the leadership of Comrade Napoleon–we have won every inch of it back again!” “Then we have won back what we had before,” said Boxer.
The Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, said at the UN:
But what if that lie, told repeatedly, and across many platforms, prompts, inspires, or motivates others to take up arms? To threaten the security of others. To turn a blind eye to atrocities, or worse, to become complicit in them. What then?
This should be related to the lie over the number of people poisoned by water every year. One of the basic numbers which has been quoted time and time again by the PM is that 34,000 people are poisoned each year by our water systems. This number is fundamentally incorrect. So are many of the other numbers which have horrified NZ citizens.
The government has demonstrated time and time again an absence of integrity. This week, after the Prime Minister responded to the 3 mayors who promoted a system for 3 waters which was different, that the government would:
“they’ve made a range of suggestions, and they’ve made them in good faith, and I’d rather us just have conversations with the mayors directly, rather than traversing it here about their proposals.”
Good faith response number 1:
The government announced that Tuku Morgan would chair the company which would operate the water systems which covered Auckland. This was a declaration of war with the Auckland mayor.
It seems the whole 3 Waters situation revolves around division in the Labour Party over the 3 Waters policy. One part of Labour disagrees with another. I support the Labour government’s proposals, simply because local government under local Labour politicians has failed to provide the necessary infrastructure and fund it to reasonable standards. There is insufficient accountability as long as Councillors have control of the 3 Waters assets and claiming the local democracy is capable of fixing everything is insufficient.
The Drainage Board should have been left as a separate entity in 1989. Ultimately the chickens have come home to roost for what was seen as a key local government goal to take over the CDB in 1989 and make it a department of the Council.