Bill Dalton

I am reluctant to wade into the wards/no wards for Napier, debate again but I’m going to give it one more go to try and make my point.

Of course I am aware that there are those who simply don’t want to listen – those who have closed minds.

Those who are pro-wards tell us that socioeconomic disparity exists in Napier and that we need ward councillors to truly understand and champion the needs of their constituents.

Frankly I find that insulting.  We don’t need pages of skewed graphs to tell us economic disparity exists in Napier – of course it does.  And to suggest that all councillors are not aware of that and are not championing the needs of the less fortunate, simply displays ignorance.

Equally insulting is the claim that there are three black spots in Napier requiring attention but council doesn’t know it.  To suggest that the council is making policy blind is unmitigated crap.

If you take the pro-ward supporters argument to it’s logical conclusion – the argument that you need ward councillors to champion the needs of their constituents – then those councillors representing more affluent areas could argue that those areas pay more in rates so therefore should receive more of the rate–spend.

It’s just nonsense isn’t it?

You don’t live in a town like Napier all your life – like I have – and not know which areas of the city need extra assistance.  And I must say that most of those leading the change for wards are imports.  An American, a couple of Poms and I think one is even from Hastings!

The situation, in my mind, is simple.

It is a fact that Napier has areas where the residents have been less fortunate in life then residents in other areas.  Those areas that are less affluent need to receive more resources from both local and central government.

The Napier City Council has provided those extra resources in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

And frankly splitting up a hard working team into a rabble of factional interests is going to achieve nothing for the city.

I hear on the radio this morning that Murray Douglas from the Chamber of Commerce is calling for us to extend the Hawke’s Bay Airport runway with all speed.  The reason given – that part of the Pacific Blue airline, might be looking to extend their services to new airports.

Time and time again, since I became a Napier City Councillor, I have asked for someone, or anyone, to present to me a compelling business plan, for the extension to the runway.  No one has even bothered to try and convince me.  The best I have had is to be told that a previous City Council voted for it because it future proofed our airport.

If an extended runway becomes necessary in the future, why don’t we do the work then.  Why aren’t we putting a proposal to airlines – getting a commitment from them – and then building to meet a need.

The extension to the runway at Hawke’s Bay airport is going to cost somewhere around 10-12 million dollars.  That of course just allows bigger planes to land, it does not give us an airport with international capabilities.  For that you need to completely fence the entire area to internationally accepted standards, you need to put in full customs facilities including x ray machines etc., you need to build facilities for immigration and the police – the list goes on.

I would guess that the infrastructure facilities would cost another 10-12 million dollars.

Again I stress, I am not coming down hard and fast against the extension to the runway.  What I am saying is that I have very real reservations about spending up to $20 million and incurring debt to do so, to extend a runway at one of the most difficult times experienced in an economic sense – for a runway that just might be needed in the future.

Frankly, I believe Air New Zealand provides a fantastic service in to Napier especially in terms of frequency.

What I need is someone to convince me that our air services will improve and an extended runway will be an economic benefit to Hawke’s Bay rather than an economic burden like extended runways have been in other provincial cities. 

I’m still waiting.

Dr Robin Gwynn seems to have embarked on a campaign to destabilize the Napier City Council.

This wealthy academic, who was voted off the council at the last election, has set himself up as judge and jury in terms of councillors’ performance.  He has decided who is doing a good job and who is not and strangely enough, he has decided in each ward where there are two councillors, only one is shaping up and in the other wards, no one is shaping up.

How does he know – is there a spy with a predetermined agenda in our midst.

Frankly, Dr Gwynn who retains an unhealthy access to the Napier Mail is wrong.  There are twelve Napier City Councillors who all work hard for the City in their own way. “Maybe they don’t have the ability to produce, or access to, pages of statistics Dr Gwynn,” but they are all working in a way they feel best benefits the City.

And statistics that show that there are no decile one or two citizens - that’s the best off - in Westshore simply beggar belief.

Dr Gwynn’s backing of just two of the 6 ward councillors could well be like presenting the poisoned chalice to those councillors.

The Napier City Councillors are a good team.  There is none of the internal bickering that characterised previous councils – we certainly disagree at times but we get on and make decisions that we believe are in the best interests of all Napier citizens.

Dr Gwynn’s actions smack of the old subversive divide and rule theory.  He doesn’t want a good team working for all of Napier, he appears to want to revert to an adversarial system where a bunch of individual councillors are fighting and scrapping for perks for their own patch.

Dr Gwynn, who was the only sitting councillor to fight for the partial ward system and then didn’t even support the system by standing in a ward – he stood on a city wide basis – paid the price at the last election. Surely this was an indication to him that Napier doesn’t want to go back to the sort of behaviour he would be well aware of.

Napier is in good heart and has a good team guiding it through these very difficult times.

Why can’t Robin just accept that?

I have spent the last two nights reading submissions to the Napier City Council’s LTCCP – the long term council community plan.

Such is the exciting life of a city councillor.

And it is interesting to see who has written these submissions. Some, who have usually never sat around a council table, believe they have the ability to provide solutions for all the challenges the council will face over the next 10 years. Others are more modest in their goals in that they are presenting a submission on behalf of an organization they are part of. Many of these submissions are worthy because the submitter usually has detailed knowledge of the subject that councilors can’t be expected to have.

Inevitably, some are from complete nutters.

There is clearly real confusion in the minds of some submitters in terms of local government areas of responsibility and the responsibility of central government. One submission calls for, amongst a myriad of other things, manufactures and retailers to reduce the use of packaging and labeling. Hardly city council stuff. The same submitter calls for us to promote the buying of fresh local produce and the use of string bags to reduce household waste. We are told that merchandise should be designed to last, rather than to be thrown away after 2-5 years.

Simply not our role and this would certainly not sit well with the next submitter, who seems to suggest that councils shouldn’t be involved in entrepreneurial activities at all.

One submitter is prepared to put her life on the line to prevent an activity proceeding, that was presented as an April Fools prank by a local newspaper.

Many of those making submissions, clearly have no idea of the pressures councils face trying to balance public expectation against income. One quarter of the rate-take goes in roading and yet our road tax on petrol goes to Wellington. Central government is constantly bringing in laws, rules and regulations that have to be administered by local bodies and that costs the ratepayers. It is taxation by stealth. And of course there are the areas where central government simply steals from ratepayers, like the nonsensical $10 a tonne waste minimalisation levy they have just imposed.

Anyway I am sure we will all be much wiser councillors having listened, to and debated, submissions for the next two days.

It is a matter of record that I have real concerns about the formation of an “Auckland Super-City”. The current situation is clearly untenable and therefore change is required. But to move from an extremely fragmented system to one where all the power is concentrated into so few hands, seems to me to be almost undemocratic. It is going from one extreme to another and generally that is anything but positive.

Regular listeners will have often heard me say, that if I led a political party, it would be the SMG – the sensible middle ground party. The party where common sense prevails. It is my view that there is not too much common sense or sensible middle ground in Rodney Hide’s proposals for Auckland’s governance.

And neither is there any sense in the attitude of the Maori Party. I watched Hone Harawira on Q&A on Sunday morning – the most inappropriately scheduled programme on New Zealand TV - and frankly I was disgusted. This fellow clearly has no interest in a united New Zealand where we are one people – albeit from different racial backgrounds.

Whilst I have very real reservations about the “Auckland Super City” - if it is to happen - I can see no justification for seats being allocated on a racial basis. Auckland is the largest Polynesian city in the world – many of those Polynesians are Maori. Surely the answer is for Maori to stand worthy candidates and to rally support behind those candidates to ensure they are elected.

That, Mr Harawira, is democracy.

I have long been a supporter of the sensible settlement of Maori grievances. Where land was illegally confiscated, Maori should be compensated. Where there has been injustice – justice must prevail

But surely we have moved beyond the situation where we have to reserve seats on a city council representing one of the most multi-racial cities in the world, for members of any one race.

When we think of the senseless murder of Len Snee and the serious wounding of his two colleagues, it is hard to see positives.  And yet, as with everything in life, there are positives that become obvious.

The first thing that became obvious was that Napier is a wonderful caring community.  Individuals opened their homes to friends – hoteliers and moteliers offered beds to those shut out of their homes and agencies such as civil defence and the Salvation Army sprung immediately into action.

On a personal note, I would like to thank Bruce and Gill Wilton who put Shirley and I up for the night.

The other real positive to come out of this tragedy is the huge demonstration of support for our police personnel.

By the very nature of their job, policemen and women spend a lot of their time dealing with the less desirable members of our community.  Many of these low-lifes have no respect for the police and it becomes very easy for police personnel to see the world as being full of scumbags who hate the police.

Events of the last two weeks have allowed us to demonstrate to the members of our police force, that we admire and appreciate the job that they do and that the great majority of citizens have tremendous respect for them.

I don’t know if you saw the letter to the editor in the Hawke’s Bay Today on Monday night from Glen Miller – brother of injured policeman Bruce.  It was a fantastic letter and if you didn’t read it – get a copy of Monday night’s paper and do so.  The paper should print it again.  It makes you feel good to be a member of the human race.

So no matter what happens in our lives there are always some positives to be found.

We can only hope that we do not have to face such tragic circumstances again, but if we do – we will do so in the knowledge that our police force can handle any situation and that our community will pitch in and do what is required.

I for one take great comfort from that.

On this, the morning of Len Snee’s funeral, I would like to offer my sincere condolences to the Snee family – especially to Joe who is a great friend of my son Mac. Mac and a number of Joe’s friends are flying in to be with Joe and the family at this time and I think that is just neat – that is what friendship and respect is all about.

And of course our thoughts are with those who were so badly injured and their families. We can only hope that their prospects brighten.

The police did an amazing job of resolving the situation on the hill with no further loss of life and no further serious injuries. And of course they weren’t without their critics. 

I was in Christchurch on Monday morning and the letters to the editor of The Press, included one from Waimarie and another from RD6 Christchurch. These fellows were expertly able to decide from rural Canterbury just where the police went wrong – how they could have handled the situation so much better and how the situation could have been resolved so much sooner.

In Napier we had some of the top policemen in New Zealand. We had the Special Tactics Group – the SAS of the police. We had the Armed Offenders Squad – a highly trained group of professionals. We had a specialist team from the army. We had psychologists and specialist negotiators. And yet scores of people from one end of the country to the other thought they knew a better way of handling the situation. They had no knowledge of the difficulty of access to the site – no knowledge of the background of the offender – no knowledge of what the police were being told by the offender and his associates and yet – they knew it all.

I wonder how keen these self styled experts would have been, for the police to throw caution to the wind and storm the building as they were suggesting, if their eldest son was an Armed Offenders Squad Officer in the front line.

Have you ever attended a funeral and listened to the minister or celebrant – who probably didn’t know the deceased at all – waxing lyrical about what a wonderful person dear old John was.  They never quite tell the truth do they!

And it’s like that with Michael Cullen.  Now at the end of his parliamentary career we are told that he had an amazing wit, he was sartorially elegant and that in the house he was wonderfully eloquent.

All these things are good to be remembered by but what about the finances of the county.  Rightly or wrongly we remember Nordy’s Black Budget, Muldoon’s think big, Douglas’ reforms of the economy without which New Zealand would be out the back door economically.  

And what will we remember Michael Cullen for?  Being a witty smart-arse who wore flash suits.
 
Cullen held the financial reigns in this country for 9 years – 8 of which were some of the most buoyant economic years we have known.  At a time when we should have been broadening the productive sector, the tax base, Cullen paid off debt and used the funds to build up an enormous army of civil servants.  I use the term army because the IRD alone musters more troops than the whole New Zealand army!

Clark and Cullen are gone and Phil Goff, one of the brightest politicians in the house, though no charismatic leader is in the hot seat. 

And he has had a cabinet reshuffle and brought Labour’s bovver boy Trevor Mallard back to the front bench.  I would have thought May was a good month for Mallard to keep his head down.

Some of the Labour members who have gained promotion I’ve never heard of.  Clearly due to lack of depth in the Labour party they are having to promote list MPs who are there because they brought the best scones for supper at the local branch meetings.

National faces incredibly difficult times – some of the most difficult times ever experienced for a government.  All I ask of them is that they be open and honest.  Take the people with you.

The last thing New Zealand needs now is to find out that another Government is not telling us the truth.

We live in a time of incredible change.

Politically New Zealand has moved right, America left and Fiji down the toilet.

On the investment front, the share market has gone from the flavour of the month to last weeks sour taste which of course is when clever investors are accumulating stocks.

Finance companies have gone from the chosen investment vehicle of many because of promised high incomes – to a sector which become populated by so many rip-off merchants that it now only exists due to government guarantees.

Our climate is changing – ask the poor cockies who are suffering with drought. Hawke’s Bay has received just 60% of its normal autumn rains and that means going into the winter without enough grass.

But one thing never changes.  And that’s New Zealanders love of knocking those with the guts to express an opinion.

As you know I have suggested that our current local body electoral system – the way we elect our councillors – is wrong.  I have suggested that there is a better way.  I have made these suggestions because a).  I believe the current system is nothing short of stupid and b).  I want to start a debate on the matter.  I want ratepayers to have their say.

And what has been the result – personal abuse.

I am told that I’m a Prima Donna because I have questioned the need for Wards.  I am accused of slagging ward councillor Maxine Boag when I’m on record as saying she does a good job in her ward.

Don’t get me wrong – the abuse is like water off a ducks back but what is disappointing, is that people, rather than giving their opinion on the wards/no wards debate, simply choose to abuse someone who is keen to see the best electoral system possible for Napier.

I say to these people – abusing me is a waste of your breath and will do nothing for Napier.

If you have a considered opinion on the matter of how your councillors are elected – have your say.  Let’s debate the merits of your views and my views.  Let’s debate the message not waste our energies slagging the messenger.

Dare I even suggest it – let’s be positive and get the best outcome for Napier.

A good mate of mine phoned the other night and during the conversation he asked me why I was so anti the Regional Sports Park.

To say I was surprised is an understatement.

I am not anti the sports park and I thought I had made that abundantly clear – but – there appears to be doubt – so I will have another go at explaining my position this morning.

If the Hastings District Council want, and feel they can afford, to build a large sports park, good on them. Such a facility will attend to the deficit in sports grounds in Hastings and of course will add to the region’s total facilities. Just as the sports grounds in Napier, like Park Island and Onekawa, funded by Napier Ratepayers, add to the pool.

My argument is, and always has been, that the proposed sports park is a Hastings venture and that Napier Ratepayers, who have already provided adequate facilities in their own city, should not be called on to fund the project.

Again I stress – I am not against the proposed sports park. I simply do not believe Napier Ratepayers have any responsibility to fund it.

Much is being made of the fact that it is a regional facility. Surely if the sports park was truly a regional facility, Napier would have been consulted on what sports they thought it should cater for.

At no time was Napier consulted about the make-up of the sports park – we were consulted only when funding was asked for.

And if the regional card is going to be played lets have a look at the most regional of all sporting facilities in Hawke’s Bay – the home of National and International Rugby and Cricket – McLean Park.

McLean Park is undergoing a 10 million dollar refurbishment to prepare for future major events including the Rugby World Cup.

Hastings made it very clear that we shouldn’t even ask for funding assistance, it wouldn’t be forthcoming.

So Napier has got on with the job and is providing this international standard facility for the region and I hope Hastings is able to get on with the job and provide their international standard facility for the region.