Hamilton City council river clean-up plan
Hamilton City Council officials say cleaning up their stretch of the Waikato River, to the standard the Waikato Regional Council desires, is too hard and too costly
They’re now preparing to lodge an appeal to the Environment Court against parts of the Waikato Regional Council’s plans to improve water quality in the Waikato and Waipā rivers.
It appears that the council is trying to avoid the responsibility of doing their bit to improve the water quality by arguing for the retention of the current requirements for the quality of the water that is discharged into the Waikato River via the city’s stormwater and wastewater systems for the foreseeable future.
We believe that this situation shows that the Hamilton City Council is admitting that they are part of the problem with water quality in the rivers but this appeal to the environment court just amounts to trying to set different rules for different groups.
The farming industry is being almost solely blamed for the levels of pollution in the rivers and decimated by the new requirements under Plan Change 1 yet the HCC is trying to ignore the extent of their contribution and in actual fact trying to get allowance to carry on polluting in perpetuity.
The current Mayor of Hamilton City, Paula Southgate, was Chairperson of the Waikato Regional Council at the time that the decision was made to initiate the process and put the Proposed Plan Change 1 out for public consultation and comment.
In fact she must have been strongly in favour of the Proposed Plan Change 1 as she actually used her casting vote as Chairperson to carry the motion to adopt it.
I make this assumption as it is normal in the case of a casting vote being required, for the vote to be to retain the status Quo rather than for change.
Paula Southgate was defeated in the next election for the position of Chair of the Regional Council and has since then been elected as Mayor of Hamilton City and also appointed by the crown to the Waikato River Authority where she holds the position of Co-Chair of the River Authority.
It is almost beyond belief that she could condone an appeal of this nature on the basis that it is going to be too hard and too costly for the ratepayers of Hamilton.
She supported the decision to initiate PC1 as Chair of the Regional Council (with her casting vote) and now leads a council that wants to appeal those very same considerations contained within PC1 because it might be too costly for the ratepayers/voters of her city whilst also being Co-Chair of the River Authority which is supportive of PC1.
Both the Hamilton City Council appeal and the Auckland water supply situations serve to highlight the cost of WRC’s interpretation of the Vision & Strategy of the Waikato River Settlement Act, requiring environmental restoration above the other considerations encompassed by sustainable management and social & economic factors.
Hamilton City Council planner Paul Ryan told councillors that while most of the points of contention could likely be sorted out between the WRC and HCC in a future mediation process, a sticking point could likely be the issue of discharge points.
Ryan said the legal challenge should not be seen as the city council trying to dodge its responsibility for halting the pollution of the river, as they already have projects budgeted at hundreds of millions of dollars in the long term plan.
The ultimate cost of meeting the regional council’s river quality requirements was not yet known, however there was a query about whether the regional council was trying to enforce an unattainable “gold standard.
It is our belief that this current appeal situation shows an admission on the part of the HCC that they are causing deterioration in the water quality of the rivers and that they are asking for special treatment based on the cost of reversing their effects on the rivers.
If this was to be granted then there is no reason why the farming industry should not be granted equal treatment.
Andy Loader
Co-Chairman P.L.U.G.