A perfect fit.

Every time.

http://www.waternz.org.nz/documents/comment_and_submissions/090730_governance_of_water.pdf

could do something just need to get Dr Smith to clear his head before anything gets done

There will be big consequences for Canterbury Government.
One way or another the rural Councilors with water commercial interests are finished.

There are 14 Councilors, 6 rural and 8 City.

Within the 6 rural sector seats ,

Eugenie sage holds Selwyn as a Green, and another rural seat is held by Jo Kane,

Jo has no political content other than herself, but she is presently conservative.
and standing for Mayor Christchurch 2010.

Farmer Councillors are 4:

Mark Oldfield ; Angus McKay ; Bronwen Murray; Ross Little;

Green Councillors are 4:
Eugenie Sage; David Sutherland; Rik Tindall; Jane Demeter:

Conservative within the 8 City sector voters are

Alec Neill [ ChCh West, and chair of council ] Pat Harrow [ ChCh West ]
Carol Evans [North ChCh ]]

2010 elections will bring some user pays water charges to farmers.

We are not expecting dissolution of Ecan.

peter quixote,

Good governance is good for the whole of society A little crass maybe but true. The challenge for those who govern is to establish the principles and the sanctions and apply the sanctions at a level that either encourages good behaviour or minimses bad behaviour or a combination of both

Sadly NZ lack the talent for good governance in any numbers. there are a few but not enough who have the will capacity and capability. They are in short supply.

Until NZ gets to the level of maturity to understand and champion good governance we will keep on getting more of the same old same old

I’m not that familiar with the specific problems of Ecan (I live in Waitakere – soon to be part of Auckland, even though none of us up here had any chance to make that decision).

The supercity won’t “work” because it is anti-democratic, removing control of much decision-making from elected councillors to unelected Ministerial appointees. Well, it may work for big business, which is keen to grab Auckland’s assets to make money from Aucklanders, but it won’t work for ordinary Aucklanders.

Why don’t we start by getting rid of the “ratepayer elector” qualification which means, for example, that I can vote for Ecan even though I live in Waitakere because I own property in Canterbury? That distorts the democratic process from “one person-one vote” in favour of property ownership, and helps to keep people like these four corrupt councillors in positions of power as members of local authorities.

I’m not a great fan of unitary authorities either. I think it is important to keep the environmental regulation aspect separate from the issuing of consents.

Yes if the electorate keeps making the wrong choices the right to choose should be taken off them.

I agree that resignations would be appropriate. The Auditor-General had already advised that they should not be entitled to vote, and the Auditor-General is the final arbiter (and the prosecuting authority) in such matters.

The conflicts of interest were not insignificant either:

• Cr Oldfield holds two permits to take ground water and a permit to discharge dairy effluent to land. He holds two of these consents jointly with his wife and the other jointly with his father. A property for which one of the consents is held is leased.

• Cr Harrow is a shareholder in Berry Fields Limited, which holds a permit to take ground water.

• Cr McKay is a shareholder in Kanuka Syndicate Limited, which holds a permit to discharge dairy effluent to land. Cr McKay also holds shares in companies or schemes that have consents to take water and those shareholdings entitle him to certain amounts of water to irrigate his land. He told us that these companies would be likely to pass on the water consent charges to him and to other shareholders.

• Cr Murray’s husband is the sole shareholder in The Wolds Station Limited, which holds two permits to take surface water. Cr Murray was a shareholder and director of that company until November 2008.

Given that the discussion and decision was about water management charges to consent holders, I would have thought Blind Freddy would have seen a conflict of interest.

But they had legal advice that there was not. Whoever provided that advice should be up before the Law Society’s Disciplinary Committee.