The problems with proposed Three Waters

THE proposed Three Waters legislation being vigorously pursued by the Government is being presented as the only solution to the 2016 Havelock North drinking water contamination problem.

The Hastings District Council is faced with a huge infrastructure cost to fix the problem but it’s a moot point if it can suddenly be claimed that all other 62 councils are in the same dire predicament and therefore command that all council water assets must be gifted to the ownership of the Government.

The Government would then gift

50% of their confiscation and give ownership to Maori.

As the Maori Party coleader Rawiri Waititi warns: ‘‘If Maori proprietary rights to water are not recognised, it’s going to turn out terribly.’’ And: ‘‘Ownership of water by Maori includes the right of the owner to charge a royalty on all the users of water.’’

Apart from the token financial offer of $2.5 billion from the Government for the total ownership of the whole of New Zealand’s water assets (about

0.5c for each dollar value) the question of who owns the water is an ongoing thorn within the New Zealand community.

Water in New Zealand arises from the ‘‘water cycle’’.

The sun evaporates water from lakes, rivers, oceans all around the world. The water is stored in the millions of tonnes in the clouds carried around the planet and eventually returned to the planet as fog, rain, hail, and snow.

This cycle has been repeated for millions of years before Homo sapiens were even thought of.

Some of it fell on New Zealand. So to claim ownership of the water, one would also need to claim ownership of the sun’s energy driving the cycle; ownership of the original source of the water; ownership of the clouds transporting the water over New Zealand and ownership of the rain and hail and snow.

Such a claim is not rational and the plan is retrograde and should be abandoned. Stan Randle

Alexandra