As an Aucklander, I am disappointed that you recently criticised the removal of the Sites of Significance overlay and requirement for CIAs in the region’s Unitary Plan (Waatea News 11/8/16). But then again, you may not be aware of the facts.
But I did have a problem with Council staff and the Independent Maori Statutory Board (IMSB) taking to Auckland with a coloured pen, marking 3,600 very broad-brush areas as Sites of Value to Mana Whenua. This affected many thousands of private homes in residential suburbs without identifying the reason for their supposed value to tribal groups. The Plan also stressed that the IMSB had only processed 35% of Auckland in this way; so much more was to be claimed.
I did have a problem with the fact that Councillors voted this part of the Plan through based on a quick and superficial PowerPoint from staff, without knowing any real detail or the significant impact it would have on Aucklanders.
I did have a problem with the fact that for the last 4 years, these affected homeowners seeking resource consent were immediately required to contact all 19 tribal groups to see if they had an interest in each homeowner’s property. Homeowners then had to get each tribal group to process a Cultural Impact Assessment in whichever way they wished, taking however long they wished to take. Then to top it off, the homeowner to pay whatever each tribe demanded. With the people I interviewed, this meant about 13 tribal groups, thousands of dollars paid with no receipts, and a few extra months added onto the consent process. I don’t recall anything “of significance” being found.
After enough complaints were lodged with Council, the staff did take
over the “liaison” but the process was still greatly flawed, slow and
expensive. Real Estate agents weren’t able/or didn’t want to advise property
purchasers about it and there was nothing on LIM reports yet the Sites of Value
could have a dramatic effect on property values.
So the onus went onto ordinary Kiwis to spend their own time, energy and
tax-paid earnings in fighting this very corrupt and unjustified imposition on
their homes!
Then after 2 years of presenting their case to the Independent Hearings
Panel, the Council staff and the IMSB still couldn’t produce evidence to support
their extensive claim on thousands of private properties.
So rather than (as you reportedly said) the Auckland Council voted
against enhanced protection for Maori sites in the Unitary Plan, they actually
voted against an unsubstantiated, unidentified, and very corruptible process.
And then only at the Independent Hearing Panel’s behest and with the threat of
legal action hanging over their heads!
Who Do Your
Stand For?
So one year out from election year, who do you respect, Mr Little? Is it just the
greedy and power hungry who will use any means to gain control over the public
and their tax-paid money? Do you care at all about the ordinary Kiwi who is struggling
to earn a living and raise a family; people who treasure their
homes; people who want to know their government representatives are working in their best
interest and not against them? Please tell me, I'd love to know.
4 comments:
Just how long before this also arrives in all Local Councils in this country? It is no wonder that Political Parties support the amalgamation of Councils. It will be just far too expensive for individual house owners to challenge financially or otherwise with not only 19 Maori Iwi but the rest as well conditions. Is Freehold Title just becoming another Dodo?
What we have is a diluted (at the present) form of Communism, with special privileges for the elite (read Maori). Our ever increasing Bureaucracy will bring in more of the same.
Just what is the purpose of this kowtowing to this one ethnic group???? It has to be something more than getting Bills passed in our Parliament and National retaining Government. The clue or one clue lies in our total acceptance and signing of the U.N. Indigenous Rights Treaty which elevates Maori to a status above the general population.
One can but wonder if this country with its pronounced apathetic attitude towards officialdom and Parliament, is merely a test guinea pig for the United Nations in its onward march to a World Government?
Brian
When a Society travels along a pathway to inequity and inequality, there will be by natural events a time of reckoning.
We know that Societies can become sick without knowing it, and it seems that the others are unwell and not us.
We know we are all right because most say so. We have the Television, the media, academia , and the priests of progress to repeat what the truth is. We have an entire Ki-wiblogpropaganda site to downtick us should we stray from this progress and truth
We have a leader who did not appear to us as a flimflam, but he is.
We are a people with Maori tribal leaders the foremost among us,
Then after that, European and other ethnic groups including Asian are roughly equal second class.
We have a separatist Maori Party dominated government which is led by appeaser-in-chief John Key who only listens to what he has decided to hear.. .
The New Zealand Government today is without a core, direction or spirit , and absent to the imperative doctrine of equity, and equality.
Entire civilisations fail and die on these grounds, as their former vigour is lost to social malady.
In a letter I burdened Don Brash and others with, I said that I see that our trouble is so deep within Government, institutions and individual apathy, that it is now irreversible other than by sudden revolution at the ballot box.
In the meantime, I say to people, we have to come to terms with the options we have.
I have no career at stake, just an iron in the fire.
We can lift NZ First to 15% in the next election, and thereby sack most of the bad spirits we have now.
In support of Brian's opinion piece... guaranteed land title is the fundamental plank upon which our concept of democracy has evolved. Confiscation of title by an unelected minority used only to be possible by conquest. Are we so piss-weak as a nation that this can be done by a cabal of a few troughers?
Good work Fiona, altho i would not hold my breath while waiting for a response!
Collin
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