Graham Adams: Government quietly changes advice on Three Waters

With only six weeks until the election on October 14, it is clear that Labour has no intention of campaigning on its record. That is hardly surprising given the Ardern-Hipkins government has earned a well-deserved reputation for incompetence in most areas it has wandered into — including housing, health, law and order, and education.

Graham Adams: Labour’s Three Waters refresh is a tragi-comedy

The government’s disdain for democracy is a gift to National and Act.

Last week, we watched the Prime Minister rebrand the contentious Three Waters project with a name so banal it is surprising he didn’t fall asleep while announcing it. “Affordable Water Reform” is, in essence, a Post-It note to stick on your computer while you struggle to come up with an arresting title. If you suggested “Affordable Water Reform” to your colleagues in an advertising agency they’d assume you were joking.

There’s a lot that is risible in Labour’s ongoing attempts to find a Three Waters arrangement the nation might even grudgingly accept. The Water Services Entities Act was passed in December — and within hours a second bill that included extensive amendments to the first was introduced to Parliament. In fact, that bill is as long as the Act it seeks to amend. Now, the government will introduce and pass further legislation to implement the changes Hipkins announced last Thursday — as well as “associated matters” — all before this year’s election.

Jason Smith: The overlooked part of Three Waters

Since PM Hipkins's February announcement that there would be changes to the Government's controversial Three Waters programme, anticipation has grown about the reboot by the Hipkins-led Labour Government. Something clearly is deeply wrong with the programme and the legislation already in place.

Despite the window-dressing announcement last week of how the government will amend aspects of the Three Waters laws it's already passed, the central Three Waters idea which Government has been advancing all along has been staunchly defended by barely being mentioned at all.