John Raine: Holy Water

As the coalition Government reviews Te Mana o Te Wai policy, it must come down on the side of both science and common sense. We must not move to a future where Iwi authorities have an exclusive co-governance role, with the additional costs, cultural impositions and rent seeking this involves. Public concern and anger over future water management in New Zealand are running hot across the country.

Pee Kay: You don’t miss the water until the well runs dry

“You don’t miss the water until the well runs dry” is an expression meaning that until something is gone you take it for granted and don’t appreciate what you have.

Water is the essence of life and in New Zealand we are fortunate to have an abundance of water. All living things on our planet need water to survive. In our modern society, water plays a vital role in things like comfort, hygiene, transport, science and even mythology.

Peter Williams: The Nats are considering keeping Te Mana o te Wai

The Taxpayers' Union has been alerting supporters about the "Te Mana o te Wai" (literally meaning the mana of the water) requirements, which are still applicable to local councils' environmental planning/consenting.

It is becoming clear that the Coalition Government is continuing down Labour's path of undemocratic and costly co-governance due to pressure from the Wellington bureaucracy, LGNZ, and the various special interests who are "experts" in tikanga.

Nick Clark: Towards a system that respects property rights - Tidy tweaks or real change?

After decades of planning gridlock, the government has promised to put property rights at the heart of New Zealand’s resource management system. But will its latest reforms deliver lasting change or just patch up the mess we already have?

The government is proposing sweeping changes across three packages covering infrastructure and development, the primary sector, and freshwater management. The direction is largely positive: streamlining infrastructure consenting, reducing housing barriers, easing regulatory burdens on farmers, and providing greater freshwater flexibility.

Peter Williams: The Government scuttles ‘Te Mana o te Wai’

I’ve got some great news: we’ve won Te Mana o Te Wai.

You’ll recall Te Mana o Te Wai came about as a result of David Parker’s National Policy Statement on Freshwater Management and required councils to figure out what the “mana” of the water entailed and how best to preserve it. That included the spiritual health of the water and was, apparently, different in every region or iwi’s rohe (geographical area).

Jordan [Williams] called me last night and said “turn on Parliament TV right now – the Government is about to snooker the regional councils rushing through their Te Mana o Te Wai rules”.

David Farrar: Fed Farmers on the cost of the mana of water

Federated Farmers states:

This week, Federated Farmers have written to Otago councils calling for urgent transparency on new policy aiming to protect the mana of water, known as Te Mana o Te Wai.

You may have seen this in the media, as it’s been picked up far and wide.

John Porter: Can We Fight Critical Race Theory?

Hello, it’s John Porter on Bay FM and today I’m talking about Critical Race Theory (CRT).

No, not heard of CRT? Well, it’s a significant issue around the world these days and seems to be becoming embedded in the thinking of certain sectors of our society.

Critical Race Theory (CRT) seeks to explain the multitude of ways that race and racism have become embedded in modern societies. The core idea is that we need to look beyond individual acts of racism and make structural changes to prevent and remedy racial discrimination.

Daily Telegraph: More work needed on freshwater rules - Fed Farmers

Changes to freshwater rules are a step in the right direction but more work needs to be done if the new government are serious about restoring farmer confidence, Federated Farmers freshwater spokesperson Colin Hurst says.

“The National Policy Statement on Freshwater Management is without a doubt the most damaging regulation for farmers introduced by the previous Government.

Peter Williams: Come in Cranmer

Thomas Cranmer’s real identity has been blown.

The lawyer and blogger and tweeter who has exposed many a scandal in the last year or so had one of his stories published under his real name in the English Spectator magazine in April.

Graham Adams: Hipkins betrays Three Waters promise

A law change emphasises Labour’s contempt for non-Maori

Jack Tame related in the NZ Herald last week how he had recently driven around the Nelson area and found fewer billboards protesting against Three Waters than earlier in the year.

The Newstalk ZB host and anchor of TVNZ’s Q&A thought this tallied with his observation that “much of the anger around Three Waters has dissipated since Kieran McAnulty took over the [Local Government] portfolio and the government reset the plan”. He also reckoned optimistically that the project is “probably more popular and less contentious than some of the pushback would have us believe”.

Thomas Cranmer: Three Waters Amendment Bill before Parliament

The new Three Waters amendment bill is intended to increase the number of water services entities to ten and introduce a Funding Agency but only makes a bad policy worse.

The Three Waters legislation was back before Parliament yesterday in the form of an amendment bill which is intended to implement changes to the reforms announced by Prime Minister Hipkins and Local Government Minister, Kieran McAnulty in April.

Those changes came about as a result of the new Prime Minister’s “policy refresh” which asked McAnulty to consider options for reform of the Three Waters proposal, including timing and sequencing, the number of entities and boundaries and alternative approaches for Māori representation and involvement.

Ele Ludemann: Te Mana o Te Wai even worse than co-governance

Co-governance of the assets to be taken from councils under the government’s Three Five Waters legislation gets a lot of attention.

John Roughen shows the costs and risks from Te Mana o Te Wai statements are much, much worse:

Peter Winsley: He Puapua is being implemented, however all is not lost

The Prime Minister is committed to “bread and butter” issues and has dropped or put on hold some government work programmes. However, Tiriti-related work is still being pushed hard, and He Puapua, Three Waters, and the new curriculum are well underway.

He Puapua and other initiatives have been undertaken in secret, without significant consultation or public debate and without an electoral mandate. In relation to Three Waters, probably less than one percent of the non-Māori population are aware that the Te Mana o te Wai statements that iwi and hapu issue are powerful enough to give tribes effective control of New Zealand’s water resources.

Te Tiriti o Waitangi is now at the core of many New Zealand statutes, constitutional and policy documents. It is disquieting that neither the current nor former Prime Minister, when asked, were able to state all three Tiriti Articles.

Graham Adams: What Hipkins doesn’t want to tell us about Three Waters

Unfortunately, there is little evidence so far that McAnulty will be any more forthcoming or helpful about Three Waters than Mahuta was.

The focus on co-governance obscures direct iwi control of water.

The clock is ticking. October’s election is just over six months away. But despite the Prime Minister’s assurances in early February that the public would be told in “another couple of weeks” of any changes to Three Waters, he has yet to tell us what his government intends.

John Porter: Co-governance Is a Con Job

Today I’m advocating that Co-governance is nothing but a huge confidence trick being played on New Zealand by Maori activists and skillfully validated by Ardern’s treacherous Government.

Co-governance is most definitely not Maori activists’ goal: Maori sovereignty is the objective!

Co-governance is merely a stepping stone. The previous stepping stone was Co-management.

Graham Adams: The stealth manoeuvre taking Three Waters to Five Waters

Adding coastal and geothermal water at the last minute seriously undermines democratic process. Even Cabinet may have been kept in the dark.

Asked in an interview last Friday on The Platform whether he agreed that Three Waters had indeed become Five Waters, Winston Peters quipped: “It’s not Five Waters; it’s Six Waters now. The sixth one is they’re pissing down your back and telling you it’s raining.”

That graphic image was just part of his criticism of the last-minute manoeuvre to extend the reach of Te Mana o Te Wai statements to cover not only freshwater but coastal and geothermal water too — as well as pointing out the mainstream media’s willingness to ignore it.

Damien Grant: Like it or not, we've got a new democracy

The Minister of Māori Development, Willie Jackson, recently declared that “Democracy has changed... This is not a majority democracy.”

He is right. Aotearoa has changed its understanding of democratic norms, and we are establishing different political and economic rights based on a person’s whakapapa.

Some of the more excitable elements on the fringes of our fractured community have latched onto the He Puapua report as evidence of an accelerated time-frame for this constitutional restructuring, but these changes have been underway for a generation and, as Jackson noted, have arrived.

Graham Adams: A taniwha rears its head in the Three Waters debate

A question many of us have been dying to ask about the Three Waters bill is: “Could the legislation allow a taniwha to stop the construction of a dam, or any other planned water infrastructure?”

It is not a frivolous question, as anyone who can remember the events of 2002 will attest. That year, work on the Waikato expressway, near Meremere, was halted and plans modified after Ngati Naho hapū claimed it was traversing the territory of a one-eyed taniwha, Karu Tahi.

An integral part of matauranga Māori (Māori knowledge), taniwha are mythical creatures said to live in or near lakes, rivers and the sea.