Three Waters and separate government: the elephant in the room
Many councils have spoken out against the Three Waters proposal, with most focussing on the high cost and the taking of ownership and control by a new national organisation. The public organisation Democracy Action has spoken against the proposal, “since the undemocratic co-governance provisions will bring more complexity, more bureaucracy, more costs – and a whole lot less democratic accountability”. The Taxpayers’ Union has pointed to “the lies about ‘ownership’, the unsuccessful buy off of the local government sector, and the parliamentary skullduggery”.There was considerable publicity when a group of law academics (professors and PhDs), publicised their opinion that the development of Three Waters raised constitutional concerns, because an entrenched privatisation provision (which was dropped following widespread condemnation) “creates a dangerous precedent”. That provision was a last-minute amendment that the Green Party had insisted on, in order to block possible future privatisation.
The claim that the Greens are opposed to privatisation is smoke and mirrors, a diversion and a con designed to misdirect public attention, away from what is going on. The Three Waters legislation takes all those resources out of public control and gives effective control, that key feature of ownership, to an undefined Maori organisation. That is privatisation in all but name.
