David McLOUGHLIN 08/11/2001Furore over signs of the times
| One of New Zealand's more colourful
protest campaigns is going to court, with Auckland City Council trying
to have a forest of signs bearing stinging attacks on Its water company
removed from a suburban front yard.
The signs, many of which personally attack two city councillors, are on the property of Ike Finau in Auckland's Grey Lynn. Mr Finau says nobody has complained about the signs except the two councillors, former deputy mayor Bruce Hucker and Penny Sefuiva. The council says the signs are an eyesore in breach of city bylaws, to which Mr Finau replies they are political statements and he is exercising his constitutional right to freedom of political expression. But the signs are just the most visible part of an extraordinary campaign of civil disobedience carried out over the past three years by a group of Aucklanders opposed to the corporatisation of the city's water supplies and the introduction of user charges for water and sewage. The very active Water Pressure Group has been encouraging Aucklanders to refuse to pay the "waste water" part of their bills from Metrowater, the city council owned water company. When Metrowater disconnects non payers, a "turn-on gang" of Water Pressure Group members reconnects the water and puts massive concrete honchoing around the pipe to stop it being disconnected again. The group has an old fire engine which It takes on protest rallies. When the council threatened to send staff to Mr Finau's house to take down the signs, the engine was brought round with the intent of using Its pump and hose to defend the property. |
The group wants water to be included in property rates,
as It was till about a decade ago, when many parts of Auckland City did
not have water meters. Meters were installed and a user charge made
for each cubic metre of water used. Then Metrowater was created as
a council owned commercial company and user charges were levied for wastewater,
the polite name for sewage.
An average Auckland home with two adults and three children now pays about $1000 a year for water and wastewater, but the rates did not come down much when user charges were introduced and they keep rising faster than Inflation each year. Mr Finau says Metrowater keeps sending him bills for assessed usage, some up to $600, but "I just throw them in the rubbish". The sign forest went up just over two years ago, when the city council voted to retain Metrowater and user charges. The vote was one of several that followed the 1998 local body elections, at which the Labour-Alliance joint ticket City Vision promised to abolish the company and reinclude water charges in the rates. Mr Finau says he is furious that the two City Vision councillors in his ward, Dr Hucker and Mrs Sefuiva, did not vote to abolish Metrowater. He reacted by erecting the signs. But Dr Hucker says Mr Finau has oversimplified what happened. |
He says that several votes were taken on Metrowater
and its fee structures were changed so that low-volume users paid less,
Dr Hucker still favours abolishing Metrowater, but concedes there is little
chance of that happening with the present council.
He says the signs at Mr Finau's place are a breach of the sign bylaw. "He was asked to remove them but he put a lot more up. It's nothing to do with the content of the signs, It's to do with enforcing the bylaws." The council is seeking an Injunction in Auckland District Court against the signs, but Mr Finau plans to argue that there is no bylaw breach because the signs are not commercial. Water Pressure Group spokeswoman Penny Bright says the organisation has reconnected "hundreds" of households, Asked if it concerns her that households that pay their water bills are subsidising those that are not, she says: "We don't see It that way. Poor people are subsidising the rich through their water bills and taking direct action is the only thing we are left with." Metrowater spokeswoman Lisa Finucane says: "Refusing to pay is like saying you don't recognise red lights so you will run them." Referring to the Water Pressure Group, she adds: "They are an important part of society and we listen to what they say. That's why we changed our billing system to reduce charges for low users."  |
NZ Herald Article by Brian Rudman
Water Pressure Groups complaint letter to the NZ
Herald Editor
Reply from NZ Herald Editor Gavin Ellis
Response from WPG to the Reply form Gavin Ellis NZ Herald
Editor
Open letter from WPG to Auckland City Council
The Dominion Article David Mc LOUGHLIN
The Dominion Article David Mc LOUGHLIN
| Home | Join | Legal | F.A.Q | News | History | Press | Reconnect | Links | Photo |
This
site aims to let the Auckland City Council know what the people of Auckland
think of the misuse of public assets
Whilst
every effort is made to verify information contained in this site The Water
Pressure Group accepts no liability
Site
last up dated 22/11/2001
best
viewed in 800 x 600 resolution or higher with Netscape
for
problems or comments about this site contact webmaster@water-pressure-group.org.nz
design~by~WebHaus
Copyright
© 2001