I had a real good message, but then lost it. Too bad, it would have taught everyone a good lesson.

Does nobody understand how Councils work? Reality people, either the USER pays for a wall to be built, or RATES do. A bunch of you are moaning about Council not charging in and building a wall all along the sea front and SAVING a bunch of dummies who choose to buy properties in an idiotic place! Point 1, I doubt the involved house owners could all afford, nor would they want to pay for a full beach length wall to be built. Point 2, I don't see why the hell the rates of the rest of the district should help them pay for it! This guy has built illegally. If I was a neighbouring owner whose property was being eroded further because of his wall, I'd bulldoze it myself. 'Common sense' would dictate we all follow the law, regardless of whether it is Council or the Police who indicate it to us. People need to grow up and stop wasting Council's time with petty complaining that is ill informed at best!

People forget that councilors are voted in to protect the citizens. Councillors seem to forget this the day they enter office. Most councillors it would seem though, in every town (from what I read in the news) are just money greedy people whom once in the council, seem to hide behind a wall of "smart" laws made by people in the past who believed they were smart enough to make good salaries, keep the money pouring in, and dish it out to over priced contracts and therefore simply couldn't be wrong. So far councils have been doing this very well. This government we now have promised us that silly red tape laws would be cut thus making it easier to better our lives/living arrangements etc without all the red tape laws. Time for them to step up the game. This bloke is a classic example of a good kiwi bugger, who was not afraid to get his hands dirty (and at what cost to him self as you can't lift these blocks by hand) to protect his livelyhood, his family's interests and he saved rate payers dollars in the process. His neighbours could learn off him by helping themselves be protected by simply doing it. Get off ya butts and just do it. Protect your self. In a just and proper county, mr Lawrence would be a hero. "Good on you mate"

We have a bach on the west coast just north of Greymouth. We have been fighting with the council over the same issue for two and half years. We finally had to pay over $20,000 to lawyers and engineers to prove the council was out of order stopping us from moving our small bach away from the sea and a seawall we had resource consent to repair. In fact, they wanted us to put up a very expensive sea wall ($75,000)further out from our property. We would happily lend our support in this battle.

The council needs to start HELPING the community, especially in this circumstance, why would they let the sea batter their home? Theres a lot of different perspectives on looking at this one story, but the sensible thing would be to give the family some alternatives if what they have doesnt meet up with criteria. Instead of saying "take the wall down" when clearly there was a wall up prior to what they have now

the council has a lot to answer for, not just in hastings but all over NZ

While local bodies try their hardest to rid the local coast of sea front houses by making life difficult for the small guy, the same councils allow consent to remove shingle from the beach for commercial purposes just a few kms along the same beach. And making matters worse the same councils mine shingle from the local rivers and sell it around a large area of the North Island. One in ten truck loads of this mined shingle could help solve the erosion problem.

Some of you need to get a clue in my opinion. Saying 'good on yer mate' to this guys' poor attempt at (re)building an effective seawall seems based ignorance of how seawalls should work. The picture shows a the rebuilt structure as a solid wall, perpendicular to the wave energy which gives no ability for the waves' energy to be dissipated. From the descriptions of the previous wall which was made of irregular blocks, although 'ugly' would have actually been more effective at protecting this area home by dissipating the incoming wave energy along and through the wall.

He didn't 'fix' the wall at all, he simply made it worse: For himself , his neighbours (wave energy will be concentrated at the ends of the wall) and the public (less access, beach stripped of sand). It is the councils job to prevent this type of ignorant construction.

But of course people that have actually spent large periods of their life studying the dynamics of shorelines and the structures therein aren't as smart as this guy right? Sheesh. The average joe can't be an expert in everything

The Hastings District Council & primarily the CEO Keith (oh by the way I note that he (Keith 46) appears to have made ignorant blog comments along with half of the council employees)should be ashamed of themselves. Keith you are not telling the truth when you say to people that you have been actively working with Mark Lawrence over this issue. The truth is you are actively working AGAINST Mr lawrence and all the other residents of the Haumoana district. The beach was a bloody mess, not now of course, you knew he was working on this for some time rebuilding the original wall that had disintegrated (lets face it you make it your business to know these things dont you?!) So you play games with people and leave it until the minute when the wall is almost complete to behave badly. Does that make you feel powerful? Oh course it does Keith! You are not making any attempt to support the ratepayers to protect their properties however if the property was yours there would have been a fasttracked resource consent to build a water break such as the one proposed by WOW and all the Council resources would be thrown at the project starting with the beach in front of your residence. Ratepayers and people of Hawkes Bay have had a gutsful of your attitude and you are wondering why the Council was bombraded by abusive calls yesterday. Come on Rodney Hide I know you have been in consultation with the WOW group the time has come for good sense and support for the average New Zealander to prevail. Keith I hope the next major earthquake hits your home.Oh what a pity!!!!

Great, just jump on the Council bashing bandwagon. The fact is, the Council offered to move the houses on this beach 30 years ago to across the road and no-one took them up on it. Now, the Council is not going to spend a few MILLION dollars (yes, you are talking millions of dollars to build a seawall from Haumoana to Clifton) to save the few houses of people who think that buying a house that can't even be insured due to the eminent destruction by the sea is a good idea.

Considering the length of time this has been an issue in the area, no one has an excuse to not know that even maintenance on an existing seawall is a non-complying activity, and therefore consent is highly unlikely to be granted.

Good on the Council for sticking to their guns and standing up for all the OTHER ratepayers who made smarter property investments.

Councils only moan when no money goes there way,if there was a wall there and youve just fixed it then stuff them leave it up,the national govt was spose to get rid of these time wasting council people,how much has it cost the rate payers already,the family should have the rights to save there house,the only reason people dont use the councils these days is because they have no idea at all what things cost,and they have no idea.People who have dealt with them in the last two years will know all about there crap.