Water-use probe widens

A fourth Environment Canterbury (ECan) councillor has become embroiled in an Auditor-General's Office investigation.

Angus McKay joins Pat Harrow, Mark Oldfield and Bronwen Murray facing scrutiny for potential conflicts of interest in water use.

McKay, a Methven farmer who represents the Rakaia constituency, has said he has interests in a farm supplied by an irrigation scheme and that he might seek shares in the Barrhill-Chertsey irrigation scheme for his home farm.

Until recently, Harrow, Oldfield and Murray were the only regional councillors holding water consents who had been asked by the auditor-general to explain themselves after voting against proposed water-management charges.

McKay had previously said he had no concerns about the auditor-general becoming involved. "The chairman at the time [Sir Kerry Burke] said as individuals you have to own up to any interests, and we did. Well, I did."

Investigators from the office will be in Christchurch this week, and McKay said yesterday that he would meet them tomorrow.

"In the Ashburton-Ellesmere area there are a lot of people associated with water or human-effluent consents. It's pretty difficult to get away from it," he said.

Christchurch Central Labour MP Brendon Burns made the complaint to the auditor-general in July after the water-charge proposal was voted down and shelved for a year.

As a result, ECan's general rates rose 10.6 per cent rather than 2.7 per cent, and the council lost more than $2.15 million of expected user-pays income.

Burns confirmed yesterday that the auditor-general's two-person team was heading to Christchurch.

Burke warned regional councillors in March that they could be dismissed if they made money from undeclared conflicts of interest. He had gained a legal opinion from the auditor-general that said councillors with water consents had to "think carefully" before taking part in those discussions.

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