Protesters rally for ECan

BY PAUL GORMAN

LATEST: Protesters gathered outside the National Party office in Montreal St today, to protest the Government's decision to sack the ECan councillors.

About 25 people with banners calling for the Government to retain the elected regional representatives protested outside the office of National Party MP Nicki Wagner.

No ECan election until 2013

The Government's sacking of Environment Canterbury (ECan) councillors will deny hundreds of thousands of Cantabrians the right to vote for regional representation this year.

Regional divisions over the future use of freshwater have come home to roost.

However, critics of the Government move say it has struck at the heart of democracy and opens the way for large-scale irrigation for the dairy industry.

Up to seven politically appointed commissioners will run ECan in place of 14 elected councillors, who will be out of a job around the start of May.

Instead of being in October as scheduled, the next elections for the regional council have been postponed until the end of 2013.

The jobs of ECan chief executive Bryan Jenkins, his directors and other staff will be in the hands of the commissioners.

Councillors were told of the decisions in a teleconference yesterday by Environment Minister Nick Smith and Local Government Minister Rodney Hide.

The Government is pushing through a bill under urgency that will also give the commissioners extra powers to impose moratoria on water takes and to make decisions on water conservation orders.

Green groups are outraged the special powers will allow commissioners charged with setting up a new regional water infrastructure to also decide on the proposed Hurunui River water conservation order.

They may also revisit the conservation order on the Rakaia River, which has been in existence for more than 20 years.

Troubleshooter Dame Margaret Bazley was named commission chairwoman-designate. The Government will decide in the next month on up to six other commissioners to join her.

At the last local body elections, 378,512 people were eligible to vote in the regional council election. However, only 156,730 did.

Deposed ECan chairman Alec Neill sounded a warning to other regional councils about unprecedented special legislation being passed.

"This is a big call because there's always a political downside. To that end, a message has been sent to other regional councils."

Neill was not prepared to discuss whether he might want to be a commissioner.

Smith said there would be no extra cost to ratepayers of appointing commissioners, although others disagreed, saying commissioners would be paid far more than the average $52,000 a year councillors' salary and more also than the chairman's $142,000 package.

Asked how the Government calculated it would cost no more and how much commissioners would be paid, Smith said he was "not prepared to speculate further".

He also defended the Government's decision not to consult with the public about the move, which had had a "level" of support from grassroots democracy in the form of the region's city and district councils.

The special powers being given to commissioners had not been offered to ECan councillors, Smith said. "It would be difficult to justify giving substantial new powers ... to a council in which the community has patently lost confidence."

Bazley, described by Neill as a "very competent restructuring expert", arrived 13 minutes late for a scheduled 1pm meeting with him.

This was her first visit to ECan, she told media on the front steps, and there was "an exciting opportunity ahead of us".

She had been approached to take on the job in the last few days.

Asked if she could give ECan staff any assurances about their jobs she said: "I'm not giving any assurances to anything."

An hour earlier, Jenkins and Neill held a packed staff briefing explaining the decision. Both men received applause for their efforts since former National deputy prime minister Wyatt Creech completed his report on ECan and Canterbury mayors joined forces to criticise the council.

Deputy chairwoman Jo Kane broke from the 10.30am teleconference to tell media of the Government's decision, causing concern from ECan communications staff not wanting the news released ahead of the noon staff briefing.

"My role as a councillor from what I understand finishes on the 1st of May.

"Angry? No. The word I would probably use is I have contempt for the way this has been carried out. This is the negation of a democratic pro-cess of the highest order," Kane said.

"Today the sun's shining and it feels like I should be in Fiji. That's what coups are about, and that's exactly what's happened here."

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