Blame Labour and Greens Crs for the sewerage spill

Peter Bassett writes:

On 27 May 2021, Wellington City Council’s Long-Term Plan Committee faced a clear fork in the road.

Officers presented councillors with water investment options, including one — Water Option 3 — that contained a $391 million wastewater renewals programme. It was not vague. It was explicit. It was designed to reduce sewage pollution, starting with the central city and south-coast catchments now making headlines.

At the same meeting, officers recommended Cycleways Option 3, a staged programme set out in the consultation document presented to councillors. 

Councillors were not choosing between water and nothing. They were choosing priority. 

What happened next is the hinge moment of Wellington’s current disgrace. 

An amendment was moved by then-councillor Tamatha Paul, seconded by Jill Day (now Labour Party President), to adopt Cycleways Option 4, expanding the programme to $226 million over ten years, compared with $120 million under Option 3, as set out in that consultation document. 

That amendment passed. 

Accelerated wastewater renewal did not.

So let’s be very clear on this. They were given an option to spend $391 million on improving wastewater and $120 million on cycleways. The now Green MP and now Labour Party President moves to spend instead $226 million on cycleways and not to accelerate the wastewater renewal.

The Wellington press gallery now demands accountability, inquiries and transparency — yet appears to have collectively forgotten the meeting where the decisive trade-off was made.

Columns thunder about “decades of under-investment”, a phrase that has the great advantage of removing responsibility from the true enablers. Contractors are blamed. Systems are blamed. Governments are blamed.

What is not mentioned is the moment when councillors explicitly chose more cycleways over fixing basic infrastructure.

Every Labour and Green Councillor voted for cycleways over wastewater. Great job.

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