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Gloves off: the DCC truth as Acklin sees it
Regarding the ODT report (17.6.25) of councillors supporting Sophie Barker. The truth needs to be told.
Mayor Radich has been the most accommodating and supportive mayor toward councillors since 2010, encouraging everyone to have their say, at length at the council table. His two predecessors pushed their own agendas and controlled the narrative at huge cost to the ratepayer.
Since the start of Mayor Radich’s term as mayor, councillors who were aligned with and fond of the previous mayor sprayed their venom wide and far, taking potshots at Mayor Radich at every opportunity. Two of his running mates during the election turned on him immediately after the election.
To top this off, two councillors have tried to interfere with the operational part of the council, which has been extremely disruptive.
Councils are facing unprecedented challenges with rising infrastructure costs and a lack of funding support from central government. This means they need to make decisions to pull back on spending. The recent DCC’s long-term plan process shows that the majority of this council doesn’t care about rising debt and rates increases. Mayor Radich, deputy mayor Lucas and a few councillors tried hard to keep this expenditure to a minimum, but were out voted by the spendthrifts looking for selected votes in the upcoming election.
Mayor Radich has worked tirelessly to perform his role and lead this council. He has achieved a number of things he set out to do. Focused councils attention on vital infrastructure including retaining ownership of our water assets, driving the South Dunedin flood mitigation works, and saving the one-way system. But due to alternative views of his elected critics, things like controlling council debt and reducing rates increases still need to be done.
That is what Mayor Radich stands for, and will achieve, if supportive people are elected with the same desire.
Bill Acklin
Dunedin city councillor
No photo ops
The compelling arguments against gold mining by Santana of Suzie Keith, Jonathan West, and latterly Matthew Sole (Not inevitable ODT 13.6.25) need to be heeded.
High gold prices are touted as the reason for the fast-track applications by this and other gold mining companies, without doing a cost-benefit analysis of all impacts, financial and environmental, on the other side of the ledger.
High gold prices are now a very good reason to recycle the approximately 98,000 tonnes of e-waste per year that end up in our landfills. As well as gold, copper and silver can also be recovered. It is perverse to continue wasting hard-won precious metals and rare earths by dumping them. However, recycling doesn’t make for good photo opportunities.
Chris Henderson
Lumsden
Stop the Bill
The Regulatory Standards Bill has to be stopped in its tracks.
Slyly disguised as a watchdog on legislation it has the potential to destroy democracy in New Zealand and replace it with an oligarchy determined to protect property rights over public good.
It proposes to elevate the Minister of Regulation (David Seymour) to the most powerful position in Parliament by allowing him to hand-pick a committee of five to seven like-minded members to examine both new and retrospective legislation against conformity with their cynical, monetarist ideology.
If Christopher Luxon supports this Bill he is no friend to the New Zealand public and deserves to give up his status as prime minister to the leader of a party which received 8.64% of the vote in the last election. But we don’t deserve this threat to our fragile egalitarian society.
Islay Little
Dunedin
Bugger the shareholders, we want our butter
Does charity begin at home? It appears not.
I, like everyone else, am angry at the ridiculous prices we have to pay for dairy products, especially given the vast amount we produce here.
We are told prices are linked to ‘‘international dairy markets’’. Why? I don’t care how much a slab of butter is in Korea or the cost of a block of cheese in Dubai.
Big dairy producers here would view the domestic market as being minuscule compared to overseas markets.
That’s fine. If for argument’s sake the local market was say 1.5%, then these conglomerates should be forced to sell that percentage of their product at a much cheaper, maybe just break-even price to New Zealanders.
I know (but care little) about shareholders and it may be that we are at the mercy of overseas countries who may own swathes of land and product here .
It is not selfish to ask why are we not looking after ourselves first.
Graham Bulman
Roslyn
Praise given to ODT opinion contributors
How lucky we are to have thinkers and writers of the calibre of your correspondents Metiria Stanton Turei, John Drummond and Sir Ian Taylor (there are others).
Their recent pieces in the ODT on the relevance of Te Tiriti (30.5-25) , climate change (17.5.25) and the Regulatory Standards Bill (12.5.25) had me saying ‘‘Yes’’ more than once as I read them.
In response to their opinion pieces, these writers are often critcised, sniped at or personally attacked by some ODT readers for their inclusive, humanitarian perspectives, so I thought that a little praise for their time and effort was due. Please know that your clever use of metaphor, humour or just doing the fact checking is appreciated and enjoyed.
Bruce Cull
Queensberry
On the other hand
I would like to comment on the letter of Frances Anderson (ODT 11.5.25) in which they vehemently support the opinion piece of Metiria Stanton Turei, which strongly supported the Te Pāti Māori members of Parliament in their disgraceful behaviour, which has resulted in a ban from attending Parliament.
They were particularly aggrieved by my suggestion that Metiria Stanton Turei and other Māori activists should attempt to ‘‘grapple with the darker aspects of Māori culture’’ instead of putting their energies into race baiting.
For this I was informed that I was bullying their current identity group.
As an example, one of the darker aspects of Māori culture is the heavily disproportionate, seemingly routine murder, committed by whānau and or associates, on defenceless children.
The likes of Metiria Stanton Turei and her activist friends find this an uncomfortable truth, and instead of trying to find a solution within Māoridom, they choose to put their energies into attempting to divide the country along racial lines.
Dave Tackney
Fairfield
