Bruce Bisset: Time to tackle this toxic culture

Bruce Bisset.

Incredible as it may seem, the dysfunction clouding the judgment of the Hawke's Bay Regional Council has deepened; every policy and principle debated now seems destined to come wrapped in controversy because of what I believe is a lack of openness, care and clarity such as is required from an environmental guardian.

The latest scandal: failure to ensure a notice of motion tabled by councillor Rex Graham in June was, as standing orders require, on the agenda for this week's regional planning committee meeting.

That motion aspired to commit HBRC to a plan change to ensure our water supply was not threatened by oil and gas exploration - appropriate, given the meeting was debating a set of principles around oil industry consents - but it was wholly ignored.

You might think excluding oil drilling from the vicinity of the aquifers feeding our urban areas and watering our high-value agriculture is the sort of no-brainer a regional council would fall over itself to support.

Even if the motion had, as Cr Graham mildly suggested, "accidentally fallen off the table", it could still have been included as an additional matter for consideration - but no.

It was a Pyrrhic victory that the (unenforceable) principles staff had proposed failed to get the necessary support.

Normally there would be a rewrite before trying again to adopt some overview position but it's unclear whether any such revisit will take place.

This because, despite strategic development manager James Palmer stating (in February) the council should bring in such rules before they were needed, he (in June) said with the oil industry pulling out of the area such rules could wait until the next major regional plan review in 2020-21. The council subsequently agreed.

So these principles may well lie unconsidered until then - but anything can happen in five years.

I simply note a consent to drill was issued to Tag Oil in May for its Boar Hill prospect at Porangahau.

They'll probably on-sell it and the buyer may drill there before 2021.

This nonsense is symptomatic of the entire council being poisoned by what I can only describe as a toxic culture, infected from the top.

As voters, we can't sack staff " but we can sack councillors.

It is not the "Hastings Four" at fault for this situation.

On the contrary, councillors Belford, Beaven, Barker and Graham were specifically elected as "new broom" candidates and have worked to counter the closed-shop indifference consuming the public goodwill the council may have enjoyed.

Now, I believe the rest of the region must grasp the nettle and tip the balance of power in favour of reform.

Napier voters need to "get" the fact hoary stalwarts Alan Dick and Dave Pipe have warmed their seats while this growing dysfunction has become epidemic.

Divisiveness will not be solved by re-electing them, nor by playing revolving chairs with their up-and-coming mates.

Replacing the retiring Christine Scott with apologist understudy Martin Williams will not effect change.

With Andrew Newman's job also up for grabs, a more-unified council willing to part company with the elitist business-first way of supposedly safeguarding our precious resources is essential to our long-term regional wellbeing.

Problem is, there is a dearth of decent candidates to oppose them - which is why, dear readers, if you think you have half a chance and wish to see real change in the way this shower operates, you have one week to lodge your nomination to stand for election, in Napier.

It's not just to protect the port from being hocked to pay for the dam. To protect all our treasures, we must unite behind change.

- Bruce Bisset is a freelance writer and poet. All opinions expressed here are his and not those of Hawke's Bay Today.