Councils want Army help: mayor

By Keith Newman

Local body leaders are poised to call for military cover to guard against millennium computer bug fallout, warns the mayor of one of the country's largest cities.

Waitakere mayor Bob Harvey said the plea for military backup was likely to be issued at a summit meeting of the 86 territorial local authorities to be held in closed session in Wellington tomorrow.

The summit will be addressed by the Prime Minister, Jenny Shipley, and Mr Harvey predicted those present would ask the Government to put the Army on standby in case of civil unrest from prolonged computer failures.

Civil Defence will maintain a full staff in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch on New Year's Eve because of the fear of isolated computer system failures in important utilities.

A special commission that the Government announced last month to stop the millennium bug wreaking havoc on public services has already raised concerns about the water supply and sewage disposal.

"The Year 2000 crisis is the greatest wake-up call you could have for the new millennium," said Mr Harvey, the Labour Party's new president.

"In Britain the Army is on standby, as it is in Ireland, France, Germany and Canada. I understand President Clinton will put the Army on standby in the US in July."

Mr Harvey said his city was one of those that had passed muster with the Auditor-General as having systems in place to deal with the computer bug, but others could expect a roasting tomorrow.

Local Government New Zealand wants the Auditor-General to identify the 19 councils that an audit of readiness deemed were putting their communities at risk.

Mr Harvey said local authorities had been meeting on the Year 2000 compliance issue since he raised it six months ago, but previously it was not even on the agenda.

"The horror in all of this is you are a victim of other people's systems," he said.

"If we don't get our computers right we won't be able to send out the rates ... The courts will be jammed for years."

Governments and everyone associated with the computer industry had known of the potential for millennium problems since 1952 but had claimed they would not happen.

The upshot was a $16 trillion global systems clean-up - money that could have been spent on the world's poor, he said.

A Defence Force spokesman, Wing Commander John Seward, said troops had been advised some months ago to consider taking holidays before December 27 in case they might be needed to support millennium "activities."