Destroyed farm buildings and Poutere Road caused by the Waipawa River in Hawke's Bay. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Destroyed farm buildings and Poutere Road caused by the Waipawa River in Hawke's Bay. Photo / Mark Mitchell
EDITORIAL
Cyclone Gabrielle has in a week shifted New Zealand’s physical and political landscapes.
It has been a harsh blast of reality for people about the country’s current level of risk to natural disasters, reinforcing the climate lessons meted out in the first weeks of the year.
Comfortable timeframes fortaking action in the future and all the excuses are meaningless. We are dealing with consequences now while aiming to reduce the severity of them down the track.
From a political point of view, the various storms New Zealand has suffered, particularly the cyclone, have both complicated life and simplified it.
Complicated it in the sense that the Government has a lot of expensive work to do, but simplified it in that the basic tasks - and the need for them - have become very clear.
There are no positive sides to a disaster that has taken and upended lives, causing grief, worry, and destruction.
Sisters Rachelle Phillips, right, and Ange are reunited after Cyclone Gabrielle overwhelmed the Mangaone River and swept away access to the area in Hawke's Bay. Photo / Mike Scott
But the cyclone has blown through some of New Zealand’s traditional weaknesses: A lack of vision; a tendency to minimise and be complacent about problems and to penny-pinch; a focus on the now rather than thinking ahead and investing for the future.
None of that should apply to this problem now. All the written words about how many of us live in areas prone to floods and sea level rises have leapt from the page into our faces.
It affects people living in poorly drained urban areas and isolated rural communities, as well as those who can afford seaside second homes, lifestyle blocks, and clifftop mansions. It strikes at the interconnectedness between those who provide key parts of our infrastructure and who produce meat, dairy, fruit, vegetables, and wine, and the rest of us who buy them.
We now need some of New Zealand’s traditional strengths: An ability to unite and help others in adversity; to come up with practical ways of solving problems; to work hard and be innovative.
This could be a game-changer in terms of October’s election because, on one level, disaster relegates the vote’s importance - there’s so much to deal with now, decisions to be made, input to be sought. None of it can be put off until later in the year.
On another level, it inevitably pushes the prime minister and other senior ministers into less partisan-seeming roles and elevates the importance of being able to wield power, rather than only being able to talk about hypothetical policies.
There’s some reassurance in the fact that the present Beehive leadership are old hands at crises, and have navigated the past weeks competently.
Illustration / Rod Emmerson
Rather like when the pandemic first hit, Opposition parties are suddenly faced with the “how” of responding to a problem, rather than the “why” of dealing with it.
There will be value in probing and asking questions to try to ensure recovery occurs in the smartest way possible. Expertise gained from previous rebuilding efforts such as the Christchurch earthquakes should be useful. Researchers in disaster risk management and related fields should be heard.
