The Ministry for Primary Industries estimates that annually 0.16 Maui dolphins die as a result of fishing-related activity, and the fishing industry is working hard to reduce this further.
We acknowledge that fishing effects have been higher in the past, especially pre-2003, before a series of closures of fishing areas to protect the known Maui dolphin habitat.
The Moana NZ and Sanford initiative goes even further in an effort to reduce the risk of fishing further still.
Dr JEREMY HELSON
Chief Executive Fisheries Inshore NZ
Hardly fantastic
Councillor Charlie Anderson's recent comments about slipway charges are ill-considered and have a whiff of the green-eyed monster about them.
If he were to observe how it is used on an average day it will be seen that the activity there is, unsurprisingly, representative of our whole community. For sure there will be some very shiny rigs but there are also a lot of battered tinnies and everything in between. Slipway activity is most definitely not just confined to those who have an "extravagant lifestyle" and therefore his argument that complaints about user-pays regimes being confined to the whingeing wealthy are without substance.
Mr Anderson uses the word "fantastic" to describe the new facility. That's inappropriate, because for many years Whanganui ratepayers have had to put up with a substandard launching area compared to most other port cities.
There are no light towers with armed guards in the new, improved site, no valet launching or complimentary boat washes, merely a concrete surface and a toilet -- both basic necessities and both long overdue.
In my view, that makes the thing adequate, not fantastic.
The efforts of council to approve the general appearance of our city in recent years are welcome, but they have been confined mostly to the inner city.
Boaties are people too. As such, we pay rates and support local businesses like anyone else. Asking us to pay for an adequately prepared slipway is equivalent to charging an entry fee to Kowhai Park or the boardwalk.
Just try getting those ones to fly, Mr Anderson!
D B TASTARD
Papaiti
Good guys and bad guys
I see Nicky Hager is at it again. Perhaps he should go out with the troops and point out the bad guys from the good guys; that's if the bad guys have not shot him in the back first.
They are past masters at hiding among the civilians.
Perhaps those lawyers should set their sights on Isis and their mates, who actually target civilians.
They would be busy for the rest of their lives.
A H McCOLL
Whanganui
