So hand proposed boundary changes are now out, and there our major moves in Christchurch. Christchurch East has lost the most people, and so needs the most people added. The suburbs being added are Shirley, Mairehau and Bromely – ie some of the most Labour areas in Christchurch Central and Port Hills, which will make those two seats very hard for Labour to win. Port Hills loses Sydenham, Waltham and Beckenham to Central, in a move that makes little sense from a community or geographic point of view. Port Hills then gains Halswell, Westmorland and Akaroa, which are very blue areas. Beyond Ruth Dyson’s personal appeal, this will be a very hard seat for Labour to keep hold of.
Wigram and Selwyn have seen a lot of growth, and so not too many changes. Moving Hei Hei from Wigram to Selwyn seems to be a move that needlessly breaks up communities. Ilam is the only electorate that doesn’t change, which is difficult, considering every other electorate is moving significantly around it. As there is such a major redraw in all the other electorates, it would make sense if Ilam’s boundaries were on the table too. Waimakariri may lose Redwood, one of the urban centres of Labour vote. This looks like becoming a more rural, rather than urban electorate, which may mean that National can transition from Kate Wilkinson to someone new. All in all, these are pretty dire boundary changes for the left.
Encouraging noises being made by Lianne Dalziel about the covered stadium project:
Dalziel said the stadium deal was a “white elephant” for the city and if elected mayor on October 12 one of her first calls would be to arrange a meeting with the Government to talk about new ways the stadium could progress with more outside investment.
Also interesting in this story was the idea put by council candidate Faimeh Burke that maybe, just maybe, some of the other Canterbury councils could contribute to a stadium:
It also appears money will not be coming from the two district councils that border Christchurch to the north and south. Both the Waimakariri and Selwyn district councils poured cold water on any suggestions their ratepayers should help pay for the stadium. The issue was raised by independent city council candidate Faimeh Burke who said other Canterbury councils should be contributing. “Why should it be just Christchurch ratepayers who pay the local public share? It will be a facility for the whole of Canterbury. The Wellington region built the Westpac Stadium, not just Wellington City ratepayers. That model should also apply here.”
Of course, people who live in these districts will expect to attend said stadium. Not that there are any stats on it, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the people who choose to live in these post-suburban cultural wastelands were actually bigger consumers of rugby than the people who live in the CCC rating zone. Rolleston alone has tripled in size over the last seven years, and Selwyn district is the fasting growing region in the country. They have a rating base to match. But it’s the people who live here who will foot the bill for this thing that we didn’t ask for.
I don’t believe that a super-city model is right for Canterbury, but I do think we need to have a discussion about how Christchurch City interacts with it’s two neighbouring councils – who have benefited massively from the residential displacement caused by the quake, and whose citizens continue to use City Council facilities, and who work in City jobs – yet have council’s that refuse to contribute anything to the massive outlay on public facilities that the CCC is (being forced into) undertaking.
Oh dear. Despite it being the seventh water contamination issue in the Selwyn district since November, their councillors are apparently “stumped” as to why that might be. I wonder if these councillors have watched the Campbell Live story on the Selwyn river running dry, or have heard anything about the Government’s subsidised irrigation scheme. Maybe the whole sacking of ECan thing passed them by?
It certainly feels like there have been more water contamination incidents since the government scrapped the regional council in 2010. Of course, that was meant to be all about “better resource management”, but was clearly a move to ensure industrial farmers had all the water they needed, environment be damned. Council officials want to pretend that there is no link between the increase in dairy cows, the reduction in river flows, and the increase in boil water notices, but they can’t honestly think the public is stupid enough to buy it. The boil water notices are becoming more frequent, affecting more people, and most worryingly, are getting closer to Christchurch.
This incident hits the 9000 residents of Rolleston, the “town of the future” to Christchurch’s west that has seen massive growth in the last two decades.
After the quakes, a large number of people have moved out there; the expansion of subdivisions is frankly alarming. One of the things this incident shows, apart from the worrying bovine-led march of Escherechia coli, is the inability of the Selwyn council to provide for the rapid expansion which it has been encouraging. Both Selwyn and Waimakariri councils have encouraged rapid expansion if their satellite towns, which have been seen as desirable due to bare land, low rates, and a reasonably easy commute into Christchurch for school or work. It may be that the discount rates also play out with discount services for their unlucky residents.
Rebuilding Christchurch 