Oil Industry Needs to Face Facts

10 05 2012

This article originally appeared as an Opinion Piece in The Dominion Post on 10 May 2012.

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BP & Anadarko’s Deepwater Horizon rig going down, April 2010

Oil industry representative David Robinson’s Opinion Piece on Tuesday said it’s time for the truth about oil drilling. It promised facts but provided only rhetoric. Mr Robinson says there have been no ‘major incidents’ in oil production in New Zealand, which is simply not true. The following incidents, all undeniably major, are examples of facts the oil industry tries to keep to itself.

In 2007 the Umuroa facility, operated by Norway’s Prosafe and Australian company AWE, spilt 23 tons of crude oil off the Taranaki coast. The spill affected nearly 15 kilometres of coastline, took 232 days to clean up and resulted in a successful court prosecution.

In 2010 Austrian oil giant OMV accepted responsibility for a large spill from the Maari field that saw oil washing up on Kapiti Coast. The Rena disaster revealed just how ill equipped authorities are to contain anything beyond a minor inshore spill under perfect weather conditions.

The offshore wells in Taranaki are at depths of no more than 150 metres, the Raukumara Basin off East Cape where Petrobras has been given a permit to drill is up to 3,100m deep and the BP exploratory well that blew out in the Gulf of Mexico for three months in 2010 was at a depth of only 1,500m. Anadarko (one of the DeepWater Horizon companies) has plans to drill off the coast of Taranaki and Otago in up to 3,000m of water.

In 2009 the Montara spill off the west coast of Australia resulted in the equivalent of one Rena sized disaster every day for 74 days in a row. Why would New Zealand be immune from such risks?

Over the past 15 years 282 fatalities among Petrobras staff and contract workers have been documented in accidents at oil rigs and refineries. Petrobras has suffered 27 rig blowouts since 1980 and was the first company allowed to drill at depth in the Gulf of Mexico after the BP disaster. Just before oil was due to start flowing a production riser broke away, if it had happened a few days later there could have been a repeat of the Deepwater Horizon disaster less than a year later.

Claims that a recent GNS report on earthquakes and fracking in Taranaki suggest there is no credible link, overlook the fact pointed out by seismology expert Michael Hasting that the GNS seismic detectors are not calibrated for nor close enough to fracking operations to determine any relationship. GNS should also acknowledge they are contracted to the industry when they comment on overseas reports citing evidence of a direct link.

If the industry is committed as Mr Robinson says to proper public consultation then they should agree to all resource consent applications for mining activities being subject to full notification.

The industry asks the public to trust them on their record in Taranaki. But with only 40 wells drilled, no independent scientific studies, sparse regulation and minimal monitoring, we need to consider the overseas evidence.

Professor Avner Vengosh from Duke University has led some of the most comprehensive studies on water quality related to fracking and found a direct link between water contamination and hydro-fracking. Professor Karlis Muehlenbachs at the University of Alberta cites the industry’s own publications that show up to 60% of well casings will fail within 20 years of construction. The list of peer-reviewed independent studies showing problems with the practice is growing but there are still huge gaps in knowledge about health and environmental impacts in particular.

This week it has been revealed that Germany is following France, Bulgaria and a number of other jurisdictions in Canada, USA and Australia with an indefinite ban on hydraulic fracturing.

New Zealand has too much to lose if large-scale petroleum extraction goes ahead. Our economy depends on quality food production, processing and exporting – why put it all on the line for a few years of income from petroleum exports? When consumers learn that Taranaki farmers are being paid by the oil industry to use their farms to absorb highly toxic fracking waste, our milk and meat will quickly lose its wholesome appeal. But our own health aside – how will our export markets react to the news that New Zealand milk products may derive from Taranaki cows grazed on land that has fracking waste spread over it?

Taranaki farmer spreading drilling waste across paddocks before planting grass and grazing cows on it. [Source: Taranaki Regional Council monitoring report]

Mr Robinson said it’s time we had a reasonable conversation about the future of the oil and gas industry in New Zealand. Let’s just make sure the conversation is based on the full facts.


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Categories : Drilling, Healthy Tairāwhiti, Onshore Mining, Prosperous Tairāwhiti

Tairāwhiti families encouraged to go Screen-Free for the week

29 04 2012

International Screen-Free Week starts today and Gisborne families are being encouraged to think about taking a break from technology.

Head Librarian Pene Walsh says: “Over 20,000 Gisborne people can’t be wrong. The members of HB Williams Memorial Library have increased their book borrowing by 20% over the same time last year. Surely that must mean their screen-time has shrunk by 20%.

Even though it is easier than ever to goggle at the telly, google on the computer, txt and tweet, fiddle about on Facebook or game the night away, when you add all that time up I reckon you’d be amazed and maybe feel there is a teeny bit more to life.

In our house all screentime is counted together so we choose and when time’s up, it is up.

Just ask Councillor Manu Caddie’s whanau – they have agreed to stop watching TV or going on the internet in the evenings – good on them, why don’t we join him for Screenfree week and try some ‘faceface’ time and visit one of our 200 friends or even try a bit of ‘bookbook’ time – yep, actually read one!

I for one will be reading several of the 120 children’s books entered in the LIANZA Children’s Book Awards and getting off my backside to visit my old neglected friend – yoga.”

Father of two and Gisborne District Councillor Manu Caddie said his family had recently put away the TV permanently and this week were having a break from the internet at home and it may stay that way.

“Most Kiwi families have television at home now, some screens are really dominant – both in the sheer physical size and the time its on all hours of the day and night.

Our kids love using the computer but some of the stuff is so compelling they forget about playing outside. We live in paradise and I want to make sure the kids get to enjoy their environment, use their imagination to create and not be completely sucked in by multinational corporations forcing brands down their throats.”

Screen-Free Week (www.screenfree.org) is an international project of the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood and this year runs from 30 April to 6 May. Since 1996, millions of children and their families have participated in Screen-Free Week (formerly TV Turnoff). Each year, thousands of parents, teachers, librarians, youth workers and clergy organise Screen-Free Weeks in their communities.

New Zealand research has found links between watching too much TV in childhood and later problems, including obesity, high cholesterol, poor fitness, smoking, short attention span, poor concentration – and lower rates of school and university qualifications.

One of the researchers, Dr Bob Hancox, said the educational effects of television viewing could not be explained by intelligence or socio-economic factors.

“It’s not just that children with little natural ability decided to watch more television. Children of all levels of intelligence did worse if they watched a lot of television.

“Similarly, the association between watching television and poor achievement was not because heavy television viewers had poor socio-economic backgrounds.

“There is extraordinarily strong evidence now that [screen] media have a major impact on children and adolescents. It’s not surprising because they spend many hours a day with media, of which television is the most important.”


Comments : 1 Comment »

Categories : Educated Tairāwhiti, Empowered Tairāwhiti, Healthy Tairāwhiti, Our Children & Youth, Our Families

Youth health package just scratches surface

22 04 2012

One of the unforeseen knock on impacts of mass lay offs, benefit restrictions and high youth unemployment brought on by the privatisation agenda of the late 80s and early 90s was a tripling of New Zealand suicide rates in the 1990s.

So Martyn Bradbury suggests the $62 million for youth mental health announcement earlier this month is like taking an aspirin for a gunshot wound.

It’s a win, albeit a small one for Sir Peter Gluckman, someone who has constantly called for Key to take the plight of New Zealand youth seriously.

As someone who has called for youth workers in high schools for a decade it is pleasing to see a select few of the poorest schools will now get this support, but it is a drop in the bucket compared to the needs.

All the initiatives like additional school nurses, anti-bullying programmes, parenting information services and a little top up for the few youth one stop shops that have survived sound great but barely scratch the surface in terms of the challenges facing at-risk young people.

Of course the government cannot fund everything, especially now they are borrowing so heavily to cover the tax cuts no one really needed.

Taxes have been described as ‘the national expression of corporal love’ – and it is fascinating to look at what has happened over the past twenty five years since top tax rates started reducing. Income inequality in New Zealand increased faster than in any other OECD country. Most of the increase was due to larger rises in overall incomes for the top 20% of income earners. Incomes for the bottom 20% actually decreased over the two decades from the mid-1980s.

British academics Professor Richard Wilkinson and Professor Kate Pickett use ten key indicators mapped against income inequality measures to compile an Index of Health and Social Problems. New Zealand features as or amongst the worst on most of the indicators.

The damage being done to the next generation living in deepening poverty will exact a terrible price on our communities. It is good to see some acknowledgement of the need to invest in the health and wellbeing of young people, but this token gesture is far from what is really needed.


Comments : 1 Comment »

Categories : Connected Tairāwhiti, Healthy Tairāwhiti, Our Children & Youth, Our Families, Social Development

Council should ‘step up’ in housing issue

21 04 2012
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THE district has few, if any, social housing providers and this is a major issue Gisborne District Council needs to address, says councillor Manu Caddie.
Mr Caddie said he struggled with the “central thesis” of the Role of Council in Housing Issues report presented to the
council this week, which said the provision of housing had not normally been seen as a local authority function.
“Three councils alone have more than 6500 social housing units, so there are probably more than 20,000 council-managed properties around the country and many councils have been providing social housing since the 1930s.”
Mr Caddie said “far from taking full responsibility for housing issues”, Government was clearly retreating from the sector and that left a gap for local authorities to fill . . . “perhaps in a review of current social housing provision but definitely in
understanding the housing needs and priorities of the district.
“No central government agency is now going to do that.”
Mr Caddie said Government programmes like the Kainga Whenua programme, designed to help those wanting to build on multiply-owned Maori land, had failed.
“Only four loans have been granted in two years, which has taken millions away from initiatives like the rural housing programme, that has provided assistance for many properties in the Gisborne district to have minor repairs to make them healthier and safer.
“Gisborne has few, if any, social housing providers. This is a major issue the council needs to help address.
“That doesn’t mean the council has to provide social housing but it could mean a review of our pensioner housing to see if it is the best use for the asset.
“We really need to understand the local issues. A council staff member has recently discovered that the WINZ accommodation
supplement for Gisborne is lower than in Rotorua, where the average rent is lower.
“In the absence of any other organisation doing this kind of analysis, the council must step up or support a regional community housing organisation to develop.”
Senior economic development officer Phil Wauchop, in the report for the community development committee, said a clear understanding of central government, local government and other key stakeholders’ roles was needed.
Mr Wauchop said responsibilities and priorities, plus funding mechanisms, was “the first step required” to ensure an effective
management of housing issues.
“The role of local government in housing issues have varied over time and often reflected the role and policy implications adopted
by the central government of the day.
“Traditionally, the local government stance is that core social assistance spending is a taxpayer responsibility, not the ratepayer’s.
“This stance has been based on the view that the role of income redistribution belongs to the entity that has access to the income tax base.”
THE GISBORNE HERALD | 13 April 2012

Comments : 1 Comment »

Categories : Housing

Terrorist Barbie?

5 04 2012

 

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UPDATE: The Broadcasting Standards Authority upheld the right of Radio New Zealand to broadcast such appalling statements under the Broadcasting Standards. Here is their decision in response to my complaint: http://bsa.govt.nz/decisions/show/4312

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Original post: 29 October 2011

I was listening to Radio NZ’s Afternoons with Jim Mora  on Thursday 25th October just after 4pm and believe the host and a panelist made discriminatory remarks about the Muslim community. I am making a complaint to Radio NZ, and if not satisfied with their response, will take it to the Broadcasting Standards Authority .

The panelists suggest names such as “terrorist Barbie” and “suicide bomber Barbie” with an explosives belt. John Bishop (‘panelist’) and Paul Brennan (host) are the offenders.

Here’s the whole show – and the offending comments.

Here’s my letter of complaint:

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On Radio NZ’s Afternoons with Jim Mora on Thursday 25th October just after 4pm the host and a panelist made remarks about the Muslim community that I believe breached the Radio Code.

John Bishop (a ‘panelist’) and Paul Brennan (the ‘host’) suggested names such as “terrorist Barbie” and “suicide bomber Barbie” with an explosives belt would sell well in the Muslim world.

This is a formal complaint regarding those remarks.

I believe these comments breach the following standards:

Standard 1: Good Taste and Decency.
I believe the comments were bad taste in the extreme.

Standard 5: Accuracy
I believe the suggestion that there may be a market for terrorist and suicide Barbies in the Muslim world is quite inaccurate – if there were any Muslims interested in getting suicide dolls for their children, a Barbie doll is the likely to be the last option Muslims who admire terrorists and suicide bombers would consider purchasing.

Standard 7: Discrimination and Denigration
I believe the comments discriminated and denigrated the Muslim sector of our community on the basis of their religion and culture as implying some inherent connection between the Muslim faith and culture and terrorism and suicide bombers has no factual basis. While the comments may be couched as the presenters views, I do not believe the comments were factual in terms of the link made between people of the Muslim faith and terrorism or suicide bombers, if the comments were based on some kind of serious analysis I can’t understand what that would be and I’d be surprised if anyone found the comments funny or satirical.

Standard 8: Responsible Programming
I do not believe that the programme content was socially responsible. After school is a normally accepted radio listening time for children and the comments in this broadcast could encourage children to associate all adherents of the Muslim faith with terrorism and suicide bombing.

I look forward to a response from Radio New Zealand on this matter within the required timeframes.

Manu Caddie
21 Cambridge Tce,
Kaiti,
Gisborne 4010.
Tel. 0274 202 957

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I expect a response from Radio New Zealand on this matter within the statutory timeframes and encourage others who are similarly concerned to send their complaints to Radio NZ via their Online Complaints Form.


Comments : 1 Comment »

Categories : Cultural Capital, Relationships

Hoping Hēkia’s here to help

3 04 2012


I appreciated the opportunity that Minister of Education Hekia Parata provided last week for local school Board of Trustees and Principals to meet with her.

The Minister has been passionate about the benefits of education for a long time and it is exciting to see someone born on the Coast in such a senior position again.

I was excited to hear about developments in governance coming out of the Christchurch situation. Ten years ago the Kiwa Education Partnership discussed a campus-based approach to schooling in Gisborne but it doesn’t seem to have eventuated. Cluster governance makes sense when we think about a village raising a child and a seamless transition between early childhood education, primary and secondary schooling.

It was somewhat reassuring to hear the Minister say she doesn’t see any need to link performance-based pay to National Standards. One of the big fears in low decile schools is that such a policy could see highly skilled teachers moving to schools where more students have participated in quality early childhood education and have better access to support for their learning. Advice from Treasury officials also reject pay based on test scores.

Ministry of Education research shows that students from poorer communities generally have slower progress than their peers – the level of material resources available to families, health problems, substance abuse and conflict, all have a deep impact on the ability of students to attend school and learn. If pay is based on the rate of progression, this may also disadvantage teachers and communities where progression is slower because of external influences.

High student expectations from parents and teachers is essential and building strong partnerships between home and school is one of the most important things we can do.

Class sizes do have a major impact on student achievement and the secondary teachers current collective agreement limits class size to no more than 26 students. While it may save money to squeeze more kids into each class, we should expect learning to be compromised.

Though it seems to go against the whole basis of the National Standards her government pushed through in their last term, I was pleased to hear the Minister acknowledge that one size doesn’t fit all and progression in learning and achievement levels should be ‘flexible’.

It was also reassuring to hear the Minister sees inequality as a major issue that the country needs to address – both in terms of educational achievement and socio-economic status. Of course we are yet to see what the plan is for addressing the growing inequalities, fuelled in part by some massive tax cuts for those of us who least need them while future generations are being burdened with government loans from China.

Schools are not solely responsible for addressing every issue facing kids – neither is central government, nor parents or the wider community. But together each stakeholder has an important part to play in pulling together the pieces of the puzzle.

Beginning a ‘conversation’ on what the goals should be and how as a community and country we can achieve them is an admirable and pragmatic approach for any new Minister. I hope the commitment to a mutually meaningful dialogue is genuine and key stakeholders all have a real opportunity to shape the direction of education in New Zealand. Tough choices have to be made all the time by those wielding power in public but including all of the people most affected by decisions in the process is essential for good results to be achieved and enduring.

Manu Caddie is Chairperson of a school Board of Trustees but these views do not necessarily reflect those of the school staff, whānau or BOT.


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Categories : Educated Tairāwhiti, Our Children & Youth, Our Families, Positive Leadership, Relationships, Social Development, Tangata Whenua

Gisborne councillor welcomes PCE inquiry

29 03 2012

Gisborne District Councillor Manu Caddie says he is very pleased that the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has decided to launch a full and independent inquiry into the risks of hydraulic fracturing in New Zealand.

“I first wrote to Dr Jan Wright in November last year asking her office to undertake an inquiry, so was pleased to hear that the scoping investigation started by her staff quickly revealed the need for a full inquiry under the Environment Act. The office of the PCE had said they did not expect to make a decision until mid-year, so obviously they found enough evidence to launch the inquiry immediately.”

While an application to frack is expected in the next few weeks from Canadian company Apache Corporation, Gisborne District Council staff have said they do not have expertise in petroleum exploration and earlier this month said they support an independent inquiry.

“It is obvious – to everyone except maybe the industry and Minister of Energy & Resources – that the fracking process has some serious problems associated with it. Hopefully the peer-reviewed PCE report due by the end of the year will provide some clarity on if and how it can be done safely here.”

Mr Caddie says he has asked the PCE if an advisory group for the investigation can be established comprising various stakeholders including industry representatives, central government officials, local government representatives who may provide feedback on the proposed scope, terms of reference and draft report.

“I think such a group would ensure the final report will be beyond criticism as much as possible if those who have concerns and those who have been claiming everything is fine, are able to comment on the scope and planned process for the inquiry.”

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Categories : Onshore Mining

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