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The Star Latest Christchurch news at www. .kiwi<br />
Thursday March 16 2017 25<br />
have seen the decline in the river<br />
water since the dairy industry<br />
got well paid from the price of<br />
milk solids. This river needs to<br />
be saved now, not by 2040 – it<br />
will be long gone by then.<br />
ECan, do your work properly<br />
or move on from the next election<br />
and get someone in there<br />
with the guts to turn the sprinklers<br />
off and save our rivers.<br />
I had to inform the agency<br />
that it was to be sorted, otherwise<br />
was going to the police to<br />
have fraud charges laid (theft<br />
by deception). Until then I was<br />
unaware that, according to the<br />
agency, they had gone back to<br />
the client who refused to pay<br />
more even though the truck<br />
required a class four license. I<br />
was paid back pay by the agency<br />
but lost the work.<br />
Second incident was a guy of<br />
63. He was told by Work and Income<br />
to come to Christchurch.<br />
Like me, he had a truck licence<br />
from years ago, but like me he<br />
had never used a Road Ranger<br />
gearbox. He was applying for<br />
jobs left right and centre either<br />
cooking or truck driving. He<br />
was called into try for a truck<br />
job but was told after two hours<br />
of training to go.<br />
A week later while labouring<br />
on a job, a truck showed up<br />
from that company with a Filipino<br />
driving. For the Filipino to<br />
have just arrived and be driving<br />
meant it was already in process<br />
when they went through the<br />
charade of seeing if a Kiwi could<br />
do the job.<br />
The third incident involved<br />
a young fellow living in his car<br />
waiting for a job to start, who<br />
went to Central Otago to pick<br />
fruit. He was lined up with all<br />
these other Kiwis when all these<br />
foreign backpackers walked past<br />
and got the jobs ahead of the<br />
Kiwis.<br />
Fourth incident was a<br />
64-year-old who went for a job<br />
only to be told he wouldn’t get it<br />
because he wanted to do the job<br />
properly.<br />
They didn’t want people<br />
who wanted to do the job properly,<br />
but just someone to do the<br />
job.<br />
Barry Rutter – In short,<br />
what a load of rubbish! There’s<br />
still heaps of painter jobs<br />
around, check out Trade Me<br />
jobs. I made three phone calls<br />
and those that I called all pay<br />
well above minimum wage.<br />
Also, at the end of the day, any<br />
painter getting $43 an hour is<br />
just out right greedy.<br />
I own a small business that<br />
employs up to six staff (no migrant<br />
workers) and none of my<br />
staff get those rates. Personally,<br />
I only get paid $18 per hour,<br />
and yes, I have three kids and a<br />
mortgage just like many other<br />
workers.<br />
So to Mr Creagh . . . Stop being<br />
greedy and get up with the<br />
times, high pay rates were never<br />
going to last forever and it is not<br />
due just to migrant workers.<br />
Holly Traxler-Puddle,<br />
of Avonhead, reacts to<br />
an article in The Star<br />
about ECan investigating<br />
measures to protect the<br />
Selwyn River. In the article,<br />
Selwyn Waihora Zone<br />
Committee chairman Allen<br />
Lim said about 15-20 per<br />
cent of the river’s low<br />
flows could be attributed<br />
to irrigation<br />
What a bunch of hooey! The<br />
Selwyn River is dead because of<br />
the irrigation in the area – certainly<br />
not the pittance of 15-20<br />
per cent as stated by Allen Lim.<br />
Where is he getting his information<br />
from?<br />
If you are from this area, you<br />
Selwyn Waihora Zone<br />
Committee chairman Allen<br />
Lim responds:<br />
The 15-20 per cent figure I<br />
mentioned, referring to the relative<br />
impact of irrigation compared<br />
with other factors, comes<br />
from the scientific assessment<br />
made for the Selwyn Waihora<br />
water plan, which became operative<br />
last year. It represents the<br />
average reduction in Waihora<br />
spring-fed streams (not just<br />
Selwyn) caused by cumulative<br />
irrigation takes.<br />
Climate played a big part in<br />
the current situation. There are<br />
examples of other rivers and<br />
lakes that have gone dry, or are<br />
at record lows, but are not subject<br />
to irrigation takes, such as<br />
Lake Lyndon in Porters Pass.<br />
To deny that the lack of<br />
rainfall for the last three winters<br />
has nothing to do with the river<br />
going dry and Lake Lyndon at<br />
record lows is like saying CO2 is<br />
not a greenhouse gas and there<br />
is no climate change.<br />
Full irrigation restrictions apply<br />
to all takes from the Selwyn<br />
River. Many groundwater takes<br />
are on partial restriction and all<br />
deep groundwater takes have<br />
restrictions on their annual<br />
volumes. This has been the case<br />
since November 2015. We need<br />
to consider all factors and not<br />
close our mind to any. To this<br />
end, in our last meeting, the<br />
Selwyn Waihora Zone Committee<br />
resolved to put the near river<br />
augmentation project for the<br />
Selwyn River up for funding. We<br />
want to have the Selwyn swimmable<br />
long before 2040. Again, I<br />
would like to encourage anyone<br />
with a bit of energy to channel it<br />
and help us manage the water.<br />
•Debate over the closing time<br />
of Selwyn bars, page 26<br />
Clinical mental health<br />
services struggling<br />
LAST WEEK,<br />
the organisation<br />
responsible for<br />
delivering clinical<br />
mental health<br />
services in our area,<br />
the Canterbury District Health<br />
Board, came to Parliament to<br />
give its annual report.<br />
This did not make for pretty<br />
reading.<br />
The health select committee<br />
heard that there are simply<br />
not enough beds for the people<br />
requiring them at Hillmorton.<br />
As a result of this, some patients<br />
have had to be moved to<br />
other facilities at night.<br />
The adult acute inpatient<br />
service has been seeing up to 80<br />
or 85 inpatients at a time, but<br />
only has 64 beds. This means that<br />
instead of being able to stay in<br />
for their treatment, patients are<br />
being shuffled off to other organisations<br />
for the night and brought<br />
back to Hillmorton each day.<br />
The committee also heard<br />
that the health board is increasingly<br />
worried about the 18, 19,<br />
20-year-old age group.<br />
Those were the children who<br />
were moving from primary<br />
school to secondary school in<br />
2011. They noted a significant<br />
increase in a range of different<br />
social agencies involved in the<br />
lives of this age group, including<br />
police and justice.<br />
There is no doubt that our<br />
mental health workers in Canterbury<br />
are under immense pressure.<br />
In January, the health board<br />
said that they’re seeing about 700<br />
more adults and 300 more children<br />
each month than they were<br />
before the quakes.<br />
The number of nurses working<br />
in specialist mental health services<br />
has increased by about 10 per<br />
cent since 2012, but the number<br />
of doctors and senior doctors has<br />
stayed the same,in spite of the<br />
unprecedented increase in need<br />
since February 2011.<br />
The National Government has<br />
let Canterbury down on mental<br />
health.<br />
In spite of an indisputable need<br />
for services post-quake, they<br />
have continued to fund us under<br />
a “business as usual” model.<br />
The small one-off funding<br />
injections the Government has<br />
delivered have not even begun to<br />
scratch the surface of the problem.<br />
The current situation is unsafe<br />
and unacceptable for the workforce.<br />
It is not good enough for<br />
the patients and it is damaging<br />
for our wider communities. National<br />
is putting everyone at risk.<br />
•Megan Woods is Labour’s<br />
Canterbury spokeswoman