February 24, 2017
National’s ‘alternative facts’ when it comes to Water quality
National's 'alternative facts' when it comes to Water quality
MARTYN 'BOMBER' BRADBURY
It seems that with the Government's bold claim of making 90% of NZs rivers 'swimmable' by 2040, is more like Donald Trump's 'alternative facts' than true care about the state of our polluted rivers and lakes.
Forget that global warming will have melted our polar ice caps by 2030, the underhand manner in which the Government are trying to con the public into thinking they are doing anything meaningful to force their dairy farming mates into cleaning up their act needs to be exposed for the dishonesty that it is.
National have attempted to create this illusion of 90% of our rivers and lakes being 'swimmable' by lowering the threshold of pollution we will accept. A rover gains an A rating if it has E. Coli rates less than or equal to 260cfu/100mL 95% of the time. Problem is that it used to be 99% of the time, National changed the rules to allow polluted rivers to become 'swimmable', it's as dishonest as that.
To give you some idea of just how bad that standard is, the World Health Organisation puts the level of safe water at 40cfu/100mL of water.
So we have a Government who have allowed more pollution in our rivers (while telling us they are safe) and we have a Government who have stopped requiring councils to extensively test our water ways for the pollution in the first place.
The magnitude of manipulation the Government are trying to pull off right in front of our faces is so bewildering in its arrogance it's like watching a burglar steal your car in front of you while they're waving at you.
By setting the goal at 2040, National are sending a clear signal that not only do they intend to do nothing about the pollution in our rivers, they also think that we are stupid enough not to notice they've redefined the terms to make dirty clean.
This is the action of a Government who believe they can con the people all the time.
Martyn Bradbury
Editor – TheDailyBlog.co.nz
twitter.com/CitizenBomber
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