Independent views By Brendan Horan

New developments with the Rena disaster come as no surprise. In past articles I warned the ships owners and the Government were laying foundations to leave the remains of the wreck on the reef; and this is now becoming a reality. Despite prior government promises of a complete removal, we now have another National Party about-face.

Surely, all New Zealanders should support the small but brave local hapu on Motiti Island, who are left fighting for justice against rich international polluters, with an asset base of more than $2.4 billion, the owners of the Rena.

Our government has gone silent on the issue; they have also done a sordid backyard deal to get a paltry payment of $10.4 million if our local hapu fail to get the wreck removed. The Government seem to have taken the attitude 'out of site out of mind”. The rest of the country as well seems to have moved on, leaving the small iwi on Motiti Island to fight the battle with the Rena owners and insurers, who want now to walk away and leave their unseen mess behind.

In Italy, the Government's own Civil Protection Agency has been driving the parbuckling for the wreck of the Costa Concordia. This is what can be done when a government stands behind its people.

The same can be said of the stockpile of corexit, a highly dangerous and banned chemical brought to Tauranga to use in the Rena clean up, and now we are left with 3000 litres of it in our town. Typical of the dismissive culture handed down by his leader, and at odds with all others, are MP Simon Bridges' comments that there has been no scientific data, and no reports of ill health from the product here in Tauranga.

I feel that if we, as New Zealanders, walk away from this wreck, what international message are we sending…pollute at will? Our government has only last week released huge new areas for oil exploration – in particular off our coasts – without adequate resources to manage oil spills. The Government has proven they can't even organise the removal of a boat from a rock, yet they're prepared to enable deep sea oil drilling, which will place New Zealand's entire coastline at risk.

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