Dear Editor, This week To Tatou Vai is hosting vaka consultations on water charges. The imposition of user-pays is the authority following through on neocolonial development policy.

Rarotonga, our remote island in the middle of the South Pacific ocean, is being aligned with cultures of ecological mismanagement, scarcity, and resource conflict that are on the rise ... anywhere else.
Government administrators and lawmakers will claim no active role in the commodification of water. Led by the MFEM (Ministry of Finance and Economic Management) oligarchy, all have been called to serve economic goals at the expense of the people. In doing so, the common good has been disregarded, along with commonsense.

Water charges do not increase rainfall.
Water charges will not compel CIIC (Cook Islands Investment Corporation) to localise the infrastructure. Water charges will not ensure prudent operation.
Our administrators are incapable of shouldering responsibility. The easy out is passing the burden to the people.
At the second consultation on the To Tatou Vai Bill, a member of the public challenged the select panel: “How will metering change our way of life – what will be the social impact of user-pays?”

Despite furtive paper shuffling, neither PM Mark Brown, nor TTV chair Brian Mason were able to answer. There have been no studies, no data collection, and no modelling.
However the economic impact is largely self-evident.
When households are charged, businesses are charged, and growers are charged, the net impact is a further increase in the cost of living.
Side-stepping the policy speak: water charges mean poverty to the people.

Andy Kirkwood

Turangi