LOCAL NEWS
CHLÖE SWARBRICK: AUCKLAND CENTRAL MP This year, Matariki will set on 2 June to rise again from 2 to 10 July. The star cluster, known in Western science as Pleiades, signals the Māori New Year. Half the year on from the height of summer, this reflection on where we’ve come from, celebration of where we’re at, and contemplation of where we’ve got to go offers a profound moment in the midst of crisp winter. I often think about what it must have been like thirty odd years ago, in the shoes of Jeanette Fitzsimons and Rod Donald, talking about something as seemingly novel as global warming. It’s because of their dogged, tireless and composed advocacy that it is now so ‘common sense’ to have due concern for the planet on which we rely on for survival. These historical fights are not always won at the time, and more often than not, they rely on many hands to tend their flowering. Waitemata- Local Board Chair Richard Northey’s contribution in May’s Ponsonby News spoke of the need for general tree protection and local government’s advocacy for it. As a Member of Parliament’s Environment Select Committee in 2019 during an Amendment to the Resource Management Act, I sought to reinstate just that, but was voted down by all other political parties. The prospect still sits alive in the member’s ballot with a Bill in the name of my colleague, Hon. Eugenie Sage. Such is the way of campaigning. Things don’t happen overnight; when it feels they do, it’s often because the long march to the finish line has been largely invisible in the mainstream. This past month’s Budget, launched by Minister of Finance Grant Robertson on Thursday 20 May, felt a bit like that. With healthy investment in public transport, support for the lowest income New Zealanders and a transformative commitment to recycling funds from pollution into green, regenerative projects, our future is very paved by the decisions we’ve made today, just as our present is informed by the work done by those before us.
Please get in touch if we can help you with local issues 09 302 0166 chloe.swarbrick@parliament.govt.nz
We’ve still so much more work to do. If we want to ensure every child in this country grows up with the opportunity to follow their dreams; if we want a stable climate with predictable summers, winters and the crops in between; if we’re to invest in a city we can all get around with ease. One of the many examples of our future potential is Richmond Road School, the country’s only school with four ‘official’ languages: Te Reo Maori, French, Samoan and English. If we can rally Government to fund some necessary new buildings for its young students, we ensure a thriving environment for the learning and mixing of ideas. Among those great opportunities are weaknesses, like the cruelty of an immigration system that refuses to allow families to reconcile. After our Auckland Central office has tried individually to process dozens of applications that will not fit through a disjointed bureaucracy, it’s time for systemic change. Please do join me at 3pm on Saturday 12 June at Freeman’s Bay Hall, along with Green Immigration spokesperson Ricardo Menéndez March. This isn’t a moment to gripe or to lay blame, but to create the overwhelming mandate for change. Because, at the end of the day, how do you facilitate political change? We build a community unwilling to accept anything less. PN (CHLÖE SWARBRICK) www.greens.org.nz/chloe_swarbrick
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Chlöe Swarbrick MP for Auckland Central
Authorised by Chlöe Swarbrick, Parliament Buildings Wellington
22 PONSONBY NEWS+ June 2021
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