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In July 1994 the Wellington City Council transferred effective control of the city’s wiring utility grid to TransAlta of Canada. See Fran Wilde In May 1996 it gave away complete control to TransAlta. See Mark Blumsky. The fascist Electricity Industry Reform Act of 1998 forced all companies in New Zealand to either sell their lines or their intelligence divisions. TransAlta sold the Wellington grid to Power Co, a subsidiary of Utilicorp (now Aquila) in the USA.Note(1) In 2003 the
Auckland community trust bought Wellington’s grid back into New
Zealander’s control. Thank you Having worked in the Bulk-generated electricity industry for two decades I had been despairing as I watched the multinational corporations gut the investments of 5 generations of the Wellington community over 90 years and witnessed our city’s electrical potential dissipating. By 2006 my area of Melrose was experiencing street-lighting blackouts for weeks on end and a series of household failures that made us a third-world rated zone. And that was only a minor part of the deterioration and loss of the city's electrical potential. With our grid back in the hands of New Zealanders I soon sensed new vigour flowing back into Wellington’s grid structures and a much greater sanity began to prevail.
As mentioned elsewhere, in a series of dodgy deals the Wellington City Council had put our grid at great risk. Vector inherited major problems because of the Saturn deal. To quote a very reliable source,” “Vector inherited an absolute nightmare – the Saturn cables are strung on poles never meant to take them …not only that they are on the wrong sides of poles in the wrong positions…” When I mentioned this to a Wellington City Councillor, Jack Ruben, recently he said, “I can tell you I vehemently opposed the sale of Capital Power…Why don’t we know all this is happening? All we know is Vector applied to replace 1800 poles or so across the city.” This lack of
communication is not
Vector’s problem. As the Hon Mark Blumksy can confirm, the
Council was warned of the risk a decade ago and decided to ignore it.
My message to the Auckland people is one of immense gratitude and with a grave warning. Vested interests, including the New Zealand Herald,(owner Sir Anthony O'Reilly) are working to con you into dismantling the AECT (Auckland Energy Community Trust), just as The Dominion and Evening Post worked to dismantle the Hutt Mana Energy Trust and have Capital Power sold in the Wellington region. They,and other vested interests argued the Hutt Mana Energy Trusts investments were better in the hands of consumers i.e. those Bulk-gen electricity consumers fortunate to be residing in the Hutt Mana region at that particular time. The vested interests I refer to include merchant bankers who can use Bulk-gen electricity systems as debt generators. In Wellington proponents of the demolition of the Hutt Mana Energy Trust (HMET) argued the “payouts” of about $1400 from a windup of the Trust would stimulate the local economy. History proved the lie in this. In the five years subsequent to that payout the Hutt economy SHRANK by 5%. There were reports of many rorts during the wind-up of the Trust e.g. landlords insisted tenants signed over their electricity accounts to them or face eviction so they qualified for multiple payouts. Now as those fancy TVs, washing machines and overseas trips people were encouraged to trade their shares for have evaporated. They are now left helpless, allowed only the use of local electrical potential that merchant bankers and managers in distant cities decide if and how they use the region's electrical potential. A decade on these households now spend much higher proportions of their disposable income on Bulk-generated electricity. They have also lost many other options – including the world leading Energy Action school education programme the Hutt community had created in the mid 1990s and other education programmes.
So please understand: control and ownership of your wiring grid is critical if Auckland is not to collapse into chaos in the Post Cheap Oil-Gas Age. The merchant bankers/speculators are never going to pay you more than a fraction of your wiring grids real value. Why would they? Beware their sweet enticements – they come loaded with poison. Know the value of your grid and its electrical potential Indeed let all communities of the world learn from Wellington’s example and avoid a similar fate. Note (1) The 1998 Electricity Industry Reform Act was created by a National-led Government. The Act effectively disenfranchised 99.9% of New Zealanders, removing their historic right to be members of democratic structures dedicated to optimising their communities electrical potential. The Labour-led Governments since 1999 have continuously endorsed the legislation. One of their first acts in 2000 was to set up the Ministerial Inquiry into Electricity to clear up what it termed "New Zealand's electricity shambles". They appointed the Hon David Gaygill to chair it and he ensured the fundamentals of 1998 legislation remained unchanged. Last week Labour appointed him Chair of the Electricity Commission. Hon David Caygill was Finance Minister and widely recognised as the intellectual powerhouse of the 1990 Labour Administration that transferred control of New Zealand's Government owned Telecom to North American corporations. Arguably David is the most powerful person in New Zealand this last 25 years because of his immense influence in determining how New Zealander's are allowed to use the nation's electrical potential.
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