Editorial: Information must be provided

Andrew Austin, Editor of Hawke's Bay Today.

There is a certain irony in the Hawke's Bay Regional Council supporting Tom Belford's denial of an official information request in the name of free speech.

In August, then Central Hawke's Bay mayor Peter Butler made a request under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act for all email and phone record communications of Mr Belford.

He requested the councillor's communications between August 8 and 25, specifying "of particular interest are any communications with Peter Fowler of Radio New Zealand, Hawke's Bay Today, political stategist Simon Lusk and Russel Norman and Genevieve Toop of Greenpeace NZ relating to either the Ruataniwha Dam or the Havelock North water contamination incident".

Mr Belford had denied responding to the request, as he argued it could set a harmful precedent - a decision then appealed by Mr Butler to the Ombudsman. At a meeting last week, the council voted to support Mr Belford's refusal to hand over the information.

I am not sure what Mr Butler is trying to prove by requesting this information. One would have thought he would rather spend his retirement from politics enjoying his family and farm, instead of worrying about what Mr Belford is getting up to.

But, he has done it and I firmly believe that in the interest of transparency, Mr Belford needs to hand over the relevant information. I say this fully aware that email correspondence between Mr Belford and me could possibly be included in that information. That is fine as I and this paper have nothing to hide.

This is an important issue because Hawke's Bay Today regularly puts official information requests in to councils and other government bodies. We do it because ratepayers have a right to know what their elected councils are up to.

Councils need to realise that we will not stop in our quest to get rid of council secrecy.