Editorial: Tightening of loo-se free camping guidelines

Northern Advocate editor Craig Cooper.

We need rules.

How we enforce them, is another story.

Freedom campers travelling throughout Northland are going to get greater guidance on where they can and can't park. The rules are slightly discriminatory toward modern-day hippies. If you are cruising around Northland in an old Kombi van, or a converted Hi-Ace, you can't stay in the same places as someone in a motor home with its own loo.

Having chosen to visit New Zealand because of its Lord of the Rings scenery, racial harmony and friendly "come one, come all" peoples, in Northland we will judge how hospitable we are toward you by the manner in which you go about your daily business on holiday.

Yes, dear tourist, your flash loo opens up greater opportunities than someone who is guerilla toileting.

And if you're driving a loo-less van with one of those clue-less slogans on them, you will feel even less love from Northlanders. Does the loo-prejudice suggest we only want a certain quality of tourist?

I hope not because the volume of tourists increases each year, and there are probably more loo-less camper vans on the road than ablution blocks on wheels.

Comically, the new bylaw also renders sleeping in your car overnight illegal.

Here's hoping that at some point a drunk driver doesn't offer up the excuse that, rather than sleep off the booze, they drove for fear a bylaw police officer would tap on the window and move them on.

It's a technicality which also makes bylaw crims of homeless families sleeping in a vehicle in public. Yes, this is a bylaw which is in danger of never being enforced.

There is a positive flow-on, the Hundertwasser toilets in Kawakawa are going to become a "must visit" for more than artistic pleasure.

Along with legislating tourists, I am sure we will continue to educate tourists about our region's delights.

We want all tourists to spend their dollars in Northland, not just those who spend a penny in their vehicles.