From city slickers to rural resistance

Chris Thoroughgood is one of a group still pushing to be left out of the Super City. Photo / Steven McNicholl

When plans first emerged for the single Auckland council to take in farming country as far as Te Hana, the outcry from farmers was decidedly muted.

"Really, we are part of the big city," Federated Farmers' Rodney chairman James Colville told the Weekend Herald last June. "I'd rather be a little fish in a big pond than a big fish in a little pond."

Rodney farmers complained of paying much higher rates than their counterparts in rural Manukau; there was an expectation that rural rates could drop.

Now, however, most farmers are behind the Northern Action Group and Wellsford Community Group campaigns to form a largely rural council with Kaipara.

High in the Kaipara Hills, Chris Thoroughgood and husband Pat farm beef cattle on 20ha with sweeping views of the flatlands between Warkworth and Dome Valley. They are former city slickers: Pat was an architectural draftsman and Chris worked in the corporate world until deciding, 13 years ago, to raise their kids in the country.

They home school their four daughters, who love rural life, says Chris.

"The girls milk the house cow and get goats off the land. We're as self-sufficient as we can be."

When she learned about NAG's petition, she volunteered to collect signatures from farmers west of Warkworth and found 98 per cent willing to "give the message that we are rural people, not urban".

She believes Federated Farmers' initial enthusiasm for the Super City stemmed from "listening to all the Auckland farmers around Kumeu" - farmers who might find better value in urban sprawl than in farming.

The couple are green farmers: Chris has worked on environmental enhancement projects at Tawharanui and Mahurangi and planted pines on their own erosion prone slopes. When we visit, she is fencing off the last of a riparian planting area, a 1300m fencing project she aims to complete this long weekend.

"Up here we have virtually no infrastructure. When you build out here you have to put in your own septic tank and your own water tank. Why should we pay for infrastructure when we don't have it up here?

"I moved up from Auckland to get away from Auckland. I would rather buy my own septic tank and water tank and stay out. We don't mind our rough roads.

"Warkworth is 20 minutes away if we want to go to town." She says the reorganisation process has been "an absolute rort" and the Government is not listening. When the two groups' petitions were presented to Parliament, she made the trip to Wellington wearing her NAG T-shirt.

"I've been a strong blue [National] supporter all my life. They're not getting my vote next time if we don't get out."