Too many of us cannot swim

New Zealand's summer death rate from drowning is shocking. Really shocking. We are a nation surrounded by water, drenched in water, aware of our water. Everywhere we have rivers, creeks, waterfalls, rapids and slow-moving liquid behemoths meandering through towns and cities.
None of us is far from the beach; well, not as far as someone in Alice Springs, say. Wherever we are in New Zealand, we are within less than a day's drive to the seashore.
So why is it that so few of us are able to swim?

Could it be that accessibility to swimming pools and learn-to-swim classes is not available to all?

When I was growing up in this town — it was a "city" then — we had access to any number of public swimming facilities and teachers able to pass on their knowledge of how to swim.
We had the beach and the river, but they were for recreation only. We also had a swimming pool in town, one in Wanganui East and another in Gonville. They were large, public facilities and usually safe places to experiment with diving, swimming or just treading water. We called them "baths".

We also had school pools open to the public on weekends: most schools had their own swimming pool. My choice was Castlecliff, because it was within walking distance and, from her kitchen window, Mum could see me take my first plunge from the high diving board into the murky, unfiltered depths below. That changed, of course, with filtration technology and different standards. Unfortunately, it also got shallower, which meant the high diving board was made redundant and our stuntman skills were no longer tested.
In our schools and at all of these places, there were learn-to-swim classes. Only a few of us became champion swimmers, but most of us at least learned enough to stay safe in the water and maybe even earn a certificate.

What do we have now?
Obviously, we are still blessed with those wet facilities that nature gave us and they are considerably cleaner these days, but the beach and the river are hardly places for a non-swimmer or someone wanting to learn.

School pools are generally closed to the public, but some will allow access to local families if they are prepared to go and pick up a key.

The Central Baths are long gone, replaced with the Splash Centre complex at Springvale Park. The Gonville pool has been sold because it leaked and the council of the time was not prepared to spend the money to fix it. The Whanganui East Aquatic Centre should be open to the public but remains closed, for whatever reason.

The Gonville baths closed permanently in 2005. Photo / Paul Brooks

So let's add up the Whanganui swimming pools available and — more or less — accessible to the public. One. Just one. The Splash Centre.

If Whanganui has decreased its learn-to-swim capabilities by so much, is the rest of New Zealand in the same boat, so to speak? If so, it should come as no surprise that too many people are unable to swim, and, if the trend continues, it bodes ill for future generations and drowning tolls in years to come.