By John Lawson
Speaking on Sunday 23rd November at the Old School, Green MP, Julie Anne Genter, described Climate Change as “The biggest issue facing us”.
The event at the Old School was part of Julie Anne’s Climate Reality Tour, which has taken in Hamilton, Waiheke, West Auckland, Wellington, Masterton, Golden Bay, Alexandra and Dunedin. Raglan was one of the few places she couldn’t reach easily by public transport. She said she did not enjoy her 2-hour drive in a car from Auckland. Many others at the School on Sunday evening had walked or cycled there.
The main purpose of her talk was to encourage others to take action. Julie Anne contrasted the approach of the Liberals in Australia with John Key here. He has never denied climate change, though done very little about it. She thought that showed a greater awareness and a basis on which to build momentum and pressure the decision makers to make the right decisions. It has been done before – think Mining in National Parks, Nuclear Free NZ and GE Free NZ. Julie Anne’s message was that we should speak out, challenge climate change deniers and spread the facts on social and other media. To get involved go to the event’s Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/events/1532763013637015/.
Locally an issue that Raglanders can have an impact on is public transport. As a modern public transport bus fleet with low emissions and fuel-efficient vehicles has a lower impact on climate change, provision of an hourly Raglan bus service running seven days a week is something to push for. You can do your bit towards this by making a submission to the Waikato Regional Council at http://consultation.waikatoregion.govt.nz/portal/transport-policy/rltp/draft_rltp?pointId=s1412735051689#section-s1412735051689
Local Green member John Lawson points out that the current service costs about twice as much as the Education Ministry would pay for the same number of buses, so better lower cost contract plus extra fares would make up the cost of an extended service. John added that it will help put Raglan on the main tourist route and allow GoldCard holders to travel both ways (at present the 11.20 to Hamilton is the only work-day bus for them), without adding to our traffic and parking problems.