None

• Published date: 16 March 2021

I have found over my long political career that when one elected member writes negative public comments about another elected member there are no winners!

And of course when an elected member criticises one elected member, by inference, they are criticising all the other elected members.

Mate’s latest letter to the editor of the Northland Age, March 11, achieves nothing because of its inaccuracies.

In Mate’s letter reference is made to council’s roading matrix which is continuing to being developed and refined as we use it to guide our decisions making about roading priorities. In the letter reference is made to the NTA.

This is the Northern Transport Alliance, a structure established by the four Northland council authorities, Whangārei, Kaipara, Far North District Council and Northland Regional Council, four or five years ago, to work together to address roading issues across the North.

However, the authority that made the final decision about the sealing of Church Rd was not the NTA nor the Far North District Council, it was the NZTA, the Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency, the government roading authority.

Waka Kotahi use their own independent audit process to validate the business case. Mate has had explained to him a number of times that there are two different authorities. It was the government authority, not the council that made the decision!

Felicity was not involved in this decision. In fact she has been scrupulous in ensuring she withdraws from any discussion relating to Church Rd.

Mate, while entitled to his views, even though he has had the system explained to him on a number of occasions, does not seem to believe it.

The NZ Transport Authority, the government roading authority, made an independent, audited decision relating to Church Rd. Just as simple as that!

Neither Felicity nor council had any say in the decision.

I do hope that we can now put this behind us and all work as a team for the benefit of and in the interests of the people of our district.

Hon John Carter

Far North mayor

To heck with Auckland

My first school was a very remote sole-charge with mainly Māori tamariki, many of whom had te reo as their first language. Super kids who loved school. There were deaths and accidents, but the little settlement coped.

My first principal’s job was at Pakanae, in the Hokianga, again more Māori pupils than Pākehā, but a happy school supported by all parents. Neighbouring schools all seemed to function with a minimum of trouble, and if there was...