The Save Manapouri Campaign

When I was in Invercargill I phoned Mr Ron McLean, the national president of the Save Manapouri Campaign. I asked him if the Save Manapouri movement was still in good health. Yes, he said. They had active branches all over New Zealand. I asked him if he thought there was any danger of the lake being raised and he replied that there certainly was. The Labour government had made a promise not to raise the lake (or lower it unnaturally) and they had set up a Guardians of Manapouri as a policing body. But there was no law saying the lake can not be raised. He added that from his own point of view, saving the lake was not the most important issue. At the tune it had to be, because the lake was immediately threatened. The most important issue was not "Save Manapouri" but "Save the People". He said that the idea of the Bluff smelter as an asset for New Zealand was just not on. It never was on, he said. Hugh Watt should be taken out into the sea somewhere and dropped. So should his opposite number from the National Party. The whole project, he said, has never been carefully looked at. No government has honestly examined the thing, he said. And neither the government nor Comalco has done a cost benefit analysis on the project, which would show the true loss to the New Zealand people. He said that whereas in the past the Save Manapouri Campaign had concentrated mainly on the lake, he would be asking his members to take a stand against the real cause of the problem — the Bluff smelter.