'Water, water everywhere but not a drop (for non- Maori) to drink”. Article IV of the Treaty is born. Ill-conceived but coming soon to a kitchen tap or offi ce water cooler near you.
Non-Maori should pay attention. The Maori Council's claim for ownership of water is not about long showers for Maori while the rest of the populace endures a dry rinse. Rather, it is a dangerous end-game being played out by a near-irrelevant group seeking to control an ingredient essential to the sustaining of life itself - fresh water. This most Disney-esque of Treaty claims to date is likely to find favour with the Waitangi Tribunal, a doting body not nervous about sidelining fact to accommodate fi ction (calling the Taniwha as a witness will probably get the claim over the line). That we are even having a discussion about ownership of water is quite astonishing. Water does not discriminate.
No ethnic group is 'special” in the eyes of a passing rain shower or pothole puddle. The Maori Council should stop angling for phantom fish and pull its line in. There is nothing down there. Just water - everybodys' water.

Peter Bullick, Kaimai.