On Tuesday 17 October, Ponsonby News attended a meeting of Auckland Council’s Environment and Community Committee in the Town Hall, chaired by Councillor Penny Hulse.
On Tuesday 17 October I attended a meeting of Auckland Council’s Environment and Community Committee in the Town Hall, chaired by Councillor Penny Hulse.
The continuing saga of lack of action by council to enforce the Council Weed Management Policy (thus reducing the use of the poisonous glyphosate) in place since 2013, is a disgrace, as several expert submitters told the committee.
There are two parts to weed management in Auckland. Parks and Reserves use new contractor, Ventia, while Auckland Transport (AT) manages roadside berms and road edges.
The Weed Management Policy calls for a progressive reduction in the use of chemical sprays. It appears from several observations and discussions I have had with Ventia staff that they may be responding to the policy dictates and reducing the use of glyphosate-based products like Roundup, but AT are certainly not.
I have tried for two months to have talks with AT staff responsible for the weed control policy, without success.
At the 17 October meeting, submitters told councillors of their legal obligations to protect the health and wellbeing of its citizens, and one, Alex Strever, a proud New Zealand citizen, formerly from South Africa, suggested council could be sued if they did not. There are now several precedents around the world where councils, states or countries have taken legal action, especially against Monsanto, the producer of Roundup. Roundup comprises the poisonous glyphosate and other additives that increase the toxicity of Roundup, which the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), has declared "probably carcinogenic".
California has banned the use of glyphosate without labelling, and Monsanto is suing them for daring to take that step. Companies making billions of dollars a year don’t give in easily.
Most submitters at the council meeting were more polite than Lisa Prager, a long-time protagonist against the council. She said to chairperson Hulse “just get on the phone and say to Lester Levy ‘stop the spraying - now’.” (Levy is the chair of Auckland Transport). Prager also told the committee that “AT has us by the goolies.”
Hana Blackmore of the Weed Management Advisory who has been fighting this issue for more than 20 years, spoke forcefully and knowledgeably about the need to stop chemical spraying. She emphasised that the council must ensure the policy guidelines are carried out, and deplored the fact that "nobody is doing anything about AT." She also discussed glyphosate residues in our water supply, telling the committee that glyphosate takes 120 days or more, depending on humidity and other environmental factors, to break down. On one occasion, she said, Watercare had to close one of the dams that supply domestic water to Aucklanders for three months.
But back to Strever. He related the historic story of Ivan Watkins Dow, from Paritutu, Taranaki, who manufactured 24D and 245T in the 1970s. Like tobacco companies before them, and Monsanto now, they denied 24D and 245T had adverse health effects. The government of the time even subsidised some of their manufacturing. And then came agent orange, made from 245T, and a huge killer during the Vietnam War. Those products were eventually banned after proof of high levels of cancer in Taranaki and large numbers of birth defects.
It was that sad history which led Strever to saying councils that are negligent with citizens health could and should be sued.
The councillors were urged to read the paper produced by former Green MP, Stephan Browning and Jodie Bruning ‘Why did the NZ EPA ignore the world authority on cancer?' which laid out comprehensive criticism of the Environmental Protection Authority’s report (EPA) last year saying glyphosate is not carcinogenic. Scientists at Massey and Auckland Universities and the Health Ministry, are also highly critical of the authority’s review and the way it just dismissed an IARC conclusion that glyphosate "is a probable carcinogen for humans".
The EPA relied on a report by a single person, former National Poisons Centre director, Wayne Temple. It has been admitted that the EPA was repeatedly lobbied by Monsanto, trying its best to discredit IARC findings and to influence the EPA.
The director of Massey University’s centre for Public Health Research, Jeroen Douwes, said he could not understand what motivated the EPA to dispute IARC findings.
Douwes said he was not sure if the EPA was incompetent or if it was being dictated to by other organisations.
It is clearly incumbent on council to widen its investigations beyond the EPA, which at best is not telling the whole story, or at worst is deliberately engaging in obfuscation, some of it industry led.
Distinguished journalist, Rod Oram, spoke to the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor, Sir Peter Gluckman, who confirmed to Oram that the Government is "talking with the EPA" about their controversial handling of the report stating glyphosate was unlikely to be carcinogenic, in contradiction to the world authority, IARC. “We don’t fully understand what they [the EPA] do," Sir Peter said.
Rod Oram asked the EPA chief scientist, Jacqueline Rowarth, about glyphosate toxicity. She said it was difficult to weigh up the financial, health and environmental costs of a substance against its economic benefits.
When pressed by Oram, Rowarth admitted she did not know when EPA last amended regulations on glyphosate use, nor what other reports existed beyond the questionable Temple report. Neither did Rowarth know of any data on risk assessment of glyphosate use in New Zealand, including volumes used or safe dosage.
The council must urgently address this issue, bringing AT into line, and at the very least, phasing out glyphosate use in public places in Auckland.
I firmly believe it should be totally banned in New Zealand.
(JOHN ELLIOTT)