MEDIA RELEASE – 9TH MARCH 2015

Auckland Transport ‘bullies’ contractor into spraying chemicals

The Auckland-based Weed Management Advisory group is accusing Auckland Transport of gross interference with a legitimate vegetation control contract and abusing its powers by instructing a contractor to spray chemicals.

Hana Blackmore said today that the Weed Management Advisory (WMA) had written urgently to Auckland Transport (AT) Chairman, Dr Lester Levy and CEO David Warburton demanding that AT’s instructions to spray chemicals on roads in the North West Urban area currently controlled with a non-chemical hot water treatment be rescinded immediately and the spray contractor told to cease and desist.

“We knew as long ago as August last year that AT officers were putting considerable pressure on both the main contractor and his specialist hot water sub-contractor to break their 100% non-chemical contract and spray chemicals” said Hana Blackmore.

“But what we did not expect is that the hot water company’s legitimate refusal to use chemicals would result in another contractor being secretly employed to go out and spray his area all over again with chemicals after he had treated it successfully with hot water.”

“This is an outrageous situation” said Hana Blackmore, “and in our opinion Auckland Transport’s actions in this affair are nothing short of bullying.”

“What is worse is that I had publicly raised this very concern about contractors being pressured to spray chemicals when I presented WMA’s Human Rights Report to Auckland Transport’s December board meeting, and had followed up with a detailed letter in January.”

“We were informed only days ago by Dr Levy that an investigation and review into this matter was undertaken by AT’s Group Manager of Risk and Audit. His conclusion was that “the issues raised were not justified” and that no further investigation was required.

“That another contractor was secretly spraying whilst this investigation was supposedly underway would suggest that either AT approved these actions or their investigation was shallow and superficial,” said Hana Blackmore.

Dr Meriel Watts said that the WMA are now hugely concerned that Auckland Transport’s inexplicable actions are part of a determined campaign to maintain agrichemical use in their road corridor operations, at all costs.

The North West Urban vegetation control contract is the first area to have a legacy chemical regime treated with non-chemicals after Auckland Transport’s boundary re-configurations resulted in part of North Shore’s hot water contract being combined with two smaller Waitakere and Rodney ‘chemical’ areas.

The specialist hot water company who was already doing the North Shore hot water contract simply added the two smaller ‘chemical’ areas into their operations, said Hana Blackmore, “thereby achieving economies of scale and operational efficiency.”

“This was not a covert or clandestine operation. The tender and price for the contract was for a performance based integrated service using hot water for the whole contract area. AT accepted that legal tender, awarded the contract, and the specialist hot water company has been carrying out that work to specification”

“It is well known within AT and the industry that in all the years this specialist company has been working on the North Shore contract they have consistently met audit standards of over 98%. They have never had to resort to chemicals to meet specification,” emphasised Blackmore.

“So we simply cannot understand why on earth AT should interfere in this appalling and underhand manner.”

The WMA are now seriously worried that the hot water company has been singled out because of their own actions in demanding evidence to back up AT’s claims that using chemicals on the road corridor vegetation control operations are the only cost effective solution.

“We have been putting in OIA requests for the basis of AT’s claims since 2012. All have been denied. Alternative costings have been done for us by the hot water company which we have supplied to both AT and Council. They have disappeared without trace, and both organisations continue to claim chemicals are the cheapest option.”

“It is our fear that by disparaging this leading edge hot water technology and discrediting the company, AT can continue to say there is no reliable evidence for our claims and continue to cover up the true cost of vegetation control operations.”

Hana Blackmore said this is a very serious accusation, not made lightly. But this very issue was also one they had raised with Dr Levy in their January letter and which the review concluded was not justified.

“In the light of what has since happened, the WMA are calling for the report of that investigation to be made public, and an independent review of all AT actions since the contracts were awarded last year be undertaken” said Hana Blackmore.

“What has yet to be revealed is why AT is so absolutely determined to continue to spray agrichemicals in contravention of Auckland Council policy, in contravention of their own specifications, in contravention of community wishes made explicitly clear in a petition to them and Auckland Council in 2013, and in defiance of economic rationale. Who is driving this absurd ideological behaviour and waste of ratepayer’s money?” asked Dr Meriel Watts.

As Dr Watts makes clear, WMA has spent hundreds of hours of unpaid time trying to get AT to honour community wishes and implement Auckland Council’s Weed Management Policy and stop spraying agrichemicals on the roadside - in the process providing leading science, technological and economic data - only to be stonewalled by AT’s secretive and obstructive behaviour.

The WMA will be taking the matter to the Ombudsman.

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