National's plan to gut the ETS wasn't the only thing revealed in the Radio New Zealand environment debate [audio]. There was also a lot of discussion on water quality, which included this disturbing comment from David Parker (at around 40:40):
Parker: Our policy is in the national policy statement. Rivers should be clean enough to swim in.Unfortunately, his actual words were lost in the noise, but it was clear from his tone that he disapproved of Greensill's statement. Which begs the question "why"? Why shouldn't we be aiming to have waterways that are clean enough for us to drink the water or eat the things which live in them? Isn't that part of our "clean, green image"? Or should our next tourism marketing campaign use the slogan "100% pure - but don't drink the water"?Greensill: Rivers should be clean enough to eat out of.
Parker: No, that's not [unintelligible].
