In a letter from Murray Burns, Manager, Regulatory Services, in response to ours to him under the Official Information Act about what transpired at the "non-public" meeting on 25th June, on the issue of the house built on the cemetery, all information as to what transpired was witheld. Not only were the legal reports witheld, but all that transpired at that meeting including submissions made by other interested parties - those who did not present them at the public part of the meeting.

What was disclosed was the position of the three trustees. It seems two were approached to resign, leaving one, who has not been approached in any way by the Clutha District Council, either to be asked to resign, or being given notice of his dismissal. The Council's position simply is - that now there are less than three trustees, the Council assumes the trustees' responsibilities under the Act. Presumably this leaves the Council free reign to deal with the problems of Mr Read's house without interference of any trustees who may "leak" information to the public and ratepayers as to what is going on.

Interestingly, in Section 25 of the Burial and Cremation Act, trustees have to the power to "hold" any land in a cemetery and enforce any regulations made under the Act. In the absence of any trustees able to do that due to their being dismissed, the local authority now holds that power. In this case, where trustees might have had the power to seize and dispense of the illegal building on their cemetery land, the Council has gained some "breathing space" to deal with the matter before the dozens of new applications for the positions of trustees can be dealt with at their discretion. Done in such secrecy, this would appear to be directly against the public's interests and concerns in the matter. There is no "open government" here!

We have asked the Minister of Health, who administers the Burial and Cremation Act, for all correspondence relating to the appointment and sacking of trustees, as well as all information / letters, etc, that the ministry has had with respect to the cemetery, with the Clutha District Council.

We are not hopeful of a reply, however, as the Minister, Annette King had not replied to any of our letters at all since the first one, dated 29 May 2000, until 10th July.

We were a little luckier, though, with our letter to the Minister of Local Government, Sandra Lee. She has referred our letter to the Minister who administers the Building Act, Mark Burdon.

On visiting the cemetery on 7th July, we saw that there had been no further building work attempted, but there was a red surveyor's mark about 15 metres out from the building. What this means is hard to determine. For Mr Read, the road to the acquisition of the land underneath his house would be long and torturous. The building permit was granted with the provision that the owner of the building would make arrangements to acquire the land either by purchase or lease, during the period which the agreement remains in force. Mr Read seemingly never bothered to acquire the land. The Council never advised him how it could be done. The Council appears to have the power to go in and remove the building. It appears, though, to not have advised the Building Industry Authority of the "waiver" that allowed Mr Read, who does not own or lease the land, to build his house, with the written support of the Council in a report on the controversy surrounding the building permit to the Lawrence/Tuapeka Community Board.

The original Trustees never had the power to permit Mr Read to build his house on cemetery land, despite the Council's claim that the one Trustee who was asked to give permission, did so legally.

It appears that the Council did know what sort of land Mr Read (or his non-existent Fishing Club) was proposing to build his house on. The Council knew that only it could negotiate (under Section 23 of the Burial and Cremation Act) with the Health Ministry to have that section of the land partitioned off and passed over to Mr Read. Mr Read could not do it himself, as he was not entrusted with the power to administer the cemetery. The Clutha District Council did not tell him anything about that while they watched him build his house. Nor, (as they admitted to us in an earlier letter) had they had any communication with the Health Ministry whatesoever about the matter.

Hence the present dreadful mess the Council's actions have landed everyone in who had anything to do with this saga.

The cemetery land is vested in the Clutha District Council in trust for a Local Purpose (cemetery) Reserve, according to the two land titles concerned. This comes under the Reserves Act 1977, under which the raceman's huts that were originally there were ordered to be removed in the early 1980's. Classification of this land can only be changed with the Ministry's permission and under an exhaustive public consultation process.

Section 21 of the Burial and Cremation Act which deals with cemetery land refers to land which is described as "unused portions" of land put aside for cemeteries. This may be leased only, not sold. It is not absolutely conclusive that the land in question had never been "used" for cemetery purposes.

All of this brings in to question the overall draconian actions of the Clutha District Council, who certainly don't appear to be acting in the interests of fairness to ratepayers and others, but to satisfy some sort of "power-freak" ethos of officials.

On the one hand, a man who builds his house illegally on land that he doesn't own achieves the full support of the Council acting mostly in secret and excluding the public from following it's processes. By hook or by crook, the Council is going to cover its posterior and make sure Mr Read is not too discomfitted by the necessary correction of the Council's errors.

On the other hand, you have the case of poor Doug Macgregor, who owns a small section in Lawrence with some antique motor vehicles stored on it. Mr Macgregor has been a careful law-abiding citizen all his life - until somebody took a snitcher to his storing of cars on his own section there, and got the Council on to him

The Council dutifully sprang into action. They were going to make Doug Macgregor's actions illegal! They wrote to him and told him to cover up his cars or put a fence round them. They threatened him with legal action if he didn't comply. Mr Macgregor wrote and said he'd been ill with a quadruple bypass operation and hip replacement, and had been out of town for six months, but would try to comply as best he could, when he could. A cold silence descended from the Council. Mr Macgregor heard no more - but ah - the Council was "moving". They got their consultant to draw up a by-law when they found out that under the present by-laws they couldn't sue Mr Macgregor if he didn't comply. In this ground-breaking piece of local government legislation, they described what a "derelict motor vehicle" was and pointed to Mr Macgregor's yard full of cars as an example.

This novel draft by-law was approved in silence, with nobody objecting, by the Lawrence/Tuapeka Community Board and now it may be drafted and go into the public consultation process, then into law.

Mr Macgregor will be fined very heavily, and they will take his cars away to the crushers and charge him for their trouble. He will never be able to restore the two Armstrongs he has - worth many thousands - they will become scrap metal. His cars, intact as they stand now, some with covers on to protect them, are doomed! Being on his private land on which he pays over $800 rates per year (on land that is worth $1500) is no protection, either.

The Council's rather cavalier lack of consultation with Mr Macgregor when they went ahead with their draft by-law without having the courtesy to reply to his letter nearly caused the poor man to have a heart attack when he saw it!

And what does this by-law say? As well as referring to any "motor vehicle" not registered or warranted, it also refers to "any parts of a motor vehicle" (not currently registered etc)! We ponder on what sort of any part of a motor vehicle could possibly be registered in the first place! A wheel lying against a tin shed? A battery sitting on the path?

Maybe you could ask - if the Council could remove poor old Doug's cars, could they not also remove Mr Read's house sitting serenely but illegally on public cemetery land? Watch this space.

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