Alexander (Sandy) Milne

I comment on the Wednesday opinion piece, "Your voice, your vote, our future" from Brendan Horan, a candidate as councillor on our local body elections.
Mr Horan took up a third of his opinion piece lauding our mayor Victor Luca for his efforts to get less wealthy residents a fair go, as many other Whakatāne residents have done, and the proof is in past Beacons that our excessive rates rises (amongst the highest in New Zealand) would have been even worse if Dr Luca had not led the way here.  

But if he gets elected, Brendan must demonstrate how he and fellow councillors can support our mayor to stall, or reverse, the downgrades in all of our health services. Similar communities New Zealand-wide will benefit from our leadership.

It is true, as he writes, that Mr Horan very publicly supported us at a packed meeting in the Little Theatre 13 years ago.  That followed the protests of all frontline Whakatāne Hospital senior medical officers about the Tauranga private lab take-over of our hospital-based lab services.

Curiously, Nr Horan did not mention an earlier Beacon-headlined packed-house Grey Power meeting he addressed, or his efforts as an MP on the same matter.

But that fact remains that all our efforts got us nowhere.   The privateers were too powerful.

Not anymore.  The time is right for us to correct that, and I shall expect Mr Horan and every other councillor to join myself and others when our campaign re-activates next week.

In the next few weeks or months, I/we shall remind everyone who reads the Beacon that the lab battle is far more serious than is the temporary obstetrics and gynaecology staffing problem.

Dangerous organisms are developing resistance to antibiotics at an alarming rate.

Whakatāne should lead the way in tackling that emergency.  Future generations deserve that.