Who would have thought that a government could have made such a hash of water reform? Now Kieran McAnulty is the new Local Government Minister and is proposing 10 regional entities instead of four, which, on the face of it, sounds better and provides for a better chance for some local representation. The trouble is it is still co-governance, which means that half the members of the governing boards will be totally unaccountable to ratepayers. This flies in the face of Article 3 of the Treaty, which gave all citizens, irrespective of ethnicity, equal rights. Funnily enough, having equal rights is called democracy – and that has served us well for many decades.

Not only will the 10 regional water entities be co-governed, they will also be subject to so-called Te Mana o Te Wai directives. These directives, which only Maori New Zealanders can give, will provide mandatory rules which the regional water entities must comply with.

Under this Government, we're moving further and further away from democracy, with those having some Maori ancestry, including other ancestors now of course, having inherently superior rights. If allowed to stand, this will be a disaster for our future.

Margaret Murray-Benge, Bethlehem.