CASH-COW INVESTMENT NOT CHARITY

There is no such thing as a free lunch. Those who say we must stay with Auckland rather than consider Thames-Coromandel, because of the amount Auckland spends on us above what it collects, are so fixated on money that they cannot feel the dagger in their backs.

First, Auckland is not a charity. It doesn't spend money on us because it loves us.

Second, when it does spend 'extra' it is more myth than fact, because if you subtract the millions of our money that it spends on its side of the water, and the profligate way it wastes money on this side, we are living within our means.

Third, from Auckland's point of view it is a very good investment. The more it citifies the island the more our valuations skyrocket and with them our rates. Clever trick. They always get their money back, and then some. My own rates have risen about 25% per year for the last ten years. That's a stunning rate of return.

The entire point is good local government, not dollars. We have enough money. But we are not getting the best local government available. For that we must go east. At the moment we are going west.