Big job toss likely as P.M. calls halt to dam

Press, 29 June 1982, Page 1

Big job toss likely as P.M. calls halt to dam

PA Wellington The Clyde dam project will be shut in about a month, the Government has decided. The Prime Minister (Mr Muldoon) said yesterday that the big. hydro project would be shelved from the point where the Clutha River was diverted and the "coffer" or base dam made secure. Any work after that time would need to be specificallydirected towards either a high dam or a low dam. Mr Muldoon said. The Government could not justify spending money when the project's future could not be guaranteed.

Lay-offs from the site seem likely to be staggered. About 400 jobs are expected to be involved.

Detailed figures will be released by the Government today. The decision.' forecast by Mr Muldoon last week, will affect several areas. He made it clear yesterday that there could be no lingering hope of an . aluminium smelter in Dunedin if there was no dam to provide the power. At the other end of the scale, orchardists who have replanted in the expectation of receiving irrigation water from the dam may suffer losses.

Mr Muldoon said that the Cabinet had no contingency plans for the laid-off men. However, it was clear there was no work in the area for them. It was not known what would happen to men who lived in Ministry of Works accommodation and who lost their jobs. "There is no easy answer to this," Mr Muldoon said. "The only answer I have is to get enough votes to pass the legislation.” The Government's decision to shut the project after preliminary work was completed towards tjie end of July or early in August, came after the Cabinet had spent the afternoon “analysing the present situation very thoroughly."

The only option was for the legislation, by-passing a return to the Planning Tribunal, to be backed by Parliament.

At present it was clear that the Government could not muster votes to pass the legislation and the Workers' Union should tell the Labour Party "in words of one syllable” that its jobs depended on the Opposition’s attitude, he said.

Mr Muldoon said that the river was expected to. be

diverted in about mid-July. and securing the coffer dam could, take several weeks more. When the exact timing was known, those workers who were no longer needed would be given notice. "That would put the job in a position where it could go to a high dam or a low dam," he said. “One would hope that it would not go to nothing because if that were to happen a great deal of work would be wasted.” By the time the work was finished.' Parliament would be sitting and the Government’s empowering legislation introduced.

“On present indications we do not have the votes to pass it," Mr Muldoon said. "But it is very clear that between now and the meeting of the House (on July 20) the .workers on the job. through their union, should make it perfectly clear to the Labour Opposition that unless they either support the bill or permit their one member who expressed support for it to vote accordingly, then we simply have to close down the w’hole project."

The “one member." Mr B. P. Mac Donnell (Dunedin Central). said last week that he would vote with his {colleagues against the bill. He

said that the "heat" had gone out of the issue for him with the likelihood that the Aramoana smelter would not go ahead. Mr Muldoon said that there was no way of speeding up the legal'process to refer the matter back to the Planning Tribunal. Any point of principle that the rebel Government member of Parliament, Mr M. J. Minogue, might have in refusing to vote for the bill was. in the opinion of the rest of the National caucus "outweighed by the national intet-est, and ' I don't just mean the workers."

The present situation meant that the contract for building the dam could not be proceeded with and power planning would also be thrown into disarray. The Workers’ Union, led by labour's junior vice-presi-dent; Mr Dan Duggan, 'has protested over the Government's action in awarding the contract to private enterprise. but Mr Muldoon said yesterday that no Ministry.of Works jobs would be < lost through allowing private contractors to build the dam. If Labour were to change its stance the job would proceed even though the legislation had not yet been introduced. If the legislation was passed, work would restart on a high dam "forthwith." Mr Muldoon said.