N-free zone call fails

Press, 27 September 1983, Page 9

N-free zone call fails

Riccarton Borough would not be declared a nuclear-weapons-free zone, the council decided last evening.

However, it will advise the Government, by letter, of the council’s “deep concern about the proliferation of nuclear weapons,” and will ask it to support all possible measures to outlaw and dispose of them. At the council’s finance and by-laws committee meeting earlier this month, a member of the nuclear-weapons-free zone committee, Mr V. F. Wilkinson, outlined the apparent feeling of many people in the community in support of such a declaration. Cr J. W. Warren said he

supported the motion and assumed from it that the council was powerless to take any action if the borough was declared a nuclear-weapons-free zone. “If the Amy decided to drive a rocket down Riccarton Road the council would still not be able to do anything about it. I believe that local bodies should not pass legislation unless they can enforce it so I think the approach suggested is the correct one,” he said. Cr R. S. Lester was concerned that the council would not be able to take action if such circumstances arose, but agreed with other councillors that objections about nuclear arms should be made to the Government.

“Nuclear weapons of any kind are not good and our duty as councillors is to make our voice heard by the Government,” he said.

It was hoped that, the Government would use all its powers to support nuclear outlawing and to dispose of nuclear weapons, said the Mayor of Riccarton, Mr R. W. J. Harrington.

An amendment to the motion, put forward by Cr G. W. Hunt, to exlude asking the Government to take note of the concern expressed by many New Zealanders and to support measures to outlaw and dispose of nuclear weapons, was lost.