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Alex, Charlie's petition was against the privatisation of the port as proposed by DHB and the retention of it as an asset which should benefit the community. At the time when Charlie's petition was doing the rounds, the DHB privatisation had only just gone public and people, including Charlie, were still formulating their ideas, no clear, viable alternatives supported with industry based evidence had been put forward at that time, so the only course was to say no to DHB. What swiftly became clear during the first consultation was that just saying no to DHB would not see any result except for the success of the DHB proposal. Gwyn Prosser knew it, Bob Goldfield was confident of it, Lord Adonis was convinced of it and the rest of us, whilst being downcast, would have had to accept it.
Your comments appear to ignore and fail to appreciate the dynamics of a campaign that is informed through genuine consultation and the changes in emphasis that are naturally engendered when new discoveries are made about the application of existing governing legislation, national audit office rules, increased knowledge of ports and harbours, injections of new expertise and international research and so on. DPPT grew out of the initial consultation period and as a response to views and part proposals expressed by a range of stakeholders.