Language matters

Driving around the South Island, I marvelled all over again. It's so vast and spectacular, so different, in many ways, from the North. It's so wildly beautiful it gives you a sense of privilege. In town for a book event at Wanaka's Festival of Colour, I talked to broadcaster Kathryn Ryan, and noticed our alternative north-south perspectives. She thought Wanaka was getting quite built up, while I, the Aucklander, could hardly believe the South Island's exhilarating emptiness.

- CHARLOTTE GRIMSHAW

On the road, counting numerous placards opposing Three Waters, I hoped that whoever invented the name has learned a lesson. I always wondered why the government didn't call its water reform programme something like, "The Nationwide Administration of Pipes and Drains". It's hard to imagine that becoming so politicised.

The label its creator must have thought would be catchy and likeable turned into code for a side taken in a culture war, for something supposedly questionable and underhand. As a matter of language, for some, it became a heuristic term for "sinister government action".

As a title, "Three Waters" had the perfect ingredients to trigger irritation and suspicion. Like a lot of official messaging in this country, it struck a talking-down, babyish note. It suggested an ersatz "mystical" quality: you could imagine it accompanied by haunting cultural music.