Copied in the table below is the official result from the Capital & Coast District Health Board elections held last weekend. What has this got to do with swimming, I hear you ask? Well, if you skip to the last result; the person who secured the lowest number of votes, the name that polled fewer votes that 22 other candidates, the name I have highlighted in bold print is Susan Turner.

The people of Wellington have spoken. Susan Turner is their last possible choice – bottom of the pile. But why is that significant to Swimming New Zealand (SNZ)? Well Susan Turner was the ex-President of West Auckland Aquatics who along with Nikki Johns, is the person who complained about my coaching at the club. She is also the person who was central to a $AU1.4million judgement against Queensland Health because of her “mismanagement”. But most important of all Susan Turner and Nikki Johns are the two people that SNZ has decided to spend $100,000 protecting from publication in the Marris Report.

Talk about, “make good choices”. Clearly Wellington voters have more brains that the Board of SNZ. In Wellington the voters would not even give Turner their vote. SNZ on the other hand are in the process of giving her privacy $100,000 of your money. Is that good use of your money? Certainly the voters in Wellington do not think so. I suspect Queensland health and their Court would agree. But not the Board of SNZ.

To SNZ the person who cost Queensland Health $AU1.4million and came last in a 23 person District Health Board field is well worth an investment of $100,000. It really is crazy stuff. As I have asked a dozen times what is in that Report that links Susan Turner to SNZ and Bruce Cotterill? What are they trying to hide? Why is protecting something about Turner more important to the SNZ Board than investing $100,000 in New Zealand’s youth? Why is your child’s swimming 100,000 times less important to SNZ than Susan Turner? What are SNZ scared of you finding out?

In Wellington, at least the people have spoken and, in my view have made a good choice. I can only wish the Board of SNZ had half the wisdom of the Wellington electorate.

Here then is the Wellington result – made by people who do know the right thing to do. The Board members of SNZ should read it well and ask themselves – why?