MP TRIES TO BAN WATER

Otago MP Jacqui Dean felt like a bit of a "wally" yesterday, after it
was revealed she tried to ban North Otago's most precious commodity -
water.

Mrs Dean has confirmed she was caught in a hoax by an online blogger
asking for her help in banning dihydrogen monoxide - which, it turns
out, is the chemical name for ordinary H20.

The blunder is a long-running hoax that seeks to trick gullible MPs
into calling for the eradication of water.

A letter, signed by Mrs Dean, was sent to Associate Health Minister
Jim Anderton last month, asking if the Expert Advisory Committee on
Drugs had a view on banning the "drug".

A Blogspot.com blogger, Michael Earley, of Auckland, published the
original letter to Mrs Dean yesterday.

On Tuesday's first reading of the Misuse of Drugs (Classification of
BZP) Amendment Bill, Mr Anderton took the opportunity to rub Mrs
Dean's nose in it.

Mrs Dean responded with a note across the house that said "touchi -
you got me".

When contacted yesterday she said she realised she had made a mistake,
but could see the funny side.

She had been in email contact with a constituent, who said he had a
bachelor of pharmacology, but despite a Google search by one of her
colleagues, Mrs Dean could find nothing to verify it was not a lethal
substance.

"I have been well and truly set up - they were trying to catch me
out," she said. "When I got the letter back I laughed out loud - I
think it's quite funny."

Mrs Dean said everyone had been "pointing the finger" at her.

"I have been taken for a ride - I just hope it does not detract from
the real issue," she said.

Mr Anderton said he would not be banning dihydrogen monoxide or asking
for the experts to consider it.

He responded saying: "Thank you for your letter of 23 August, 2007
about your constituent call for the ban on dihydrogen monoxide, (but)
dihydrogen monoxide is water," he said.

"It may have been described to you as colourless, odourless, tasteless
and causing the death of uncounted thousands of people every
year...(but) I had to respond that the experts had no intention of
(banning water)."

It is not the first time MPs have had a brush with the
hoax.

In 2001, a staff member in Green MP Sue Kedgley's office responded to
a request for support saying she would be "absolutely supportive of
the campaign to ban this toxic substance".

A quick call around the phone book proved Mrs Dean was not on her own
in believing the technical name sounds like a lethal substance.

Oamaru woman Bronwyn Shallish had no idea what it meant either."It
sounds like a chemical - it's a long word, but I probably could have
worked it out," she said.

Whiterocks resident Atholea Shanks found the name "fascinating" and
thought it sounded like a gas rather than a party pill.

A retired Oamaru woman, who declined to be named, thought it must have
been a peroxide-type chemical.