Eamon Sloan

  Petone. Pitone. Pitune. Pito-one. Pitoone. I picked up recently on the Hutt City Council’s current interest in correcting the spelling of its suburb Petone. I sent a politely worded letter to the council a few days ago - see below. No response or acknowledgement as yet. Following on from that The Post (formerly The Dominion Post) published my letter (Friday 1 Dec) which duplicated much of what is below – apart from a pointed criticism of the council, and a final political point paragraph. I was trying to land within the Letters word limit. Too many of our New Zealand councils are going down too many rabbit holes or falling into the trivia swamp. The council sees the naming exercise as a local Maori Trust’s initiative rather than the council’s - that is the Trusts submitting to the Geographic Board regarding a name change. The Hutt City Council website notice states in its support of the name change: “This is also in line with our Naming Policy, and we are required to suppor...