Stronghold should be on shaky ground
Dunedin has been a Labour Party stronghold forever.
I am proud that my mother, Dorothy Kennedy, with the help of Dorothy Fraser (Labour MP) was instrumental in promoting a private members Bill in 1972-73 which overturned an injustice and changed the law of our country.
The nature of that Bill is not important but was impressive.
It is a travesty that our more recent crop of Labour MPs has been far less impressive than their predecessors and has failed over decades to make meaningful gains for our community.
Pete Hodgson’s appointment to the key role in the development of our new hospital has been a huge disappointment punctuated by his assertion that "Auckland should naturally receive a PET scan ahead of Dunedin" due to its greater size.
This is despite the fact that there are already several private PET scanners in Auckland and only one in the South Island.
His feeble acquiescence to the cuts to our hospital being showered down from his party seems to demonstrate his preference for his political party’s ideology over the good of our community.
David Clark’s rendition of "village idiot on a bike" as minister of health during Covid was only eclipsed by his complete strangulation of the nation’s financial liquidity in his role as minister of commerce when he introduced legislation aimed at curtailing loan sharks.
Claire Curran’s embarrassing performance in the communications portfolio requires no further explanation let alone Ingrid O’Leary’s seeming moral bankruptcy in courting criminal gang support.
Or is she just a bit confused?
Otago, and Dunedin in particular, deserve far better than we have endured from our local parliamentary representatives.
Time for some big changes, I think.
Picture this
I see there’s a picture of Chris Hipkins with four of his MPs, who have fallen short of the rules, circulating in the media and being shouted about by Christopher Luxon et al.
Funny thing is, if that was an image of National MPs or candidates who have been convicted in the courts, deselected, sacked or just keep on no matter what heinous actions they had committed, we would need five pictures.
Paramount right
Attributed to Voltaire are the words "I disapprove of what you say, but I defend to the death your right to say it". The elected mayors of the Clutha and Central Otago, Bryan and Tim Cadogan, should remember that in any civilised democracy the right to freedom of speech is paramount.
Name and shame
A visit south gave me the opportunity to read the Otago Daily Times. Unlike The Post, the ODT prints, in detail, court news with names, crimes and penalties of those who break the law. Such naming and shaming should be mandatory given the weaknesses of some judges failing to hold people to account for serious offending against the community.
Not amorous
The use of "amorous" in your headline (ODT 4.7.23) to describe a recently struck off secondary teacher portrays his action as romantic. His grooming, manipulation, exploitation and abuse of female pupils warrants greater gravitas.
Tread carefully and cut your cloth to suit
I wonder if councils have noticed that staff abuse is increasing at a similar rate to the ever -growing numbers of new rules and regulations being forced upon ratepayers along with increased costs of compliance and rates hikes.
Unfortunately, ratepayers are unable to increase their incomes by just the stroke of a pen and be backed by the law of the land.
It becomes even more frustrating watching these same councils employing hundreds of extra staff and increasing budgets when the rest of us are tightening our belts and making sure every dollar we spend is being put to good use.
I’m certainly not condoning the abuse of staff but understand the frustrations often felt when dealing with what appear to be senseless regulations that are only adding costs to our legitimate occupations and diminishing incomes.
I would also be interested to know if some staff or contractors attract more abuse than others.
It’s time all councils took a hard look at themselves, cut their cloth to suit, then tread carefully in a community of increasing pressures that are often the result of their own doing.
Carpet call carpeted by readers
The Ministry of Education’s decision to use imported nylon carpets in rural schools is a short-sighted one. Synthetic carpets, soft furnishings, clothing and other fabrics need to be phased out. They’re hard-wearing, it’s true, but so hard-wearing we have no idea how long they will last in our landfills, and what the long-term impacts of microfibres are in the environment.
Wool is a renewable, biodegradable, breathable fibre, naturally fire retardant, and locally produced by New Zealand farmers.
Did the ministry use a life cycle analysis that included not just the immediate cost of the nylon carpet, but also its longer-term cost to local councils, to the environment, and to human and ecosystem health?
The Ministry of Education need to become educated after their appalling decision to have nylon carpets laid in rural schools.
Of course nylon carpets are recyclable — almost endlessly so in fact. Fire resistant is also a joke since wool, not nylon, is used in high-quality builds as insulation because not only is it warm and organic but also fire resistant.
The finance that the ministry will be using for this large purchase is taxpayers’ money. New Zealand taxpayers may be better pleased to be supporting the local strong-wool economy, especially taking into account the present precarious situation in which it finds itself.
Instead of making this decision uninformed by current scientific and environmental facts, costs, I suspect, have played an unbalanced role.
Address Letters to the Editor to: Otago Daily Times, PO Box 517, 52-56 Lower Stuart St, Dunedin. Email: editor@odt.co.nz
