The policy thing

In the pre-election clash of ideas, must we be subjected to “yes it is/no it isn’t” arguments as if they constitute political debate ( Politics, September

2)? Instead of politicians just talking past one another, the public want to hear about the policies that set the parties apart. For example, do we solve high house prices by facilitating the free market, governmental control or leaving it to the banks?

Policy can be defined as a deliberate system of principles used to guide decision-making. Politicians mix up policies and promises. When they are questioned by the media, they use the opportunity to deliver a party political broadcast. Rarely do candidates dare go to the policy side of the issue, which is the fulcrum of how to accomplish their promises.

Surely our politicians could respect their interviewers more and allow the robust debate that democracy requires? Caroline Mabry (Glen Eden, Auckland)

PRICE OF GROWTH

Kudos to the Listener for the features on tackling greenhouse gases and the pollution of Lake Horowhenua (“Suing to save us”, August 19; “Water war”, August 26), but a brickbat for avoiding the underlying cause of both problems: our obsession with growth.

Whether it’s growth in visitor numbers, growth in population or so-called “economic growth”, the eternal quest is for more, bigger, newer or flashier without regard to the consequences.

And no one’s prepared to pay. As I write, there’s outrage that visitors to New Zealand might be charged the price of a packet of cigarettes to help contribute to our dwindling conservation estate. No, no – it’s a tax!

We should expect more

Lake Horowhenuas, more greenhouse gases, more extinct species and more industrialscale farming with attendant run-off and pollutants, because they’re all symbols of glorious growth. The thing that no politician seems ready to address is that endless growth in a finite system – whether a country like New Zealand or a planet like Earth – simply isn’t possible. Geoff Palmer (Mt Victoria, Wellington) Fifty years ago, I went to watch my brother-in-law sail his P-class yacht on Lake Horowhenua. Along the shore from the clubhouse, for about 2m into the lake, the water was covered in a black sludge that smelt like an open sewer.

The pollution would have started when the lake was lowered by about 4m, turning into farmland what would have been raupo swamp, which acted as a filter for water feeding the lake. This country has destroyed millions of hectares of raupo swamp because we see little value in it.

Cleaning up the lake even then would have been a massive task. Today, I would think the job would take all the $44 million the Government is promising to restore waterways. Chris Bowen (Lower Hutt)

PROCREATIONAL PROCLIVITIES

When the biggest threat facing the planet is climate change, and overpopulation is its cause, rather than querying whether Jacinda Ardern plans to have children, shouldn’t we be asking Bill English why he has so many ( Shelf Life, September 2)? Terry Hannan (Oamaru)

SORRY SUICIDE STATS

Maria Baker, a leader in suicide prevention among Maori and Pasifika youth, drew attention on RNZ’s Morning Report on August 29 to two oftenoverlooked points: suicide is complex and any actions are a long game. She was commenting on figures from the chief coroner showing the number of suicides in the country in the year to the end of June had hit a record 606, 130 of whom were Maori. When asked about the high Maori rate, she drew attention to a slew of social factors that can be best summed up as deprivation.

Harvard Professor Matthew Nock and colleagues have quantified the contribution of

the most important factors in suicide. Their analysis shows we could prevent 80% of suicide attempts if we could “cure” five key factors: parental mental disorder, childhood adversity, trauma, chronic ill health and mental disorder in attempters. Two, child deprivation and mental disorder, contribute by far the most. Maori are over-represented in both of these.

It is pretty clear from this list that there is no quick fix and that we should focus on the two big factors, and in vulnerable populations, not the affluent middle classes. It’s pleasing that district health board specialist child and youth mental health services are meeting their targets of helping the most severely affected 5% of the population for both Maori and Pakeha respectively. But there is a huge problem in primary or community-level services, creating overloads on secondary services.

The problem of childhood deprivation is one for society to debate as an election looms. John Scott Werry Emeritus professor of psychiatry, University of Auckland

TRUMP’S MAN IN WELLY

Your profile of US ambassador to New Zealand Scott Brown was interesting but not in a

good way (“Diplomacy rules”, September 2).

It feels as though Brown has been planted here to groom us for doing President Donald Trump’s bidding on the promise of better trade deals.

Do they really think New Zealanders would be swayed by a PR exercise featuring a sporty, sexy man, his cute dog and his wife? L Child (Maraetai, Auckland) Thank you for publishing an article that refers to Donald Trump in a non-derogatory way. I suspect there are even positive opinions in existence. It would be nice to read some. Michael Pinkney (Kohimarama, Auckland)

GORY STORY

Al Gore has dedicated his life to fighting climate change, and he has the political contacts to make people listen ( Film, September 2). He has educated thousands of people about the issue, including New Zealanders who have travelled to his classes in the US.

As the review of An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power says, there’s reference in the film to the US Supreme Court overturning Gore’s election as US president in 2000 despite his having won the popular vote. His awareness-raising work could not have been done if he had been president. I hope millions will see this movie. Joy Rising (Tauranga)

DEMO CRAZY

I was amused to see that correspondent John Ansell, who objects to “whingeing Maori radicals”, ends his missive with the word “democracy” ( Letters, July 22).

In the demos kratos (people power) that was the city state of Athens, women were not allowed to vote. Slaves were not allowed to vote. Immigrants, although being allowed to run businesses and farms, etc, were not allowed to vote. The only people allowed to vote were male tangata whenua.

If Aotearoa New Zealand were indeed a democracy in the original sense, the only people to be voting on September 23 would be Maori males. Kathleen Hickey (Amberley Beach)

SLIPPERY PIRATE

I was delighted to read Redmer Yska’s account of Felix von Luckner’s adventures in the Pacific (“Devil in the detail”, August 26).

One aspect of von Luckner’s “blatant cheek” towards the New Zealand authorities that Yska does not mention is the fact that on their way across the Pacific in a lifeboat after running aground at Maupelia, von Luckner, his navigator and their crew of four called in at two New Zealand territories before being captured in Fiji, making a point that their visits, using false names, be officially recorded so the certificates could be used as identity documents.

Certificates were duly provided, which are held at