Truth time as election buzz fades
Now that the pre- and immediate posteuphoria of a new minority party in charge has faded, and after having been told that what we took as promises were really only aspirations, we face the truth.
Alas we realise that ensconced on the Treasury benches we have boys and girls trying to do the job of women and men. A class of children who for nine years went to school to eat their lunches and fight over who was to be “class captain”. A class that is experiencing trouble selecting the right “group leaders!” As the now Opposition tried to tell us, in its own somewhat drab, grey way, it is sound policies, based on experience, that we need. Not fairground razzamatazz. Nor policies grabbed out of the broom cupboard in passing while dashing away to tread the boards and preach, in earnest tones, the creation of a “wonderworld”.
A.D. Kirby, Papamoa.
Medicinal cannabis
Ask anyone who has tried medicinal cannabis for chronic pain if it works. Feedback from the 170 patients I started on CBD shows half report very good to excellent response.
Many have suffered pain for years or decades, unresponsive to standard treatments with associated side-effects. GPs will tell you that medical evidence often does not match real-world experiential evidence — evidence-based medicine versus personalised medicine.
Patients ask for relief but not to get high. All doctors may prescribe CBD, the noneuphoriant component of medicinal cannabis. Patients do not get addicted or intoxicated and are safe to drive.
Unfortunately the main side-effect of CBD is “financial toxicity”. A New Zealand medicinal cannabis industry will likely reduce prices and improve access.
Sure, medicinal cannabis doesn’t work for all pain, but it is safe and everyone deserves a chance to use it.
Dr Graham Gulbransen, Henderson.
Visas for chefs
I was very interested in your Weekend Herald article “eateries simmer over visa denials”. Why oh why can’t Immigration New Zealand use some common sense and listen to the people like Simon Gault and Luis Cabrera who know what they are talking about? Auckland is a top tourist destination with many amazing eateries, but these will soon close if passionate, competent chefs cannot be found in New Zealand. We have an amazing opportunity to showcase our fresh, seasonal and ethnic foods to the world and, if overseas chefs need to be recruited to do this, it is worth granting visas to them as a longterm investment in our tourist industry.
Kay Robinson, Henderson.
Parliamentary prayer
When last week’s earthquake rumbled Parliament Building, it’s a likely bet that some MPs exclaimed the two words they wanted expunged from the parliamentary prayer. Peter Culpan, Waitakere.
Government decisions
Jami-Lee Ross was inducted into politics as a teenager and elevated to National’s front bench. Despite his now tarnished career he is likely to return to the debating chamber as an independent backbencher, work experience unknown, credentials in question. Draw comparison with many of today’s aspiring politicians to their counterpart from yesteryear, miners, farmers, doctors, trades folk, all exposed to the rigours of the workplace, shaping character, minds maturing.
A recent Herald report outlined the dubious decision to let a convicted drug dealer remain in New Zealand, a decision endorsed oddly by that champion for tighter immigration Winston Peters, also the ban imposed on offshore oil and gas exploration acutely aware gas reserves are nearing depletion. The intent of KiwiBuild compromised, large deposits a requisite and the decision to increase fuel taxes ensuring Aucklanders pay $1 a litre more than an Australian motorist, actions that threaten inflation and rising costs, the nemesis of the coalition’s support base. Is common sense redundant?
P.J. Edmondson, Tauranga.
Fireworks law
Lost in the thick of the daily news is the important information that the Auckland Council is offering the public the chance to have their say on changes to the Public Safety and Nuisance Bylaw 2013. Possibly the most important suggested change is to ban the sale of fireworks to the public, allowing only public displays. This is the first time, as far as I am aware, that Aucklanders have had the opportunity to agree/disagree with this often mooted move, but we know many are keen to see the end to the damage to animals, children, and private and public property that occurs every year from fireworks. To record your opinion, go to “Auckland Council Proposed Changes to the Public Safety and Nuisance Bylaw 2013” and have your say by December 5, 2018.
M. Carol Scott, Birkenhead.
Rogernomics rollback
It’s becoming obvious we’ve never had a Government more destructive to the New Zealand way of life than the regime which foisted Rogernomics upon us in the late 1980s and which continues to provide professionals, entrepreneurs, bureaucrats and tradesmen with so many chances for ripping us off. The question is, what is the present administration going to do about it — or are they just going to sit on their hands like the last one?
Kerry Craig, Mt Eden.
Assisted dying
In the face of an overwhelmingly negative response by thousands of submitters to his assisted suicide bill, David Seymour is grasping at the straws of vaguely and ambiguously worded public opinion polls. Many people think “assisted dying” means palliative care.
Naturally Seymour is worried. Not only were around 90 per cent of written submitters against the bill but the proportion of opposing oral submitters was even higher. These were concerned New Zealanders from a wide variety of walks of life who had both professional and personal experience of vulnerabilities faced by Kiwis of all ages, and especially youth, the elderly and the disabled.
It is laughable to consider the kneejerk reactions expressed in opinion polls as superior to these real-life testimonies. In contrast with the submitters, almost no poll responders would have read the bill.
Many submitters not only repudiated the bill due to concerns about public safety but went further to describe the alternative pathway they would like New Zealand to follow. They called for improved palliative care services to be available as of right throughout New Zealand under every DHB. This would provide real choice at the end of Kiwis’ lives without any danger of abuse.
Melissa Hardy, Army Bay.
Tiny houses
I’m at a loss to understand this import of yet another US fad — “Tiny Houses”. I totally understand and support the notion of reducing the use of (very often) “big houses” or (too often) “enormous houses”. But surely an easier and far more logical innovation would be to “small houses”.
How about The Block, or something similar, being based around this concept? They could also include a maximum expenditure for each room, removing the possibility of everything being top end and ludicrously costly. Surely this whole notion is far more in line with what we really need if we have any chance of addressing the housing crisis.
Judy Lawry, Goldlands.
Trade agreement
I’m surprised this Government’s greatest and most damning abandonment of a major pre-election promise has had such minor coverage in the media. This is the sellout over the TPPA, which, in opposition, Labour and NZ First vehemently opposed, in concert with a large number of the voters.
Government’s facile, cosmetic name change (the deal is now known as the “Comprehensive and Progressive” TransPacific Partnership) has changed none of the one-sided, sovereignty-sapping conditions still in the “Partnership”. The central problem is the continued inclusion of the dominant, legal bullying device of the “Investor State Dispute Settlement”, which favours multinational companies having all of the power to inflict their will on cowering countries. Prior to the election, the PM and Minister Parker attempted to have the oppressive ISDS provisions for New Zealand removed but they weren’t. However, they and Cabinet decided to sign anyway!
No matter what adjectives they use, this “Partnership” is not in New Zealand’s best interests. Quite the contrary, in my view, and another example of why an increasing number have no faith in anything politicians promise, with grave consequences for our democracy.
Tony Holman, Northcote Pt.
Royal visit
We have seen some radio broadcasters and print journalists sneer, snigger and trivialise their way through the royal visit.
Meanwhile, everyone on the ground is just enjoying it, in a time of general nastiness and bad news. I felt ashamed when we cannot greet this young couple with generosity and good manners.
Back home the royals follow a punishing schedule in which they support and dignify many deserving individuals and charitable organisations.
The Queen is genuinely devoted to the Commonwealth. They are undoubtedly a force for stability in society. Would we really rather have a Trumpian Republican landscape, with the self-serving ideals and low levels of safety that we currently see in the USA? J.A. Goddard, Mt Wellington.