Crowd disappointed jolly fellow did not show

I don’t know whether it was intended to be unduly provocative, but Nelson’s anti-Maori Santa stance shows modern racism in rude health (Dec 26) ran far short of actuality.

There was no racial backlash in Nelson – just huge disappointment among the many who turned out in the understandable expectation of seeing Santa in the Santa Parade, when his recognisable figure didn’t materialise.

Their reaction would have been identical had it been Superman, Batman, the Cookie Monster or Easter Bunny attempting to front for the jolly, red-and-white-clad fellow, so to attempt to portray Nelson’s reaction to such transparent nonsense as ‘‘stirring up racially charged feelings’’ is just wilful and inexcusable ‘‘fake news’’.

Any Santa Parade without Santa is not – and cannot be – a ‘‘Santa Parade’’. Surely it’s not difficult to grasp that?

Jim Cable, Nelson

Congestion in 50s

Of course in 1955 roads were being congested as fast as they were being built (Letters, Dec 27).

Big trends were under way: home ownership, the end of urban crowding, the end of a renter-landlord social divide, and urbanisation of previously rural workforces. These things were rightly viewed as positive at the time.

An absence of ‘‘automobility’’ in urban development may well correlate with the perpetuation of high urban densities and hence high mode shares for public transport, cycling and walking, but it also perpetuates social divides, lifetimes spent trapped in paying high rents, crowding, unhealthy conditions for children, homelessness, and illegal slum housing.

There are obvious reasons why illegal slum housing continues to exist in so many cities around the world, to the extent that up to half the population lives that way. This is the context that is left out by anti-car, anti-road activists who arrogantly assume themselves to be wiser than policy-makers of the 1950s and 60s.

Basic urban economics: the supply of land for the urban economy affects the cost of housing; and the flexibility and reach of the transport system determines the supply of land.

Policy-makers used to understand this.

Phil Hayward, Naenae

Wonderful e-bikes

An excellent Opinion by physicist Shaun Henry (The year this Kiwi didn’t fly, Dec 26) didn’t mention the wonderful change e-bikes can make to most travel, which is urban.

E-bikes can easily tow a shopping and/or baby’s trailer besides having long seats for more kids and saddle bags for shopping.

Daryl Cockburn, architect planner, Wellington

Stoned drivers

I cannot agree with road safety campaigner Clive MatthewWilson’s assertion (Dec 27) that the road toll is mostly caused by ‘‘yobbos, blotto drivers or outlaw motorcyclists’’.

Normal drifting over the speed limit is not the cause of road carnage.

Now this unelected Government wishes to legalise marijuana. Surely stoned drivers are not safe?

I am very confused – it is not safe to smoke, not safe to drink and drive, not safe to use a cellphone while driving, not safe to go 5km over the limit, but safe to drive stoned or under the effects of regular cannabis use.

Oh, I think I get it, it will just give police even more to do rooting out not only speedsters, drunks, meth users, yobbos etc but also stoners. All this, of course, whilst patrolling our inadequate roads that will be geared towards cyclists. Alan Kelly, Tawa

Dangers in bill

Alida Van der Velde (Letters, Dec 26) says there has already been ample discussion about David Seymour’s euthanasia bill. I disagree with her – the debate has barely moved from where it started, with deeply personalised exceptional cases thrust into the public gaze along with repeated demands for autonomy above all else.

There is a great deal more to this issue than these personal stories, particularly in light of the acknowledged truth that ‘‘hard cases make bad law’’. Personalised stories of disabled New Zealanders fearful of the dangers that such legislation would bring are by contrast given very little publicity.

Then there is the only other argument in favour of legalised euthanasia – that of personal choice. This does not hold up to scrutiny, however.

Is a doctor obliged to amputate the leg of a patient who has decided this is what they want? Of course not. Such a move would run directly counter to a doctor’s ethics. So does the killing of patients, whether they want it or not.

By all means read the bill. And take careful note of all the ill-defined and dangerous provisions it contains as well as its glaring omissions which would inevitably lead to future complications and extensions. Deborah Scott, Auckland

Pay-back time

That the Government should even contemplate committing our country to the United Nations Global Migration Compact is horrific to consider.

The compact is in line with the Left-wing Marxist agenda that at present controls the UN, with the intention of gaining full international control, and removing national sovereignty and governance. The proposed migrant movement is from east to west, never the other way.

The majority of former colonial countries, a very large number, and with voting rights equal to all other nations, see this as ‘‘pay-back time’’ for historical injustices blamed on the major colonial powers.

The Marxists, having failed under Stalin and Mao, in spite of the hundred million of their citizens exterminated, now see this as another way of gaining international control and have persuaded the formerly colonised nations to support them.

Their successes among morally naive and historically ignorant but highly altruistic students have led to Left-wing control of teaching faculties in most Western universities, including New Zealand.

An apathetic public are unaware of this threat to their national identity and are kept uninformed by a less than objective media.

Wake up, New Zealand. Be very concerned.

Bryan Johnson, Omokoroa

Top this

To Rod Shaw (Letters, Dec 27), I must reply with my late father’s frequent scornful comment when he heard ‘‘top of the country’’ in a weather forecast: ‘‘The top of New Zealand is the summit of Mount Cook.’’

Jenny Chisholm, Wilton