Shut down now for eight weeks
I have been writing to the prime minister and the minister of health regularly to urge more pro-active measures to deal to Covid-19. Everything we’re doing is totally brilliant, except always one or two weeks too late.
We still have an opportunity to rid our shores of this virus, but this window is closing by the hour. Talk of “flattening the curve” has become a thoughtless mantra – we need to stop the curve.
We’ve allowed huge gatherings at Womad, and cruise ship passengers to mingle in their thousands with local citizens. We’ve been less than rigorous with self-isolation. We have been just a bit complacent.
The country needs to close down now, all unnecessary travel banned, no pubs, cafes, theatres, churches, gyms – whatever and wherever people assemble needs to close, for the next eight weeks at least. Involve the army and organise effective food and essential supplies distribution – actions to be backed by severe fines or imprisonment for the uncooperative.
We must do now what other countries have been forced to, but long before we find ourselves in the same dire straits.
Frustration? It’s like watching an impending train wreck and being unable to do anything about it.
Dr J K Monro, retired GP, Martinborough
Help the homeless
Every day more of us have to self-isolate or stay home. We must urgently think about the 30,000-plus New Zealanders who lack a home to stay in and for whom selfisolation is impossible.
People cannot guard their own safety, let alone anyone else’s, if they are crowded into a relative’s lounge or a garage. They cannot even wash their hands regularly if they’re living in a car or sleeping rough.
A vast amount of money has been poured into emergency accommodation, with a desperate lack of suitable places and a few bottom-feeding moteliers cynically taking advantage of a sellers’ market. That market, like so much else, has now changed. We have empty rooms in hotels, motels and Airbnb.
We also have an amazing opportunity to help the homeless while giving immediate support to these struggling businesses: let’s join them up, and quickly. MSD and Housing NZ need to facilitate this and provide subsidies
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where necessary. No price-gouging, no discrimination, no undue fussiness on either side.
Public health and common humanity demand that people be housed. It would be an obscenity if people remain homeless and at high risk when there are thousands of rooms going begging. Raewyn Brockway, Karori
Health before agriculture
As we start to feel the full effects of the Covid-19 virus, some are out of work or having hours cut. My friends in tourism and hospitality have no work at all. One sector seems to have the least disruption: the agricultural sector.
Despite this, some agricultural leaders are seeing this as an opportunity to push the Government to delay regulations. Federated Farmers called for the Government to defer a raft of regulatory changes, including freshwater reforms.
This issue is very close to my heart. I have been waiting most of my life to see real protection for rivers and lakes. Growing up in Canterbury, I witnessed the relentless decline of rivers there from intensive agriculture.
In the early 2000s, soon after I moved to
Southland, the increasingly industrial dairy industry arrived. Again, I witnessed relentless decline of rivers. Government after government failed to act.
Pollution of water has now become such a problem that our health and wellbeing are at risk. Our rivers are sick and we are paying through our rates for new and better water treatment plants as our water becomes more unsafe.
So what I want to say to agricultural leaders is Covid-19 is a reminder that our health must come first. Stop trying to delay cleaning up, and embrace changes in regulations that are going to protect our water, our environment and our people’s health.
Mathew Coffey, Mossburn
A bouquet for councils
Councils across New Zealand are deserving of a big thank-you for keeping our water supplies safe at this time.
Wellington City Council is talking about a 9.2 per cent rates rise to cover the cost of repairs to our water services. If the Government wants to help keep services going while helping all New Zealanders, it should let councils keep the vast amounts of GST that is collected locally so that they won’t need to increase rates.
Joanna Saywell, Feilding
Case for universal income
I note the article by Andre Chumko (Lights, Covid, inaction, March 21) that highlights various employment dilemmas.
Over many years I have urged that successive governments consider introducing a Universal Basic Income (UBI). Again I ask that it be implemented now rather than awarding piecemeal succour to those with or without significantly reduced income.
I would suggest, for simplicity, a UBI must be unconditional and generous – setting it at the level of single superannuation would be easiest. All citizens 16 years plus should be eligible, with all of those younger than 16 being entitled to a half-payment from birth to 16.
The UBI would of course be taxable, and administered by IRD so that those with any other income would continue paying tax at their normal rates. Rosamund Averton, Mt Victoria
Time for innovation
To recover from the global pandemic and its associated deep recession, we’ll need some innovative ideas. Unemployment alone is predicted to exceed 20 per cent.
So what about making education free for the next 24 months? Isn’t this an opportunity for people to ‘‘return to school’’ and complete their high school education online?
What about tertiary qualifications? Retraining? Upskilling? Without student debt, and studying largely online from home (where many of us may soon be in lockdown anyway).
We don’t have to do this on our own. What about partnering with a country such as Singapore, instantly doubling the number of courses available? We could come out the other side with more of the skills we so desperately need as a society.
Think about bilingual education and a multilingual workforce. Finding and retaining enough bilingual teachers is the big problem. Schools that establish bilingual programmes struggle to keep them staffed long-term. We could make a huge dent in that problem for Asian and Pacific languages over the next 24 months.
Or what about more nurses? Strange to say, this is almost a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. We’d be crazy to miss it. So isn’t a solution staring us in the face?
Don Long, Days Bay
Advice for supermarkets
With supermarkets getting busier and busier, this is completely contrary to government advice on two counts. One, we are supposed to be social distancing; and two, they have become gathering places.
So would it not be prudent of supermarkets to insist that anyone picking up essentials should don a mask and gloves.
A mask won’t stop you getting the virus, but it will help greatly in preventing you from passing it onto others. One cough in the milk aisle is all it takes.
If you can’t source a face mask, get creative and fashion one from a supermarket canvas bag.
Supermarkets should already be recommending the use of payWave and we should all be keeping our purchases to less than $80 anyway, Pin entry being the best way to pick up something nasty. Tom Reid, Camborne