Alcohol sales
Virginia Fallon deplores the fact that ‘‘non-believers’’ like herself cannot buy a drink on Good Friday, Easter Sunday, Christmas Day or Anzac Day (Raise a glass to new laws, April 8). This she puts down to ‘‘archaic’’ moral and religious beliefs of Christianity inherited from the 19th century.
It seems she has rather transferred her allegiance to the great god of commerce, at whose altar his many acolytes hasten to genuflect.
Leaving aside that Anzac Day does not have a religious origin, Fallon, and perhaps MP Kieran McAnulty, seem to disregard that originally a public holiday was a day when the public as a whole could be free of the quotidian demands of labour and have the opportunity to come together and celebrate as a community.
And by deeming such days ‘‘holy’’, it meant those masters who forced their servants to work on that day risked the opprobrium of the community, if not the sanction of a divinity.
But sanctions, moral or legal, carry little weight now, it seems. It is disingenuous to say workers still have the right not to work on holidays. If the boss wants to open, what workers are going to resist the pressure to comply?
Yet perhaps Fallon has a point about allowing licensed premises to sell liquor on the above holidays. Part of community living involves being able to have a relaxing drink with friends in a restaurant or pub. But don’t let supermarkets, offlicences and other businesses open. They have 361 other days a year to garner their trade.
Colin Anderson, Upper Hutt
Council and housing
I was shocked that Wellington City Council is sending out a Draft LongTerm Plan which omits to mention its legal obligation to provide $400 million for new housing. I thank the Audit Office for its very rare qualified report and for drawing this to public attention.
However, one should not have to rely on mere chance to learn what the council has in mind. By law it was required to publish its Longterm Plan for consultation earlier this week but it has not done so.
Nor is the Audit report mentioned in the published minutes of the fateful council meeting where the auditors justified their serious concerns. One had to watch the proceedings to find out what was going on.
Perhaps the strong Labour element on the council is embarrassed. With direct access to Cabinet ministers (Mayor calls for inquiry, April 3) we should be able to rely on the Government to provide the finance needed for our housing.
The Audit Office reports that the source of the necessary $400m funding for our housing needs to be identified and should have been shown in the Long-Term Plan.
The sooner Labour’s machinations bear fruit and the Government is identified as the missing source of the finance the better. Michael Gibson, Karori