Prescription fee change and health affordability

I FIND the comments about affordability of prescription charges by politicians very interesting.

While we are all aware we are going through a recession and times will be hard, I notice there has been no mention or indeed any reference to the parliamentary privileges which cost this country a considerable amount of money. Nowhere can I find an employer who pays a pension after nine years’ service and adds free international travel.

Perhaps if there is a genuine intent to assist families and those on lower incomes a relook at whether these entitlements contribute to any productivity to our economy or whether the money would be better spent on health and education. I wait, not with bated breath, to see which political party is prepared to reconsider these entitlements.

J. Millar

St Kilda

BECAUSE Christopher Luxon does not feel comfortable about being let off a $5 prescription fee he can afford because the cost of filtering out those who also could afford to pay for their prescriptions themselves would cost a ridiculous amount of money, he could just choose to donate $5 to a charity each time he fills a prescription.

How someone heading a political party cannot see that wiping the $5 fee for everyone would cost much less than administering a tiered fee system makes me worried that other financial advice he is getting is flawed.

Carol Thompson

Central Otago

MAYBE $5 prescriptions and cutting them is a welcome relief for the truly poor, but unfortunately I can't abide a $5 cut costing $157 million when we just had our local hospital budget attacked by the very same people. It's just a scattergun policy method that makes no sense to me.

Matt McDonald

Mosgiel

Sheer disinformation

WHEN Jacinda Ardern as prime minister claimed her government was the sole source of truth it signalled a huge change in the relationship between New Zealand governments and the general public — a change further reinforced by the adoption of the term ‘‘disinformation’’ to describe any point of view that disagrees with pronouncements from the Beehive.

That this situation should have arisen in New Zealand, of all countries, is a blight on the democratic processes which have seen, for the most part, a society which has functioned in a remarkably cooperative way with free exchanges of differing opinions.

The increasingly Orwellian nature of ongoing government pronouncements is exemplified by the current call for tenders to produce ‘‘insights to build an empirical picture of the disinformation landscape’’.

This is sheer gobbledegook.

The Oxford dictionary's definition of disinformation as, ‘‘false information that is given deliberately, especially by government organisations’’, casts an interesting light on this matter.

David Tranter Gore

Hospital waiting

WHY are we still waiting on the goahead for Dunedin’s much needed hospital ?

The percentage of the shortfall is a lot less than other infrastructure projects completed further north.

Why can’t ACC, who are apparently flush with profits from the associated health system, contribute to the shortfall ?

ACC are in the health business and indirectly benefit from the public health system.

Come on ACC. Put your hand in your pocket and let’s get this hospital built for the benefit of our community.

Peter Sinclair

Highcliff