Cunliffe right to take break

IT SEEMS to me that the Labour Party and its affiliates have, for the last century or so, been championing eight hour days, work breaks, four weeks holiday etc. It is a known fact that humans, dogs, horses and other working animals perform much better if they have decent rest breaks and families are a lot more solid if they get to spend some time together.

Yet, when Labour’s leader, who demonstrably is working as hard or harder than any other member of the party, takes an opportunity to take a break with his family before two months of hard slog he is pilloried for his trouble.

David, old son, you did the right thing to take some time off with your family and you have no need to apologise. Unfortunately you lead a rabble that will need to get its house in order if it thinks that it will have any chance of taking over the treasury benches from National.

Your apology for being a man in front of an audience such as a family violence conference should be taken for what it was. It takes a great deal of humility and character to defer to such a group of people and I am more than impressed. It is a pity, but not unexpected in our so called modern society, that it caused such an uproar. An even bigger pity that the politicians that so want to woo the current crop of voters could not find the steel in their souls to support you.

Geoff Orchard, Ohaupo

WHAT COLIN Espiner, Andrea Vance and Steve Kilgallon, as journalists, seem happy to perpetuate is the seven second sound bite with the tired and hackneyed phrases that go with it. I am infuriated by the likes of Paul Henry, Mike Hosking and their kind who peddle a right-wing flippant view of the world, but I am equally appalled by showpony journalism that fails to inform. The named trio produced idle empty nonsense in the July 20 edition at a time when there is real and urgent narrative to be told. So to answer Espiner’s final question ‘‘who cares?’’: I do! I care that you wasted another opportunity to report important issues. I care that you continually serve up irrelevant pap to keep an already indolent and mostly ignorant readership in a state of comatose indifference.

Mike Friend, Motueka