Grant the plant

The penny has finally dropped – it’s dirty politics. Damien Grant is clearly a plant by some shadowy left-wing organisation to discredit the right-thinking right-wing.

Harry Love, Dunedin

Grant attempts to stimulate debate towards returning to a First Past the Post (FPP) electoral system, and indeed he is not the only one, in the vacuum following the election while everyone waits to see which

way Winston Peters will jump.

At the time the current MMP system was set up no MP wanted it so they presented the public with a model that was so flawed they thought it would get rejected out of hand at the referendum. What they failed to consider, however, was that the public were so sick and tired of the shenanigans under a FPP system where Grant’s version of a ‘‘stable government’’ was actually stumbling from left to right extremes, that any form of proportional representation was an improvement.

What is actually required is a MMP system which provides greater proportionality which will result in multiple combinations of options to make up a representative government. It will also mean that extremes of ideology should be strongly limited, to protect against unbalanced government and excesses.

Murray Shaw, Whanganui

Rejoyce, for St Steven sometimes known as the fiscal holy man, will try to lead us to the dangerous world of huge fiscal holes, unbridled immigration, land sold from under our feet and rivers of poison. Instead, St Winston the patron saint of travellers will lead us to the promised land.

Graham Fleetwood, Mellons Bay