Cellphone fines too low
Re ‘‘Motorists rack up $1.7m in fines for mobile phone use’’ and the weak home detention penalty for a user who killed a pedestrian on a crossing, and a plea from the victim’s granddaughter for people to stay off their phones while driving (News, January 6).
But pleas to stop the use won’t ever reduce the 21,153 caught in 11 months or probably the 80,000 not caught. The only effective way is to lift the $80 fine to $400 as applies in Australia. That will really drop the number killed, saving many lives as right now mobile phone use kills more people on our roads than speeding; so why let it continue as is?
We deserve protection in the form of much higher penalties – a $400 fine for all offenders and, if their car hits a person and kills them, at least six months’ jail. Pleas just won’t work. Offenders ignore them.
Murray Hunter, Auckland
In the state of Victoria the maximum fine for cellphone use while driving is $1517. The average fine is $500 plus demerit points . You do not see many on their phones like you do here. The NZ Transport Agency has proved to be a slack organisation in regard to WOF policing and it is missing the boat when it comes to keeping our roads safe. Large fines and loss of licence or vehicle is the only way to get the message across to some people. Trevor Sennitt , Christchurch
We do all right
Very strange that I was just in discussion with a close acquaintance and said we live in the best country in the world, which in a way echoes your views (‘‘New Zealand, we don’t know how lucky we are’’, Editorial, January 6).
No, we are not the biggest or brashest, we have our housing problems, nurses’ and teachers’ strikes – and the doctors’ to come Stan Chun, Wellington
Reject the bill
I have grave concerns about how the euthanasia bill would affect my elderly mother.
There is nothing to preclude doctors from suggesting a premature death to patients struggling with difficult symptoms.
Doctors may also be obliged to include assisted dying in the options of treatments they present to patients.
This would be confronting enough for any elderly patient but doubly so for someone like my mother who does not always understand the nuances of English – particularly when euphemisms are used. If a doctor refers to ‘medication’, would she not think it would help her to live?
I beg MPs of all parties to consider the implications for vulnerable members of society such as my mother and all for whom English is not their first language.
This bill should be rejected and instead the money for its campaign should be put towards the genuine care and support for those in need.
Anne Cotton, Auckland
Empire 2.0
The item ‘‘The sun never sets on nostalgia’’ (Focus, January 6), suggests that Britain is dreaming if it thinks it can reconstitute the empire to replace Europe, post-Brexit.
The writer (Ishaan Tharoor) seems never to have heard of the Commonwealth and it is inconceivable that British officials have not made soundings of opinion during the various CHOGMs that have taken place over the Brexit period. He constantly refers to ‘‘former colonies’’ and never to our free association of Anglophone nations with the Queen as its head.
Tharoor comments on the supposed attitude of various countries, including Malaysia and ourselves, yet offers not a shred of evidence that he has consulted even one New Zealand or Malaysian official as to postBrexit policies and attitudes. Rob Harris, Dannevirke
Recession reality
Thank you to Frederick Williscroft for pointing out what constitutes a recession (Letters, January 6) but I think he may have misunderstood the point of my earlier letter.
He is correct in saying that New Zealand was in a recession in 2008 but it was not of Labour’s making, as a previous writer, who I was responding to, had claimed. The Global Financial crisis (GFC) arrived in December 2007 and pulled New Zealand into recession along with many other countries. It wouldn’t have mattered who was in government – it was clearly unavoidable – as we are ‘bit’ players in the world economy.
But Williscroft’s suggestion that the GFC led to a worldwide depression really is drawing a long bow. The last economic depression, as such, was in 1929 and the GFC bore very little comparison to the devastation that wrought. My parents lived through the Great Depression. My father’s uncle was cracking stones in Foxton for a shilling a day (10 cents) to try and put bread on the table for his family. People wore sack cloth because they couldn’t afford clothes. I didn’t see anyone having to do anything closely resembling that in 2008.
Steve Plowman, Seatoun