Why the frenzy over ‘snooping’?

I am wondering what all the frenzy about government agencies ‘‘snooping’’ is about.

The police ‘‘snoop’’ too but it is their job to catch lawbreakers. If they exceed their powers, for example to frame an innocent person, that is a serious issue separate to whether police should ‘‘snoop’’ or not.

It is naive in the extreme to insist that all government agencies must ignore the possibility that some people are crooks and fraudsters and that the public and taxpayers do not need protecting.

There are business and financial fraudsters, welfare fraudsters, illegal immigrants and drug-smuggling gangs, and there are activist organisations operating under figleaves of ‘‘social concern’’ and ‘‘care for the planet’’ and so on who are deeply dishonest and malicious enemies of the current stable sociopolitical consensus.

No-one should get a free pass by moral posturing that they are ‘‘above the law’’, or that woolly ‘‘humanitarian’’ considerations because of this or that exception should render the whole law redundant.

As far as I can tell so far, much of the government agencies’ ‘‘snooping’’ has involved doing the right thing on behalf of honest citizens and taxpayers, not the wrong thing.

Philip G Hayward, Naenae

Drivers, not roads

Martin Bond (Letters, Jan 9) has finally compelled me to make known two experiences I had before Christmas on the Remutaka Hill Road which confirm my belief that it is incompetent drivers who cause accidents, not the roads in question.

The first occasion was going uphill on the Wairarapa side when a motorcyclist with pillion passenger felt the need to pass me and others on a left-hand curve crossing over the double yellow lines. As he passed me a large logging truck appeared coming down and to avoid the truck he swung left so sharply that his exhaust struck the road. How he got away unharmed I just don’t know.

On the second occasion, driving towards Featherston, a car driver decided to pass me on the left. There simply isn’t room for such a manoeuvre without going over the bank. I was compelled to move right partly over the double yellow lines. I then observed him further on passing more cars over double yellow lines.

If these are not examples of dangerous and impatient driving, and not the fault of the road, then what is? This is one road which could be 80kmh bridge to bridge.

Richard Airey, Greytown

Strategies conflict

The Government seems to be pursuing two conflicting strategies: to invest heavily in roads, and support public transport options.

There is no evidence that wholesale investment in roads reduces fatalities, except when targeted to known areas of risk. What it does do is keep people in their vehicles and encourage even higher car ownership at the expense of public transport and rail.

Better, surely, to plan for a level of congestion on those roads where motorists have travelling choices, manage motorists’ expectations, keep cars out of cities, abandon emotive rhetoric about petrol prices, lower driving speeds, and set lower standards of maintenance (without compromising safety).

Then we might start to get the incentives right to improve our environment, reduce fatalities and build a viable public transport network.

Bill Gebbie, Porirua

A waste of time

Public transport loses (Jan 8) quoted a Te Horo man on his transport choices as saying he didn’t see anything ‘‘particularly laudable’’ about public transport.

Clearly many car users are of the same view, preferring to clog up the roads at peak times, even though it is a waste of time and fuel.

Such people might have a different view if they had to negotiate this growing nightmare twice a day, every day, as part of their job, while being expected to keep to some semblance of a timetable. There are few situations more frustrating and disheartening than to be held up by thousands of cars containing only the driver.

A congestion charge is well overdue.

B C Quin, Naenae

Inspiring woman

For every Lucretia Seales there’s a Neroli Colvin (Life Story, Jan 9); both talented ladies, both dying early. Those whom Colvin left behind talk of her heroism and life-affirming attitude, despite the tremendous obstacles that confronted her, right down to her last dying words. They tell us she never counted her problems, but “daily recounted her blessings”. I am sure many readers will be inspired by her story.

Bernard Kernot, Brooklyn