Category: Democracy
The way that Jacinda Ardern’s Labour-Green-New Zealand First Coalition Government is dealing with the quarter of a million law-abiding New Zealanders who make up this country’s firearms community is a disgrace. Given the trust that had existed, the Prime Minister’s crackdown was unexpected. Their democratic rights were trashed by wide-ranging and punitive restrictions that destroyed an important part of the Kiwi way of life.
The Commission’s work is vital. How a free society deals with the terrorism threat is serious everywhere. If the Commission can give us a report that counters current political temptations to whip up the fever, it should have all the time it needs. Many societies have been blighted, and ultimately undone, by leadership willing to exploit tragedies and panics and attacks, to distract their people.
A new radicalised narrative now claims that Maori have been oppressed since colonial times and their over-representation in disadvantage is the fault of the descendants of the colonisers. Meng Foon, Labour’s new Race Relations Commissioner is promoting this propaganda.
The Race Relations Commissioner demanded Andrew Hollis’s immediate resignation after posting on social media the Treaty is “a joke”. Point of Order sought clarification about the implications for the freedom of speech which should be cherished in a healthy democracy.
If it is the Minister’s role to monitor his staff, what’s to stop the Ministry of Truth from becoming the Ministry of Lies and muzzling those who wish to take a contrary view to the Government’s position.
Looks like Andrew Little has already dug himself into a hole over his hare-brained scheme to monitor, and somehow regulate, our views and opinions next year when it comes to votes on weed, euthanasia and the government itself.
The National Party is about to make one of the biggest decision of its time in opposition - whether or not to support Jacinda Ardern’s radical Zero Carbon Bill during the third reading debate in Parliament tomorrow.
With New Zealand’s contribution to global man-made greenhouse gas emissions a miniscule 0.17 percent, the Prime Minister’s obsession with looking good on the world stage, comes at a serious cost to the country.
The question for the new council is whether they will revoke the anti-democratic decision their predecessors made - with no public consultation - that unelected and unaccountable iwi would sit at the council table with the same voting rights as elected councillors. With the committee the Ngai Tahu representatives joined dealing with the allocation of freshwater, their conflict of interest is plain to see.
Local democracy may look like its working, but council rules of engagement virtually prohibit any public conflict of opinion between councillors. Codes of Conduct and the demand for “group speak” preclude vigorous debate. It is wrongly viewed that dissent around a council table is seen as dysfunctional. Nothing could be further from the truth. The ability to speak against and vote 'no' in the face of majority support is an all too rare attribute in politics.
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