Category: imported_weekly
“Nia Glassie died in Starship Hospital on 3rd August 2007 aged three years. She had been on life support for 13 days. She had such severe brain damage that she was unable to breathe without life support. The medical evidence at the trial established that the horrific injuries and swelling to her brain were consistent with blows, and possibly, kicks to the head...” Coroner’s Report, Wallace Bain August 2011[1]
The debates over the place of the Treaty in our law, constitution and national life are not legal debates. Maori prefer to phrase them in legal terms, because it would do their cause no good to see their claims revealed in their greedy racist nakedness. But claims are not a matter of law. They are - I say this not as metaphor, but as actual fact - the colossal programme of confidence men, accompanied by carefully-judged doses of hard luck stories, flattery and menaces. It is highly convenient to disguise them as law, and Maori as artless lovable hard-done-by innocents, but it is not true. That is why Treaty claims will not end until we say ‘No’. – David Round (Time to Say “No!”).
There are no excuses for the rioting and hooliganism that took place in Britain in recent weeks. It was criminal and cowardly behaviour – the worst form of opportunism by (mostly) young delinquents. That the government has made a commitment to the British public that the rioters will face the full force of the law is as it should be. The tragedy is that the initial response to the crisis by the Police was so inadequate that rampaging mobs were able to create widespread mayhem and death.
Lord Christopher Monckton, a former policy adviser to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and one of the world’s leading climate change realists, has been visiting New Zealand reminding audiences that the world’s climate is not in the grip of catastrophic man-made global warming - as alarmists would like us to believe – but is instead continuing to change within the bounds of natural variability as it has always done. He warned that attempts by politicians and bureaucrats to control the climate through complex and expensive emissions trading schemes are a futile waste of time and money. He reiterated that because climate science is not settled - with new discoveries on the impact of oceans, volcanoes, sunspots and other natural phenomena on the climate emerging almost daily - the public should strongly reject all attempts by politicians and bureaucrats to impose controls aimed at saving us from ourselves.
As a representative democracy New Zealand’s system of government is supposed to be ‘of the people, by the people, for the people’. So why do our ruling parties go to such great lengths to prevent the public from having a proper say on how we are being governed? With an election just around the corner, isn’t it time that voters collectively demanded the right to hold governments to account?
Since the 2008 election, the Labour Party has been desperately searching for a new identity and relevance. As the main opposition party they have failed to gain political traction – if anything they have simply made National appear better than they really are. Now with an election just months away they need policies that will give them a real breakthrough, and Phil Goff needs to give his caucus a reason to support him as leader.
Since 1996 our MMP voting system has given New Zealand a series of coalition governments, consisting of a mainstream party – Labour or National – and minor parties. Some minor parties have radical agendas that are not supported by most voters. Having such parties in government becomes problematic when extreme policies that have a significant impact on the country, are passed into law as part of coalition deal making - against the wider interests of the New Zealand public.
There is no doubt that New Zealand is being subjected, more than ever before, to radical forces from within. Previously we - the silent majority - quite rightly relied upon our elected politicians to do the talking and keep the radicals at bay, so that the wishes of the majority of citizens were respected. Unfortunately, however, we now live in a new political environment where the radical elements in our society – those that used to be confined to the fringes of New Zealand politics - are now firmly ensconced on the crossbenches holding the balance of power.
Saturday’s release of the Waitangi Tribunal’s long-awaited report on the Wai 262 indigenous flora and fauna claim is packed full of recommendations designed to empower the Maori elite.[1] While the Tribunal is careful to avoid suggesting that Maori should have ownership rights to native plants and animals – something that would evoke a strong public backlash – they have proposed a series of wide-ranging and powerful rights that taken together effectively result in ownership by the back door!
It is decision time for the proposed Citizens Initiated Referendum (CIR) to restore Crown ownership of the foreshore and seabed. If you are concerned about this issue I would ask you to forward this newsletter on to as many interested people as you can. We need to make contact with as wide a group as possible if the referendum is to have a fighting chance of success.
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