Comments on: Belford key to US election

By: Roger Wakefield

Roger Wakefield — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 00:06:32 +0000

The article written by Tom Bedford on Yule and Arnott pandering to voters was a real downer in an otherwise worthy publication. As an owner of a log burner I totally object to being told that I can’t have a log burner by 2013. My log burner is cleaned by an approved registered qualified chimney sweep at least twice a year. Once in February and again midway through the year if it needs it. I do this not only for the environment but also for insurance purposes. Rather than denigrate the stand taken by the two mayors one should congratulate them on saying a loud vorciferous NO to yet more loony legislation no doubt brought in to keep the Green Party happy. It is also good to see the mayors in accord. Too often in the past this has not been the case. So I say well done to Mayor’s Yule and Arnott. Well said. It is time for less government and less interference in our daily living.

By: Duncan Lennox

Duncan Lennox — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 04:15:08 +0000

I thought the regulate, regulate comrades were the communists. It is strange to read a complaint about poison that was put into food in Communist China, as though it was lack of power to nanny state.. Come back Mao, all is forgiven? While they are not perfect, I’d rather take my chances in a free market, thank you very much.
It is so easy to put up straw men and to knock them down. Should all roads be privatised? I don’t know anyone who advocates that. Can state/private partnerships work to everyone’s benefit at times? They have in Australia and other places.
As far as schools are concerned, the issue is not whether or not the state can help with funding for education, it is whether parents should be forced into a one-size-fits-all or pay taxes, pay fees for another school and pay gst on top of that. Let the funding go with the child to the school of the parents’choice. And don’t tell me that only rich people want choice or that people who run alternative schools do so to get rich. Isn’t it strange that socialist of socialist Sweden set up a voucher system for education and still has it twenty years later. They seemhappy enough with it. What’s differnt about NZ?
Clever poetry though, Marie!

By: Marie Dunningham

Marie Dunningham — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 00:54:18 +0000

NANNY STATE

Lets leave it to the individual to build the nations capital,
The bridges, road and ports, the schools and institutions
To make it easy we’ll not tax your pay at all.
O nanny state it is not within your constitution
To regulate.
But:

When a greedy businessman gets very rich
By making little children very sick
From mixing melamine in baby’s milk
Then we can call in nanny state
To regulate

When the banks have all gone bust
And there’s no-one you can trust
With your money, then you must
Call on nanny state
To regulate

The market’s been so free
It is hard for you and me
To bail out the fat cats in the city.
So we must call on nanny state
To regulate.

When your grandma sits in poo and is not upon a loo,
In a private rest home close to you
Then blame the carer who
Is nearly in despair at wages of ten dollars for an hour,
O, call on nanny state to regulate
Regulate, regulate!