State Highway 2 is 'dreadful', a reader says. Photo/file
State Highway 2 is 'dreadful', a reader says. Photo/file
Highways 'tragically useless'
I wish to contradict your correspondent (Letters, July 14) who suggested that our roads in the Western Bay are safe, and it is drivers at fault.
No one can say that SH2 and SH29 are safe. They were both formed decades ago for a smaller population, slowercars, and small port.
SH2 is a dreadful road and no one, no matter how sympathetic they are to the present government. The fact remains both SH2 and SH29 are tragically useless for today's growing needs.
It is the local government's job to plan for new settlement patterns, so years ago Ōmokoroa was planned as an ideal growth node for 12,000 people.
Make a decision Minister Twyford, we deserve progress.
Margaret Murray-Benge Bethlehem
Get what you voted for
When you increase minimum wages it ripples right through the cost base of every business and prices go up.
When you cut taxes people get more in their pocket but it doesn't increase business costs and it doesn't force business to increase prices.
What part of that did voters not understand at the last election? Certainly, they should be realising it now as prices increase with no increase for those on fixed incomes.
You get what you voted for folks.
Bruce Ingram Pāpāmoa
A reader says nurses are being 'unreasonable'. Photo / File
Careful of hypocrisy
Rachel Stewart says she will "vigorously defend anyone's right to wholeheartedly believe" but then labels someone a bigot for exercising their belief in traditional marriage.
While service providers cannot and should not be allowed to generally discriminate against anyone, neither should they be forced to participate in or support ceremonies and events with their services that directly violate their moral or religious convictions.
When pushing through the same-sex marriage bill, the Select Committee considering the bill said: "It is our intention that the passage of this bill should not impact negatively upon people's religious freedoms… The bill seeks to extend the legal right to marry to same-sex couples; it does not seek to interfere with people's religious freedoms."As we argued during the marriage debate, in my opinion, the law currently creates a culture of coercion, despite the politicians promising otherwise.
Unfortunately, the Warkworth bakery case will not be the last case of the redefinition of marriage clashing with people's freedom of conscience rights and faith-based beliefs.
A bigot is defined as a 'person who is intolerant towards those holding different opinions'.
