In response to Jan Harrison's letter about the arts festival. Yes it is fabulous that we have the Biennial Arts Festival happening again in Tauranga. I do, however, wonder though how she quantifies her comment of "Tauranga very rarely has anything of interest happening in the evenings".
Many of these events are appearing at the 16th Avenue Theatre, a venue owned and built by the members of the Tauranga Repertory Society which has been providing quality productions for Tauranga for over 70 years, all with volunteers.
Tauranga Repertory offers at least four productions a year each for a three-week season.
Around the corner in 17th Avenue, Tauranga Musical Theatre offers three to four seasons per year of two to three-week seasons (they are one of the major users of Baycourt).
And down the bottom of the hill Detour Theatre Trust is offering four seasons of two weeks. All of these productions involve hundreds of local talented volunteers offering quality productions for what I total to be about 29 weeks so more than half the year. Let alone the other evenings of music, song, dance and drama offered by other groups, schools etc.
One of the productions in the festival involves two of our own. Phil Ormsby and Alex Ellis, who both "cut their teeth" in local theatre. Odd that they need to leave Tauranga before anyone realises we have talent here.
Matthew Roderick, Tauranga
Anne tried hard
I am interested to see that daughters of a reigning monarch can now become Queen even if they have a younger brother.
It would make naming the eldest child, if a girl, of even more importance if it was always to be preceded by the title of Queen.
Tradition in naming has always been maintained I cannot imagine a Queen Bailey, or Queen Kylie.
Charming as these names are, there is nothing regal about them whatsoever!
One monarch from history I have always felt sorry for is the 17th century Queen Anne, the daughter of King James II. She had a total of 18 children over 16 years and 13 of them, including twins, were stillborn. The rest died within a year and one child lived to 11 years of age.
With no children of her own to succeed her, it changed the course of history and she was succeeded by her cousin Prince George of Hanover which brought in the German branch of the family.
Even though her sufferings are long ago in the past I do wonder how she managed to do her queenly duties while attempting so hard to have a family. I guess she multi-tasked.
There is so much to be said for living in a western country in the 21st century.
Robin Bishop,Pyes Pa
Plot was foiled
In your editorial Saturday you wrote about "Guy Fawkes" night.
You referred to "This day which celebrates some idiot who was part of a plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament in 1605 in Britain".
The celebrations that followed on every November 5 were to celebrate the plot being foiled, not the other way round.
Although the way that politicians' behave I can well understand people saying that Guy Fawkes was the only man to go to parliament with good intentions.
David C Medhurst, Bellevue
Going off the rails
I read with some bemusement in Saturday's BOP Times, an article on the business page saying that KiwiRail will write off $6 billion of assets.
Only last night I heard Phil Goff of the Labour Party trumpeting how they had bought back KiwiRail for "New Zealanders" from private owners to protect it.
Yes it is correct, the then Labour Government, spent just under $1 billion in taxpayers' money in early 2008. Combine that with the latest announcement, it means that you and I dear reader have spent $7 billion to own a rail system that needs some more significant investment to bring it up to scratch.
The dividend on this investment is what? Surely it is just money down the toilet for some political dream. We still can't catch a train from Tauranga to Auckland.
Oh, did I mention that Mr Goff's government was paying $90 million a year to keep KiwiRail afloat? All in all, the KiwiRail story is a disaster and one would think not an ideal candidate for an election story.
Roy Edwards,Tauranga
DHB doing better
It was not so long ago that the board and management of the Bay of Plenty District Health Board were concerned about not achieving all the performance targets set by the Minister of Health Tony Ryall, particularly for elective surgery.
At the last board meeting it was announced with some satisfaction that the DHB had lifted its performance for elective surgery to 104 per cent against its target, giving it an improvement in ranking from 14th to ninth. They have also increased its outpatient specialist assessments by 2941, and have achieved large increases in other surgical procedures, and at the same time have reduced waiting times.
Credit must also be given to Maori for lifting their immunisation rates by 7 per cent which brings them within 1 percentage point from the overall performance of the DHB.
They have achieved a level of responsibility for their children's health, which shames those, who in their ignorance, are prepared to put their children's health at risk.
Ewen Lowden, Te Puke
Give them a fright
I notice (BOP Times, Saturday) that of a recent poll of 500 voters, half of them are undecided.
This is probably because they are disillusioned with the whole political scene, where we, the voters, come a poor second to the pollies' needs and desires.
I would suggest that to give the big boys a good fright, that all of you disillusioned people vote for any of the minor parties, or whichever one takes your fancy.
Hopefully the message will become clear that the voters are not a happy bunch.
I'm not holding my breath however.
Cedric Sutherland, Otumoetai
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