Dialogue: Weekend pleasure that brings despair

By GARTH GEORGE

There is no doubt that the Weekend Herald has become one of the finest newspapers in the world. That 1kg smorgasbord of news, information, sport and entertainment keeps me occupied for between three and four hours every weekend. And that doesn't include the cryptic crossword, which can add a further 20 minutes to an hour.

I have been an inveterate newspaper reader for as long as I can remember, a habit picked up from my father who, in the days before TV and radio news, reckoned that if he didn't read the paper first thing in the morning, somebody in town would know more than he did.

And when I entered the trade of journalism as a lad, I was told that I had to read the paper from the top left-hand corner of the front page to the bottom right-hand corner of the back, including the classified ads, which often provided more story leads than the police or fire stations.

That wasn't as bad as it sounds, for the newspaper I worked for ran to 10 or 12 pages during the week and perhaps 14 on Saturday. Shopping was not then the preferred recreation of most of the population.

My enjoyment last weekend turned sour when I glanced at a brief item on page A4 and read of the 14-year-old girl who jumped from a moving car after being assaulted and threatened with rape and suffered extensive cuts and bruising and lost several teeth.

From then on, reading with an admittedly jaundiced eye, it was pretty much all downhill.

Right alongside was the story of the jailbird who had admitted ham-fistedly holding up a bank and fast-food joint after telling staff he had a concealed weapon. He was given a 27-month sentence - but it is to be concurrent with and not cumulative upon the sentence he is serving.

And above that was an item about a change to the defamation law which would amount to a serious gag on the media and freedom of speech, which had been sneaked as a subclause into the Electoral Amendment Bill (No 2). This devious, underhand action was perpetrated by, of all people, Margaret Wilson, who is an Associate Minister of Justice, if you please.

The next page was just as bad. We read that a young man who was present during the murder of Justin Dyne and who turned informer was almost certain to receive a police reward of $50,000.

And under that we discovered that the mistress of the faux pas, the dimmest bulb in the Labour string, Tariana Turia, had telephoned the Chief Judge of the Maori Land Court about a case involving one of her iwi; and all the Attorney-General, Margaret Wilson - yes, the same woman - could say was that it was "inappropriate".

By the time I'd finished A7, I was almost in tears. The tragic tale of the elderly couple whose 41-year-old son, who has the mental capacity of a 5-year-old and is incontinent, was to be turfed out of the soon-to be-closed Kimberley Centre was almost too much to bear.

And once again I cursed the political, bureaucratic and medical (psychiatric) scum who still insist that people like this can be found suitable places "in the community". When in God's name will these stupid people understand that there will always be some among us for whom institutional care is the only answer - irrespective of cost?

And on the same page the story of the demise of the construction division of the 75-year-old building products company, W. Stevenson and Son, with the loss of 30-odd jobs, because of uncertainly over roading projects. How come penny-pinching politicians and bumbling bureaucrats can deprive 30 people of their livelihoods - under a Labour-led Government?

Then there were those scarce-as-hens-teeth radiation therapists threatening to strike in support of a 25 per cent pay increase, which is opportunism if I ever saw it. There is no doubt they are underpaid and in short supply, but a pay claim of that magnitude is unconscionable.

The story about the issue of drivers' licences by the self-proclaimed "Maori Government of Aotearoa", led by that stirrer John Hikuwai, would have been hilarious had it not been so sick. Officials were investigating, the story said, to see if it was illegal to issue the licences. And I wondered how long it would take them to investigate if I issued a licence to myself.

So by the time I got to Michele Hewitson's deft (as usual) interview with our one-and-only female Deputy Commissioner of Police, I was asking myself (again) what all this said about the moral, ethical and social condition of our nation.

PS: No column in six or so years has received the reaction of last week's memo to John Banks. Of the 75 personal e-mails, phone calls, faxes and letters I received, 64 strongly agreed with me, six strongly disagreed and three were "yes, but ... "

* garth_george@nzherald.co.nz