Fine for people using a phone while driving need to be increased, says a reader. Photo / John Borren
New Zealanders overall are discourteous and impatient drivers and we are reminded of these failings pretty much every time we drive on the road.
Our road statistics are some of the worst in the Western world, comparatively speaking. It was reported this week that 46,000 drivers were fined in the past 12 months for driving while using a mobile phone. The fine in New Zealand for driving while on a phone is $180, having been increased from $80 in April 2021. Does anyone care about a fine of $180? I don’t think so, and that’s why so many people were caught and fined. Imagine how many people were not caught — the number would probably triple.
The fines need ramping up and there needs to be much greater consequences for “poor driving”, including compulsive defensive driving courses, if we are ever to reduce our road toll significantly.
Randal Lockie, Rothesay Bay
90-day trials
In response to Shaneel Lal’s column “Trials allow employers to exploit staff” (HoS, December 24), bad employers will always exploit staff, usually illegally. Good employers want to hire good staff and develop them, but the process is not fallible and to undo a mistaken hire is costly.
A friend who works in a large organisation has a colleague who was considered a good hire during the process. Unfortunately, within the first two months, it was discovered the new colleague’s skills were below the level as described in their CV and discovered during the hiring process. To remove them within the law was considered too hard by HR, so they decided to “carry” him. The hiring manager said to my friend that “if there was 90-day trial for everyone, [colleague] would have been 90-day’d”.
Andrew Parsons, Ōrākei
Praise for transit lanes
To me, transit lanes are a great way of keeping traffic flowing and encouraging ride-sharing. Single-occupancy cars are a very inefficient way of moving people around in any big city. Cars with two or more people and buses should always be given priority.
Constellation Drive, on Auckland’s North Shore, is a vitally important four-lane road. It links the East Coast Bays with State Highway 1 north and south. It also transitions into SH18 heading west. Could AT please explain why there are 55 parking places on Constellation Drive in the T2 Transit lane on the southern side. In my view there is absolutely no need for anyone to ever park on this road.
It is not a residential area. Gilmours, Caltex and other companies adjacent all have parking for their customers.
To me it is bordering on insanity to allow any cars to park on this and indeed every major link road of similar importance. These roads should be kept clear 24/7 to allow traffic to flow freely.
Glen Stanton, Mairangi Bay.
Gender and sex
The bias in our medical system against recognising women’s specifically sex-based health needs is compounded when what are specifically female biological conditions are referenced as “gender”-related.
“Gender” is a socially constructed smorgasbord from which each of us ought to be free to nourish ourselves — in terms of constructing our own appearance and consenting sexual behaviour — as we see fit. “Sex” is the term for the biological scientifically verifiable binary of human reproduction.
Health professionals treating women are therefore wrong when assessing their symptoms, to prefer their subjective beliefs and opinions about typically “feminine” behaviour and appearance (gender), over the verifiably science-based facts of a woman’s symptoms as based on her biological sex.
All of us can help with eradicating the mysogynist patriarchal prejudice that denies girls and women agency over their own bodies, by using the term “sex” when referring to matters related to the science of binary human reproduction and by reserving the term “gender” for references to the culturally constructed appearances and behaviours that feature on humanity’s rich and ever-changing menu of social diversity.
Janet Charman, Avondale.
Health funding
Manatū Hauora doesn’t now publish sex-discrimination figures in its otherwise important information about who misses out on health funding. In the last figures they did provide about sex difference in the budget, women got 70 per cent of the health vote, men obviously the rump, 30 per cent. Your correspondent (HoS, December 24) is right to point out many many groups don’t get a fair share of the health vote, but she can rest assured that her granddaughter won’t be in one of them.
Mark Nixon, Remuera.
Climate change worries
Recent storms, cyclones and floods have got us all aware of the impending doom if we do not change, starting right now. But recent articles in the Herald caught my attention: just one airline, our own Air NZ, has projected 1 million domestic passengers and 700,000 international passengers will fly during the Christmas season. How many millions will fly worldwide? Or cruise in giant ships? Why no mention of the pollution caused by the enormous airports and harbours all over the world? But tiny New Zealand (0.17 per cent of global emissions) is being bludgeoned into reducing our emissions while James Shaw and others make no mention of the huge international airline and shipping industries and their massive daily emissions. Too hot to handle? And what about Mother Nature and her 72 volcanoes that erupted worldwide in 2023, where just one eruption would probably cancel out all of New Zealand’s puny efforts? Is it not time for New Zealand’s climate-change warriors to change their focus to the vast and dangerous everyday activities of the airline and shipping industries?
Johan Slabbert, Warkworth.
Wood’s smashing hat-trick
On the back page this week (NZ Herald, December 28) you printed some smashing photos of New Zealander Chris Wood, scoring a hat trick of goals against his old club, Newcastle, who got rid of him to Notts Forest. Wood is someone who has always been there for the All Whites when called on. He is someone who should be appreciated by all football fans, as he is by NZ Football.
Arthur Amis, Whangaparāoa.
Scooter near miss
I recently walked out of a supermarket and barely missed getting hit by a speeding scooter travelling fast on a narrow pedestrian path, oblivious to anyone walking. Where is the sanity in mixing people walking with speeding vehicles together? That is a path for foot traffic, not dangerous, speeding scooters. If there is any more evidence needed that the fabric of society, the management of which ensures some degree of order and mutual caring, is unravelling, just observe the lunacy of scooters on footpaths, zig-zagging between often frightened pedestrians, and the council doing nothing about it.
R Riccola, Albany.
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