Nigel Meek, Raglan
Upbeat carols abound
Gary Hollis sounds like a Christmas Grinch (Liven up the carols, NZ Herald, December 26) with his description of the traditional carols as being “dreary, inane and downright boring”. A few minutes on the internet and he’d find many upbeat versions of all the carols he seems to loathe, as well as lots of other lively songs about Christmas. Then, next year, he’ll be able to say, “Ding Dong, Merrily on High” no more boring carols to make me sigh.
Lorraine Kidd, Warkworth
Switching off ideal solution
Correspondent Gary Hollis is upset about dreary and boring Christmas carols. The solution is easy — turn them off/ignore. The same advice also applies for politicians!
Garry Wycherley, Awakino
Former PM unpopular
The letter “Swapping places” from Mark Nixon (NZ Herald, December 26) praising “the wonderful Norman Kirk years” is hopelessly inaccurate, even to the extent of failing to recognise that Kirk served as PM for less than two years before he suddenly died. The majority of his 1972 Labour Government of 65 Labour seats and 32 National seats was overwhelmingly defeated by the National Party at the 1975 general election by 65 National seats to 32 opposition seats, a significant “swapping of places”. The National Party slogan seeking a change to “New Zealand the way you want it” summarised the voting electorate’s view of the outgoing Norman Kirk/Bill Rowling-led 1972-1975 Labour Government .
Dail Jones (ex-National MP, 1975-1984), Stanmore Bay
Two words for bad drivers
An excellent article by Simon Wilson on New Zealand driving habits (NZ Herald, December 26). Yes, we all make mistakes but most of us try hard to avoid doing so. Unfortunately, for drivers who think taking care on the roads is for wusses, two words apply – entitlement and competitiveness. “I am entitled to drive how I choose – how dare they try to dictate what I can and can’t do!” And to the competitive ones, their right to “be first”, “get in front” takes precedence over safety.
Anne Martin, Helensville
Look beyond taxation
Professor Boyd Swinburn (NZ Herald, December 26) challenges Matthew Hooton to explain the good social indicators of the Scandinavian countries, while himself already giving the high tax take as the reason.
Perhaps the professor could instead compare obesity rates, drug use, racial strife, truancy rates, productivity, and general adherence to rules and laws. All of these are independent of taxation.
K H Peter Kammler, Warkworth
NZ in the money
NZ Herald correspondent Robert Burrow (Letters, December 26) has concluded that because so many New Zealanders can afford to travel , both locally and overseas, over this holiday period, that New Zealand is actually a very wealthy country.
He is correct, with his statement being backed up by the UBS Global Wealth Report showing median wealth per adult in US dollars for New Zealand in third place in the world at 202,410, compared to the same figure for Norway at 143,890 and for the US at 107,740.
New Zealand is indeed a very wealthy country compared with the rest of the world.
David Mairs, Glendowie
How to improve rugby
To survive, rugby needs a lot of changes to the game.
Firstly they need to reduce teams to 13 players to allow more attacking space.
Next, they need to reduce the substitutes from eight to four, two forwards and two backs, to negate the bomb squads.
Penalties reduced to two points and drop goals to one.
Players receiving an aerial bomb cannot be interfered with in the air.
This will reduce the number of bombs and increase player safety.
Once the rolling maul has formed the defending players can come around the side and attack the ball carrier. The rolling maul has too many advantages and is technically illegal as players are in front of the ball and blocking defenders, just like truck and trailer .
Players red carded should be able to be replaced after 20 minutes in the interests of a fair contest.
Just a few suggestions.
Jock Mac Vicar, Hauraki
