"One cannot say that Prime Minister Christopher Luxon isn’t enthusiastic about everything he believes in," a reader says. Photo / Ben Dickens
The power crunch blame game
Government ministers of different parties, editorials and opinion writers have been vocal in the blame game of why New Zealand is facing an electricity energy crisis with a cold snap looming.
Most of it has seemed to miss the point. The Government blames a lack of oil and gas supply and Labour’s banning of more licences for its exploration.
All of which have also ignored the fact that it is clear that burning oil and gas is a major contributor to global warming and all the ills that has brought us recently with billions of dollars cost to our economy with events such as Cyclone Gabrielle.
What is amazing is the fickle finger of blame has failed to point at one of the more pertinent causes of this problem: a maximising of profit-taking and lack of investment by the privatised energy companies.
Successive governments are not devoid of blame for this either, with them still holding 50 per cent shareholding in most of the privatised energy companies.
But where has been their leadership on the boards of directors in demanding to curb high-dividend payments and demanding decent investment in renewables?
Certainly the suggestion by feature writer Fran O’Sullivan (Weekend Herald, May 11) that we should move to a Singapore-style sovereign wealth fund such as Temasek would only exacerbate that malaise with control of government shareholding decisions put even further out of reach.
Neil Anderson, Algies Bay.
Luxon’s vision
One cannot say that Prime Minister Christopher Luxon isn’t enthusiastic about everything he believes in.
What is a problem though, as a former salesman, is does his being eager to please demeanour not leave him in a weaker negotiating position?
As for him reading up on world leaders, as quoted in the Audrey Young interview (Weekend Herald, May 11), that would make an interesting list along with what he gained from each one.
I can think of a few who were not the type I would not like to see emulated here. As for Ronald Reagan, he was very good at reading the scripts that were handed to him and was noted for taking afternoon naps.
To be fair the incumbent, Joe Biden, who Luxon wants this country to become pals with again, is more than likely to do the same. Perhaps Luxon should just work out his own version of that “vision thing” for we Kiwis that has more to offer than just tax cuts, locking up children, and generally punishing people for being poor.
John Capener, Kawerau.
Managing expectations
Looking at the Government’s recent poll results, we would do well to remember the Labour/Greens record.
Auckland was subjected to a four-month Covid lockdown, at the cost of $1 billion a week in lost productivity, to help contain a disease with a two-week incubation period, Many NZ citizens were unable to return to NZ under a poorly thought-out and resourced Covid quarantine protocol,
Government expenditure was nearly $80b over budget (most of it reactionary, not strategic), leading to the inflationary spike and current interest rate climate. Despite that, the amount of public housing actually delivered was a small per cent of that promised and numbers of homeless increased.
The approach to gangs was mostly carrot and hardly any stick, leading them to become emboldened, with retail and violent crime increasing.
NZ children’s educational achievement levels in numeracy and literacy declined, while waiting lists in the public healthcare system increased. Concurrently, numbers of non-productive bureaucrats and public service contractors swelled at the expense of more teachers, nurses and police.
Chris Hipkins is right, we do deserve to be a first-world country. His coalition Government had six years to address the big issues and in most measurable metrics, made things worse.
We should, at the very least, give the current Government more than six months to address these issues before judging their performance.
Champak Mehta, Remuera.
Voting changes
Whilst I agree with most of what correspondent Andrew McCosh writes about the current voting process (Weekend Herald, May 11), I believe two very important considerations have been left out.
The first is compulsory voting with penalties applicable for those who don’t, because under the current system it only takes a minority to decide how our country is run for the following three years.
Also, I believe that voting should be restricted to those who live in Aotearoa/NZ permanently. There are many ex-pat Kiwis living overseas with no intention of heading home, so why should they still be eligible to help dictate how our Government is formed? They are citizens in name only.
The only exceptions acceptable for people out of the country on polling day should be for those abroad on holiday or for work-related reasons. Measures could be taken to allow early voting for those so engaged.
These both, if entered into legislation, will give a more realistic assessment of the will of the nation. That’s how democracy works best.
Jeremy Coleman, Hillpark.
Power brinkmanship
Your editorial (Weekend Herald, May 11) is raining fire and brimstone, and Claire Trevett is explaining the politics of the power warning.
Perhaps a technical/financial perspective would be helpful. Our electricity system has a built-in bias toward brinkmanship.
Nobody wants to build power generation which is used for just a few weeks in a year. With increasing wind and solar generation this becomes even more pronounced, and throttling demand will get us only so far.
In the end we will have to pay not only for electricity, but also for a sufficient idle backup plant. This capacity charge is like an insurance premium, and part of a zero-carbon economy.
K H Peter Kammler, Warkworth.
EV logic
Saturday’s Herald was full of the good news about what electric car to buy.
This is putting the cart before the horse; before having an electric car, we need spare electricity, 24/7, something that we seem not to have.
The Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority is busy recommending that we drop gas and use more electricity; while we remain critically short of electricity, this doesn’t sound very logical.
I thought that the main idea of EVs was to lessen CO2 emissions, so why are we installing diesel-powered charging stations? To further compound all this madness it needs to be noticed that if we embrace the dream of zero greenhouse gas emissions, it will go unnoticed in the global scheme of things.
We need to accept that as a nation, we are inconsequential.
Neville Cameron, Coromandel.
Celtic folly
How ludicrous that Winston Peters advises NZ to embrace “Irish Celtic Tiger” economic policies, in order to place this country on a stronger growth path (Weekend Herald, May 11).
“Celtic Tiger” is a term referring to the economy of Ireland in the mid-1990s until it fell into recession in 2008. “Irish Celtic Tiger” became an economic example of “how not to do” things and, when compared to other small Euro-zone countries, such as Finland and Belgium, the latter two far exceeded the physical wealth of Ireland because of their vastly superior transport infrastructure, telecommunications network and public services. “Irish Celtic Tiger” became an “Irish Dodo”.
Now, Ireland’s generous corporate tax regime has made it a hub for multi-national tech and pharmaceutical companies. These firms generate much of their income in Ireland, inflating its GDP, but they funnel that money to their headquarters (or shell companies) abroad.
Hardly what NZ’s economy needs.
Edith Cullen, Te Kauwhata.
It would appear to me that it has become a game of make a quick decision, wait for the firestorm and then apologise if it all backfires, which is certainly the case with respect to CBD parking. As in a similar way of using consultants, no one person is then responsible, or will take responsibility for the decision. But after it all dies down, rest assured, Auckland Transport will again in the near future come back again and reinstate the same parking policy, albeit in a slightly modified manner. I think that ratepayers have had enough of its CEO, who seems not to care at all about the citizens of this city. Time for him to find greener pastures perhaps.
Paul Beck, West Harbour.
June Sinclair (Weekend Herald, May 11) suggests that Christopher Luxon could instruct his accountant not to claim the rebate on the money donated from his salary increase. Many donors I know of claim the rebate and then redistribute it and it would be of far greater benefit to struggling charities if the PM did the same. Any food bank would be more than grateful.
Gavin Baker, Glendowie.
All I can say to you: do as we did eight years ago move out of Auckland and come down to Horowhenua Levin/Foxton. Easy living here and a great place to live. If you would like to talk about our area I would love to talk to you so make the move south now you won’t regret it.
Gary Stewart, Foxton Beach.
Many people say that others should take more responsibility for themselves. If all the people asking for someone else to invest in more electricity generation to address a peak that occurs, on average, for one hour a year, invested in a solar generation with battery system that is typically self-funding, then the risk of such outages would be virtually eliminated and the country’s energy resilience would be improved.
Jon Eriksen, Parnell.
Chris Hipkins slams the decision to reduce the cost of school lunches. No one is disputing that the Labour lunch system wasn’t a good idea. But David Seymour copping criticism from Hipkins for trying to save money (or get better value for money) is ironic given Labour had not allowed any future funding for this.
Ian MacGregor, Greenhithe.
Shaun Johnson was injured during last Sunday’s NRL match by a Sydney Rooster player who subjected him to a brutal “tackle” known as a chicken-wing, which is an illegal manoeuvre according to the NRL judiciary code. Why was that rooster not immediately removed from the game? If the roles were reversed we all know what would have happened, don’t we?
Renton Brown, Pukekohe.
Perhaps Auckland Transport and Watercare should be renamed CoCos - Council Out of Control Organisations?
Bruce Tubb, Devonport.
There seem to be many people driving around Auckland with only their parking lights on at night and (even worse) at dusk. Do they not realise this is illegal? These lights are so dim as to be almost invisible and are designed to be used in dark streets with no street lighting to prevent your car from being struck.
Robert Howell, Onehunga.
Insurance companies and cowboys across the country will be celebrating the end of Fair Go.
Neil Hatfull, Warkworth.
Perhaps if the Warriors were to pay as much attention to their football as they do to their hairstyles they may actually win an occasional game.
Martin Adlington, Browns Bay.
OPINION: New Zealander reflects on delivering speech at St James' Palace.