Mike Hosking: Let's kick-start New Zealand back to life

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COMMENT:

We should be grateful there are enough people in Cabinet, people like Grant Robertson and Winston Peters, who clearly won the day yesterday over the health hawks who would have had us locked down for another week or two.

Many of us would say the lockdown was too severe, that the evidence was there for us all to see way sooner than the Government was prepared to act on, that seven weeks should have been about four or five.

This is still way too prescriptive, not just because it's not necessary, but because it leads to confusion.

The more complicated the message, the more people won't take it in, or understand, or will miss it.

The more dictatorial the instruction, the more you invite some of the more rebellious among us to simply say "stuff it, I'll do what I want".

Last weekend might have been a clue.

The Government's overarching message these past two months has been way too heavily weighed around negativity, lack of trust, and fear.

We have been ear-bashed into hibernation. We have been too frightened to think for ourselves. Too many of us have been quivering wrecks, reliant on a handful in Wellington to tell us what to do, what to ask and when to act.

And as the economic side of this story continues to unfold, and the cold hard realisation dawns upon us what sort of carnage has been created, the frustration and anger will only grow.

Given there have been fewer than 1500 cases in total, many of us will have not met or know an actual person who had the virus. But every single one of us will know, meet, or be one of the casualties of the economic price paid.

• Covid19.govt.nz: The Government's official Covid-19 advisory website

The trick here is to be bold, be confident and spend some money.

The businesses who are allowed to be open still have massive issues. Being open isn't making a living. The two things are very separate. Businesses need all the help we can give and so much of that is up to us.

The wage subsidy won't go on forever, nor should it. The Government is spending money it doesn't have, and that can't go on forever either.

At some point we have to realise that this is up to us. Stop relying on Wellington, stop looking to dob people in, and stop asking weird banal questions.

Just get on with it, let's take our country back.