Sam Fisher: Frenzy over public spending finally losing froth

Community boards' excessive tea bag use is a concern. Photo / NZ Herald

Opinion

Things have got to change, and they will. We're on the verge of having the political system we can afford and that we want. But before revealing this exciting new order it is worth revisiting the orgy of public angst that has made this possible.

Now in its 17th week, the feeding frenzy on public expenditure continues to dominate news. However, the only people really paying attention are those who are yet to have their spending uncovered. Neither of them could be reached for comment.

Starting with deliberately leaked details of Labour MPs' credit cards, moving on to National ministers, mayors and public servants, the revelations have continued. No one has been prepared for the bizarre twists and turns we have been forced to be concerned about.

And oh, the collateral damage: a former Cabinet Minister losing the plot and attacking his leader; the crying mayor and pictures of expensive restaurants in Wellington followed by footage of attractive young waitresses who somehow represent excessive spending - I'm not sure how this works, perhaps they're not waitresses after all?

Personally, I ran out of moral indignation and shock in week seven and tried feigning disgust, but couldn't go on after week 14. I tried tag teaming with a friend of mine, who wrote to the paper over judges' gavel allocations.

I rang talkback over sexton shovel allowances and he started a petition on Facebook to complain about excessive teabag use by community boards. But we both lost steam when the toilet paper costs for local water companies were uncovered. We couldn't give a flush anymore.

To save time, here are some possible Official Information requests that can keep us going until Christmas: traffic engineer bus ticket allowances, policy analyst magnifying glasses expenses, assistants' paper clip bills and legal aid lawyers' brief costs. And so I can get on with my life, I'll just say now I'm appalled by the excessive nature of all of them.

The good news is that in a few short months all of Government will be paralysed. Chief executives will have important gatherings catered with re-used pump bottles, MPs will make decisions using NZ Post and the Prime Minister will cycle his way around meetings in foreign capitals and then return to New Zealand on a container ship carrying South American bananas or cheap plastic toys from China.

Perhaps in time the meetings, decisions and trips will stop all together. Lindsay Dom Perignon, the leader of the Free Market Librarians, will have the anarchy he wants.

I feel fortunate to live in a community where we understand the value of small things, where the most important public issue is spending on working lunches and preventing our representatives eating when they're overseas.

While there are big issues, these are things we can't control. Imports, exports, balance of payments, current accounts are all words with vowels in them, but what do they matter? Crime, unemployment, tagging, emissions trading ... more vowels and lots of consonants.

A simpler life beckons. The Daihatsu Society is on the horizon. Think small; we're 90 per cent of the way there with a declining economy, anyway.

Parliament will only meet for six weeks a year, and by email. MPs will have to look after local services such as the sewerage or the rubbish and have their numbers advertised as 24-hour helplines.

Public servants will not have budgets to do anything, including getting paid. Local councils will be neighbourhood collectives run by the nosiest person in each suburb. We'll have our South Pacific, foreign-owned, sugar-free pavlova paradise.

Once there is no effective government we'll only be free to complain about the All Blacks.

Does anyone know how much Graham Henry spends on his credit card?