Letters: Drop GST on basic groceries

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15% GST on basic groceries is a grossly unjust tax on low income families. Food is not an optional purchase. We all need to eat. The effect of this tax on low income families is quite out of proportion to the impact on high income people. If this was translated into income tax there would be a public outcry. There needs to be one on this issue.

Families of equal size and ages need about the same amount of food. If a family spends $300 per week or $15,600 per year they pay $45 per week or $2340 per year in GST. This $2340 would be a great help to those struggling on $50,000 but is a more negligible amount to those on $150,000.

The governments of Canada, Australia, UK and others understand that people have to buy food and their groceries are exempt from GST. Why have successive New Zealand governments continued this imposition on low income families? It is not hard to work out how to do it. The other countries manage it. We like to think that we are at least as bright as the Australians.

This needs to be an election issue. The level of poverty in this country is a disgrace. This needs to be discussed with our MPs, candidates, the community and the many worthwhile organisations that are feeding those who cannot afford sufficient groceries for their families.

ROSEMARY MICHIE
Rotorua

There are a lot of positives surrounding the Rotorua Seafood Festival and one is reluctant to go against the flow considering the many capable and considerate employees who helped make the day what it was.

However, a couple of things were kind of disturbing.

One was the extraordinary length of the beverages queue which one was forced to wait in and wait in to get what, for many, was an important ingredient of the afternoon.

The other was the poor/low volume when it came to spoken sequences from the stage most significantly the food preparation demonstration by the event's two headliners.

Everybody seemed to enjoy themselves regardles. However, some things could be looked at to ensure the quality of an important Rotorua event.

BRIAN GILLESPIE
Rotorua

As a child at school in Wales I was taught Welsh a 'dying' language' they said. Living in Cornwall they were trying to keep 'Cornish' alive. At college we were taught Latin, Greek and French, and I learned to speak 200-year-old French in Quebec. Great! Very useful I'm sure! I could have spent much of that time learning something useful.

Children in our schools need to learn to use English properly, the lack of proper teaching of this useful language is evident from looking at Facebook! Mathematics should be taught properly - if the computerised tills in supermarkets stopped working the supermarkets would have to close their doors - none of the till girls can add or subtract sufficiently well to work without a calculator.

Boys could learn useful skills - carpentry, mechanics etc. Girls how to cook!

Face it, Maori is a 'dead' language, if people want to learn it let them - don't 'make' them! School time is too important.

JIM ADAMS
Rotorua