Investors and speculators in real estate are equal contributors to a ridiculously overheated housing market and they should have seen these changes, or something similar, coming at them like a freight train at least five years ago. There have been warnings enough that the booming house market would not be allowed to continue without Government intervention. If anything, that intervention has taken too long.
It makes no sense to have hundreds of tourism industry staff in fretting about being out of work while the agriculture and horticulture industries are desperately short of the same number staff.
Projected large scale changes in the near future to the way potable water is supplied to homes throughout the country should not have come as… Read More »Water and local body woes
It has been a long and difficult year since the first nationwide lockdown to take Covid-19 out of the community and keep the deadly virus… Read More »A virus is not deterred by bishops or anybody else
The many laws, rules and regulations which govern our lives can be seen as a measure of our uncertainty. In effect, if we are certain about what we should or should not do, we do not need laws to direct us. It is only when we are unsure that we need laws to direct us. It is only the dishonest or the stupid who defy certainty or the law.
In a world of angry and sometimes fearful people shouting past each other over all manner of real and imagined problems it is refreshing to… Read More »Citizenship Ructions and a Rabbit
A couple of weeks ago, following an unseemly bout of infantile intolerance over the use of te reo Maori at a Grey Power meeting, I… Read More »When traditions prevent common sense
These tough times will include the most dramatic changes in farming systems since we put the last of the working horses out to pasture and began using electricity to replace steam engines. There will be fewer and smaller dairy and beef cattle herds, improved breeding technology for cattle and sheep. There will also no doubt be a requirement for a much-reduced reliance on artificial fertilisers.
We have proven to ourselves, and to the world, that we are very good at handling emergencies when we all pull together for a common cause. We now have two new closely linked emergencies for many people simply because one section of the community is taking advantage of the situation to make obscene profits from the unavoidable hardship of others.
In spite of some recent inaccurate rhetoric from both sides of the political debate racism has always been here, as it has in most other nations and communities. It is as difficult to define as it will be to eradicate and screaming racism at everything we don’t like or understand doesn’t help. But, if anyone can succeed we can and we will be the first nation in the world to do so.