We are coming up to Anzac Day. We remember those who fought and died so we can live in freedom; of where to live, to speak what we believe and who we choose to associate with – that includes Israel and Maria Folalu.
So please, Brad Webber, Louisa Wall and others, say what you want, but give others the right to do the same - whether you like it or not.
Stop using phobia as a means to stifle free speech. It's the least we can do to practically honour our fallen and injured soldiers.
Andrew Austin
Matua
Time to pay
District health boards have, in my view, been sidestepping nurses' wages for years. It is time for them to pay.
Having been a nurse for many years but now more focused on grandparent duties, I consider that staffing levels, substandard equipment and morale are at an all-time low.
If we thought there were shortcomings 20 years ago, it is worse now. Sadly, there is not the loyalty and friendliness between colleagues who feel such pressure to get their daily workload completed.
A rise in wages will fix some of the woes of these caring, dedicated workers who just want to do a great days' work.
When have nurses been able to say they had a great day? There is such frustration in knowing your ideal but never being able to achieve it. When you feel that too much is stacked against you and all you can do is scratch the surface, how sad. It's not what you signed up for but being an ever optimistic nurse, you wait for the situation to improve.
Nurses of a high-calibre are required to work in the health industry and yet their rate of pay does not encourage people to consider it a worthwhile career. Ideally we want to retain the nurses we train and have a positive, happy workplace conducive to the wellbeing of the patients and staff alike.
Tess Nesdale
Otumoetai
Great work
It was great to see your write-up on the latest family to benefit from the Habitat for Humanity programme that helps needy families build, and eventually own, their own homes (News, April 19).
This successful formula has worked in the Bay of Plenty for more than 20 years, and helped nearly 80 families into home ownership, and in neighbouring Waikato, about 100.
It is interesting that your report on Minister Phil Twyford talking on plans regarding homelessness and housing appears on the same page.
Hopefully it reminds him of the role Habitat plays, with government aid, in disaster-ravaged areas around the Pacific where Habitat is often first on the ground to plan and rebuild whole communities of 100 or so houses - for example, Samoa and Tonga.
And in the wider international scene, Habitat New Zealand was involved in the 1000- house rebuilds following tsunamis, earthquakes and typhoons in the likes of Nepal, Thailand and coastal India.
Obviously, government help to Habitat in New Zealand could double its building rate amongst some of the most desperate families in need – and help simultaneously to solve a serious social problem.
Don Brebner
Omokoroa
Not opposed to a museum
I am not opposed to a museum in Tauranga but I am opposed to the use of ratepayer money being used on a non-binding referendum on the matter.
Furthermore, being given a choice of only two sites also grates me.
Perhaps, with the fiascos of recycling and the Bella Vista Homes - my heart goes out to the people caught up in this - and who knows what else, a better use of our money would be a binding referendum for a vote of confidence or no confidence in the council?
Catherine Campbell-Smith
Tauranga
Unfair Situation?
1982 was rather a long time ago, but I can think of two reasons why the two loans Will Goldsmith mentions (Letters, April 20) are actually fair.
First, a home owner such as Goldsmith gets a double tax advantage. With no rent there's no tax on earnings needed to pay rent, and mortgage repayments are tax-exempt. The combined tax benefit back then was probably about equal to the 3 per cent interest differential between the two loans.
Secondly, a kiwifruit orchard would provide employment for people who otherwise would be dependent on a benefit paid from tax money, and that is a good reason for the Government to subsidise the loan. Yes, it was a Maori Affairs loan, but the reason for the subsidy wasn't ethnicity.
Alan Armstrong
Rotorua
