Advice better than handouts
All this political bantering about getting mothers on the DPB back to work one year after the birth of their second child. This is not ideal for the children and more costly to the taxpayer in subsidies.
Why don't they talk about setting up work schemes to keep our unemployed youth too busy and too tired to make more babies and also out of trouble with the law.
Regarding children and poverty in NZ - teaching budgeting and home management skills would be the best help for those families and not more handouts.
Adrienne Haswell, Hastings
Facts on fracking
John Pfahlert (Not Relevant to NZ, Nov 16) is, I think, being rather disingenuous (adj: having secret motives; insincere). Horizontal hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in its current form has not been around for 50 years.
It is a relatively new technology that enables the extraction of shale gas in a way not previously possible.
Tag Oil's own information pack - released last month for local bodies and iwi - describes the process as "extremely risky" and has partnered up with Apache Ltd as a company experienced in shale gas extraction. Apache has fronted with $100 million to fund exploration in our region. It is unlikely that Apache would invest this amount of money without a reasonable expectation of ROI. It follows, therefore, that Tag/Apache exploration is likely to result in a programme of extraction in the future.
Mr Pfahlert tells us that there is a "public process of approval" through the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the use of certain chemicals. The EPA regards each chemical individually and does not approve the mix, quantities, and use, in the fracking process.
Elsewhere, he asserts that chemicals make up "only 2 per cent" of "racking fluid. Correct. A recent application to a neighbouring council seeks consent for a water take of 25,000 litres of water per day over 4-6 weeks (just for testing).
This amounts to around 600,000 litres of water - 2 per cent of this equals 12,000 litres of chemicals!
There is a mounting wall of evidence from highly regarded international experts that warn the process of fracking can be harmful to the environment, waterways, and to human health, and that these new technologies are getting ahead of our understanding of the short, medium and long term impacts.
The economic benefits to our region are not so well documented!
Every issue raised at the recent Hawke's Bay Water Forum was about dealing with the unintended consequences of earlier decisions, such as dairying and land clearance. We cannot afford to allow fracking in our Bay without a great deal more research, and much more assurance than John Pfahlert is offering.
Do Google "Hunter Valley - Fracking" and take a look at what is happening in that beautiful wine growing region of NSW.
Pauline Elliott, Don't Frack the Bay
(newly formed lobby group)
Port in wrong place
If truth be known, the Port of Napier should never have been built there in the first place.
Hardinge Rd was once one of our NZ surfing spots - that, too, went when the port was extended.
Then they greedily wanted to take over the only sandy beach we had left there for the children. Obviously there was a public outcry, with petitions to be signed all around Napier - which protected it.
So many people were involved, with so many consultants - some from as far away as Canada - when we have perfectly good professional people here.
At what cost? And, more importantly, what result? Submissions upon submissions were put in by residents - all ignored.
Now, 14 years later, it's still the same old, same old. We continue to throw gravel around and drift it all along the coastline. They must have all the sand eliminated by now if that was their aim.
If it is supposed to stop erosion, it has never worked. You can see for yourself how the surf club is teetering on the edge.
So, yet again with our endless Hawke's Bay summer, where at Westshore everyone flocks to the sea, they will sit on a mound of gravel - and find no shady tree.
Sheila Lintot, Napier
Citizens come first
When is our Napier City Council going to focus more on its citizens and less on tourists?
More needs to be provided for those in our community on low wages, and we have plenty of those. More development of the Parade as suggested by design students of EIT in a recent competition, could benefit all.
To think our Council has deemed it unnecessary to upgrade our outside community pool at Onekawa seems a disgrace.
Hundreds of locals would spend an inexpensive day there in the heat of the summer. Many cannot afford to use the Marine Parade pool.
Focus on the residents, I say, and not just the well-off.
Margaret Hutchinson, Taradale
Collection success
On behalf of The Parkinson Society of Hawke's Bay, I would like to thank all who made our Appeal Day on Thursday, November 3, in Wairoa, Waipukurau and Waipawa, and on Friday, November 4, in Hastings, Havelock North, Napier and Taradale the most successful we have held, raising in excess of $11,369.
Without the support of our volunteer collectors, and those who give of their time in various ways, these special days would not be able to take place.
I can assure you that this money will be used in Hawke's Bay, for our Field Officer and Support services, helping those whose lives are governed by Parkinson's.
Barbara Billington, Co-ordinator
Not a deterrent
The misanthropists among us routinely oppose any proposals for tougher sentencing of violent criminals. They routinely claim that tough prison sentences in the USA have not effected a reduced crime rate.
Statistics might or might not support that. Regardless, it is important to ask whether prison sentences in the USA are actually tough.
I'm brought to think not when I read in today's newspaper that a member of the notorious murdering Manson gang who has been in prison for 42 years has, during that time, married, divorced, fathered four children, become an ordained minister and an author. Not a huge deterrent.
Leo Leitch, Napier