Mind that child, every child
Your Monday headline (NZ Herald, January 24) caught my eye: "No progress on child abuse slated by advocacy group".
It was sad reading. Child Matters said one child died every five weeks as a result of abuse last year and thousands more were abused and injured.
How could
this possibly happen? A few years ago, thousands of taxpayers' dollars and countless hours of parliament time was spent in passing the "anti-smacking bill".
Yet the abuse seems to be increasing. It is plain to see the anti-smacking bill is a farce and was a complete waste of time and money.
Alan Eustace, Pakuranga.
British scorn
That rascally reactionary right wing raconteur Piers Morgan, having run out of royal babies to pillory, has turned his attention to Jacinda Ardern (NZ Herald, January 25). He doesn't understand why New Zealand has imposed "draconian" measures in our fight with Covid.
Common sense health measures - wear a mask, get vaccinated, avoid large gatherings - are not draconian.
If you extrapolate the UK Covid death toll to NZ's population, we would have nearly 15,000 deaths from Covid, instead of the 54 that we have. If you extrapolate NZ's death toll to UK's population you would have had only 670 deaths, not 176,000.
Morgan, Mark Jenkinson, Nile Gardiner et al, thank you for your insightful observations regarding our Prime Minister and her approach to public health, but you can keep your Prime Minister and we'll keep ours thank you.
aul Cheshire, Maraetai.
Calm down
I heartily agree with your correspondent Sandra Coney (NZ Herald, January 25) that some of your columnists are undermining the public response to government health advice, and stirring up resentment and even rage.
The crude and offensive attempt to run the Prime Minister's car off the road when she was visiting Paihia is a disturbing example of this.
The righteous indignation of anti-vaxxers is ludicrous and misplaced. I suggest they stay at home and avoid Omicron, as it's likely to be in their street very soon, seeking them out.
V. M. Fergusson, Mt Eden.
Heavy option
The CC2M project (NZ Herald, January 25) is flawed and expensive.
Blair Ngarimu was right to dissent on the choice citing equity and cost. Matt Lowry from
Greater Auckland is also right to query the expense of surface light rail.
On the other hand, the $10 billion-$14b for a tunnel will likely balloon 70 per cent or more. It has limited scope, ignoring many suburbs in Auckland especially in the south and west who will have no direct access to the employment hub.
The cheapest option will be a heavy rail connection to north and south at Wiri, travelling via the Mangere airport, employment hub and residential area to Onehunga. There is a need for a freight line from Avondale to Southdown and a simple connection at Onehunga will provide many new services from south to west, but importantly connecting many more residential suburbs with the employment hub and airport.
The best mass transit for central Auckland would be a surface line from Queen St, Dominion Rd, Richardson Rd, Maiora Rd, Sandringham Rd to Symonds St.
Add front loading compensation for disruption.
More equity, less emissions, less congestion and much cheaper.
Niall Robertson, chair, Public Transport Users Association.
Unjabbed councillors
Organisations such as the Waikato Regional Council who are considering allowing non-vaccinated members to attend meetings while everyone else is required to produce a vaccine pass is a double standard.
To attend these people must show two negative tests, which means these need to be paid for, need the testers to be paid and add to the long queues at the testing sites and testing laboratories for each meeting. Are these councillors going to pay for their own RAT but will still be diminishing rapidly depleting supplies for essential workers?
There are rules for some and rules to be bent for others, at a cost to the majority.
A blanket "no pass, no entry" rule should be for all.
Get vaccinated or do Zoom meetings for the safety of all.
Marie Kaire, Whangārei.
