Border glitches
Matthew Hooton's claim (NZ Herald, August 21) that the Government has displayed "abject incompetence in overseeing basic border and quarantine services" needs to be tested.
Does he have any facts, or figures, to support such a wild claim? I would take a punt that the number of border failures, as a proportion of the number of arrivals, is well under 1 per cent. If that were the case, then the Government's policies are in fact hugely successful.
Hooton needs to work harder to avoid hysteria. Otherwise, he compromises his own arguments.
David Nicholson, Wellington.
Chain of command
So this is what happened: The Prime Minister told the minister; the minister told the director general of health and he told his direct report; who told her senior manager; who told the middle managers; who passed on the directive to the junior clerk; who emailed the private security firms (who rubbed their hands at the lucrative Government IMQ contract heading their way); and they told their minimum wage workers (but only for a very few minutes).
Then the security firms said to the junior clerk, "we're good". she passed it back up the chain and the Prime Minister did tell the 5 million, "we're good"; and the 5 million did rejoice.
Simple.
P. Raine, Devonport.
Home isolation
Demanding all returning New Zealanders gain a negative Covid test prior to their return is ridiculous as you will still have to spend 14 days in government-managed facilities. The country can ill afford this.
Having spent the last seven months flying cargo aircraft across the globe; being incarcerated in hotels; tested for Covid every time on my return to Hong Kong; and then undergoing a two-day quarantine in my apartment, I have not once returned a positive. I've more chance of catching Covid in a New Zealand isolation facility than under the working restrictions that I have been complying with.
What's needed is home isolation at your private residence with a tracker fitted to your person that is visible to others.
New Zealand demonstrated it has a society of people who will dob people in who won't comply in the last lockdown. Offer a reward and charge people the cost of their isolation in full to be returned if they don't stray, but don't treat us all as imbeciles.
Keith Moran, Stonefields.
Power shock
The headline of Peter Whitmore's article "Fixing our dysfunctional electricity market" (NZ Herald, August 21) tells the whole story. Capitalism is not working for electricity generation.
The problem is that electricity generation is a public utility. Electricity is a shared resource. Socialism is all about sharing; Capitalism is all about trying to out-do the competition.
In 1992, National privatised electricity generation, creating a mishmash of competing energy companies. The result is dysfunctional.
It's time to turn electricity generation back into Electrocorp, a socialist enterprise with no competition.
The existing energy companies could be turned into a 49 per cent shareholding of Electrocorp with the Government owning 51 per cent.
John Caldwell, Howick.
Single buyer
I agree with Peter Whitmore that our electricity market is a disaster.
If he had read the excellent report of the Interim Committee on Climate Change he would be aware that it is not possible to have a 100 per cent renewable electricity system. The key problem is dry years when burning fossil fuels to make up the hydropower shortage is the only practical and economic option.
If we followed his recommendations, electricity would become much more expensive and much less reliable because wind, solar and tidal power are all intermittent, unpredictable and, when the need for backup is taken into account, expensive. This is exactly what has happened in California which is now suffering from blackouts and in Germany where electricity prices are among the highest in the world.
What we really need is more hydro and geothermal generation, exploring for more gas and adopting a single-buyer market. This would reduce prices and lower the risk of blackouts.
Bryan Leyland, Pt Chevalier.
Out of Auckland
To improve control of the Covid containment and economic charge on the country, the quarantine centres should be moved out of Auckland.
This would allow for easier containment through the smaller communities and contact tracing through a breach. It would mean the economic engine of the country could avoid lockdowns and keep running, thus improving the welfare of everyone.
New Zealand would have to reduce the flow of returning citizens and be more selective on who gets priority of entry, depending on their economic benefit to the country.
The obedience of Kiwis will diminish with each subsequent lockdown and with clear-cut catastrophic consequences to the country.
David de Lacey, Remuera.
Greater peril
We continue to worry ourselves sick over the Covid-19 outbreaks while the world suffers untold ice loss, pollution of ocean, earth and sky, and a continual search for fossil fuels.
One day soon we will wake up and see the real danger our planet is facing and therefore our lives.
This one now is just another pandemic, serious, but no more serious than ones our ancestors have suffered and survived. But are we ready to survive this silently encroaching disaster to our planet, already years in the making?
Emma Mackintosh, Birkenhead.
Call the ambassador
Has the NZ Government summoned US Ambassador Scott Brown to the Beehive for a "please explain" over the President's comments? And if not, why not?
It is not acceptable to allow Donald Trump to make spurious comments about our country to go unchallenged. For him to say that New Zealand has "had a big outbreak" "everything's gone" and "it's all over" is patently ridiculous and untrue.
The comments on Twitter implying that NZ is a "hellhole" could actually be damaging to our economy and need to be refuted in the strongest possible terms.
Our Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters was quick to criticise China over the treatment of Hong Kong. Let's hope he has the courage to criticise the United States over the scurrilous comments their President has said about our beautiful country.
Glen Stanton, Mairangi Bay.
Short & sweet
On criticism
Opposition parties have grand plans for border and infection control, with all the pitfalls eliminated. They've had six months of bitter experience and hindsight, with no accountability in the meantime. Norm Murray, Browns Bay.
Am I the only person who is absolutely incredulous at the amount of criticism and vitriol being hurled at the Government over its handling of the Covid epidemic? Our record stacks up against every other country in the world. Peter Brooks, Mairangi Bay.
On challenge
The court has been tied up in a one-man crusade to prove a legal point at the expense of serious litigation cases being shunted back on the hearing lists. Borrowdale surely has enjoyed a pyrrhic victory. Des Trigg, Rothesay Bay.
On Trump
Perhaps when American schools reopen, Donald Trump could enrol in a mathematics class with a focus on the basic arithmetic needed to compare infection and death rates from country to country. Gil Laurenson, Eastern Beach.
Not one word of empathy about the NZ outbreak from Trump who seems only to want to portray it as some sort of competition. But then again he has hardly expressed any empathy with the 170,000 plus American citizens who have died. Bruce Manson, Ōrewa.
On returnees
We need to win this battle on a global level as the virus knows no boundaries. Not allowing our own citizens to return to their home country is not an option for a civilised country. Frank Olsson, Freemans Bay.
On water
Re: the lack of encouragement (active discouragement?) to install rainwater tanks, in this time of drought. I can just imagine the discussion in the Watercare boardroom. "We are in the business of selling water. We don't want a million people getting their water from elsewhere for free." Roger Stewart, Te Atatu.
