Scene of a shooting on Gibbs Road, Manurewa over the weekend. Police. Photo / Dean Purcell
Hold the phone and you lose it
Safe driving requires full attention at all times. Using a cellphone jeopardises much of this attention, and texting even more so. Waka Kotahi's survey is wasting time, money and possibly lives with another useless data-gathering venture.
It matters not an iota if 5 per
cent or 55 per cent are using devices while driving; we've all seen people doing it. We don't need a six-month survey to tell us we need action!
Correspondent P Salvador (NZ Herald, May 26) is far too kind. First offence should be loss of phone for six weeks, demerit points and $1500 fine. Cellphone logs and location records can confirm the correct phone is confiscated. Second offence is permanent loss of phone, most demerit points, $5000 fine and dangerous driving charge. Third offence is permanent loss of new phone and driving disqualification for at least one year. Safe drivers need not fear.
This will change behaviour overnight and make our roads safer much more effectively than another juvenile Waka Kotahi advertising campaign ever will.
Alastair Brickell, Whitianga.
Construction incompetence
In 2018 the Government signalled its intent to solve the housing crisis it had inherited by a large building programme of state, social and private housing.
You would expect business to have calculated the increases in building materials required and to expand production to supply the extra product. It didn't happen, and now builds cannot be completed because they need Gib and other materials. Andrew Bayly (Weekend Herald, May 28) predicts a major recession as building companies continue to collapse.
Another example of incompetent business management. Imagine if our Government was this hopeless.
Mark Nixon, Remuera.
US must face gun truth
The right to own a gun in America has two forces fighting for it. Firstly, the second amendment, enacted on December 15, 1791. Secondly, National Rifle Association (NRA) funding political campaigns. Ex-President Donald Trump promoted armed security guards at every school. What a tragic state to be in.
America needs to look at itself. Until it realises guns kill people, it will not resolve these mass shootings.
John Ford, Taradale.
PM misinformation
I agree with the PM that disinformation should be stamped out. A good place for her to start is not going to America and telling US media and politicians that after the Christchurch massacre our gun buy-back scheme has been a great success. She also implies that owing to the Government's policies we don't have the same problems as the US. If that is so, how does she explain the seven gun-related incidents on the same day she made these comments and also that most guns bought back were from legal gun owners? Jacinda, be open, transparent and honest.
Dr Alan Papert, Queenstown.
Pro-gun lobby ignorance
After the school massacre, the pro-gun lobby in the US predictably trotted out the past-its-use-by-date response of "it's not the gun, it's the nut behind the gun".
Exactly the same argument can be said for vehicles on roads, but every state has laws to protect all people in and around traffic routes, no matter an individual driver's level of competency.
People who resort to "my constitutional right" to defend their choice to carry guns not only show ignorance and lack of original thought by hiding behind that phrase, but also an egocentric lack of disregard for the wider community.
It will take brave, committed people to make any difference to gun laws in the US. At one stage, however, cigarette companies and segregationist attitudes looked to be irretrievably entrenched in US society. People power took care of that. Let's look forward to the levelling of this next towering monolith.
Maria Carbines, Hillsborough.
Decisions should be ours
Law should be a set of rules by which society wishes to live. What it should not be is a set of rules by which a few Law Commission members want us to live. I have spent over 45 years working hard to acquire property and possessions and there is no way anyone is going to tell me to whom I may or may not leave that when I die. Should they try to do so, I will make sure there is not enough left in my estate to be worth contesting.
Gerald Payman, Mt Albert.
Ask the shippers
I cannot believe we are going to do another study on using Onehunga Harbour to replace Auckland Port. Surely we should ask the shipping companies what they think? Are they happy to go to the West Coast, then up and around North Cape to get to Tauranga and Napier? How much extra will it cost them? Who pays? Would they even go so far as to can Auckland completely? If they say it's fine, maybe we can proceed. I trust the cost of 24/7 dredging of the whole of the new shipping channels is taken into account.
Geoff Levick, Kumeu.
Harbour study needed
In the 1980s the Auckland City Council employed the person responsible for developing Botany Bay as Sydney's main port. (This left Sydney harbour itself for cruise ships.)
This expert advised that the Manukau Harbour was a top prospect for a port to replace our downtown port. But a study should be undertaken on the movement of sand across the entrance to the Manukau harbour to show whether it could be maintained in a navigable state.
Bruce Anderson, Auckland.
Bats out of hell cyclists
I went with friends on the opening walk through the land from Meadowbank train station up to St John's Rd last Wednesday. It was fantastic. Beautifully laid out, lots of new tree planting and lots of cyclists. Cyclists go like a bat out of hell, never ring a bell to let people know they are coming. I would hate to see the same nonsense that has occurred on the waterfront since they made a cycle path on it.
Please, cyclists, whenever there are old people, very young people or new mums pushing a pram, go on the road.
Susan Lawrence, Meadowbank.
Leadership lacking
Brilliant article on Norway, the EV capital of the world, by Simon Wilson in Saturday's (May 28) Herald Canvas. Just one reason Norway is 20 years ahead of the population of New Zealand: the Government led the way.
Leadership, capability, financial discipline and design. Not hundreds of millions of dollars spent on consultants because the central and local government does not know what it is doing or have the skills to recognise or implement good decisions and wastes heaps of time and money on multiple distractions.
Is the entry level set too low for our politicians? If so, how can we raise the bar?
Gary Carter, Gulf Harbour.
Bleeding the rich
Lani Fogelberg is quite right when, in the Weekend Herald (May 28), she says the tall-poppy syndrome is alive and prospering in this country.
The leftist letter writers that regularly pepper the correspondence columns of this newspaper are always in a hurry to tax the "rich". They are adamant that any who has made something of themself should have their "wealth" redistributed to the "poor".
That view is frequently echoed in the news and comment columns where there is a constant focus on "inequality", "poverty" and the "under-privileged".
Rarely, in the general news columns, do we see success being celebrated. The Peter Becks, the Mowbrays, the Lani Fogelbergs of this world, and many similarly successful others, are the creators building a better economy for all of us. Why should we tax them into oblivion?
People like that are globally mobile. Create a hostile tax environment and they can quickly and easily (and already do) move offshore to a more benign economic climate.
It also strikes me as curious that we have no problem celebrating the success of entertainers and sportspeople who earn millions of dollars a year, yet want to tear down the people who generate wealth and employment for the whole country.
In a world where fruit pickers, according to a recent report, can earn over $80,000 a year and truck drivers $100,000, I do not understand why we continue to support people who can't be bothered getting off their backsides and making a better life for themselves.
David Morris, Hillsborough.
On chocolate
Tsk! Tsk! Steve Braunias. Surely Jacinda would have been offering NZ-made Whittaker's chocolate, not foreign Cadbury's. Fiona Downes, Hobsonville.
On Queen St
Ben Goodale (Comment May 28), worries about Queen St, calling it a "street of shame". Hopefully, it does not also become a street of bollards courtesy of the Proceeds of Crime Fund. Nick Nicholas, Greenlane.
On Covid toll
Clyde Scott (and so many others) need to understand that 1000 people in New Zealand have not died from Covid; rather, with it. Big difference. Colin Nicholls, Mt Eden.
On democracy
John Roughan's brilliant piece on democracy was the Weekend Herald at its finest (May 28). We need to hold on tight to the facts and to our values. Arch Thomson, Mt Wellington.
On voting age
It seems reasonable the people who will have to deal with the planet's crisis have a right to vote in politicians who will do something about it. Paul Kenny, Ponsonby.
On spending
What a pity we don't all have a money tree in our garden like Grant Robertson must have hidden in the grounds of Parliament. Katherine Swift, Kohimarama
Inheritance law: Assets no longer safe
There should be no recourse to argue with a deceased person's wishes. It's not "fair share" — it's what a person wanted to do with their assets. If they wanted to leave the house to their second partner then that's who it should go to. David C.
My property. My money. My possessions. My decision. Trusts should be incontestable, full stop. Helen T.
I have two estranged adult children who wouldn't care if I lived or died. Why should I provide for them in my will? I will be damned if I will let the courts give my hard-earned money and assets to two people who despise me. Mikki S.
The use of trusts to hide assets, if not illegal, is morally wrong. If you need to hide assets to keep your family, estranged or otherwise, ignorant of your wealth then you have a strange set of values, in my view. Is it embarrassment, greed, jealousy or revenge?Christine W.
The answer seems easy — if you want to use the state system after your death to enforce the will then it can be challenged. If you wish otherwise, simply distribute your assets as you wish before you die and only leave a residual estate. After all, you can't take it with you. Hector B.
Trusts are far too widely employed in NZ for underhand purposes. The article discusses their use for estate planning but the rot sets in much earlier when wealth is hidden in inter-vivos trusts, to put it out of the reach of spouses, creditors or Inland Revenue. Colin J.
A witness reported seeing a police officer setting up a rifle.