Jane Frericks is organising a petition about wandering dogs. What about wandering cats?
Jane Frericks is organising a petition about wandering dogs. What about wandering cats?
Minority voices still silenced at local level I would like to thank your correspondent D Partner for contributing to the debate on the unrepresentative nature of our district council.
He has asked "how can two-thirds of the population manage to elect 12 councillors and deny the wishes of the other third"?(ie, Maori). It is hardly a mystery because at the local level we do not have proportional representation.
It is the first 12 past the post who get elected. Everyone including the majority of the population gets 12 votes so the majority could and did stick to people they could identify with. Minority voices were again excluded.
We ended up with an experienced council with diverse skills but can we be happy that time after time we have no or occasionally one Maori representative. Good democracy, including our Government, makes sure there is space for the minorities to have a proportionate voice, so why not do it at local level?
I thoroughly object to stray cats coming on to my property and defecating in my garden, attacking the bird life that I nurture, sleeping on my outdoor furniture and generally making a nuisance of themselves. I would ask Jane Frericks if the cats that are being attacked are on their own property?
If they are on someone else's property, then I say "hard luck" If the cat is on public property when it is attacked, then who is in the wrong - the cat or the dog? I have nothing against cats, but cat control in my opinion is as big a problem as dog control.
I belong to the Motor Caravan Association, and a number of our members have cats in their vans. As with dogs they have to be controlled.
Our members teach them to go an a lead and they have enclosed runs for the cats. It can be, and should be done. After all, why does a cat roam? To hunt and kill. I rest my case. (Abridged) KEVIN O'SULLIVAN Parkdale
End of Life debate The euthanasia thing: What a joke, they state an application to succeed must be signed off by two doctors. The thousands of abortions performed in New Zealand each year are all signed off by two doctors. Go figure. TONY HORE Whanganui
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