Having been an unexpected guest for a week at Whanganui Hospital following an encounter with a wood chipper, I feel qualified to pass observation on the hospital staff having to undertake 16-hour shifts.
My attendance was during a long holiday weekend and the support I needed, which included two operations, was superb.
However, I do not accept that the skilled staff who attended to me should have to work twice the daily hours of a factory, office or shop employee. Frankly, I expect more concentration of skill and attention for my flesh and blood injury than that required to operate a machine, process an account or sell a dishwasher.
I am concerned at the comment from Ms Patterson that "staff are aware that if they are fatigued, they can request support" because there is no explanation as to what happens were they to do so.
Is there a stigma attached to them for making such a request?
Hospital staff attending to human injuries have enough accountability and pressure without the additional strain of twice the hours expected of a normal employee.
VERNON BALLANCE, Westmere
Lives cut short
What a dramatic and tragic front page of the Chronicle - "Pair of shoes mark a mother's tragic loss" (September 8).
The sight of all those pairs of shoes belonging to someone's son or daughter was very moving.
Why do so many of our young people feel that suicide is the only answer for them? I am sure their families are devastated by such a loss of a loved one.
We do, of course, have many young people who lead fulfilled lives, being into sport, drama, the arts etc, but others seem to feel they have no goal or purpose that would help them get through, and that applies not only to the young.
How very sad this all is for everyone involved. I only hope the appropriate help will be available to turn this situation around in the future.
FIONA DONNE, Whanganui
Mining returns
I see that the Nga Rauru people are angered about the seabed mining off Patea.
Will these people tell us, the New Zealand people, where future governments are going to get the money to pay for these people who go to Winz for handouts, to the doctors, to get medicines from chemists which are paid for by the government, schools, dole payments and Treaty payments, just to name a few.
Seabed mining will bring into the country over a billion dollars a year. The country needs this money to pay the above and more.
If you are worried about a few dolphins, shift them - and other species you are worried about.
Get a life and let the country prosper. The sea will fill the hole that is left.
C SPOONER, Springvale
Think before ticking
People going to vote in this election should think carefully which party they support to be the government for the next three years.
Under National our debt to foreign countries has trebled from $18 billion in 2008 to $58 billion in 2016.
National have put in place the Marine & Coastal Act where tribal groups can declare it sacred, and the marine title, if you are building or extending your boatshed without tribal permission, you can be fined - 90 per cent goes to the tribes and 10 per cent goes to the government.
Labour were the government who put in place the false document and made it as the English draft of the Treaty. By doing so they removed all non-Maori out of the Treaty so that they could give special rights to Maori.
IAN BROUGHAM, Tawhero
Status quo
If National gets re-elected, nothing will change. Hospitals will still be overworked and underfunded; teachers will still be struggling with class sizes and low pay; it will still be claimed that water quality is satisfactory; housing in the cities will still be horrifyingly expensive and the environment will be further degraded.
None of their spur-of-the-moment desperate policies will change that.
Governments become over-confident and complacent after nine years and need replacing.
I D FERGUSON, Whanganui
Two sets of rules
Labour's proposed water tax will no doubt buy them lots of votes and lose them very few, because the general population has been so bombarded by reports of the farming industry causing water pollution.
Many people will think, 'What a great idea. Let's tax those suckers and clean the rivers up - no cost to us and it hammers those causing the pollution'.
Trouble is, there is lots of evidence out there that humans in New Zealand are causing more pollution than the dairy industry. I guess that people don't like being told they are polluting - I can relate to that as a dairy farmer. So if our city folk are to be told they are causing pollution, that's not going to sell a whole lot of newspapers.
Whanganui's continued discharge of raw sewage into the sea, which has been going on for years, draws no media attention or public outcry. It is a disgrace. Does the sea not count as a body of water to be looked after?
I recall with embarrassment causing smell pollution some years ago when spreading poultry manure. I was fined within 24 hours. How come a city can get away with hugely more serious pollution with no apparent consequence.
What the media has achieved is the creation of a gulf between town and country that Labour is exploiting to win votes. Town and country need each other and need to work together for a healthy future.
BRUCE CAVE, Whanganui
Speak the truth
There seems to be little courage from jourmalists in the face of political correctness. A good model to follow would be Malcolm Muggeridge in his Tread Softly for You Tread on my Jokes.
Vilified by the Western media when he pointed out the truth of the failure of early socialism in Russia mid 2oth century; lionised like few others when the truth became more apparent.
F HALPIN, Whanganui
Financial nous
I often hear folks parroting National's propaganda that a Labour government is financially incompetent.
When the so-called financial genius Muldoon was finally booted out, Aotearoa NZ was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Muldoon refused to devalue the New Zealand dollar to save the country from that demise.
His arrogance extended to demanding incumbent Prime Minister David Lange do likewise. Lange had to step in, before the due date, to ensure NZ stayed afloat.
After Helen Clark's government departed there was minimal debt which allowed National to ride the 2008-09 recession in considerable comfort. Now, after nine years of National's financial irresponsibility, we are in debt up to our eyeballs.
This government has relied too heavily on immigration as a tool for artificial growth, while productivity declines. They are using Trump's scare tactics around reducing these number because that would show up the true state of the economy.
So, Bill and Steven, do you want to 'fess up as to who will be involved in your planned public/private enterprises, and provide full details of what they entail. Joining the lolly scramble while denegrating Labour for their promises surely negates that argument.
The massive blunder in underestimating funding of Oranga Tamariki hardly engenders confidence in National's financial competence.
Look at how this present government has acted over the past nine-year term - feeding the rich and ignoring the ever increasing poverty is not acceptable.
DENISE LOCKETT, Whanganui
The claim alleges breaches of Treaty principles in fast-track approvals process.