Letters, Dec 2
2/12/2009 11:06:00 a.m.
Welfare blowouts
The hard facts are coming through that welfare spending is out of control, so the time is here when we should have a look at where all the millions are going. Recently we have been made aware that the Wellingt on hospital can hardly handle the injured drunks that block treatment to real and less ‘self inflicted’ injuries which blow out the emergency department’s case loads, particularly in the weekends. Surely a case can be made that if drunks end up injured in hospital they should be charged for the costs of their treatment, and have the cost of their injury treatment taken from their pay, or fines imposed. User pays has real merit, maybe this might make teenagers especially drink more sanely. Perhaps the state should also look at a Brazilian solution for welfare payments to families. In Brazil a family will not get its welfare cheque if it cannot prove that all their children go to school. They must also show that the children are getting their free vaccinations. Both these policies could have beneficial outcomes in terms of better educated and healthier adults. This is a time for some much more aggressive solutions to social issues we are seeing every time we read our newspapers.
Christopher Harris, Wadestown
Water conservation
You have been getting a number of letters lately about the issue of water supplies for Wellington. Concern seems to be building up over the future security of supply, how much we are going to need and the possibility of shortages. The situation is fairly straightforward. The regional council, which is responsible for bulk supply to the city, is currently assessing the possible need for an additional supply source in the future. That source would be a new dam at Whakatikei. I say “would” because there is no particular reason to suppose that we will ever need it. The dam is no more than a long term option. If there is only modest growth in population and we are able to hold, and ideally reduce our consumption, then we won’t need it at all. There are encouraging signs that Wellingtonians are now beginning to conserve water as a matter of habit without having to be constantly asked to, especially in the summer months. If each household can achieve a reduction by a few percentage points we will effectively be able to live within our existing means when it comes to water. If we can’t, or won’t, then other demand management options will be necessary. Water metering is one of these. And if we can’t stomach any of the demand management options we will inevitably finish up having to build that new dam, with all the various costs and complications that would impose on the ratepayer. It’s a no-brainer really. What we need is rather less hysteria over the supposed evils of metering and rather more rational attention to conservation.
Chris Laidlaw, Greater Wellington Regional Council
Trolley buses
Trolley buses are the most antiquated form of transport available in Wellington today, yet the council still wastes money keeping the network going. Why are we pandering to a half-witted bunch of environmental lunatics instead of consigning the buses to the rubbish tip once and for all. To claim we should keep them because they are “iconic” is ludicrous. Public transport should be usable, not iconic.
Ronald R Smythe, Mt Cook
Vector Wellington Orchestra
Garth Wilshere’s great review of the Vector Wellington Orchestra concert (Capital Times 25/11 - 1/12/09) ends with the opinion that “Taddei directed a sensitive performance which actually made the music sound better than it is”. This reminds me of a statement attributed to Mark Twain: “Wagner’s music is better than it sounds’.
Merrilyn Lander, Broadmeadows
Darwin has company
H Westfold (Nov 18) assumes Darwin would be in hell for writing a book based on fossils and the environment which led to his theory of evolution. This theory contradicted the established religious fundamentalist view of creation and as such was rejected by the churches but at the same time took education out of the dark ages. If Darwin is in hell he has great company in Mark Twain, Voltaire, Robert Ingersoll, Huxley, Joseph McCabe and such like thinkers.
RO Hare, Lower Hutt
(abridged)
Darwin lies
E Warren of Wilton has a gift for satire. But it is important to grasp fundamental differences between Galileo and Darwin. Galileo was a prominent figure made an example of by the theocracy of the day for stating what was already obvious to intelligent people a surprisingly long way back in human history. Darwin, on the other hand, advanced a theory for which he had no proof, only saying that he expected that proof to be discovered within 50 years. One hundred and fifty years later, scientists are still obfuscating frantically about gaps in the fossil record and other inconvenient truths. The recent revelations about the lies and fraud emanating from scientists about global warming is just another manifestation of the untrustworthiness of scientists with a non-scientific agenda. It will be a tragedy if the lies continue to prevail in this case as they have for so long with Darwinism. Darwinism has already amply illustrated the potential for scientific lies to bring calamity on humanity, with its contribution to the development of Nazi and Communist ideology; and will yet bring more such calamity if not repudiated.
Galileo did no such harm and it is an insult to him to put him in Darwin’s company.
Philip G Hayward, Naenae
The hard facts are coming through that welfare spending is out of control, so the time is here when we should have a look at where all the millions are going. Recently we have been made aware that the Wellingt on hospital can hardly handle the injured drunks that block treatment to real and less ‘self inflicted’ injuries which blow out the emergency department’s case loads, particularly in the weekends. Surely a case can be made that if drunks end up injured in hospital they should be charged for the costs of their treatment, and have the cost of their injury treatment taken from their pay, or fines imposed. User pays has real merit, maybe this might make teenagers especially drink more sanely. Perhaps the state should also look at a Brazilian solution for welfare payments to families. In Brazil a family will not get its welfare cheque if it cannot prove that all their children go to school. They must also show that the children are getting their free vaccinations. Both these policies could have beneficial outcomes in terms of better educated and healthier adults. This is a time for some much more aggressive solutions to social issues we are seeing every time we read our newspapers.
Christopher Harris, Wadestown
Water conservation
You have been getting a number of letters lately about the issue of water supplies for Wellington. Concern seems to be building up over the future security of supply, how much we are going to need and the possibility of shortages. The situation is fairly straightforward. The regional council, which is responsible for bulk supply to the city, is currently assessing the possible need for an additional supply source in the future. That source would be a new dam at Whakatikei. I say “would” because there is no particular reason to suppose that we will ever need it. The dam is no more than a long term option. If there is only modest growth in population and we are able to hold, and ideally reduce our consumption, then we won’t need it at all. There are encouraging signs that Wellingtonians are now beginning to conserve water as a matter of habit without having to be constantly asked to, especially in the summer months. If each household can achieve a reduction by a few percentage points we will effectively be able to live within our existing means when it comes to water. If we can’t, or won’t, then other demand management options will be necessary. Water metering is one of these. And if we can’t stomach any of the demand management options we will inevitably finish up having to build that new dam, with all the various costs and complications that would impose on the ratepayer. It’s a no-brainer really. What we need is rather less hysteria over the supposed evils of metering and rather more rational attention to conservation.
Chris Laidlaw, Greater Wellington Regional Council
Trolley buses
Trolley buses are the most antiquated form of transport available in Wellington today, yet the council still wastes money keeping the network going. Why are we pandering to a half-witted bunch of environmental lunatics instead of consigning the buses to the rubbish tip once and for all. To claim we should keep them because they are “iconic” is ludicrous. Public transport should be usable, not iconic.
Ronald R Smythe, Mt Cook
Vector Wellington Orchestra
Garth Wilshere’s great review of the Vector Wellington Orchestra concert (Capital Times 25/11 - 1/12/09) ends with the opinion that “Taddei directed a sensitive performance which actually made the music sound better than it is”. This reminds me of a statement attributed to Mark Twain: “Wagner’s music is better than it sounds’.
Merrilyn Lander, Broadmeadows
Darwin has company
H Westfold (Nov 18) assumes Darwin would be in hell for writing a book based on fossils and the environment which led to his theory of evolution. This theory contradicted the established religious fundamentalist view of creation and as such was rejected by the churches but at the same time took education out of the dark ages. If Darwin is in hell he has great company in Mark Twain, Voltaire, Robert Ingersoll, Huxley, Joseph McCabe and such like thinkers.
RO Hare, Lower Hutt
(abridged)
Darwin lies
E Warren of Wilton has a gift for satire. But it is important to grasp fundamental differences between Galileo and Darwin. Galileo was a prominent figure made an example of by the theocracy of the day for stating what was already obvious to intelligent people a surprisingly long way back in human history. Darwin, on the other hand, advanced a theory for which he had no proof, only saying that he expected that proof to be discovered within 50 years. One hundred and fifty years later, scientists are still obfuscating frantically about gaps in the fossil record and other inconvenient truths. The recent revelations about the lies and fraud emanating from scientists about global warming is just another manifestation of the untrustworthiness of scientists with a non-scientific agenda. It will be a tragedy if the lies continue to prevail in this case as they have for so long with Darwinism. Darwinism has already amply illustrated the potential for scientific lies to bring calamity on humanity, with its contribution to the development of Nazi and Communist ideology; and will yet bring more such calamity if not repudiated.
Galileo did no such harm and it is an insult to him to put him in Darwin’s company.
Philip G Hayward, Naenae
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