Conscious that this is my last opinion offering for 2024 I have elected to be a little reflective with a wee touch of future thinking.
Peter Carr
This has been – and continues to be – a turbulent year.Politically it’s been rather messy, a huge list of promises not yet achieved, a rather silly tit-for-tat series of exchanges where the political authors know they can do better.
A socio-economic picture hints at third world experiences coupled with a mad scrambling to grow trees on land that is ideal for ‘proper’ farming – in the name of some foggy carbon credit idealism that many countries ignore. The idealism of the Paris agreement long gone despite all the rhetoric that abounds.
The Green Party, staggering from intra-destructive embarrassment, the Māori Party showing their true colours and a tripartite political governance that struggles to hold together promises.
Back in 1993 I voted against MMP and still maintain that we were – and still are – going down a path which, when coupled with three-year parliaments, aids an appearance of little hope for our younger people.
My 16-year-old grandson who is achieving well at school shocked me with a statement that he doubts if he will ever be able to own a house.
Possibly the best advice I can give him – which grieves me – is that he looks at purchasing an Australian residence. Reading we are short of nurses, yet nursing graduates are turned away by employers just does not resonate for me.
And we now hear the Post Office is planning a major reduction in delivery services, possibly culling 300 outlets.
And we are about to lurch into about seven weeks of television darkness as regard current affairs
. The regular (and popular) Q&A has shut down until late January (or possibly beyond).
In the week prior to Christmas the now monopolistic TV1 will withdraw all morning news efforts until late January.
Imagine if the editors of the major dailies decided to take five weeks off from their regular work?
Yet freely distributed organs like the one you are currently reading only take a short break despite a very large number of them being culled at this moment.
But there must be some light at the end of the tunnel – even if we cannot find the entrance to it.
The pundits would have us believe that we move in cycles – which is partly correct – but the centres of the cycles keep lowering on each round.
My hope is always that there must be a brighter future for our young people.
Te Awamutu Intermediate kapa haka group gave a rousing performance.
I was enthralled by the frenzied dancing, singing and stamping of an intermediate school’s Māori group last week at Waipa council’s annual mayoral social and explanatory function.
Girls standing on the floor with the boys on the stage behind. The stomping by the boys’ feet was so thundering I feared for the safety of the stage floor.
But several people around me despaired at the waving of the (wrongly named) Māori flag by one of the students.
A political statement that would certainly not have been officially condoned by our host.
