GBE2:Blog on: The Truth as I see it today.
We have just had an
election in New Zealand and, as expected, the right wing
conservative
National Party was returned in a narrow result with the
left of
centre block. But our major left of centre party, the historical
Labour Party
had one of its biggest defeats in its history. We have a proportional system
here now, known as
MMP. Our system is based on the
German system and allows for
a variety of interested parties, political affiliations, ethnic and social
minorities etc. We used to have the
First Past the Post system - winner takes
all. But democracy occasionally allows for some political machinations and
corruption to some degree or another.
I'm not complaining so much about the result, it was in many ways a foregone
conclusion, but for voters to regard it as such and not bother to vote defeats
the democratic right to vote - millions in other places around the world don't
enjoy that right - and add the apathetic voters to that mix, and you don't have
a very good political environment or outcome.
So what have we been promised by the
right wingers? Privatisation of state
assets, welfare reform to get everybody off
welfare benefits: the unemployed,
the sick, the invalid, get them all ready for work! I don't have a problem with
getting the unemployed to work, to training or up-skilling. They have also
indicated that further eroding of the rights of New Zealand workers is on the
agenda again - just like the fascist Employment Contracts Act of the 1990's
which was used to emasculate the
NZ union movement, to create more flexibility
in the labour market and allow more casualisation, and to reduce the real cost
of wages and salaries.
But where are the jobs for those thousands of semi-skilled workers now that
so many industries have gone offshore to places like China? And there are severe
economic difficulties being experienced in Europe and to a lesser degree other
places too. What sort of employment is there for the sick or invalid? They are
on these benefits because health professionals have assessed them unfit to work
and needing welfare support.
Those on invalid benefits include the mentally ill, and those with
intellectual difficulties. Across the western world mental health hospitals and
facilities have been closed and sold off and replaced by emergency units in
recent decades. IHC sufferers no longer have IHC Workshops where they could do
part time work and meet socially. There are few residential homes in New Zealand
for IHC patients. So many are looked after by family members, particularly
grandparents who struggle for financial support because society says they are
"family" and should do it for love! Fortunately this attitude is changing and
there is now a belief that family members should at least be paid the minimum
wage for looking after children or family members fulltime. Invalid benefits do
not provide all the finance needed to cater for mentally unwell and
intellectually deprived and challenged people.
But we don't have such people living on the streets here in this country.
Some
homeless people are that way inclined, because there is support in New
Zealand for the homeless. So somebody living under a bridge is not really an
indictment of NZ society.
But in the meantime we will have to suffer fools rather ungladly, those
ideologically driven, ignorant politicians who lack first hand knowledge of
those people they claim should get back into work and stop using resources that
would better (in their opinion) utilised in building more highways and motorways
to the beaches and holiday resorts further north, building higher decile schools
and private hospitals for the offspring of the privileged sector of New Zealand
society.
Until help is really on the way and the left of centre Labour Party is able
to rejuvenate itself, we will have to tolerate the inanities and ignorance of
the political right here in New Zealand. And that friends, is the truth and
nothing but the truth! Every decade the Labour Party has to rejuvenate and
reinvent itself as another generation of the politically inane right of centre
tries to influence the good people of this fair country, be they farmers,
business people, those that service our industries, and those that actually
provide the sweat and tears and make the wheels of industry and service go
around - the working people of New
Zealand.
http://anzacbloggersunite.blog.co.uk
A
visit to Thorpe Lodge - a haunted Norfolk house. Real paranormal activity caught
on camera. You be the judge. Come along for a visit here.
A
criminal escapes from prison where he has been for 15 years. He breaks into a
house to look for money and guns and finds a young couple in bed.
