Letters, November 13: Slash and burn city on Home Services

Jan

Letters, November 13: Slash and burn city

posted by admin in Window Cleaning

While Hamilton may be a thriving town it has to be one of the most dreary in New Zealand. What should be a graceful city on a majestic river is nothing of the sort. Virtually nothing historic has been retained and what has gone up in its place has been just bland or plain ugly; the latest in a long line being the flats in Knox St and the “red shed” in town. Nothing wrong with it being red, but ugly as well? Other places have done it so much better. Christchurch is gracious and Wanganui has a charming main street. Napier has its fabulous art deco and New Plymouth has well-preserved historic homes and a fantastic museum. Oamaru is chasing world heritage status for its townscape. Meanwhile Hamilton puts up parking buildings. Town planners? More like town wreckers. H RICHARDS Hamilton Backing Winston I believe Winston Peters should be complimented for his stance on the attitude we should adopt towards the ambitions of certain folk to bring about a state of anarchy in our country. He alone, so far, has the political courage to express a view which I feel sure most of us share. I would doubt Tame Iti and his ilk have seriously considered what would be the plight of the Tuhoe people if their territory became a separate nation. No more social welfare and free medical services from the rest of NZ and no right to the dole of course. Hence, no easy money for guns and ingredients for molotov bombs or booze. ATHOL L BISHOP Hamilton Snail mail I spent October 16 to 28 in Brisbane. A day after arriving there I wrote a letter home. As of October 31 this letter had not arrived here. On my last Friday I sent a postcard to the same address that has arrived. The time by air to Brisbane is 212 hours. The time difference is three hours. There are regular flights between Hamilton and Brisbane. The time by car to Auckland is well under two hours, to Wellington via the Desert Road just less than six hours. And the inter-city bus ferry is regular and cheap. Who has not got his/her A into G at which end of the postal management that a 212-hour trip takes at least seven days? JAMES HEATH-CALDWELL Hamilton Council pays I look with interest to the first meetings of the newly elected Environment Waikato councillors. I was unsuccessful in standing in the South Waikato ward. When I put in my nomination I received a candidate handbook. On page 70 in the handbook it lists the current annual remuneration from July 1, 2006, to June 30, 2007. They are listed as follows, along with the amount of remuneration they have just voted for themselves: chairperson from $123,525 to $123, 310 plus car; deputy chairperson $39,452-$60,465; councillors $25,249-$40,310; committee chairperson $39,452-$50,308. This increase does not include the $120 per day meeting attendance. Quite a few of the councillors stood on the platform of keeping Environment Waikato’s spending under control; their adverts said they would put the squeeze on spending. Well the only squeeze I can see is on ratepayers’ wallets. H LODGE Tokoroa Farm pollution The fenced-off stream on a dairy farm pictured in the farming section of the Waikato Times of October 30 was running brown. Hardly a picture of clear, clean water. Farmers like to show off an environmentally friendly side, but this photo shows the fencing of waterways is little more than window dressing. Behind the narrow strip of fenced-off grass, the farmers still pour urea on to the pastures and open up more drains which run polluted water straight into waterways. Farming is causing more and more pollution with dairy conversions and the clearing of forests for farming. A farmer-dominated regional council is nothing new. The council has allowed farmers to pollute waterways for years while water quality has got steadily worse. Lake Taupo is just one example of this lack of action. ALLAN PEARCE Hamilton Alcohol and crackers I heard the prime minister say on TV news that further irresponsible use of fireworks would result in further restrictions on their sale. At present fireworks can be sold only on four days per year. Alcoholic liquor is on sale almost all day. Its adverse effects are much more serious than those attributable to fireworks. When will the prime minister treat alcoholic liquor in the same way that fireworks are treated? CLIFF TURNER Hamilton Unfair criticism The Waikato Times’ columnist Rosemary McLeod’s use of stereotypes to criticise me (November went beyond reasonably held opinion. It is not acceptable to denigrate women for physical features such as the pitch of our voice. She would not make such comments based on someone’s ethnic features. She also got it wrong. I did not go out to the protest at the Labour Party conference to confront the protesters. Our union delegates were being challenged about our union’s position as they arrived for a meeting we were holding to highlight low pay. I went in support of the protest. One of the leaders gave me the megaphone as he knows I have long called for the repeal of the Terrorism Suppression Act. But the protesters drowned me out with calls of “lies, lies, lies”. Something was going horribly wrong when a trade union leader totally in agreement with the aims of the protest was being attacked. I couldn’t understand it and so I walked away. I now know it is because I have joined the Labour Party and for that, some of the protesters think I am a class traitor. Go figure. JILL OVENS Mangere East