Minimum alcohol pricing is empirically and philosophically wrong

If you want to see the "conservative" in the Conservative Party and see how little "liberal" there is in the Liberal Democrats then you only need consider that the UK Government is about to announce plans to introduce minimum unit pricing for alcohol in England and Wales (the Nationalist Socialist People's republic of Scotland has already announced similar plans, but half of the population there is probably so sloshed it hasn't noticed yet).

According to the Daily Telegraph:

- 45p per unit of alcohol will be the minimum price set;

- BOGOF (Buy One Get One Free) offers with alcohol will be banned.

Of course the plan is motivated (isn't it always) by a desire to do good.  It is to save alcoholics from themselves, to save binge drinkers from themselves, to put a price barrier upon behaviour that politicians and bureaucrats have deemed to be bad for people (and of course, drinking to excess your entire life can kill you).  It is also being sold, absurdly, as an antidote to anti-social behaviour in evenings, because it is believed that people wont be drunk and obnoxious in any serious number any more.

Few policies can show such a direct distinct gap between the general public and what they perceive as a ruling elite of politicians and health do-gooders who believe they know what is good for others.

Of course, it punishes everyone who drinks alcohol, particularly the poor.  Of course retailers agree, because it will obvious reduce sales, even though minimum pricing raising their revenue per product, they obviously know that this isn't market pricing, so wont be revenue maximising.   Those on the left and health do-gooders  of course have no time for the retailers, as they profit from high levels of consumption, but unlike them the retailers are actually making two sets of people happy - themselves and their employees, and the people buying the products, who health do-gooders want to treat like children.

It is easy to picture the average pensioner who likes a wee dram in the evenings, now having to pay more, because highly paid health do-gooders want her treated no differently than a lager lout.

How dare they?

The two public policy problems identified are:

- Criminal behaviour whilst drunk; and

- Diseases due to excessive alcohol consumption.

In both cases it is grossly unfair to target all those who drink alcohol.  Only a small minority of people who drink alcohol get drunk and assault, vandalise or threaten others.   That is where the state has a role.  At the places and times where such behaviour becomes an issue, the Police should be present as a deterrent and to take away those creating danger to others and their property.   More could be done if the public areas where this happens were privatised, and placed under the control of adjoining property owners - who could then choose to ban drinking outside, they could choose to hire their own security staff who could order people to leave if they are causing trouble.   Bear in mind that shopping malls don't tend to have this behaviour, because of that reason.   

On the health concerns, there is already taxation on alcohol that is meant to reflect this, but the bigger issue is that the vast bulk of people in the UK (and in most Western countries) have decided that the costs of health care are to be socialised, and so everyone pays in proportion to the taxes collected from them.  If you accept this then part of accepting it is that some people will not look after their own health, others will do so, and it will seem very unfair that some impose enormous costs upon taxpayers and others do not.   Yet if you want to fix this, the only fair way to do so is to have people pay either directly or to an insurer that assesses risk.  Fiddling with alcohol pricing becomes the thin end of a wedge that already includes tobacco, and should also target foods high in saturated fat, salty foods, foods high in sugar, adventure sports and contact sports (for injuries), sunbeds, holidays in the sun, sedentary jobs, driving or riding buses short distances, etc. 

The potential scope for health do-gooders to tax and regulate everyone's lives to protect a few is substantial, and it is philosophically ground in the view that some adults not only know best what is good for other adults (which objectively may be true in some circumstances), but that they have the right to force them to do what we want or force others to penalise or reward them, whether by regulation, taxation or subsidy.

Furthermore, the Adam Smith Institute has released a study that demonstrates that the empirical evidence for the value of minimum alcohol pricing is flawed.  It argues that "the estimates of how minimum pricing will affect health outcomes have overwhelmingly come from a single computer model—the Sheffield Alcohol Policy Model." the study "argues that the model is based on unreasonable assumptions which render its figures meaningless."

The executive summary states it as follows:

"Amongst the problems with the Sheffield model is its false assumption that heavy drinkers are more likely to reduce their consumption of alcohol as a result of a price rise. Its calculations are based on controversial beliefs about the relationship between per capita alcohol consumption and rates of alcohol related harm. Its assumptions about the relationship between price and consumption have frequently been refuted by real world evidence."

The Sheffield model provides figures without estimates of error and ignores statistical error in the alcohol-harm relationship. Data is drawn from different populations and applied to England and Scotland as if patterns of consumption and harm are the same in all countries. When data is not available, the model resorts to what is essentially numerology. Insufficient data is provided for the model to be recreated and tested by third parties.

The model ignores the likely effects of minimum pricing on the illicit alcohol trade, it disregards the health benefits of moderate drinking and fails to take account of the secondary poverty created by regressive price rises. The decline in alcohol consumption seen in Britain in recent years has not led to the outcomes predicted by the model.

We conclude that predictions based on the Sheffield Alcohol Policy Model are entirely speculative and do not deserve the exalted status they have been afforded in the policy debate.

Minimum alcohol pricing may have a modest effect on alcohol consumption, but it will have that effect disproportionately on the poor, and disproportionately on people who do no harm to others.   As such it is a grotesquely regressive measure that should be opposed not just by libertarians, but those on the left who purport to care for the poor.

It will have a negligible effect on alcohol abuse, and a negligible effect on health, but will look as if "something has been done", which is the pressure that the predominantly statist media puts on politicians.

It should not be implemented.  If the concern of government is about behaviour, then it should undertake its core function and police the streets, and change welfare from being a handout of cash to being another form of payment that can't be used for alcohol, at least directly.   If its concern is about health, it should challenge the state religion of the NHS.  

Of course what it really cares about are small groups of feral welfare dependent chavs being drunk and obnoxious to middle class restaurant and theatre goers on Friday and Saturday nights.   That's a matter for the Police, but also to note that the welfare state is funding many of those people to drink.   The left wont tackle that, because it will see the idea that welfare recipients drink away their benefits as being a generalisation and unfair on those who don't - which is correct - yet the fact remains that taxpayers do pay for the alcohol consumed by those on welfare.

Meanwhile, it should emphasise that alcohol consumption is a matter for adults to decide for themselves, and get off their backs.

Sue Kedgley says your diet is not your responsibility!

Frogblog has this astonishing post from Sue Kedgley where she damns a new UK government policy because:

"The idea is to shift responsibility for health and improving diets from the state to society and to convince people that public health is all about personal responsibility"

Yes you read it right. Sue Kedgley does not think people should be primarily responsible for their own health and their own diets.  She wants responsibility to be held by the state.  Not only that, she also thinks you all agree with her, you want to be treated like children, because she follows her comment with:

"And no, this isn’t a joke, it is for real. And since its happening over there, we will probably see a version of it happening over here soon."

You mean New Zealand might see an end to finger pointing joyless control freaks using force and regulation to control people's diets, smoking, exercise (or lack of)?  Speed the day!!  

The question is, how does Sue get up in the morning without having the state organising her meals for the day?  Maybe she simply uses Bellamys and other state owned eating houses to get reassurance that she is eating correctly. 

You see, not having had much attention lately, she has turned her attention to events outside New Zealand (because being an elected New Zealand MP means you should comment on what are basically internal policies of other liberal democracies).  She is having her perennial panic about consensual collectives of multi-ethnic adults seeking to make a living out of investing in capital and selling goods without regard for borders, race, nationality, religion or background - in other words multinational corporations.   Those despicable evil companies that sell people want they want, at prices they can afford at conveniently located stores.

Her concern is that the British Conservative/Lib Dem coalition government has invited the food industry to develop policies to encourage healthier eating or as she describes it "will focus on persuading –or ‘nudging’—people to make healthier choices without force or regulation"

This is when her synapses short circuit.  One shouldn't persuade people to eat healthier now, she disapproves of persuasion when there are the glorious tools of state "force and regulation" to compel people to eat healthier.  Presumably she wont take this as far as it has gone historically, when the Khmer Rouge had communal kitchens and cafeterias for the hard working proletariat (no disparities of wealth or inequality!) to eat the same rice gruel every day. 

Though why should I be surprised, Sue is legendary for being the greatest proponent of the use of force in Parliament.   Her dismay at the UK government not wanting to use force is because:

Apparently it’s all part of a wider Conservative agenda to replace state intervention with private and corporate action!

Her beloved Nanny State is threatened, and the exclamation mark shows how outrageous she thinks it is!

Now I have a beef about governments getting involved in this at all.  Producers of healthy foods are able enough themselves to promote their products.  Consumer and health lobby groups are also able to pay for campaigns to promote healthier eating.  The state shouldn't even be doing this.

However what is astonishing is that the Green Party thinks you shouldn't be responsible for your own health - you should be like a child, who guzzles what it feels like, on a whim, and needs the carrot and stick of the Nanny State to force you to do what is right.

She thinks the lumpenproletariat are stupid little people who need the state to force them (she doesn't like persuasion according to that article), like gullible children, to eat more fruit and vegetables, stop smoking, exercise more and get strength through the joy of being healthy.

Kedgley and her health bureaucrats wet themselves with excitement at being able to control how people live their lives, in the name of "public health" because to them, personal responsibility is a failure.  Personal responsibility means some people don't do the "right thing", and so only the state can make sure they do.  She can't stomach that lots of people LIKE McDonalds, LIKE chocolate, LIKE smoking, LIKE getting drunk, LIKE high fat high sugar food.  

Of course there is something even more sinister behind this.  Like a patronising imperial empress, she and other health busybodies, treat Maori and Pacific Islanders as children, because they disproportionately tend to eat less healthily etc, she wants to help because she thinks she should be responsible for people's lives.  Sadly she hasn't picked up that the hectoring she has advocated fails, and that people by and large know what are the healthier things to do, but don't always want to do so.  Their lives though, NOT Sue's.

Go to hell Sue, the sooner New Zealand sees the back of joyless, finger pointing, busybodies like you from Parliament, the better.  Go peddle your hectoring bullying, force people to do that, regulate this, philosophy somewhere where it is warmly welcomed - Rangoon, Pyongyang, Ashgabat or Minsk.  

McCarten a ranting fool

For some time Matt McCarten has had a profile in New Zealand politics, because he has been able to express himself rather well.   For he has not been much of a success story, having been President of the New Labour Party then the now virtually defunct Alliance Party.   Bear in mind the Alliance peaked in vote in 1993, when first past the post made it a safe protest vote at 18%, 1996 saw it drop to just over 10% and when it was almost certain to get into power in 1999 it dropped to just under 8%.   After losing its personality cult leader of Jim Anderton, McCarten's Alliance fell out of Parliament in 2002.  Quite why he still has a column in the NZ Herald remains a mystery, and the Herald should think very carefully about whether he still deserves it after his latest rant.  For rant is all it can be described as, being as devoid of fact and pithy analysis as many talkback callers.

We start with a headline that tells us that McCarten basically doesn't believe in liberal democracy.  Quite something for a man who has had such high level involvement in a party that sought power and was part of a coalition government for one term.  The "idiots rule" at poll booths.  Unlike Matt, who knows better.   Not that many of us who comment in politics don't sometimes wonder why people vote as they do, but for him to suggest that voters are stupid implies he is better than they are, and should make their decisions for them.   I guess given his political heritage that may not be all that surprising.

Of course he doesn't mean New Zealand voters (yet) but rather Americans.  Nothing like bashing a whole nationality of people, particularly Americans.  I mean had he said Indians, or Chinese, or Kenyans or Samoans or... but he wouldn't would he?  It's ok to bash people according to their nationality because in Matt's world white Americans have power, and can be insulted and denigrated.   Not that he would tolerate anyone saying people of his nationality are stupid with "naivete and proud ignorance" (sic).

Then he has his own vision of the Bush years "Two years ago the Republicans, led by that boofhead, George Bush the younger, idiotically ran their own form of Rogernomics: giving the rich huge tax refunds; slashing public services".  Matt did you actually follow US public policy over that period or just fit it into your binary left-right framework that fits New Zealand rather well, but doesn't fit the US?  Where do punitive tariffs on steel imports fit into Rogernomics, where does bailing out banks, where does expanding state education ("No Child Left Behind" was a bipartisan initiative with that known "Republican" Ted Kennedy), where does increasing state spending and deficits fit into Rogernomics Matt?  Yes there was a tax cut, which applied from middle to upper incomes, but slashing public services?  No. Any privatisations? No, even though USPS, Amtrak and the FAA are all easy targets.  

No, you see Matt is dumbing down US politics so you can understand it, except it's so dumb he's wrong.  It is why the Tea Party opposed so many Republican nominations for the mid term elections and why the Tea Party has specifically rejected the past politics of both main parties.   Such details confuse Matt, he obviously forgot Rob Muldoon was one of New Zealand's most socialist Prime Ministers, because he opposed him at the time.

Matt ignores that "going to war against two countries" was in part retaliation for 9/11.   Of course he would rather the US sit back, take 9/11, feel guilty and let the Taliban be emboldened and maintain their totalitarian rule in Afghanistan without interruption.   He would deny it, but that is precisely the implication of his statement.

He continues to be wilfully blind on Obama "."He used his majority in both houses of Congress to get an economic stimulus to save greedy capitalists from themselves and then introduced a health system to cover just about everyone who got sick".  Actually Matt, the Bush Administration was playing big spend ups and bailouts first, but you were ignoring things at the time.  The "health system" is compulsory health insurance, which you opposed when it was actually Roger Douglas's policy for New Zealand in a slightly different form.   Too complex I know, just blank it all out Matt.

"Obama also saved millions of skilled jobs by nationalising the car industry" Steady on Matt, keep a tissue handy.  Your economic illiteracy only gets you excited by seeing money taken off of millions of people somehow "saving jobs" by going to a few thousand.

"The liberals and progressives have been sidelined to a large degree. In New Zealand, the power of corporations and wealthy individuals in United States politics seems extraordinary" Yes you noticed how rich all those Tea Party supporters and American voters are.  Oh that's right, they didn't decide things really did they?  The US media was completely against Obama from the start, not that you'd notice this on CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, NPR, PBS, New York Times or the LA Times etc, but Matt doesn't bother consuming much foreign news, obviously.

"Can you imagine a corporation in this country being able to spend as much money as they liked to get a policy they want adopted, or unlimited funds to get a favourite candidate elected?"  You mean like the campaign for electoral reform?  Oh you mean spending their own money as much as they liked - their own money.   However, you think it isn't their money do you?  You think anyone with money must have taken it from someone somehow.   Bit of envy is it, or just disbelief as to how free people actually function on a grand scale?

"the calibre of the "teabag party" Republican candidates are just plain scary. Many of their serious contenders oppose abortion openly, even in cases of child rape or incest on the basis that it is "God's plan". One of them opposed masturbation. Others argued that if they didn't get elected their supporters would take up arms to overthrow the country ."

Many? Really Matt?  Or is that just your own spin again? Yes that's right.  One opposed masturbation once yes, but it wasn't her policy platform, and your party had Alamein Kopu - one of Parliament's greatest non-entities, and screaming Pam Corkery, an enormous intellect there.   Maybe had you quoted the Tea Party website which had only three policies you might have had some substance there: fiscal responsibility, smaller government and lower taxes.   Hard to paint that as hysterical madness isn't it?

"Attendees at their rallies carried assault weapons" How many Matt? Do a handful at hundreds of rallies count at significant?  Does this not happen with Democrats? 

"The leader of the Congress Republicans campaigned actively for a candidate who dressed in Nazi regalia,"  Yes as a joke Matt, and your Sandra Lee once compared what happened to Maori as a Holocaust.  Given Obama's past links to far-left radicals and a pastor who blamed the US for 9/11 and made numerous anti-semitic remarks, you might want to look in your own ideological backyard.  

Then, finally, Matt sees this as advice for Phil Goff!  "Working people need a party with specific visionary policies. Merely being a more pastel version of the other party won't get you elected next year, Phil."

Why not? It worked for John Key, he was Labour lite par excellence.  Your party had a vision, and it didn't get close to the 5% threshold once it lost its "great leader" Jim Anderton.  

The message Matt didn't get from this is that many Americans became scared at vast overspending by government of THEIR money (Matt doesn't understand that taxpayers think their money is theirs!) and borrowing ever more that will have to be paid off.  He didn't get that maybe a lot of Americans WANT more of their money back, and don't like ever growing government doing more for them.

You see Matt, while you and your ideological compadres were thinking the USSR was simply an alternative way of looking at things, and it was best to be neutral in the Cold War, Americans by and large did not.

It would help if you took down the hammer and sickle in your brain and opened your eyes.  You're more prejudiced than most Republicans, you're more stupid than many of them too because you can't even engage in basic research or read sufficiently widely to figure out what was going on in the US.

US voters rejected Obama because he was elected on a vapid bubble of hype, empty slogans of "change" and "can we fix it, yes we can".   There was nothing behind this but the hype of believing one man could make people's lives better.   That bubble has been burst, and Americans fear being pushed into second place by an Administration that keeps spending far more money than it gets in taxes.

Sadly, because you can't think beyond your ranting leftwing cage, you spout out empty nonsense which has at best a few grains of truth in it.

Want growth? Get a spatial plan

Yes that's what the Green/ACT government thinks.

The headline is "Spatial Plan will ensure economic growth for Auckland".

The main space I can find is between the ears of the press secretaries of Nick Smith and Rodney Hide that have let such empty nonsense escape their offices.  It plunges new shallows of vapidity, reaches new epic heights of failure and demonstrates once again that this government is devoid of philosophical challenge to the leftwing, planning obsessed arrogance of the past.

The press release is so empty that you could drive a train through it, and it shows once and for all that Nick Smith, the Green Party member in Cabinet, is driving policy.

There is more substance between an electron and the nucleus of an atom than this piece of pontificating waffle

"One of the most important roles of the Auckland Council will be to articulate the 20-30 year vision for Auckland through the spatial plan"

Really?  What happens if it doesn't happen? Will there not be economic growth?  Indeed when has ANY local government successfully forecast economic activity by sector, location and the like ever?  Did the local government plans of 20 years ago talk about the internet and online economy?  Of course not.  Did the local government plans of 40 years ago talk about an economy driven by services and tourism from China and India?  Hardly.  So why is it important?  

Take this piece of Sir Humphreyism.. "Cabinet agreed the spatial plan is the key vehicle for developing an integrated approach to managing Auckland’s urban growth."

Why manage it?  Why must there be an integrated approach? Who told you this (the Ministry for the Environment Smart Growth control freaks no doubt)?  

Oh the faith... "The spatial plan will illustrate how Auckland will develop in the future. It will show where and when growth will occur in transport, housing, energy, water, recreation, education and health infrastructure and services"

Will it Nick? Will it, bollocks!  Unless you live in an authoritarian nanny state where you stifle the private sector growing anything that is not in zee plan.  How do you know Auckland will develop like that, and most of all, how do you know it is right?

Oh and he knows what Aucklanders like "Aucklanders will be looking to see that the spatial plan sets out their aspirations for their city – all those that are affordable and feasible – and which supports efficient and effective resource allocation"

No they wont, they will be looking to see how best to live their own lives peacefully, with their family and friends, minding their own business.  Most of them are not busybodies who want to tell other people where to live, how to move and what businesses they should run and where. 

Imagine Auckland without a spatial plan.  It isn't hard. 

Auckland hasn't had one up till now.  However, you voted for National or ACT to make sure there was one didn't you?

$60 a year for Radio NZ listeners to pay

Brian Rudman unsurprisingly loves Radio NZ, an outlet for the statist world view that he shares, that argues about what government should do, rather than what it shouldn't do.

He claims imposing a funding freeze is "bullying", but can't for the life of him figure out that making everyone pay for a station most don't listen to ISN'T bullying. "I like Radio NZ, I am happy to pay for it, but only if I make you pay for it too" is rather distasteful.

He throws up some strawmen, like the Ministry of Culture and Heritage commissioned study by KPMG that said Radio NZ was underfunded. Hardly surprising, since the report was part of the Ministry's wider strategy to get more state funding for its remit. Consultants can be adept at giving clients reports that tell them what they want.

The UNITEC study for the Ministry (PDF) was another strawman. Setting aside the minor mistakes throughout (like calling South Korea - "Democratic Republic"), the figures quoted on per capita spending on public broadcasting are seriously flawed. The report itself admits the figures for each country used are from different years. All of the figures are converted from local currencies into US$, with no transparency about the exchange rates. Moreover, the per capita spending is not on a Purchasing Power Parity basis. In shorthand that means the report thinks £10 buys the same in London as it does in Wellington, which is nonsense. The figures make New Zealand look cheap and nasty when that isn't the truth. The report is also full of ridiculous statements like:

“there is much evidence of market failure insofar as a purely commercial model of broadcasting tends to overlook the needs of commercially unattractive segments of the audience (such as ethnic minorities),”

although the US is full of minority language radio stations all commercially run.

It also has a distinctly anti-commercial broadcasting bias:

"That is certainly not to say that commercial broadcasters can never produce high quality content, but where they do so on a consistent basis there are usually factors other than market forces and commercial revenue at work.”

The word "quality" is in the eye of the beholder of course, but this sort of statement is absurd. It is like saying that without state funded books, newspapers, websites, art or music, there wouldn't be any "quality".

However, it is when Brian talks about the small cost of Radio NZ that he actually makes a point that Radio NZ supporters are closing their ears to.

He says "Of all our state-funded cultural institutions, Radio New Zealand is probably the most vital of all. It's the town hall of a community of 4.35 million people, widely dispersed from North Cape to Stewart Island.”

No Brian, it is 650,000 people, given only 15% of radio listeners tune in to RNZ stations.

Then he says "It costs under $9 per person a year to run. For that small outlay we provide ourselves the only venue to hear extended and serious discussions on politics, the arts, medicine, lifestyle - you name it. We also provide for ourselves a newsroom with valuable competition for the two or three big metropolitan papers."

Well if you leave out those who don't listen, then you mean $60 per person a year. Not a lot of money is it?

So go on Brian, cough up, ask Radio NZ supporters to cough up. Stop wanting non-listening taxpayers to fund what YOU like, indeed if it is so valuable you should be jumping at the chance.

Does it just speak volumes about the hypocrisy of those who say how "valuable" it is, how much "we" should appreciate it, that THEY wont spend a dollar of their own cash to help out?

THAT Ladies and Gentleman is the difference between those who are statists and those who are libertarians. Those that think something is good, and want everyone else to pay for it, and those who think if you like something, YOU should pay for it.

I like reading the Economist and the Spectator, will you pay for my subscriptions? If not, why the hell is it any different?

UPDATE: Facebook now has a group OPPOSED to further state funding of Radio NZ.

NZ home insulation foolishness tells a lot about attitudes

Following on from the Australian catastrophe in subsidising home owners who can't be bothered paying for their own energy bill savings, there is now the consequences of the New Zealand scheme. However, what it says about the general public speaks volumes about the trust they have in the state, trust that anyone who has spent time working with the bureaucracy knows is misplaced.

The New Zealand Herald reports that many insulation installers are upset that:

"the government subsidies are allowing competitors to hike their prices and still undercut them using taxpayers' money.

They say customers are avoiding them because they see government approval to offer subsidies of up to $1300 for insulation and $500 for energy-efficient heating as a "badge of quality".

Of 249 companies wanting to join the $347 million scheme for the next four years, 60 were chosen based on factors including geographical coverage, financial stability and their ability to carry out self-audits."

So in other words, 60 firms are suckling off the state tit, whereas the rest are out in the cold, helping to PAY for their competition to undercut them.

It speaks volumes that the EECA subsidy is seen to be a guarantee of quality, the same stupid mistake Australians made thinking government approved installers were somehow a higher standard. Seriously, do people think bureaucrats exist that check the quality and standards of insulation installers? Do people think that if a state approved installer does work for them that they have a greater degree of sanction if it turns out to be poor quality?

The notion of this is ridiculous. I've known literally hundreds of bureaucrats, most of whom know the limits of their competence. There simply are NOT people out there able to check this sort of thing. Yet people believe the state is somehow benevolent and offers some sort of reassurance.

Now I oppose the fundamentals of the scheme. Yes it might save energy bills, but that is a private good. Those with insulation shouldn't pay for those without to save money. Yes it might improve health of some, but when are people meant to take responsibility for the cold and damp in their homes?

The political reaction to this is predictable. Energy Minister Gerry Brownlie effectively endorsed the idea that the scheme ensures a "tight control" on quality of work, although it isn't clear quite how that quality is being ensured. This contradicts EECA claims that just because some aren't part of the subsidy scheme does not mean their work is poor quality. So is Brownlee just knifing those who don't get taxpayers money to run their business?

Labour spokesman Chris Hipkins thinks the subsidy should be offered to everyone, doing a Peter Garrett.

You see a better response is this:

- Stop the subsidy scheme;
- Tell homeowners that if they want to make energy savings, they should buy their own insulation and use recommendations, word of mouth and other means to explore the market to find good installers and suppliers;
- Tell homeowners who already have insulation that it is unfair to tax those who already have insulated their homes to subsidise those who haven't;
- Used the savings to cut the budget deficit, working towards tax cuts WITHOUT countervailing new taxes. Hiking GST wont help people pay for insulation.

After all, if people paid less taxes they would have more money to spend on discretionary expenditure, and if would rather pay higher heating bills than insulation, why should nanny state save them?

UPDATE: Not PC also has a recommendation of a GOOD installer. A recommendation I'd trust over any government "endorsement" that apparently isn't one.

How can he sleep when the roofs are burning

Who couldn't see this coming?

Peter Garrett, former singer for band Midnight Oil, former member of the far-left Nuclear Disarmament Party, now committed Christian, family man and Australian Labor Party MP for Kingsford Smith, New South Wales and Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts in Australia, has presided over one of the most monumental disasters in recent Australian Federal Government history.

The blame, of course, is not just his. There is a line of bureaurats who should be rendered unemployable as well, but the story is one of how much government can screw up with other people's money.

It started with a package that may sound familiar. A plan to use taxpayers' money to subsidise the insulation of homes of those who couldn't be arsed paying for it themselves. Garrett proudly launched the plan in June 2009 with this press release saying "From today, householders can start shopping around and working out which registered installer and type of insulation is right for them"

In essence, the taxpayer would be forced to pay the value of insulating a home up to A$1,600, and a whole series of government approved installers were appointed to undertake the scheme.

In addition:

"As well as the ceiling insulation offer for homeowners, there is also insulation assistance of up to $1,000 available for renters and landlords. It is expected around 2.9 million households Australia-wide will benefit from these insulation offers.

The Energy Efficient Homes Package also provides a rebate of $1,600 to help eligible home-owners, landlords or tenants replace their electric storage hot water systems with solar or heat pump hot water systems."

The motivation was to "create jobs" (by taking money out of the hands of some and handing it to the insulation industry) and to contribute to Australia's climate change objectives.

The cost was estimated at A$4 billion, so we are talking A$200 per Australian!

The result?

The Australian reports around a million homes have been insulated, of which 160,000 have apparently "shoddy ceiling batts", 80,000 homes have "potentially dangerous insulation", 1,000 roofs have been "electrified", 93 houses have caught fire and 4 deaths have resulted.

Despite extensive questioning, the Australian Federal Government doesn't know which homes are at risk, how it is going to undertake a risk assessment or how it will fix it.

The scheme has been terminated as of last Friday.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports Aussie PM Kevin Rudd has taken ultimate responsibility, indicating Garrett wont be a sacrificial lamb. Interesting given it is election year in Australia.

Why should all this happen?

Well the incentives were all wrong.

For starters, those who take other people's money don't take the same care with it as those whose it was the first place. Those who set up this scheme knew none of them would ever have any financial responsibility for the failure.

Secondly, those who installed the insulation and the hot water systems also knew it was a case of install, then claim. They knew their work wouldn't be inspected, the customer wasn't THAT careful since it was being installed for free and if there was a need to take a short-cut, they would still be paid.

Thirdly, the home owners whose homes are affected, having no financial relationship with the installer, had little leverage after the fact.

The bottom line is that if home owners get a financial advantage from insulation and improving heating/air conditioning systems, they can make the judgment themselves about spending money on it. Why all taxpayers, including those who already spent their money on such improvements, and those who don't own homes, should subsidise those who don't, is astonishing.

It is the sort of collective groupspeak that claims "we will save" a fortune if everyone does it that blinds public policy to what is simply a matter of private benefit. I save nothing if my neighbour saves money on heating or air conditioning, it is of no benefit to me. If I asked my neighbour to help me pay for insulation because it would save my power bills, and might even save costs of health care, the neighbour would rightfully tell me to leave, politely.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports the result is that the insulation industry is in crisis. This, of course, serves them right for trusting government and wanting to benefit off the back of taxpayers rather than customers.

"Several companies have been running their factories 24 hours a day, seven days a week for months, creating a huge glut of batts that are now largely unwanted in the wake of the rebate scheme being axed"

Tough, when you deal with politicians then sometimes you pay the price. Taxpayers had no choice to pay for you being a party to this filthy little arrangement, now you pay. You no longer have nanny state to pay your bills, and you've screwed things up so badly that domestic private consumers don't want to touch it. How sad, but now an opportunity for NZ installers to source some cheap stock?

"Fletcher Insulation makes about 40 per cent of Australia's insulation, and managing director David Isaacs said he expected 8000 jobs to be lost from the industry."

Nice own goal there for both the industry and the government. Nice job creator Labor. Sad for those losing their jobs, but how many of them thought the Labor Party would look after them?

How many will still, like sheeple, tick Labor this year?

Love Radio NZ? Well cough up...

The Government is putting pressure on Radio NZ so that taxpayers wont be forced to pay for it so much. There is plenty of potential to do this. The ridiculous introduction of FM simulcasting should end for starters, setting free those frequencies for those willing to pay for it.

The NZ Herald reports that Labour Deputy Leader Annette King says " it would be like living in a Third World country if National Radio had to shut down between midnight and 6am"

Really Annette? I didn't know the UK was a third world country. The UK equivalent of National Radio is BBC Radio 4, which between 1am and 6am closes down and simply carries the BBC World Service. Better yet given the time difference, National Radio could simulcast Radio 4, or the World Radio Network.

However, this is all fiddling beyond the real point.

It's all very well for Helen Clark, who is barely a taxpayer in New Zealand (and not at all one in New York excluding local sales taxes), to defend Radio NZ. However, for the likes of Clark, King and the irascible Sue Kedgley to make a difference there is only one moral option.

Use your own money and donate to Radio NZ.

Why should anyone else be forced to pay for the broadcaster? Radio is not a "public good", and given that 85% of radio listening is not done with Radio NZ, then is this not simply one of the most explicit forms of elitism that is propagated by the left?

The view would be that Radio NZ is "good for you", which begs the question that if this is true, then 4 out of 5 members of the public disagree, or are stupid. Which justifies making them pay for the remaining 1.

Now I'm not going to pass judgment on Radio NZ myself, since I did use to listen to it regularly in NZ. I might even be willing to pay for it, if it rid itself of its inherently statist bias (how many panels does it have on shows that include nobody who believes in LESS government?).

However, the answer to all those who may bleat about Radio NZ is this. National isn't planning on removing the state tit from your favourite radio station, but if you think it is underfunded then dig into your own pockets and start making regular contributions.

If you wont do that, then why is it moral to make everyone pay for something a small fraction actually use or appreciate? Or is it just because it happens to correspond with your world view that government should exist to spread information and entertainment?

The bureaucrats for whom freedom is unknown

I have said before that I despise smoking, I don’t like the smell and I hate walking behind smokers and don’t like walking through them outside buildings. So you might think I’d welcome what the Auckland Regional Public Health Service is calling for as reported in the NZ Herald.

ARPHS (why not say ARS) calls for what is effectively a ban on smoking anywhere but in one’s own home, which looks to me quite simply as the sort of nanny state authoritarian bullying that I thought was voted out in the last election. However, it would be a fair bet that those who “work” for that organisation are unlikely to have much philosophical truck with personal freedom.

The thought process appears alarmingly simple:

People smoke - it is bad for them - it's already illegal to allow smoking at places of employment, retail outlets and on public transport, so let's make it illegal everywhere else, except the home (that would be seen as too far).

Banning something that is bad for people is good. The very idea that perhaps it is morally wrong to do this appears to have not crossed their minds, after all it's for the "greater good" (as is the justification for all limitations on personal freedom). Fascists? Well, they wouldn't think so, they just think they are acting for the interests of others. However, they are treating the public as children. It's only one step removed from treating tobacco like an illegal drug.

So what should the response be to this?

Should it be to ask whether a study has been made as to the health benefits to non-smokers of the measures proposed? If not, why not? Why not come clean about what “public good” there allegedly is, or is there really none at all? I suspect the health benefits to non-smokers are virtually undetectable, after all the emissions from motor vehicles are in greater volumes and significantly more toxic (smokers don't die from a lung full of tobacco smoke, but you wont last long intentionally inhaling petrol exhaust).

Should it be to ask to what extent these measures are likely to reduce smoking? If not, why not? How about noting how effective these measures are at reducing illegal drug use?

Why are you not simply being honest about wanting to criminalise smoking other than in the private home? Or does that just show you up for what you are, as petty fascists wanting to change behaviour by force rather than persuasion?

Or, how about simply asking why the hell they think it is their business what adults do with their bodies on their own property or in public spaces?

Clearly the public health bureaucrats have no clue what private property means, and what private property rights mean, for long ago they surrendered the idea that you can decide whether or not to allow otherwise legal acts on your property.

However, they also seek to control public space. To have people prosecuted for smoking as a way of reducing the propensity to smoke. The idea that there are adults who voluntarily choose to smoke because they like it would bewilder them all.

How can people LIKE harming themselves? Well the joyless do-gooders who think they know best for everyone else can't grasp that not everything everyone does is “good” for them. Some people drink to excess, some people eat to excess and don’t exercise. Some people have unsafe sex. Some people take illegal drugs. Some people participate in dangerous sports.

The proportion of smokers who do not know it is bad for their health will be very low, so it isn't about that. Tobacco smoking has addictive qualities, but plenty give up smoking and the state has used other people's money for some years subsidising methods to do this. So the conclusion is that people smoke because they enjoy it.

People have freedom to choose to smoke or not smoke. Those who do should have that right on their own property or with the permission of property owners. Those who do not like it should prohibit it on their own property and not enter places where it occurs. Public (as in local and central government owned) locations should be places where people can peacefully go about their activities without initiating force against others, that includes smoking.

The only appropriate response to this proposal is incredulity.

It demonstrates the profound need for all policy proposals to government to be subject to a test of whether it enhances or detracts from individual liberty, and whether it represents the initiation of force or defending citizens from initiations of force or fraud. Such a simple test would see such proposals dumped in the inbox of the Labour, Green and Maori Parties who think that individuals are a means to an end, not an end in themselves.

While we're at it, abolishing the Auckland Regional Public Health Service would make a modest contribution to reducing the budget deficit.

The state owns your shop at Easter

That's what opposing Easter trading is saying. Quite simply, it isn't your shop during Easter, and unproductive petty fascist goons will go around, at your expense, to catch you committing the dastardly deed of opening for business, paying employees and selling to willing customers.

It is disgusting, but telling of what MPs believe small businesses deserve the freedom to choose, and which ones think that this religious based public holiday is special enough that people should be prosecuted for trying to make a living.

So shame on Labour and the Greens for showing themselves up for being the petty fascist little anti-capitalists that they are.

Kudos to ACT and surprisingly Peter Dunne and Jim Anderton for actually wanting to let businesses choose. Surprised given Dunne and Anderton's previous Christian and unionist tendencies.

Kudos to Tariana Turia, Pita Sharples and Te Ururoa Flavell for supporting freedom, brickbats for Rahui Katene and the absent Hone Harawira.

However, brickbats to John Key for not making this National Party policy. For had it been so, this ridiculous victimless crime would be about to be consigned to history. Particular brickbats to busybodies Shane Ardern, Bill English, Phil Heatley, Sam Lotu-Liga, Tim Macindoe, Eric Roy, Katrina Shanks and Jonathan Young. How dare any of you claim to be "pro-business".

If you don't think a shop should be open on ANY particular day then you can do three things:
1. Don't shop there. Ever.
2. Use freedom of speech to ask others to boycott the shop.
3. Buy the shop.

Instead you choose to use force. For shame.

More tax more state more thieving from children

Alastair Darling released the Brown government’s last ever Pre Budget Statement (let’s be honest it wont be a stunning victory for Labour at the next election) and what does it bring? The Times tells all and the ledger goes like this.

In terms of restraining state spending there is:
- A senior civil service pay cut worth a paltry £100m
- Treasury approval needed for government appointments earning more than £150k;
- 1% cap for public sector pay settlements other than the Armed Forces;
- State contributions to public sector pensions to be capped by 2012;
- Bingo Duty (yes really) cut from 22% to 20% in 2010;
- Deferral of corporation tax increase for smaller companies;
- Electric cars exempt from company car tax (!) for five years.

Pathetic really. Political pablum, leaving the hard decisions to the Tories.

How about new or higher taxes?
- VAT to return to 17.5% on 1 January (buy before then);
- Threshold for top tax rate not to rise for one year after 2012;
- National insurance increased by 0.5% of income in 2011;
- Inheritance tax allowance frozen for one year (not increased);
- 50% one off tax on banking sector bonuses over £25k;
- 10% Corporation tax on patent income in the UK;
- 50p a month tax on phone lines to subsidise rural broadband.

Again, more tax, taking more from the economy because Labour is limp wristed on cutting spending, when it should be ruthless. These bastards can’t keep their hands out of people’s pockets. What’s truly disgusting is how they are going to spend MORE, so basically stealing from people’s children in debt to buy some votes as follows:
- 2.5% increase in state pensions in 2010 (go on old folk embrace Labour stealing from your grandchildren and great grandchildren);
- Guarantee scheme for bank loans to small businesses to be extended;
- £200m more money for a “Strategic Investment Fund” stealing from productive businesses to bribe new ones;
- 6 month extension of welfare to help the unemployed with mortgage payments, effectively propping up housing prices and rewarding those who don’t buy mortgage repayment insurance;
- 10,000 undergraduates from poor (Labour) backgrounds to be subsidised into jobs;
- Guaranteed training or education for all 16 and 17yos, and all under 24 who are out of work for more than 6 months are guaranteed work or training;
- Child benefit increase of 1.5% in 2010. This isn’t means tested so children of the wealthy mean a £20 benefit a week for the eldest and £13.20 for each other child. Welfare for every family;
- Four carbon capture and storage demonstrations to be paid for;
- £200m more to subsidise home energy efficiency (rather than letting energy companies raise prices);
- 125,000 homes subsidised to get more efficient heating boilers;
- Extend free school meals to half a million primary school children of poor parents;
- Rail electrification between Manchester, Liverpool and Preston (can't have fare payers paying);
- Minimal increases in education, health and police spending;
- £2.5 billion for Afghanistan;
- £5m to help ex. Service personnel set up own businesses.

Other than the last two items, this is just more bribes using stolen loot. Not surprising, but certainly disgusting. Profligacy and waste in health and education remain rewarded, picking winners through subsidies is the order of the day, and next to nothing done to confront net debt reaching 78% of GDP by 2014/2015.

A chance that Darling had to acknowledge he wont be doing this a year from now, and he could make the hard decisions to cut spending, was wasted. Why? Because the Labour Party just wants to keep their people in Parliament by bribing voters with their children's money.

So voters will face an election which will probably see the Tories win, hopefully see the Tories engage in serious cuts in spending to take Britain away from risking debt default, and saddling generations with debt.

Then Labour will say how mean and cruel and heartless they are for cutting spending on “vital services”. Yes ladies and gentlemen, if this isn’t an example of the lead up to an advance auction of goods, stolen from children, I don’t know what is.

For shame. How soon can the UK be rid of this tired vile socialist oriented big government regime?

Oh and for now, just don't remind me of what the other lot are like. Can they seriously make it any worse?

Snooping State drumming up business

(Warning - profanity in last paragraph)

I blogged recently about the Independent Safeguarding Authority - an Orwellian UK bureaucracy which exists to vet adults as to whether they are pedophiles, or more specifically, whether they might be on something like a balance of probabilities. That, of course, gives it the veneer of being judicial, when it is quasi-judicial. In essence, if you EVER arrange to look after children for longer than a few hours, who you are not related to, it is illegal to do so in the UK, unless the ISA vets you. Vetting you is not just a criminal check, it is to check to see if you've been charged, investigated or if someone lays evidence of "doubt", you might be blacklisted - you have the right to challenge it, but the ISA will rule as final (short of you taking it to court for defamation I suspect).

This vile organisation has been under pressure lately, with even the government that spawned it wanting to curb its powers. Childrens' Secretary Ed Balls announced a review. Nothing like government creating something then effectively admitting it got it wrong.

So you might ask why the hell is the ISA effectively seeking to drum up business by claiming that even people who rarely deal with children might want to get vetted.

The Daily Telegraph reports:

"Sir Roger Singleton, the chairman of the Independent Safeguarding Authority, said the scope of the database could increase significantly because companies would fear losing business if they did not have their employees vetted."

He then describes how an electrician business might think it is a good idea, if bidding for work at schools, and that more generally it would be a competitive advantage.

In other words, he wants more and more people to be vetted, for his organisation to hold quasi-judicial judgments about whether people are perverts, and for it to become the norm so that NOT being vetted would make someone suspicious. Not ISA certified? Oh you must be a pervert then.

Sir Roger Singleton has good intentions, but he has paved the road to hell - a hell where every adult is assumed to have dubious intent towards children unless they are found innocent. Where society operates under a burden of proof not of all being innocent, but all being guilty.

It is a climate of mass distrust, a climate that I can only say is paralleled in countries with totalitarian governments - where nobody can trust who is or is not an informant.

The ISA should be disbanded. People should be able to request that others undertake criminal vetting for convictions, for anything less risks barring people who have done no wrong, or those who are victims of false accusations because they are "different".

Most of all, Sir Roger Singleton deserves to be blasted for promoting his little mini-Stasi.

He deserves to be told to get fucked by all those who look after kids without the slightest nefarious intent, how fucking DARE you run a system that implies that without your imprimatur, people are child molesters.

Why don't you and your joyless goons go to the more feral parts of our big cities and start seeing who really ARE the child abusers in this country, the ones who have unwanted children, who ignore and neglect them, leave them to be preyed upon by strangers, gangs, alcoholics and drug dealers? Or is dealing with this sort of thing a bit too frightfully difficult for the upper and middle classes?

Taxpayer and TV rights

The NZ Herald says "The cost to the taxpayer of the bid for Rugby World Cup broadcasting rights will be "considerably" less than the $5 million speculated, Prime Minister John Key says."

So give one good reason why it shouldn't be nil?

This is a very popular event that many will want to watch, it presumably has some commercial viability for a broadcaster, New Zealand has four different free to air nationwide TV network operators that could do so (TVNZ, TV3, Prime and MTS), so for what conceivable reason should taxpayers be forced to pay to buy the rights to a sports event to be broadcast?

Oh, and doesn't this make the claim that National is about less government interference in your life rather vacuous?

Go on, look at your TV listings and find the long list of sports events and other events on free to air television that DIDN'T have you being forced to pay for it.

This whole issue has been a complete debacle, a waste of time and your money. The government should have had no more to do with this than it has had with other sports broadcasting rights over many years.

Yet the majority of you trust this lot to buy your healthcare, your kids' education and a retirement.

Why?

Maori TV offended - so what?

I didn't see the TV3 sketch obviously, I don't care whether I did or didn't, but notwithstanding that TV3 should have a right to free speech. It is privately owned, you don't have to pay for it or watch it. If its customers are offended then they can pull advertising if they wish.

There is no right to not be offended. It doesn't matter if you didn't find it funny.

In a free country nobody else is required to please you.

After all, the Maori Television Service is highly offensive to those who don't want to be forced to pay for any TV channels. I have never considered TVNZ to be anything to do with my values or my culture, for example.

The Broadcasting Standards Authority is increasingly anachronistic when anyone can easily obtain video and audio content from across the world via the Internet, not that international broadcasting is new. It is time to wind it up, and for people, parents especially, to be reminded that:
1. Owning a TV is voluntary. I know of at least two families who deliberately do NOT.
2. Turning the TV on is voluntary, and you can turn it off too.
3. What is broadcast by television is the choice of the broadcaster. If you don't like it, don't watch it.
4. Unless a broadcasting is inciting commission of an actual crime, the broadcaster is party to a crime, engaging in defamation of an individual or breaching copyright, there should be no legal remedies against it.

So next time TV3 offends you, turn it off. Next time Maori TV offends you, turn it off.

Shame you can't stop paying the state when it offends you.

Drinkers' licences - a joke?

Here's an idea:

"One possible solution could be an entitlement card that people would carry and swipe when every time they buy Alcohol or Tobacco and record their usage. Is that too radical? I don't think so. For a long time the Government have controlled motorists with a system of licences where people enjoy the right and freedom to drive - as long as they conform to certain rules.

With the card, people who got into trouble for, say, minor crimes or drunk and disorderly conduct in public would receive a fixed penalty notice and 3 points on their entitlement card with points disappearing over time for in the same way works on driving licences.

More serious offences would result in endorsements on the entitlement card and the cardholder would not be able to purchase alcohol, tobacco or other drugs available for sale through the entitlement card scheme."

This comes from a Labour Party Parliamentary candidate, John Cowan on a British Labour Party blog.

I kid you not.

This lot rightfully call the BNP fascists, but methinks the proverbial pot is calling the kettle.

I'd like to think this nonsense will just be dismissed, but experience tells us it gets embraced by statists, who think it's a great idea.

Pop at "Beware Mad Socialists" says it is justified by the "cost to the NHS" and says "The 'cost to the NHS' is used by totalitarian socialists to justify many of their evil plans. If the NHS doesn't want to treat people, they should simply give people their money back and let them sort out their own medical care - private health companies would be delighted to sell people the care they really want."

Ration cards for what you consume.

Of course, then it could help with obesity couldn't it? You wouldn't get more points to buy chocolate if you didn't get points from going to the gym. You wouldn't get more points to buy petrol if you didn't get points from catching the train. You could all be good boys and girls and do what we say, rather than do what you want - as if YOU know what's good for you.

You think I'm kidding don't you? It is like Not PC's recent post on NZ in Print, one jokes about calorie taxes, and then someone thinks it is a great idea. In fact, Google "calorie tax" or "drinkers' licences" and discover how many are jokes and how many think it is worth considering.

Hat Tip: Old Holborn

Rudman shows why politics and transport don't mix

Brian Rudman has a cheek to call the Minister of Transport an ideologue when he is one of the true believers of the Auckland rail religion. Rudman doesn't call into question the "business cases" the ARC puts together on rail, or Mike Lee's strong leftwing political background in being mischievous towards the government before he is put out of a job.

Bear in mind a "business plan" for something that produces ongoing financial losses is a curious thing, and that scepticism from central government officials about the veracity of the ARC's work doesn't motivate Rudman to question his fellow true believers.

He damns the proposal for a Puhoi-Wellsford motorway. A project which may not be worthwhile, but only money to investigate it has been approved. Money paid for by road users of course. The same can never be said about capital expenditure on Auckland's railways. Rudman in a rather arrogant style dismisses the only major link between Northland and the rest of the country as a road to John Key's holiday bach. I guess he thinks nothing exists north of Puhoi.

Auckland's Regional Transport Committee, a hodgepodge of political interests, naturally wouldn't think so. Given it is advocating a billion plus underground rail tunnel in central Auckland, which would also run at a continued loss, it is clear it worships at the same church as Rudman and Lee.

Rudman doesn't understand why central government time and time again has said no to pouring taxpayers' money into Auckland local government's railway flights of fancy, except the last government. Maybe he should check his premises, these being the following key features of the religion he subscribes to:

- Auckland rail projects all result in ratepayers and motoring tax payers losing money year after year, but that's ok. It is for their own good, even if few ratepayers will see their property values increase as a result, and motorists wont notice a jot of difference to congestion.

- Auckland rail projects always fail conventional economic cost-benefit appraisal, compared to other public transport projects or road projects. That's because the wrong things get counted. People don't value saving travel time that much (they speed, use shortcuts and overtake because they are mean spirited), accident reductions aren't that important, and it is just really really special for people to ride by train instead of, bus.

- Just because the majority of Auckland rail users come from buses or wouldn't have taken the trip in the first place, doesn't mean it isn't worthwhile subsidising them at $4 a trip.

- It doesn't matter that 88% of Auckland jobs aren't in the CBD, where the railway is focused, it doesn't matter. Just ignore that. It will change when there is a railway, you'll see. Aucklanders who work elsewhere don't matter anyway, and we'll build more railways to serve them.

- It doesn't matter that 7% of Auckland trips are by public transport (most of those by bus), spending over a billion to get it to 15% (by 2051!) is good for you all (although 17% of trips are currently by foot).

- It doesn't matter that between 33 and 45% of peak trips to Auckland's CBD are by public transport, predominantly by bus as it is. It doesn't matter that this split is high by international standards.

- It doesn't matter how much money is spent on rail in Auckland, it must all be good, it must be good, even though the whole network was only worth $20 million to start with and wont be worth much more after $550 million is spent electrifying it. You couldn't sell it off for what has been spent on it, you couldn't sell it off for a quarter of that. However, in the church of Auckland rail, spending other people's money is a core sacrament.

- It doesn't matter that the impact on traffic congestion of Auckland rail is virtually nil. Traffic congestion is good. Car users are addicts and must be weaned off their addiction. They really don't want to drive, many don't really want to own cars, they just haven't learnt it yet.

Brian wants government to treat Aucklanders as adults. Brian, they would be better treated as adults if you let them spend their own money, respected the fact that most Aucklanders most of the time choose the transport modes that best suit them, respected the fact that most of the money you want spend on railways comes from people using roads, and respected the fact that this religion of yours is completely useless for the trips most Aucklanders do most of the time.

Maybe you should go to Penrose/Mt. Wellington, Auckland's second biggest employment hub, and ask workers there what the electrified railway will do for their trip to work?

Time to abolish NZ On Air

David Farrar has written apparently sympathetically about the idea of extending the state broadcasting subsidy body - NZ On Air - to other media. This was because Fran O'Sullivan proposed it, and Janet Wilson appeared to endorse it.

What nonsense.

As people consume media increasingly online, they are doing so without state subsidy (although Labour poured a little into subsidising infrastructure and National is keen to pour vastly more into it). In the meantime, it has never been cheaper or more accessible to produce video footage or recordings. The excuses of the expense of local production making it difficult to make "Kiwi Kontent" now lie in only one place - the salaries of those working in the sector.

NZ On Air is, in effect, a job subsidy programme. It pays for people to work in the film and television industries (and state radio), from actors to producers, directors, camera crew, editors and the rest. A labour of love for many.

The argument that without NZ On Air, national culture on broadcasting would suffer is only true if you believe that the people whose jobs are supported by this subsidy would do something else. Many wouldn't. The question really is, who should pay for something that those working in the sector say is so valuable?

Should you be forced to pay for programmes you don't watch and didn't ask for? No. Of course not.

Plenty of people provide online content and do not get subsidised. Of course a significant number of households choose to pay for TV they want, through Sky and Telstra Clear cable television. People want what those companies offer, and those who don't aren't forced to pay.

So who SHOULD pay? Those who are such loud advocates for it. The people who say it is good for you. However, most importantly, all those working in the sector should do their bit - and work for free.

How can the humble taxpaying public be expected to embrace culture they are forced to pay for, if so much of what they pay goes into the pockets of those proclaiming how good it is for them?

No. If you work in the NZ On Air subsidised sector and think it is so valuable, then you do it for free and ask people to donate for your time.

Otherwise, isn't it just another form of rent seeking?

NZ On Air should be told that no more money will be available for any future allocations. Existing contracts will be honoured, but that is it. Radio NZ will face a similar fate, but can start to tout for donations, subscriptions and sponsorship.

Suddenly, TVNZ, TV3 and Sky will find it cheaper to make New Zealand content, because a whole host of people, whose jobs were dependent on the taxpayers, have to cut their income expectations in the hope of working in the sector they love. The time has come to stop propping up this vestige of protectionism.

Harriet Harman ignores the US constitution

There is, in the US, a rather unpleasant website called Punternet. It effectively is a website for consumers of prostitutes to rate their experiences. It is legal in the US, indeed it is constitutionally protected free speech. The speech may be highly offensive to many, but that is not a ground to prohibit it, it is, after all, just a series of opinions about consensual experiences between adults. For many it is no doubt a bit of prurient reading, for some it may be useful. It rates prostitutes in the UK . Again, this is protected by the First Amendment. Nobody has to go there, and no crime is committed to produce the website.

However, these are boundaries that enemies of free speech don't respect. They believe free speech which offends should be banned. So what is the result?

According to The Times, Harriet Harman, the Equalities Minister (an Orwellian role if ever there was one) thinks the Governor of California should ignore the US Constitution, and ban the website, because it offends her for encouraging the "commodification of women". Whether it does or does not is besides the point.

Sorry Harriet, just because the UK doesn’t enjoy protection of civil liberties by Constitution, and just because you have a petty fascist attitude to that which “offends you”, doesn’t mean you can extend your bullying ways to the USA.

Harriet has been criticised by Carrie Mitchell, of the English Collective of Prostitutes, who said "Once again instead of prioritising dealing with rape and other violence, Harman is prioritising censorship and repression”. So not even those who represent prostitutes believe in this supposed attempt to protect them, they'd rather the Police better dealt with real crime.

Nobody has a right to not be offended, for it were true, then I’d ban Harman and most of the utterings of this contemptible government for offending me and millions of Britons every day. This latest extension of the authoritarian "do as we say for your own good" nanny state shows further how vile the British Labour Party is, wanting other countries to break their own Constitutions to extend the nanny state into their jurisdiction, because of the limits of their own authoritarian reach.

Oh and well done Harriet, you’ve made Punternet’s day by undoubtedly increasing the hit rate from the UK by a significant factor. Today it is ranked 1053rd in the UK (according to Alexa), with 36576 hits yesterday. Let’s see how it is in the next two days….

Can't rural women pay for their own broadband?

The call by Rural Women New Zealand to force taxpayers to pay for them to be able to watch Youtube more easily, listen to foreign radio broadcasts, swap holiday photos and play multiplayer computer games (and no doubt some looking at porn) is outrageous.

There is no right to high speed broadband services. Just as there is no right to free car parking next to your job, or no right to have paddocks to keep horses on.

If Rural Women New Zealand want fast broadband access, nothing is stopping them paying for it, signing long term contracts with prospective suppliers and seeing who will provide it. If no one will, nothing is stopping them entering the market themselves and providing these services which they claim are in demand.

Nothing except, they don’t want to pay the cost of providing it.

If they don’t like how much it costs, they can always move into one of the main centres where such broadband services are available. You see, if you live in remote areas why should you not be surprised that you don’t get everything that is economic to provide in cities?

In the meantime, they might contemplate why, if taxpayers are forced to subsidise their choice to live remote from telecommunications infrastructure, why they shouldn’t pay for car parking for people at work in cities (which rural people “unfairly” get for free at their jobs), pay for city home owners to acquire an acre of land each upon which their kids can play and they can keep multiple pets including ponies, and pay for increases in road capacity so city dwellers can enjoy uncongested trips, like country dwellers do. After all school children in cities miss out on having open spaces to play in, and the opportunities to interact with nature, and it is “unfair” that they don’t.

Instead, you might just accept that where you live has advantages and disadvantages, and if you live in remote areas, you get cheap land, wide open spaces, empty roads, in exchange for being remote.

Nanny State Beer

No. Really!

The Daily Telegraph reports "A brewer criticised for making what it claimed is Britain's strongest beer has unveiled an ale with a 1.1 per cent alcohol content, which it has called Nanny State."

Sales Director of Brewdog said "the new beer had such a low-alcohol content that the Government did not class it as a beer and it was not subject to beer duty.

There is more on the Brewdog blog. Including how Alcohol Focus Scotland doesn't think it is funny because it"proves that once again this company is failing to acknowledge the seriousness of the alcohol problem facing Scotland". Joyless little Nanny State worshippers who don't understand people don't like being told what to do.

Of course the test will be in the tasting, time to compare Nanny State to Tokyo (the highest alcohol content beer) methinks. By the way Tokyo includes hops from New Zealand.