These past few days haven’t been kind to stirrers like me, either at local or national level. And in asking myself “Why?”, I end up with four words, all ending in the letter Y:
arrogancY, bureaucracY, incompetencY, and finally, apathY.
I’ll get on to these four words shortly, but first I urge you to read (and read again if you have already done so), this absolutely outstanding post on The BFD on Monday by renowned left-wing commentator and analyst Chris Trotter: “Let Classical Liberalism Lead the People”
The essential extract is this:
New Zealand (and English-speaking Canada) says Gray, are in the throes of a “hyper-liberal” revolution. It is dedicated to overturning the existing cultural infrastructure and erecting in its place a wholly new set of institutions dedicated to radically “re-educating” the unenlightened majority and bringing them to the point where they are able to recognise and atone for their historical sins.
The work of a highly-motivated minority – what Gray calls “an aspirant ruling class” – who regard the present system as a sham, this revolution seeks to overturn all of the most cherished traditions of classical liberal democracy: the rule of law; freedom of thought and expression; the separation of church and state; sexual and racial equality; majority rule. These “counter-elites”, as Gray calls them, come not to praise the Western tradition – but to bury it.
The importance of Chris’s post was brought home to me at the Special and Annual General Meetings of the National Party which I attended as an observer (unfortunately not as a voting delegate this time), on Friday and Saturday (another unrelated engagement prevented me from attending on Sunday, which turned out to be a good thing in that I did not have to suffer hearing the results of the election of new members to the party board – more on that shortly).
Friday afternoon included debate on the original five remits of little or no consequence. My efforts to obtain late agreement to discuss the He Puapua report and whether or not the Treaty of Waitangi is a “partnership” were rebuffed by the party leadership, and I feel very strongly that we as a party missed the boat, in what would have been a timely opportunity to focus on what many Kiwis agree are the two most contentious issues of the moment and which the present government is trying to sneak in by stealth.
As an aside, what the Treaty says and means is covered in this post by Don Brash. I recommend reading that, as well as scrolling through the comments that follow.
The early part of Saturday was devoted to the special general meeting to debate changes to the party rules in response to needs exposed by the disastrous result of the 2020 General Election. Ponderous and over-detailed, but we got there in the end with necessary changes to the vetting of constituency and list candidates, conduct of pre-selection meetings, and more local member focus on final candidate selection.
The main interest in the annual general meeting that followed was the election of four of the nine candidates to vacancies on the party’s governance board. I hope my good friend, Richard Harman (one of our very best political journalists and commentators, worth the modest price for full access to his weekday blog, www.politik.co.nz) will forgive me for cribbing this brief extract of what happened:
Judith Collins’ proclamation of National Party unit lasted only from Friday afternoon until Sunday morning at the National Party conference.
Then a bid to topple President Peter Goodfellow saw its author, former Speaker, Sir David Carter, defeated and then resigning from the party.
At the same time, the party turned its face away from its rural and provincial heartland and embraced a high tech urban future for the country.
By the close of its conference, South Island representation on its board had gone from three to one, and a party that has been described as the political wing of Federated Farmers was left with no farmers on its board.
I’m sad for the party and for the man himself that, after 11 years as president, Peter Goodfellow failed to understand that the mood for change in the organisation included his own position. By clinging on to office he may well have aggravated a rural-urban divide that won’t help the chances of Judith Collins becoming the next Prime Minister; something that New Zealand needs with increasing desperation.
But my innate streak of eternal optimism bids me to look to Peter to have learned to listen; learned that he needs to persuade his board to appoint either Grant McCallum (Northland) or John Sunckell (Canterbury), both farmers, to the board to fill the vacancy left by Sir David Carter’s resignation, to reassure our primary producers and the rural community that they are still a valued and vital component of our party; and have learned also that new board members Janitta Pilisi, Sylvia Wood and David Ryan bring new perspectives that deserve a hearing.
But, back to the Y-words, whose origins are more local than national:
- arrogancy: Panuku, the (Un) Controlled Council Organisation in Auckland City whose desk-bound daydreamers think they know better than our local community what’s best for residents of our pleasant, laid-back seaside suburb of Takapuna. Panuku’s idea of “consultation” with locals is, “here’s what we think you should do.” This is not helped by our North Shore Ward being represented by Chris Darby, who, as chairman of the Council Planning Committee, indulges his pretensions as a super-city guru at the expense of the interests of the ward residents he is supposed to represent.
- bureaucracy: again, Auckland Council’s legion of over-paid paper shufflers who make work for each other, and thus impose long, unnecessary, and costly delays on long-suffering citizens.
- incompetency: the common failing of the above two categories, especially Panuku and Auckland Transport, and the cycle-maniacs like Waitemata Councillor Pippa Coom who loses no opportunities to highlight her obvious hatred of cars, and will hopefully be replaced by Sarah Trotman in next year’s election.
- apathy: The turn-out of registered voters in the 2019 Auckland Council elections was abysmally low at 35.26%, and for our North Shore Ward 40.9%.
As someone who has unbounded respect for the community in which most of my family and I have the privilege of enjoying a peaceful life, and who, at the age of 92, has accepted the role of chairman of our Takapuna Residents Association Inc, I’m also doing what I can to help the North Shore branch of Communities & Residents (www.c-r.org.nz). As well as selecting candidates for the two ward seats on Council, and the two Local Boards, we will be concentrating on persuading eligible voters to fulfil their responsibilities to themselves and their neighbours by casting their votes. If you don’t vote, you also lose your right to complain when things go wrong.
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