Bill Dalton

I still can not believe – or I don’t want to believe the information that John Key brought to our attention this week.

Key claims that bureaucracy is gobbling up huge amounts of the government’s contribution to sport in this country. He claims that Sparc, the government’s sports funding agency, spends a third of its budget on administration. We are told that Sparc employs 86 full-time staff, 47 of them on over $100,000 per year and 14 of those on over $150,000 per year. And despite this army of highly paid and therefore one would hope highly skilled employees – they plan to spend $5.5 million on their website this year.

Frankly I find this outrageous. Surely the government allocates funds to Sparc with the intention of improving the health and well-being of all New Zealanders. Surely the government allocates funds to Sparc to foster sport in such a way that champions are produced. People we can all be proud of.

I am sure Sparc was never set-up to produce a large number of highly paid semi-civil servants who no doubt bolster the numbers on the Wellington cocktail party circuit.

The minister who allowed this to happen should be sacked although – in the interest of costs – we can probably wait until November when that will happen anyway.

But it does raise in my mind the so-called regional sports park.

I say so-called because it is clearly a Hastings District Council initiative – if it was truly regional, others would have been consulted in the region.

For instance – and I accept that this project has been underway since 2004 – I have never been asked if I think a velodrome is a greater asset than a swimming pool, or if gym-sports were more important then badminton.

It is my view that the opportunity to build this park has been lost. We are now into a severe downturn in the economy and corporate backing is going to be extremely hard to obtain.

But if Hastings do manage to complete this ambitious project, they are going to have to be very careful that the planned administrative offices are not full of overpaid bureaucrats eating from the hands of real sports people.

Fuel prices are continuing to rise and we have to ask ourselves – “Why has the price of oil more than doubled and now looks like trebling?”

One thing is for certain – the cost of extracting oil from the ground hasn’t doubled or trebled so somewhere along the way the market is being manipulated.

The Opec nations claim they are not ramping up the prices and yet daily we read stories of the amazing standard of living of the heads of those oil rich states. Personal 747 jets with solid gold bathroom fittings – diamond encrusted Mercedes cars – palaces and houses of indecent proportions – these are certainly not the trappings of those who work on narrow margins.

We know that countries such as the United States released oil from their strategic reserves when prices started to rise – hoping to stem the flow of price increases.

We also know that when they realised that prices were going to continue to rise, they then started to rebuild and expand their reserves therefore exacerbating the problem.

Fuel reserves are essential for the United States Security Plan and as high oil prices tend to undermine international security – they simply need to bolster reserves.

India and China are rapidly increasing their usage of oil as the standard of living improves in these countries. China in particular seems to be oblivious to the situation in the rest of the world and tends to work on the “I’m all right Jack” principle.

Clearly there are speculators somewhere in the middle who are seizing their main chance.

The international oil companies are announcing record profits. As usual they are quick to raise prices on the news of dearer crude and totally ignore the fact that the opposite should happen when crude prices fall.

And all the time sitting on the sidelines is the government. Their tax take is set as a percentage of the pump prices so – the higher the petrol price the greater their take. Michael Cullen must be rubbing his hands with glee. All this extra money pouring into the Government Coffers and he and all his colleagues have cars and petrol supplied by you and I the humble taxpayers.

Now there’s a thought – cars and petrol for City Councillors.

Yeah right.

Many of you will know that I have had a life long interest in politics. Even as a kid I followed central politics with a keeness a little unusual in children.

I well remember our MP, Jim Edwards, who was Arnold Nordmeyer’s son-in-law coming to our school and I vividly remember the reaction to Nordy’s Black Budget in 1958 – I was 7.

In every government since there has been one or two members who were appallingly arrogant and frankly I always detested that arrogance. I always thought that if I became a central government politician – which was a dream for many years – that I would never become arrogant. Arrogance in my opinion usually covers up inadequacy.

Well we now have a government which is chock full of arrogant individuals from the top down. Labour used to have its rotweiller Trevor Mallard to do its dirty work. When an altercation in Parliament’s Foyer proved him to be more of a toy poodle, they quickly put him back in his kennel. Have you heard from Mallard lately.

So they have wheeled out the smart tongues. The deliverers of the sharp one liners like Clark, Cullen, and Parliament’s most arrogant individual Cunliffe.

Frankly the current approach to New Zealand’s problems by Helen Clark’s government is not only arrogant, but is also inept.

Clearly they see John Key as an individual, being a real threat.

Why else would they spend so much time attacking him personally. And when Key asked Labour’s front bench when they were going to get on with the real business of government and cut out the personal attacks, the best the super arrogant Teflon Tyrant could muster, in the house, was diddums.

The Prime Minister of this country and all she could come up with in response to a reasonable question was diddums.

You and I the humble taxpayer should expect better than that.

Telling the leader of the opposition he is an empty space is equally pathetic.

Being the boring person I am, I watch a lot of channel 94, Parliament. Last night Cunliffe was so glib and arrogant I had to turn it off – my blood pressure wouldn’t stand it.

It is time that these disappointing examples of the human race were given a very clear message that we expect better.

Mind you – that might have to wait until November.

There is no doubt in my mind that somehow or other, we need to get rid of Winston Peters and his loony lieutenant Peter Brown.

Frankly – on the international stage – they are an embarrassment.

Let me remind you. Before the last election Peters made it clear he was not interested in the “Baubles of Office.” Then, when this totally unprincipled opportunist spied the main chance – he convinced Helen Clark to split the Foreign Affairs and Trade Ministry – leaving the hard work of trade with Phil Goff – and he has swanned around the world with his entourage, from junket to junket ever since.

The comments of Peter Brown, his off-sider, can be dismissed as the mumblings of a fool. But with Peters the situation is far more serious. How can this man pour himself around the world as our foreign affairs minister, whilst at the same time telling those he meets that he disagrees with one of the main policy initiatives of the Government he represents.

It is an impossible situation and my God – some of you voted for the system that allows it.

One way or another Winston Peters needs to be removed from his position as an international representative of New Zealand.

But don’t feel sorry for him – he will quickly worm his way into another cushy number at the taxpayer’s expense – it is all he knows.

I have to say I am beginning to despair about New Zealand society. I hate to see our young people settling in Australia but frankly I can’t blame them.

As of next month I will have two of my three kids settled in Melbourne and frankly if I was in my 20’s, that’s where I would be too.

All this nonsense about not being able to buy home-made jam – not allowed birthday cakes and other piddling decisions probably made by some kid in Wellington is starting to drive me nuts. And this enormous over-regulation is one of the real things that is driving our youngsters away.

What is needed in this country is the same energy that has been put into developing an army of civil servants to be put into increasing productivity so that we can all enjoy the spoils and hopefully keep our kids at home.

Perhaps we could send Winston Peters to Australia instead.

The new commissioner of the Hawkes Bay District Health Board – Sir John Anderson – has stated that he intends turning around the finances of the board within two years.

I can only presume this fellow is highly competent because the Labour Government seems to appoint him wherever they have got problems – perhaps they should appoint him Prime Minister!

But despite his competency he is not a miracle worker. He has said he has confidence in Chief Executive Chris Clarke, and it is good someone does, and Clarke has already signalled that the Napier Health Centre in Wellesley Road is under threat. With his great confidence in Clarke and his incredible workload, I can only assume that Sir John will be delegating a lot of decision making to Clarke. That, for every Napier resident, is frightening.

Sir John has called on local community leaders to get behind the board. Well sorry, Sir John but we were behind our democratically elected board and your egotistical patron sacked them. Much has been made of the financial management of the board. I challenge Cunliffe to publish a list of all DHB’s throughout the country and show their financial performance against budget. I would suggest those figures would show that the Hawkes Bay District Health Board was doing pretty well against its fellow DHBs in a sector where so much of the health spend has been diverted to administration.

Sir John has stated “In the short time I have been here, I have found a very capable and competent organisation. So despite some of the difficulties that have been well aired, this organisation is very sound.”

This Organisation is very sound. Sorry I thought Cunliffe sacked our DHB because they were incompetent – they lacked integrity and yet Sir John finds the organisation to be capable, competent and sound.

You tell me who lacks integrity in this whole affair.

Some have complained about the local bodys spending ratepayers’ money on a judicial review of Cunliffe’s actions – for my dollar the 60 or 70 cents per head that may take is an investment, not a cost.

There is no doubt that democracy as we know it is under serious threat here in New Zealand.

Over recent years we have been given the choice to vote on three significant matters – all of which have a direct affect on our lives.

We could vote for members of our District Health Board so that provision of health services had some local flavour. And what’s happened? A corrupt government sacked our locally and democratically elected members and has replaced them with a commissioner. Everyone knows, that commissioner has that many other jobs – some government appointed – that he will be a figurehead in Hawkes Bay only. Despite his undoubted talents he will be a puppet whose strings are pulled in Wellington.

We could vote for up to 12 people to represent us on our local Napier City Council. Some boof-headed bureaucrats in Wellington forced a ridiculous partial ward system on us and we can now only vote for 7 or 8. This half-baked system is already causing tension in council and it simply has to go. As I have said so often – you can drive from one side of Napier to the other in 10 minutes, we are one big ward. Wards, or even worse, a partial ward system is simply devisive in such a compact electorate.

We could vote for the political party we wanted to run the country and have some idea what sort of government we could get.

Under MMP we could end up with one of the major parties getting more than 50 per cent of the party vote and yet have a government that doesn’t include that party and is controlled by the Maori Party. In fact that is what the polls are suggesting right now.

I wonder if the poor misguided sods who voted for MMP ever thought they would end up with a government which is controlled by a party whose candidates are selected on a racial basis.

I bet they did not.

Peter Dunne of the United Future Party is calling for a referendum in 2010 to determine our future voting system.

I for one will be supporting that call and continuing to show how stupid the MMP system is in such a tiny country.

The hot topic of debate during the weekend has been the Hawkes Bay DHB debacle and frankly, so it should have been.

It is my view that much of the discussion is totally misguided. Time and time again I am hearing both sides of the argument regarding the competency of the board and frankly we – the humble taxpayers – are not in possession of sufficient facts to enter that argument.

The discussion should be centred aroutchend the high handed, arrogant actions of an appallingly egotistical Minister of Health.

Did he act in a reasonable and informed manner – of course he did not. His actions thrust a dagger into the very heart of democracy.

How dare this fellow Cunliffe, call into question the integrity of our elected DHB members. How would you feel if you had been newly elected in October – had attended only one board meeting – and were then sacked by the Minister on the basis of a lack of integrity.

Surely if Cunliffe had a problem with the way the Hawkes Bay DHB was discharging its duties, the reasonable thing to do would have been to summon Kevin Atkinson to the Beehive and discuss the problem. No such meeting was ever arranged – in fact it is my understanding the two have never met and Cunliffe never returned repeated calls from Atkinson.

It is clear the trio of Labour Government patsies in this saga, have had ample access to the Minister. If Clarke, Lind and Hausmann can be heard, why not Kevin Atkinson and the board.

And speaking of Hausmann – the report on his apparent conflict of interest is a real can of worms.

Clearly Hausmann and his mates at the Health Ministry did not like the draft report because they have taken legal action to prevent the publication of that draft. The fact that the DHB sought legal action to delay the publication of the final report suggests the board members were unhappy with changes to the draft. What are the changes to the draft – who made them and why were they made. Surely, in the interests of transparency, both the draft and the final report should be published.

One thing is for sure – Mr Cunliffe’s action – supported by his Prime Minister – is another hammer blow to Labours election chances in November.

The Labour Government’s new Minister of Health is obviously someone who likes to be the life and soul of the party.

But his sabre rattling and posturing prove to me – that not only is he arrogant and ignorant – he is also totally politically naïve.

I would have thought it was obvious, that if Labour wanted to regain the Treasury benches in November, they would need to win back some of the previously “Safe Labour Seats” they lost in 2005.

Perhaps Russell Fairbrother and Rick Barker should be reminding this fellow Cunliffe that two of those seats are right here in Hawkes Bay.

If Cunliffe sacks our democratically elected members of the Hawkes Bay District Health Board, then I have a very clear message for Messrs Fairbrother and Barker.  Start looking for jobs.  Don’t even bother standing in November.  Save your money.  Cunliffe has lost the race for you.

Frankly I find the bully boy tactics of Cunliffe to be abhorrent.  Where does it leave the DHB members – especially the new members of the DHB who have only just got their tootsies under the table.  I would imagine these poor sods have spent 3 -4 or 5 thousand dollars on a campaign which has resulted in their being elected to the DHB.  Now, before they have even recovered their investment this Minister, eager to see his name in the headlines, is threatening to sack them.  Surely they will have some legal redress if that turns out to be the case.

The Labour Government has increased spending on health significantly during their 3 terms.  The problem is, as is so often the case with Labour, the funds have been poorly directed.  They have totally forgotten that they are meant to be playing “Doctors and Nurses”, not “Build the Empire”.

Our health system is now totally overburdened with a whole variety of non-medical personnel and the medical and surgical service to us, the poor taxpayer, is simply getting worse.

So Mr Cunliffe – sack our District Health Board at your peril.

Just remember that after November you may be joining Rick Barker and Russell Fairbrother in the job line.

Recently I sat and watched the NZ cricket team demolish the English cricket team in a rain shortened one dayer. And I loved it.

I loved it for a variety of reasons – but most of all because it was a real two finger salute to that egotistical pillock Adam Parore.

One of the stars was Jesse Ryder. When Jesse was selected, Parore said that he was too fat to play top class cricket. Parore said there was no room at the top for a fat man. Well – on behalf of all fat men – and Jesse Ryder hardly qualifies – I’ve got news for Mr Loudmouth Parore. A few extra pounds will not stop a talented fellow like Jesse Ryder performing at the top level.

Why do the media go to people like Parore for comment. Sure he had some cricket talent but what has he done since. Perhaps his greatest achievement is his ability to sell pictures of his family to some womens’ gossip magazine.

Anyway- enough about Parore – he is of no consequence – the win was fantastic for New Zealand cricket and will be a great confidence booster for the team. Make sure you are at the game in Napier.

Parliament opened last week with the usual rubbish dished up in the house. Helen Clark claimed that there was no quick fix to New Zealand’s problems – an amazing statement considering she has been in power for 8 years.

John Key pointed out to her that fact and her trusty – “I’m not part of the Government” – Lieutenant Winston Peters got up and – well actually I’m not sure what he said. As usual he talked in riddles.

The usual election year jockeying for position is going on. The Greens are sending out old Nachos to pasture so they can bring in their deputy leader to gain publicity before the election.

NZ First has clearly done a deal with the government and Donnelly is off to Rarotonga to bask in the sun. That allows them to add some firepower in terms of Dail Jones.

Don’t you think all this makes an absolute mockery of democracy. We elect one bunch and then they decide who is really going to represent us.

I am still waiting to hear from any party that is prepared to hold a binding referendum on MMP.

They’ll get my vote.

I am sure – if my kids were asked to name one word that came to mind, when discussing their upbringing – it would be the word consequence

If there was one thing I drummed into their little brains it was that their actions would have consequences. If they behaved well, there would be positive and good consequences, and if they were naughty there would be negative or bad consequences. And I make no excuses for the fact that sometimes that meant a smack on the bum.

So I was delighted when John Key announced the National Party’s policy on troubled youth yesterday. Delighted, because for too long these young yobbos have been able to roam our streets, tagging and terrorising, stabbing and stealing, and society seemed powerless to stop them.

For those dregs of society, unsociable and unlawful behaviour had no consequences.

So I applaud John Key’s announcement – the policy may need a little modification but at least he has recognised the problem and decided to do something about it.

Contrast this policy with Labour’s track record in the area of youth crime. In eight years Labour has totally failed to recognise and address the growing problem.

And in response to John Key’s address, Annette King came out with a statement that epitomises Labour’s whole approach to governance.

She said that National’s policy was short sighted because it concentrated on the minority who are trouble makers and ignored the vast majority who were good citizens.

How bloody silly is that? The policy announced, was specifically developed to deal with the trouble makers – that is the whole point of the exercise – a point clear to you and I, but obviously lost on Annette King.

Labour and its army of law drafters, has inflicted so many unnecessary laws and regulations on us over the last eight years, and now it would appear they want us to ignore the huge and growing problem of delinquent youngsters whilst we concentrate on those who are productive members of society.

Talk about putting your head in the sand.

Anyway, at least it’s election year.