Local Bodies

New Zealand is a land of Bullies. While many New Zealanders are good caring people it is a bullying culture that leads and governs us. The evidence for this came out strongly in the recent Unicef report . We have the 2nd highest rate of bullying in schools out of 51 countries and if anyone disputes this they can try and explain why we have the highest levels of youth suicide in the world . Bullying is a learned behaviour and the fact that it exists so strongly in our schools is just a reflection of what has been taught within the environment our children live in. National Standards in Education (narrowing teaching to literacy and numeracy), has stifled the teaching of a rich curriculum and reduced the importance of teaching values. Strict uniform rules and demanding compliance has also become increasingly important in some schools and civics education has a low priority. The focus has been on educating to be work ready rather than supporting our students to be fully active cit

This has probably been the most dramatic election campaign that I have experienced in almost 40 years of voting. As with most elections, the media focusses on the drama rather than the substance and there is very little real analysis of the policies and what would really be in the best interests of our country. After nine years in power National has created an opportunist, boom and bust economy that has served property investors, banks, corporate interests and intensive dairying well. At the same time we have seen damaging under-investments in social welfare, housing, education and health. The lowest income quintile of New Zealanders have suffered most and we now have the highest percentage in the developed world of homelessness and the  worst statistics for child health and welfare . Our environment has suffered hugely and we have one of the weakest responses in the world to climate change. To hold on to power National has resorted to wild scaremongering as it has seen its com