FOR SALE: Last Friday, a hikoi of 5000 marched to Parliament to protest the Government’s plan to sell state assets. The vote in Parliament will be close. Which way will the small parties fall? Did the 2011 election give the Government have a mandate for a mixed ownership model? Was the prospect of asset sales not scary enough to voters? Why do we need to own these assets? Is privatisation a dirty word?
GIMME A LOAN: The zero budget has brought big changes to the student loan scheme. Students will have to pay back their loans more quickly. While access to student allowances is tightened. Are these changes unfair to the youth of NZ? Are the students of tomorrow paying the prices for the students of yesterday who haven’t paid their loans? The money will be reinvested in tertiary education—so isn’t this a good thing?
PLAYING POSSUM: Playing possum, the NZ drinking game, which has some Dunedin students boozing until they fall out of trees has made international headlines. So, perhaps a good sign we’ve got a bit of an issue with the drink? Here are some proposals from the Alcohol Reform Bill—split purchase age, sales ban between 4am-7am, and parental permission for under-18s to drink at a party. Will these changes do the trick? Do they go far enough? Or are we over-reacting to a few stupid apples who ruin the cider for the rest of us?
Live pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 9th of May from 9:05pm and on TVNZ7.
The Panel: Green Party MP Catherine Delahunty, Labour MP Shane Jones, New Zealand First MP Brendan Horan and National MP Mark Mitchell.
We need those assets!
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The student loans thing is pointless and will make it harder for students!
!!!!!
The booze thing: “Do they go far enough? Or are we over-reacting to a few stupid apples who ruin the cider for the rest of us?”
Well, changing the rules won’t stop people from drinking to get drunk!
Go Shane!
!!!!
On the loans, it’s actually the baby boomer generation. They got free tertiary education, then when it came time to pay it forward with the tax from their good salaries that they got with their tertiary education, they decided they wanted to pay less tax. As a result, the current generation of graduates have to pay for their tertiary education or get loans that put the burden of government debt on the next generation. The current and next generations will also have to pay for the pensions of the baby boomers, because the baby boomers also didn’t want to pay for a national superannuation scheme to fund their retirement.
The current generation now has to pay back their loans faster so that money can pay for the next generation’s tertiary education- because again the tax take won’t cover it, and there’s plenty enough debt already.
However, the current generation and the next generation have found an ingenious solution to their dire financial plight – move to Australia, and the baby boomers will be screwed when they need pension money.
Of course, this is all terrible for the next-next-generation, because the baby boomers will probably drive the country into bankrupcty – but nobody has the forethought to think that far ahead.
Actually Ivy it would seem to me that all is well at Otago Uni. Spud it is just fun get over it.
” PLAYING POSSUM: Playing possum, the NZ drinking game, which has some Dunedin students boozing until they fall out of trees has made international headlines…”
@Ivy
“… it’s actually the baby boomer generation. They got free tertiary education, ….”
Very few baby boomers got a tertiary education – that is why it could be free(ish).
Reintroduce competitive examinations to scythe down the numbers and it could easily be free again.
The hikoi was well over 5000 by my count.
Rod Donaldson announced 10.000 after getting help presumably from staff high in Parliament over looking the grounds.
Key’s ignorance towards and disdain for NZders is indicative of where he is leading.
TPPA will be the next round of secrecy and disenfranchising on NZders.