Well I know everyone has had their say on this but I need to have my say now.

Ok to start with I think the age should stay at 18, but this has no real reasons behind it other than I don't think changing it now is either fair or going to fix any problems.

The government is trying to use scare tactics to get this through. Namely the growth in teenage violence involving alcohol. Yet this rate was already rising as quick if not quicker before the age went up. Secondly of all the violent drunken murders in the past year I would like someone to name one case where the Attacker was 18 or 19...I did a bit of research and I couldn't find a single one. yes some 18 and 19 year olds have been killed when they were drunk, but none of them were the cause. So ok the ones who aren't doing the crimes are being punished.

And anyway stopping them drinking in pubs will only make it unsupervised and therefore probably worse for society...ridiculous, the changes are a lot harder to make than lifting the drinking age. This legislation is like blaming murders on guns. "Guns don't kill people, people do!!!" It seems to me that this law is just a response to a media hype.

Update to come later, but long enough for now.

AL has made a great post on Sir Humphreys about foriegners working in New Zealand on work visas paying full New Zealand Tax rates, but not recieving any of the benefits involved. They have no access to our Health or Education systems or certain other services. I feel this is a gross miscarriage, if they are paying full taxes I think they should be eligible for the services just like any other Tax Payer.

Then there is the flipside as pointed out by Winston Peters in 2002. At the time Labour was trying to close immigration loopholes that had allowed people to move to New Zealand claim residency and put their children through the New Zealand Education System and then leave without necessarily making any contribution to New Zealand. Some of these loopholes have been closed but not all of them.

These two in my opinion are easy enough to work through, the way to do it in my opinion is that we need a law along the lines that if you pay tax you are eligible for the services provided by the government, but if you don't you're not. There are of course problems with this as well, but it is fairer in my opinion than the current system where the foriegners on Work Visas are effectively paying for the share of 'residents' who are only coming for the purpose of education and or health care. This needs to be worked on and something needs to be done.

If anyone knows about the conditions of Work Visas overseas I'd love to know as I am about to head overseas on a series of Work Visas to try and have a working holiday, but I don't know much about the way they really work.

The man charged with murder after driving his car into a crowd outside a party is pleading not guilty and his friends and family have said "that he was driving his car in there to disperse the crowd and to save his mate who was being beaten unconscious by a 'mob' of 30"

Last night a second victim passed away after the incident on the weekend.

I agree completely with the police on this murder charge and believe that it should stand up in court. The man knew what he was doing and the self-defence claim cannot stand up as he replied with a completely disregard for life and way in excess of the necessary force.

The UN is condemning North Korea once again. This follows on from a nuclear test by North Korea making them the 9th Nation to become a nculear power. North Korea joins the UN's "permanent five" - the US, Russia, China, Britain and France - and India and Pakistan, as verified nuclear powers. Israel has never declared itself but is believed to have at least 75 weapons. These nuclear tests confirm previous worries from the nations close to North Korea, in particular Japan and South Korea.

The UN has moved quickly to condemn these actions, but as I have said previously this is nothing more than a slap on the wrist with a wet bus ticket, there is no need for North Korea to listen. When the UN condemned Iran for beginning a nuclear program, Iran stood up and protested it, I see it as a real issue that there is nothing the UN can really do. They talk of Sanctions, but these will only hurt the people of North Korea and worsen the humanitarian crisis in the country.

I also see it as a little hypocritical when the 5 permenant members of the security council are tryng to condemn other nations for joining them as nuclear powers.

Stories

News.com.au
Sanctions
Small test
Fear for Oil
Clark: UN Action needed

The time for words has passed, if the UN is so worried about it do something. Action is all tht will work in this case and sanctions are not action they are just a way to hurt the people, they don't work. The reason the US is unlikely to treat this the same as Iraq is 1)North Korea does not have Oil and 2)North Korea can actually fight back. If the Us attacked North Korea, within minutes we would have missiles on their way whether to Japan or the United States it doesn't matter, the US intellegence shows them that it is a bad idea to try and take on someone who can fight back.

How can they get away with this, this is completely dusgusting. The Pipi foundation has proceded to offer Donna Huata a bonus of $60,000 this is after she STOLE more than $80,000 from them.

Despite being nearly bankrupted in the fallout over her offending, the Pipi Foundation has authorised the payment and is now awaiting an invoice from her before handing over the money.

For some reason this foundation seems to think that they should be giving her more money. I hope to hell that the government has stopped all flow of money to this organistaion because if the haven't she is just going to get back in there and find more money.

The Kahui case is dragging on now well into its 4th month, there is still no arrest even after the babies father broke his silence yesterday and then spent this morning talking to police.
Today after Chris Kahui and his lawyer Lorraine Smith spent five hours with police, Detective Senior Sergeant John Tims, said the interview was a major development.
"I am not going to comment on what was said or what wasn't said.
"There are still things we need to do. We will evaluate what has been said."
After he left the station Mr Kahui refused to make a statement.

Ok my thoughts on this still remain the same slowly they are breaking the tight 12, now 10, but I think the best approach is still to arrest the lot for obstruction of justice and eventually you'll find out who did it even if it takes putting 10 people behind bars to find out.