It’s the same now I’d argue. He also said, and bear in mind this is many, many years ago, that it was "the worst place in the world to be if you had any ambition.” That’d be true now too I reckon.
And at the risk of sounding like Marc Ellis and all the other Kiwis bailing, we have definitely lost our mojo. We are backwards on too many metrics. Australia - where I’ve been three times in the last month —Sydney and Melbourne— is more forward focussed than we are, it’s going places, people are upbeat - my sister's currently in Queensland, she says it’s the same there.
Here, it feels like we are still mopping up from a pandemic and a shut down that we should've bounced back from ages ago. The fact we haven’t yet, or don't want to, or don't know how to, speaks volumes about where we are and who we are. Focussed on all the wrong things, held up by all the wrong belief systems, dragged down by lowest common denominator BS.
Take our Universities for example, laying people off, closing down courses, low enrolments, high dropout rates. Compare that to Australia… in huge demand by international students, drawing in large numbers of Kiwi candidates - in fact at Sydney Uni they say the waitlist for some on campus accommodations is so long you’re best to apply now for 2025.
The gap now between Australia and us seems ever wider. You can feel it when you’re there. NZ just seems down at heel, and to be frank, miserable.
So how do we turn it around? Because a change of government I don’t think is going to be enough. The change needs to be radical. We need wholesale changes in attitudes and ambition. We need to want for better and demand more. From our government, from our law and order, from our bureaucracy, from our thought leaders, and from ourselves.
We’ve gotten complacent and happy with average. And that’s seeped into every orifice. And the problem with average is it just erodes into below average before you know it.
But I’m desperate to turn it around because as I watch more and more of our young people refuse to hang around here - it makes me more determined to fix it. How have we become a country our children don’t even want to stay and study in? A country that anyone with ambition or drive, is leaving. I don’t know how we fix it or how we grow everything back up, bit when Marc Ellis said NZ’s best days were behind it… that cuts deep. That’s writing off a whole country forever and I refuse to believe we can’t bounce back.
It’s not as simple as just ‘go’ if you don't like it, not if you're established here with a home, family, kids in schools, jobs, pets, commitments. It’s not that easy for everyone to upsticks and leave and I’m not sure that’s the answer.
I think we have to dig deep at this juncture and work out what we can do to build a brighter future here, and turn attitudes around. A few simple things might get us back on track, like cleaning up the levels of crime, working on our infrastructure, paying better attention to the liveability of our CBD’s. It’s really confronting when you travel and see just how quickly other cities have moved on from where we're still stuck, but just because it’s hard, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.
Kate Hawkesby is a political broadcaster on Newstalk ZB - her articles can be seen HERE.
6 comments:
You've missed a really, really big thing to fix, Kate.
Kill co-governance stone dead, and the Waitangi Tribunal, and the whole revised Treaty, and start treating Maori the same as everyone else. Not as some culturally superior but ever entitled group who look down on everyone else.
That's what's ruining NZ and until it's addressed we will continue to slide further down the hill.
The slide began long before Labour got in back in 2017. They just accelerated it massively.
I've got no faith in Chris Luxon. He seems confused on co-governance and has a track record of folding instantly when a young, ignorant journo questions him about it.
If the opinion polls can be believed, the biggest problem we have is that about half of our population are still happy to vote for parties on the Left who openly promote racism.
If that's true we're buggered. Because you need an overwhelming majority to come outa against this.
Kate everything that is wrong with nz at the moment can be summed up in the woke, unbelievable interview from that newshub reporter that david seymour was forced to endure. David had to defend his stance that everyone in nz should be treated equally. It was like something out of 1984 george orwell. The misery of the people here is because our gut feeling tells us that something is not right.
All true from Dee M. Plus:
.Due to the biased media, we are constantly hammered by " high achieving" Maori with national and international acclaim in every possible field.
This is admirable - but is contradicted by the constant sob story of deprivation caused by "colonization"
.And, this is not over.....still to come is the Truth and Reconciliation" process to ensure guilt and atonement in every non Maori citizen ( notably European) who will cede advancement and accept second class status.
Kate, currently in the UK catching up with family. It has its issues like most countries but from what I’ve seen, it’s getting on after Brexit and Covid and moving on.
The Co Governance issue is killing NZ and needs to be put to bed.
Divided we fall and NZ is divided.
Where I am staying ,several years ago signage was in Polish and English due to all the immigration.
Now it’s only English. No more Euro money only pounds.
These are big changes for the UK but it moves on to better things.
Time NZ did the same.
I think October will be that turning point. Roll up the sleeves NZ, there’s work to be done.
Kate, we are loosing thousands of overseas students and the millions of dollars they circulate in our economy. I was involved with education in China for over 11 years but the last few years Chinese social media has people discussing what a waste of time and money sending their children to NZ, mainly all the maori crap being forced on them and weak woke academics who are not up to international standards. Kiwialan.
A destroyed education system , forcing sexism, Green's propaganda and Maori paganism down our children's throats and moral turpitude evident in a lying and thieving government with no concern for citizens but only in promoting their own socialist -Marxist- racist agendas. None of which are credible and will drive us even further into a deep dark hole.
We used to be God's own now we are absolutely the devil's playground .
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