NZCPR Weekly: Controlling Covid

Dear NZCPR Reader,   

In this week’s NZCPR newsletter, we look into the Government’s management of Covid-19, our NZCPR Guest Commentator Dr Eric Crampton shares recommendations for improvement being made by medical professionals, and our poll asks whether you agree that the Covid-19 vaccine rollout should be prioritised on the basis of race.

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Barry Soper - What has New Zealand Government learnt from virus?

Five months ago we were all beginning to hunker down, to stay at home, to only venture out for the vital necessities of life like food.

For all of us it's been a long, hard slog - particularly for Auckland, which by Sunday night will have been in lockdown for a total of nine weeks.

Well we've learnt to be obedient, to stay at home, to wash our hands, to be kind and from next week to accept that we'll be wearing masks when we climb on public transport.

But what have they learnt, those who call the shots that we are all ordered to follow. Well, the answer is surely bugger all.

NZCPR Weekly: Border Botch-Ups

Dear NZCPR Reader,   

This week, we raise concerns about Government incompetence at the border and the risk that this creates for all New Zealanders, our NZCPR Guest Commentator Barry Brill outlines the case against the Government over the legality of the Alert Level 4 lockdown, and our poll asks whether you consider the Government’s border control performance has let the country down.

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Mike Hosking: Government's rocky week shows they're out of their depth

These must be strange times.

Shamubeel Eaqub and I turn out to be in lock step on one key thing: We need an adult in the room. That's what he said to Parliament's Epidemic Response Committee.

That committee might have been one of the great modern democratic discoveries. All the stuff you never hear about, all the Parliamentary question times you never listened to, was there on display with the added advantage of a bunch of experts, Eaqub being one of them.

By week's end Sir David Skegg spectacularly exposed the Government over a lack of testing, a lack of clear direction, and a plan. Act MP David Seymour managed to change the Government's mind on community newspapers.

And Eaqub exposed the cold hard reality that this is turning into a chaotic mess - and no one of any great repute is actually running this thing.