Chris Trotter: The stuff of nightmares

The images were the stuff of nightmare. Cars being driven at speed – not on the streets, but inside a shopping mall. Jarring enough for most people, but what followed the cars was even more disturbing. Hooded figures moving swiftly and purposefully across the mall’s polished floor: a loose formation of young offenders heading for the shops. Unstoppable, for the very simple reason that no one was present to stem the larcenous tide.

Well-meaning experts – like Professor Ian Lambie – will implore New Zealanders to refrain from making their usual rush to judgement. They will be told that youth crime statistics are actually registering a drop in offending. That the individuals captured on the mall’s CCTV represent only a tiny minority – the product of the very worst instances of familial breakdown and dysfunction. Lambie, himself, in discussion with Q+A’s Jack Tame, suggests that the offenders are drawn from just 200 families nationwide, and all are likely well known to the authorities.

It will do no good.

Fiona MacKenzie: Riding Roughshod Over Middle NZ

Our politicians, bureaucrats and journalists are struggling to stay in touch with Middle New Zealand. Many of them think it’s unnecessary. After all, they hold the power to tell us what we ought to think and what we should endure.

The system usually works well for them. The Middlers keep to themselves, too busy with the day-to-day.

The problem arises when the people are actually allowed a voice. Referendums must be so frustrating to those who think “they know what’s good for us”.