Right Thinking 19/7/13
act-new-zealand
Fri Jul 19 2013 12:00:00 GMT+1200 (New Zealand Standard Time)
Right Thinking 19/7/13
Friday, 19 July 2013, 5:20 pm
Column: ACT New Zealand
Right Thinking
You’re invited to:
Is affordable housing just a pipe dream?
Guest speaker David Seymour
David Seymour is the Senior Fellow on Municipal Governance at The Manning Foundation for Democratic Education. He was No. 5 on the ACT Party List in the 2011 General Election and has previously worked as a Ministerial Advisor to Hon John Banks. He will speak to us direct from Calgary, Canada via Skype.
Friday, July 26 2013, ACT Party Head Office Level 2, 27 Gillies Ave, Newmarket
The Week That Was
Affording our future
Friday last week saw Treasury release their report ‘Affording our Future’ – a statement on New Zealand’s long-term fiscal position.
The report looks at the changes occurring in New Zealand’s society and demographics, and how this will impact on New Zealand’s fiscal sustainability in the future.
At the top of Treasury’s concerns is the growing cost of New Zealand Superannuation.
Since 1980 the number of people aged 65 and over has doubled. It is expected to double again by 2036. And despite John Key’s statements to the contrary, it is an issue that we no longer have the luxury to put off.
Between February 2012 and February 2013, the number of people receiving New Zealand Super grew by 27,000 – close to five times the annual rate of growth of the previous decade.
Between now and 2020, the number of people receiving NZ Super is to grow by 150,000.
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So what does this mean?
New Zealand Superannuation will start to take up a bigger and bigger share of the government’s total spend. It means less money will be available to spend elsewhere unless something is done.
To cope with the increasing cost, the options are clear: either taxes will have to go up, government spending in other areas will have to be cut, or the age of eligibility for NZ Super needs to be raised.
ACT believes raising the age is the fairest and most sustainable option. New Zealanders are living longer and are far healthier than ever before. Children born today are projected to have an average life expectancy of close to 100 years! The age of eligibility needs to go up to reflect our longer life expectancy.
If you ask students and people in their 20s they don’t believe that NZ Super will still be around when they retire, so they are open to change. ACT believes it is time to have a discussion about this important issue, so that any changes are signalled well in advance.
To read the report click here
Youth Parliament 2013
Tuesday and Wednesday this week marked the 2013 Youth Parliament. Young New Zealanders from all around the country descended on Parliament and were able to experience a day in the life of an MP. We are sure that more than one of them has plans to come back one day, and represent their fellow New Zealanders in the house.
Epsom Girls Grammar student, Ellie Bishop, did a fine job representing John Banks and Epsom over the two days and gave a great general debate speech against the testing of recreational drugs on animals (as per photo below).
In other news
Constitutional Review – Make a submission
Unlike other countries New Zealand does not have a law called “The Constitution.” Instead, the rules for how the country is governed are in what is often called an unwritten constitution. Most of it is in fact written down in various laws, rules and practices – just not in a single document.
Right now the Government is undertaking one of the biggest reviews of our constitutional arrangements in New Zealand’s history.
The review is focused on a number of areas.
These are:
Electoral matters
The size of Parliament, the term of Parliament and the election date; the number and size of electorates, including the method for changing the size; the electoral integrity legislation.
Crown-Maori Relationship matters
Maori representation in Parliament; Maori representation in local government, including the requirements set out under the Resource Management Act; and the role of the Treaty of Waitangi within our constitutional arrangements and whether it should be entrenched.
Other constitutional matters
Bill of Rights Issues, such as the protection of property rights and whether it should be entrenched, and whether we should have a written constitution.
But submitters are free to comment on any aspect of New Zealand’s constitution that they care too.
So what does this mean for you?
This is your opportunity to have a say on how New Zealand’s constitution should operate in the future. There are many aspects to the review and not all of them may be relevant to you, but we believe it is important that as many New Zealanders as possible have their say.
How to make a submission
You can find more information and make a submission here http://www.ourconstitution.org.nz/
You can find out more about the Constitution Review Panel here http://www.cap.govt.nz/The-Panel
Our new columnist
Guy McCallum is the ACT board member for the scenic south, Vice President of ACT on Campus, studies at Otago University and now has the title of weekly columnist for OUSA’s student magazine critic to add to his list of accomplishments.
We will be republishing Guy’s columns in Right Thinking from time to time and will also put them on the ACT website and Facebook page every week.
Here is an excerpt from Guy’s first column – Liberty: how to spot the fakers
I love liberty. And we all enjoy the benefits of it. As it turns out, whether or not you have a job you can still pay for all the basics even if you do find yourself struggling. And because of liberty, life is more than what you can do from your wallet: in New Zealand you have the freedom to be yourself (sometimes with the requisite courage), the freedom to decide what you want from life, and how you go about your relationships.
Liberty is behind this standard of living. How so? Well, if weren’t for all of us going about our daily business of earning more money than we spend, meeting our obligations and making choices about employment, education, health, recreation and how to live (or think) – and being free to do these things – then the provision of a $23.6 billion welfare state, a $12.4 billion education system, and a $15 billion health system would be impossible….
But here’s the crunch: everyone’s about liberty. So how do we know they mean it? Here’s a way to catch out the ones who will achieve only the opposite – those whose underlying (and usually hidden) premise contains the idea of undeserved entitlement... to read more click here
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