Letters to Editor: polytechs, learning spaces, right to vote
The government's announcement that it will abolish the long established right of special votes by people who enrol after the voting period has started is cause for concern.
About 150,000 special votes were cast in the last general election and they strongly favoured left-wing parties.
The coalition government should not be allowed to stack the electoral deck in this fashion as it is a serious assault on the democratic process.
Bill Southworth
Port Chalmers Something borrowed
Golly, National is taking on Ingrid Leary's retirement village proposals as theirs.
The ideas cupboard in the National camp must be almost bare.
Maybe it's true then, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Robyn Bridges
Roseneath Learning spaces
Well said Bridget Davidson (principal of Otago Girls' High School) ''open-plan or not - the quality of teaching and learning remains if the school culture and relationships are rich and strong, and the thirst for learning and knowledge is there'' (ODT 22.7.25).
Learning spaces vary from single-cell classrooms, open-plan/flexible, outdoors (on and off a school's campus), and spaces designed to support specialist subject learning (such as science laboratories, technology workshops, music studios, gymnasiums and all-weather turf).
Each learning space has its purpose and contributes to broad and deep learning.
Evidence affirms that positive school culture and relationships, along with effective teachers are the most influential factors that promote learning across learning (subject) areas.
So much rich learning would be utterly constrained if we think single-cell classrooms are the magic bullet for student learning and achievement.
Margie Campbell-Price
Dunedin Crossing swords and turning around opinions
Since crossing swords with Jean Balchin several years ago I have come to enjoy reading her column. I have re-visited the archive, however, and her memory (Opinion ODT 14.7.25) has played a scurvy trick - she did more than question Captain Cook's ''sainthood'', holding him largely responsible for all the ills of colonisation.
And I certainly said if that was the best she could do I'd have failed her first-year history at Otago. I did not hazard a guess as to her likely fate at Oxford though I'd have undoubtedly sought her out for further tuition. Curious and even opinionated students are the lifeblood of universities.
However, all that aside, I mainly want to reassure her, as a member of the distinguished club of School Certificate failures, that I have never considered falling at one of the hurdles along the way has much significance ... And may I add that I am delighted to know that Ms Balchin is planning to work on Truby King and the Plunket Society. I hope Ms Balchin will keep up her column while she works away on Sir Truby and Plunket.
Erik Olssen
Dunedin The Gaza blues
Re the response to my own letter re the council writing a letter to a political party offering support.
If Heinke Matheson had read my letter closely she would have seen that at no time did I actually mention any war by name. Nor was I addressing any personal feelings on any war, nor did I mention a political party.
I was addressing the issue of Dunedin city councillors using their democratically elected positions to support a political party response. Councillors are not elected on the basis of party affiliation or the actions of a political party unless it affects the citizens of Dunedin.
Council represents the citizens of Dunedin who voted for them to devote themselves to the running of our city regardless of their personal political and religious views. Discussing a world event is out of council business.
Asking councillors to publicly vote on an issue of political, religious and moral grounds in any situation is putting peer pressure on a councillor. Any such vote should be done in a private and anonymous way.
Lynne NewellDunedin
[Abridged - Editor.] Winston fooled
Winston Peters' statement to Israel (ODT 23.7.25) is misplaced and misinformed: he and foreign affairs ministers from 27 other countries have fallen for the ruse.
The demand for an immediate unconditional permanent ceasefire and a return to the previous compromised UN and humanitarian aid, is naive.
Israeli conditions for a ceasefire are reasonable: free the hostages and remove the perpetrators. It's not, and never has been, Israeli aggression that is the issue.
It's not Israel taking and holding hostages, it's not Israel intentionally shooting civilians gathering for food, it's not Israel selling the aid, after taking it from civilians. Israel does not use civilians as shields. Israel did not build tunnels and purchase arms, using financial aid given to house, feed and educate civilians.
Unfortunately 28 countries are now on the wrong side of history.
Tony VinkAndersons Bay
[Abridged - Editor.]
Address Letters to the Editor to: Otago Daily Times, PO Box 517, 52-56 Lower Stuart St, Dunedin. Email: editor@odt.co.nz
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Yet as the current Trump tariff episode shows, our dependency on the US for trade (and for foreign investment funds) is highly significant. The NZ/US Council executive director Fiona Cooper pointed this out in a speech she gave in March.. 'Over the last 12 months, the US has overtaken Australia to become New Zealand's second largest export market after US is New Zealand's largest market for beef and wine, no doubt including a lot of fine Marlborough wine. It is an important market for many other products including other meat, dairy, honey, casein, fish, fruit and wood, as well as mechanical appliances, medical instruments, electrical machinery, pharmaceuticals and aluminium and steel products. In addition, she noted, ' The US is also a fast-growing market for New Zealand services exports, which were worth nearly $7 billion in the year to September 2024. The US is now our largest services market, taking nearly a quarter our total services exports.' (Those services dollars are being driven upwards by the numbers of US tourists coming to New Zealand. We're mounting ad campaigns to attract more of them.) All signs therefore, would suggest that our booming goods and services trade with the US is badly unbalanced, at least on the terms Donald Trump uses to view the world. Chances are, we will probably continue to run a trade surplus with the US – and will remain in Trump's bad books - until Air New Zealand buys a few more planes from Boeing and/or until via AUKUS, we start buying large amounts of expensive weaponry from the likes of Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and General Dynamics. That would be a bad idea for other reasons. Footnote One: Some of Trump's headline tariff rates are highly deceptive. The 35% headline tariff rate on Canada for instance not only exempts some of the stuff the US wants and needs (eg Canada's energy exports) but also much of the trade carried out under the CUSMA trade agreement (between Canada, the US and Mexico) that's due to be reviewed next year. In the meantime, Canada's real tariff barriers with the US are not 35%, but average out in single digits. In other words Canada too, has some real trade advantages over us in US markets. Footnote Two: Brazil has far more reason to feel aggrieved than we do. After all, it runs a trade deficit with the US - normally treated by Trump as a sign of virtue – but has been hit by a 50% tariff because of its 'persecution' of Bolsonaro. Yet as with Canada, Brazil's headline rate is rife with exemptions on stuff that the US wants and needs, including fresh orange juice. Overall 45% of Brazil's exports will be exempt, but the rate will still hit two of Brazil's main exports to the US very hard: beef and coffee. As mentioned above it is hard to predict what the impact will be on global prices for beef and coffee, as Brazil seeks to find other markets. Increasingly, Brazil's alternative market for its oil, soybean and beef exports is China. Already only 12% of Brazil's exports get shipped to the US, while 28% is being sold to China. Ironically, Trump's mood swings on tariffs are serving to make China look like the sensible adult in the room on global trade, and the preferred buyer of first and last resort. In itself that's an added reason for us not to join an AUKUS military pact targeted at China. Crafting our diplomatic efforts in order to earn imaginary brownie points in Washington looks like being an increasingly futile exercise. Footnote Three: All of the evidence on US trade exemptions suggests that New Zealand's best fallback negotiating strategy with the Trump administration – if we can get in the door at all – would be to argue for an exemption, probably for beef exports. We seem unlikely to get relief from the headline 15% rate, given that this seems to be the bottom line penalty for every country running a trade surplus with the US. Footnote Four One of the stranger items on the Trump tariff enemies list has been the harsh 20% rate levied on Taiwan. This comes amid signs that US support for Taiwan may be waning. It seems only yesterday that the US was giving every sign that any Chinese aggression against Taiwan would be met with the full force of US military now, maybe not so much. Taiwan is suddenly being pushed out at arms' length. For example: on top of those 20% tariffs, there has been this: Washington blocked Taiwan Premier Lai Ching Te's request to visit New York next week during a planned overseas trip to Taipei's Latin American allies. The Trump administration is also considering a downgrade to bilateral defence talks, which it postponed in June. The reason for the sudden cooling? Well, Premier Lai has been talking about leading his faction-ridden minority government into declaring independence from China, a gambit likely to trigger an even more furious response than usual from China. Parts of what China sees as its sovereign territory cannot be allowed to secede at will. That's the kindest interpretation of the US switcheroo, as an attempt to rein in Premier Lai. It is also a useful reminder that the US is an unreliable defence ally, and that its priorities and commitments in the Asia-Pacific region can change at a moment's notice according to its own domestic perceptions and priorities. In sum that's yet another good reason for New Zealand not to join AUKUS, a nuclear pact that would be under the effective operational command of the Americans.
