Jury service

This story describes how a man was jailed for contempt of court for refusing to serve on a jury. The jailed man refused to serve on the grounds that he had work commitments that would have reduced his impartiality. The judge responded by jailing him.While I am in favour of people doing their civic duty and doing jury service, in this case the judge was an idiot.

Fines for failing to appear for jury service are relatively light, but this bone-headed judge has now made the penalty for showing up to explain your reasons imprisonment. End result? More people just won't show up.

More people would turn up for jury service if 1) there was strong legislative protection for their jobs while they were serving, and 2) the compensation for jury service was equivalent to what they would miss out earning while serving. Instead, we get a judge throwing a temper-tantrum and putting an honest man in jail.

Whinging Dunedin airport

The management of the airport in Dunedin are complaining about people avoiding parking fees by parking in the nearby village of Momona instead of in the airport car park. It turns out that Momona is a private village that is entirely owned by the airport, including the roads. While you might think that this gives the airport the right to whinge about people parking there, the article goes on to say that the airport is considering putting up signs in Momona informing people that it is private property. In other words, they have made no effort before now to inform the general public that the roads in Momona are not public roads.

I've driven to Dunedin airport many times (I used to live in Dunedin) and I know that there are no signs near or in Momona that say anything to the effect that Momona is private property, or that the parking there is for residents only. They are complaining to the newspapers and police without having made any effort to inform the public of the facts. This is like complaining that no-one came to my party when I hadn't told anyone about my party.

They should instead have put the signs up first, then, if people were still parking there illegally after several months, complained to the papers. This way they just look like idiots.

Children in drugs houses

Another article where police decry children living in a house where drugs are present. In this case, the drugs were cannabis plants.

But the thing is, the vast majority of children in New Zealand live in a house with drugs present: alchohol and tobacco. But despite the fact that alcohol and tobacco are much more harmful to users and society than cannabis, the police say nothing about it.

We need a national drugs policy that is evidence-based, that is based on reality rather than ideology. So many lives have been destroyed by the prohibition of a plant that is, on the balance of evidence, fairly benign, that we simply cannot continue as we have been. Something must be done, the drug laws must change.

Stupidity from the Immigration department

Will Ricketts is a member of the band The Phoenix Foundation. Despite the group being flown around the world to promote New Zealand music, Ricketts is being denied New Zealand citizenship. This is despite the fact that he has lived in New Zealand since the age of two. The reason? Over the last five years, he hasn't spent at least 240 days of each year in New Zealand. Because he was being flown around the world to promote New Zealand music. He has been told that he can pay $470 to appeal the decision, but the Immigration department will fight it anyway.

So, the government is happy to use him to promote New Zealand, but don't want him as a New Zealand citizen. This isn't just a case of the right hand not knowing what the left is doing, it's a case of the right hand belonging to a completely different person on a completely different planet! This is obviously a case where discretion should be applied, yet the idiots in immigration refuse to use it.

This brings to mind two of my favourite aphorisms:

1) Slavish adherence to rules and regulation is a sign that one has nothing better with which to occupy one's mind

2) You don't need common sense when you have rules