This is a very powerful piece of writing as it explains in stark reality the states desire to refute liability for the state’s wrongdoings. It is the state composed of individuals from ministers and ministries officials that will do their utmost to avoid responsibility and therefore admitting liability and the need for compensation.
When Luxon said he would apologise to the victims of Abuse in Care in November, my immediate thought was that gives the ministry officials plenty of time to dream up the reasons they are not responsible and compensation should be minimal.
Are there a politicians or journalists with the ability to organise a campaign to force effective compensation similar to the Post Office scandal in the UK?
'Imperfect though it may be, New Zealand’s democratic system of government makes it relatively easy for the state to present itself as the servant of the people it purportedly serves.'
Since the advent of the Ardern government in 2017, successive governments, aided by complaisant and uncritical journalists, have told us that 'state servants' are now 'public servants', a conversion formalised with the renaming of the State Services Commission as the Public Services Commission in 2020.
We are expected to believe that these government employees are now our servants, the servants of the public. But they will always be the servants of the state that employs them and pays them, and will do to us as the state directs.
Survivor here, 1972 14 years old. I see no difference between the attitude of the State and Faith based institutions in dodging responsibility and liability. I tried for years to get answers from the Anglican Church, before during and after the Inquiry. Stunning so stunning that ACC accepted my claim, yet the Anglican Church can’t muster an apology. Any f apology will do. Luxon can and should apologise to those abused in State institutions, and the Government needs to pay out the survivors.
My compensation shouldn’t have come from the State via ACC but the Anglican Church. The State didn’t harm me, the f Anglican Church did through people they hired.
These examples of the obduracy of the State are amply demonstrated by the current Public Inquiry in the UK into the appalling behaviour of the Post Office
The Inquiry is peeling back layers of staggering wrong doing in just the way that Chris Trotter describes
The Royal Commission report is one of the best I have read. It's honest and direct. I don't expect any of our current political parties to honestly respond to the Commission's challenges. I've been reading John A Lee's book "simple on a soapbox". In this he reveals the fights in caucus of the Labour Party to get the supposed leaders of the Party to actually implement what they had promised in the election. Leaders with feet of clay comes to mind. I think that's what we have in NZ right now. This report calls for a complete re-write of our social contract in this country. Politicians won't lead this. Who will..........
Chris's article reminds me exactly how NZers were treated during Covid pandemic by the queen of kindness. Goes to show that anyone is capable of abuse, regardless of the virtue signaling they use.
This is a very powerful piece of writing as it explains in stark reality the states desire to refute liability for the state’s wrongdoings. It is the state composed of individuals from ministers and ministries officials that will do their utmost to avoid responsibility and therefore admitting liability and the need for compensation.
When Luxon said he would apologise to the victims of Abuse in Care in November, my immediate thought was that gives the ministry officials plenty of time to dream up the reasons they are not responsible and compensation should be minimal.
Are there a politicians or journalists with the ability to organise a campaign to force effective compensation similar to the Post Office scandal in the UK?
Chris……..?
'Imperfect though it may be, New Zealand’s democratic system of government makes it relatively easy for the state to present itself as the servant of the people it purportedly serves.'
Since the advent of the Ardern government in 2017, successive governments, aided by complaisant and uncritical journalists, have told us that 'state servants' are now 'public servants', a conversion formalised with the renaming of the State Services Commission as the Public Services Commission in 2020.
We are expected to believe that these government employees are now our servants, the servants of the public. But they will always be the servants of the state that employs them and pays them, and will do to us as the state directs.
Survivor here, 1972 14 years old. I see no difference between the attitude of the State and Faith based institutions in dodging responsibility and liability. I tried for years to get answers from the Anglican Church, before during and after the Inquiry. Stunning so stunning that ACC accepted my claim, yet the Anglican Church can’t muster an apology. Any f apology will do. Luxon can and should apologise to those abused in State institutions, and the Government needs to pay out the survivors.
My compensation shouldn’t have come from the State via ACC but the Anglican Church. The State didn’t harm me, the f Anglican Church did through people they hired.
Spot-0n Chris.
Which leads me to the sad realisation that no matter how the terms of reference for the Covid enquiry are couched the same outcome is likely.
Why you describe Chris Trotter as an extreme left wing columnist? In this article he is telling it as it is ,is he not?
'Chris Trotter is New Zealand’s most provocative leftwing political commentator.... He identifies as a “libertarian socialist”.'
Nothing extreme-left-wing here.
These examples of the obduracy of the State are amply demonstrated by the current Public Inquiry in the UK into the appalling behaviour of the Post Office
The Inquiry is peeling back layers of staggering wrong doing in just the way that Chris Trotter describes
The Royal Commission report is one of the best I have read. It's honest and direct. I don't expect any of our current political parties to honestly respond to the Commission's challenges. I've been reading John A Lee's book "simple on a soapbox". In this he reveals the fights in caucus of the Labour Party to get the supposed leaders of the Party to actually implement what they had promised in the election. Leaders with feet of clay comes to mind. I think that's what we have in NZ right now. This report calls for a complete re-write of our social contract in this country. Politicians won't lead this. Who will..........
Chris's article reminds me exactly how NZers were treated during Covid pandemic by the queen of kindness. Goes to show that anyone is capable of abuse, regardless of the virtue signaling they use.