Letters to the Editor

 

Voters turn to Winston
Just read an item in your March 23 issue re waste water fiasco (Mangawhai Focus, March 23, Council says no to legal action.) Your newfound messiah Winston Peters has branded the council decision as weak and a cop-out, as we all know.

Winston is a forthright person who rigidly sticks to his principals and ideals. What better opportunity than now to demonstrate his powers of persuasion and demand answers and results on behalf of the many who voted for him in the by-election just held.

Getting answers for the local rate payers would justify the mana he justly deserves. I am not a rate payer but my son is and he is being penalised like so many more in Mangawhai – unjustly, in my humble opinion.

Ted Partridge
Auckland


Is flag change legal?
Unfortunately for Ron Davidson and his black and white flag (Mangawhai Focus, March 23), black is the symbol and colour of death. Colour will always be an issue.

Like most I am biased. I like our existing flag and don't see a need to change. The poor old Union Jack has weathered much criticism over the years mainly on the basis that it is too similar to the Australian flag. Maybe Aussies should change their flag!

Our current flag is colourful and distinctive and represents the history of the United Kingdom and also that of NZ. There is only one other NZ flag that has as much historic legitimacy and that is the white flag of the confederation of Maori tribes. There is appreciable support for this flag beyond Maoridom. It is distinctive and was the first official flag of this country. On that basis it has to be the top choice for an alternative to the current flag.

Changing flags is, in the eyes of some, a rebranding marketing exercise. How many times do we have to accept the rebranding of our public institutions like Auckland City Council that started life with the slogan 'Decently and in Order.' We don't hear much of that about the City Council these days but the City started with a magnificent crest of arms like all local bodies. Then it became the City of Sails.

A country should not be rebranded in such a manner that ignores all the history that has gone into nation building in the flag it accepted at its birth.

Canada changed its flag from one with the Union Jack to the maple leaf as part of an appeasement deal to French speaking Quebec. If Maori feel strongly about the retention of the current flag, maybe it would be appropriate to look at a new flag that symbolically unites the two founding races of NZ – the Maori and the British.

However the call for a new flag does not seem to come from that quarter. A prominent Maori leader only recently pointed out the Union Flag was the one that the Treaty of Waitangi was signed under. There may be possible legal implications in a flag change.

The Cook Islands had a go at getting rid of the Union Jack on its national flag but after a few years they dumped the new flag and went back to the old.

One of the best flags that has survived for hundreds of years is the Red Dragon of Wales which predates the Union Jack in its current form. It has not only survived the test of time but is proudly displayed by the Welsh on any national occasion of note.

If we are to start afresh with a new design the final choice has to be as distinctive, unique and colourful as the Welsh Dragon.

(Abridged)
Roy Vaughan
Mangawhai