POLITICS: 

Many Kiwis of Indian origin who I have met in the past few weeks as part of ACT’s Honest Conversations tour feel that this Labour Government is punishing them while rewarding other people for doing nothing.

We’re past the halfway point in the year now, our second calendar year in the midst of a global pandemic. Even though life carries on with levels of normality in New Zealand, events across Australia and around the world have been a good reminder that we are not out of the woods yet with COVID.

As part of our engagement with communities across New Zealand ACT MPs are engaging with New Zealanders in honest conversations. We hope you will take time to attend the Auckland public meetings on 07 August in Botany and 04 September in Mt Roskill.

Many countries around the world are still reporting surges of new COVID cases, and it’s clear that we’re going to be living with the impact of this pandemic for some time.

Increased penalties for hate speech have also been proposed, with the maximum fine to go from $7000 to $50,000, and the maximum length of imprisonment from three months to three years.

Three years in prison for hate speech is longer than the punishment for assaulting a child.

Statistics New Zealand recently reported their findings which told us that a quarter of New Zealand’s population could be Asian in 20 years’ time. This gave statistical evidence of what we see around us daily -the changing face of New Zealand. In response to these findings by a respected agency -the government of the day, hopelessly out of touch with reality and clearly unwelcoming of migrants went ahead and cancelled a bill that would have required all primary and intermediate schools to offer second language tuition from among 10 priority languages.

The role of the Opposition Party is to hold the Government to account on its promises, its ability or lack thereof to deliver on those promises, and to ask the questions New Zealanders want answers to.

Around a million New Zealanders will be warmer when the Winter Energy Payment resumes this Saturday. The Government introduced this payment as part of our Families Package, to help seniors and families with the cost of heating during the colder months. It’s simply about being able to run the heater when you need to.

Kia Ora Indian News readers! I’m Naisi Chen, Labour list MP based in Botany. It’s great to be able to contribute to this incredible community news outlet.

The Government has rushed out its latest attempt to intervene in the housing market, but the sad reality for Kiwis struggling to rent or buy a home is it will most likely make the situation worse.

“When vaccines hit our shores earlier than Ministers expected last month and our first vaccinations started a day ahead of Australia, there was much glee among some in the commentariat that New Zealand might catch up with the rest of the world,” says ACT Leader David Seymour.

Recently the National Party has been pushing for the Government to open a travel bubble with Australia.

This would see mean people coming from Australia could bypass our Managed Isolation and Quarantine (MIQ) facilities if they provide a negative Covid-19 pre-departure test within 72 hours of travel.