Straitjacketing Students?

Although the National Government's introduction of new, across-the-board national standards may have some positive short term benefits, little good can come of further straitjacketing of New Zealand's educational system.

The new national standards are merely the latest in a long line of governmental reforms aimed at curbing the deteriorating quality of education in New Zealand. However well intentioned the latest reforms, the government needs to wake up and realise that the true problems lies with the continual packing of pupils into schools which merely exist for the sake of bureaucratic convenience.

The children and teenagers of New Zealand, like any nation, are an incredibly diverse group of people, with many different talents and abilities that don't reach their full potential. The only way to get pupils to shine, is to treat education as a genuine value.

Education has its greatest value at the individual level, which then rubs off on the rest of society later. How can we expect the youths of the nation to thrive, if they themselves are not taught to see it as that themselves?

The only way to do this is to, once again, get education to be a task of parents and teachers, not of bureaucrats in Wellington. In short: the government needs to butt out of educational arrangements.

So, however well intentioned and well informed National's education reform is, the government simply cannot drastically improve education levels without realising the basic truth: education, fundamentally, is a value. Until the government treats it as such, and gets its head out of bureaucrat-run doll houses known as public schools, continue to expect educational standards to fall into the abyss.

The "Rights" of Beneficiaries

Not surprisingly, the MSM has been all over the case recently of some (not-so) "private" information of some beneficiaries being released into the public sector by Paula Bennett. Although one lady has already realised that her little gesture actually did little to compromise her security at all, the other is still unrepentant.

What she, the public and the MSM are forgetting is that the lady in question is a beneficiary -she lives off public money that has been forcibly extracted from taxpayers. As thus, the taxpayer has the right to know about the people they're paying for!

I suggest something like this, to be available online free of charge, for every beneficiary:

name
sex
age
marital status
no. children
which benefit they're receiving
benefit income per month
other income per month (this could be family income for stay-home mothers)
how long they've been receiving government funds.

This would not apply to pensioners, or children under the age of 18. Once an individual has stopped receiving government benefits, their information is removed from public access. Although the information will allow taxpayers to see how their money is being spent, it will not compromise the security of the beneficiaries.

The database will not include money for tax rebates.

Any beneficiary complaining about the new system will be told that they're receiving public funds; the taxpayer has the right to know who they're paying for, and make decisions accordingly.

The Place of Principals

As a consequence of the National Government’s policy to publicly display school performance data, hundreds of New Zealand Primary School Principals are threatening to boycott literacy and numeracy standards.

As a Libertarian and Objectivist, of course I do not support the governmental interference with matters that rightly belong to schools, teachers, students and parents. But as it stands we are stuck with government’s foot firmly in the door, and millions of taxpayer dollars go to fund primary schools.

As a result, those principals threatening to boycott the standards are public servants –the public has the right to know how good our schools are, as we are paying for them! The taxpayer is their benefactor, so principals have a duty to release information about school performance publicly. Of course, the information doesn't tell all details about every aspect of schooling -but the use of it is at the discretion of parents, not principals.

In a free market for education, principals would reserve the right to release information about their schools. But in a competitive marketplace, it would be a wise decision to release information, to be better able to compete for students and the business they bring. But as parents are forced, through no choice of their own, to fund schooling whether they like it or not, it is their right to choose the best school for their children.

Luckily, Education Minister Anne Tolley believes that parents do have a right to know how about school performance. But principals, in a taxpayer-funded education system, need to remember their place as servants of the public, not masters of their children.

Article:http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/2564336/Principals-in-threat-to-boycott-standards

Boscawen's Lamington

For the life of me I'm no ACT supporter, but most ACT members are still head and shoulders above other parliamentarians, one such example being John Boscawen, who led the anti EFA marches last year (which, thankfully, is history).

So, it really annoyed me when a rival candidate at the Mt Albert by-election from the "People Before Profit" Party (whatever in hell that means) went up to him and put a lamington on his head. Fortunately, some others threw food at the perpetrator.

Perhaps he should be lucky I wasn't there -I'm not sure I could resist spitting at him, or something to that degree.

EFA Repealed!

Well, this crept up on everyone. Parliament has, just this afternoon, repealed the Electoral Finance Act.

Looks like Labour saw the light, too, calling the EFA a "mistake". All parties -except the Greens, whoopdie-doo- voted for the repeal.

An excellent day for free speech in New Zealand!

Oh Yeah, They're the Government

I'm pleased I'm not the only one who needs reminding of the new National Government:

"Even Speaker Lockwood Smith stumbled when he referred to Opposition leader Phil Goff as "prime minister".

Perhaps it's because I was six years old when they attained power, but whenever I hear the word "government" I automatically think of Helen Clark and her cronies, and their associated ideology. It's rather surreal to see her as a backbencher, after having her on TV for most nights during the last nine years.

Looks like I'm not the only one, either!

Should We Get Our Hopes Up?

At his Speech From the Throne today, John Key said :

"In pursuing this goal of economic growth my Government will be guided by the principle of individual freedom and a belief in the capacity and right of individuals to shape and improve their own lives."

There are things that John Key wants to do, that will be applauded by Libertarians. However, as Lindsay Perigo notes, is it all rational to get our hopes up? There are still many anti-freedom elements to the new regime.

Nevertheless, it's still much better having a government that will actually listen to its citizenry (RE: electoral finance act, anti-smacking*) and will at least hold self-responsibility as its ideal, than the all-arrogant and all-pervasive Labour Government of 1999-2008.

*Admittedly, Key had a role to play in this as well.

The Best Thing About a National Government...

...is that, in Government, the Greens are ignored. From the article:

Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said New Zealand should be showing leadership and focus on targets not on the rules around farming and forests.

"Our actions to exclude our largest pollution sources, can only lead to other countries seeking to do the same," Dr Norman said.

"If this happens we will undermine the talks and we will be targeted as a global climate criminal. Tourism Minister John Key will oversee a great leap backwards in our tourism industry."

So, according to Russel Norman, it's perfectly alright to try and cripple New Zealand's greatest money-making industry in the name of a completely arbitrary environmental goal, which is out of our control anyway, and whose only purpose anyway is to destroy human industry and capitalism?

And it's all kind of ironic: New Zealand's emission's are 26% above 1990 levels, compared to the great satan's (US) emissions of 14%. NZ has been, over the nine years of the Clark government, emitting more than the US above 1990 levels. The Clark Government has been one of the greatest proponents of the climate change regime, yet we've done less to get our emissions down than that all-evil US.

Which tells you how much of a farce Kyoto really is.

Phil Goff: John Key

Helen Clark resigned on election night, and promised that "a new leader will be chosen before Christmas". Looks like it was already pre-chosen -Phil Goff is Labour's new leader, with Annette King taking Michael Cullen's place.

Phil Goff is on the right of the party (despite still being leftist nonetheless). After seeing John Key's win on Saturday, Labour was out looking for pragmatism, so Phil Goff was the ideal candidate (and was from the start). After all, he is not too different from John Key. Fundamentally, there is no difference between the two. Labour was merely looking for a candidate who hadn't fallen out of favour with the middle class (as the election result shows).

And where's Don Brash when you need him?

Election '08: Reflections

Finally, the effort of campaigning for the 2008 election is finally over. We have a new Prime Minister and new ruling parties. Helen Clark has resigned from her position in the Labour Party, as has Michael Cullen. Winston Peters is finally out of politics. The good thing about the large gap in the party vote (which did actually reflect the polls!) is that, even with Maori, Progressives, and the Greens, Labour could not get to the magic 62 seats needed to rule. National, however, needs only ACT to get that number.

Libertarianz got 1,070 party votes. However, as traditional supporters of Libertarian ideals wanted to vote the Labour Government out of power, we got more votes for single electorate candidates, including Richard McGrath in Wairarapa who got 419 votes -we're planning to get even more next time!

I'm pleased to see that Simon Bridges in National got such a large number of votes over Winston Peters -Bridges got twice the votes of Peters, which shows us that Tauranga is now firmly behind National. Not that anyone who turns up to his functions are under 80, anyway.

It's also good to see that ACT got a good result, to place Sir Roger Douglas and John Boscawen in Parliament -so hopefully, we can see the end of the Electoral Finance Act in the next three years, hopefully sooner rather than later.

And although he'll provide some support for the new government, I'm not particularly happy to see Peter Dunne back again -those votes should've gone to Katrina Shanks.

Also, I wasn't happy to see Central Wellington go to Grant Robertson, when it should've gone to Stephan Franks -a much better choice.

So, apart from those two gripes, I'm happy to say that this election has delivered a pleasing result. Finally, Aunty Helen is out of power -lets see if Uncle John does a better job of delivering freedom and capitalism to NZ.