CAN’T SHE SEE IT?

Fascinating to see that Poto Williams, the hapless Associate Minister for Housing, reacting to the sustained pressure by National’s Nicola Willis regarding Kainga Ora tenants gone feral, has reversed her previous ‘no eviction’ policy and announced that she has directed Kainga Ora to use the ‘three strikes’ complaint scheme provided for in the Residential Tenancies Act to evict tenants who terrorise their neighbours.

The irony of that decision must have escaped her. Here she is directing a three strikes solution at the same time her government is moving to repeal the three strikes provision in the criminal jurisdiction with Labour saying three strikes doesn’t work.

Funny if it weren’t so sad.

New Zealand … the way you’ve got it.

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RIGHTS VS RESPONSIBILITY

A little while ago I authored a post lamenting the demise of personal responsibility under Labour. The commitment to people being required to take personal responsibility for their actions is a major distinguishing feature between National and Labour.

And so it is that we read yet again at https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300469297/brawls-and-police-raids-living-next-door-to-members-of-rival-gangs of rival gang members occupying Kianga Ora housing attacking each other and terrorising other residents. So much for the concept of ‘quiet enjoyment’.

And we have to assume Mark Rawson, the Waikato Regional Director for Kianga Ora, was speaking for the government when he said in the article that ‘the agency did not discriminate against those who were connected to different groups in society, and who were equally part of the community with the right to a home’ and further ‘that eviction was a last resort and experience had shown it did not solve problems, because people still needed a house.

What tosh.

You do not have a right to a Kianga Ora home. You apply for it. There’s a waiting list. Being allocated a state house is a privilege which comes with a reduced rental matched to income compared with those private sector rentals and (now) a lifetime tenancy unrelated to changed personal circumstances. With the privilege comes obligations … to pay one’s rent; maintain the property and be a good neighbour. Abuse that privilege and you’re out on the street and good luck with finding alternative accommodation. There will be more deserving tenants on the wait list ready and eager for the chance to better themselves.

And what about the kids? Yes, that’s an issue but the power to fix the problem rests entirely with the parent. Modify your anti social behavior or reap the consequences. It’s called taking personal responsibility. St Jacinda may bang on about being kind but taking personal responsibility for ones actions trumps that any day in my book. Actually I care more about vulnerable neighbours left afraid and hanging and devoid of hope that Kainga Ora will come to their rescue anytime soon.

I strongly suspect the increasing debacle around the management of Kainga Ora housing will become an election issue.

Not the way their lives should end

Over at Chris Trotter’s blog, Bowalley Road, he recently had a post on the problems that state housing provider Kāinga Ora (KO) is having with “unruly tenants”.

Specifically the problems they’re having with gang members terrorising their neighbours, often very aged neighbours, and the seemingly complete inability of KO to do anything about it. Chris claims that it’s a case of the Labour Minister, Poto Williams, being “entirely captured by her officials”.

No! It is the entirely logical outcome of a modern Left-wing approach to crime that sees criminals as merely a by-product of a bad society, who cannot and should not be punished further.

To that end I saw a comment there from one “Swordfish”, which Chris did not publish but advised to be taken to reporters. Being somewhat familiar with the commentator I tracked him down to his blog, Subzero Politics (which I don’t frequent), and specifically the story of his parents and KO. I won’t re-produce the whole thing here but hopefully the NZ blogosphere will spread this wide enough that the MSM might take an interest in it. It’s horrifying.

My Parents (aged 90 & 91) have been forced to endure 4 years of constant, prolonged violent intimidation and extreme anti-social behaviour (the latter including being very regularly kept awake until dawn, sometimes over 2 or 3 consecutive days) from the Kainga Ora tenant on the other side of their dividing-wall in a two-house Unit (My Parents have lived in their house for almost 60 years & have owned it since the 1970s).

His parents have been driven into a very poor state of health as a result of all this, largely coming from one man, with assistance from an occasional friend of his. “Swordfish” has kept a detailed diary of events and there have been multiple calls to the Police.

Based on my diary entires, my Parents have suffered precisely 116 – let me repeat that … 116 !!! – really large-scale explosions of violent intimidation since their neighbouring tenant arrived in late 2017. Together with several hundred mid-level, more minor & sporadic acts of violence & intimidation. The latter occur on an almost daily basis, except when he is away. This tenant has always been very violent & aggressive in his everyday behaviour, clearly a deeply-ingrained facet of his personality. 

These have involved violent confrontations with others, sometimes out on the street, with what can only be described as insane behaviour inside his own house, which apparently shares a concrete brick wall with the parents. In the last three years his rage has been directly aimed at the parents.

In the very worst of the Major Explosions (and there have been 7 of these = out of 18), in the midst of his multi-hour intimidation, he has gone right along their fenceline, down to their letterbox & driveway, aggressively strutting back & forth straight outside their house, violently swearing & making loud threats – just the most blatant violent intimidation – interspersed with loud declarations of dominance / fighting prowess (essentially Maori Warrior-style ‘Proclaiming’) … and on 3 separate occasions he has actually rushed onto their front lawn in the middle of his explosion & vandalised their property (in one of the worst cases, for instance, smashing their concrete fence with a sledgehammer at 2am.

But there’s been plenty going on inside his house, at all hours of the day. “Swordfish” lists some of these activities, including:

1) Uber-Violent slamming into the dividing-wall with full force (punching, thumping, pounding and full body-slamming)

(2) Throwing very heavy objects or weights at the dividing-wall with full force (we don’t know exactly what the objects are but the noise is always so shocking that it sounds like some kind of heavy steel builder’s tool or similar … like something really heavy & substantial being thrown or slammed into the wall with full force … like he’s trying to smash a hole right through the dividing-wall … just makes my Parents jump 10 feet in the air with total shock)

(3) Driving large or heavy objects (presumably the same things as above) into the bedroom floorboards with all his strength

(4) Doing very aggressive haka-like stomping in the bedroom right next to the dividing-wall with full force … clearly aiming to scare & intimidate.
….

Twice his parents were so terrified that they fled to their neighbours across the road to phone the cops.

To me, one of the saddest aspects is the following:

My Parents are not only lifelong Labour voters but also long-term Party members with a long family history in the Labour Movement … they’ve been viciously betrayed by this Govt … having voted Left all my life, I swung into Non-Voting at the last Election.

I cannot help thinking this is the experience of many older Labour voters (and in the USA, older Democrat voters), who do not realise just how fundamentally their Left-wing parties have changed. These sad old people have been let down by almost every arm of the government (save the healthcare system) in every way in their twilight years. If even the cops are powerless then what hope is there for these people, and many others like them, judging by other stories?

What a hell of a way to end up and it will not just be Left-wingers who end up being betrayed. I can only hope that I’ll have enough wealth in my latter days that I won’t be reduced to depending on our governments in any way in the future.

SORRY … I STILL THINK BEING GIVEN A STATE HOUSE IS A PRIVILEGE NOT TO BE ABUSED

In the 1950’s I, like many New Zealanders, grew up in a State House. My parents got it new and eventually purchased it outright thanks to the Holyoake government. I know it was an article of faith with them that they paid their rent on time and equally, that they maintained the house to the highest standard. For the record and come election time dad tramped the streets for Labour while mum remained a devout Tory … but that’s another story.

But I know dad would have rebelled at this story about Kainga Ora. A State House turned into a gang pad with party goers terrorising the neighborhood including threatening to kill the elderly couple next door and Kainga Ora refusing to evict per courtesy of a change in government policy. All part of Ardern’s determination to be kind to ferals and f**k the rest.

Does anyone think the situation is going to improve any time soon? New Zealand, the way you’ve got it.