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Apology to Barnsley Bill

by Whaleoil on March 3, 2010

State Control in NZBarnsley was right, I was…that word that starts with w and ends in g.

Steven Joyce has gone rogue and is starting to make the She-Beast and the other members of the Heleban look like angels from heaven.

First he banned cellphone use in cars, then he wants zero tolerance for under 20′s driving, even though they can legally buy piss at 18, and now he raised the driving age to 16.

WTF is this a Police State, I’m starting to think that even Bomber and Tim Selwyn are onto something with their ranting.

We elected this government to get the nanny state away, not for more of it. I was with Steven Joyce on the zero tolerance and now I see that Barnsley Bill was right. This is just another impinging of our civil liberties from a party that should know better.

Quite how this matches the vision and values of the National Party is beyond me. How are these law changes compatible with Individual freedom and choice, Personal responsibility and Limited government.

I think that “Smile and Wave” Key and “cardinal Richlieu” Joyce have got this one dead wrong. Way to go guys piss off the entire rural sector plus a few hundred thousand 14 year olds that will be voting soon.

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  • peter

    My friend all cats are the same colour in the dark…Thts the problem with NZ, the difference between Labour and National isn’t really all that great..

  • Brian Smaller

    My 14 and a hlaf year old son is somewhat pissed off. We live in a rural area and now his chances of finding and getting to any sort of school holiday work is nil unless I give up my job to become a taxi service. National – you are pissing more than a few people off.

  • sportcar

    Get some accuracy here WO! Helebad was about BANNING cell phones on cars – hands free use is totally different!
    But raising the driving age doesn’t make sense! That IS nannystatism.

  • http://nominister.blogspot.com Barnsley Bill

    A thousand screenshots of that post title have been saved.
    Now then.
    Rogue?
    Nope. This fucker has gone Rouge.
    So bad is this prick that if you gave him a silver wig, hacked off one of his legs and gave him a bigger cock he would be the reincarnated margaret wilson.

    The problem of course is that when you drip all these little changes out over the course of three years the lumpen masses do not notice. Each little change is all a bit hohum when looked at in isolation but if they brought them all in at once we would scream and shout.

  • petal

    Isn’t it great that WO still has this youthful naivete? Personally I knew that there would be little difference with the HUGE exception that the lying, stealing and cheating would abate for 2 or 3 terms.

    Also, it seems odd to MPs that once there, we want them to do very little. Instead they go off on their personal crusades (Banning Uranium enriched munitions has to be a great use of an MP’s time and government resources), and this innate need to ‘fix things’.

    People die. Youth is stupid. Get over it. No need to use the law to try and control nature.

  • Dr Gonzo

    Actually John Key is just keeping his promise to catch up to Australia. Oz have a higher driving age than NZ and a zero young driver blood alcohol limit, (believe me, rural in Oz is truly, long-distance rural, and they cope). They also have far far fewer road deaths than NZ, though I don’t see any of you whinging about how Oz is such a nanny state!
    In fact, “nanny state” has become an all-purpose label for things that you don’t like but can’t mount a rational argument against and which the rest of the western world has had for decades…

  • http://nominister.blogspot.com Barnsley Bill

    OZ has 20 million people and a world class roading network.

  • Mike

    I have an idea, WALKING!!! jeezuz its like the car is some essential tool that kids have to have, driving is not a right – so this law change can’t be impinging on it. And to those people saying rural kids have to have cars thats bullshit – what for?? If they are so far out that they HAVE to drive somewhere for work, what jobs are they doing that would make the trip and associated costs of owning a vehicle worth it? Get a grip people ffs.

  • Brian Smaller

    Mike – my son may need to go 30-40km to the farm that gives him employment in the holidays. Walk? Are you kidding? Ride? With the gear he may need for his job? My son wants to work so he can raise money for 1) personal purchases and 2) to save for university.

  • Deb

    I was born and raised NZ rural, and I can tell you that the number of boys I went to school with who killed themselves on country roads is the stuff of legends and heartache.

    When you have a child you are charged with their care until the age of majority. You’ve done it lovingly for 15 years, so why the hell should an extra year of ferrying a kid around cramp Farmer Joe’s lifestyle. We want what is best for our kids and in my opinion it is in their interest and society’s that they are at least 16 before they take a car on a public road.

    It’s not Nanny State to raise the age, it’s common sense.

  • Ted Danson

    Brian Smaller, how can your 14.5 year old son drive legally anyway?

  • http://nominister.blogspot.com Barnsley Bill

    Deb, your comment summs up my theory perfectly.
    Firstly. I agree with you 100%.
    But, try looking at the wider issue. Each and every thing that Joyce changes can be looked at as a sensible move. But it is not one thing, he has been squeezing and removing activities constantly since he walked in on the list.
    For the last 20 years in this country we seem to be constantly told what we cannot do. And the list of things that ordinary kiwis are now forbidden to do grows like a snowball running down hill.

  • Mike

    Brian – My point remains, what job is he going to do at 15 that is going to give him enough money to pay for an 80km round trip to work as well as keep a vehicle maintained and insured? If you live that far out is it safe to assume you are a farmer or live around farmers? surely there is something he can do around the home or nearby that would help? Or perhaps you could drop him off as Deb suggests.

  • Brian Smaller

    Ted Danson – I never said he was driving now. As it is he is driving around the paddocks now like most country kids do. He will be 15 in five months. If this law is changed before his birthday it will be another year before he can get his license.

    Mike – Lets see. Crutching, dagging, drenching and shearing, work on orchards. The sheep jobs can be good earners if you pump through the numbers. I am not a farmer but have a small-holding and I don’t give my kids pay to do household chores that keep us alive. I also work in Wellington, whcih means I am away from home 3 days a week so dropping him off will be impossible.

    This whole thing is about level headed kids getting penalised for the actions of a few morons.

  • Debbie2

    This is politicking at its worst. None of these changes are going to make a bit of difference to reducing the road toll. Never has a government flopped around “looking” to be doing so much while achieving so little. It is nanny state interference under the facade of strong governance. National have become pros at appearing to be making the hard calls, but it is all window dressing. Like the government before them they believe they know what is best for us, but unlike the government before them they don’t have the courage to admit that is what they are doing. Cowards the lot of them.

  • Ted Danson

    Brian Smaller: you must drive under supervision on a learners licence anyway. So even if the age stayed where it was, he couldn’t legally drive himself to work until he is on his restricted.
    I hear what you’re saying – he won’t be able to drive to work on his learners licence either way and under the new rules will have to wait another year. I don’t mean to be offensive, but that’s just tough luck. A minority will be inconvenienced if the driving age is raised to 16 but it will benefit far more people who don’t get maimed or killed.

  • Rumpole

    The point really is driving ability and the NZ practical test is woefully inadequate as evidenced by the poor driving standards visible daily of many age groups/gender/ethnicity, in Christchurch at least.Stop dealing with effects National and sort out the cause that way you prevent the disease rather than try and cure it.

  • http://steve@rosenorth.co.nz Tayhei Notts

    Leave the driving age at 15, but make it illegal to drive in cities until you are 17.
    Most importantly though, enforce the laws and their penalties in an extremely vigilant manner. Like, make it illegal to use a mobile telephone while you have unpaid fines. Confiscate the phones, cars etc until the fines are paid. Student loans should be unobtainable by anybody with unpaid fines. Similarly social welfare benefits.
    The write off of fines has done more to reduce the young peoples’ respect for our laws than any amount of silly policing will ever do.

  • tim

    The question is why are 15 year olds crashing? I think it’s mainly because they are speeding or driving drunk. Raising the driving age is not going to solve this issue. It will just shift the problem to 16 year olds. Next thing you know it the age will probably move up to 17,18,21. We can’t keep moving up the age for things like this. Just searched for steven joyce on facebook and found a ‘Steven Joyce has gone rogue’ page:

    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10150113679035082

  • kehua

    Brian Smaller, I too live in an area pretty much like yours and I can tell you that all those wiggles and donuts on the tarseal at every straight and at every intersection were most likely created by drunken teenagers prepared to kill your son and mine for the sake of `a bit of fun`. Are you really prepared to send a 15 year old child into that scenario? After all it will most probably be your wife who answers the door to the cop, as you pontificate from Wgtn.I support both moves ,I just wish Joyce had had the balls to make `zero tolerance` universal. Boy would that have caused some sqeals.