Friday, August 05, 2005
Police have held a crisis recruitment meeting after concerns that intake numbers are down 50 per cent and officers are leaving faster than can be replaced, the Police Association said today. This doesn't square with Police Minister George Hawkins assurances only a week ago that there was no problem. So who's right?
An inquiry into problems with secondary school exams blames unstable leadership and poor communication at the New Zealand Qualification Authority (NZQA). The second State Service Commission review of the education system said the leadership failures helped to create a lack of consistency in marks. It also said, following its investigation into NZQA and the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA), that the authority tried to do too much too quickly.
As a consequence, the NZQA has bowed to public pressure to record failure on externally assessed NCEA results. Acting chief Karen Sewell said yesterday that changes were under way to ensure this year's examinations were sound. She confirmed that there would be "significant changes" in the longer term. In the short term, the board had agreed to make it clear on a result certificate when a pupil had failed a particular subject, by recording it as "not achieved". NZQA's decision last year to leave that information off results was criticised and drew complaints from employers. Failure in external assessment was recorded only on a website accessible to pupils.
Christchurch City councillors have ignored legal advice and will appeal against a High Court decision quashing their prostitution bylaw, leaving ratepayers to foot more legal bills. Although top law firm Simpson Grierson rated the appeal's chance of success at just 25 per cent, councillors yesterday voted nine to two in favour of appealing against Justice Panckhurst's decision removing the council's geographical controls on brothels.
The alienation felt by young blacks and Asians in the UK is not a result of any intolerance shown towards them, but of the endless tolerance of those who would allow everything and stand up for nothing. It is the excesses permitted by a culture spawned by the liberal Left that have produced a generation that feels rootless and hopeless. The young crave noble purposes as children need discipline; neither get much of them in modern Britain and the void is filled by disrespect, fecklessness, mindless nihilism or, worse, wicked militancy.
This is the world Britain has lost. Once, football crowds sang “Abide with Me” or “Bread of Heaven”; today they sing songs full of thoughtless blasphemies, obscenities, and thought-out sexual and racial abuse to upset their opponents. Regular attendance at Sunday School was a standard part of most people’s youth, and it was the place where standards of respectability were inculcated. Britain’s was a society with a remarkably low and falling incidence of violent and acquisitive crime, illegitimacy, and addiction to opiates. Public drunkenness was a problem, but it was gradually ceasing to be so; by the 1920s it had all but disappeared.
When civil society disintegrates, the state has to step in to do what character and virtues once did. In the UK, the government plans to introduce a national ID card, which is running into a lot of flak. Only yesterday the government's own data protection watchdog said the ID card scheme could turn Britain into a "surveillance society". Information Commissioner Richard Thomas condemned the project as "excessive and disproportionate", adding that it would allow civil servants to build a detailed picture of how every adult lives their lives.
Breast implants for 18-year-olds? Hymen reconstructions? Rape-themed fashion collections? Don't tell Sheila Jeffreys these are signs of female liberation. Jeffreys, a revolutionary lesbian feminist, is pursuing her 30-odd-year mission to shift women out of their collective complacency. "Beauty And Misogyny" is her sixth book. Like the others, its central theme is an exploration of the use of sexuality by men to dominate women. Much of it is spent arguing that beauty practices - from make-up to breast implants - should be redefined as harmful cultural practices, rather than being seen as a liberating choice. [There are times radical feminists and conservatives share the same conclusions, although for very different reasons.]
I'm just getting used to cell phones that do almost everything but make telephone calls. Now we have sunglasses that play music and work with cell phones.
Two years ago South Africa looked a spent force in Rugby. Two years ago at the World Cup New Zealand looked a spent force. No-one would think that of either team now. The clash of the two tomorrow is shaping up to be the Rugby highlight of the year, after the damp squib of the Lions tour. The test of greatness will be which team can win on the other's home territory. Success in the TriNations this year may well be determined by the number of bonus points they can pick up. It's a bit strange that victory may go to the team which loses by the least rather than wins the most. But that's the modern game! Incidentally, for some insight into the amazing technicality of today's game, this article on scrummaging is a stopper. I wish my father - who was an All Black trialist hooker - were still alive to give me his insights into this.
An inquiry into problems with secondary school exams blames unstable leadership and poor communication at the New Zealand Qualification Authority (NZQA). The second State Service Commission review of the education system said the leadership failures helped to create a lack of consistency in marks. It also said, following its investigation into NZQA and the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA), that the authority tried to do too much too quickly.
As a consequence, the NZQA has bowed to public pressure to record failure on externally assessed NCEA results. Acting chief Karen Sewell said yesterday that changes were under way to ensure this year's examinations were sound. She confirmed that there would be "significant changes" in the longer term. In the short term, the board had agreed to make it clear on a result certificate when a pupil had failed a particular subject, by recording it as "not achieved". NZQA's decision last year to leave that information off results was criticised and drew complaints from employers. Failure in external assessment was recorded only on a website accessible to pupils.
Christchurch City councillors have ignored legal advice and will appeal against a High Court decision quashing their prostitution bylaw, leaving ratepayers to foot more legal bills. Although top law firm Simpson Grierson rated the appeal's chance of success at just 25 per cent, councillors yesterday voted nine to two in favour of appealing against Justice Panckhurst's decision removing the council's geographical controls on brothels.
The alienation felt by young blacks and Asians in the UK is not a result of any intolerance shown towards them, but of the endless tolerance of those who would allow everything and stand up for nothing. It is the excesses permitted by a culture spawned by the liberal Left that have produced a generation that feels rootless and hopeless. The young crave noble purposes as children need discipline; neither get much of them in modern Britain and the void is filled by disrespect, fecklessness, mindless nihilism or, worse, wicked militancy.
This is the world Britain has lost. Once, football crowds sang “Abide with Me” or “Bread of Heaven”; today they sing songs full of thoughtless blasphemies, obscenities, and thought-out sexual and racial abuse to upset their opponents. Regular attendance at Sunday School was a standard part of most people’s youth, and it was the place where standards of respectability were inculcated. Britain’s was a society with a remarkably low and falling incidence of violent and acquisitive crime, illegitimacy, and addiction to opiates. Public drunkenness was a problem, but it was gradually ceasing to be so; by the 1920s it had all but disappeared.
When civil society disintegrates, the state has to step in to do what character and virtues once did. In the UK, the government plans to introduce a national ID card, which is running into a lot of flak. Only yesterday the government's own data protection watchdog said the ID card scheme could turn Britain into a "surveillance society". Information Commissioner Richard Thomas condemned the project as "excessive and disproportionate", adding that it would allow civil servants to build a detailed picture of how every adult lives their lives.
Breast implants for 18-year-olds? Hymen reconstructions? Rape-themed fashion collections? Don't tell Sheila Jeffreys these are signs of female liberation. Jeffreys, a revolutionary lesbian feminist, is pursuing her 30-odd-year mission to shift women out of their collective complacency. "Beauty And Misogyny" is her sixth book. Like the others, its central theme is an exploration of the use of sexuality by men to dominate women. Much of it is spent arguing that beauty practices - from make-up to breast implants - should be redefined as harmful cultural practices, rather than being seen as a liberating choice. [There are times radical feminists and conservatives share the same conclusions, although for very different reasons.]
I'm just getting used to cell phones that do almost everything but make telephone calls. Now we have sunglasses that play music and work with cell phones.
Two years ago South Africa looked a spent force in Rugby. Two years ago at the World Cup New Zealand looked a spent force. No-one would think that of either team now. The clash of the two tomorrow is shaping up to be the Rugby highlight of the year, after the damp squib of the Lions tour. The test of greatness will be which team can win on the other's home territory. Success in the TriNations this year may well be determined by the number of bonus points they can pick up. It's a bit strange that victory may go to the team which loses by the least rather than wins the most. But that's the modern game! Incidentally, for some insight into the amazing technicality of today's game, this article on scrummaging is a stopper. I wish my father - who was an All Black trialist hooker - were still alive to give me his insights into this.
