Ae Marika!
A column published in the Northland Age
By Hone Harawira
Te Reo Motuhake o Te Tai Tokerau
12 April 2011

To comment on this column please go to my website www.hone.co.nz

SOMETIMES YOU CAN’T …

Back in ’81, a bunch of us hard-out, take-no-shit activists got arrested at Waitangi – along with a guy who was so green he hadn’t even had a speeding ticket before! Anyway, me and this guy bunked up in a cell together and I spent a lot of time talking him through the rigours of frontline protest action, how to handle the cops and the courts, and the importance of standing together and not allowing the cops to break us down.

We ended up marching together, standing alongside one another on the front lines, and working together on a number of projects up here in the far north as well.

Then last week I hear that he’s considering standing for the Maori Party against me, so I ring him up and he admits he is. A few days later, he tells the media he ain’t.

Sometimes you just can’t tell with people eh?

AND SOMETIMES YOU CAN …

Last week’s announcement that the government was going to bail out AMI, was a bitter bloody pill for poor people to swallow given how tough things have gotten over the past few years.

Yes, we all know there’s been a global recession, and yes, we know that governments have an obligation to take steps to reverse the economic decline.

But you’ll note that in its 2009 Budget, this government gave tax breaks and incentives to the rich, and they did it all again in 2010. And both times they paid for those tax breaks by cutting back on social spending, raising GST, flogging off mining licences to overseas interests and limiting wage increases for workers.

And then, while the poor people were struggling, government decided to bailout South Canterbury Finance to the tune of $1.7 billion.

And what are we gonna get in 2011? More of the same.

The government, with the support of the Maori Party, will be making further cuts in health, education and social services; they’ve already flogged off mining exploration licences in the Raukumara Basin (at more than twice the depth of the Gulf of Mexico disaster); they’re considering a proposal to lift GST again; they’ve announced already that wages will only be allowed to go up a measly 25c; and now they’ve announced bailouts for AMI and Mediaworks.

But why the double standard?

If poor people forget to turn up for a course or a work interview, they get their dole cut straight away.

So let the same rules apply to the big boys. If they’ve blown their money, then let them fail. And if they’ve blown investor’s money, then that’s tough luck for the investors.

If government is gonna come down hard on the poor folks who get it wrong, then they should come down hard on the rich folk who get it wrong as well – not bail them out.

It kills me to say it but it seems that “when rich people fail, poor people pay”, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw a couple more finance companies go belly up before the election.

ENDS

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