I'm a Bit Green

 

As you know, I am presently in the UK and travelling always has one comparing apples with oranges when it comes to the differences other countries have with us in Godzone down under.

There have been many.  From the foods in the UK, to the supermarkets, food, cars, housing and prices, interest rates, Pommie habits, restaurants, pubs, governments, transport, weather!, dogs, cyclists … the list can go on. 

However, on this trip one of the standout comparisons has been related to green issues.  Farming issues, food supply issues, recycling issues, pollutions issues, vegetarian/vegan/carnivorous issues – and general air-that-we-breath environmental issues.

Any topic of environment is an enormous topic – with hundreds of sub-topics – far, far too many for this mere minion to spout views on.  But for today’s purpose I want to share with you my thoughts on just one aspect that has taken my focus for the almost four decades I have travelled here.

That’s renewable energy.

Yes, it sounds a boring topic.  And it is.  But too bad.

You see, in 1985 I visited North Wales for the first time and when my hosts took me walking to the top of a beautiful Welsh hill range to see the view they had long ago boasted of – their village nestled on the coast line of the North Sea in the Atlantic – we reached the summit look out point and I looked out seaward to take in the glorious vista of the Welsh coastline.

Well, what should have been glorious vista was blotted by the sight of oil rigs – rigs way out there on the ocean horizon.  Great big, smoke billowing structures.  It horrified me.  Yet to my UK friends oil rigs on the ocean’s horizon had been the norm for some decades, they didn’t ever notice them.  Besides, I was in Wales after all, the country of slate and coal mines where environments had been massacred for centuries.  They were somewhat surprised at my naïve reaction to seeing only the rigs and not the beauty of the coastline.

Twenty years later in the early 2000s I walked up the same hills to the same view and was confronted not by the oil rigs I was expecting to see but by the insane ugliness of ocean installed wind turbines - mile upon mile upon mile of wind turbines sitting out in that North Sea.  Neat rows and rows of them – perpendicular rows – parallel rows – this way – and that way.  Row upon row.  Mile upon mile.

Visual graffiti – on our natural world.

Now, I know the world has to look at alternative options of resources.  And I know that wind turbines are now infiltrating our own eco systems in various parts of New Zealand – one trip from Palmerston North to Wellington educates one on that - and I know that to environmentalists and even those not really into the environmental med-care see turbines as a ‘reasonable’ alternative to the environmental issues that coal and gas burning is doing to New Zealand ozone and to the global warming issues of the world.

But no matter how much I try to analyse it I cannot accept the ugliness, the environmental noise and the environmental impact these power source structures are giving us.

Then last week I took a train journey from the north of England to London.  It’s a journey I have done many, many times over the years – and have loved.  The train (electric) is fast, efficient and takes one through glorious English countryside – looking out the train window one is treated to views of pastoral England, of canals with their pretty canal boats channelling through the many locks.  One enjoys the quick glimpses of the pretty and historic villages, the castles, the rolling hills with three- to four-hundred-year-old stone walls.

And now, that same countryside has great big, ugly wind turbines on the hillside horizons, for mile after mile.  And added to that – on the fields below are acre upon acre …  of solar panels.  All low lying to the ground.  Hundreds of metres long, row after row after row – field after field after field of them.

Not quite the visual pollution of the wind turbines, but certainly green spaces taking up valuable land space that now cannot have any other use.

Yes – outwardly it seems the UK is doing its bit toward greenhouse gases by installing these power generating mechanisms.  But.  At what cost? 

I wanted to learn that turbines and solar panel had nothing but positive outcomes for all that would far outweigh my negative attitude towards them.

Greatest thoughts to me was that if one had to have such ugly structures on the landscapes why not build them so many miles out to sea that the public did not have them in eyeshot?

Since first seeing the oil rigs those decades ago, and then latterly the wind turbines, and learning of oil rigs and turbines in New Zealand my interest in them escalated substantially.  I recall researching wind turbine information in the British papers on subsequent visits here and collected quite a bit of information that the average person would never have been told about them.  Some good and some not so good – dependent on who wrote the articles and for whom.  One interesting fact was that British farmers were receiving government funded subsidies in the 80’s, 90’s and early 2000’s for each turbine on their land.  At one point a large turbine was returning up to 40,000 British pounds per turbine to a farmer.  Subsidies are not a factor today – but no need to as the farmers made their fortunes in those early turbine days.

Nowadays the farmers do receive rental payments for the land the turbines sit on. 

As is the case with solar panel fields.  Farmers receive a substantial rental fee from the UK government for the area usage that solar paneling takes. 

Easier life for the farmers than the daily chore of going out early mornings to round up and milk the cows.

Other factors that stand out: One ocean bound wind turbine requires 900 tons of steel, 2,500 tons of concrete and 45 tons of nonrecyclable plastic.  Google it.  I have.  Steel and concrete and nonrecyclable plastics that are sourced, made, manufactured somewhere in the world – in foundries that burn gases and oils for manufacturing; slave labour – particularly for any lithium that are often used in solar panels (but that’s another topic all together!).

Wind turbines, have a life span of 20 to 25 years.  That steel, that concrete that nonrecylable plastics – what happens to it?  It’s dismantled and whilst the steel can be recycled a great amount of it is taken to … land fill.  And EVERY blade on a wind turbine is NON recyclable as it is made up with resin/plastic componentry rendering them totally unreusable.

I found a great BBC article yesterday showing photos of a wind turbine blade grave yard.  Huge, huge, deep, deep landfills.

And solar power panels.  What is their life span?  25 years.  So all these fields of panels I saw on my train trip will have to be disposed of in 25 years.  Can they be reused?  No.  It will all go to landfill.

There are toxic materials inside the solar cells.  It is cheaper for suppliers to discard them in landfills.  Where their toxic metals can leech out into the environment.

Look – I’m being very general in my comments – but rest assured, I have sat for hours over the years and especially these past few days reading various articles on the positive and negatives of both wind turbines and solar cells – but despite all the varying views from the manufacturers, the green environmentalists, the politicians, the marketers – there is no way of denying there is – OR WILL be major issues when it comes to disposal of these products – the very things that are manufactured to save our environment.

I am placated to some degree that we in New Zealand have hydro damns and geothermal resources that we are still developing.  Long may they continue.  But our country is going enthusiastically down the line of wind turbines and solar.

Of course, nuclear is the one power resource many of the Brits and Americans say we will have to eventually succumb to.  That sends me off on another tangent altogether. 

Britain has 11 operational nuclear reactors – supplying Brits with power – it churns my insides out.  May it never be a New Zealand option.

And the end product of nuclear radioactive waste – goes to landfill!

I’m not professing to have any solutions – if I did I’d be a multi-billionaire – but us switching to these renewable energy resources is not as simple as many are making it out to be.  Often quite the opposite.  There is a cost.

I am quite concerned a good number of Kiwis are not aware of these simple facts.  Support alternative options of power source, but don’t do it without educating oneself on all the pros and cons. 

Even if a little research has one or two rethink their own power needs - maybe if it stops one person of complaining about cyclists getting on bikes and riding to work instead of driving.  Maybe if one or two more people cycled or walked instead of driving that motor car – gas fueled or electric.  If some got rid of the electric heated that spa pool, spend less time on that play station, pc or motor boat.  Hang the washing out on a line instead of using the dryer.

 

And think – if someone rode their bicycle twice – it would count as recycling.

 

We all have to do our bit for the environment. And there are many ways we can save energy.  Lately I’ve been using the couch.

Party Political Broadcast

 

This is not a party political broadcast.

But read it anyway!

 

Being here in the UK it has been interesting waking every morning, making a cuppa and catching up with the New Zealand newspapers on my pc.

Of course, it’s evening time in New Zealand when I am reading the papers, not that that is relevant to anything, but always makes me feel quite weird that I am living in a Tardis time machine and living in my own past.

I confess that the NZ newspaper headlines over the past few weeks has made for deeply depressing reading first thing in my morning.

Gang violence.  Drive by shootings. Gang utu. Bodies found. Murder investigations.  Murder convictions.  Police shootings. Grandmother killed.  Manslaughter.  Drug deaths. Drug rings.  Sex convictions.

It’s all rather appalling, depressing and even embarrassing to read from afar.  Guess in some ways I should be pleased to be away from it all. 

I know of some who will say, ‘then don’t read it’.  Because I know those who won’t read anything they’d rather not know about.  I confess to doing so with many articles on the Russian invasion of the Ukraine.  But I do go back later and ensure I am up to date with the reality there.  It is stupid to bury one’s head in the sand and avoiding acknowledging and learning what is happening in the world around you.  That’s with anything negative that one does not wish to learn about.  It does not make for an informed, balanced you.

There are none more ignorant than those who want to be ignorant.

So at 6 a.m. my time this morning I made my cuppa and began reading latest NZ Herald online issue.  And there was one rather different headline today that took my initial attention.

In fact, there were two rather different but similar headlines in the papers I have read today.  One in the NZ paper and one in a British paper today that had me simmer a little.

I shall address the NZ Herald headline first:

 ‘First-home buyers face potential $1000 monthly rise in mortgage payments’.

I have been following a number of such articles this year as it does relate to factors facing my immediate family.  One son is having to re-mortgage his family home and the other is mortgaging for the first time.  Hence these financial articles hit a personal nerve of mine.  So much so I find them almost as repugnant reading as the other negative, crime-ridden headlines.

Today’s headline reminded me that a year ago the average interest rate was 3.3%.  At todays market it averages 4.63%.  Of course the rates are dependent on the term of the loans.  But the change in interest rates does mean that a borrower could now be paying around $1,000+ a month MORE than a year ago. 

It seems so very numbing.

In saying that, I do keep reminding those who will listen that as a young mother with one baby my husband and I purchased our first house and were paying an 18.5% interest rate – and that we felt good about due to many of our friends having to pay over 20%. 

On top of that, many, and if I recall correctly, including my husband and I, also had a second mortgage to enable us to get into our first ever subdivisional square-boxed, fibrolite, tin roofed home.  At that same high interest rate. 

The past few years have had me ride that roller coaster ride my sons have had in endeavouring to purchase their first homes.  Yes, prices of homes have risen exorbitantly high.  Yet mortgage rates had been getting lower and lower. 

Housing and getting the new generation into houses has been a major topic of general conversation for those past same years. 

Newspapers, financiers, builders, government officials have highlighted and headlined the difficulties the Gen X, Y, Z or whatever the younger generation is now called have had and are having in getting themselves into their first homes.

I am not going to go anywhere near the argument many have heard me spout before – about life and expectations now as opposed to the 18-24% generation of interest payers I was in.  It’s a blog or speech many have already heard.

But what has always been highlighted in my mind when these conversations come up is the lack of government assistance to those who desperately want and need to get into their own homes.

This government, and the previous, have and do rant on about the difficulties of young couples and families in being able to afford homes that are rising in value by the hour.

Yet they are doing and have done nothing about it. 

Apart from the good old Winston’s Kiwisaver scheme, there is no other government, or socialistic assistance or encouragement for these desperately search and striving families to be able to secure their own roofs over their heads.

Why not?  And thank God for Winston!

So.

Think back to post Second World War years, post depression times.

In 1936 the government of the time renamed a mortgage arm they already had in place to The State Advances Corporation. 

The State Advances Corporation was a government mortgage scheme initially set up to aid ex-servicemen and their families into their own homes.  At that time the government mortgage had an interest rate of 3%.

Over the years State Advances Corporation evolved to include any civilians on small incomes to gain a government 3% loan enabling them to purchase a house.  It was still at a 3% interest rate in the early 1960’s when the market interest rates were between 4.5 to 5.5%.  It was government assistance for those who needed it to buy their first homes.

At that time there was also something called Child Benefit (or Family Benefit) where all families with children were given a weekly government benefit for each child they had.    

Should the family still not have enough equity and mortgage available to get into their own home, the government would allow the family to ‘capitalise’ the family benefit to add yet more assistance in financing their new home.

This is exactly how my parents purchased their first ever home in 1968 in Mangere Central.  They used the government loan assistance, plus capitalised the family benefit they were getting for me and my younger sister.

Many people with families who had been unable to save enough to bridge the gap between the cost of a house and the loan limit were actually able to obtain a house.  And those families who were slow savers no longer had to wait.

So.

Why, if the government/governments who profess to really care and worry about their ever increasing number of homeless or those who cannot afford to buy their own homes not establish exactly what the governments of the 1930’s did?

They already pay monies out to those on low incomes to assist with rent.  And low income families do received a Working for Families grant.  So why not use these payments as the system used to do?

ASSIST PEOPLE NOW into getting into their own homes.

Instead of it being payments literally going into a bottomless pit, make it payments that goes into roofs over their heads. 

And this brings me to the second newspaper headline in today’s paper that caught my attention.  This time in a British paper, The Times.

              ‘Johnson to let benefit claimants buy homes’.

Hurrah!  Exactly what I’ve been discussing above.

Boris has come up with this brilliant idea.  An idea that our post-war New Zealand government initiated and successfully implemented.  For decades.

The Labour government of 1936.

Michael Joseph Savage was the NZ Prime Minister.  The infamous (and I say that with the greatest of respect) Finance Minister, Sir Walter Nash. 

Those men and that government – and I repeat and remind you, it was a Labour government – set New Zealanders on the road to home ownership by establishing the State Advances Corporation; and also the Labour government who put Family Benefit into action.  (If you really knew your NZ political history you could say it was a government back in 1885, long before Labour & National parties existed, that initiated something that eventually evolved into Family Benefit).

Boris is saying in today’s newspapers that he thinks lower paid workers should be able to use their housing benefits their government already gives them to pay their present rents, and use them to buy homes. 

Boris wants to change the rules so people can use welfare payments to get mortgages.  Is this a new world thought!?  No.  New Zealand USED to do it.

The UK has 30 BILLION pounds a year in benefits to its citizens helping them pay rent.  Why not use it to pay a mortgage? 

The article – it’s truly interesting – it’s almost replicated in what our previous governments used to do.

Goodness knows how many billions of NZ dollars the Kiwi taxpayers pay in rental allowances to beneficiaries and those on low incomes.  PLUS the Working For Families benefit is pays to the low income households.

Look – you may think this reads as a political party broadcast for the Labour Party.  By a stalwart.

It is far from that.  I’m criticising this present Labour government for NOT doing it. 

And nor has the opposition parties come up with anything remotely aligned to helping those trying to get into new homes.

This blog is a call for many or all of you to – think about it.

Why hasn’t this government, the one who has campaigned on helping those that need help, actually done something real, something substantial to help those who are now falling further and further back on the list of possible home stability?

I stew on how much money has been literally wasted these past years on inane, vague schemes and systems that are put into place to help but a few of our disassociated members of our society.

And stew all the more when I read almost buried articles on nepotism among our government head where family members have been awarded tens of thousands of dollars for vague schemes and ideas that we will never see a defined outcome.

Want to get the homeless and low income earners and families into homes? Stop political point scoring on issues that should be down on the list – and address one of the most important ones.

Labour Party.  National Party.  Green Party.  Maori Party.  Act Party.  Whatever Other Party.

Help the growing percentage of your constituents who feel so helplessly helpless in being able to get their own roofs over their heads.  Do something like the 1930's, 1940's, 1950's, 1960's governments did - helping Kiwis.

               

Kick That Bucket .... list

Don’t ever tell me about your bucket list. 

Ever!

Kick your bucket list!

I absolutely loathe the term ‘bucket list’.

It bugs me hugely. 

I hear folk using that term so often.  Its connotation is contagious, death-defying.

What it literally means is one consciously sits and writes down a list of things to do BEFORE YOU DIE!! 

Before you kick the bucket!

For goodness sake, why on earth would you be preparing for death by writing your ‘bucket list’??

Want to write a list of things you want to do, then do it NOW, before you even begin to thing of dying. 

Why wait until you know you are going to die before writing a ‘bucket list’?

I’ve heard folk in their 20s and 30s talking about “… it’s on my bucket list…”  For heaven’s sake. Don’t you know what that connotation means?  You’re anticipating your death already?

Oh what a positive outlook to have in your 20’s and 30’s….

I’ve had folk tell me recently, ‘it’s great you’re doing things on your bucket list’. 

What bollocks.

BOLLOCKS, BOLLOCKS, BOLLOCKS.

If I ever had a bucket list how would anyone know what would be on the list. I'm not doing things on my 'bucket list'.

Sure, I have things I’d love to do.  Or aspire to do.  BUT THEY ARE NOT ON MY ‘BUCKET LIST’!

They are on my, 'gee, that would be good to do' list.

The term ‘bucket list’ became popular due to the movie with Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman.  The movie about 2 men who had terminal cancer, were soon to die, so wrote their ‘bucket list’.

I went to that movie.  I left that movie feeling hugely depressed.  Felt I should go home and slit my throat.  That phrase - I found it morbid, ghoulish, depressing, pessimistic and … deadly. 

It was one movie I NEVER recommended anyone see. 

Why go to a movie to remind you that you are going to die, so write a list?

If you must write a list of things you want and have always wanted to do – well, do so.  WRITE A LIST!  NOW.  And call it ‘A list of things I’d like to do’. 

Or ‘Things to Do’  Or, ‘My next goals’.  Or …  name it anything POSITIVE. 

Like ‘Anything is possible TO THE WILLING MIND’.   

If you want to go to Outer Mongolia, go to Outer Mongolia.  If you want parachute out of a plane, parachute out of a plane.  But don’t ask me, it’s not on my ‘want to dos’.  And never will be.  If you want to try NZ’s Got Talent, audition.  If you want to dance naked on a beach, do it. But make sure it’s pitch dark and no police, or me, are about.

If you want to try eating 12 Double Whoppers in one go – do it – but ask me to help…

And for goodness sake.  Why wait until you are going to die before doing what you want to do.  Do it.  Now.  Or, plan to do it now.  Whether it will be 4 days away or 4 decades – if you feel the need, plan it now.

As an aside.  In my life I have had many buckets.  At the moment I know I have a red one, a white one, a blue one, another blue one, another white one.  And a grey collapsible one (which is useless – it collapses all the time). Indeed, I have lots of buckets.  When my mind pictures those buckets all I can see is all the work they have had me endure when using them.  Washing.  Gardening. Mixing concrete. Mixing compost.  Worm-post.  Slime-post. Flushing out stinking, blocked drains.  Cat poo.  Dog poo. Horse poo (thought it was good for the garden, it’s not).  Chicken poo.  Chicken poo pallets.  Work!  Dirty work!

So why magicalise a bucket? 

It’s shite.  Literally

Conclusion

Should I ‘kick the bucket’ today, tomorrow or next week I will go knowing that whenever an opportunity has cropped up and there was a possibility or feasibility that I could do it, I have done it. 

This year a perfect example.  Another go at parasailing, despite knowing I hate heights.  Walked the Kepler, cause the opportunity came up.  Rewalked the Tongariro Crossing, despite vowing never to do it again, but the opportunity came up.

Climbed Mt Snowdon.  Cause the opportunity came up. Got here to Wales and the UK, because if I worked it right it could be feasible – despite obstacles.  Next I knew, I was with my mates in Nice.  Monarco.  Cannes.  Because it was a window of opportunity.  I grabbed it.   Nowt to do with buckets.  Or bucket lists.

Actually, if I think of all my life of buckets – the most vivid is those buckets of poo’d nappies by sons gave me back in the 70’s.  In the days when we had real nappies – and had to soak the poo off.

Told you, buckets go with shit ….

Thinking of climbing a mountain soon ....