Migrant Tale – New Zealand Citizenship May Be A Way Out

A NZ passport may be a route out

Continuing in our series of Migrant Tales – first hand accounts of the migrant experience of New Zealand, taken from locations around the net.

Today’s tale was first published on the forum at Expatexposed.com, a self help and support, not-for-profit forum, for people living in New Zealand.

It is the only immigration forum on the net to be free of vested interests and corporate sponsorship, and as such portrays a refreshingly realistic image of life in New Zealand for many emigrants.

"Our Story.
I’m so glad I found this website – you can begin to think you are imagining all the negativity. I just wish I had seen it before we moved to NZ.

We arrived in NZ in 2005. Settled firstly in West Auckland where we enjoyed living during the ‘honeymoon period’. Couldn’t quite believe that we had paid over $300k for little more than a wooden shed to live in….. Shocked but anyway…we then decided that we should chase the kiwi dream of a lifestyle block and moved to rural Otago. Mistake number one. Rural town, rural people, rural attitudes….

We then made our second mistake of renovating the house we bought thinking we would get the money back when we sold it. We didn’t, and ended up $30k worse off. Husband couldn’t find decent work so we ended up living off our savings. We moved again, closer to a ‘city’ (pfft!) to increase OH chance of work. Didn’t work. Moved again – now in Christchurch (we moved into our house 2 days after the Feb earthquake). Things going very slightly better now…

Things I miss:
Being able to have a conversation without that ‘delay’
Decent houses with central heating and double glazing, not ones thrown together with a bit of gib board and pink batts.
Walking over footpaths for miles with my dogs
History and culture (seen more in a pot of yoghurt…)
Affordable grocery shopping and decent fruit and veg markets and a range of things to choose from in the supermarket.
A good curry
Being able to watch TV without ‘look how fantastic NZ is’ being forced down my throat everywhere.
Having some savings.

We arrived full of how wonderful our new life was going to be. I am sick of having my decent salary (pre tax) being creamed off by the government to support the majority of this rural, undereducated nation. We don’t have holidays (no wonder the kiwis are such good campers), we can’t afford to go back and visit our family. I am gutted we made the decision to come. I now feel that we can’t return and leave my son behind (he is 22 and happy here living with his girlfriend). My daughter is 13 and I feel she has suffered due to the education system here –she has just started high school. Her peers in the UK seem way ahead. But still, they let anyone into University here so I’m sure she’ll be fine…

We are applying for citizenship so that at least we may be able to consider Australia in the future. I would love to go home, but I’m worried about reports of ‘ping pong poms’, people who get home and hate it, then spend the next few years trying to get back. Maybe I have my rose tinted specs on when I think of ‘home’."

You may also be interested in:

Jobs-driven migration to Oz at high of 53,000 (22/3/2012)- “The Kiwi exodus to Australia has hit a new high, with annual departures reaching 53,000 last month, Statistics New Zealand said yesterday.

New Zealand suffered a net loss of 39,100 people after departure numbers were partially offset by 13,900 arrivals, most of them returning citizens…The overall net loss of 4100 people in the year to February 29 is also the largest since the year ended August 31, 2001, when 4400 people left New Zealand.” read more

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Gay Hate Crime In Moeraki, New Zealand.

Two North Otago men accused of kidnapping a man last week are facing seven charges including  kidnapping and assault of a male at  Moeraki last Friday, unlawfully entering and remaining in his house and another house at Moeraki, threatening a second man and assaulting him twice.

The charges stemmed from an incident where the men allegedly ordered two men to leave town because of the mistaken belief they were gay. Source

The two accused, a 41 year old man from Oamaru and a 40 year old from Hampden, have had their names suppressed.

Hampden police Senior Constable Darrin Low told Dunedin District Court (on Monday) that one man who had been detained said he had “never known fear like it“. Source

Our thoughts are with the victims and we wish them a full and speedy recovery from their ordeal.
It’s good to see that police are taking this incident seriously and are prosecuting the alleged offenders, however it does highlight how shockingly bigoted and violent some of the more rural areas of New Zealand can be.

But is ‘gay bashing,’ in all its forms, limited just to the rural backwaters of New Zealand, or is there something dark lurking within the collective fragile Kiwi psyche  ?

Air NZ’s Gay Kiss Refusal



Following complaints from gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people Air New Zealand said recently that they will remove a scene from an in-flight safety video where All Black player, Richard Kahui,  refused to kiss a gay flight attendant on the cheek.

The video, which had already been shown to over two million people on Air NZ’s aircraft, apparently without any thought as to whether it may have marginalised or offended some people, also raised concern from a university professor who feared it may have caused gay male suicide. Is it any wonder in a country where ads like this next one are permitted, legitimising homophobia:

Low Carb Beer ‘Queer’




Earlier this month GayNZ reported on an ad campaign by Moa Beer, which suggested that anyone drinking low carb beer was ‘queer’:

“Moa Beer is offering to apologise in person to anyone offended by a t-shirt campaign which suggests low carb beer drinkers are queer, after an outpouring of disgust and disappointment on Facebook.

The boutique brewer’s marketing department was giving away t-shirts which said “Low Carb Beers”, with the a pink ‘Q’ superimposed over the letter ‘B’ so it read “Qeers”, promoting the fact that Moa’s brews are “full strength”.

When asked by GayNZ.com Daily News whether the campaign is saying that anyone who drinks low carb beer must be queer, Moa’s marketing manager replied “yes”, but also so replied “yes” to the question of whether Moa was bothered that it had offended some gay people.

The ensuing story sparked angry backlash on its Facebook page…” read the full report here

So what’s the message here – Homophobia in NZ is acceptable until it results in physical harm and assault?
Comments left on the beer company’s wall included:

“Yesterday a friend of mine was threatened with being bottled, sworn at and called a faggot because he walked down Ponsonby Road holding his boyfriend’s hand.
THIS is why, unfortunately, NZ isn’t mature enough for Moa’s advertisement. I know it’s meant in humour, there are too many people who see that kind of advertising as legitimising their homophobia. Take Toyota and the ‘bugger’ commercials. Suddenly it was acceptable. It was on wheel covers. It was publicly ok to say the word. This will happen with homophobia if advertisements like Moa’s are seen as ok.”

“It’s reading debates like this that I’m pleased I’ve left New Zealand. Considering it’s nearly 2011 it’s amazing how backward kiwis can still be. We need to be more accepting. To those that posted “PC madness” “take a joke” etc., it’s easy to say that when you are part of the majority. Try putting yourself in the shoes… of someone in a minority group and feel what it’s like to be oppressed; dealing with this stuff day in, day out.
ps I’m not gay.
pps won’t be buying the beer.”

“The only people that will take offensive to it are ‘Queers’, I don’t get mad at ads that take the piss out of woman, as a lot of beer adverts do, eg Tui…. I say grow a set of balls and laugh… by the way well done MOA by the reaction this has had it means your advertising has worked!!!”

“Another ‘Like’ just to post on your wall.
I really thought we had made progress, as a country, away from homophobic shyte like your QEER T Shirt campaign.
Like many, I’d never heard of you but the bad news is, now I have, I don’t like you.
Epic PR failure.”

Other stories presently in the NZ News you may be interested in:
Upset by sexual moves, murder trial told
Gay community calls for justice over banjo killing
Thanks to Readerofe2 for the links




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British Expats No Longer Favour New Zealand As Top Destination

A Natwest International survey has revealed that New Zealand is no longer the top destination of choice for British expatriates, it has been displaced by Australia:

“A survey commissioned by British bank NatWest has found Australia has displaced New Zealand as the top destination choice for Brits abandoning the mother country.
Brisbane has also overtaken Perth as Australia’s most popular destination for migrants.
So popular is it that, according to the third annual NatWest International Personal Banking Quality of Life report, one in every 10 Brisbanites is now a British expat.
The NatWest figures fly in the face of those in the 2006 national census, which found just 4.5 per cent of Brisbane residents were British.
But Brisbane Marketing chief executive John Aitken said there was no doubt southeast Queensland had become Australia’s fastest-growing region, with 1100 people now arriving each week from interstate and overseas. more here”

Immigration in New Zealand has virtually slowed to a trickle and could soon turn negative, economists say. Net migration has hit its lowest monthly level since late 2008, having significant implications both for the economy and the housing market.

Just 70 more people arrived in New Zealand than left in June on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to Statistics NZ, down sharply on the monthly gains of more than 1000 at the start of the year.

Net migration has hit its lowest monthly level since late 2008.

“ANZ Bank economists said the support provided to the economy from net immigration was “clearly diminishing” with arrivals trending down while departures were rising.
On current trends the prospect of New Zealand losing more people from migration, rather than gaining them as is usually the case, “is very real”, ANZ said. “This does not augur well for the housing market and domestic spending.”
There has been a slowdown in the number of migrants arriving in New Zealand, with a sharp drop in work visas in the past year. At the same time more people have been leaving, especially for Australia, since the end of last year.
Migration has been a key support for economic growth, housing and retail sales. There is a link between strong migration and rising house prices and rents, while house prices tend to fall in times of migration loss, economists say.
For example, during the economic downturn of the late 1990s, more people left New Zealand than arrived for a couple of years, and house price inflation slumped from more than 10 per cent a year to zero…more here“

Also read these recent blogs:
Migration to New Zealand continues downward spiral – 21 June 2010

“More bad news for the NZ economy today with the release of the latest set of immigration figures. Net migration has sunk to an 18 month low as more as more and more Kiwis leave for Australia…”

New Zealand Immigration Growth Continues To Slow. Trans-Tasman Departures At 12 Month High – 23 April 2010

“New Zealand’s annual immigration growth slowed for a second consecutive month in March, suggesting that the economic recovery is weaker than first thought.
The number of permanent migrant arrivals exceeded departures by 20,973 in the 12 months ended March 31, Statistics New Zealand said today in Wellington. That’s down from 21,618 in the year to February. Migration into New Zealand was in negative figures for March, which is bad news for an economy that is so dependent on a buoyant housing market and income from migrants…”

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Ministry Of Defence Houses "Freezing"

This news item may be of interest to people thinking of emigrating to New Zealand and working for the NZ defence force. Defence housing appears to have exactly the same problems with lack of insulation, damp and heating that other homes have in New Zealand. The women decided to go public with their concerns because of a number of symptoms their families were suffering, including barking coughs, asthma, ear and chest infections and allergies suffered by young children:

From Stuff

Freezing Cold Houses anger RNZAF Mums
“Some of the women living at RNZAF Base Woodbourne are waging war with the Ministry of Defence over freezing temperatures in the houses where they are raising families.
Two partners of air-force servicemen said they were desperate for action after going through all the right channels and having their complaints ignored. One was so fed up she said she was leaving Marlborough to bring her family up in Christchurch, leaving her husband behind. Splitting the family was a last resort, but her children’s health came first, she said.

Air Force spokesman Squadron Leader Kavae Tamariki said military housing throughout New Zealand was in poor condition. “I understand where the Woodbourne women are coming from,” he said. Any complaints would be listened to if they went through the correct chain of command, he said...

...The complaints included homes with no insulation and no carpet, where fireplaces had been boarded up, damp crept up the walls, mould grew and window frames were rotten, with paint holding the glass in place. Heat escaped through gaps between the floorboards and around the windows. Water from a leaking roof ran down the walls of one house. Each home had a heat pump, but even with it on all day, one woman said they had to wear down jackets and scarves.

One woman had a power bill for June of more than $580"...read the full report here

For more about winter living conditions in New Zealand please read:
NZ’s High Winter Death Rate and Burning Wood to Keep Warm
“Most People Consider Hypothermia a Symptom of Being Cold, Rather an Expression of National Identity“
Leaky Homes
The Problems Migrants Encounter with Housing
Immigrants Caught in Cold Poverty Trap
$380 a Week Gets You What?
How to go to Bed New Zealand Style


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"NZ: 100% Pure RIp Off"

Oh dear, bet the guys who coined the “100% Pure NZ” are cringing right now.

It will be interesting to see how well the brand’s image survives this latest onslaught on the slogan that lends itself so easily to abuse. It is currently being used to highlight how expensive New Zealand has become.

It all started with an article in the NZ Herald under the header “NZ: 100% Pure Rip-off. Rip off New Zealand?” written by Peter Bills, an international writer for Independent News & Media.

“Guys, just 14 months out from the 2011 Rugby World Cup, you are sleep-walking into acquiring such an unwanted reputation worldwide.
The price of ordinary, everyday articles and living costs horrify me in this country. I’ve been here, admired the place, loved the people since 1975. I wasn’t even put off by my first ever weekend in New Zealand – 17cm of rain in 24 hours and sitting shin-deep in water at Eden Park as the All Blacks aqua-planed past Scotland in that infamous 1975 test.
But what I see today is of far, far greater concern. This place is becoming one of the most expensive I visit, one giant rip-off. And most of you seem unaware of it.”

We think not, thousands of migrants struggle to make ends meet in New Zealand, many of them attracted by baiting 'NZ is cheap’ campaigns, such as that run in Singapore recently.

“What I find here amazes me. So much so that I don’t know how most ordinary folk manage to balance their budgets. True, petrol is much cheaper than in Britain. But in just about every other field, hotels, car hire, restaurant food, wine, clothes or whatever, you’re the victims of massive overcharging.
Of course, it’s always difficult to compare like with like when speaking of different countries but this is an overall impression from someone from Europe.
I sat down for a simple lunch at a restaurant on Auckland’s waterfront last week. The sun was shining, the setting fabulous. A glass of splendid New Zealand sauvignon blanc was a delight – until we saw the price. $28 for two ordinary sized glasses? You don’t pay that in Paris or London, unless you go somewhere like the George V in Paris or London’s Ivy restaurant.”

But ordinary folk don’t balance their budgets. Many are up to their ears in debt, working two jobs and sending their kids to school hungry – 230,000 children are living in unacceptable poverty in New Zealand. As for those who like to maintain lavish lifestyles? well, there’s always good old fashioned fraud and theft to fall back on. Little wonder that crime is on the rise.

“Now let’s be fair. The NZ dollar has appreciated significantly against the pound over the course of the past 12-18 months. When I last visited NZ it was $2.40 to £1. Today, it is around $2.04. But does that explain a growing number of instances where an overseas visitor felt totally ripped off?
And there is growing evidence that it is chiefly the cities of this country who are leading this “grab what you can, make a killing” attitude towards visitors. If that is indeed the case, then it is the country areas, the less populated centres, who will suffer most.
Take car hire. Am I the only visitor to New Zealand who has ever decided that it would be better to drive from Auckland to Wellington and stop for a couple of nights somewhere to see the North Island? It hardly struck me as a revolutionary idea, yet this set me up as a target for just about every major hire car firm in Auckland.
Hertz demanded an outrageous $300 drop-off fee if I wanted to leave the car in Wellington. Yet isn’t that what 90 per cent of visitors would do if they were touring, especially going on to the South Island? Companies such as Avis, Europcar and others were demanding only slightly smaller amounts. Some didn’t even have a drop facility in Wellington…

…Parking in one city centre carpark in Wellington this week was $9 an hour, $39 for four hours. In Monte Carlo, the first hour’s parking at public carparks is, er, free.
Then there are the hotels. This weekend in Wellington at the InterContinental, a king room costs $410. Now it is rugby test weekend and it has club facilities but even so. £205 a room? You might pay that in New York or London but not in most European capitals. And just imagine what on earth such a room will cost on the weekend of October 8/9 next year when Wellington hosts two of the Rugby World Cup quarter-finals.
The capital city costs a fortune and it’s not just an Englishman who thinks so. In the winter of 2008, in the company of several visiting South African writers, we sat down in a harbourside restaurant. When the menus arrived, we were so horrified by the prices we all got up and walked out. It was daylight robbery.
Last week, at Kermadec in Auckland, one main lunch dish was $33. In the evening, entrees were $25, mains around $42 with desserts $18. The wines were equally expensive. In a Takapuna restaurant, also last week, a bottle of Stoneleigh pinot noir cost $48. I could take you to a dozen restaurants in Nice where you’d drink a perfectly good French wine for nothing near that amount….”

Welcome to New Zealand.

So long as someone is prepared to pay those sort of prices people are going to charge them. It’s a free market economy. Perhaps more people should be “horrified by the prices” and ‘get up and walk out’ and spend less time being mollified by the scenery? Whilst they’re absorbed in gazing at those vistas, searching for the lifestyle and dangling from the end of bungy cords they’ll not feel their pockets emptying until it’s too late (In NZ, everything – even the scenery – comes with a price tag)

“Does any of this matter? After all, it’s only tourists who might get fleeced and they won’t be back every year (ed. only tourists?! quite a few immigrants would take issue with that remark) And the Rugby World Cup which is being held here next year might be the last time it is hosted exclusively by New Zealand. So hey guys, grab what you can in hiked up profits, make a fortune and smile all the way to the bank. Right? No, wrong, dead wrong. (ed. why not? it’s been going on for 150 years and has worked just fine)

New Zealanders will be dumb if they even think of such a philosophy. The World Cup ought to be an event that showcases the whole country to visitors from every corner of the globe. They should go home extolling the virtues of this land. Think long term, six or even 16 years of profits on the back of that scenario, not a money grab operation spanning six weeks which will persuade many visitors never to return.
Already, the word is getting out in an international sense that New Zealand is getting expensive. The fact is, you just can’t afford to allow that image to take root. You’re too far away from the rest of the world to afford such a scenario. In Paris, Rome, London or New York they can get away with that purely due to population numbers in those parts of the world. It is very different here. International travellers are not fools; fewer will come if New Zealand is known as too expensive…” read the whole article here

New Zealand draws most of its international travellers from Australia, most of them just a few hours flight time away from New Zealand. Other fans from wider afield are said to be basing themselves in cities like Sydney and plan to fly in and out for matches, or watch the games in 3D cinemas, outdoor venues, bars etc.  There’s only so much that can be done in New Zealand during winter and who’d want to hang around for longer than they’d have to?

Some of the visiting teams may decide to do the same. In September last year the Springboks decided to give ‘boring Hamilton’ a miss and jet in from the Gold Coast, Australia, for a match. How many teams will do the same next year is anyone’s guess but who will blame them for wanting a bit of sun, sea and sand?

The Herald today published another contribution on this subject, this time from former All Black Justin Marshall who agreed that New Zealand is expensive and not just for visitors, he admitted that he’d ignored the warnings from friends that New Zealand was more expensive than Britain:

When former All Black halfback Justin Marshall left for England five years ago, a litre of petrol cost about $1.30. He remembers a flat white coffee costing about $3 and a beer at his local about $6. But since his return to New Zealand about a month ago, Marshall has noticed his British pounds are not going as far as he had hoped. “I think five years ago you could get a coffee for around $3 or $3.50 but I wouldn’t think there would be many places you’d get one for under $4,” he said. “Petrol is now close to $1.80 a litre and if you’re drinking quality lagers in a pub, a lot of the bars are charging up towards the $10 mark. “It’s expensive and something you can’t help but notice.”
Marshall, 36, agreed with rugby correspondent Peter Bills that New Zealand was an expensive country – and not just for visitors. Bills – sounding a caution ahead of next year’s Rugby World Cup – said the prices of everyday articles had “horrified” him and Kiwis were “victims of massive overcharging”. He said New Zealand was becoming “one giant rip-off”.
Marshall, an 81-test All Black who is now a Sky TV rugby comments man, said his rugby friends had also warned him that the cost of living had become higher in New Zealand than in Britain. “All of my mates who had come home kept saying to me that I needed to be aware that the expense of living in New Zealand is something you really have to take into account … It really has become an expensive country to live in.”
He said his weekly grocery spend in Britain was between £150 and £200 ($323-$431) to feed his family of five. Here, the bill is $400 to $500 a week.
“I’ve really noticed it with things like cheese, milk and bread and butter … When I was in the UK I bought a leg of imported New Zealand lamb for 17 quid [$36.60]. I bought the same thing here and it was close to $40. “Even when you take the exchange rate into account, it still costs more to buy our own meat here.”
New Zealand Beef & Lamb chief executive Rod Slater said Marshall was “pretty much on the mark” and said prices for export lamb in Britain, our biggest market, were generally “on a par” with prices here. Mr Slater said this parity was partly because of New Zealanders paying GST on food whereas consumers in Britain did not. “So that’s 12.5 per cent right there.
“The other thing is a huge part of the lamb sold in the UK is frozen, whereas we get it fresh here. Our currencies have come closer together as well. I mean, not long ago it was $3 to one pound; now it’s two to one, so that has made a difference, too.” Marshall said retailers, hoteliers and people in the hospitality industry were in a Catch-22 situation with next year’s Rugby World Cup looming.
But he agreed with Cup chief executive Martin Snedden, who expressed concerns that rorting visitors could damage the country’s reputation. “You want people to come to NZ and see it for what it is,” Marshall said, “but in the same breath we want to make money … It’s an opportunity to maximise businesses and maximise what New Zealand has to offer and people are going to be here anyway.
“It’s very difficult to pull away from that opportunity when it is so evidently going to be in your face but you want those people who come here to go back to the UK and not talk about how difficult they found it to find cheap hotels or how expensive it was to go out for dinner.”… read more here

Little wonder that well over 500,000 New Zealanders live in Australia and a similar number in Britain, they know when they’re onto a good thing.

Enough of our thoughts on this. Let’s take a wider view and look at the responses this article drew from people who live, or have lived, in New Zealand and see what prospective visitors and migrants can learn from their comments.

This is a sample from the  TravelMSN site where there was a massive response on a very emotive topic:

NZ a giant rip-off?

kiwi rip off
Posted by: Nick, auckland, on 19/07/2010 9:50:59 PM
I am a recently returned Kiwi and about to become a recently departed one. New Zealand has become, very sadly, ridiculously expensive and there seems little reason for it other than blatant profiteering. the result is an escalation in crime and an influx of the rich. I feel terribly sad to have lost my homeland and very let down by the politicians who are responsible yet unaccountable. If anyone is likely to save this country I for one think it will be the Maori and good luck to them, they are fighting for the values the pakeha seem to have abandoned and I feel ashamed.

Land of Milk & Honey?
Posted by: ndawoodz,Wellington, on19/07/2010 10:38:16 AM
I wish I could disagree…but alas! Single mother of two, prices for food are ridiculous! With pride I have often said, “this is the land of milk & honey”. Seemingly the best of our milk & honey etc gets exported overseas & foreigners get NZ quality produced goods, for cheaper than us!! What!!?? This is seriously not good, us that live here contribute to our economy & I am now left wondering…for what?. The rest of my family had moved to Oz many years ago, so when I visit them I often spend hours in their supermarkets looking at the huge array of variety & prices. The Australians & co are definitely spoilt for choices & prices. Of course us Kiwis are not happy about…but we don’t get any options…Just do what your told! Hmmmmn maybe another family off to Oz soon!…great economy, realistic wages & apparently cheaper NZ produce!

Have to agree
Posted by: goldie, Auckland, on 19/07/2010 9:02:16 AM
Having just moved back to Auckland after 10 yrs living in Europe, the USA and Hong Kong I have to say that I agree mostly that NZ is over priced. Also the quality of things like clothing is crap here compaired to the UK and the USA. I have been looking to set up a house and the choices in furniture and beding etc are pretty poor here. I have just ordered a whole lot of 100% cotton beding from the UK at a much cheaper price (including shipping) than I can get here in NZ. I will be buying most of my clothes from the UK and the USA as the colour choices here (black or red neither of which I wear) are so limited that I can go into every clothing shop in the likes of St Lukes and not find anything in a colour that I would wear. Also most of the clothes we get here are synthetic fabric and I only wear natural fibers. Food here is also very expensive. My supermarket shop is about twice as expensive here as it was in the UK. As much as I love NZ I do find it to be overpriced!

i agree
Posted by: Gemz, Wellington nz , on 19/07/2010 7:02:59 AM
I am a english lass, lived in nz for almost 6 years now and i agree with the reporter. Houses are cheaper here, cars and petrol but thats about it. Clothes are very expensive and i do not agree that they are better quality. Food is totally over priced, its cheaper to buy new zealand lamb in britain then here……what the hell is up with that. Wine is over priced here everything is, they seem to sell nz products to other countrys for much cheaper and then make us pay prices through the roof. Its stupid. New zealand is a beautiful country and i love living here, can hardly afford to live here as the ongoing problem with price rising and wages not rising. Somthing must be done.

NZ a giant rip off?
Posted by: Linds, Te Pahu, on 19/07/2010 5:32:59 AM
Having just returned from a trip overseas to both Italy and the UK and I can vouch for certainty that in NZ we are ripped off for food and clothes in our shops. But then European countries don’t seem to add the equivalent of GST to food or clothing as these are, rightly, considered essentials for everyday living. So why do we put up with this tax on essentials in NZ? As for accommodation, car hire, eating out and wine, NZ is cheaper but then our average incomes are, I reckon, over 40% down on most European countries. One thing most noticeable about the European countries we visited is the abundant affluence as manifested by the huge numbers of new cars on the roads plus the shops, restaurants and pubs were mostly full of customers spending freely. They seem to have fully recovered from the recession.

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More Suburban Shoot Outs In New Zealand - Updated

Just days after two policemen were shot and a police dog killed in Christchurch, there’s been a similar shoot out on a suburban street in New Zealand, this time in New Lynn, West Auckland, plus an armed police operation in Dunedin.
 
In the New Lynn incident a man was taken from the scene with a gunshot wound to the stomach. The shooting occurred during the execution of a search warrant in connection with an arson incident:

“Late last night, police said they had gone to the Nikau St address about 6pm to arrest the man over an alleged arson. Asked if police were armed on arrival, police spokesman Kev Loughlin said police did have guns. “But I am not going to make a statement about when the officers were armed,” Mr Loughlin said.
A fight broke out and the man fired at officers. They fired back, hitting him in the stomach. The man, aged in his 30s, is understood to have lived in a caravan alongside six blocks of two units down a right-of-way…”

The Police Union say that an attempt use a taser to subdue the offender had failed and they emphasised again the importance of firearms being available to front line officers.

As the day progressed news was released about an armed police operation in Dunedin this afternoon. Witnesses said a number of armed officers and police cars converged in the city and had cordoned off Dundas St, near Logan Park, at Clyde St, Forth St and Harbour Terrace; near Otago Polytechnic. Reports of shots being fired would not be confirmed by police but a number of witnesses said they thought they heard shots.

Neighbour Brylie Meng said police first arrived around 1pm, and ordered the man, who she believed was in his early twenties, to surrender, while armed police trained their guns on the house. “All we could hear was ‘If you come out now, we won’t hurt you, come out with your hands in the air’.”
Eventually, about 15 armed police went around the side of the house before about five shots were fired. A man was lead outside a short time later, she said. Ms Meng said she was not sure whether they were gunshots but “it was really, really loud”
Smoke was seen coming from the house on Dundas St at around the same time…”source

The incident was talked about on the Trademe forum as the event unfolded, with one person giving a possible explanation for the panic:

I thought it was in Dundas Street, some guy was obsessed with a girl and had been snooping around her for ages then decided to turn up with knife today and hide in the bushes near her flat? That’s the word at uni

 A little over a week ago a party of tourists on quad bikes near Ahipara, Northland were caught up in the aftermath of an armed “squabble” between two brothers.

The group was stopped by fully kitted out Armed Offender Squad officers looking for the offenders, no doubt scaring the wits out of the visitors looking forward to a quiet day at the beach.

Elsewhere, police are still looking for a breakthrough in their hunt for the killers of Feilding farmer and family man Scott Guy who was shot to death on his driveway a week last Thursday.

Gun crime is shockingly frequent in New Zealand where there are thought to be at least 1.1 million legally owned firearms in circulation. Hand guns, rifles and shotguns are frequently used in armed robberies.
See also: Posts tagged Gun Crime

Related posts:

• "Christchurch, New Zealand, Sucks"
• Christchurch Street Robbery “Almost Endemic” Says Judge
• China Issues Warning About Crime In New Zealand

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NZ's Fat Cats Feast As Homeless Queue For Bread & Jam

 
A nice little feature article appeared in today’s Herald, demonstrating that a vast social divide exists in New Zealand’s supposedly ‘classless society.’

The ever widening gulf between the country’s dirt poor and the wealthy classes has been recognised on an internationals stage, something that is unlikely to be mentioned next time one of those ‘most livable’ surveys gets published (most livable for whom?)

If you ever see PR hype hailing New Zealand hailed as a ‘great place to raise kids’ or the sixth best country in the world to be mother it’s worth remembering that  230,000 children live in unacceptable poverty in New Zealand and that Kiwi youth suffer some of the worst health outcomes in the developed world.

Whilst the fat cats feasted on marinaded fish salad yesterday, metres away queues formed for bread and jam and generations are born into and die in poverty:

“Great poverty still affects pockets of New Zealand, ministers were told yesterday – shortly before their sumptuous three-course lunch.
Millionaire Auckland mayor John Banks told the conference at the SkyCity Convention Centre that “there are pockets of social deprivation” that needed to be addressed.
“We have to bridge the gap between the very poor and dispossessed and those of us who are making great progress,” he told delegates...

...Just 250m away at the Auckland City Mission, dozens of homeless people queued up for handouts of bread and jam.

A spokeswoman said the United Nations rated New Zealand with the sixth greatest gap between rich and poor among developed nations last year.
For Stephen Flowers, who has lived on the streets for about 10 years, Banks’ words were empty rhetoric. He said: “It does make you laugh when you hear people like Banks and John Key talk as if they know what life is like for us. They have no idea, I haven’t seen any improvements since National came to power. After my fines have been paid I’ve got $60 a week. … Lunch for me usually consists of picking food out of rubbish tins.”...
“There are people living with rats who are at risk of starting an outbreak of rabies or TB. They are born in poverty, they live in poverty and they die in poverty.” read the full report here

Thanks to Netizen and ‘Waiting for them’ who sent us a very links to a report on the United Nation’s report into income inequality across the world and another which shows half of disabled Aucklanders are living on the poverty line.

“There are 77,000 disabled people living in Auckland, the majority of whom earn far less than their non-disabled counterparts, even when they have a tertiary qualification. poverty is a daily reality for many disabled Aucklanders and their families, and from available figures estimates that about half of disabled Auckland adults have personal incomes of less than $20,000, predominantly sourced from benefits, casual, part-time, and/or low-paying work

The United Nations report on income inequality:

“…ranked countries and regions based on a number of factors, including their Gini coefficient, named for Italian statistician Corrado Gini.
We have listed the world’s most advanced economies based on their Gini score, with zero marking absolute equality and 100 absolute inequality. Scandinavian countries, Japan, and the Czech Republic have the least amount of inequality. The U.S. is among the most unequal, but it’s not No. 1. To see which economy is, read on…”

The to 10 countries for income inequality were ranked as follows
1. Hong Kong, Gini score 43.4
2. Singapore, Gini score 42.5
3. United States, Gini score 40.8
4. Israel Gini, score 39.2
5. Portugal Gini, score 38.5
*6. New Zealand,  Gini score 36.2
7. Italy and Great Britain, Gini score 36
9. Australia, Gini score 35.2
10. Ireland and Greece, Gini score 34.3

*”According to the OECD, New Zealand had the biggest rise in inequality among member nations in the two decades starting in the mid-1980s. The country’s economy emerged from recession in the second quarter, but with growth of just 0.1%, the central bank is likely to keep interest rates low until well into 2010.”

But this blog is written from the point of view of the migrant or visitor to New Zealand, how is this relevant to them? Because, believe it or not, migrants are unexpectedly finding themselves caught in New Zealand’s poverty trap due to the low wage economy or through losing their jobs in the recession and having no safety net.

Readers will remember the blog we wrote a week ago about the young couple (an American and an Australian) caught up in a cold poverty trap and unable to borrow money to insulate their timber home.

We’ve also written about immigrants forced to live in third world conditions, – skilled migrants that lost their jobs and, faced with high rents, were forced into  living in cars, vans and overcrowded houses. The unlucky ones lived on the streets.
If you’re about to move to New Zealand we recommend that you read them and posts tagged Poverty.

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Another Old Person Injured In A Home Invasion

Another elderly person has been beaten-up in a home invasion in New Zealand, this time in The Avenues, Tauranga, a town that is popular with retired people.

Police were called to the man’s home by a concerned relative. He is thought to be in his 80s, and has serious head injuries. He was taken to hospital today where he is now said to be in a critical condition. We wish him well and hope he makes a full recovery.

Two weeks ago a 93 year old grandmother, Gwendoline Samson, was attacked in her home in Papakura, but fortunately she managed to successfully fight off her assailant without suffering any major injuries but it was the second time she’d suffered such an assault.

Police have yet to catch the thugs who smashed the face of another Tauranga grandmother. 65 Year old Mary Loader was severely injured when a half full beer bottle was thrown at her from a passing car one morning. She was out picking fruit at the time and the attack was completely unprovoked. See Tauranga grandmother in coma after bottle attack.

Update:
Later news reports are that the injured man has died and a man has been arrested in connection with his death. A homicide investigation is currently underway, read more here. Our deepest condolences go out to the victim's wife and family.

We’ve said before that one may judge the character of a society by how it treats the weak, the vulnerable, the most easily forgotten. Abuse of the young and the old is widespread in NZ and may not be such a great place for older people to retire in. Other recent attacks on elderly people include:

• A Racist attack on elderly man in Hastings

• Gaynor Alice White, 62, battered to death with a hammer by an intruder in her home in Parkland, Christchurch

• A 72 year old man left shaken and bruised after being robbed at gunpoint at his home in Beerescourt Rd Road, Hamilton

• An 82 year old woman kidnapped and robbed whilst shopping on W.Tamaki Road, Auckland

• Grandmother Barabara Julian, battered to death by an intruder in her Kaitaia home

• Lois Dear, 66, murdered and sexually assulted in her classroom at Tokoroa primary school

• An elderly woman was physically and sexually assulted in her Eltham home

• Retired teacher John Rowe, murdered by two teenage girls in his Opotiki home

• An 83 year old woman who was assaulted and her home set fire to in Howick

• An elderly couple who were hopsitalized after a home invasion in New Plymouth

• An elderly man kicked to the ground and assaulted by a truck driver in Manukau

• An 85 year old man badly beaten during a home invasion at his Bethesda Village retirement home in Wiri.

• 86 year old Patricia Burrows was left with a fractured pelvis, cuts and bruises after she was mugged in a Christchurch shopping mall

• Yin Ping Yang, 80, died following a savage attack during a home invasion in Manurewa East that lasted for several hours.

• A 99 year old woman who was sexually assaulted in her Palmerston North home and died in hospital

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Another Armed Offenders Call Out In NZ - Auckland

It’s been a busy period for the Armed Offenders Squad.

Three  days ago there was an armed robbery of a pub in Point Chev that led to an AOS stand off in the residential area of Flatbush, 20kms away.

Then this morning they cordoned off roads and surrounded a house in Pakuranga Road, South Auckland. Witnesses said the police were negotiating with a person holed-up in a property. The incident is thought to have ended without injury or loss of life. See “Another dickhead on the lose in Panmure“

The day finished with call out to the North Shore suburb of Hllcrest, another quiet residential area:

“About 20 police officers including members of the armed offenders and dog squad were seen packing down and leaving from Coronation Rd at 4.10pm. Police earlier received a report about a man waving a rifle in the area around 2pm, detective Shane Page says.
The police Eagle helicopter and patrol cars surveyed the area and access to part of Coronation Rd and nearby Velma Rd and McFetridge Pl was blocked. Road blocks forced some students from surrounding schools to take a longer route home. Nearby Marlborough Primary and Sunnybrae Normal Schools were on lock down as a precaution until the end of the school day. “

Is there something in the water, or is this just the silly season for nutters with guns? There’s thought to be at least 1.1 legally owned million firearms in New Zealand so the odds are that something, or someone, is going to kick-off sooner or later.
See also:
Family row led to shots being fired from house -  “A Pukehina Beach man at the centre of an armed police seige after he fired several gun shots has been sentenced to 100 hours’ community work and six months’ supervision. Shaun Albert Cockburn, 39, who earlier pleaded guilty to charges of discharging a firearm near a house was sentenced in Tauranga District Court yesterday.” 23 June 2010

Armed police called out in Southland – “An Armed Offenders Squad (AOS) call-out, an unprovoked assault which left a man unconscious, and an aggravated dairy robbery at knife point kept Invercargill police busy overnight.  At 8.50pm police received a 111 call from Bluff, reporting that a man with a weapon was threatening to kill the two other people at a property — another man and a woman.” 10 June 2010

Police seek man after armed offenders called out - “Police say the AOS was sent out on Saturday morning to a rural property where it was thought there had been an altercation between a man and his nephew. They say the women who called them had fled the house saying she had fears for a young man after her partner had assaulted him and threatened him with a firearm.” 15 May 2010
Norsewood gunman puts lower North Island into lockdown – “Residents of the lower north island towns of Dannevirke, Ormondville and Takapau have been advised to stay inside, lock their doors and stay away from windows after a body was found in a car abandoned by a gunman on the run. Police closed State Highway 2 between Norsewood and Waipukurau while they hunted for the man who had also fired at police and shot at a farm worker, injuring him in the arm. The offender was described as a European, aged 46 and highly dangerous. He was later named as David John Bourke from Wanganui.” 5 October 2009

Armed sieges and gun politics in NZ – “An armed stand-off in Chaucer Road South, Napier that started yesterday morning continues into today. A routine cannabis bust went horribly wrong when the suspect, Jan Molenaar, shot dead policeman Len Snee, 53 and critically injured 3 other people yesterday in the small tourist town of Napier, famed for its art deco architecture. Len Snee was the fifth police officer to have been shot dead since the Aramoana massacre of 1990 and one of 29 officers to have died as a result of a criminal act in New Zealand.” 7 May 2009

Armed robberies in NZ

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2011 World Cup Fans May Be Based In Sydney - "Kiwi Cup Rip-Off"

William Webb Ellis Cup

The Australian Daily Telegraph (see below) is reporting that many sporting tour groups from Britain and Australia are thinking about basing themselves in Sydney for the 2011 Rugby World Cup. The decision to stay in Sydney has been brought about by reports of NZ accommodation providers' extortionate price gouging. See our article "Price Gouging and Cleaning Up, the Rugby World Cup" for background.

Rugby World Cup accommodation prices in NZ are so steep that the country's NZ Rugby World Cup Minister has actually been asked to tell hotels to tone it down, some of them have tariffs  700-1,000% more than the usual rates for the fortnight of the tournament.

A 10 night minimum booking at the Auckland Hilton will put the average punter back a whopping $17,000, for a room "the size of a prison cell." (well, NZ prisons are said to be like luxury hotels) $17 grand! that's enough to buy a VW combo (that can be sold off later) and still have change for business class air fares and a night out at the pub.

We don't blame the supporters for wanting to stay in Sydney - the climate is better, there's far wider range of good quality accommodation and entertainment options and they're less likely to get ripped off for it all. Even with flights over to NZ to pay for it will work out a whole lot cheaper, and probably more pleasant, than staying in NZ.

Our regular readers will remember last September's  Springbok Tour who opted to stay in Brisbane, Australia and enjoy the amenities of the Gold Coast, rather than stay over in "boring Hamilton". Coach Peter de Villiers was concerned  his players would suffer from apathy as “there is nothing in Hamilton”. The town's Mayor, obviously offended,  retorted with "To be honest, if the Springboks were in the streets of Hamilton they probably wouldn’t feel that welcome anyway.”

The following day the Hamilton PR effort bounced back and Waikato Rugby Union chief executive Graham Bowen tried to promote attractions such as the Waitomo caves (much loved by David Attenborough) Raglan’s surf breaks and Rotorua, about an hour and a half away.
Anyway, back to what the Australian Telegraph had to say

"Kiwi Cup Rip-Off
NEW Zealand's Rugby World Cup minister has asked hotels to tone down the price gouging after tournament organisers continue to be embarrassed by accommodation rorts and mark-ups.
Sporting tour groups from Britain and Australia are considering basing themselves in Sydney for the 2011 World Cup given the exorbitant prices being charged for rooms in New Zealand during the tournament, particularly the finals in Auckland.
With a shortage of hotels, many have upped their rates by 700-1000 per cent for the finals fortnight and set down a minimum stay of a week or longer.
A room in the Auckland Hilton - normally $344 a night - is going for $1700 per night at a minimum 10-night booking, totalling a whopping $17,000.
And that's for what a front-page report in the New Zealand Herald last week described as a room the "size of a prison cell". Numerous other examples of hotel price gouging abound, but it's emerged bed & breakfasts and private house owners are now also getting in on the act.
A B&B near Eden Park, where the finals will be played, was in the news for asking $1600 per night during the finals. Private homes in Auckland are being advertised for as much as $7000 a week.
NZ's World Cup minister, Murray McCully, last week wrote to New Zealand's Hotel Association, asking its members to find balance between charging a reasonable premium during the tournament but not trashing the country's tourism reputation.
"It is not acceptable for anyone to rort the system - and I'm simply asking people to understand the difference between charging a premium and doing something that is extortionist and harmful to New Zealand's reputation from a tourism point of view," McCully wrote.
The minister said he was confident most hotels would abide but "one or two need to be persuaded".

That sounds rather ominous, will he be sending the boys in black round?

"It's not just Auckland hotels marking up their prices. Rooms as far as away as Queenstown - normally $255 a night - are being offered for $940 a night.
A room in the modest Ibis hotel in Hamilton, a 90-minute drive from Auckland, can be booked for as little for $77 per night, but during the World Cup finals it will cost $770.
Some angry Auckland hoteliers are refusing to join in the gouging.
The owners of the Kiwi international hotel in Auckland will charge no more $200 a night for their rooms, up from a regular rate of $89 but well short of the drastic mark-ups elsewhere.
"It's just ridiculous," the hotel's owner told the New Zealand Herald. "I think it's criminal and not only that, how does it make New Zealanders look?"

Price gouging, or just capitalism in action?  Fortunately Rugby fans are canny consumers and will be looking for the best-value all-round deals they can find. If they find them across the Tasman from New Zealand, Kiwis will only have themselves to blame - it's a free world.

Many New Zealanders have already said that they will only attend a match if it's local to them - only 12% of Kiwis said they intend going to a game and of those only 5% are intending to travel to it. Most of them to the 4 major towns/cities of Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton and Christchurch. They're canny consumers too and simply don't have the spare cash to get ripped off by their fellow countrymen.

Back in March Australia's We Love Rugby issued a press release slamming price gouging in New Zealand, saying that attendances could suffer as a result:

"Attendances at the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand could be the lowest ever for international fans with Australia's largest rugby tour operator; We Love Rugby today refuting claims from the Hospitality Association of New Zealand's Bruce Robertson that fears surrounding hotel rates during the 2011 Rugby World Cup were an "Australian beat up... "We have all seen what has happened at the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa where tourists are staying away in droves against a backlash of high hotel and transport prices. We saw it at the 2007 Cricket World Cup in the West Indies as well.

If this price gouging farce continues the 2011 Rugby World Cup is going to be nothing more than a damp squib, which will be a travesty - for the game, for the people who want to support it and for the many small businesses hoping to make a honest dollar from the event.
For all our 2011 Rugby World Cup related articles click HERE
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“Massive Quakes Hit Bay Of Plenty”

The Trademe board was buzzing in the early hours of this morning with posters scared stiff about a prolonged swarm of shallow earthquakes that were hitting Whakatane and the Bay of Plenty overnight,  it shows how frightening and disruptive shallow quakes can be for those near the epicentre:

“Massive Quakes Hit Bay Of Plenty”

3:56am ” Been a rough night here for Whakatane…..had 3 massive quakes inside 2hours…..was a couple….real real huge shakes!!!….was felt in Whakatane, Rotorua, Ohope….
4.3 20km north of Whakatane 5km deep….2:38am
3.2 20km North of Whakatane 5km deep….2:48am
and another one at 3:30am…still to be scaled….”

3.59am “4.0 10kms north of Whakatane at 5km deep 3:42am”

4.03am “gonna go watch a movie to settle my nerves lol…there was also 8 recorded over the weekend in Whakatane….so something is starting to happen”

4.22am “4:21am….another quake”

4.33am “3.7 20kms north of whakatane 5kms deep 4;21am Poor people in Matata getting rocked by all this…”

5.04am “2 more quakes 5:01 and 5:03 but i think they’d be classfied as 1 quake not 2…”

5.17am “damn this recent one…had NO depth at all. 10km north east of Edgecumbe….3.7 and NO depth…5:03am

6.24am “massive for those who are sleeping right on top of the epicentres..i’m 20ks away and it scared the shit outta me, so what about those right on top of it”

6.31am “3.5 6:18am 10kms north of whakatane”

some reponses to him:

• “they have been very much felt, i have felt 3 the noise wakes then it shakes i run out of bed thinking its never going to end its going to be big, then it stops lol but there have been so many hopefully it sorts it self out.”

• “What a crap nights sleep… the first one I actually bolted out of bed to get the kids but then it stopped. Just as I would fall asleep, then another one would hit. First time in years I’ve had my son sleep in my bed!” 

It was the second cluster to hit the region this week and unsettle residents in the area. The Whakatane Beacon reported on 18 May :

“Swarm of earthquakes hit the Bay”
“THE Eastern Bay was hit by a swarm of earthquakes over the weekend.
The first was a 2.5 magnitude quake at 9.09pm on Saturday, 10 kilometres north of Whakatane with a shallow focal depth of 2.5km.
This was followed 30 minutes later by a larger 3.5 quake, also 10km north of Whakatane with a focal depth of 5km.
At 10.01pm and 10.36pm there were two 3.1 quakes, both 10km north of Whakatane and 5km deep.
The final shake of the evening had a magnitude of 2.9km and a very shallow depth of 1km. It was similarly centred 10km north of Whakatane. Then at 2.07am on Sunday there was a sixth quake of 3.3, 20km north of Whakatane. It had a depth of 5km.
Further away a 4.5 quake was recorded north-east of Matawai at 10.50am Sunday, with a focal depth of 5km. “

In 1931 a magnitude 7.8 quake devastated the Hawke’s Bay region. It was centred 15 km north of  Napier and it lasted for two and a half minutes.

There were 525 aftershocks recorded in the following two weeks. The main shock could be felt in much of the lower half of the North Island. (source)

In August 2006 experts at the Natural Hazards Management Conference in Christchurch warned that Rotorua, Taupo and Whakatane are set to be wiped out in a massive, long overdue earthquake and that people should be prepared for a catastrophic event:

“Geology experts Tim Davies and Mauri McSaveney have predicted that an alpine fault earthquake is overdue, and would result in the East Cape ripping away from New Zealand, destroying the plateau that Rotorua is based on and taking Taupo and Whakatane with it.
The pair say the earthquake will strike “out of the blue” and cause widespread death, shut down power generators, create tsunamis within New Zealand and overwhelm emergency services.
“The most likely time [for the quake] is now. The next most likely time for it to happen is tomorrow,” Associate Professor Davies, of Canterbury University, told the conference.
“It will occur with no recognisable warning. We can’t manage it – we have to adapt to it.”
The pair have outlined a nightmarish scenario in the aftermath of the quake and are urging people to be prepared as best they can. Overseas help would be needed when the quake struck…
The interval since the last event (in 1717) is longer than any interval between known earlier events.

Rotorua historian Don Stafford said the experts’ predictions were probably right and residents should be prepared.
“Who else could you listen to other than an expert. They have their reasons for why they believe they are worth listening to.”
Mr Stafford said historically there had been major eruptions and earthquakes in the Central North Island, with the most recent being Mt Tarawera in 1886.
“Lake Rotorua was a gigantic eruption 230,000 years ago. There have been gigantic eruptions for thousands of years.
“The historic massive eruption of Lake Taupo was recorded in China, Rome and Italy.”
Mr Stafford said the Central North Island had been relatively quiet during the past few decades.
“We have had it pretty sweet and I don’t doubt for one minute that there will be more big eruptions. … We would be foolish to presume that it won’t happen just because we are living here.”

Over the last thousand years, there have been four major ruptures along the Alpine Fault causing earthquakes of about magnitude 8.

These occurred in approximately 1100, 1450, 1620 and 1717 AD, at intervals between 100 and 350 years. The 1717 quake appears to have involved a rupture along nearly 400 km of the southern two thirds of the fault.  

Scientists say that a similar earthquake could happen at any time as the interval since 1717 is longer than between the earlier events. (source)


Large ruptures can also trigger earthquakes on the faults continuing north from the Alpine Fault.
A list of  30 most recent earthquakes in New Zealand may be found here.

Also See blog : “Mass aircraft grounding possible in NZ too, scientists say”

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Racial Bullying WAS A Factor In Hamilton Girls’ High School Knife Incident

A security guard at the school and her husband have confirmed to the press that racial taunting and bullying may have been factors that led to a girl bringing a knife into school and threatening people.

The security guard had taken time off work following the incident and was said to be distraught because the girl had been bullied over her family. It is thought that the girl was an immigrant from Iraq whose father had died recently.

For the  background to this story and an account of New Zealand’s appalling record of bullying  and “culture of brutality” please see our blog entry “Knife incident at Hamilton Girls’ High School linked to bullying“

From Belinda Feek in the Waikato Times:

“A Hamilton Girls’ High School pupil who allegedly chased another girl with a knife may have been the victim of race-based taunting by a group of Indian students.
Stephen Hawkins, whose wife Linda is a security guard at the school, said the alleged taunting had been simmering for some time and his wife had feared tensions would escalate.
“It was a race-based kind of stand-off involving (a group of) Indian girls.”
The school went into lockdown for 15 minutes just after 11am on Thursday after a 15-year-old student chased another pupil with a knife.
Mr Hawkins said the girl was found with three knives in her possession which she had bought from The Warehouse during the morning break.
The Year 11 pupil was arrested by police.
The girl appeared in Hamilton Youth Court yesterday on charges of assault and threatening to kill.
Mr Hawkins said the girl bought the knives during morning break after a confrontation earlier between a group of her friends and a group of Indian girls.
“This girl that had the knife had been bullied by the girls,” he said.
“It had been coming for some time and my wife thought that something would happen,” Mr Hawkins said.
He praised both the actions of the school and his wife, who had calmed the girl down and recovered a third knife from her before taking her to the principal’s office and sitting with her while waiting for police.
Mrs Hawkins had felt the effects of the incident, he said and had taken yesterday off work.
She was distraught because the student had allegedly been bullied over her family.
Mr Hawkins said he that felt for the accused student but did not condone her actions.”

Also see posts tagged Racism

Another Armed Robbery In Palmerston North

New Zealand's violent crime epidemic continues with yesterday's gun point robbery at a Palmerston North dairy (corner shop) by four youths in their mid to late teens. It follows Sunday's robbery of a New Plymouth dairy by a gang of five teenagers and this morning's Armed Offenders Squad call out to an armed man sighted at a Gisborne shopping centre.

A NZPA report said

Four masked men have robbed a Palmerston North dairy at gunpoint, threatening the owners and an elderly customer.

Police are today still searching for the men who burst into the Gloriana Dairy in the suburb of Highbury about 7.40pm last night, their faces covered with hoodies and clothing.

One of the men threatened the male and female shop owners, and an elderly woman who came into the shop, with a long-barrelled firearm.

They stole the cash register and a quantity of tobacco before fleeing and eluding a police cordon.

The offenders would not have got more than few hundred dollars in cash and a similar value of tobacco, said Detective Sergeant David Clifford.

The firearm has not yet been recovered. Police were trying to identify the offenders by going through security camera footage. They may have been in their mid- to late-teens, he said.

The Association of Community Retailers (ACR) today linked the robbery with the Government's sudden hike in tobacco tax last week.

"They don't need to rob a bank for a mere $5000 when it's easier to rob a dairy of double that amount of value in tobacco products," said tobacco spokesman Richard Green.

Someone had also tried to break into his own Palmerston North Discount Tobacco business early on Sunday morning, he said.

A Ministry of Health proposal to outlaw tobacco displays would also make things worse for tobacco retailers, he said.

"It will be nothing for a couple of criminals to walk into my shop, close the door, assault me and steal my tobacco stock -- all without being seen because my windows will have to be blacked out under the new rules."

But regardless of the cost of tobacco, banks are still seen as easy targets.

This was evidenced by last week's armed hold-ups of the Wespac Bank in Blockhouse Bay and the ASB Bank at Three Kings Plazza, at the end of April. They were latest in an epidemic of bank robberies that's hit New Zealand in recent years.

During 2009 there were 84 Armed Robberies just in banks in New Zealand and hundreds more in dairies, clubs, pharmacies, hairdressers, video shops and other premises.


Much of the increase in armed robbery has been attributed to rising poverty levels in New Zealand, an increase in substance (drugs and alcohol) abuse and mental health problems.

Alcohol offences skyrocketed in Palmerston North during 2009, up from 87 to 409 on the previous year and the Salvation Army issued 1880 food parcels to more than 1130 Palmerston North families in the year to March.

For background see:

• Armed robberies reach historic level

• Armed robbery and drugs, 80% or more smoke weed in Gisborne, 14 April 2010:

"The rise in violent crime in New Zealand continues unabated today with three more armed hold-ups. The first was at the Balance Street Village pharmacy in Gisborne at 8pm yesterday by a man with a handgun who escaped with a quantity of drugs. The second was at the BNZ bank on Ti Rakau Drive, Manukau where two security guards were robbed by two men wielding a shotgun at 9.50am, that was followed by a pistol wielding thug holding up a Palmerston North branch of Kiwi Bank at 4pm.

After a three year climb armed robberies reached a high in 2009. Armed robbery must be one of fastest growing occupations right now in a country where there are enough firearms for one in four of the population.

There were officially 84 armed hold-ups in NZ banks during 2009. See “Armed Robberies reach historic level“

What’s causing this rise, could it be a massive increase in drug and alcohol abuse?

Drug and alcohol dependency are expensive habits to feed in New Zealand, substance abuse causes severe mental health problems that makes people to do irrational and dangerous things (Look at the thug who bottled a grandmother in Tauranga on Sunday morning, hardly the behaviour of a rational person) unless something is done to curb it violent crime is going to continue its upward trajectory.

Here’s a look at what the residents of Gisborne think about their town’s drug problem and the effects it’s having on their once pleasant community. It may come a surprise to anyone thinking about emigrating to the town ‘looking for a better quality of life’ to find out that New Zealand has these issues and how widespread the problem is...more"

Did you know:
There are currently 362 listings for rifles on the NZ online auction site TradeMe. Isn't it time to curb the sale and ownership of firearms in New Zealand, it seems that everyone has gone one...except the police. See: Police Call for Guns.




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