The NZ Herald has become a function of the current National government, providing spin to promote a regime of disinformation.
I don't mean to dismiss all of the journalists who contribute to the widely read publication, but on the balance of things there's no doubt that more prominence is given to a flawed and corrupt right wing ethos.
Today they carried that dysfunction on with an article entitled Rena response adequate, poll says:
The Government has again defended its reaction to the Rena disaster after a third of respondents to a Herald-DigiPoll survey thought the response was not good enough.For starters all the other parties bar Act and United Future say that National has not handled the Rena oil spill response well. That lack of a proper oil spill response plan that Hekia Parata promised was in place is what has been damaging for National. They utterly failed.
But more than half of those surveyed said the response was adequate or better.
Just over 36 per cent of respondents thought the response was unsatisfactory - a view backed by opposition parties who say the container ship's grounding on October 5 and subsequent oil spill had been politically damaging for the Government.
At the other end of the scale, 11 per cent thought the response was "very good" and 50.3 per cent thought it adequate.
Yesterday, Environment Minister Nick Smith said the Government had been cautious not to let politics meddle with what he called "good technical decisions".
To highlight just one instance of how much National is unaware of their own failure, here's Nick Smith talking about the governments response to the disaster:
However on the 25 October, (twenty days after the ship first grounded) Maritime New Zealand revealed at a public meeting held in Opotiki that they were having to exert a lot of pressure on the salvors to get the fuel off the ship."That also occurred quite close to an election and the politicians had agencies doing things that looked good but actually were very damaging - we've been very determined we make the right decisions for the right reason and it's encouraging to see that the public is recognising that."
This is because the salvors have no financial interest in protecting the environment because thanks to National, there are no proper fines able to be imposed on those responsible for the disaster.
The total lack of initiative shown by National to take control of the situation has meant an extended delay in removing oil. This has increased the likelihood of further oil leaking into the ocean and damaging not just our beautiful beaches but also New Zealands reputation as a clean and green destination.
The polling on 3 News last night said 36% of people polled thought that National didn't do well, 30% only OK and 34% said National had done well... making me conclude that the NZ Herald and 3 News didn't poll anybody from the Bay of Plenty.
Being that one poll showed 11% of people polled thought Nationals response was very good and the other said 34% of people polled said they had done well clearly shows that the polling process is highly flawed. That's a 23% margin of error between these two polls.
It is unfortunate that the main newspaper in New Zealand has decided to disproportionately disseminate Nationals propaganda and is clearly unbalanced in its opinion.
I wouldn't be surprised if they had just called John Key to ask him what the numbers should be... although the fact that the media has been showing nice clean beaches while oil continues to wash up along the East Coast and there are now whale and seals dying is probably just as influential.
