In the wake of the news that in August this year at least 50 families were forced into mortgagee sales of the family home, Professor Flynn says there is a simple solution.

“Rather than have people face mortgage sales, the government should buy the houses off the banks for their rateable value. The bank would be relieved of a ‘toxic’ asset and the government would get something in return for helping the bank.”

The home could then be rented back to the occupiers at perhaps 20% of their income. This would mean people could afford stay in the family home. They are spared the upheaval of trying to find alternative accommodation, which could mean overcrowding, children having to move schools and a loss of social support systems.

“All of these things put considerable stress on families and could end up requiring more taxpayers money than buying the original home. There would also be a saving in that one less family would need a rent subsidy.”

The greatest advantage would be that the the Government would instantly increase its stock of state housing.

Professor Flynn says the simplest way to avoid a subprime mortgage crisis is to have no subprime mortgages.

“Rather than have the lower third of income earners finance their homes through banks, put them in homes through state housing. There should also be a scheme so that workers can swap state houses and go from a area of high unemployment to an area where there is a job.”

Professor Flynn says there would need to be provisos to make sure that people who could afford their mortgages did not default to take advantage of the scheme.

“In general, it would need to be limited to properties of no more than the median house price for a particular city or town.”

In addition, the Alliance would like to see people able to negotiate to buy back their homes by paying an extra 5% or so of their income on top of their rent.

Similar schemes were in place up until the 1980’s and enabled many low to middle income earners to eventually own their own home. This provided financial independence and stability for families and an asset in later years.

“It was agreed that for New Zealand to be a truly democratic society, voters need the option of a democratic socialist party and that the Alliance is the only party ready and able to fill this slot nationwide, regardless of how well supported or not we are at present,” said co leader Kay Murray.

“Delegates and members of the public were buoyed by Jim Flynn’s two open addresses on the need for social democracy to achieve an equitable and just world which benefits everyone rich and poor alike, and his innovative ideas for achieving this. Jim is a longstanding Alliance spokesperson, internationally published author, social commentator and Emeritus Professor of Political Studies at Otago University,” she added.

Co leaders Kay Murray and Andrew McKenzie were re elected unopposed to their positions as was party president Paul Piesse demonstrating that the Alliance has put the past behind it and is committed to stable leadership and ready to move forward with a united front campaigning for issues of social justice and equity on a political front but also working at grass roots level on community based campaigns with other like minded organizations.

Ms Murray says in many ways the Alliance is in an enviable position. Because of it size, it is now a truly policy driven party not a party comprised of individuals who see it as a vehicle for furthering their own political careers.

“Nor is it beholden to individuals or organisations who give large donations to the party machine. Its funding comes from small donations from its very committed rank and file members, most of whom are not wealthy. While this means electioneering on a shoestring, the party is able to keep its integrity intact and is in an ideal position to represent ordinary New Zealanders who wish for a New Zealand in which everyone gets a fair go,” she said.

The Otago Daily Times reported today (22 October 2009) that an ORC owned rental property in North Dunedin was let to a young family when it was known to have lead levels several times the safe limit for residential use.

The Mission Statement and Goals of the Otago Regional Council include the “sustainable development of Otago’s resources, through the sharing of knowledge and information” and to “mitigate man-made and natural risks and hazards to Otago communities.”

Mr Billot says in this case knowledge and information of the most important kind has not been shared, and as a result a young family had been exposed to man made hazards, which was a dereliction of duty by the ORC.

The fact that a family has been living in the property since March 2009 with children, and were never told the property was contaminated, “was the kind of thing that happens in poor and corrupt nations.”

Mr Billot says the main question is why the ORC gave permission for a residential property to be let at all in the knowledge it was contaminated.

“For the ORC to put this in the hands of a property management company and make it their job to inform tenants is a classic example of contracting out not just work but responsibility for the health and safety of local people. The ORC should not be allowed to fudge the fact that it should have never got to this stage.”

Mr Billot says that it is unlikely the ORC would locate its executive offices and council chambers in a building with two to four times the recommended lead level, but there seemed to be no problem in it renting out residential properties with this very problem.

“This stinks of putting a few dollars rent above the interests of tenants and working people who don’t seem to rate very highly in the ORC’s scheme of things.”

Mr Billot says the Council now has clear responsibilities to the wellbeing of the family.

First, rather than offering the tenants an “option” to break their lease, it should refund them their entire rent they have paid since arriving at the property.

“This is a young family, and they should be immediately offered high quality alternative accommodation in the area, and financial assistance to relocate if they should wish to do so. The ORC also should front up and pay for any medical tests and treatment for the family.”

Furthermore, the decision making process and responsibilities in this situation had to be identified.

While the property management company involved had failed to do their job, the ORC should not be allowed to shift responsibility onto external contractors. The ORC should not have allowed such an important issue to be left in the hands of an external contractor, and as owner the ORC has a political responsibility to resolve the issue.

Finally, an external report should be commissioned to investigate the decision making process of the ORC in this and any similar situations.

“While local Government in Otago including regional and city councils have been focussed on “glory projects”, they have lost sight of their basic purpose and responsibility to their constituents.”

In his talk entitled “Roots of the Current Economic Crisis” Professor Flynn drew on his studies of the recent American crisis and research undertaken for his recently published book Where Have All the Liberals Gone?

Professor Flynn argued that good quality affordable housing provided by the state to people on low incomes is essential to avoid both social issues associated with extreme poverty and the sorts of credit crises that caused the near collapse of the US banking system. If the state provides housing for people on low incomes either through rental accommodation or low interest loans, Professor Flynn said, the banks are no longer tempted to give loans to people who have no hope of keeping up payments. Thus the problems with subprime mortgages and bad debts, the reasons for the current crisis, could not arise again.

In addition, Professor Flynn recommends that those on low incomes should pay no more than 20% of their income on housing as rent or 25% as mortgage repayments. Any more impinges on their ability to pay for other essentials such as food and electricity. It is highly unlikely that the private market can provide this, so the state must intervene by expanding its own stock of housing.

Professor Flynn’s thesis is amply demonstrated in the Queenstown Lakes District. There the lack of state intervention, and consequently affordable housing, means according to the Community Housing Trust that householders there, are spending on average, around 47% of their income on their mortgage repayments. This is correlated with up to 50% of people moving out of the district within 12 to 18 months because of high living costs. As a consequence, the Lakes District faces a chronic shortage of skilled workers, even in times of high unemployment elsewhere.

The Alliance Party is the only party in New Zealand that is committed to the construction of more state housing and also to provide state financed low interest concessionary mortgages to both ordinary workers and beneficiaries so that they can buy their own homes as Professor Flynn suggests.

In an interview on TVNZ’s Q+A yesterday, Turia told the nation that she was opposed to any further cuts in entitlements, especially for ACC clients who needed modified vehicles and homes if they acquired disability through accident. Alliance Party Disabilities Spokesperson Chris Ford welcomes Ms Turia’s stated opposition to these moves but has challenged her to keep the pressure up on not only this but other aspects of the ACC cuts programme.

“It is a breath of fresh air for a minister to keep out swinging against an aspect of Government policy that will severely impact on so many New Zealanders with disabilities. We hope that she can exert a great deal of pressure upon ACC Minister Nick Smith to re-think his position on the cuts and levy rises,” said Mr Ford.

The Alliance Party has also added its voice to the call for the ACC cuts and levy rises to be rescinded.

“We believe that this crisis has been deliberately manufactured. This might well be the case as any drop in revenue has probably resulted from the ongoing underfunding of ACC by previous Labour and National administrations whom both cut levies for businesses and some individuals and now this Government is using it as an excuse to begin the privatisation process.”

That is why the Alliance Party is viewing this move as being merely analogous to the old fairytale of Hansel and Gretel.

“The National Party is merely, like the evil old woman in Hansel and Gretel, seeking to fatten up ACC so that it can then be served out and eaten up by private insurance interests. If this occurs, then many thousands of New Zealanders will be denied accident coverage and ongoing support if they acquire disability through those means,” he said.

Mr Ford is hopeful that Tariana Turia can best represent the interests of the disability community during her Tuesday meeting and make the case that many disabled people, across both the health and ACC sectors, are already getting a raw deal in terms of entitlements.

“During the past week, we have witnessed what could be the beginning of the end for ACC as we know it. However, the Alliance reiterates its commitment to retaining ACC as a fully publicly-owned, levy funded operation which provides no-fault, 24 hour cover for all New Zealanders who have accidents and this includes access to the full range of entitlements currently available and also implementing the desire of the disability sector for full equity of entitlements for both ACC and Ministry of Health funded disability support clients,” added Mr Ford.

Alliance Party co leader Kay Murray notes that so far all of the discussion is focussed on the different ways of raising tax revenue without actually examining the goal of taxation in the first place.

“I can’t help but get the impression from listening to these people that tax is simply play money for parliamentarians. It pays their wages and fairly generous living expenses and gives them money to spend on pet projects and other things that they think will encourage people to vote for them. They are fastidious about making sure that taxes pose no impediment the already wealthy adding to their personal wealth at an incremental rate. We need to go back and ask ourselves what the real purpose of tax is,” said Ms Murray.

“The Alliance believes that the purpose of taxation is to serve the common good and to reduce inequality in society and that is best achieved through a genuinely progressive tax system where the well-off pay more and ordinary working Kiwis less. New Zealand has, as a nation, prided itself on being a country where everyone gets a fair go. And there is a lot of research now that proves when everyone gets a fair go it benefits not just the people at the bottom who get the chance to catch up and have a decent life, but the rest of us as well,” she added.

However, Treasury’s other proposals of introducing a flat tax and raising the rate of GST would not sit well with this goal and while the Alliance welcomes John Key’s pledge not to further flatten company or personal tax rates, any other regressive moves on the taxation front would be unwelcome.

“Having said that, we believe that some other Treasury ideas, like the introduction of a land or estate tax and/or a capital gains tax, would be welcomed by the Alliance but not if they are used to offset any revenue losses that would accrue from giving further tax cuts to the wealthy,” she said.

A public session will be held at 3pm, Saturday 17 October at the above venue, where Alliance Party finance and tax spokesperson Professor Jim Flynn will speak on the international economic recession.

Professor Flynn recently spent 10 months as a visiting scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation in New York City.

His latest book is “Where have all the liberals gone? Race, class, and ideals in America” is published by Cambridge University Press.

Author of six books, Professor Flynn has combined political and moral philosophy with psychology to clarify problems such as justifying humane ideals, and whether it makes sense to rank races and classes by merit.

The findings of his research into increasing IQ levels are known widely as “the Flynn effect.”

His research interests include humane ideals and ideological debate; classics of political philosophy; and race, class and IQ.

He has stood for the New Zealand Parliament several times as a candidate of the Alliance Party.

“The modified Emissions Trading Scheme has nothing to do with reducing harmful emissions or preventing climate change. It is all about keeping up appearances to the outside world whilst carefully avoiding any substantial changes within any meaningful time frame. Above all we are concerned about the potential impact on ordinary people of higher electricity and other charges that will result from the ETS as well,” said Ms Murray.

The Alliance Party believes that the need to reduce the six greenhouse gases identified in the Kyoto Protocol is urgent to avoid future environmental disaster but there is still no sense of urgency conveyed in the Bill. Indeed it waters down the Climate Change Response Act 2002 by giving much greater protection to heavy emitters and contains even fewer incentives for energy efficiency or sustainable development. This is because environmental damage is driven by the forces of capitalism who seek to despoil the planet in order to reap excessive profits.

“We see the emissions problem as being created by the market placing far greater emphasis on profit margins than on preventing environmental damage. We fail to see how introducing a market based scheme which allows carbon credits to be traded like a commodity or currency will do anything to reduce overall emissions. Emissions reduction ultimately relies on cooperation between governments, producers and consumers. A competitive model such as the proposed emissions trading scheme cannot achieve this.”

The Alliance strongly recommends the introduction of a carbon tax as an alternative to an emissions trading scheme. This enables the Government to retain control over emissions and to manage the process in a way that ensures that workers and consumers do not end up paying the greatest cost through their power and other utility bills. It also promotes cooperation between producers rather than competition.

The Alliance believes that the National Government needs to take a strong lead and facilitate the transition to energy efficiency in a way that is positive for the environment and the people of New Zealand. It needs to do this through education, leading research and development, encouraging the development of new energy efficient industry to replace heavy emitters and, as a last resort, penalizing those businesses that either cannot or will not reduce their emissions, with a carbon tax.

“This structure does not provide security of supply, and it increases the price paid by both households and businesses much faster than the general rate of inflation. What is more, it increases the price of power for households faster than it does for businesses,” said Mr Tinkler.

Electricity prices were stable immediately after the current structure was created following the Electricity Industry Reform Act 1998. However, since the number of retailers has consolidated, electricity prices have increased significantly.

The Alliance believes that to ensure ongoing secure supply, the Government should combine SOE generation assets into one ‘National Generator’, give this generator the responsibility to ensure there is enough electricity to meet future demands and provide it with the ability to source electricity from a wide range of sources including hydro, solar and wind to help meet this obligation.

“The Alliance also recommends that all retail customers of the three SOEs are transferred to community owned entities. It is important that all consumers have an opportunity to have influence over their own retailer as was the case in the day when local power boards and metropolitan electricity departments existed. Major electricity generators like Contact Energy and the current SOEs should not also be permitted to retail electricity unless there is a current contract with a major user,” said Mr. Tinkler.

“There needs to be tighter controls on how Transpower finances it operations as well. It is unclear what industry the board and management of the SOE believe they are in as in their 2007 annual report the company stated that they had 10 subsidiaries whose prime activity was capital raising. Besides, the Alliance Party is not comfortable that important infrastructure is owned overseas and then leased back,” he added.

The Alliance strongly recommends that TransPower is removed of its SOE directive to return a dividend and that the Government itself contributes towards greater investment in lines infrastructure, stated Mr Tinkler.

The Alliance Party believes that if these moves are implemented by Government, they will ensure both security of supply and lower prices for all customers.

“Aspire scholarships will be offered to children from low income families so that they can attend private schools – the assumption being that private schools will provide them with a better education that their local state or integrated school,” said Ms Murray.

The Alliance says that if this proves to be the case it is an indictment on the Government for failing to make sure that all public schools have the resources to offer the sort of education private schools are able to provide.

“Rather than offer a few scholarships to private schools, the government should move forthwith to shore up public schools found to be performing below par. All New Zealand children must have access to the best education programmes available. It is a core function of the government of the day to see to it that this is so.”

However, the Alliance doubts that lack of faith in the public education system is the main reason for the Aspire scholarships. They suspect that the scheme may be at least as much about enabling private schools to cream off the best of the public school students as anything else.

“All applicants for the scholarships go into a ballot according to the Ministry of Education website. However applicants must have been accepted as a student by a private school before they put in their application for a scholarship. This means private schools will be able to select the students with the highest academic or sporting achievements and use them to bolster exam pass rates and strengthen their sports teams, thus improving the public perception of the quality of programmes provided by their school. This is critical to their ability to attract fee paying students,” added Ms Murray

The Alliance says that the scheme, devised by the ACT Party and promoted by its Deputy Leader Heather Roy, is a misuse of taxpayer’s money and should simply be axed with the savings going towards funding under-resourced state schools.