Erewhon: Where everyone is lazy and does drugs
RadioNZ (sorry RNZ) has a remarkable story up about New Zealand’s high level of immigration, and how this high level of immigration is actually bringing in a lot of low-skilled workers who are taking the jobs of low-skilled New Zealanders (the whole thing is filled with plenty of words to make anyone uncomfortable actually).
The whole piece is here: http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/312562/immigrants-needed-due-to-nzers’-work-ethic,-drug-use-pm and the link itself should give away its big reveal (good on you RNZ for not using the headline “You’ll never guess why John Key loves immigrants; hint: it’s because of drugs”).
The money quote is this one, where Key is talking specifically about fruit-pickers in the Hawke’s Bay and how the immigration of a number of fruit pickers from Pacific Islands has worked out splendidly. In this quote, Key is talking about the locally unemployed:
But go and ask the employers, and they will say some of these people won’t pass a drug test, some of these people won’t turn up for work.
First off, I’m not sure why fruit picking is harmed by drug taking – unless you’re high and operating a forklift, but I haven’t seen that police ad yet so I’m not sure how big a problem it is. Secondly, who’s buying these people drugs? Is it John? Is he buying drugs for people? Also why are people not turning up for work? Obviously the implication is that they are LAZY but we don’t know for sure. They may be passed out from too many drugs? Instead of asking for one drugs maybe they accidentally asked for 1000 drugs because they were on DRUGS.
It seems at this stage that John Key actively loathes the people he’s leading. It’s like we’re in that death-rattle stage of the relationship where neither party really likes each other, but you dislike each other so much that you can’t stand them to be with anyone else that will make them happy so you stay with them just out of spite.
But now we seem to be trying to have some kind of mature conversation about immigration, how many is too many? What are the benefits/cost of immigration? Etc.
The only problem with this is that throughout the entire conversation, we’re going to have Winston Peters screeching from the sidelines “see I told you so” like some kind of racist cheerleader, and that’s going to derail it.
So instead we should all sit back, take some drugs, pick some fruit and just chill. John’s got this. Everything will be ok.
“I use a theory if I need 30 people, I get 40 people, locals, ’cause on average I only get 30 every day … They just don’t turn up, they couldn’t get a ride, I don’t know, but their reliability, I mean, you just can’t depend on it.”
He said workers under the RSE scheme were much preferable. “They live in kennels on the farm and have the same nutritional requirements as the pigs, too, so we don’t have to worry about them about side issues like them not being able to afford a car or petrol.”