Radio New Zealand
- Rating the Sustainability 
of our Prime Public Broadcasting Institution

Introduction
Letter to Radio NZ 
Invitation
Sustainability Ratings of Radio NZ  Programmes

Introduction

The following commentary on the state of Radio New Zealand was largely written in a burst of frustration at the poor quality of its language and its coverage of events in early 2011. Subsequent developments in the month since it was written have all proven the validity of the commentary. However readers may easily dismiss the general commentary as the intemperate and perhaps ill-informed outburst of an individual. However the rating of the sustainability of Radio NZ programmes using the Sustainability Principle of Energy should not be dismissed so quickly. It is based in deep physics and psychology. We ignore the ratings at our peril. 

Re lies and deceit.
We all have an incredible ingenuity for self-deceit with it associated capacity for denial of stewardship/change. Lies involve the deliberate failure to propagate the truth, especially when there is a large quantity of evidence available supporting that truth. I am aware it is often very difficult to differentiate self-deceit and lies. Thus this is written in a state of considerable compassion, mindful of the reality that we are all fallible beings who struggle to transcend the limitations of our ego with its incredible self-deceits. 

Footnote. Tuesday 22 February 2011-02-23

I was just about to post this letter out to Radio NZ and news of the Christchurch earthquake disaster arrived. I worked for the Christchurch Municipal Electricity Department for a decade and became aware of how it was primarily a communications and civil protection institution. I then worked for the Wellington MED-Capital Power-TransAlta-OnEnergy for over a decade and witnessed first hand the impacts of privatisation and corporatisation. Civil Protection investments were redefined as liabilities, community intelligence was actively destroyed and Civil Defence considerations ceased for all but PR purposes. See this photo essay of the near collapse of the Wellington City grid about 2004 (at http://tinyurl.com/6d8hblo) The grid was stressed to near collapse not by weather or seismic events but by the greed of a few bankers/traders.

As I explained in a letter our Prime Minister three weeks ago he will not learn of such failures of systems in our media. When rated on an intelligence-incoherence continuum New Zealand's Capital City rates as the dumbest of our five largest cities now. Most of its citizens do not even know who owns our main local electrical grid now, let alone have an intelligent say in its management.

Also as an active member of the city’s Civil Defence community I witnessed how the corporatisation of  the city by the Wellington City Council under Mayor Fran Wilde in the early 1990s destroyed this vital community with volunteer numbers plummeting from about 3000 to the current 100 or so. Our media, including Radio NZ, and our education system have been in the forefront in the destruction of our Civil Protection potential. I hope the latest disaster and associated misery in Christchurch helps you take this letter more seriously. 

Letter to Radio New Zealand 

To whom it may concern. 

About week into listening to post holiday Radio New Zealand National  in 2011 and I feel I have experienced enough lies and corruption to do me the whole year. I expect this of our television and broadsheets because they are almost entirely controlled by Rupert Murdoch, either directly through his ownership of them or through his dominating influence via Sky- TelstraClear. I am left relying almost entirely on Radio NZ for truth and sanity. Currently I am wondering if Radio NZ is failing me on scale and if perhaps its management is criminally negligent in failing to provide quality public radio. 

I remain very mindful that there are wonderful and very dedicated people working in Radio NZ and I value them very highly. However the overall framework, which seems to allow too many corrupted, lazy and cowardly journalists to thrive, overwhelms the endeavours of the quality journalists. It is a framework that lacks science, tends to be hostile to the interests of most New Zealanders and diminishes Radio NZ as a public broadcaster. 

Here are some examples of Radio NZ broadcasts that are already seared into my consciousness this year: 

Lie/deceit: “And now to the markets”. 
This statement is not quality news journalism but rather is a corrupt free daily advertisement for the greed-driven elite of Mark Weldon and other utterly parasitic money traders, speculators and gamblers that have wrought such misery on us.

There is an even more disturbing element to many of these “business news” broadcasts. Radio NZ journalists often say “ The Market liked this/did not like that today”. This is evidence of profound psychosis in your journalists. “The Market” does not think, speak or feel any more than a stone does. Indeed their construct of “The Market” is also profoundly psychopathic. These journalists need help. They endanger us all. This week these psychotic individuals even talked of “The Market being comfortable” with a situation! 

Fact: Markets are a social construct and have no more feelings than a stone. There are many markets. All have a name and all represent the different interests and activities of various groups of people. True public radio is born of the profound belief in democracy and all markets representing all people are given equal voice. 

Recommendation: If individuals in a corporation or group of corporations e.g. Goldman Sachs, Citibank et al who are the main drivers of stock market and currency movements like or dislike a policy, then name them or state that Radio NZ is unable to identify the individuals and their motivations behind a certain price movement. 

Recommendation: Until Radio New Zealand is able to employ sane journalists that are capable of reading the state of currency movements, stocks and share prices etc then it should desist from providing this information. The current system to totally corrupt and is simply free advertising for a small group of parasitic money trading firms. Broadcast time given to Mark Weldon et al should be matched by broadcast time to the many other more vital markets that exist e.g. the daily state of home-care market, the community volunteer market, the energy efficiency market and other vital markets. Without them our society would implode in violence. By contrast StockX could disappear today and we would only be aware of net increasing community wealth and resilience. 

Lie/deceit: “..high petrol prices with prices at the pump on the West Coast at an eye watering $2.20 a litre.” (CheckPoint) 

Fact. Existing mineral oil reserves on this planet are the result of what was probably a unique confluence of tectonic, solar, climatic and other factors that may never occur again in the existence of Earth. Mineral oil is limited in quantity and accessibility. It is also has unique potential in that each 42 gallon barrel contains the equivalent of nearly 25000 manhours of labour that can be stored, transported and used widely in all Earth’s surface climates. Currently most of NZ’s system are based on a valuation of $25 a barrel i.e. a valuation of about 0.1 cents a manhour equivalent of mineral oil’s huge potential. 

Before its widespread use in every aspect of food production last century the human population was about 1.5 billion and almost all the calories required to put a calorie of food on the average plate came from direct solar sources. Now, a mere century and four generations later, our population is 6.7 billion people and more than 5 out of every 6 calories required to put a calorie of food on the average plate come from mineral oil/gas. 30 years ago we used a calorie to put a calorie of fish on the average plate. Now we use 20 calories to put that same calorie on the plate and almost all those 20 calories are derived from mineral oil.

Another way of putting it is that there are 10 calories of mineral oil in every calorie of food we eat.

Thus upward changes in the price of mineral oil have an exponential impact on food prices. 

In this context a pump price of $2.20/litre for extremely inefficient devices such as cars and trucks is eye watering cheap. In fact it is an undervaluation that is profoundly insane and barbaric.

Note: Norway with the largest mineral oil reserves per capita in Europe charges the highest - $NZ2.73/litre. Indeed check out European prices and you will notice the countries with the biggest debts are also the nations that value mineral oil the least at the pump.

Note: There is a direct link between recent rises in mineral oil prices and recent protests against food price rises. Radio NZ ignores this truth at our peril.

No Radio NZ host articulates this reality and the only Panelist I have ever heard who shows the slightest understanding of our situation is Bomber Bradbury.

Lie/deceit: “Our economic problems are the result of fiscal mismanagement” Example Bryan Gould Afternoons this week.

Lie/deceit  “New Zealand was broke in 1984”. Afternoons this week.

Fact: In 1984 New Zealanders did have serious liabilities that included large community investments in very inefficient systems such as meat production, motorways, Air New Zealand and the Think Big projects that were designed entirely for the benefit of a few (overseas) individuals. However it had huge assets in the form of a wide range of innovative Trust Bank systems, a national bank, national radio bandwidth, a national telecommunications system, a publicly owned national rail system soon to be equipped with optic fibre, the Maui mineral gas field, loan-free university education, the provision of pensions at 60 freed many to realise their fuller potential and make enhanced contributions to society, large publicly owned forests and mineral reserves, a much smaller prison population etc. 

Above all it had a national system of integrated freehold democratic electrical grid structures that was the most advanced of its kind in the world. This system was brilliantly designed to capitalise on the great conjunction of new technologies that were emerging – “solid state” computer systems in metering, optic fibre, dwelling scale “smart” generators of products and “smart” appliances.  The intelligence potential inherent in this system was worth hundreds of billions of dollars per decade. Realisation of this huge potential was eminently possible, enabling New Zealand to become the global model of a sustainable nation in the Post Cheap Mineral Oil/Gas era. 

The Economic Reforms, since 1984 have worked exactly as intended. This is particularly true of the Electricity Industry Reforms. The Reforms demolished our national intelligence so a few overseas money traders can control and lever off those freehold national assets, ensure addictive uses of mineral oil/gas are sustained and, in general, lock NZ households into a profound level of debt. Massive increases in pollution, car use, household debt, $11 billion student loans, over 25% pension losses, halving of home affordability, world-leading inequity growth and other statistics all prove this truth.  

This accelerated destruction of New Zealand’s wealth since 1984 is especially true of the Electricity Industry Reforms – not one single community of the previous 60 democratic communities representing all New Zealanders now owns the intelligence of its local electrical potential anymore. That fractured intelligence is effectively controlled by a few individuals now and is a major source of debt manufacture for the money traders so they can extract the remaining wealth of our communities. 

In this larger context it is most incorrect to speak of New Zealand being broke in 1984 and it is not true to say we are better off now, as one Panelist claimed. What we did have in 1984 was an extremely corrupt Government assume control of the Treasury benches that lied about its real intentions, which were to work closely with overseas bankers to engineer the so-called “financial crisis” to justify “an unparalleled transfer of capital to the Americans” (The latter quote from David Lange in an interview with Kim Hill shortly before his death.) By leaking about three weeks before the election he planned a devaluation of 20% Roger Douglas et al enabled a fiscal crisis that cost NZers dearly and hugely benefited a few money traders. Yes, I recall well my shock at his brutality when I heard Roger’s leak at least two weeks before that election. 

Pre 1984 a strong intelligence had formed in New Zealand as many people learned from the chaos and social conflict we endured as a result of the 1973 and 1979 mineral oil price blips. As mentioned, NZ still had great wealth with which to transform our economy and make it sustainable beyond the era of cheaply extracted mineral oil/gas. Instead Governments subsequent to 1984 systematically destroyed that intelligence and reinforced the addictive use of mineral oil by running down rail while ripping off car tariffs and committing New Zealand to massive and escalating structural debt by encouraging the imports of a flood of second hand cars, trucks and SUVs. Both Labour and National led Governments have imbedded massive unaccounted subsidies to car, truck and jet users while those who conserve mineral oil are increasingly heavily penalised. The NZ fund is been squandered, propping up an unsustainable sunset industry while Shell profits from our ignorance and corruption..

Our growing capacity to make use of the solar potential of dwellings was effectively wiped out and much of our urban solar potential has been deliberately destroyed since1984. 

In brief the destruction of wealth, the civil conflict, inflation, unemployment, debt creation etc of the last three decades has primarily been driven by our addictive destructive uses of mineral oil. For instance it was the insane undervaluation of mineral oil at $US10 in1999 that enabled the repeal of the Glass Steagall Act and other similar wise legislation. $US10 was part of a syndrome involving massive self-deceit that enabled the fatal belief that we were effectively freed of the constraints of the laws of physics. It enabled us to believe that unlimited credit creation was thus possible now.

Our systems are based on the premise that cheaply extracted mineral oil will last forever. This makes our economy by far the largest Ponzi ever because no such resource has actually ever existed.

In other words, currently failed fiscal policy reflects and is generated by addictive uses of mineral oil/gas. We are converting the enormous wealth inherent in the mineral in most wasteful way directly into pollution. The ultimate evaluation of an economy is whether it works to conserve resources or not. This underpins all other analysis and perspectives. 

Lie/deceit:“The sale of the energy companies will release capital…” (Variations on this in Radio NZ commentary repeatedly last week, especially by “business journalists.”) 

Fact: All companies are energy companies, whatever their activity. To describe any sector of companies as “the energy companies” is a profound denial of the principles of physics –especially the Conservation Principle of Energy. It also represents very corrupt advertising and is a severe breach of Public Broadcasting principles. I cannot think of a more dangerous breach than this statement! 

I worked for Wellington MED-Capital Power-TransAlta-OnEnergy. TransAlta’s initial 49% holding gave it effectively complete control of Capital Power, which it used to ensure it gained control of the remaining 51% on terms that were very hostile to the interests of Wellington City citizens, the other shareholder. It is no coincidence OnEnergy collapsed at the same time as Enron, for both were similarly corrupt with the same architects, including Arthur Andersen and Co. The difference in these massive corporate failures is that even though OnEnergy was proportionately a far greater collapse (the biggest corporate failure in NZ history directly involving 33% of NZ households) you will find a Google search of “OnEnergy NZ” reveals no results, which is a stinging indictment of the state of our media. Compare a search on “Enron”. 

The use of the “release’ symbol represents great hostility on the part of Radio NZ  to the people of New Zealand and our heritage. I was a reader of electrical meters for two decades 1978-1997 and thus was privileged to visit many thousands of homes and small businesses. I spoke with many people who endured the deprivation of the 1930s Depression and experienced the horrors of the World Wars. They had seen the misery of starvation, disease, people freezing to death etc. I have vivid memories of sitting in their kitchens or lounges taking their payments and hearing their stories. 

As they counted out their dollar notes from their meagre incomes to pay the bill these good, humble folk expressed pride that they were bequeathing on our children wonderful freehold electrical grids even if it was at considerable personal sacrifice. Understand that in most cases their rooms were almost bare of the devices and luxuries we have now and they went without so our children could go to good schools and future elderly and sick could afford to stay warm. In times of shortage of Bulk-generated electrical products these caring, patriot people were the first to turn off their one bar heaters and live wrapped in blankets to “save the country” while rich people up the road often cranked up their demand if they perceived it might embarrass a Government they did not like. 

These people clearly saw their investment in community-owned freehold grids as the best savings system for New Zealand, which it is. Not once did I hear a Radio NZ journalist question the extremely narrow framework and vision of the Savings Working Group publication this week. Not once.

It is depraved to associate the destruction of this humane heritage with  “releasing”.

The Savings Working Group is clearly designed to serve the interests of a few very wealth and greedy individuals. Raising GST is the obvious proof of this, for the rich can and do avoid GST on scale. A less obvious malaise is the Group’s promotion of Kiwi Saver, a device designed to destroy Universal Super and to enable the money traders to divert funds from sustainable community investments  and thus deplete remaining community wealth. 

I stand by the prediction I made to Radio NZ when KiwiSaver was launched: Radio NZ was and is wrong to promote KiwiSaver because most New Zealanders will be lucky to receive 5 cents back for every $1 we invest in it. 

I refuse to join to KiwiSaver for patriotic reasons though I stand to make more money from it short term than nearly all New Zealanders, being within five years of 65 at the time of its launch and receiving the medium wage of $24000.  I am actively punished for my act of patriotism. 
Radio NZ describes KiwiSaver as a choice. I have no choice - my taxes are used to subsidise this dangerous destructive scheme that will be used to destroy universal superannuation, increase the risk of warfare, temporarily prop up the middle class confidence in the system for maybe two more years and provide immense wealth to the likes of Goldman Sachs who rig the stock market with their computer intercepts of trades. 
Worse, I pay a relative penalty tax because I put my money in the bank instead and am taxed far more heavily than shareholders. 

Note: since I made that prediction about the lethal nature of KiwiSaver evidence has emerged that similar schemes in the US have transferred trillions of dollars into the pockets of a few mega-wealthy individuals and gutted communities there. Leveraging by the money traders is currently at unprecedented unsustainable levels and military stocks are climbing… 

Radio NZ completely failed us by neglecting to question the Working Group’s endorsement of KiwiSaver. It then compounded this failure by attacking community asset structures such as Meridian et al that involve very real, substantial and sustainable savings. I reiterate: to speak of “releasing” those funds is to suggest they are not the very valuable self-sustaining national saving that they are. Such language works to support and orchestrate the current Government’s policy announced this week re “asset sales’ and is profoundly hostile to the generations of very generous and caring New Zealanders who funded and built these assets, which are the key to our sustainable future. 

Lie/deceit: “Independent energy analyst Molly Melhuish” (Afternoons this week.) 

Fact: This is not a personal comment on Molly who I know and value as a kind, caring person who has considerable expertise about the trade of Bulk-generated electrical products. However she is not independent because her language reflects a fundamental belief and commitment to existing structures under the Electricity Industry Reform legislation. Her symbol use is profoundly destructive of the state of science in our communities and thus, despite her excellent intentions, her commentary works against the communities she advocates for, especially the elderly. Molly is no more an “energy analyst” than any of the billions of human beings that reflect on the nature of energy in their daily lives. To associate her expertise of the distribution and retail of Bulk-generated electrical products with “energy” is simply another example of Radio NZ promoting the self-serving ethos of the few who now control and benefit from this distribution/retail system. 

Recommendation: Radio NZ review its use of our prime symbols and work to ensure this use is based in and supportive of the state of science. For example, a possible prototype for such a review is provided at www.thesustainabilityprinciple * 

Lie/deceit:: John Key is a moderate/intelligent/caring man and this Government has made no large changes this term and is a do-nothing, middle-of-the-road administration.  

Fact: John Key was put in because he is the perfect agent for the bankers – he believes money begets wealth and exhibits very little sentience of the natural limits of resources. Indeed many of his statements on the economy exhibit severe psychosis and considerable psychopathy in this regard, . He has been primarily put in as Prime Minister because his personal qualities work to ensure the continuing radical commitment of NZ to addictive uses of mineral and to commit NZ to massive loans that ensure remaining control of our national assets is transferred to overseas bankers. In the context of the rapid depletion of global reserves of cheaply extracted mineral oil this Government’s actions are historic in the scale of their negative impacts on NZ and humanity in general.

There is considerable evidence that John does not really care for New Zealanders. I predicted years ago to Afternoons he would skip NZ - as did Fay, Richwhite, Watson et al - and last week my prediction was supported when John said he would “leave politics” if National did not win the next election. That is not the response of a person who is committed to promoting the welfare of our children.  Of course it may be he will experience some transformative event that enables him to transcend his current primary role as a banker's agent.

Recommendation.  Radio NZ identifies the huge raft of subsidies to cars, trucks and jets plus the associated debt creation. It should present reports on the state of this activity at prime times at least once a week. This market is a much larger and more critical market than, for instance, NZX. Also the state of clean water and food nutrition and the personal comfort, and health levels of NZ homes should be given the same status as other “business reports”. These are the truer measures of the health of our economy. 

Lie/deceit: “...there is a vacuum in Egypt at the moment”. 

Fact: Many millions of Egyptians live on a few dollars a day and recent food price-rises stemming from mineral oil price increases are causing great misery. This use of the “vacuum” symbol is pure White House/White Hall Speak serving the narrow, greed-driven interests of US and UK corporations that control them. These misery mongers exploit the hardship and social unrest. If there is a vacuum it is the lack of morality of these corporations.

Lie/deceit: “Credit Rating Agency Standard and Poor/Moodys/Fitch et al..” 

Fact: These institutions exist to serve the interests of a few extremely wealthy money traders. They do not rate credit risk but rather engineer the perceptions of credit risk so as to serve the narrow interests of those traders. This was proven as a fact in 2008 when these Agencies rated completely bankrupt private corporations AAA while wealthy community assets were rated A- or B or less, thus enabling the money traders to extract that community wealth by engineering high interest public bond issues which they purchase with the low interest funds they create for themselves via “quantitative easing” etc. Put brutally, S&P, Moodies et al are the street bullyboys for the Mafia. They are not bona fide credit rating agencies. They are extremely dangerous because their ratings are not based in science in general, less still in physics in particular. 

Recommendation. Describe agencies such as S&P as the agents acting on behalf of an elite of very rich money traders. They are better described as Credit Manipulators.

  Invitation

*www.thesustainabilityprinciple.org * And now for a change to a much deeper level of reflective thinking.

All human beings have an incredible capacity for self-deceit and unless this is psychological fact is embraced we can easily self-destruct. Radio NZ people are no exception and in their role as the prime public broadcasting institution in NZ they can cause both great misery and great good. Currently the same malaise that afflicts our Anglo-American culture pervades the Radio NZ institution. It involves self-deceit and associated denial of stewardship/change on a scale that puts our societies at great risk of implosion into misery while forming a major threat to the remainder of humanity. (The risk of a global catastrophic war being triggered by current Anglo-American activities and policies by about 2013 is probably over 90% now and becomes more certain with the destruction of every barrel of mineral oil.) 

I invite your interest in the Sustainability Principle of Energy, which provides us with a valuable tool for transcending the limitations of our ego and its capacity for self-deceit. Inherent in the Principle is great hope, for in conserving the potential of our prime symbols we are able to enjoy far greater and more sustaining options. 

The Sustainability Principle is also a tool for evaluating the sustainability of individuals and organizations. Below is a hastily assembled evaluation of Radio NZ programmes that I regularly listen to. In general the analysis suggests that on balance all the programmes are evaluated are unsustainable and generate hopelessness by failing to conserve the potential of our prime symbols. Hopelessness is propagated because the failure in conservation results in the destruction of many valuable options inherent in the potential. We are diminished and less sustainable as a species.  

The context of this statement is important to note:  the Sustainability Principle also suggests Radio NZ is probably the most sustainable of all our mass media. 

The qualification is because the relationship between the credibility accorded an organization and its propagation of misinformation is not direct and can involve considerable leverage. Thus, for instance, when the Broadcasting Standards Authority or the Royal Society of NZ decree, as they do, that it is acceptable to use the “energy”, “power” and “electricity” symbols interchangeably they destroy the state of science in our communities on a disproportionate scale because they are the perceived authorities on language and “science”.

Also it is a well-supported principle of PR that the promotion of a product is far more potent in reputedly advertisement-free media than in advertisement-dependent media. 

Both these caveats re leveraging off public broadcasting in general also apply to the comparisons of the sustainability of Radio NZ programmes. I do not have the means of calculating the relative leverage because I do not know how listeners rate each programme. I can only hypothesise that a programme such as Sunday Morning that is promoted as an authority on sustainability has greater leverage than one like The Arts on Sunday. 

However the Sustainability Principle with its insights into symbol use offers clear indications whether the overall framework of any programme is sustainable or not. 

I hope you can enjoy the immense hope and power that resides in the Sustainability Principle of Energy.

Yours sincerely

Dave McArthur

  Sustainability Ratings of RNZ Programmes

Index

Afternoons
Afternoons The Panel
Nights
Our Changing World
Saturday Morning
This Way Up
The Arts on Sunday
Sunday Morning   
Sunday Morning Insight
Sunday Morning MediaWatch
Sunday Morning Ideas
Checkpoint
Morning Report
Midday Report  
Nine to Noon  
Music 101
Story Time
Radio NZ Management

Afternoons
Response to listener’s letters
Generally very good, respectful, often thoughtful

General comment

Much valuable content – Our Changing World reports; technology commentary; discussion of language (exciting but remains superficial); personal health, NZ drama, music etc.  Your Place is of outstanding value in promoting national coherence and community – it could be extended to include non-European cultures more. For instance I went to college in Greytown 50 years ago for five years. Not once did we go to Papawai Marae a short distance away and we were taught nothing of local pre-European history. Listening to Your Place on Greytown I noted little has changed.Currently I share my house with two people who were born in India. They too are part of our NZ culture. Jim has a rare gift for engaging our people and bringing our stories to life.

Web care
Good – programmes labelled by guest and topic for Ipod, MP3 player etc

Sustainability rating
Moderately unsustainable. 

Index 

Afternoons The Panel
Response to listener’s letters
See Afternoons

General comment

Very valuable -offers fascinating and informative insight into the media people who are in the frontlines of the forming our culture.

Web care 
To be commended for breaking Panel into digestible segments. Could include names of Panel members.

Sustainability rating
Very unsustainable to hopeless –basically an extended advertisement for addictive uses of car and jet travel. Severe lack of comprehension of fundamental physics is reflected in poor quality insights in contemporary affaires and very unsustainable language. Indicative of dangerous state of NZ media generally.

Index 

Nights
Response to listener’s letters
Generally very good – often thoughtful acknowledgement

General comment

Good range of content with some excellent regular features. The series on philosophy is particularly sustaining by reminding us the human condition remains unchanged and sages in all cultures over millennia have provided a range of deep insights into how individuals and societies can better transcend our limitations and sustain ourselves. Such programmes are critical in our current morally and intellectually bankrupt culture. Repetition of highlight daytime programmes is of diminished value because of advances in Web-based broadcasts but remains important still. Accords undeserved respect for BBC programmes and should expand programme sources. To be commended for attempting high-risk interviews and lesser mainstream topics.

Web care
Good. Often helpful with links to imported programmes. However, for instance, it is frustrating that Thinkers does not include guest and topic e.g. philosophy Ann Kerwin Plato

Sustainability rating  
Moderately to very unsustainable – particularly the framing of programmes on “energy” “power” and thermodynamic processes.  

Index

Our Changing World

Response to listener’s letters
Zero response to correspondence over the years.

General comment

Programmes contain a wealth of valuable content. Special commendation for the revised name to Our Changing World  – brilliant! However both the hosts and guests tend very often to frame much excellent data in very unsustaining ways, particularly with the use of the science, warming, energy and power symbols.

Web care
Good – website often rich in information, labelled by topic for ipod/mp3

Sustainability rating  
Moderate to very unsustainable  

Index

General comment

My Ipod records indicate Kim Hill generates for me more riveting, memorable and stimulating programmes that bear repeat listening than nearly all the other National programmes put together. This is particularly true of interviews revealing people’s lives. On occasion Kim has demolished guests who lack public speaking skills and are attempting to present radical perspectives. Thus I imagine there are many shy people like me that would not risk such an experience and the dismissal of years of unpaid research. At the same time when Kim is humble her intellectual curiosity in inspiring and exhilarating. Constant check of recent her broadcasts is a must-do.

Web care  
Very good – programmes clearly labelled by guest and topic. An exemplar.

Sustainability rating  
Moderately to very unsustainable, particularly because of flawed uses of the science, art and energy symbols. This is frustrating because Kim is tantalisingly close to becoming a major sustainable force if she could review her use of the science symbol.

A classic recent example where these uses failed us was the interview with Dr David Suzuki, which was on the subject of hope and yet generated a severe state of hopelessness that left both host and guest and probably many of the audience distressed at the end.

Index 

 This Way Up
Response to listener’s letters
Not applicable – zero correspondence.

General comment

A wonderful eclectic selection of topics. Series such as the beehive, henhouse, nuts and food foraging series are particularly sustainable by connecting us with our chemical being and empowering us to be more self-sufficient and enjoy quality food more. However the programme’s regular promotion of interests of the interests of those who control the Bulk-generated electrical products sector is of great concern. 

Web care  
Good –guest and topic filed well. Resource page is excellent.

Sustainability rating  
Moderately to very unsustainable - particularly because of flawed uses of the power, electricity, science, art and energy symbols.

Index 

The Arts on Sunday 
Response to listener’s letters
Not applicable – zero correspondence.

General comment

Lyn’s enthusiasm for her subjects is a refreshing delight and infectious. The programme is an essential reminder to me of the vital sustaining role of dancing, music, drawing, painting, acting, writing and other skills (arts) in our lives.

Web care
Good - guest and topic filed well. The web page provides a stimulating vision of a very narrow range of the arts and expressions humans are capable of.    

Sustainability rating  
Moderately unsustainable – mainly because of the use of the arts and science symbols. (Current uses of both symbols are born out of and enable the excesses of the Industrial Revolution.)  

Index

Sunday Morning   
Response to listener’s letters
Correspondence often acknowledged – Chris’s role as broadcaster overlaps his role as my Regional Councillor. Sometimes it is unclear if the correspondence is read with care.

General comment

This programme is a very important prime time weekly magazine broadcast at a time when people are often in a more reflective mode. Some people go to church for the truth, beauty and meaning. For many like me Sunday Morning is our temple and university – not to be confused with the contemporary profit-driven factories that associate themselves with the church and university symbols. 

Sunday Morning does explore a wide range of aspects of the human condition in general and our New Zealand culture in particular. It asks some of the big questions that can lead us to be able to more fulfilled sustainable lives and enjoy greater civilisation. Often guests provide very wise insights and sadly too often it appears that Chris has been unable to hear them to learn from them to provide more insightful context and questions in subsequent programmes. Perhaps he has a tendency to venerate overseas dignitaries while being dismissive of New Zealanders who challenge his beliefs and sometimes I have been overwhelmed during interviews with UK and US diplomats with a sense that I have dropped in on a couple of retired British Colonial Administrators sitting in the smoking room at the Club reminiscing about those dashed uncivilised Arabs, inscrutable Chinese and slippery Indians. Perhaps Chris’s decisions as a Regional Councillor limit his development as a radio host?

Web care
Good - guest and topic files well for MP Ipod etc

Sustainability rating  
Very unsustainable – perhaps the least sustaining RNZ programme because of its prime time broadcast, reputation and framing of issues.  

Index

Sunday Morning Insight   
Response to listener’s letters
Not applicable – zero correspondence

General comment

Often insightful of activities I am less aware of. However I tend to find meaningful in-depth analysis of macroeconomic trends and events is lacking because a failure to understand the physics of our systems. (See above re mineral oil for instance)

Web care
Good –topic files well. Perhaps needless duplication of broadcast date can be avoided and topic placed in more prime position.

Sustainability rating  
Tending unsustainable.

Index 

 Sunday Morning MediaWatch
Response to listener’s letters
Zero acknowledgement of or evidence of response to correspondence over the years.

General comment

Valuable programme often providing insights into the activities of areas of NZ media I never have time nor desire to follow. Provides valuable discussion of the vital role of our media in pursuing the truth and sustaining democracy in our society plus keeps us mindful of the power of language in general, the framing of issues and the risks of advertising. However the programme regularly falls into the traps it warns us of.

Web care
Perhaps needless duplication of broadcast date and programme name can be avoided and space used instead to indicate prime topics and guest names.

Sustainability rating  
Moderately to very unsustainable - particularly because of flawed uses of the power, electricity, science, art and energy symbols and poor comprehension of thermodynamics.

Index 

Sunday Morning Ideas
Response to listener’s letters

Not applicable – zero correspondence that I can recall.  
General comment

I am assuming the objective of a programme entitled Ideas is to explore the boundaries of our thinking mind so we are better sustained. The programme does explore a range of stimulating ideas and provide us with considerable options. It is commendable for attempting to balance overseas sourced insights with local commentary of how those insights might be relevant to New Zealand.  Ideas is limited by its Eurocentric framework and lack of physics and thus fails to explore some of the most sustaining ideas humans have generated.

Web care  
Poor – which is particularly frustrating because the programme generates excellent material. The repeat filing of the complete date is unnecessary and would provide space for information on topic and prime guests. Also the programme is filed as an indigestible blob. If I wish to re-listen to the last sentence or interview on my Ipod I have to listen to the previous 45-50 minutes again. If I reload my Ipod partway through listening to an Ideas programme I have to listen to it all again. See Afternoons The Panel as an exemplar or, better still, A World of Possibilities where options are given for entire or partial downloads.

Radio NZ policy is particularly frustrating because it effectively destroys the excellent material generated on the programme with our taxpayer funds by precluding further propagation on the Web. Ideas contains timeless wisdom that should be sustained for the benefit of all via the Web instead of locked in Radio NZ’s vault. Criminal.

Sustainability rating  
Moderately to very unsustainable - particularly because of flawed uses of the power, electricity, science, art and energy symbols and poor comprehension of thermodynamics.

Index 

Checkpoint
Response to listener’s letters
Zero acknowledgement over the years though occasionally I have heard evidence suggesting Mary has read and reflected on comments and information provided.

General comment

Checkpoint accurately reflects the self-deceit and associated denial of stewardship/change that prevails in New Zealand society. Thus court reports of violent offences feature on scale, as do debates about “benefit fraud” and other relatively small-scale fraud. This places disproportionate focus on lower income people while many of the most violent and corrupt individuals in our wealthy elite escape scrutiny and are even lauded – some as “expert commentators”. An excessive dependence on narrow US Whitehouse and UK Whitehall perspectives is revealed in the language, even in commentary supposedly critical of those perspectives. Mary and the crew seem very hardworking but operate in an unsustainable institution.

Web care  
Good –topic files well, sometimes addition of guest/subject individual/policy name could be helpful.

Sustainability rating
Very unsustainable – use of prime symbols is chronic e.g. energy, power, electricity, warming, conservative, market, carbon, greenhouse, etc.

Index 

Morning Report

Response to listener’s letters  
Zero acknowledgements over the years though occasionally I have had reports my comments were broadcast.

General comment

These days my live listening is limited to 6.30 am to about 7.15 am. Thus my views are heavily coloured by my responses to the Business Report and the headlines. See general comment for Checkpoint.

Web care  
Good –topic files well, sometimes addition of guest/subject individual/policy name could be helpful. Radio NZ policy of archiving for a very short period limits my listening and precludes me studying the broadcasts on particular topics over a period.

Sustainability rating
Very unsustainable – use of prime symbols is chronic e.g. energy, power, electricity, warming, conservative, market, carbon, greenhouse, etc.

  Index

Midday Report  

Response to listener’s letters
Not applicable – zero correspondence that I can recall.

General comment

See general comment for Checkpoint and Morning Report. As mentioned in more detail in my general comment, Business News is appalling.

Web care  
Have not studied it on Ipod, MP3 etc

Sustainability rating
Very unsustainable – use of prime symbols is chronic e.g. energy, power, electricity, warming, conservative, market, carbon, greenhouse, etc.    

Index

Nine to Noon

Response to listener’s letters
Zero response over many years of correspondence.

General comment

My listening has dropped off over the years as a result of the nature and time of my work. Also being a daily programme much of the material is out of date by the time I get to check the archive. Thus I tend to download the programmes that discuss economic, sociology, psychology and advances in knowledge on the more universal level. I listen to Rod Oram because I know he is very influential with some sectors and I am concluding he reflects in the most sophisticated way the general hostility of Radio NZ to the majority of New Zealanders. Kathryn and crew seem particularly out of their depth when discussing the real reasons for the current economic malaise, perhaps because they lack physics. 

I was delighted to see recently the programme attempt an exploration of the nature of energy. Understanding the nature of energy is critical to our existence and the adoption of flawed notions of its nature can destroy great societies in a very short period. This vital subject was given two ten minute discussions and after listening to the programmes multiple time I was confused as I was about the nature of energy as I was when I graduated from our education system. The more I listened the less it made any sense. I am concluding this is an exemplar of the lack of sustainability of Radio NZ and recommend all staff listen to these two programmes on the Conservation Principle of Energy.

Web care  
Reasonable. Programmes like Business and Technology lack information. 

Sustainability rating
Very unsustainable

Index

Music 101

Response to listener’s letters  
No applicable – no correspondence

General comment

In the 1990s I argued strongly for programmes containing contemporary popular New Zealand music with interviews and insights into the creators and their creations and its international context. Music 101 fulfils this request in many ways. Initially the new music that was broadcast on Saturday afternoons came as a shock for many, including myself. I was mortified at what I might have asked for. NZ music has evolved and so have I. I now delight in NZ music as never before. My intuition this is, on balance, valuable community building work.  

Web care  
Thoughtful and accessible

Sustainability rating
Not rated. It is probable that research of many uses of the love symbol in songs would indicate those uses are unsustainable.

Index 

Story Time

Response to listener’s letters
No applicable – no correspondence

General comment

Children are our future and constitute a significant proportion of our population. The stories we tell them remind us all of our past; our state of uncertainty and constant search for meaning; the paradox of the universality of humanity in embracing the variety of cultures and in many cases the stories transmit great wisdom. Sometimes I hear these stories mixed with my waking dreams if I turn the radio on early on weekend days and I am reminded how listening to the great children’s stories as a child cemented my life-long love of public broadcasting. 

It is a sign of the corporatisation of RadioNZ with its associated loss of soul that management no longer broadcast children’s stories daily at bedtime. Often I used to tune away from CheckPoint – there is only so much I can take of court stories and banal BBC accounts of world affaires. I would tune back in to hear the stories of Narnia etc at 6.45 pm and be refreshed in the creativity, imagination, play and wisdom of the stories. They had major therapeutic value in the insane world of current affaires. The current programming is another example of the underlying hostility of Radio NZ to humanity.

Web care
A quick look indicates it seems OK

Sustainability rating
Unsustaining.   

Index

Radio NZ Management

Response to listener’s letters

Zero response to the letters I have sent over the years. On the positive ledger there is considerable evidence that Management listened to the views of the public consultancy group that I was a member of in the mid 1990s.

General comment

This management poorly serves New Zealand and its poor public broadcasting framework diminishes and negates the excellent work of many of its frontline staff. As mentioned in my general discussion Radio NZ works to serve the interest of a wealthy parasitic elite of New Zealanders and multinational corporations. There is a fundamental hostility to the majority of New Zealanders. 

This situation is compounded by the very exclusive policies of Radio NZ management. Requisites of the state of science include the spirit of sharing, collegiality, inclusiveness and trust. “Copyright” laws are actively hostile to this state and are extremely destructive. They were prime reasons for the two major global wars of last century and put us at imminent risk of a far greater catastrophic event. The most grossly in-debt nations like USA, Japan and the UK are all living proof that their addiction to copyright destroys wealth. Arguably Radio NZ Management use of copyright is Fascist. The resources of the people, including considerable taxpayer money and millions of hours of free audio contributions from all manner of citizens are locked away for the benefit of a few rich people. 

The argument that this is to “maintain high standards of public broadcasting” is both flawed (The Sustainability Principle of Energy reveals clearly the low standards that currently prevail) and arrogant (It implies the myriad contributions by citizens has no standards and their reputations are worth nothing.)  Radio NZ management confuse copyright with stewardship and we are all the losers for this unsustainable policy. It is also insulting of all the high quality work produced by its more dedicated and capable staff. I, for one, am proud of their work and would love to propagate it. Binning it, as is the current policy, is criminal in a culture that is destitute of quality ideas.

Web care

Radio NZ management is to be commended with establishing the RNZ website, particularly in the face of active opposition from other miserable-minded media. However the management seems oblivious or fearful of the massive extra potential for public broadcasting that is now possible using the Internet. This includes the potential of the computers of individual citizens to download and broadcast programmes from all over the world.

Sustainability rating

Index 

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