Food safety legislation: novice Greenie MP plays to the Ooooby and Wwoofer gallery

What price should we pay to ensure it doesn't poison us?

Alf perhaps wasn’t paying attention, when the Food Bill was introduced into Parliament.

He certainly didn’t spot the shortcomings in the legislation now being highlighted by egregious greenies and Labourites.

But he is aware that our splendid Government has given assurances that the bill won’t affect good honest Kiwis who grow their own food and swap it with friends and neighbours.

Those assurances should put an end to the matter.

But he reads that

Much too taxing for a rural MP

As the masthead on this blog shows, there are more than a few small businesses in the humming township of Eketahuna. These should benefit from something Revenue Minister Peter Dunne highlighted yesterday.

He welcomed

… Inland Revenue’s update of tax regulation Determination E11 as a further measure to reduce compliance costs on businesses.

Go get ’em, Rodney

Compliance costs are in the gun again, but this time the sheriff who has set out on their trail is the mean-minded Rodney Hide. We can expect to see blood, whereas they proliferated – paradoxically – whenever the previous government sent posses out to round them up.

Wearing his Minister for Regulatory Reform hat, and looking like a grimly determined John Wayne, Hide today announced a government-wide review of red tape and unnecessary bureaucracy.

The Building Act and the laws covering swimming pools and shop trading hours will be included.

Great, says Alf. He can’t get too excited about the laws covering swimming pools (he prefers to drown himself from the inside). But he knows how they are a pain in the arse for others.