Readers' Comments

Reader Comments on Aardvark Daily 3 December 2002
Note: the comments below are the unabridged submissions of readers and do
not necessarily reflect the opinions of the publisher.
From: Brian
For : Right Of Reply (for publication)
Subj: I spy with my little eye... 8-|

While Government requires the means to adequately govern
and provide essential services, hopefully entailing the
deployment of efficient and effective procedures and
associated technologies, and hypotherically those who have
no guilt should have nothing to fear, bureaucrats and
technocrats could be potentially prone to collusion and
fraud etc etc, if not properly founded.

Hence government departments should have transparent
structures, working to well understood operational
guidelines with regular audits, staff rotations etc etc...

For the potential of internal abuse can certainly exist.
Recalling my days during the 80s and early 90s while
working for Petrocorp that then morphed itself into
Fletcher Challenge Petroleum, as an IT professional
progressively overseeing systems, security and finally
departmental management, the sense of "power" beneath one's
fingertips as they hovered above the keyboard was
sometimes "frightening" to behold... ;o(

PS. Btw, it's laughable now to recall how the big-iron e-
beast, a PR1ME supermini computer supporting over a 100
users, ran on 32 MBs of memory with 600 MBs of HDD. Geez,
those were the good old days... ;o)




From: Allister
For : The Editor (for publication)
Subj: IRD = Big Brother

If the IRD gets to be big brother, I shudder to think what
kinds of sibling rivalry will ensue.

Based on my dealings with IRD during 4.5 years of self
employment, I can say that any private company run along
their lines would be out of business in weeks if not days.

I once asked them: "Are you telling me that in order to
*potentially* save me money, you charged me interest?"
Their answer was vague, but definitely not "No."

BEWARE!




From: Dominic
For : Right Of Reply (for publication)
Subj: Power of a citizen

Frankly, when it comes to anything with the Government, my
only power is the general election.

I rely on certain pieces of legislation to bring to my
attention the activities of certain Government departments
and their employees. Official Information Act, amongst
others.

No Government department consults me when it is handling my
information. I'm in two minds about this: a) is it
necassary to consult me, given the effects from the
handling and b) might my actions if I were consulted,
create or solve problems.

If I don't like my Government, I leave the country, its as
simple as that. However, when I leave, does my personal
information get deleted? Or does it get transferred to the
country I go to?

Laws are not made by the public. Effectively, my life is in
the control of people I don't know and can't get to know.

What I find disturbing about this modern civilisation is
that truth exists but it can't be accessed. And when I try
to access it, someone tries to stop me.
Hit Reload For Latest Comments
Now Have Your Say