Even as a scooter rider, I think these motorcyclists who are kicking up a fuss about their ACC levies going through the roof don’t have a leg to stand on.

It’s quite possible too that the motorbike guys will think that someone who rides a 2-stroke Vespa isn’t even a real motorcyclist.

And they’re free to think that, but even though the ACC levy is going to increase by almost 80% over the next three years, you won’t find me running off to the Human Rights Commission.

I’m not joking there either, because that’s exactly what Motorcycle Advocacy Group New Zealand has done.

So here are the numbers: in three years’ time the ACC levy for anyone who registers a motorbike will be $532. At the moment, it’s $297. So, yes, a truckload more money. It’s an increase of nearly 80%.

And the motorbike people think they’re being unfairly targeted when you consider that the ACC levy for car drivers in that same three-year time period is going to go from $42 a year to $64 for drivers of petrol cars. For EV drivers, the levy will go from $42 a year to $122 a year.

So the motorbike people have lodged a complaint with the Human Rights Commission, saying it isn’t fair that they’ll be paying more than $800 a year when car drivers will only be paying a maximum of $122 a year.

They say it would be much fairer if everyone just paid a flat rate of $140, but I disagree.

In their complaint to the Human Rights Commission, they say that as a minority group of New Zealand citizens, motorcyclists are being unfairly singled-out and the increases will particularly affect people on low incomes who rely on motorbikes as an affordable form of transport.

Here’s a quote from their submission: “Although motorcyclists only account for only 0.26 percent of all ACC accident claims, they bear a disproportionately high financial burden.”

So you look at that stat, and it could be very easy to think that they have a good point. If so few ACC claims are being made by motorcyclists, why are they paying way more than other people on the road? But it’s not about the number of crashes - it’s about the severity of the injuries.

For me, it comes down to the fact that —when you’re on the road on two wheels— you are at so much more risk. And I don’t have a stat to back this up but I bet you that when a motorcyclist is involved in a crash, chances are they require a lot more medical care than someone in a car.

That’s what ACC itself says too – it says the cost to the country of motorcycle accidents is extremely expensive.

This is because of the kinds of injuries someone can get if they’re on a motorbike and get involved in a crash.

And, unfortunately, a lot of the time those crashes aren’t caused by the motorcyclists themselves, they’re caused by muppets in cars and other vehicles.

If you’ve ever ridden a motorbike or a scooter, you’ll know how key it is to make sure that other drivers have seen you. Example: when you’re heading down the road on your motorbike and there’s a car approaching an intersection on your left.

You can never be sure they’ve seen you unless you catch their eye. I do it every time, try to make sure I catch their eye. Always have. Because, quite often, what I find is that the car driver at the intersection is actually looking beyond you.

They’re looking out for larger vehicles and they can completely miss you.

Not that us motorbike and scooter riders are completely innocent, either. I don’t know how many times I’ve given into the temptation —when traffic’s at a standstill— to undertake, and ride through the space to the left of the built-up traffic.

I don’t know how many times I’ve said to myself I’m never doing that again and I have done it again.

Nevertheless, riding a motorbike or a motor scooter is not compulsory. It is a choice. It is a choice that motorcyclists make knowing full well that riding on two-wheels is way riskier than riding on two wheels.

And, because we acknowledge that risk, we also need to accept that if we come to grief, chances are we’re going to need more support from the health system.

And, because of that, we have no reason to complain about paying higher ACC levies than other road users.

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A regular weekly contributor to the show up until last year, Gerry Brownlee is finishing his first full year as Speaker of the House.

Brownlee joined John MacDonald to reflect on his year amid the continuing drama in Parliament.

He says has been a very democratic year in the chamber.

When elected to the position this time last year, Brownlee said it was his job to protect MPs rights to speak freely.

He says he feels he's done this job well, ensuring debate in the house was well facilitated.

Brownlee says he's been particularly liberal in allowing MPs to express themselves –particularly in a parliament where there is a balanced opposition and Government.

LISTEN ABOVE

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When Finance Minister Nicola Willis said “I have delivered” yesterday —after announcing the Government’s so-called plan for the Cook Strait ferries— what she really meant was: “I’ve had a gutsful of this lot fighting over it and I’m out.”

She was throwing her arms in the air because she’s had enough of NZ First and ACT squabbling over what should happen with the ferries, and so she went to the Prime Minister and said, “I’m done”. She said to Christopher Luxon, “if Winston thinks he can do better, then let him do it”.

And, as of yesterday, he is apparently going to do it in his new role as Minister of Rail.

That’s my theory on how things have played out behind the scenes in the lead-up to yesterday, but the evidence is there.

Because it’s obvious, isn’t it, that there’s been a spat in Cabinet. Which is why they’ve managed to do absolutely nothing over the past 12 months.

They’ve been squabbling over whether they should get ferries capable of transporting trains. And they’ve been squabbling over whether the ferry service should continue to be a government-run thing or whether it should be handed over to the private sector, which is what David Seymour wants.

He thinks Bluebridge runs a pretty good operation, so why couldn't another private operator do the same?

But, either way, I reckon even died-in-the-wool National supporters can’t deny that this ferry thing has turned into a real cluster, and what happened yesterday was a circus.

And everyone sitting around that Cabinet table should be hanging their heads in shame.

The big negotiators. The big talkers. It’s come to nothing and it’s going to be the second half of next year before we have any idea what’s going to happen, and 2029 before we see any new ferries. And that’s probably being pretty optimistic.

It was Winston Peters who got the iRex project underway in the first place when he was in government with Labour between 2017 and 2020.

On Newstalk this morning he admitted that he’s even embarrassed by how it’s all played out, but he's the guy who's going to fix, apparently.

There was no information forthcoming yesterday about the trains being capable of carrying trains or not. Nothing about the cost. And Winston Peters wasn’t budging on that when he spoke on radio today, either.

"Help is on its way," is all he would say.

All this bravado a year after Nicola Willis pulled the plug on the iRex project, saying it had gone way over budget and she was going to come up with a cheaper alternative.

Remember her banging on about getting a Toyota Corolla inter-island ferry service, instead of the Ferrari service she said the iRex project had become?

Well, it was all talk. We don’t even have a Toyota Corolla. We’ve got a Hillman Hunter - and that’s being kind to the clapped out ferries that are servicing Cook Strait at the moment. It’s also being unkind to Hillman Hunters.

And we will be using the Hillman Hunters until at least 2029 because of the Government's inaction.

What a circus.

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A firm answer from Christchurch's mayor on whether the Cathedral restoration levy should go into reducing a rates increase.

Households have paid $6.52 each year since 2018.

Halswell councillor Andrei Moore wants it used to help a reduce a 8.4% rates increase, while the rebuild is indefinitely paused.

Mayor Phil Mauger told John MacDonald he believes the money should stay where it is.

He says interest will accrue and be ready for when the Cathedral restoration continues.

People can submit feedback on the draft annual plan in February.

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I have never had a problem with greyhound racing so you’re not going to hear me singing the Government’s praises for banning the sport.

But I am scratching my head. Because there are so many things about this move by the coalition that just don’t make sense to me.

On one hand, the Government wants more people working, but it’s happy to see about 1,000 private sector jobs go down the gurgler within two years.

It wants to grow the economy, but it’s happy to say goodbye to the $160 million the sport generates every year.

The Government wants to rescue the greyhounds, but it’s happy for livestock to be stuck in a crate and shipped overseas.

Not to mention the fact that horse racing and rodeos are fine, but dogs chasing a lure around the racetrack is a no-no.

Here’s another one: the Government wants to rescue the dogs, but is happy to spend less on school lunches.

See what I mean? It makes absolutely no sense to me. And that’s not just because I’ve never been concerned about greyhound racing.

What this is, is a left-field move by a right-leaning government which I thought Winston Peters did a pretty good job of announcing yesterday. Considering he’s like me and doesn’t seem to have much of a problem with the sport.

Here’s what he said to a select committee earlier this year: "Dogs love racing. Just like horses. Three o'clock in the morning, everybody's quiet and they're out there having a race in the paddock.

"So before we rush off, there are certain instinctive things that animals like, and one of them they will do whether you're going to organise the race or not."

So with so many unanswered questions, this is when the conspiracy theories start to emerge. Especially when you consider that the greyhound racing people themselves had just one hour’s notice before yesterday’s announcement.

So here are a couple of my theories: Winston Peters has done a deal with Cabinet to get more government money pumped into the horse racing industry, in exchange for banning dog racing.

The only potential fly in the ointment with that theory is that some people think this greyhound thing is the so-called thin edge of the wedge and horse racing will be next on the chopping block.

But as long as Winston Peters is breathing, I don’t think we’ll see that happening. And that could be a long time because Winston is the Keith Richards of New Zealand politics, isn’t he?

Another theory of mine as to why this all came so quickly and out of the blue, is that the Government wanted something to keep the greenies happy when it looks like its new ferries aren’t going to be capable of carrying trains.

That might be stretching it a bit, but see what I mean? When a government does something like this, which doesn’t really marry-up to its general way of thinking, we all start to wonder what’s really behind it.

The reaction so far has been at both ends of the spectrum, as you would expect. The greyhound racing people say they are devastated. The SPCA people say they’re ecstatic.

Edward Rennell is chief executive of Greyhound Racing New Zealand. He got the phone call 45 minutes before yesterday’s announcement.

He says the greyhound racing of today is different to the greyhound racing of yesterday.

Yes, 13 dogs died last race season from injuries, but, according to the saving animals people themselves, more racing horses die each year.

And yes, greyhounds probably do have a much more comfortable life when they’re re-homed with humans than they do when they’re racing.

But their animals for goodness sake. And I can’t help feeling that the Government has taken its eye off the ball with this decision.

Especially a government that bangs-on all the time about dealing with the cost-of-living crisis, growing the economy, getting more people into work and sorting out the education system.

It makes absolutely no sense to me.

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Surely this is the final straw for Gloriavale. Or, more to the point, surely it’s the final straw for the Government.

Because it is absolutely shameful that it still exists.

This final straw, by the way, is the Court of Appeal ruling announced yesterday that the BNZ has every right to close the community’s bank accounts. For the simple reason that it doesn’t want to do business with them anymore.

And good on the Court of Appeal. More to the point, good on BNZ, which could turn out to be the outfit which does the most for those poor sods stuck there.

It will probably also force the hand of all those businesses on the West Coast that have been quite happy to turn a blind eye, as long as they get to do business with them and make a crust.

Because aside from being a place where kids are treated like slaves, where women are treated like sex slaves and lord knows what else, it is also a large business. A large financial entity which includes two trusts and 13 companies.

And there are many people who have done alright out of Gloriavale. They’ve made money servicing their property and everything else that needs doing at a place like that.

But for how much longer? The lawyer representing the people who have escaped the place and who took Gloriavale to court for ripping them off with all the crazy work hours is saying today that Gloriavale should be shut down.

He’s putting responsibility for that on the Government.

I would like nothing more than for that to happen, but I’m not sure whether the Government actually has any powers to do that.

But either way, this has to be one of this country’s greatest embarrassments. That, for years now, concerns about Gloriavale have been raised and —aside from the odd court case where creeps who have committed sex crimes have been hauled before the courts— Gloriavale’s been allowed to just keep on keeping-on.

What happened, which led to yesterday’s ruling, is BNZ told Gloriavale that it wanted to close all of its accounts – citing its human rights policy.

Gloriavale said ‘you can’t do that’, claiming that if they lost their bank accounts, their whole future would be in jeopardy. So they took the bank to the High Court and managed to get an interim injunction which forced BNZ to keep the accounts open.

The idea was that there would be a hearing down the track to decide whether BNZ would be in breach of its contract with Gloriavale if it closed the accounts.

But the BNZ wasn't going to sit around and wait for that to happen, and it went to the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal considered the case and released its finding yesterday that BNZ has every right to choose who it does and doesn’t do business with.

The fact that it has a human rights policy makes it pretty clear, I reckon. Although I bet there will be some people going through BNZ’s list of other clients to see if it’s following its human rights policy to the letter and isn't just singling-out Gloriavale.

But I wouldn’t even care if the BNZ was singling-out Gloriavale because that place needs to go. And if shutting down its bank accounts is one way to force it out of existence, then bring it on.

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The minute the defence force said it didn’t want a bar of the new youth boot camps, the Government should have put the brakes on then and there.

It didn’t, though, because it had talked a tough game before the election and like hell it was going to back away from that promise now.

But it should have.

So, let’s give the Government another chance and let’s see if it’s prepared to stop being so gung-ho now that we know that two of the kids who did a runner from the programme were involved in what appears to be some sort of car-jacking attempt at the weekend.

I don’t hold out much hope. But, at the very least, the Government should be pressing pause.

It should be pressing pause until it’s worked out whether this is a full-on residential programme or whether it’s still happy to have the kids go in-house for a bit and then send them back to the lives they came from in the first place. Because why would you do that?

It should be pressing pause to see if it can get the military involved on a much greater scale. The scale that it talked about before getting into government - without actually talking to the military.

It should be pressing pause until it gets Oranga Tamariki properly on-board. Because, let’s face it, boot camps are the last thing OT wants to be involved with.

I know that because I have some familiarity with OrangaTamariki and I know that sending kids to boot camps goes completely against its DNA.

It should also be pressing pause so that it can get advice from actual experts in this field. Instead of pressing on blindly with something that it knew it could get votes for - but, at this point anyway, looks like something doomed to fail.

Not that Phil O’Reilly feels that way. You’ll know him from his time with Business New Zealand. But he was also a member of the welfare advisory group that was in place during the last version of the boot camps under John Key’s government.

He said on Newstalk ZB this morning that boot camps work and he hopes the Government doesn't lose its nerve.

If you’re thinking ‘hold on a minute, these two kids weren’tactually under lock and key because they’d finished what’s called the “facility-based” part of the programe and were in family or community placements, and so why do you want to write-off the boot camps because of that?’

If you’re thinking that, then doesn’t the fact that they did this when they were away from the boot camp show you that this idea doesn’t work?

Since these two did a runner, and since a third young person who was involved in the programme died in a car crash, the Government has been at great pains to point out that other kids involved have got back into education or found work.

Which is great. Don’t get me wrong.

But it’s not enough to convince me that the Government should just keep on keeping on without, at the very least, talking to a few experts, trying to get the military more involved, and deciding whether this “community placement” part of the programme is actually a good idea.

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