Paul
So I was looking for a work-related project now that the painting is all done – and I checked the COVID-19 “Business Finance Guarantee Scheme” list of banned activities just to see if any of my ideas were banned.
I noted these items near the top of the list of “Activities excluded from the loan scheme” *
- Manufacture of cluster munitions civilian automatic, semi-automatic firearms, magazines or parts and anti-personnel mines
- Manufacture or testing of nuclear explosive devices (NEDs)
- Processing of whale meat
Now I know legal documents must cover all eventualities, but this doesn’t do that.
It just highlights a few issues which appear to be predictably ideologically driven. It appears to me on the face of it to be the government saying,” Let’s virtue signal to the people what evils we are stopping ”
So “cluster munitions civilian automatic” (whatever they are) are banned- good -they sound scary… (Did they lose a comma after munitions? or does the writer not know their subject?)
Princess Diana hated landmines and PM Jacinda Ardern hates Civilian guns, so clearly we must do this!
But Bio/Chemical Weapons development and investment is still OK, OK?
And what! I can’t build a low yield tactical nuke? Because that would really sort out the barberry, blackberry and hemlock on the back 40.
Lucky for us our caring Government is protecting us from the Atom Bomb! It’s the Nuke Free ‘80s again!
But at least I can still go Whaling, Phew!
(Sure you can’t process the meat but its more about the thrill of the hunt, right?)
Funny how all those non-binding UN treaties and their voluntary initiatives that supposedly still maintain our nation’s independence, unique culture and sovereignty still work their way down to affect every aspect of our everyday lives.
They got to get everybody in line.
What seems odd to me though is that the NZ Government via the SuperFund will not let Kiwis invest in entities active in the above areas, yet the NZ Government happily facilitates trade and cultural ties with the nation-states participating in all the above activities, and worse, then supports them in the UN, and even gives them state welcomes, or lowers our flag when their sovereign dies, or signs FTAs with them.
I guess it’s the ol’ ‘don’t do as I do, do as I say’.
* these banned activities likely cut and pasted from the NZ SuperFund’s Responsible Investment Framework – which they base upon the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment (UNPRI), part of the United Nations Global Compact.
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