2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2529759 27-Jul-2020 18:36

Rikkitic:

Handle9:

Presumably nobody (except perhaps a few nutters - including a couple of politicians) would want a result that allowed people to be illegally arrested or detained in New Zealand.

As I wrote above it's different to temporarily over reach in the interests of public safety. The government has the power to change the law and, if required, should do so. To do otherwise is to be actually be a police state as opposed to what the conspiracy lunatics like to suggest.

It's an important test of law.

I don't really understand the problem here. I understand what is being said, but I don't follow the logic. Wherever else I have lived, public health always takes precedence over individual rights. This is especially true in Europe, which has a history of contagious diseases. I experienced this personally when I returned an incorrect positive result on a TB test and my civil rights were immediately abrogated as I was kidnapped by ambulance personnel and confined against my will in a hospital quarantine facility. I had no say whatsoever in the matter. After a couple of days, it was determined I did not have TB and I was unceremoniously dumped on the street to find my own way home.

I think after the example of Typhoid Mary, most civilised countries adopted legislation that gives health authorities power to arbitrarily detain individuals who may potentially be carriers of a disease that poses a threat to others. Covid 19 is clearly such a disease. It is contagious and people die from it. This kind of power exists to serve the greater good. It does not mean the end of democracy.

In your case the authorities (presumably) lawfully had that power. The point is whether the New Zealand government lawfully had the power to do what they did. If they didn't then why didn't they enact legislation to give them the power to do what they did, as they did with the Covid-19 Public Health Response Act 2020?

The Ministry of Health has been routinely ignoring the law pertaining to compassionate exemptions and lost in court in the Christiansen case. This is fairly predictable behaviour from most large organisations, which is why there are laws to protect individuals.

The point is that the government can't wave its hands and detain people, there needs to be a legislative framework for this. @dejadeadnz may want to comment further, or not.

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#2529765 27-Jul-2020 18:55

Handle9: To do otherwise is to be actually be a police state as opposed to what the conspiracy lunatics like to suggest.

I think you're well on the path to conspiracy theory - first with comparison to Trumpism, now "police state" conspiracies.

There may have been / probably was by error or omission a failure, but it's delusional to compare what happened to either Trumpism or police state - with all the connotations that implies.

Protecting the weak and vulnerable (ahead of the financial interests of powerful lobbying groups) is not what fascists like Trump and leaders of police states do.

At the start of the hearing, Chief High Court Judge Susan Thomas said it was not the wisdom of the steps that was an issue, but rather whether they were lawful or not.

So if the laws need to change, then change them. If some dickheads in opposition parties want to allow selfish dickheads to help C-19 kill people, then the media has a responsibility to tell everybody what's going on.

mattwnz

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#2529766 27-Jul-2020 18:56

Would these people that are complaining, preferred that we had become another Victoria, where we had only a limited lockdown, meaning the virus could never be eliminated, and resulted in many people dying?Or another Uk, or USA?

At the end of the day, what was done was in the best interests of the health of NZers, and businesses longer term, so we didn't have to live in a Covid environment, and could back to a normal life again. That was to go hard and early When working with something so fast moving, and the long time that it takes to debate and change laws etc, I don't think the government had any choice over what they did. I understand some people on here are currently living in Covid infected countries, so may not have the same perspective on what this means and how important it is..

The fact is that we weren't prepared for this, and many governments work in a way that they an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff, and reactionary, instead of being proactive..

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#2529770 27-Jul-2020 19:23

mattwnz:

Would these people that are complaining, preferred that we had become another Victoria, where we had only a limited lockdown, meaning the virus could never be eliminated, and resulted in many people dying?Or another Uk, or USA?

If it meant more money for them - then sure - some would have preferred that.

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#2529774 27-Jul-2020 19:33

Geektastic:

I am not convinced that is not what happened.

Without seeing the legal advice that was relied on, it is not possible to say. It is very sensible that it should be determined in court regardless of whether it turned out to be a good thing or not. I imagine you'd be less happy if it turned out that they had acted ultra vires AND lockdown had not actually worked? The ends do not typically justify the means in arguments over the legality of something.

Laws exist for a reason and when governments exercise draconian powers over the entire population, they should really only be doing so under laws passed by elected representatives.

I see no value in attempting, for want of a better expression, to prosecute the government in the event it were to be found that they had no power to legally do what they did. I do see value in (a) determining if they did have the power and (b) if they did not, in amending the relevant legislation so that if it happens again, it is clear that they do have the powers they need.

Its gone over your head. No one has an issue with the enquiry. It may show the Govt acted illegally, or not. No issue. If you want to view the pandemic as just another problem, then you can feel free to go after the Govt. Its not just another problem. You need to decide, was the Govt acting as a dictator, or was the law not accounting for the level of the pandemic. The answer is pretty darn obvious

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#2529776 27-Jul-2020 19:40

GV27:

That's....effectively what I think happened too? I'm not for a second saying the Government failed to get or got Crown Law advice that they chose to reject, but more the idea that the legitimacy of orders (especially ones that result in severe financial pain and curtailment of movement) should be above scrutiny because they got the job done isn't something I can swallow.

If there was any suggestion at all the Govt had knowingly disregarded concerns about the legality of the lockdown (instead of just changing legislation under urgency) then you'd be hearing overwhelming demands for resignations and they'd be somewhat justified.

Worst case scenario, the legislation wasn't fit for purpose and the initial orders and breaches of it are no longer valid. This is the bit I'm actually interested in, not the blame game. What does it mean in practice if we can't actually do the thing we already did, and so on.

It is about blame.

I guess the pandemic and everything it is causing was foreseeable, if the law being wrong was the worst scenario.I guess we can go back and blame who had last use of the Pandemic Plan?? Thats blame. But if you want to be a realist, it was not foreseeable. So the Pandemic Plan wasn't good enough, nor did we plan to have 25 million masks available on demand. Not foreseeable. And no time to have a few working groups discussing it for a few months.

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#2529777 27-Jul-2020 19:49

freitasm:

"Vietnam evacuates 80,000 tourists amid new Covid-19 cases in Danang"

Vietnam has evacuated 80,000 tourists from the central city of Danang and reimposed disease-prevention measures, after four local coronavirus cases were detected, the first to be recorded in the country for more than three months.

Social distancing measures have been introduced indefinitely across Danang, a tourist hotspot, with all religious, sports and cultural events suspended. Wearing masks in public places in the city is now compulsory and gatherings of more than 30 people at public places are banned, the government said.

The city’s borders were also shut on Monday to inbound domestic tourists. Almost all foreign travellers are banned from visiting Vietnam, and anyone who does enter the country must quarantine on arrival.

Damn, Vietnam was the other success story with Covid19. That's not good.

dejadeadnz

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#2529778 27-Jul-2020 19:51

mattwnz:

Would these people that are complaining, preferred that we had become another Victoria, where we had only a limited lockdown, meaning the virus could never be eliminated, and resulted in many people dying?Or another Uk, or USA?

At the end of the day, what was done was in the best interests of the health of NZers, and businesses longer term, so we didn't have to live in a Covid environment, and could back to a normal life again. That was to go hard and early When working with something so fast moving, and the long time that it takes to debate and change laws etc, I don't think the government had any choice over what they did. I understand some people on here are currently living in Covid infected countries, so may not have the same perspective on what this means and how important it is..

The fact is that we weren't prepared for this, and many governments work in a way that they an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff, and reactionary, instead of being proactive..

None of this doesn't mean that people can't legitimately test out in court whether the lockdown had a legal basis or not. Even if the lockdown is ruled unlawful, whether certain remedies are granted or not is discretionary. The courts also should simply not get in the way of democratic processes such as holding the government of the day to account for exercising reasonable options that nonetheless lack a legal basis. At the end of the day, it's up to those with their hands on the levers of power to act lawfully. It's perfectly consistent and rational to expect governments to both exercise good and legal choices. It's not an either/or situation.

The MoH has already proven to be disgracefully lawless during the Christiansen case/saga. Those in power need to be scrutinised and checked -- not worwhipped.

These aren't difficult concepts to understand.

tdgeek

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#2529783 27-Jul-2020 19:58

dejadeadnz:

None of this doesn't mean that people can't legitimately test out in court whether the lockdown had a legal basis or not. Even if the lockdown is ruled unlawful, whether certain remedies are granted or not is discretionary. The courts also should simply not get in the way of democratic processes such as holding the government of the day to account for exercising reasonable options that nonetheless lack a legal basis. At the end of the day, it's up to those with their hands on the levers of power to act lawfully. It's perfectly consistent and rational to expect governments to both exercise good and legal choices. It's not an either/or situation.

The MoH has already proven to be disgracefully lawless during the Christiansen case/saga. Those in power need to be scrutinised and checked -- not worwhipped.

These aren't difficult concepts to understand.

Here we go. No one has an issue with the enquiry. Yes we know your stance on MoH

dejadeadnz

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#2529789 27-Jul-2020 20:07

tdgeek:

Here we go. No one has an issue with the enquiry. Yes we know your stance on MoH

Not sure what you've been reading. There are people carrying on like anyone challenging the legitimacy of the lockdown is behaving as though they'd rather people drop dead left, right and centre from COVID. Look, most of the uninformed commenters on the law won't know this but the applicant Borrowdale in the judicial review was a very well-respected senior law in the office of the Parliamentary Counsel. This isn't some silly crank.

I don't like his case as much as he does but I happen to think in a society with the rule of law he's more than entitled to resort to the courts. My stance on the MoH is objectively correct, independently validated, and proven by the courts. Bloomfield should have been summarily fired after that decision -- read through the whole thing and see how the whole MoH bureaucracy acted like a bunch of mobsters that had zero interest in obeying the law.

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#2529805 27-Jul-2020 20:08

Watching CNN. Florida death rate is super high, its the retirement state so not surprising. Texas, the ICU capacity is 146%, so they are assessing who gets one and who doesn't. Thats tough for the health workers.

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tdgeek

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#2529806 27-Jul-2020 20:18

dejadeadnz:

tdgeek:

Here we go. No one has an issue with the enquiry. Yes we know your stance on MoH

Not sure what you've been reading. There are people carrying on like anyone challenging the legitimacy of the lockdown is behaving as though they'd rather people drop dead left, right and centre from COVID. Look, most of the uninformed commenters on the law won't know this but the applicant Borrowdale in the judicial review was a very well-respected senior law in the office of the Parliamentary Counsel. This isn't some silly crank.

I don't like his case as much as he does but I happen to think in a society with the rule of law he's more than entitled to resort to the courts. My stance on the MoH is objectively correct, independently validated, and proven by the courts. Bloomfield should have been summarily fired after that decision -- read through the whole thing and see how the whole MoH bureaucracy acted like a bunch of mobsters that had zero interest in obeying the law.

I dont see anyone here having an issue with the enquiry. I think it's important. My issue is the politicising by some as if its a dictatorship now, what next. I have no issue if there are legal issues, its a circumstance that is not just another problem. If the Govt made a choice or choices that crossed legal line and it was for the betterment of us, but a fault, that can be sought out by the enquiry. Sort the Govt or sort the law. Time was of the essence and there was none. But for some to see it as a dictatorship ignoring the law, doesn't sit with me.

Fred99

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#2529808 27-Jul-2020 20:27

dejadeadnz:

I don't like his case as much as he does but I happen to think in a society with the rule of law he's more than entitled to resort to the courts. My stance on the MoH is objectively correct, independently validated, and proven by the courts. Bloomfield should have been summarily fired after that decision -- read through the whole thing and see how the whole MoH bureaucracy acted like a bunch of mobsters that had zero interest in obeying the law.

Yet here we are enjoying the benefits bestowed on us regardless of the law - as the right actions were taken (wrt level 3 and 4 lockdown).

Fred99

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#2529811 27-Jul-2020 20:30

tdgeek:

Watching CNN. Florida death rate is super high, its the retirement state so not surprising. Texas, the ICU capacity is 146%, so they are assessing who gets one and who doesn't. Thats tough for the health workers.

Note that WRT Florida in particular, it's taking them 2 weeks to issue a death certificate with COD and reporting that to the WH and CDC, so it's probably far worse than official figures are showing (given the exponential growth rate of confirmed cases).

dejadeadnz

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#2529815 27-Jul-2020 20:32

tdgeek:

I dont see anyone here having an issue with the enquiry. I think it's important. My issue is the politicising by some as if its a dictatorship now, what next. I have no issue if there are legal issues, its a circumstance that is not just another problem. If the Govt made a choice or choices that crossed legal line and it was for the betterment of us, but a fault, that can be sought out by the enquiry. Sort the Govt or sort the law. Time was of the essence and there was none. But for some to see it as a dictatorship ignoring the law, doesn't sit with me.

For the umpteenth time: this is not an inquiry. It's a judicial review. There's a big difference. An inquiry typically involves terms of reference that are softly softly and drawn up by the powers that be. Here, we are talking about the fundamental principle in a society with the rule of law that any citizen can, in good faith, approach the courts and contend that the government of the day has acted beyond the powers granted to it by the courts. And the courts actually will practice a method where, upon fundamental limitations and derogation of fundamental rights, the government is held to a high standard in seeking to justify it. If the governments have exceeded its powers, the courts can potentially issue coercive remedies.

This has a degree of importance that frankly any responsible thinking adult should be able to grasp.

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