Penguin power

Happy Feet could offer a few lessons in how to boost the economy.

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If the New Zealand economy were only able to don a cute penguin suit, it might be able to pick up some of the residue of care and concern New Zealanders had for Happy Feet. Comparisons are difficult, but the economy gives the impression it has been eating sand and sticks and is now having serious digestive problems.

News this week that the Government’s liability for the Christchurch earthquakes has been increased by $4 billion is another big fat stick shoved down the patient’s gullet. Since we taxpayers are picking up the bills, it is almost painful to watch the constant run of bad news. Finance Minister Bill English must be wondering what he got himself into. He’s sweated each Budget to save a hundred million dollars here or there only to have it wiped out by a single memo from EQC that reads, “Dear Minister, we have done a few more calculations around Christchurch …” English will be hoping he gets a few positive surprises from the economy sometime soon, although looking around the world these seem as rare as an emperor penguin on a Kapiti Coast beach. Sadly, shipping the economy off to subantarctic waters to fend for itself is not an option.

Despite myself, I’m being lured into following the Rugby World Cup. Back in 1987 I watched the All Blacks win the first RWC and confidently predicted this was a tournament that would never gain traction. There would be no real competition because it was blindingly obvious the All Blacks would win every time, much as the Chinese always win the World Table Tennis Championships and the Kenyans the World Cross Country Championships. Other countries – bless them for trying – are there just to make up the numbers. Ha.

As a warm-up to this year’s tournament proper, I watched the All Blacks lose to the Wallabies in Brisbane and the next day, for the first time ever, I tuned into Radio Sport for post-match comment from rugby fans. It didn’t take me long to work out there are only three types of calls to talkback stations the day after a test loss. Most are bagging the team, especially the hapless player who dropped the ball at a crucial moment; others are calling on New Zealanders to stop bagging the team and “get behind the All Blacks”; and there are those who look back to the halcyon days when the Rugby Union had only three part-time employees and the All Blacks played in the afternoon having spent the morning crutching ewes. After listening for an hour – which was all I could take – I realised if New Zealand does not win the RWC, one political party or another will make good ground in the election by advocating a return to hanging.

There is a business opportunity for someone, especially ex-News of the World employees and their affiliates, in hacking the phones of people like me who would like to know the contents of my voicemail messages without the bother of having to listen to them. Back in 2005, Prince William, one of the first “victims” of the British phone-hacking scandal, damaged a tendon in his knee, then learnt he had an appointment with a surgeon when he read about it in News of the World. This is nothing to complain about. On the contrary, it is a helpful service that News of the World gave selected celebrities. It should be extended to the rest of us with busy lives and an aversion to our own voicemail. No messages on my phone would be of any interest to a tabloid columnist, but they would be of interest to me, especially if I could just scan a daily printed summary of them. My voicemail is a kind of hoax on callers, although the joke could be on me: recently I found an invitation to a party that I’d missed because I hadn’t cleared my voicemail for three weeks.