This evening I helped the wonderful people of the Libertarianz prepare our presentation for the Libz Alternative Budget. I’m particularly proud of the line “Libertarianz is pro choice when it comes to your money” which Bernard uses, as I thought of it.

So without further ado, here it is:

Unlike Michael Cullen, Libertarianz believes your money is your own. That’s why our budget is designed to slash taxes and let you keep far more of your own money.

Other parties will be making a big deal about finally offering you a tax cut this year. Libertarianz policy has always been and will always be to cut taxes as fast and as hard as possible. If you are lucky, Michael Cullen will grudgingly give you back $20 a week after nine years in power. John Key is offering $50 – eventually.

Libertarianz will make the first $50,000 of income tax-free. This means that the average New Zealand household, with an income of $68,000, would keep an extra $403 per week, going a long way to offset rising food, electricity and fuel prices.

We will also immediately get rid of GST, knocking $20 off a $250 grocery bill and ten dollars off the price of a tank of petrol.

The government will say they can’t afford this – but it’s not their money – it’s YOURS. You have the right to spend your money however you wish. Libertarianz is pro-choice when it comes to your money.
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I hope you all are having a good start of the year so far. We are a club that is committed to getting debate and understanding about the core principles of liberty into the university. This year is an important year because Labour  and National are going to try and turn you into their sheep. They will try to use your own money to bribe you for your vote. They will sell their values for it, and they would even sell democracy for it with the Electoral Finance Act.

It might be a good time to learn the philosophy of Liberty if you don’t want your freedoms to continue to be stepped on. Libertarianz on Campus is for learning and discussing the concepts and reasons behind the principles. Almost all people today agree on the fundamental human rights of life and liberty, but most sell out when they want to apply it to the government. The government is not meant to be your mother it should only be there to protect your rights.

The Libertarianz Party, is the only party in New Zealand which is not only based on sound rational principles but actually keeps to them. Every man and woman on this earth has equal rights to their own freedom, life and property and that no-one (not even the government) has the right to initiate force or fraud against them. The Government does not own your life and Helen certainly does not own your vote.

If you study society, any rational person will realize the virtues and importance of freedom and individual responsibility. Libertarianism is not only the most moral system, it is also the most practical. So if you are thinking of living on Earth any time soon you might like to learn the principles.  Everyone wants to live at the expense of the government, they forget that the government wants to live at the expense of everyone.

Here are some links to content that introduces and describes the principles of individual rights and responsibility:

• The Philosophy of Liberty Is a flash animation that summarizes the principles of liberty.
• Collectivism Vs Individualism
• The Future is Calling
• The World’s Smallest Political Quiz - Find out where you stand in the political spectrum
• The Libertarianz Party Website.

• This is our blog Libz on Campus blog

If you don’t have that much time I would recommend just watching the flash animation and reading the Collectivism Vs Individualism Essay. Feel free to get back with questions or if you want to read more about the principles of freedom and responsibility.

Daniel Aguilar.Libz on Campus.
We are not right or left, we’re Better!*Alternate slogan: More beer less government.

Sean, one of our newest members, getting Vic students to do the “World’s Smallest Political Quiz”.

Each year, on the Wednesday of Orientation week, Victoria University has a Clubs Day in the quad. And since 2005 the Libertarianz Party have presented Vic students with a genuine political alternative. I may have left university at the end of last year, but I’m still organizing Libz on Campus (someone’s got to do it). Clubs Day is a perfect opportunity to set up a table, hand out pamphlets, advocate libertarian ideas and most importantly, recruit enthusiastic new members.

The day began well, but we had a minor setback involving me getting some verbal abuse from a Student’s Association bureaucrat who thought we had no right to be there and told me, rather forcefully, that we should just f*** off (Also, he accused me of being rude to him!). We cooperated by moving to his suggested spot in the library foyer, but that was fine because in some ways it was the better location. Shelter from the unforgiving Wellington wind is vital when you have a table covered in pamphlets, quizzes, samizdata and Free Radicals.

Luke was hungover tired and I was stressed out by my encounter with bureaucracy. I hate red tape, along with all forms of rules, restrictions and regulations. A typically libertarian attitude, but it does get me into trouble sometimes. Luckily we were rescued by two enthusiastic and very effective Libz activists, Mitch (editor of Samizdat) and Sean (pictured). Together we signed up a number of new members, collected donations, received several more expressions of interest and engaged quite a few people in debate and discussion. Not bad for a party which received 0.04% of the vote last election! Thanks Mitch and Sean, you guys are legends.

We are currently considering a regular meeting time, and developing ideas for further activism now we have some more new members.

Canterbury and Elsewhere

We also had a presence at Canterbury University (thanks to Rick for sending the full-size photo). As Rick Giles of Act on Campus describes:

Libertarianz Ben Morgan and his girl Jess. A hard worker, all on his own and signing up lots of names despite being a hard-talking no-shit tactless (but all in good spirit) typical Libertarianz libertarian. Did I used to talk to people like that?

Ben got 72 email addresses which he will follow up on. While that’s not the same as signing people up, it’s an amazing achievement for someone manning a stall single-handedly. Good on you, Ben! And Rick: perhaps it is because he is a “hard-talking no-shit tactless… libertarian” that he got so much interest? Just a thought.

The next opportunity to help us out on campus is next Tuesday at Auckland University, all day in the quad. Contact Daniel Aguilar, mexaguil@gmail.com, if you’re interested in doing some activism there. It’s fun and rewarding and I highly recommend it!

UPDATED: PC and Daniel Aguilar had a table at Auckland University on Thursday morning. They will also be there Tuesday next week for Clubs Day. Here’s a photo of Daniel:

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Youth

Libertarianz education spokesman Phil Howison today slammed Helen Clark and John Key’s mirror-image plans to nationalise New Zealand teenagers.

“Forcing students to stay at school until they are 18 will cause unruly classrooms, bored students, stressed teachers and an increased burden for taxpayers” says Libertarianz education spokesman Phil Howison. “It is essentially an admission of defeat for state education. If eleven years in state schools leaves most students unemployable, what difference can adding two years make?” Howison asks. “Clark and Key have come up with plans combining the worst excesses of Nanny State. Add to it the plans to screen toddlers for ‘anti-social behaviour’, schools such as Westlake Boys High School which hold back even academically gifted students for a year if they have a ‘bad attitude’, and the threat of boot camp for students who refuse to comply, and you have the blueprints for unprecedented state control of New Zealand youth.”In her attempt to cram reluctant learners back in the classroom, Clark also condemns those who actually want to be there to disruptive and unruly classrooms. “Students who are hostile towards their compulsory schooling usually end up being disruptive and lowering the quality of the learning environment,” Howison says, pointing to Hutt Valley High School as a particularly grim example. He also laments the unnecessary stress that will burden teachers as they struggle with
classroom discipline, becoming babysitters rather than educators. “Forget about Key’s boot camps - schools these days seem to be just as rife with violence, bullying and substance abuse as the prisons. But all teenagers, not just youth offenders, are forced to attend!”

The extra $150 million of taxpayer loot that Clark is prepared to spend on turning schools into prisons will hit the taxpayer where it hurts again. “Clark’s scheme will take many young people out of the workforce where they are learning to be self-sufficient and productive, leaving them with no choice but to accept government handouts” says Howison. “And Key’s plan is no better. By supplying government funding to even more tertiary courses, he would extend government control of higher education, leaving a mere facade of private ownership while leaving the door open for waste and abuse.”

“The first step of the Libertarianz transitional education policy will be to lower the compulsory school leaving age to zero. In a free society, all interactions including the decision to stay at school must be voluntary. To help young people gain meaningful employment and encourage private apprenticeships, Libertarianz will remove minimum wage laws and make the first $10,000 of income tax free,” Howison says. “Libertarianz believe in the separation of school and state, allowing new methods, subjects and ideas to evolve in a free market system.”

“It’s enough to make you vote Libertarianz!”

ENDS

For more information, please contact:

Phil Howison
Libertarianz Spokesman for the Deregulation of Education
Phone: 027 437 0308
Email: phil.howison@libertarianz.org.nz

Libertarianz: More Freedom - Less Government
www.libertarianz.org.nz

Having welcomed in the New Year last night, Kiwis woke up in 2008 to find their freedom of speech severely curtailed - even if they don’t know it. The curtailment in question comes from the Electoral Finance Bill which came into effect today.

“If ever there were a time to openly break a law, it is now. Bugger registering to have your say and bugger staying silent,”

- Peter Osborne

The immediate effect of the bill will not become apparent until the electioneering starts in earnest - that’s when we will see the parties start to use the draconian rules to shut down other parties’ advertising, gag competing interest groups, and get billboards removed. Labour, meanwhile, is allowed to use OUR money to advertise how much good Labour policies are doing for schoolteachers, recreational fishermen, model train enthusiasts and single breastfeeding mothers.

“In 2005 Labour flouted election laws by stealing public money to buy propaganda. In 2006, they abandoned all constitutional norms and retrospectively changed the law so that they wouldn’t be called into the High Court to answer for that action. This year the government has passed legislation allowing them to steal far more at the next election. Worst of all, the Clark regime is now trying to ram through legislation that would ban me from pointing out that they are behaving like tyrants and telling people not to vote for them.”

- Bernard Darnton

Remember, don’t vote Labour. Vote Libertarianz.

For the record, my name is Luke Howison, and my address is none of your business.

The EFB is one of the most breathtakingly audacious things the Labour Government of New Zealand has attempted so far, exceeding even the 2006 retrospective legislation which legalised the theft of almost a million dollars of taxpayer money (and which the LIbertarianz celebrated by declaring Banana Republic Day). The Electoral Finance Bill will have a chilling effect on free speech, severely limiting an amazing array of activities which discuss or criticise almost any political issue. And the bill’s effect will occur exactly when we need to discuss politics the most: election year.

The bill is actually the culmination of a range of attacks on free speech by the Labour government, as succinctly explained by the VRWCNZ:

Tell your friends. This horrific attack on free speech cannot be allowed to pass.

Crossposted from Pacific Empire.

Here’s a slideshow I gave at the Libertarianz Conference 2007 to show off Libertarianz activism over the last few years.

You can play the slideshow while listening to my own dulcet tones telling you what’s going on, by downloading this mp3 (17 MB); my bit starts around 37:15.

You can also download the full-quality slideshow from this page on SlideShare.

Summary:

• Budget Day Protest
• Electioneering
• Election Night Party
• Burning The Census
• Hezbollah Counter-Protest
• Banana Republic Day
• Pro-Smacking Rally
• Save BZP Petition

Crossposted from Pacific Empire.

In late July, Phil and I had a great time attending the 2007 Libertarianz conference held at Mac’s Brewery right here in Wellington. One of the highlights of the conference was the rollout of Transitional Policies, which we hope will be inspiring for certain political parties who haven’t come up with new ideas recently. The first transitional policy presented was the education policy, which Phil and I wrote along with Craig Milmine and Colin Cross (current and former teachers, respectively).

I’d like to invite you to listen to the first audio we’ve made available here at Pacific Empire: Phil’s speech, Free the Schools (mp3, 12 MB)

The text of Phil’s speech follows after the break.

Crossposted from Pacific Empire.

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