ACT and freedom

These words from ACT Deputy Leader Heather Roy, from a just-written piece entitled Oppressive Government, are mildly encouraging;

The State increasingly seems to feel it has no choice but to take responsibility for those who are not prepared to take responsibility for themselves. Government has assumed the role of saving people from themselves.

The inevitable result - an unintended consequence of State meddling in people's lives - is that those with diminished responsibility have been given the right to be picked up and cared for by the State at the expense and inconvenience of the majority. And the majority seems expected to acknowledge and understand this - even to respect it when, in fact, it should be the reverse.

Our society is slowly being turned on its head. The minority rules - or at least the rules are made for the minority, but imposed on all. The minority must be saved from itself by the State, and the only way the State can do this is by loading increasing impositions on the responsible people - taking away their freedom and choice. How is that right? Well, it's not.

One of the ways in which the state goes overboard is in its surveillance of children. The last Children's Commissioner had a grand plan to screen all children to check for physical or emotional problems. This is a sledge hammer to crack a walnut. But the Commissioner got her way.

Straight after reading the above, I clicked on another release from the same MP. It is from a just-given speech to the Early Childhood Council Conference;

Many of your services will have provided information about a child's social and emotional development through a strengths and difficulties questionnaire. I appreciate that there have been concerns about this questionnaire, but it is an internationally validated tool that was widely looked at by the Ministry of Health before being included as part of the 'B4 School Check'.

The Ministries of Education and Health acknowledge the value of the professional judgement of early childhood teachers, and we strongly encourage you to contribute to the B4 School Check.

So I don't know whether Heather Roy does understand freedom. Or perhaps continuing a developing political theme, there are two Heather Roys.

More likely it is just the inevitable and dissembling result of being the Deputy Leader of an apparently 'libertarian' party but also a government Minister.