Kate Hawkesby: New speed cameras another scheme to ping people on the roads

I talked this time yesterday about the reshaping our streets proposals coming to a street near you, and I notice the Road to Zzero campaign in full swing alongside it too. Our roads are changing, you can see it happening already, and there’s more where that came from. And the Greens are taking credit for it. Julie Ann Genter was saying yesterday it’s “years of pressure from the Greens” that is bringing this stuff to fruition. And as we talked about earlier, new speed cameras are coming now too. These cameras take two pictures at different spots in order to work out your car's average speed, rather than just a spot speed read, but not only that, as we know they’ll also capture a clear enough image to include more offences – like tailgating or drivers using cellphones or not wearing seatbelts. The Waka Kotahi is calling them "safety cameras", and according to one article I read that’s ‘a Cabinet-ordered attempt to shift the public away from perceptions that safety cameras are an enforcement, revenue-gathering tool'.  They’ve worked out that we’ll see this as revenue gathering, so they’re calling them ‘safety cameras’ in the hope we fall for that. There are privacy issues around use of these cameras and the data they collect of course, but that’s “still being worked out,” apparently. I would've thought working out privacy implications might be quite an imperative before sticking up cameras that are going to zoom inside people’s cars photographing them, but that’s just me.  It’s on the desk of the Privacy Commissioner.  I’ve got no idea when he’s coming to some kind of conclusion on that, which appears to be like the price and cost of all this – still a bit vague. “Waka Kotahi refuses to specify the total cost of the camera system and new tolling system..” the article stated. So how is it decisions can be made without a price tag? This kind of approach worries me when you look at the record of how this Government tends to sprinkle money round the place like fairy dust, with no regard for whose actually paying that bill. It’s been reported the first phase alone, of even choosing the camera’s designs, has already cost “$21.6 million dollars, which is $10 million more than expected.” So is this just another scheme to ping people on the roads, without even a clear parameter yet on total cost or impacts to privacy laws, all under the banner of ‘safety’? The reason I’m increasingly exercised about what they’re doing to our roads and people in cars, is that it’s becoming apparent they’re just going to railroad through whatever they like in the name of climate, or safety, or whatever ideology they decide suits the narrative. And less and less are we provided with the opportunity for consultation or discussion on it.  We are increasingly looking like pieces to be moved around on a Monopoly board, rather than democratic citizens with brains, voices, rights and valid views. Reshaping our streets, taking away carparks, adding speed humps and walkways and cycleways may be all well and good, but surely you have to consult on it first.  The more they take away consultation, the fewer people they canvas on this stuff, the more autocratic they look, which is a worry.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.