Flag-raising opposed in Canterbury

Press, 14 April 1984, Page 2

Flag-raising opposed in Canterbury

“Honouring the flag” is not favoured by the Canterbury Education Board. A letter expressing concern about the new flagraising regulations will be sent to the Education Boards’ Association, the Canterbury Education Board decided at its monthly meeting yesterday. Mrs N. J. Johnson said that she had no objection to honouring the flag but she was against spending money on this proposal when there was not enough money for education aids and courses. The board’s general manager, Mr D. Wilson, said that it was estimated it would cost $lO,OOO to provide flags and flagpoles in Canterbury schools. Upgrading flagpoles and supplying new units would cost an estimated $4OOO, new flags $3OOO, and another $3OOO would be needed to replace and repair existing flags. “There is also the ongoing cost of supplying new flags as they have a much shorter life when they are used every day,” Mr Wilson said. Mrs Johnson said that already there were many shortages in the education system without having the regulations forced on the board. “Already in Canterbury two flagpoles have been chopped down and this insistence that the flag be raised every day will bring resentment and further vandalism,” she said. Every State primary and secondary school will be required to fly the New Zealand flag from the start of the 1985 school year. The Minister of Education, Mr Wellington, said

when making the announcement that New Zealand had a fine heritage and strong traditions and that the daily elevation of the New Zealand ensign, bearing its distinctive Southern Cross, would inspire the present and successive generations of New Zealand’s young people. Mrs R. J. Cowell said that in 1981 support had been given to the flag-raising idea and it now seemed strange that the board was writing to the Boards’ Association not supporting something it had already given support to. Mr I. K. Dunbar was in favour of honouring the flag. He said he believed that it should be encouraged in schools because nationalism was dying in New Zealand and people were thinking about themselves rather than others. Mr G. S. Maister said that nationalism would be achieved much better through class projects than flag-raising. “We seem to be putting the cart before the horse. Raising the flag should be done later as a follow-on,” he said. Miss M. Ockenden said that flag-raising would make people resentful, and polarise groups, which was the opposite to what it was trying to achieve. Mrs Johnson said that she believed in national pride, but as long as New Zealand was a country where people were unable to see a place for themselves, could not find a job, and had low selfesteem, flag-raising would not improve nationalism. Raising the flag did not build the economic state of New Zealand, she said.