French agents

Press, 21 July 1986, Page 20

French agents

Sir,—l am both amazed and saddened that your correspondent, Gerry Draper (July 16), can applaud the performance of an Australian TV interviewer, Mike Willisee, in his recent “third degree” confrontation with our Deputy Prime Minister, Geoffrey Palmer. I would be prepared to wager that the majority of New Zealanders viewing this television “interview” would have been disgusted by the downright rudeness and arrogance of the Australian “celebrity,” and would have approved the courtesy and firmness of our Minister of Justice in the face of such hostility. I wonder, too, what grounds Mr Draper can have for his allegation that New Zealand is now the laughing stock of the world and should become a state of Australia. I seem to remember that both the Australian and New Zealand Labour Parties had anti-nuclear policies as main planks of their respective election campaigns. When elected to govern, however, only New Zealand had the principle and courage to stick to its election promise. — Yours, etc.,

R. L. PLUCK. July 16, 1986.

Sir, —The French pair from the Rainbow Warrior case will have a much more exciting island to live on than my late husband, Staff Sergeant Bert Thurlow, did during the last war. He and one other New Zealand chap spent three years on

Wailangalala Island off Fiji, coast-watching. It only took 20 minutes to walk around the island, they saw some wreckage of Japanese boats and planes, they had no mail for six months, made their own bread, had no electricity, no wireless, no fridge, no bath, just a swim in the sea. The so-called “hardships” the French will have to “endure” on Hao make it sound like heaven in comparison.—Yours, etc.,

LESLEY THURLOW. July 9, 1986.