The Summer of the Divide – Stuff.co.nz

ROBERT KITCHIN/Stuff

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has a plan.

EDITORIAL: If youre not vaccinated your summer will be shaded; your freedoms far fewer.

Not your essential rights, the Government insists, but your ability to enjoy a host of enjoyable pursuits will be constrained.

Theres one massive division, right there, between those who see this as coercion and punishment, and those - a substantial majority - who say its not about that at all.

Rather, it's a case of not being able to protect people from the natural consequences of their choices, particularly where the safety of others is at risk.

READ MORE:* Covid-19 NZ: How the traffic-light system will work, and what New Zealand needs to do to reach it* Covid-19 NZ: How domestic travel will work under the traffic light system* Covid-19: South Island could relax restrictions before the rest if vaccination targets are reached

Another divide that presents itself is in how we distinguish between our collective and separate situations.

Were all in this together, sure. But our regional stories may differ and were increasingly aware of that. The South Island will be allowed out of Covid alert status ahead of our northern friends if all our DHBs reach their vaccination targets first. But the West Coast is to date dragging the chain. Within the West Coast, theres the sizeable Gloriavale community who arent great joiner-inners. What if this becomes the handbrake for everyone?

Legislation will most likely move quickly through Parliament to empower the social environment the Government wants to put in place once district health boards have passed the at-last-identified milestone of 90 percent fully vaccinated.

Those who support or oppose the Governments plans should watch this lawmaking process closely and engage as much as they can.

Partly because its all-but-inevitable that courts will be called upon to test this legal framework. And partly because we need to to keep our collective guard up against the possibility of unintended consequences.

Mind you, its the intended ones that will have some up in arms.

Although its clear most of the country is persuaded, and wed say rightly, that vaccination is our path to freedom, theres a civil libertarian component who see us on the path to increasing acceptance of the idea of second-class citizens.

Some businesses like supermarkets cannot decline entry to the unvaccinated - people have to be able to eat - but at the other end of the spectrum close-encounter businesses will be required to insist on vaccination of customers.

Mandated vaccines for staff will also become more commonplace.

On top of that, the Governments message is clear that many employers not required to insist on vaccinated customers will be legally empowered to require that anyway - providing if they tread carefully through the procedures.

And theyre getting a strong encouragement to do so - theyll be able to operate pretty much as normal through any of the traffic-light settings.

PM Jacinda Ardern says if you want to go to a bar, a festival, and enjoy your freedoms get vaccinated. Shes using the language of temptation. She might just as fairly have flipped that said it as a threat: if you dont.then you wont.

Whatever your own views on the fairness of that, and whether our present situation affords workable alternatives, her descriptions fairly characterises the summer thats coming.

But another summer characteristic will be the aching resentments that will result among a minority, perhaps many of them not all that politically minded to this point, who might find themselves suddenly interested in libertarian phrases like the tyranny of the majority.

Fridays announcement carried good news for many businesses and many people including at least a dose of the much discussed clarity thats been lacking. Which is helpful.

But whats also becoming clearer is that our future will depend not only on how well we rally behind calls for unity, but how mature, careful and respectful we are when it comes to handling the disunity thats out there.

Go here to see the original:

The Summer of the Divide - Stuff.co.nz