"Choosing to live outside New Zealand" isn't a crime punishable by having one's right to return suspended or revoked
Your right to return has never actually been suspended or revoked and nobody has accused you of a crime.
No, you just suggested that as I chose to live outside NZ, I got what I deserved. And according to international law, curtailments to a citizen's right of return to their own country have to be necessary and proportionate. I would argue that the MIQ system, if managed fairly (see below) and without charges for citizens returning home for family connection (rather than business), or with a single "free" visit per year is both. That isn't the system that has been implemented though, and that is why the system is under legal challenge from a number of directions.
the decision (yes, it was a decision) not to increase MIQ capacity, safety and efficiency has been the reason for many a situation that people would not have banked on.
Does the fact that the decision resulted in unexpected circumstance
Where did I say MIQ shouldn't exist? It shouldn't exist in hotels, which are ABSOLUTELY not designed for infection control, nor are the many hour trips all around the country on buses or planes to said hotels which have certainly increased the number of cases "caught at the border". Both capacity and efficiency could have been increased by purpose building an MIQ facility that could later have been used for emergency housing. Efficiency and transparency could have been improved by having a queue, rather than a lottery.
- there is little knowledge work in New Zealand, and I had the choice to go on the dole, or make something better of myself.
Leaving aside the tacit insult to all NZ-based knowledge workers, you must be in a rather specialised field if 'the dole' or 'overseas' were your only possible work futures.*
Yes, my field is that specialised. Does that bother you? Also, I didn't say there was no knowledge work in New Zealand, or that it wasa p, I said there was little (and none in my field). New Zealand is absolutely world-leading in some fields (such as indigenous data governance), but the areas where it is world leading are concentrated. Compare NZ to Finland, a country that is similarly remote and has a similar population size to NZ: the proportion of the economy in knowledge work there is around 40%|jyx.jyu.fi/bitstream/handle/123456789/67664/1/female%20knowledge%20workers.pdf. In NZ, the equivalent classification employed around people at a similar time|www.myob.com/au/blog/lowdown-on-professional-services-market/, accounting for around 4% of the overall workforce. I'm not the first person to say any of this, though, the late Sir Paul Callaghan made an excellent case for increasing knowledge work in New Zealand because of our geography|www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/sir-paul-callaghan-our-strength-lies-in-the-weird-stuff/ZH7GNVIIILANY2OABLAH2WFLQY/, a case that has not been picked up as well as it might by policy or other instruments (see Siouxsie Wiles here|thespinoff.co.nz/science/16-11-2016/new-zealand-as-a-place-talent-wants-to-live-paul-callaghans-vision-five-years-on
*I have paid tax in NZ since I left on the home I thought I might come back to.
So... you're a landlord and you have, in the time you've been away, rented out a capital asset and fulfilled the legal requirement to pay tax on the income you received (though not the likely large capital gain). *
I absolutely should be taxed on the capital gain, I completely agree with you, though you might be surprised how little I'd make, given the size and location of the house. Unfortunately if I tried to write the government a cheque, they would have no way of accepting it, because for political reasons, CGT on property is off the table. I didn't say I'd paid tax to woe is me, though--just to point out I had maintained ties with, and done the morally right thing by, NZ (unlike many who structure their finances to not contribute).
Unlike many who left, I paid off the student loan (that the government charged me 9% interest on while I was a student).
A good choice if you were visiting the country 2-3 times a year and didn't want to get arrested for non-payment.
Has this ever actually happened? I know loads of people who have been back and forth and never stopped. Again, not a woe is me, but a demonstration I've done the right thing by NZ because it is the right thing to do. Is this an alien concept to you?
My kids have been heartbroken at the disruption to their relationships with family, and we did as much as we could--my Mum doing MIQ once, and us visiting during the bubble.
So you have in fact been back to New Zealand during the pandemic and your mum has left and come back? So nobody's 'right' to return has actually been revoked, as above?
One visit in 3 years. Christmas, birthdays, easter over zoom. Crying in the bathroom every time the border reopening changed again, because home isolation meant I could hug my mum, but the MIQ lottery has made it out of the question, and we never tell the kids she's coming because we don't want them to be disapponted. And if I had wanted to come back in the past 10 months? People in Australia were not even eligible to apply for MIQ, except under emergency circumstances. That is neither reasonable nor proportionate, which as outlined above, probably makes it illegal.
Knowing we could get home if we desperately needed to for financial or family reasons, and being able to promise the kids a visit at some point would have been nice though. But hey, I chose to live outside NZ, so I can just fuck off, eh?
Financial reasons like having to go on the dole because the rest of the world ran out of the knowledge work you can't do in New Zealand?
Yes, precisely this actually, because other countries do not have a responsibility to house or feed me because I am not their citizen. New Zealand does. I work in the University sector, which in Australia has shed 60,000 jobs as a result of the pandemic (for those following along at home that's equivalent to every person who lives in New Plymouth--it's also twice as large as the WHOLE NZ University sector). As it stands, I have had the good fortune to maintain and improve my employment situation, but that hasn't been the same for all kiwis. While things were insecure, I applied for several University jobs in NZ (my sector having grown a bit), but was given the feedback that they were not even interviewing even citizens outside the country, because they needed some assurance that the people they employed would be able to begin work in a reasonable timeframe. For clarity, the typical notice period for academic staff in Universities is 3-6 MONTHS. They had genuine reason to believe that citizens overseas would not be able to return in this timeframe.
Or urgent family reasons for which you can apply for an emergency exemption?
Like my colleague who watched his Dad die on Zoom you mean? There are hundreds of stories like this. The emergency allocation system is not fair, not transparent, and not timely.
What can fuck off is your victim-stancing that you haven't been able to pop back and forth repeatedly for holidays during a global pandemic,
Er, I actually specifically said I did not expect to be able to "pop back and forth", but I guess you left that out because it doesn't fit your argument.
because the NZ government has been doing a world-leading job of protecting the health of the people who live here 365 days a year
Yeah, legally they also have a responsibility to me and my family, should we wish to enjoy those same protections, but again, I guess that's inconvenient. Also, for much of this time, I have posed no risk to NZ. My Mum did MIQ returning from Australia when the entire country had been community covid free for over two months. The NZ government put her at risk by putting her in a quarantine facility. How is that protecting her health (or, frankly, that of NZ?)
and pay $5K every month on their rent and mortgage and shopping, not just on prezzies and treat during visits at Christmas.
Sigh, actually protections shouldn't be dependent on money, though NZ's MIQ system with the all blacks and various other sportspeople pingponging back and forth like yoyos (which apparently is just fine by you, but people who want to see their family isn't) gives the lie to that. Or are you going to argue that they bring additional financial benefits, and people like me coming into the country and spending money don't?!
Like I said in my first post, there are many elements of the NZ response I support, and there are many ways in which it was world leading for the first two years, but to shrug off what the rest of the team of 6 million have had to deal with "because we chose to live outside New Zealand" is callous at best, and xenophobic, jealous and heartless at worst.