The Solider’s Memorial on the Otago Peninsula

In the evening I decided to walk one of the peninsula tracks up to the Solider’s Memorial. Having not heard any news in the past week, I loaded a podcast that promised to bring me ‘all the latest news from around the country’. Having set off, after several minutes I quickly discovered that the major local news focus seemed to be centring around the government’s restructuring of a nation-wide school lunch programme. Essentially, wanting to save money, the government took a well run scheme that provided healthy, nutritious and tasty school lunches to thousands of children and slashed millions of dollars from its budget. The result of course has been disastrous! Schools have been delivered an endless quantity of uneatable macaroni and cheese that simply gets thrown away by children due to its nasty taste and off putting smell. In his infinite wisdom, the Prime Minister responded to the uproar by advising parents to pack a sandwich and an apple if they weren’t happy. 

I pondered this problem walking up the hill. Nearing the end of the track and the monument, I began to think of solutions instead of throwing the lunches away. I also wondered if the schools in the Wellington region had really investigated all the food recycling options available. I would like to suggest that they could gather all the uneaten meals and send them to the houses parliament via Uber Eats. The cabinet could have them as an afternoon snack while discussing more ways to stumble and stammer through interviews and avoiding giving straight answers to straight questions.