We're watching you, Mr Smith. Protest 27th June 2010

[Pixie]

None of the cake shops in Bugtussle are open on Sunday,so I'll be out of luck.



Explain to me again why we need baklava?

[Ixion]

So that we can have our cake and eat it too, of course. Who's bringing the cucumber sandwiches?

[NONONO]

After being there this morning, I gots to ask....WTF???????????

[bogan]

after not being there this morn, I gots to ask, how did it go?

[riffer]

After being there this morning, I gots to ask....WTF???????????

after not being there this morn, I gots to ask, how did it go?

All right guys, what happened? :|

[bogan]

All right guys, what happened? :|

maybe they're all in the cells? or at the pub, my money is on the later!

[jade911]

there was like only 100ish bikes and no news crews, quite a dissapointing turnout

[Fatt Max]

Well, about, I donno, 60-70 bikes maybe turned up. I was in the cage and had mini Max with me. We gathered in the card park next to the ferry building, Les and a few of the BRONZ guys got up, said a few words, wanted to know from us what we wanted in the way of protest action. A petition was passed around inviting you to say what action you preferred. Then we got some postcards to send to Nick Smith and bought some stickers.

Then, a manequin dummy with Nick Smiths head on it was brought in on the back of a very nice bike, it was dumped in a 40 gallon drum of sheep shit and an oversized rego sticker stuck up it's arse while we shouted 'Get your ACC and jam it up your ARSE'.

And that was it.

Credit where it is due, BRONZ did try to rally support and get feedback from the crowd as to what action they wanted. Brave and ballsy IMHO. They invited anyone with questions or concerns to raise them, again ballsy.

I suppose the feeling I did get from talking to a few of the guys is that this particular gathering was not publicised as well as maybe it could or should have been. There was a lot of slagging going on and that did taint us all as being divided, which is not really where any of us want to be.

How do we fix that? Jeez I dunno, wish there was a simple enough answer but if we are a divided community then it plays into the hands of those we are trying to lobby and change.

As I said, credit where it is due, BRONZ did have a crack at rarking everyone up but the turnout was not spectacular, so not too much could be achieved.

Mind you, the lovely lady flogging the stickers did say (and I have heard MANY bikers say this) we must keep getting the word out.

Thats my take on it. Mini Max loved being among the bikes and the riders.

Oh, and I never went to the pub, honest.....

[Phreak]

Not the best protest I've been to, but nice to be out among other bikers again. The guys with the mannequin thing took off too early for anyone to follow...

Still, I reckon it was better than doing nothing. Bring on the next one guys!

(I'll be posting off my postcard to Mr Smith first thing tomorrow morning. Wonder if he'll reply...?)

[Marmoot]

Advertising the protest in NZHerald would be better for the exposure and sure to attract some attention (from everyone including opposition), wouldn't it?

[FastBikeGear]

It was pretty evident from the brief conversations that I heard this morning at the protest, that as someone said earlier in the thread there is very little consensus about protesting in the biking community.

There is an evident lack of consensus about both what people are protesting about and how to do it.

Here's some food for thinking. Please ignore the typos and bad grammar it's a bit of rapid brain dump.

There are a whole range of reasons as follows (and nicely summed up in the original BRONZ manifesto here http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/sh...1647-Manifesto)

The following are the main items (Features) in the list.

Some people are protesting about the privatising of ACC accounts. Some of us believe that ACC is going to allow the private sector to move into providing injury insurance and compensation for motor vehicle accidents. Some riders want this opened up to private competition some don't.

Some people are Protesting about the move to the fully funded model. Some riders are in favour of this and some aren't

Some people are protesting about the inequity of 'insurance' fees paid by different risk groups and get into the analysis of complicated statistics to prove their point.

Some people are protesting because they want a return to the long abandoned principals of the Woodhouse report that ACC was founded on.

Some people are protesting because the new changes are being justified on a new philosophy that motorcyclists are ‘responsible’ for their accidents which re-introduces the notion of fault into the scheme when it was set up in the first place to avoid it.

Some are protesting that those who choose motorcycles instead of cars make a positive social and environmental contribution. motorcycles use less fuel, have a smaller footprint, cause less emission, congestion and pollution

Some are protesting that ACC should be required, as public policy to take account of social and environmental benefits when setting levies and accept a responsibility for promoting those

Some are protesting that the present method of levying vehicle registrations causes unjustifiable anomalies and injustice, not only to motorcyclists but to anyone who has more than one vehicle but drives only one at a time.

Some are protesting that ACC is not in financial crisis and is not broke. The "crisis" is an artificially engendered one to give spurious justification for actions that the Government could not otherwise justify

Some are protesting that there is no justification, statistical or otherwise, for different levy rates on different capacities of motorcycles.


The marketing problem

If this was a product and campaigning for changes to ACC is a marketing issue, then you have a problem. The problem is we have a product that has multiple features (the list above) and not all customers want all features.

When marketing a product (in this case your product is changing ACC) you are typically looking for a single (USP) Unique Selling Proposition sometimes called a Point of Difference that will both significantly effect (or benefit) the majority of customers and be simple to convey to the majority of customers.

Which would you pick as the USP from the list above?

Next you have to decide who the target market for the campaign is?

Is your market all New Zealanders, or just all motorcyclists, or is it just Nick Smith and key members of National Party that you have to sell our product to?

Or do you even need to sell your proposal to change ACC to the next government (perhaps Labour and Phil?) and get them to adopt it as part of their stated election campaign promises?

What will it take for the National Party to change their mind. Will you be able to convince them by logic they have made a genuine error so that they put up their hands and say we see the error in our decisions and will reverse them?

Can we change Nicks mind without support (pressure) from other groups and is the motorcycle riders market big enough on their own to bring pressure to change the system? Motorcyclists represent a reasonably big voting block on their own.

What form will the pressure need to be in?

1.If they don't change their minds it will be a key factor in them being voted out at the next election?
2.If they don't change their minds you will vilify and lampoon them so that they buckle and cave in?


Taking the campaign to the market

Having made these decisions it needs to be decided how to take it to market. What form and tone do your protests and marketing (lobbying) need to take to get the results you want? If you honestly believe you don't need the rest of the motoring public on side, maybe you can afford to alienate them and this may change the style of protesting/lobbying you opt for. There are many many ways you can take the message to the market. Maybe you organise a national petition to show that the countries leaders that the form of ACC we have is a voting issue.

So the decisions that need to be made are:

What is the USP?
Who are you marketing your USP to?
What pressure can you bring to support your USP
How do you take our message to the chosen target market?

[MSTRS:Me]

My opinion is that Nick the prick isn't interested in our opinion. So we must grab his attention by targetting all of NZ. With the message that everyone is being charged more and is getting less for their money. Whether ACC remains a 'public' entity or goes private, makes no difference. Everyone is being shafted. The only way to stop this is to return ACC to it's founding principles. And stop all political tinkering.

[Katman]

What will it take for the National Party to change their mind.

The greatest leverage we could possibly get would come from motorcyclists being seen to be taking motorcycling a whole lot more responsibly (including putting pressure on fellow motorcyclists to clean up their act) and becoming a less costly burden for ACC.

We need to be seen to be crashing a whole lot less.

[bogan]

I think one of the reasons the bikeoi worked so well, was that it wasn't about any consensus's other than we don't want these fucking levies. Supporters of all actions turned up, and all the reps got a say (i think?).

Why not try that again, set a date, get speaker submissions (bronz, uylesses, wima etc; katman can even stand up in front of thousands of bikers and tell us to sort our shit out if he wants!), put the word out ages in advance, get huge numbers, that will send a message.

[retro asian]

Here are some photos, in case anyone wants to email a press release to stuff.co.nz or nzherald etc

The effergy was a novel idea, but there was no one (from the public) around in the vicinity to see it. If it was in the viaduct by the restaurants or on Queen st it would have been fun for the passers by to watch. And kinda gutted that we didn't get to ride through the city as a big group with our "Nick Smith".

[Katman]

The effergy was a novel idea, but there was no one (from the public) around in the vicinity to see it.

Thank fuck for that.

How big a laughing stock do you want us to be?

[Big Dave]

Advertising the protest in NZHerald would be better for the exposure and sure to attract some attention (from everyone including opposition), wouldn't it?

BRONZ can afford classified advertising.

[Katman]

BRONZ can afford classified advertising.

BRONZ need to start asking themselves why (at a time when motorcyclists are looking for positive and assertive leadership) are they not gaining the widespread support of motorcyclists that they should conceivably be able to expect.

[NONONO]

BRONZ need to start asking themselves why (at a time when motorcyclists are looking for positive and assertive leadership) are they not gaining the widespread support of motorcyclists that they should conceivably be able to expect.

Because, as Les keeps telling us, BRONZ do not represent bikers, they (we, I spose as a member) represent motorcycling.
Now I for one have never been off road on a bike, never raced on a track, don't hoon across deserts or play motorcycle polo. I ride on the roads so by definition am only a minor concern for BRONZ. Suppose BRONZ is the equivalent of "Bike Rider TV", interested in all things two wheeled and motorised. But I'm not really. I'm interested in road bikes and the people who ride them on the road.
There is a not too subtle difference and no doubt many of us do both. But I'm less than interested in quad bike races and agility trails.

[Katman]

Because, as Les keeps telling us, BRONZ do not represent bikers, they (we, I spose as a member) represent motorcycling.

Unfortunately, currently BRONZ seems to be representing nothing other than Les' bitter and twisted viewpoint.