What value a nurse in a hospital? A skilled tradesman, who does a job that no highly paid professional can do – build a house, work on his car etc.? It's about time that people are paid for their skills. Thanks to some pathetic antics in parliament, it now takes 16 years to save up for a house deposit, never mind the house itself. You don't have to have a degree to work out where that is heading in the future. Society needs to start caring now.

R Chamberlain, Otumoetai.