Tina, Trade Wife. Auckland, NZ.

In addition to my story (which I've just submitted) the following are the stories written by my 3 children…

Master 13:

I am 13 and I want the government in charge of the covid-19 response to be held to account. The lockdowns were fun at the start with not having to go to school, but by the end it got boring and I missed my friends. I missed out on school camps, zone cross country and also the end of year trip to Rainbow's End. We were also locked into Auckland, so we couldn't visit any of our family. I noticed by the last lockdown with mask and vaccine mandates people started being horrible to each other. One time we were walking down the street and an elderly lady told my mum she would see her in hospital as my mum wasn't wearing a mask, the weird thing was neither was the elderly lady, it made no sense. I was mask exempt, so I did not need to wear one at school, but it was strange having the rest of the class wearing them. My teacher told our class that if we didn't wear a mask we could kill her 96 year old mother, that made no sense either. In my opinion the pandemic was an overreaction by the world to a virus I'm not even sure existed!

Master 11:

I am an 11 year old and I did not like the lockdowns and I do not think they were necessary. I missed so much school and I couldn't see my friends and because my parents were unvaccinated and didn't have a vax pass we couldn't do anything that we normally enjoyed, not the pools or even the library, we were shut out. It was heartbreaking watching my mum cry all the time because she hated the discrimination and how awful people were to each other and my Dad nearly lost his job.

I went to school without a mask and everybody was asking me ‘where is your mask?' I said ‘I am exempt', but they said I still needed one, luckily my teacher knew and it was okay. Funny though because as time went on my friends started saying how lucky I was not needing to wear one because they were having trouble breathing in them. I'm glad I never wore a mask because I noticed that I was never getting sick, but all my friends were.

I think the government were stupid and although it was nice not having to go to school I noticed I got behind in my favourite subject,which is maths, I had to work hard to catch up. I think the lockdowns did much more harm than good and I hope we never see another lockdown again.

Miss 9:

Hi, I am a 9 year old. I did not like the lockdowns because I couldn't see any of my friends. I missed going to school for a long time. I didn't like not being able to leave Auckland as my grandparents live in Gisborne and the Coromandel. I remember asking if we could go to the pools, but we couldn't because my parents were unvaccinated and didn't have the pass to be able to get us in, it was wrong. We are taught at school to be inclusive, but this didn't seem very inclusive to me. I am still behind on my reading from missing so much school. The mask rules made no sense, it looked weird that half our school had to wear them, while the other half didn't, they definitely didn't work as most kids got COVID anyway. I never want to see another lock down ever again!