Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, April 16th, 2009 - 38 comments
The Herald covers some of the donations to parties and candidates before the election. One of the big donors was the Road Transport Forum, the trucking lobby, who were behind the famous ‘truck strike’. They’re getting value for money eh? National’s Transport Minister Steven Joyce has taken half a billion out of public transport and …
Written By: - Date published: 2:14 pm, April 6th, 2009 - 37 comments
I’ve long been of the opinion that the Talley family, owners of the Talleys food empire, are a corrosive force in this country who have a complete contempt for their workforce, the public and our democratic institutions. Sure enough, they’re at it again. NZPA reports: The New Zealand Food Safety Authority (NZFSA) plans to call …
Written By: - Date published: 4:33 pm, March 25th, 2009 - 17 comments
Boing Boing reports that: The London police have bested their own impressive record for insane and stupid anti-terrorism posters with a new range of signs advising Londoners to go through each others’ trash-bins looking for “suspicious” chemical bottles, and to report on one another for “studying CCTV cameras.” It’s hard to imagine a worse, more …
Written By: - Date published: 1:06 pm, March 19th, 2009 - 10 comments
The Electoral Commission has released the third party spending returns for the 2008 election campaign and it looks like for all National and ACT’s fears that the $120,000 third party cap would stop groups from being able to express themselves, only the Council of Trade Unions came close with a spend of around $100k. Other …
Written By: - Date published: 10:11 am, February 24th, 2009 - 43 comments
After his gaffe last time Key’s made a point of openly announcing his next meeting with the Tories’ deputy chairman, strategist and largest donor, Lord Ashcroft. A company controlled by the billionaire is currently being investigated back in the UK for possible breaches electoral law relating to its political donations. Key insists that Ashcroft hasn’t …
Written By: - Date published: 1:13 pm, December 28th, 2008 - 17 comments
Reading about Madorf and the filching of USD 33 billion in a pyramid scheme from his select group of customers makes for interesting reading. It draws the attention (yet again) to the dangers of having a lack of transparency in financial markets. As the Economist says, it was “Dumb money and dull diligence“. What marks …
Written By: - Date published: 5:49 pm, November 28th, 2008 - 41 comments
Frogblog reports: The Green Party initiative to have electoral reform reviewed and managed by a citizens’ jury has been scrapped by the National government today. While not surprising, it does mean that electoral reform falls back into the hands of the politicians – putting the wolves back in charge of the hen house. The press …
Written By: - Date published: 9:58 am, November 3rd, 2008 - 37 comments
The revelations in today’s Dompost that Peter Dunne’s United party took a donation from the Vela family shows again what a messy business donations can be. The Vela family opposed New Zealand following a new UN fishing agreement. Ross Meurant, acting for the Velas met with Dunne, days later he issued a press release opposing …
Written By: - Date published: 7:43 am, October 24th, 2008 - 48 comments
The Dom Post reports that ACT will have to file amended returns after failing to declare $20,000 of donated office space. Luckily for ACT nobody found out until they got past the time-limit for prosecution. Rodney Hide is, of course, not embarrassed. I’m reminded of that proverb about glass-houses.
Written By: - Date published: 7:44 pm, October 19th, 2008 - 29 comments
Act have run an anti-crime protest outside of Mt Eden today and it was particularly theatrical by the sound of it with lots of coffin lids and whatnot. ACT have never done anything like this before. But the Sensible Sentencing Trust certainly has. I’ve asked before why the trust has refused to register as a …
Written By: - Date published: 4:00 pm, October 12th, 2008 - 7 comments
From the campaign launch, I got this photo, and decided that I’d put it up for the skulkers complaining about the EFA. For some reason they were conspicuous by their absence (didn’t want to tangle with 1600+ activists?). For the EFA fetishists, please note that Mike is authorising himself. I didn’t sneak around to get …
Written By: - Date published: 6:11 am, September 23rd, 2008 - 38 comments
The Privileges Committee has reported back. Peters is censured for not declaring that he had made a pecuniary gain from his lawyer taking donations for Peters’ legal fund. A minority of the Committee, the Labour and NZF MPs, disagreed with this censure pointing out that the evidence given to the Committee was that, had Peters …
Written By: - Date published: 3:20 pm, September 18th, 2008 - 25 comments
First, it’s nice to be pleasantly surprised by a tory. Turns out Tony Friedlander’s Road Transport Trust is not just donating to National. As well as $30K to the Nats, Labour got $20K and other parties will get something as well to help the democratic process. Can’t help but notice National got the most though. …
Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, September 18th, 2008 - 49 comments
The word around the traps is that ACT will be announcing the name of its mystery 5th list candidate at its Law and Order policy launch this weekend and it’s rumoured that the candidate will be David Garrett. Garrett is a Barrister and is also a legal advisor to the Sensible Sentencing Trust who drafted …
Written By: - Date published: 3:50 pm, September 15th, 2008 - 45 comments
Prime is running a series of interviews every Sunday until the election with the leader of each party in Parliament, starting with Rodney Hide last night. It was surprisingly good. Hosted by Bill Ralston with a panel of Barry Soper, Audrey Young, and Colin Espiner, some good questions were asked and Hide himself was good …
Written By: - Date published: 12:15 pm, September 11th, 2008 - 79 comments
One of the great things about the EFA is that donations over $20,000 must be declared within 10 working days. Because of that, we have today learned National received $30,000 from something called the Road Transport Trust on August 27. The Trust is clearly a front – there is no record of it on the …
Written By: - Date published: 9:48 am, September 10th, 2008 - 151 comments
Winston Peters will be wondering why he has let his political legacy be destroyed by not simply declaring donations that came from legal sources and being open in his role in soliciting them. All those MPs and other hangers-on who have ridden on the coat-tails of one of New Zealand’s most successful politicians* must be …
Written By: - Date published: 12:45 am, September 8th, 2008 - 8 comments
In 1993, the then National government reluctantly implemented the MMP system by putting in the Electoral Act 1993. This was an act that had some serious flaws, some of which were fixed in the Electoral Finance Act of 2008. One of the Electoral Act’s innovations appeared to be designed to make sure that the true …
Written By: - Date published: 11:50 am, September 5th, 2008 - 20 comments
As the polls start to turn on National – and a new poll out yesterday saying the Left working with the Maori Party would have the numbers why aren’t we surprised that Granny Herald’s ‘your views’ section today asks voters if they think the polls are accurate? Could they be more blatant in their concern …
Written By: - Date published: 2:22 pm, September 4th, 2008 - 55 comments
This business with donations from the Spencer Trust going to New Zealand First but not being declared. I find it hard to credit that this was an accident. It seems beyond belief that no-one in the party would have seen the donation declaration at some point and said ‘hey, what about that $50K from the …
Written By: - Date published: 11:26 am, September 2nd, 2008 - 36 comments
TV3 revealed last night that John Key has recently met with billionaire Tory donor Lord Michael Ashcroft. Lord Ashcroft clearly preferred that the meeting be kept secret and only a glimpse of him was caught as he departed Auckland airport in his private jet. Garner: “Has anyone in the National Party met Lord Ashcroft in …
Written By: - Date published: 7:05 am, September 2nd, 2008 - 25 comments
As we’ve discussed earlier, it would be highly surprising if the investigations into NZF’s finances find any serious illegality. At worst, a failure to declare donations might be found, an offence for which charges cannot be laid more than 6 months after an alleged offence. Now, TV3 was shown accounts by the Spencer Trust which show that …
Written By: - Date published: 5:49 pm, August 29th, 2008 - 145 comments
Peters has stood down. Clark has taken over his portfolios. It’s good that Peters appears to have accepted that this is a necessity and hasn’t turned on the Government. Clever of Clark to take the portfolios herself too. [we nearly had the scoop on this too but it took too long for me to get …
Written By: - Date published: 10:42 am, August 29th, 2008 - 62 comments
I’m not going to spend a lot of time on Peters because its not the kind of issue that affects Kiwis lives (its messy but its not like secretly planning to sell public assets). I’d rather use my post-writing time taking a deeper look at the findings of the Social Report. But… It seems likely, one …
Written By: - Date published: 1:43 pm, August 28th, 2008 - 190 comments
Winston Peters’ stories around the Owen Glenn donation to his legal fund are dangerously convoluted and have stretched everyone’s credulity but without real evidence either way it has been impossible to fairly condemn him. Glenn’s letter yesterday provided strong evidence and left Peters ’hanging by a thread’, as every hack in the country wrote. Now, Helen Clark …
Written By: - Date published: 12:26 pm, August 27th, 2008 - 63 comments
Owen Glenn’s letter to the Privileges Committee contradicts Winston Peters’ previous statements to the media, the Privileges Committee, and, presumably, the PM. Glenn says that Peters did personally approach him for a donation, contrary to what Peters has said. It’s important to remember that there’s nothing illegal or even unusual about what Glenn claims Peters did. …
Written By: - Date published: 11:56 am, August 24th, 2008 - 16 comments
According to the Sunday Star Times the Sensible Sentencing Trust and Family First have decided to refuse to comply with the Electoral Finance Act. While the Sensible Sentencing Trust is outrightly claiming they are going to use their breach of the Act as a publicity stunt, Family First are absurdly claiming they can’t register as …
Written By: - Date published: 10:26 am, July 31st, 2008 - 47 comments
Today’s front-page story in the DominionPost on New Zealand First is a complete beat-up. It starts off: More questions have been raised about donations to NZ First over a $20,000 deposit to the party’s bank account that does not appear on its register of declared donations. Really? The story goes on: The Dominion Post has …
Written By: - Date published: 2:05 pm, July 30th, 2008 - 59 comments
Brian Rudman’s piece in today’s Herald is so far the most sensible comment on the Spencer Trust affair. He points out that funding of elections in New Zealand has for far too long been vulnerable to the cheque-books of the rich. While some may be philanthropists like Glenn, or occasional players like Jones, others such …
Written By: - Date published: 10:21 am, July 30th, 2008 - 38 comments
The Electoral Commission has decided the EPMU can register as a third party under the Electoral Finance Act despite the National Party spending big bucks to try to stop them in the courts. Given the EPMU is a democratic organisation representing 50,000 Kiwi workers and the other unions (dairy workers, meat workers, maritime workers and …
Written By: - Date published: 10:18 am, July 30th, 2008 - 8 comments
The Electoral Commission has ruled that several unions affiliated to the Labour Party are able to register as third parties under the Electoral Finance Act. Their registration was objected to initally by David Farrar, the National Party frontperson who is the principal behind the registered third party known, ironically, as the Free Speech Coalition. The …
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