Written By: - Date published: 2:58 pm, February 28th, 2008 - 98 comments
Categories: john key, wages, workers' rights -
Tags: john key, wages, workers' rights
Like most of his policy positions John Key’s story on his comment “we would love to see wages drop” just keeps on changing.
First he was “misrepresented”, then his comment was “lighthearted”, and now he’s claiming he never said it. Which is it John?
In an interview today with Mickey Havoc, Key now denies ever having made the comment (“I did not say that quote”), claims he never took part in an interview, asserts that the reporter was “eavesdropping”, implies the reporter is lying, and states rather ominously – “there’s more to this than meets the eye” and “we’re taking our own issues with it”. He even loses it a bit at the end under pressure from Havoc and throws in a “don’t give me that crap”.
Anyone remember that advice (see image) from Richard Long to Brash in The Hollow Men in relation to accusations about foreknowledge of the Brethren campaign to ‘try to dodge further questions by feigning irritation’?
You could almost be forgiven for thinking Key and Brash had been coached by the same guy. On the other hand, maybe Mr Key’s just not as friendly underneath all the gloss as some may have supposed.
The audio’s four minutes long but I reckon worth having on the record:
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Scoopit!
“if you don’t like it you can go read someone else’s blog, it’s not like it’s your job to comment on this one.”
Tut Tut. Your dummy is now on the floor covered with cat hair. Yuk.
IrishBill says: What?
Or somebody could beg for the tape and post it on here.
Daveo,
Are you saying the standard’s posts are supposed to influence the political polls or something? What an odd thing to believe.
No, I’m saying that it’s odd that the biggest news story of the weekend — those poll results — hasn’t been discussed on a political blog. Meanwhile, the coverage of this story continues unabated.
IrishBill,
The last time I checked this was our blog and we were free to post on what we found interesting. If you don’t like it you can go read someone else’s blog
Fair call. Based on what I’ve seen since first visiting The “Standard”, maybe I ought to stick to blogs that actually discuss topics of interest, rather than 17 posts on something you guys wish was a story.
Kia kaha
So it’s a non-story.
But hang on – if this is how he flounders when the media aren’t chasing the story, how’s he going to cope when they ARE?
Fast forward to 2009: “No, I did not say that about President Obama – that was off the record – the American media have misrepresented – I don’t recall saying it – I was joking – I may have said it but didn’t mean it – the White House has got it wrong – no, hang on, that’s not a diplomatic gaffe, I’m not saying Obama is wrong, I, I …”
is this the best you have you pathetic socialists – really this story is going no where. How about finding something else to bleat about – trying to make this story rise is making all socialists look desperate and stupid.
Only a blithering lickspittle dumbarse would believe that John Key or anyone else in parliament excepet maybe the Greens would want wages to fall. It is an obvious mis-quote – by a leftard journalist.
How about getting stuck into Peters and his dodgy “Big Money” – he is going to turn against you soon so you may as well make the first jump on him.
Steve
Don’t confuse my comments with Keys’. I’m not sure if he knew he was being taped. Did Key deny knowing? How do you know Robertson set up the interview with the knowledge of both parties?
David Slack is the only report I have read of how the event happened and that fails to mention Key’s acquiescence. That may be significant, gvien Key didn’t seem to know it was a staged event, or it may be an innocent omission by Slack or Robertson.
It’s a surprise, in the interests of thoroughness and given your passion for this event, that you guys haven’t followed up on the record with Robertson. Where did you get the details of his CV?
Lay off the turps, sugar, when you get angry it makes you seem worried.
If you’re too economically illiterate, or have too limited an understanding of the right to understand why Key might want wages to drop then that’s your problem, but try some form of self-improvement instead of posting childish gibberish here. Are you seven, or drunk?
David Slack is the only report I have read of how the event happened and that fails to mention Key’s acquiescence. That may be significant, gvien Key didn’t seem to know it was a staged event, or it may be an innocent omission by Slack or Robertson.
Of course Key knew it was being recorded. Remember his quote about the “young guy taking notes”?
Key pretended on radio today he’d be eavesdropped on. He was lying.
Matthew
I’m illiterate. Explain it to me because I can’t see the rationale. Lower wages implies fewer opportunities for everyone – rich pricks included. The richest companies tend to come from the richest countries, and much of their profit will come from those economies too. Would you rather be selling products to wealthy Americans or poor Chinese?
So how would rich pricks benefit from lower wages except in the very short term for commodity based businesses?
National is the party that represents the interests of employers. Employers want to pay their workers less and that means an environment of low union density, a reserve army of labour (high unemployment and immigration) and depression of direct levers like the minimum wage. They also like personal tax cuts because it reduces pressure from workers for wage increases.
National won’t always follow these policies to the letter but it’s the tendency they will follow and have done historically.
Daveo
By recorded I meant with an electronic device. People take notes for all kinds of reasons, not just for putting it in the paper. I’ve done it at meetings where the PM and Key have spoken and never reported the contents.
Insider
I think that was aimed at Monty, not you.
Daveo
In my experience employers don’t want to overpay ie get out of line with the market but are quite willing to pay much more if there is a significant reason such as retention and performance. I don’t think they usually want to pay less – but that may just be the circles I move in. If that truly was the general case, why aren’t we all earning the minimum wage?
You guys at The Standard remind me of the Pharaoh’s army charging across the Red Sea bed just before Moses commanded the waters to drown the useless pricks.
Hey Adolf – why did you name yourself after Hitler. Do you think that’s funny?
Maybe for the same reasons you gave yourself a name that gives me a mental image of Adam West in full regailia as your “Big Spoon”
petrhaps this will help you with your fetish for adolf’s name Rob.
A very good read;
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/daniel_finkelstein/article3441328.ece
funny how when dark watcher says “quiet day at finsec” his comment stays up but when I talk about all-your-base working for the prime ministers office that comment gets deleted as a “smear”. This is why you standard guys are so dumb.
Um, OO, yours was moderated because it was a personal attack on a_y_b. If you want we can start deleting any comment that included accusations about where each poster may or may not work or of being the President of the Labour Party, but then you’d find there’d be very few left from the right.
Tane why was my last post deleted, rather than just ripping out every second or third comment why not just tell me not to post and save me some time
Bill your comment wasn’t deleted. You may have got the captcha wrong – even happens to me sometimes. It’s a fiddly little thing so it usually pays to copy your comment before you post it, and if the captcha looks iffy just click the button with the two arrows and get a new one.
yeah bill you’re one of those incompetent right-wingers who always gets the captcha wrong. The standard doesn’t moderate comments, they don’t have time to employ full time moderators, apart from eddie, irishbill all your base and tane who are pretty much full time here and only have time to moderate comments they don’t like.
righto, I will up the dose on my anti paranoia pills and try to comment again.
Rob, once you have read the article I linked to try this.
do you agree with this sentence;
Augusto pinochet is a hero.
fills you with revulsion no doubt.
Now try this one;
Fidel castro is a hero.
Slow nod of the head no doubt.
This highlights the fundamental hypocrisy of the left. Whilst you are happy being a loyal little foot soldier of the current regime a moment of quiet reflection might be called for to ask yourself what Clark and co are doing.
They will lose the next election not because key looks and sounds good but because the labour party have gone too far with their invasive meddling in our lives, trying to control what we eat, drive, drink, do with our money and think.
Both left and right will fuck things up, but at least the right want to STEAL AND spend less of MY MONEY
OO: BB is a valued contributor. May be occasionally on the sauce (probably why he is missing the re bit of captcha at present see here). But usually he makes a sort of skewed sense.
On the other hand, there is your contribution. Which primarily consists of saying bugger all – and doing it very badly. Probably why your comments aren’t of an awful lot of value.
Perhaps you could consider trying to actually say something of some interest. If you can’t do that, then possibly just say something as inane as todays contribution – but in an interesting manner.
Frankly to date you just sound like a dickhead.
That’s hilarious OO. There are (from memory) nine of us and we do this voluntarily and on a casual basis. We post when we have the time and we all try to keep an eye on the comment threads to make sure they don’t descend into a sewer or a flame war. It’s called a collective, and we work like this because a) we’re no-good left-wing collectivists, and b) none of us on our own has the time or the inclination to run a blog of this size by themselves. It’s hard work.
What I find funny is collectively we usually post three to five articles a day between the nine of us, and we get accused of being full-time paid bloggers working on behalf of some vast left-wing conspiracy. Your mate DPF posts upwards of 10 a day by himself and no one bats an eyelid. Whaleoil, The Hive and No Minister often post at similar volume. Why aren’t you directing your questions in that direction?
As for your other whinge, the reason right-wingers tend to complain more vocally about comments not showing up is because they’re the ones who assume some great conspiracy to silence dissent. People on the left realise it’s just a technical error with the captcha.
BB: at least you say inane things in an interesting way…… Hope you’re not driving, even if there is only a single traffic light there.
captcha: weekend The
one could wish
Tane said;
“hat’s hilarious OO. There are nine of us who do this voluntarily and on a casual basis. ”
Bastard, I read this and laughed so hard I sprayed Johnnie Walker from both nostrils all over the keyboard.
your captcha comment is spot on by the way, it posts the message straight away but when you refresh it disappears…
SO MUCH SO THAT THIS IS THE SECOND TIME I HAVE POSTED THIS… DOH
Wayne
Feb 28th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
It’s his continued denigration of the journalist that gets to me.
You must be well ticked off with Helen then…hasnt she been denigrating journalists for the last week?
I have in front of me this weeks bay report. All 16 pages of it, these advertising vehicles run typically at 65% advertising. This one has less than half a page of local ads with the rest of the ads made up of whangerai retail ads lifted from the paper down there and reproduced to pad it out. The editor writes about the misquote in a style that would rival the sanctimonious drivel of James Sleep and our intrepid hero G Robertson gets the front page writing about another 150 year flood in kaeo. Despite receiving visits from Helen Clarke and just about every other public tit sucking drone in the country, most of whom visited by helicopter and made grandiose promises of help. NOTHING HAS BEEN DONE TO HELP.
All it needed was a dredging at the bridge end and thinning of the noxious weeds that some people call mangroves and this would not have happened. Mr robinson failed to point out the hollow promises and failure to act on the part of the govt. But I am sure he would have got a gold star from his fifth form english teacher for his breathless drivel.
I should have mentioned that the editor is called Mike Regan, the O no doubt dropped from his name. Undoubtedly a ginger and probably comes from a long line of Irish socialists.
You must be well ticked off with Helen then hasnt she been denigrating journalists for the last week?
Learning2write, you’re not by far the first rightie to come on here and confuse criticism of a major newspaper’s editorial line with the repeated and baseless denigration of one journalist’s professionalism to cover for your own mistakes.
Steve
You say earlier in this thread:
Yet on this thread: Solution to wage-gap in hands of business
You posted the Dr. Cullen “I have no fricken idea” quote that it’s up to business. Are you a confused, hopelessly partisan or just a complete dumb fuck who repeats party talking points without even noticing you are making a complete dick of yourself ?
“repeated and baseless denigration of one journalist’s professionalism”
What…taking a recording and forgetting to save it? I find it hard to believe that you ‘Tanethaloserwhoisobsessedwithkeyscomment” (i can play wit your name to) are actually running with this story.As key said, what politician in their right mind would love to see wages drop..it would be political suicide. But then again our good looking PM seems to be doing everything she can to lose the election.
Steve
Since you posted on that previous link;
Why are you saying it’s not good enough for National to not have a policy to lift wages? Why must National provide the silver bullet that you have said doesn’t exist and don’t expect Labour to have?
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