New Zealand shamed at Paris

Written By: - Date published: 8:24 am, December 1st, 2015 - 67 comments
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The aspirational John Key

The aspirational John Key

Well, no one can say John Key was talking up expectations with that statement. Just as well because, once again, New Zealand has won the “Fossil Of The Day Award” for being the most regressive country at the 2015 UN COP21 Climate Summit in Paris.

Just earlier, in typical National Ltd™ style, John Key addressed the leaders of the world with vacuous words wafting on about ending subsidies for fossil fuels. Turns out, however, that since 2008, National Ltd™ subsidies for the production of fossil fuels have gone up 700%. Yes, seven hundred percent! New Zealand now provides over $80m in production subsidies for fossil fuel industries.

Thank’s John. That’s really something all us Kiwis back home can feel overtly patriotic about.

67 comments on “New Zealand shamed at Paris ”

  1. esoteric pineapples 1

    The fact that this government isn’t going to make the agricultural sector pay its share of costs for reducing emissions means that it is being subsidised as well.

    • BLiP 1.1

      Yep, I’m so proud.

      • Rosie 1.1.1

        Yeah, me too, proud little Kiwi.

        “Just earlier, in typical National Ltd™ style, John Key addressed the leaders of the world with vacuous words wafting on about ending subsidies for fossil fuels. ”

        I heard him speak of this on rnz this morning. What a womble. (Sorry lovely wombles) He can say that, knowing there are no longer subsidies on the “consumption” side of fossil fuels in NZ and blather on about how everyone else must do the same, while back home he dramatically increases the subsidies on production.

        Do you have special category in your chronicles BLiP for such half truths? How do you categorise a lie that is not actually spoken?

        • Anno1701 1.1.1.1

          Wombles actually cleaned things up didnt they ?

          • Rosie 1.1.1.1.1

            Yes, they did. They were environmentally conscious creatures. “Making good use of the things that we find, the things that the everyday folk leave behind”. They were into recycling and tidying up.

            Womble is a derogatory term for someone who is a bit of a slow fool, and really it shouldn’t be. It’s most unfair. I apologise to wombles, not only of Wimbledon, but to the world wide womble family, who I may have offended by comparing them to the New Zealand PM.

        • BLiP 1.1.1.2

          Do you have special category in your chronicles BLiP for such half truths?

          No, not really, Its difficult enough to keep up with John Key’s blatant lies let along his Crosby Textor language mangling and slippery framing of issues. In this case, it seems almost deliberate. A suspicious person might wonder if NSA had tipped off the GCSB with information from its mass surveillance that John Key was going to receive the Fossil Of The Day for New Zealand’s performance on fossil fuel subsidies. Its not like the GCSB hasn’t done this sort of thing before.

          • Rosie 1.1.1.2.1

            I don’t know how you do it. Key’s mastery of the black arts of deception are legendary. Corralling these utterances must require a special super power.

            And yes, it could be plausible that a 5 eyes partner assisted Key with the direction of his speech by providing some timely information – they didn’t bat an eyelid over the matter of spying on Groser’s competitors for the WTO, as per your link.

            Then again would Key really care if he had knowledge that he was going to win F.O.D and that the priority was always going to be about how he framed our fails and turned it into a win?

            Tracey’s comment further down the post:

            “I thought he sounded the most wooden and looked the most uncomfortable in a very long time making that speech. He looked/sounded like a fish out of water.”

            says a lot about the pressure he was under to magic the spin into something believable. It was like he knew he was dealing with a tougher, sharper crowd than he’s used to on his home turf and one that would bother to scrutinise him, so he had to pull out all the stops for his show of conviction. The strain to do really showed in his speech.

  2. tracey 2

    Can you post the link to the stats which show the rise?

    • BLiP 2.1

      700% increase from 2009 – 2013 – http://350.org.nz/our-work/gofossilfree/take-our-money-out-of-fossil-fuels/

      See also this from Peer Review on Fossil Fuel Subsidies

      . . . At the time the [tax] exemption was being reconsidered in fiscal year 2013, there was a major drilling campaign being prepared for the 2013-14 drilling season with 20 confirmed wells and a further seven wells being classed as contingent, probable or possible. Of the 20 confirmed wells, approximately four to five wells were intended to be drilled by rigs that would have been in New Zealand for over six months. It was considered likely that there would have been a delay in the drilling of these wells if the existing tax exemption was not in place. It is also possible that some wells may not have been drilled at all. In addition, if the wells were drilled at a later date because the exemption was removed, it is likely that there would be additional costs relating to mobilizing and demobilizing rigs. The mobilization and demobilization costs for an off-shore rig are approximately USD 10-15 million (NZD 12.2-18.3 million). These additional costs are deductible by the exploration company engaging rig services against income that is earned from a successful well . . .

  3. Sirenia 3

    The PM seems to believe whatever he says at that particular moment. His grasp of truth and ethics is so minimal that words that completely contradict his actions is business as usual for him.

    • Heather Grimwood 3.1

      Yes, truly frightening Sirenia, and here I’ve been hoping his embarrassment on being immersed in facts in Paris will have made him rewrite his (sadly our) offering. I insist on hoping!

    • b waghorn 3.2

      Just his standard mo of telling a big lie then backing it just long enough for people to lose interest and move on. Same shit different day.

  4. Bill 4

    New Zealand now provides over $80m in production subsidies for fossil fuel industries.

    The IMF calculated that the total subsidy going to fossil for NZ as the following – post tax subsidies US$ 2.51Billion for 2015, up from US$ 2.18 Billion in 2013.

    http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/survey/so/2015/new070215a.htm

    • David 4.1

      If you read that report, would someone what to explain how on earth the Ukraine spends 60%+ of GDP on energy subsidies?! That’s just beyond laughable, more than half the Ukrainian economy is subsidies for energy, lol.

    • tracey 4.2

      I think the IMF, like our treasury, are just mupets (right Gerry?)

      This has been his (Key) ploy thorughout the seven years…

      Cut, cut, cut. When people cry out, give back some but not all of the cuts to make it seem generous and addressing something even though you never get close to pre-cut rates.

      The subsidy is in reverese. Increase, increase, increase then go on the world stage and offer to cut by 20% HERO!!!!

  5. Anonymous 5

    The manority of people crying about climate change are very hypocritical. Make a change yourself, stop driving cars or travelling overseas. Cycle everywhere. Try crossing between the north and south island without using fossil fuels that will be fun. I am for eeducing emiaaions, but a country can not just do a full 180 degree turn thats not how evonomics works.

    • b waghorn 5.1

      You’re wrong , people vote in there leaders in a democracy in the belief that said leaders will be making the correct decision s for all our futures.
      Piecemeal changes will achieve bugger all ,government needs to drive the changes, unfortunately we have a populist douche as pm instead of a leader.

      • Nessalt 5.1.1

        what a copout statement. the whole idea of marching is not to be seen to be doing something, it’s to actually do something. your idea just allows you to blame everyone else.

        now that you aren’t part of the solution, you are the problem

        • b waghorn 5.1.1.1

          Where did I say don’t march ?
          I said that restricting ones own use of climate damageing substances won’t make a difference , apart from 2008 I’ve voted labour or greens because I wanted a government that would be looking for ways to shift Aotearoa towards good environmental habits.

        • tracey 5.1.1.2

          I love how the people who deny CC and are doing nothing have started t paint themselves as the true righteous ones in all this. Bizarre.

    • Lara 5.2

      The range of choices we have when we make decisions on much of our consumption and our transport are choices which are limited by those who make decisions which affect us all.

      Politicians and business leaders have power. They make decisions which affect us all. Subsidies for decades on the fossil fuel industry skews our choices, affects our behaviour at population wide levels.

      This is not a complicated concept, surely.

      We are ALL “hypocritical”. Some more than others. But there’s nothing wrong with operating within our limited choices and still complaining about it. Because if the playing field weren’t skewed so much towards fossil fuels we would have better choices. And there’s every need to point that out to our “leaders”.

      Would you have no one complain? No one point out that we need population wide solutions to our problems? Because we are all hypocritical. We all use fossil fuels either directly or through the food we eat and the products we consume, every day.

    • Ryan 5.3

      Well actually recent studies show Climate Change main driver isn’t actually Fossil fuels.. Sure they are a big part but… “Animal agriculture is the leading cause of deforestation, water consumption and pollution, is responsible for more greenhouse gases than the transportation industry, and is a primary driver of rainforest destruction, species extinction, habitat loss, topsoil erosion, ocean “dead zones,” and virtually every other environmental ill. Yet it goes on, almost entirely unchallenged.” – Cowspiracy 2014

      • Robert Atack 5.3.1

        Yeah Ryan,
        https://www.farmmachinerylocator.co.uk/impact-of-our-consumption/

        LIVESTOCK’S CONTRIBUTION TO GLOBAL WARMING
        In fact, if we look at figures published by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, agriculture contributes 18% of the total release of greenhouse gases worldwide, a much higher figure than that for transportation. Emissions from cattle are particularly damaging because it is not CO2 that cows are releasing but methane. Every single cow releases between 70 and 120kg of methane per year and while this is a greenhouse gas like CO2, its detrimental impact on the planet is 23 times higher than the negative impact of CO2. In addition, livestock cause over two-thirds of the world’s ammonia emissions, and this greatly contributes to acid rain. When you consider there are over 1.5 billion cattle worldwide the damage quickly adds up.

        Livestock figures are rising because of the general increase in our level of prosperity, which brings with it a higher demand for beef and milk. It’s not only emissions from cattle however that are causing problems to the planet, intensive farming also leads to a whole range of other environmental issues.

        – See more at: https://www.farmmachinerylocator.co.uk/impact-of-our-consumption/#sthash.05Rm4lef.dpuf

        • Naturesong 5.3.1.1

          you may want to recheck a few things.

          Starting with how mixing ammonia with water results in an acid*?

          *normal rain water contains sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and carbon dioxide.
          When any of these compounds levels are elevated the acidity of rainwater increases (pH decreases).
          Ammonia is a base and will increase pH (more caustic, less acidic).

    • tracey 5.4

      How many of those things are you doing? Or are you smugly doing none as if that makes you the righteous one?

    • Simon Johnston 5.5

      You really think you know all of us, don’t you kiddo? As for your bizarre solutions: apparently you haven’t bothered to find out what it is we actually believe should be happened as solutions to climate change. You make your brainless assumptions, and you attack those assumptions, rather what we actually believe – because engaging in honest debate and conversation, let alone doing some reading beforehand – is just too much hard work.

  6. johnm 6

    Paul Beckwith says: ” Personally I think we are in an emergency situation, the likes the world has never seen before. I have thought this for about the last 5 years, with no doubts and 100% certainty. I think that we are undergoing early stages of abrupt climate change, that if continued unchecked will lead to an Arctic “blue-ocean event” by 2020 or sooner, and the enormous feedbacks will then carry us to a much warmer planet, greatly exceeding the 20C threshold rise that the politicians debate. A blue-ocean event guarantees that the frequency, severity and duration of extreme weather events will ramp up 10 to 20 times over what we see today. ”

    http://paulbeckwith.net/

    In other words the situation has become more serious. To state the obvious we are caught in a monkey trap: To have a hope of saving ourselves we must renounce and let go of fossil fuels if we don’t we’re scuppered! Probably resulting in Homo Hubris/Arrogantis ‘s extinction.

    This government’s reaction: We’re too small to make any f’ing difference therefore not our worry full stop.

    • johnm 6.1

      ” Brazil’s Great Amazon Rainforest Burns as Parched Megacities Fall Under Existential Threat

      One need only look at today’s satellite image of Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest to notice something’s terribly wrong. A vast 1,000 mile swath of what should be some of the wettest lands on the globe running south of the world’s largest river is covered by a dense pall of smoke. Scores of plumes boil up out of the burning and sweltering forest. Pumping dark clouds into the sky, the fires’ tell-tale streaks out over a drought-parched Brazil, across the Atlantic, and over to Africa where the plume is again thickened by yet more wildfires. ”

      http://robertscribbler.com/2015/11/30/brazils-great-amazon-rainforest-burns-as-parched-megacities-fall-under-existential-threat/#comments

      ” The greatest rainforest in the world, sometimes called Earth’s lungs, is burning, blackening, and belching out a thick pulse of carbon dioxide into an atmosphere that is already greatly over-burdened with industry-emitted greenhouse gasses. The world’s largest watershed and remaining largest rainforest combined now finds itself in a crisis of human making. A set of insults that may not now be reversible as the forest begins to succumb to both drought and fire. ”

      ” It’s a crisis that threatens to turn South Brazil into a desert, to turn one of the world’s vast carbon stores into a carbon emissions source, and to eventually convert the great rainforest itself into dry grasslands. Such a transition would result in yet one more major contributor to increasing global greenhouse gas concentrations even as it puts Brazil’s mega-cities under threat of collapse. And it’s a transition that’s happening now. A violent transformation that likely started during the early 2000s. One now reaching catastrophic new intensities. ”

      http://robertscribbler.com/2015/11/30/brazils-great-amazon-rainforest-burns-as-parched-megacities-fall-under-existential-threat/#comments

    • Yeah John,
      Paul said on one of his last presentations, that CH4 was up to 150/1 CO2, which puts the environment at about 700 PPM CO2/CO2e pluse the other GHG’s.
      Nature is emitting more CO2/CH4 than humans now, with the forest fires, methane clatherates, drought etc it may be thousands (?) of years before the environment sees PPM numbers below 400.

    • johnm 6.3

      — Failing phytoplankton, failing oxygen: Global warming disaster could suffocate life on planet Earth —

      Falling oxygen levels caused by global warming could be a greater threat to the survival of life on planet Earth than flooding, according to new research.

      “About two-thirds of the planet’s total atmospheric oxygen is produced by ocean phytoplankton — and therefore cessation would result in the depletion of atmospheric oxygen on a global scale. This would likely result in the mass mortality of animals and humans.”

      http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/12/151201094120.htm

      Are our oceans dying? Phytoplankton has declined 40% in 60 years as figures reveal Earth has been getting hotter since the Eighties

      Microscopic marine algae which form the basis of the ocean food chain are dying at a terrifying rate, scientists said today.

      Phytoplankton, described as the ‘fuel’ on which marine ecosystems run, are experiencing declines of about 1 per cent of the average total a year.

      According to the researchers from Dalhousie University in Canada the annual falls translate to a 40 per cent drop in phytoplankton since 1950.

      The research into phytoplankton comes as a separate report today offered evidence that the world has been warming for the past 30 years.

      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1298596/Massive-40-decline-oceans-phytoplankton-puts-entire-food-chain-threat.html

      • johnm 6.3.1

        International Community Attempts to Negotiate with Nature in Paris

        Yet, an uninhabitable planet is what we should expect if participants in Paris fail to reach an ambitious and binding agreement this month that puts science and nature ahead of politics and profits. In this sense, the 40,000 negotiators engaging in two weeks of discussions and horse-trading in the French capital are not really negotiating with each other, but with Mother Nature. And the fact is, there is no reason to think that Mother Nature is willing or able to wait for humanity to start drastically reducing its carbon output.

        “The 40,000 negotiators engaging in two weeks of discussions and horse-trading in the French capital are not really negotiating with each other, but with Mother Nature.”

        “When it comes to global warming and related environmental, security and environmental concerns, these matters are simply not up for negotiation.”

        http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/12/01/international-community-attempts-negotiate-nature-paris

  7. PeterMG 7

    Love it when the loveys from the left call a tax break a subsidy. Just like they call government spending an investment. What they don’t realise is that they only delude themselves.

    Talking of delusion, Paris is full of it this week. The whole world knows man made climate change is a con, yet our brain dead Politian’s along with the troughers from the banks and big business are there to see how much more money they can squeeze out of us in the name of saving the planet. What a joke. Oh and they will have dragged along a bunch of useful idiots from the left who haven’t yet realise this is the biggest redistribution of wealth from the poor to the rich in human history. Its a scandal.

    But fortunately for us ordinary people there will be no deal worth a toss, for the simple reason the worlds economy is on the point of collapse and there is no money left.

    And by the way. [Gratuitous personal insult on site author deleted. The only reason the rest of this comment hasn’t been deleted for anthropomorphic climate change denialism is that it serves as an example of the level of ignorance and make-believe thinking required to sustain such a delusional state – BLiP] There is no such thing as a fossil fuel. Hydrocarbons are not fossils. They are not dead fish or dinosaurs or anything else. Not even coal, which simply could not form in the way that mainstream geology would have you believe. This is why every year for the last 200 years or so that we have been mining coal and extracting oil and gas the known reserves have grown. The only limiting factor is demand, and our ingenuity will allow us to extract oil and gas for millennia yet. Oh and just in case you are really worried there is not such this as a green house gas, so sleep easy. Just another lie perpetuated by government paid scientists who know 90% of people won’t look stuff up for themselves. A very sad reflection on the poor state of todays education system.

    • Michael 7.1

      Can you please provide links to literature that clearly states climate change is not related to anthropogenic carbon emmision? Also, can you provide more information as the where these infinite supplies of coal, oil and gas are to be found, and what the cost of extracting them (for which I assume you have accounted for) will be. I tried to look them up for myself but was unable to find. Perhaps you could shed some light here. For the greater good of “90% of people”.

      Kind Regards.

    • Anno1701 7.2

      “The whole world knows man made climate change is a con,”

      no. no they dont ……

      “A very sad reflection on the poor state of todays education system:

      yes, yes you are…

    • Paul 7.3

      We are in deep trouble.
      And our present Neros fiddle as our world burns.
      This is ecocide.

      • We are. And addressing climate change on its own might not be enough. This is systemic trouble we are talking about here, impacting on multiple important parts of the planetary system we call home.

    • alison 7.4

      “There is no such thing as a fossil fuel. Hydrocarbons are not fossils. They are not dead fish or dinosaurs or anything else. Not even coal, which simply could not form in the way that mainstream geology would have you believe.”

      A citation or two would not go amiss here. After all, if your assertion is correct then you’d surely be up for a Nobel Prize.

    • Expat 7.5

      To PeterMG,
      Just a shame their are so many like you who support Key, they seem to have a problem being able to distinguish the difference between verifiable, evidence based FACT, and utter BS, I suppose I can forgive you to some extent, given Key is such a CONvincing liar, and the worst part is that He actually believes what he’s say’s and so does his loyal followers.

    • Murray Simmonds 7.6

      Thank you for that insert, BLiP – the only bit of sanity in the above post.

      Yes, we can only sit back and marvel at the ignorance of the CC-deniers.

      • Robert Atack 7.6.1

        Alas it is not just the out and out CC deniers that ‘we’ are up against.
        It is also the CC down talkers like – McKidding (350.org) Al Gore, Jim Salinger, nearly every ‘on the payroll’ scientist including the IPCC. They all down play the ‘issue’ with utter bollocks statements, like ‘we need to reduce emissions’ …. Nature is bursting forth with more emissions then humans now, our reductions would pale in comparison to what is coming out of the planet at the moment.
        And no one is asking the government to actually do anything that could ‘reduce emissions’ like aiming for 80% unemployment maybe? Telling the truth about our growth based saving scheme, removing subsidies on babies (ouch, or should that be oink, as a pig flies past the window), instead we go on fun walks, taking selfies, to show how much we ‘care’
        How many people on the march were 1- Kiwi Savers 2- having or planing to have children?
        It is down to education … the lack of 😉 Back in 2006 I tried to get the govt to ‘give’ me $30K to try and get serious information into schools and libraries
        http://oilcrash.com/articles/algore01.htm
        But their goal is to maintain the hopium and bullshit, because the truth does not win votes, and boy does that go double for the left.

    • DoublePlusGood 7.7

      “A very sad reflection on the poor state of todays education system”
      That’s a very good reflection on your post, which shows nothing other than that you really should go learn something about geology and chemistry before you return here and post again on those topics.

  8. JimmyP 8

    There a couple of paid deniers on this thread.

    Don’t bother arguing with them as it is their job to spread doubt, in the same way that the anti-smoking lobby did between 1962 and the mid-eighties, before passive smoking became a key concept in the debate. That’s 20 years of deaths from lung cancer because of paid shills.

    The tragedy of our current predicament is that these paid shills are weakening political resolve at a time when we need decisive leadership and coherent action.

    If they are right and anthropogenic warming is indeed less than suggested by the data, then the only harm done will be to migrate our economies to home grown, particulate free energy, which doesn’t pollute our air or enter our bloodstream.

    If they are wrong, as all scientific entities agree – including NASA which has observed warming from 13 different Earth observing satellites – then we are looking down the barrell of hell on earth for our children; failed harvests, dust bowls, mass despeciation, chronic water shortages. (If you need evidence, drive through California today.)

    If you are a Denier, you need to look yourself in the mirror and say, ‘what if I’m wrong?’

    • If you are a Denier, you need to look yourself in the mirror and say, ‘what if I’m wrong?’

      Or look at their children and ask the same question, but that goes for all parents.

  9. JonL 9

    “The whole world knows man made climate change is a con,”… oh dear, another deluded conservative who has convinced himself black is white!
    …and with about as much scientific knowledge as my cat!

  10. http://willnewzealandberight.com/2015/12/01/climate-change-or-not-new-zealand-must-act/

    Whether climate change exists or not, there is a compelling case to act anyway. I have tried to set the basics out in the above article.

    • BLiP 10.1

      Nice work. Take a bow.

    • tracey 10.2

      Thanks Robert, reflects my view too. The thing is what do we have to lose by becoming more responsible and cleaner inhabitants? The game of having to be “right” played by many is killing us. IF the deniers are wrong, we are fucked. If they are right, they can gloat later. The reverse is much worse.

  11. rod 11

    I expect Gower will hail John’s speech tonight.

  12. Smilin 12

    Key , the postulating fossil, what a liar and a disgrace to the nation
    Gets some guts Key and take the blame for all the dough you’ve got invested in the oil industry
    Your speech was a pack of lies you have no conscience

    • tracey 12.1

      I thought he sounded the most wooden and looked the most uncomfortable in a very long time making that speech. He looked/sounded like a fish out of water.

  13. D 13

    Climate change…. Is not man made. …. Are we that delusional that we think we have the power to force the earth and sun? If you think you know a lot then maybe you know little. Earths climate has warmed up. And cooled down. And so on and so forth for a very long time. Before we existed. So what were the reasons before us? We know little about what’s above and even less about what’s underneath us. In fact we have only drilled down over 12km. And yet the earth is over 6,000km to its core. So we know shit. Your fed all these stories and bullshit and yet nothing holds water. Yes we should watch our pollution and the way we are dealing with forestry. But that doesn’t mean you bring in a bull story and jump on it. Climate tax is the latest shit to hit the fan. And most people seem to be sitting around with there mouths open.

  14. lprent 14

    So what were the reasons before us? We know little about what’s above and even less about what’s underneath us.

    Evidently you know bugger all about earth sciences. I suggest that you go and learn some. We know a lot about what has driven the climate in the past and what it does in the future with the things that we have been doing.

    The only thing that we don’t really know about this particular driver of climate change, the push of large amounts of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere, is what the effect of doing it quite as fast as humans have been doing it. That is the ONLY thing that is unusual.

    What humans have done in 150 odd years is what happens ‘naturally’ over thousands and tens of thousands of years. The most spectacular previous atmospheric events like the deccan traps or the siberian traps took thousands of years to get to similar levels of atmospheric change.

    We know exactly happens when we have forced changes in atmosphere. The only question we have is how fast the disaster is going to roll in. Earth sciences have a good idea of what will happen because it has happened before.

    The only real issue is how fast the effects will happen because of the idiotic speed that crazy fools have been throwing fossil carbon into the air. In the past it has taken thousands or tens of thousand of years. The argument in the earth sciences community is if it will happen in years, decades, or (optimistically) over a century. Is it going too be too fast and will topple our civilisation by impacting on agriculture?

    Basically you are an ignorant idiot without any understanding on the subject you trying to wank on about. Perhaps you should go and learn some more before making such a dickhead of yourself.

    • john 14.1

      ‘Gratuitous personal insult on site author deleted. ‘…….one rule for all.

      [lprent: Nope it is not “one rule for all” on this site.

      Since you don’t expend effort keeping this site going, you are covered by the guest rules which are different to those governing the people who actually help to keep this site running, including site authors. See the policy.

      Personally attacking a host on their own site falls under the self-martyrdom rules. Robust debate and pointed abuse are allowed under the general rules.

      Moderators run under their own rules, which largely operate on the basis of making sure that comment stream operates cleanly within the policy, and that their time doesn’t get wasted. We expect thta guests on the site will assist in doing this task by reading the site rules.

      So, lets demonstrate..

      1. Banned for 2 weeks for being a stupid useless critic who hasn’t read the rules of the site.
      2. Banned for 2 weeks for trying to tell us how to run our site.
      3. Banned for 2 weeks for being lazy and not providing a link to your quote.
      4. Banned for 2 weeks for wasting my valuable time in looking up your quote and linking to it.

      Sentences to be served sequentially.

      I hope this demonstrates the difference between those who do on this site and those who are silly critics. But I’d expect that you’ll merely whine about how unfair it all is.

      BTW: did I mention how dangerous it is to call for a judgement from a moderator, getting the call wrong, and wasting their time? ]

  15. http://oilcrash.com/articles/wilson08.htm
    This is Derick Wilson’s last effort to bring some sanity to the discussion , Derick (at 90ish years old) spent $5,000 publishing about 500 copies of the above lecture in a small booklet, he then posted it to every politician, and mayor, and high up public servant, along with Albert Bartlett’s talk on exponential growth, and the movie Blind Spot.
    This was in 2011.

  16. Judith Lawson 16

    Shame on NZ’s prime minister! Every self respecting Kiwi should be up in arms and
    standing in line to take him out office. New Zealand, you’re a better country than
    this …

  17. don Johnson 17

    Good for New Zealand — I’m tired of hearing how we have to reduce our quality of life by destroying our industry, inflating our cost of living and by doing with less — the Paris climate accords are a giant suction draining the life out of our country and for what – I have traveled places in the world and the money being spent is largely being used to keep dictators, despots and bureaucracy in in high life style – it’s not doing jack squat to make a significant difference — Canada pledges 2,6 Billion to the UN – and didn’t even reserve the right to dictate how it would be used –Air Pollution if Africa is so bad that Abuja Nigeria has day time visibility of 75 meters and people want us to cut back on our pollution because 170 million people produce less per capita then 36 million Canadians – they live in a country less then 10% our country size and don’t have winter — Come ON – the day I see real programs – eg – why doesn’t Canada put 100 million dollars into program providing free tune ups for 2 stroke motorcycles in Africa and it will reduce air pollution far more then all the expensive programs they will invest in. The real problem that people do not want to address is that poor people will always pollute – eg burn wood when they cant get better fuel – no one in the third world is worried about 50 years in future — they are worried about having some supper today Congrats to New Zealand – in my opinion the award is an award recognizing they actually do understand and are not being hypocrites – DJ

  18. nettie 18

    God, u guys talk alot of shit. [Rest of comment deleted for anthropomorphic climate change denialism crazy talk. Also, Attempted Derail detected – BLiP]

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  • Promiscuous Empathy: Chris Trotter Replies To His Critics.
    Inspirational: The Family of Man is a glorious hymn to human equality, but, more than that, it is a clarion call to human freedom. Because equality, unleavened by liberty, is a broken piano, an unstrung harp; upon which the songs of fraternity will never be played. “Somebody must have been telling lies about ...
    34 mins ago
  • Don’t run your business like a criminal enterprise
    The Detail this morning highlights the police's asset forfeiture case against convicted business criminal Ron Salter, who stands to have his business confiscated for systemic violations of health and safety law. Business are crying foul - but not for the reason you'd think. Instead of opposing the post-conviction punishment and ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    39 mins ago
  • Misremembering Justinian’s Taxes.
    Tax Lawyer Barbara Edmonds vs Emperor Justinian I - Nolo Contendere: False historical explanations of pivotal events are very far from being inconsequential.WHEN BARBARA EDMONDS made reference to the Roman Empire, my ears pricked up. It is, lamentably, very rare to hear a politician admit to any kind of familiarity ...
    1 hour ago
  • Bryce Edwards: Scoring 4.6 out of 10, the new Government is struggling in the polls
    It’s been a tumultuous time in politics in recent months, as the new National-led Government has driven through its “First 100 Day programme”. During this period there’s been a handful of opinion polls, which overall just show a minimal amount of flux in public support for the various parties in ...
    Democracy ProjectBy bryce.edwards
    2 hours ago
  • Bishop scores headlines with crackdown on unwelcome tenants – but Peters scores, too, as tub-thump...
    Buzz from the Beehive Housing Minister Chris Bishop delivered news – packed with the ingredients to enflame political passions – worthy of supplanting Winston Peters in headline writers’ priorities. He popped up at the post-Cabinet press conference to promise a crackdown on unruly and antisocial state housing tenants. His ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    3 hours ago
  • Will it make the boat go faster?
    Ele Ludemann writes – The Reserve Bank is advertising for a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion advisor. The Bank has one mandate – to keep inflation between one and three percent. It has failed in that and is only slowly getting inflation back down to the upper limit. Will it ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    6 hours ago
  • Bryce Edwards: Is Simon Bridges’ NZTA appointment a conflict of interest?
    Last week former National Party leader Simon Bridges was appointed by the Government as the new chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA). You can read about the appointment in Thomas Coughlan’s article, Simon Bridges to become chair of NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi The fact that a ...
    Democracy ProjectBy bryce.edwards
    6 hours ago
  • Is Simon Bridges’ NZTA appointment a conflict of interest?
    Bryce Edwards writes – Last week former National Party leader Simon Bridges was appointed by the Government as the new chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA). You can read about the appointment in Thomas Coughlan’s article, Simon Bridges to become chair of NZ Transport Agency ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    6 hours ago
  • Bernard's Top 10 @ 10 'pick 'n' mix' at 10:10am on Tuesday, March 19
    TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Gavin Jacobson talks to Thomas Piketty 10 years on from Capital in the 21st Century The SalvoLocal scoop: Green MP’s business being investigated over migrant exploitation claims Stuff Steve KilgallonLocal deep-dive: The commercial contractors making money from School ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    7 hours ago
  • Bernard's six newsy things on Tuesday, March 19
    It’s a home - but Kāinga Ora tenants accused of “abusing the privilege” may lose it. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The Government announced a crackdown on Kāinga Ora tenants who were unruly and/or behind on their rent, with Housing Minister Chris Bishop saying a place in a state ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    8 hours ago
  • New Life for Light Rail
    This is a guest post by Connor Sharp of Surface Light Rail  Light rail in Auckland: A way forward sooner than you think With the coup de grâce of Auckland Light Rail (ALR) earlier this year, and the shift of the government’s priorities to roads, roads, and more roads, it ...
    Greater AucklandBy Guest Post
    9 hours ago
  • Why Are Bosses Nearly All Buffoons?
    Note: As a paid-up Webworm member, I’ve recorded this Webworm as a mini-podcast for you as well. Some of you said you liked this option - so I aim to provide it when I get a chance to record! Read more ...
    David FarrierBy David Farrier
    11 hours ago
  • Bernard’s six-stack of substacks at 6.06 pm on March 18
    TL;DR: In my ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.06pm on Monday, March 18:IKEA is accused of planting big forests in New Zealand to green-wash; REDD-MonitorA City for People takes a well-deserved victory lap over Wellington’s pro-YIMBY District Plan votes; A City for PeopleSteven Anastasiou takes a close look at the sticky ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    23 hours ago
  • Peters holds his ground on co-governance, but Willis wriggles on those tax cuts and SNA suspension l...
    Buzz from the Beehive Here’s hoping for a lively post-cabinet press conference when the PM and – perhaps – some of his ministers tell us what was discussed at their meeting today. Until then, Point of Order has precious little Beehive news to report after its latest monitoring of the ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    1 day ago
  • Labour’s final report card
    David Farrar writes –  We now have almost all 2023 data in, which has allowed me to update my annual table of how  went against its promises. This is basically their final report card. The promise The result Build 100,000 affordable homes over 10 ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    1 day ago
  • “Drunk Uncle at a Wedding”
    I’m a bit worried that I’ve started a previous newsletter with the words “just when you think they couldn’t get any worse…” Seems lately that I could begin pretty much every issue with that opening. Such is the nature of our coalition government that they seem to be outdoing each ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    1 day ago
  • Wang Yi’s perfectly-timed, Aukus-themed visit to New Zealand
    Geoffrey Miller writes – Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    1 day ago
  • Gordon Campbell on Dune 2, and images of Islam
    Depictions of Islam in Western popular culture have rarely been positive, even before 9/11. Five years on from the mosque shootings, this is one of the cultural headwinds that the Muslim community has to battle against. Whatever messages of tolerance and inclusion are offered in daylight, much of our culture ...
    1 day ago
  • New Rail Operations Centre Promises Better Train Services
    Last week Transport Minster Simeon Brown and Mayor Wayne Brown opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre. The new train control centre will see teams from KiwiRail, Auckland Transport and Auckland One Rail working more closely together to improve train services across the city. The Auckland Rail Operations Centre in ...
    1 day ago
  • Bernard's six newsy things at 6.36am on Monday, March 18
    Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson said in an exit interview with Q+A yesterday the Government can and should sustain more debt to invest in infrastructure for future generations. Elsewhere in the news in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 6:36am: Read more ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 day ago
  • Geoffrey Miller: Wang Yi’s perfectly-timed, Aukus-themed visit to New Zealand
    Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. It is more than just a happy ...
    Democracy ProjectBy Geoffrey Miller
    1 day ago
  • The Kaka’s diary for the week to March 25 and beyond
    TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to March 18 include:China’s Foreign Minister visiting Wellington today;A post-cabinet news conference this afternoon; the resumption of Parliament on Tuesday for two weeks before Easter;retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson gives his valedictory speech in Parliament; ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 day ago
  • Bitter and angry; Winston First
    New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters’s state-of-the-nation speech on Sunday was really a state-of-Winston-First speech. He barely mentioned any of the Government’s key policies and could not even wholly endorse its signature income tax cuts. Instead, he rehearsed all of his complaints about the Ardern Government, including an extraordinary claim ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    1 day ago
  • 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #11
    A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
    1 day ago
  • 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #11
    A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
    1 day ago
  • Out of Touch.
    “I’ve been internalising a really complicated situation in my head.”When they kept telling us we should wait until we get to know him, were they taking the piss? Was it a case of, if you think this is bad, wait till you get to know the real Christopher, after the ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 days ago
  • Bring out your Dad
    Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • Bring out your Dad
    Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • Bring out your Dad
    Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • The bewildering world of Chris Luxon – Guns for all, not no lunch for kids
    .“$10 and a target that bleeds” - Bleeding Targets for Under $10!.Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.This government appears hell-bent on either scrapping life-saving legislation or reintroducing things that - frustrated critics insist - will be dangerous and likely ...
    Frankly SpeakingBy Frank Macskasy
    3 days ago
  • Expert Opinion: Ageing Boomers, Laurie & Les, Talk Politics.
    It hardly strikes me as fair to criticise a government for doing exactly what it said it was going to do. For actually keeping its promises.”THUNDER WAS PLAYING TAG with lightning flashes amongst the distant peaks. Its rolling cadences interrupted by the here-I-come-here-I-go Doppler effect of the occasional passing car. ...
    3 days ago
  • Manufacturing The Truth.
    Subversive & Disruptive Technologies: Just as happened with that other great regulator of the masses, the Medieval Church, the advent of a new and hard-to-control technology – the Internet –  is weakening the ties that bind. Then, and now, those who enjoy a monopoly on the dissemination of lies, cannot and will ...
    3 days ago
  • A Powerful Sensation of Déjà Vu.
    Been Here Before: To find the precedents for what this Coalition Government is proposing, it is necessary to return to the “glory days” of Muldoonism.THE COALITION GOVERNMENT has celebrated its first 100 days in office by checking-off the last of its listed commitments. It remains, however, an angry government. It ...
    3 days ago
  • Can you guess where world attention is focussed (according to Greenpeace)? It’s focussed on an EPA...
    Bob Edlin writes –  And what is the world watching today…? The email newsletter from Associated Press which landed in our mailbox early this morning advised: In the news today: The father of a school shooter has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter; prosecutors in Trump’s hush-money case ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    3 days ago
  • Further integrity problems for the Greens in suspending MP Darleen Tana
    Bryce Edwards writes – Is another Green MP on their way out? And are the Greens severely tarnished by another integrity scandal? For the second time in three months, the Green Party has secretly suspended an MP over integrity issues. Mystery is surrounding the party’s decision to ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    3 days ago
  • Jacqui Van Der Kaay: Greens’ transparency missing in action
    For the last few years, the Green Party has been the party that has managed to avoid the plague of multiple scandals that have beleaguered other political parties. It appears that their luck has run out with a second scandal which, unfortunately for them, coincided with Golraz Ghahraman, the focus ...
    Democracy ProjectBy bryce.edwards
    3 days ago
  • Bernard’s Dawn Chorus with six newsey things at 6:46am for Saturday, March 16
    TL;DR: The six newsey things that stood out to me as of 6:46am on Saturday, March 16.Andy Foster has accidentally allowed a Labour/Green amendment to cut road user chargers for plug-in hybrid vehicles, which the Government might accept; NZ Herald Thomas Coughlan Simeon Brown has rejected a plea from Westport ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    3 days ago
  • How Did FTX Crash?
    What seemed a booming success a couple of years ago has collapsed into fraud convictions.I looked at the crash of FTX (short for ‘Futures Exchange’) in November 2022 to see whether it would impact on the financial system as a whole. Fortunately there was barely a ripple, probably because it ...
    PunditBy Brian Easton
    4 days ago
  • Elections in Russia and Ukraine
    Anybody following the situation in Ukraine and Russia would probably have been amused by a recent Tweet on X NATO seems to be putting in an awful lot of effort to influence what is, at least according to them, a sham election in an autocracy.When do the Ukrainians go to ...
    4 days ago
  • Bernard’s six stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15
    TL;DR: Shaun Baker on Wynyard Quarter's transformation. Magdalene Taylor on the problem with smart phones. How private equity are now all over reinsurance. Dylan Cleaver on rugby and CTE. Emily Atkin on ‘Big Meat’ looking like ‘Big Oil’.Bernard’s six-stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15Photo by Jeppe Hove Jensen ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • Buzz from the Beehive Finance Minister Nicola Willis had plenty to say when addressing the Auckland Business Chamber on the economic growth that (she tells us) is flagging more than we thought. But the government intends to put new life into it:  We want our country to be a ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    4 days ago
  • National’s clean car tax advances
    The Transport and Infrastructure Committee has reported back on the Road User Charges (Light Electric RUC Vehicles) Amendment Bill, basicly rubberstamping it. While there was widespread support among submitters for the principle that EV and PHEV drivers should pay their fair share for the roads, they also overwhelmingly disagreed with ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    4 days ago
  • Government funding bailouts
    Peter Dunne writes – This week’s government bailout – the fifth in the last eighteen months – of the financially troubled Ruapehu Alpine Lifts company would have pleased many in the central North Island ski industry. The government’s stated rationale for the $7 million funding was that it ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    4 days ago
  • Two offenders, different treatments.
    See if you can spot the difference. An Iranian born female MP from a progressive party is accused of serial shoplifting. Her name is leaked to the media, which goes into a pack frenzy even before the Police launch an … Continue reading ...
    KiwipoliticoBy Pablo
    4 days ago
  • Treaty references omitted
    Ele Ludemann writes  – The government is omitting general Treaty references from legislation : The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last Government in a bid to get greater coherence in the public service on Treaty ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    4 days ago
  • The Ghahraman Conflict
    What was that judge thinking? Peter Williams writes –  That Golriz Ghahraman and District Court Judge Maria Pecotic were once lawyer colleagues is incontrovertible. There is published evidence that they took at least one case to the Court of Appeal together. There was a report on ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    4 days ago
  • Bernard's Top 10 @ 10 'pick 'n' mix' for March 15
    TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Climate Scorpion – the sting is in the tail. Introducing planetary solvency. A paper via the University of Exeter’s Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.Local scoop: Kāinga Ora starts pulling out of its Auckland projects and selling land RNZ ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • The day Wellington up-zoned its future
    Wellington’s massively upzoned District Plan adds the opportunity for tens of thousands of new homes not just in the central city (such as these Webb St new builds) but also close to the CBD and public transport links. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Wellington gave itself the chance of ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • Weekly Roundup 15-March-2024
    It’s Friday and we’re halfway through March Madness. Here’s some of the things that caught our attention this week. This Week in Greater Auckland On Monday Matt asked how we can get better event trains and an option for grade separating Morningside Dr. On Tuesday Matt looked into ...
    Greater AucklandBy Greater Auckland
    4 days ago
  • That Word.
    Something you might not know about me is that I’m quite a stubborn person. No, really. I don’t much care for criticism I think’s unfair or that I disagree with. Few of us do I suppose.Back when I was a drinker I’d sometimes respond defensively, even angrily. There are things ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    4 days ago
  • The Hoon around the week to March 15
    Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:PM Christopher Luxon said the reversal of interest deductibility for landlords was done to help renters, who ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • Labour’s policy gap
    It was not so much the Labour Party but really the Chris Hipkins party yesterday at Labour’s caucus retreat in Martinborough. The former Prime Minister was more or less consistent on wealth tax, which he was at best equivocal about, and social insurance, which he was not willing to revisit. ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    4 days ago
  • Skeptical Science New Research for Week #11 2024
    Open access notables A Glimpse into the Future: The 2023 Ocean Temperature and Sea Ice Extremes in the Context of Longer-Term Climate Change, Kuhlbrodt et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society: In the year 2023, we have seen extraordinary extrema in high sea surface temperature (SST) in the North Atlantic and in ...
    5 days ago
  • Melissa remains mute on media matters but has something to say (at a sporting event) about economic ...
     Buzz from the Beehive   The text reproduced above appears on a page which records all the media statements and speeches posted on the government’s official website by Melissa Lee as Minister of Media and Communications and/or by Jenny Marcroft, her Parliamentary Under-secretary.  It can be quickly analysed ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    5 days ago
  • The return of Muldoon
    For forty years, Robert Muldoon has been a dirty word in our politics. His style of government was so repulsive and authoritarian that the backlash to it helped set and entrench our constitutional norms. His pig-headedness over forcing through Think Big eventually gave us the RMA, with its participation and ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    5 days ago
  • Will the rental tax cut improve life for renters or landlords?
    Bryce Edwards writes –  Is the new government reducing tax on rental properties to benefit landlords or to cut the cost of rents? That’s the big question this week, after Associate Finance Minister David Seymour announced on Sunday that the Government would be reversing the Labour Government’s removal ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • Geoffrey Miller: What Saudi Arabia’s rapid changes mean for New Zealand
    Saudi Arabia is rarely far from the international spotlight. The war in Gaza has brought new scrutiny to Saudi plans to normalise relations with Israel, while the fifth anniversary of the controversial killing of Jamal Khashoggi was marked shortly before the war began on October 7. And as the home ...
    Democracy ProjectBy Geoffrey Miller
    5 days ago
  • Racism’s double standards
    Questions need to be asked on both sides of the world Peter Williams writes –   The NRL Judiciary hands down an eight week suspension to Sydney Roosters forward Spencer Leniu , an Auckland-born Samoan, after he calls Ezra Mam, Sydney-orn but of Aboriginal and Torres Strait ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • It’s not a tax break
    Ele Ludemann writes – Contrary to what many headlines and news stories are saying, residential landlords are not getting a tax break. The government is simply restoring to them the tax deductibility of interest they had until the previous government removed it. There is no logical reason ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • The Plastic Pig Collective and Chris' Imaginary Friends.
    I can't remember when it was goodMoments of happiness in bloomMaybe I just misunderstoodAll of the love we left behindWatching our flashbacks intertwineMemories I will never findIn spite of whatever you becomeForget that reckless thing turned onI think our lives have just begunI think our lives have just begunDoes anyone ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    5 days ago
  • Who is responsible for young offenders?
    Michael Bassett writes – At first reading, a front-page story in the New Zealand Herald on 13 March was bizarre. A group of severely intellectually limited teenagers, with little understanding of the law, have been pleading to the Justice Select Committee not to pass a bill dealing with ram ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • Gordon Campbell on National’s fantasy trip to La La Landlord Land
    How much political capital is Christopher Luxon willing to burn through in order to deliver his $2.9 billion gift to landlords? Evidently, Luxon is: (a) unable to cost the policy accurately. As Anna Burns-Francis pointed out to him on Breakfast TV, the original ”rock solid” $2.1 billion cost he was ...
    5 days ago
  • Bernard's Top 10 @ 10 'pick 'n' mix' for March 14
    TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Jonathon Porritt calling bullshit in his own blog post on mainstream climate science as ‘The New Denialism’.Local scoop: The Wellington City Council’s list of proposed changes to the IHP recommendations to be debated later today was leaked this ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • No, Prime Minister, rents don’t rise or fall with landlords’ costs
    TL;DR: Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said yesterday tenants should be grateful for the reinstatement of interest deductibility because landlords would pass on their lower tax costs in the form of lower rents. That would be true if landlords were regulated monopolies such as Transpower or Auckland Airport1, but they’re not, ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • Cartoons: ‘At least I didn’t make things awkward’
    This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Tom Toro Tom Toro is a cartoonist and author. He has published over 200 cartoons in The New Yorker since 2010. His cartoons appear in Playboy, the Paris Review, the New York Times, American Bystander, and elsewhere. Related: What 10 EV lovers ...
    5 days ago
  • Solving traffic congestion with Richard Prebble
    The business section of the NZ Herald is full of opinion. Among the more opinionated of all is the ex-Minister of Transport, ex-Minister of Railways, ex MP for Auckland Central (1975-93, Labour), Wellington Central (1996-99, ACT, then list-2005), ex-leader of the ACT Party, uncle to actor Antonia, the veritable granddaddy ...
    Greater AucklandBy Patrick Reynolds
    5 days ago
  • I Think I'm Done Flying Boeing
    Hi,Just quickly — I’m blown away by the stories you’ve shared with me over the last week since I put out the ‘Gary’ podcast, where I told you about the time my friend’s flatmate killed the neighbour.And you keep telling me stories — in the comments section, and in my ...
    David FarrierBy David Farrier
    5 days ago
  • Invoking Aristotle: Of Rings of Power, Stones, and Ships
    The first season of Rings of Power was not awful. It was thoroughly underwhelming, yes, and left a lingering sense of disappointment, but it was more expensive mediocrity than catastrophe. I wrote at length about the series as it came out (see the Review section of the blog, and go ...
    6 days ago
  • Van Velden brings free-market approach to changing labour laws – but her colleagues stick to distr...
    Buzz from the Beehive Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden told Auckland Business Chamber members they were the first audience to hear her priorities as a minister in a government committed to cutting red tape and regulations. She brandished her liberalising credentials, saying Flexible labour markets are the ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    6 days ago
  • Why Newshub failed
    Chris Trotter writes – TO UNDERSTAND WHY NEWSHUB FAILED, it is necessary to understand how TVNZ changed. Up until 1989, the state broadcaster had been funded by a broadcasting licence fee, collected from every citizen in possession of a television set, supplemented by a relatively modest (compared ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    6 days ago
  • Māori Party on the warpath against landlords and seabed miners – let’s see if mystical creature...
    Bob Edlin writes  –  The Māori Party has been busy issuing a mix of warnings and threats as its expresses its opposition to interest deductibility for landlords and the plans of seabed miners. It remains to be seen whether they  follow the example of indigenous litigants in Australia, ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    6 days ago
  • There’s a name for this
    Every year, in the Budget, Parliament forks out money to government agencies to do certain things. And every year, as part of the annual review cycle, those agencies are meant to report on whether they have done the things Parliament gave them that money for. Agencies which consistently fail to ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    6 days ago
  • Echoes of 1968 in 2024?  Pocock on the repetitive problems of the New Left
    Mike Grimshaw writes – Recent events in American universities point to an underlying crisis of coherent thinking, an issue that increasingly affects the progressive left across the Western world. This of course is nothing new as anyone who can either remember or has read of the late ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    6 days ago
  • Two bar blues
    The thing about life’s little victories is that they can be followed by a defeat.Reader Darryl told me on Monday night:Test again Dave. My “head cold” last week became COVID within 24 hours, and is still with me. I hear the new variants take a bit longer to show up ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    6 days ago
  • Bernard's Top 10 @ 10 'pick 'n' mix' for March 13
    TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Angus Deaton on rethinking his economics IMFLocal scoop: The people behind Tamarind, the firm that left a $500m cleanup bill for taxpayers at Taranaki’s Tui oil well, are back operating in Taranaki under a different company name. Jonathan ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    6 days ago

  • Positive progress for social worker workforce
    New Zealand’s social workers are qualified, experienced, and more representative of the communities they serve, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “I want to acknowledge and applaud New Zealand’s social workers for the hard work they do, providing invaluable support for our most vulnerable. “To coincide with World ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 hours ago
  • Minister confirms reduced RUC rate for PHEVs
    Cabinet has agreed to a reduced road user charge (RUC) rate for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. Owners of PHEVs will be eligible for a reduced rate of $38 per 1,000km once all light electric vehicles (EVs) move into the RUC system from 1 April.  ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 hours ago
  • Trade access to overseas markets creates jobs
    Minister of Agriculture and Trade, Todd McClay, says that today’s opening of Riverland Foods manufacturing plant in Christchurch is a great example of how trade access to overseas markets creates jobs in New Zealand.  Speaking at the official opening of this state-of-the-art pet food factory the Minister noted that exports ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    7 hours ago
  • NZ and Chinese Foreign Ministers hold official talks
    Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Wellington today. “It was a pleasure to host Foreign Minister Wang Yi during his first official visit to New Zealand since 2017. Our discussions were wide-ranging and enabled engagement on many facets of New Zealand’s relationship with China, including trade, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    20 hours ago
  • Kāinga Ora instructed to end Sustaining Tenancies
    Kāinga Ora – Homes & Communities has been instructed to end the Sustaining Tenancies Framework and take stronger measures against persistent antisocial behaviour by tenants, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Earlier today Finance Minister Nicola Willis and I sent an interim Letter of Expectations to the Board of Kāinga Ora. ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Speech to Auckland Business Chamber: Growth is the answer
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