Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step right up to the mike…
“..Over the years, there has been an extensive health debate over whether coffee is really good or bad for our bodies – with strong arguments and research coming from both sides of the fence.
Some research suggests that coffee can prevent strokes – delay the onset of diabetes and heart disease.
Other findings indicate it might lead to some forms of cancer – and adversely affect the metabolism.
The most recent study from the Mayo Clinic published on August 15 reveals that drinking more than 28 cups a week can harm your health considerably –
– with those consuming more than four cups a day twice as likely to die than those who are non-drinkers..”
“…with those consuming more than four cups a day twice as likely to die than those who are non-drinkers..”
Dude, with one possible exception everyone who has ever been born has died so I am not sure what this sentence even means.
Since we are all gonna die of something someday, I’ll take my chances with the coffee. Probably better to live a fun life and die at 80 than be petrified of an expresso and live to be 102 when you are blind, deaf and the only thing you have to look forward to in your life is getting your nappies changed.
Hungarian creamer with that latte?
NZ 250M export infant baby formula market in China nearly wiped out; many exporters orders halved, some cancelled. China preferring infant formula sourced from Hungary for now.
-RNZ (interview with an industry Exporter) Checkpoint.
28 a week? Oh am I in trouble. When I was younger back in the BBS days I existed on Coffee and Nicotine (As did Most Sysops Back Then) Now I am older, I have given up the Nicotine. But give up Coffee Now thats a whole nother story.
Apparently coffee protects against liver damage from alcohol – so if you had a glass of wine last night feel comfortable with your cup of coffee this morning 😉
Anyone else feeling slight queasiness with the collective sympathy-fest around the Team NZ homecoming? Isn’t that strange how the government and the middle classes are happy to throw millions at rich yachtsmen but very reluctant to fund food for schoolchildren? And I dont think that the rest of our not-so-well pampered and funded sportspeople are feeling happy right now either.
Someone somewhere needed a feel good parade, and by the looks, Team New Zealand lucked in.
That they lost with what can arguably be called the biggest choke in sporting history appears to be totally beside the point.
A precedent setting paradigm shift in NZ culture in rewarding humiliating failure?
But we funded the winner too, apparently Larry the billionaire ‘owns’ the NZ boatyard in which the ‘American’ boat was built, the tax breaks so far given are said to have Larry wanting to do it all over again…
The opposition should be going hard on solid energy. It sums up the NACT, profit stripping via debt, hobbling its business model, ignoring its board then tossing jobs and ownership away.
“$800,000 salaries for top city staff the market rate, says mayor
Auckland Mayor Len Brown last night defended salaries of nearly $800,000 a year for two senior council executives, telling a public meeting, “You have got to meet the…
The just-published 2013 annual report shows council chief executive Doug McKay’s salary increased by $15,656 to $782,887 and Watercare CEO Mark Ford’s salary rose $70,000 to between $780,000 and $790,000.
In the same year, the number of council staff earning more than $100,000 rose to 1500, and 113 staff earned more than $200,000.”
An interesting blog from Chris Trotter on a matter much discussed within these pages.
My own recent experience of trying to do things differently in a group – to be genuinely democratic, consensual, non-hierarchical…even with lashings of goodwill – makes me feel like running for the hills (once I’ve finished tearing my hair out, that is).
Has Bill English ceded his Job to Governor of the Reserve Bank of Auckland.
The OCR mechanism is a blunt tool unsuited to the extraordinary times we still find ourselves in. I hope David and David are going to follow through with rhetoric on the Reserve Bank and not become captured by orthodox lobby of the self interested
I don’t see why we shouldn’t make the job of governor of the reserve bank an elected one. After all, he has an important role in setting policy for OUR economy.
So more neo-liberal privatisation –your ideological solution to everything?
It’s really worked so far!
Return to Kiwiblog and the Sewerblog, where your pernicious ideas will gain traction, no doubt.
This sadly shows you how a corrupt media with shills like John Roughan and Mike Hosking can influence opinion when they get unopposed airtime on the corporate news wires.
Review of fourth annual RightsWatch Conference of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), presented this year in partnership with Ryerson University.
“Civil Liberties and Democracy in the Digital Age: Privacy, Media and Free Expression” held in Toronto on Friday and Saturday, September 20th and 21st.
After signing New Zealand up. John Key says that he does not expect that the major emitters who are dialogue partners to the Pacific Islands Forum, the US, China, India, (or as it turned out, even full member Australia), to sign up to the Majuro Declaration on climate change.
Maybe the political leaders of these nations feel that if they did sign this international agreement, they might be bound to honour it?
Oh my, just been given a link to a webpage that is more left than here, (didnt think it was possible) The Daily Blog?
Such disgusting items, such as the USA was behind the Kenyan Mall attacks,and it would appear its great that America has shut down, because millions of babies wont be killed world wide?
Does the left in NZ really believe that BS, are you that precious about the USA?
Surly not even Temana or the green party supporters are on this level.
Totally repugnant page.
[lprent: I’m surprised that you’re been able to miss TDB? Have you ever looked at the Feed on the right of this site which amongst everything from No Minister to some really really local left sites (and the odd science site as well because I like them). The Daily Blog makes up a good quarter of the feed on most days. ]
I don’t know about the Kenyan Mall, but the Americans have definitely been providing infantry training and weapons to islamist Al Qaeda fighters in Syria.
I don’t know about the Kenyan Mall, but the Americans have definitely been providing infantry training and weapons to islamist Al Qaeda fighters in Syria.
Time to get over the fact that you have been supporting a foreign invasion of Syria and a Qatari/Saudi regime change programme targetting the Syrian government, Jenny.
and the organised criminal extremes their society (might is right) have bred: Mob, Irish, Hispanics, Russians, Crips, Bloods, Aryans and NLR, Central and South American gangs and so on, and that’s not including their own internal terrorists, the Patriot-aligned and their NGO / Defense Contract private mercenary armies. Gee, that sure worked out well.
I think ‘ANT’ is off in a couple of things in that comment, but you completely misrepresent what is said.
‘Complicit in’ is not the same as ‘was behind’.
I know that you hate people criticising the US, it’s the weird little chip you carry on your own shoulder Brett, but it is simply a fact that they work with all sorts of unsavoury people around the world, and do all sorts of awful things. They really do.
Now that doesn’t mean that they are behind every bad thing that happens, but it does mean that it isn’t ‘vile’ to talk about things they are doing, and ask questions and what not.
It isn’t ‘out of the question’ that US actions in Africa are inflaming things. It isn’t ‘out of the question’ that the US funds and trains people who go on to do very bad things.
Yeah I can’t see any article suggesting the US were behind the Kenyan Mall attacks, you better link to it Brett. I gave your stupid comment a thumbs down too.
With you using the word repugnant, I think you must be talking about the whale-snot website, silly boy.
“Ant” wrote: “There was a recent story on globalresearch.ca that says western intelligence agencies were complicit in the Kenya mall attacks. According to the story, the attacks may be a part of a geopolitical strategy to counter the rising influence of China in Africa.”
SO, you are a fucking liar Brett.
You should know by now that people here are not as stupid as you would like them to be. Only someone as stupid as you will swallow the garbage you throw around.
Are there any examples of anything ‘vile’ that has been left up?
The commment from ‘Ant’ is abit wrong headed in a few respects from my point of view (it’s a bit simplistic about Saudi Arabia and AQ), but what is vile about it?
the rest of the comments, what’s wrong with them?
If there are ‘vile’ tweets that have been moderated, that kind of suggests that your idea about TDB being a vile cesspit is wrong, doesn’t it?
Or are you saying that if they leave them up, that’s awful, but if they take them down, why, that’s awful too!
Go to the link, its right there, western governments behind kenya mall attacks,
Martyn is celebrating the usa government shutdown because it means no drone
attacks against thousands and thousands and thousands of children.
Because drone attacks have nothing to do with the usa shutting down, and im guessing if there was a tragic event in the states like an earthquake or another massacre, someone would write….
What about iraq?
or
What about drones??
What of course has nothing to do with the actual incident that took place.
So what is wrong with the ceasation of drone attacks on civilian areas? Seems like a good thing to have happen, even if it is simply due to running out of budget.
And you imagine that there would be all sorts of vile things said about things that haven’t happened.
Well I think that in a hypothetical universe where the US launched a nuclear strike in response to a cyber attack on their power grid, (which is something they have not taken off the table), you would criticise anyone who objected to it.
Brett’s point is that it’s morally wrong to discuss violence done by the US in other places while recognising violence in places other than the US, and that it is morally wrong to discuss violence done by the US while recognising violence or unfortunate events that take place in the US.
Which drastically limits the morally acceptable opportunities to discuss violence committed by the US, but I’m sure that such an outcome is completely inadvertent.
Commentator refers to wingnut web site = vile attack on the US must make you the stupidest man on the internets today – congratulations fella.
btw, bomber is correct.
The study by Stanford Law School and New York University’s School of Law calls for a re-evaluation of the practice, saying the number of “high-level” targets killed as a percentage of total casualties is extremely low — about 2%.
[…]
TBIJ reports that from June 2004 through mid-September 2012, available data indicate that drone strikes killed 2,562 – 3,325 people in Pakistan, of whom 474 – 881 were civilians, including 176 children. TBIJ reports that these strikes also injured an additional 1,228 – 1,362 individuals,” according to the Stanford/NYU study.
FFS, Okay I posted this at my blog and here once I think, this is blogger james robinson response to someone who wrote..
“what about Iraq” In response to James writing about the boston bombing.
It sums up my whole feeling…
JAMES ROBINSON
“The “what-about-Iraq” comments here miss the point.
I stewed on them for a couple of days and what I have to say is this.
If you grieve a friend of yours dying, are you being
disrespectful to everyone else that died that day? No.
I lived in Boston. I live in America. This was big news to me.
I’m well versed in Iraqi policy and America’s failings there.
And don’t just zero in on Iraq because its in the news.
People are dying in huge numbers in places that America
didn’t invade too. There’s a lot of bad stuff out there, always
happening. That doesn’t mean that seeing bombs going off in
my former home isn’t somewhat traumatic. I hope I never have
to sit next to you guys at a dinner party.”
Because whenever there is a major disaster in the usa or a tragic event, people bring up other international issues, that have nothing to so with what has just happened.
The left seems to have a rage in them if people dare give sympathy to the people of the usa.
So why don’t you give actual examples of them doing that, instead of imagining it would happen?
And why do you say it’s ‘the left’ that do it? Does everyone on the left do it? Does no one on the right do it? Or does it only concern you when it is from the left, or about the US.
And does no one on the left give sympathy to the US, ever/ Pretty sure that’s a pile of bullshit. So what the hell are you talking about.
It looks like you just hate to see the US criticised. Why is that?
Martin Heidegger prepared the ground for his major work, Sein und Zeit (1927; tr.Oxford 1962) with a series of lucid and solid, if unremarkable writings which anticipated the themes of his mature work.
In “The Problem of Reality in Modern Philosophy (1912) he argues against various versions of idealism, including Kant’s critical idealism, in favour of critical realism. “New Investigations of Logic (1912) assessed recent works on logic, including those of Russell, Whitehead and Frege through Husserl’s critique of psychologism. In keeping with his doctrine of truth as unconcealment , H. had little truck with ‘logic of assertion’ traditions; Analogous to the later Wittgenstein, H. was more inclined to base arithmetic on everyday activities like counting and measurement.His doctoral dissertation The Doctrine of the Judgement in Psychologism (1914) continued this opposition to the reduction of logic to psychological processes; his habilitation thesis Dun Scotus’s Doctrine of Categories and Meaning demonstrates a respect for metaphysics, history, and subjectivity that flows through his later work.
( His initial support for Naz1sm was due to his abhorence of technological and industrialized mass society, which he associated with the USA and the USSR. Although recently elected Rector of Freiberg in 1933, he resigned in 1934, and in 1945 was forbidden to teach until 1951, due to his associations with Naz1sm ) .
Being and Time crystallized his study of virtually the entire breadth of past and contemporary philosophy at that time, it’s central concern being the ‘question of being’. Since the Greeks, being ( Sein ) had not been well-integrated into Time; it had been insulated from change as presence , excluding past and future. This exclusion embraced not only temporal presence, but also the atemporal, eternal presence of , for example, Plato’s Forms
H. revived investigation of the ‘sense of being’ through engagement in a ‘fundamental ontology’ underpinning the ‘regional’ ontologies dealing with the being of particular realms of entity ; nature and history for example.
This examination requires consideration of the entity , Dasein (literally, ‘to be there’ ). H. uses this term for several reasons: it does not require commitment to a view of humans as biological entities, as consciousness, or as essentially rational; Dasein has no determinate essence, hmmm, ; it’s being consists in it’s possibilities, “To be or not to be, that is the question”. It is there in the world, yet not confined to a particular place (or time). It is the entity that asks “What is being?” and whose understanding of being is itself, an essential feature of it’s being.
Although Dasein is essentially ontological, the philosopher cannot simply adopt Dasein’s own understanding of itself and other entities. For Dasein tends to systematically misinterpret itself and it’s world, for example, regarding itself as a thing equivalent to other things leading to much of the vocabulary of traditional philosophy- ‘consciousness’, ‘subject-object’ to be infected with such misunderstandings. Thus H. , like analytical philosophers such as Wittgenstein, J.L. Austin and Ryle avoids such terminology, preferring more grounded terms such as ‘care’ ( Sorge ) which carry no burden of philosophical assumptions. (Bear in mind that H. holds that silence is an ‘essential possibility of discourse’). Like Husserl, he attempts to describe ‘the things themselves’ without the help of theories and preconceptions, yet unlike Husserl, he holds that this requires a determined rethinking of philosophical language.
You’re letting Head-Gear off far too lightly in 1933. He never gave up his membership, and never repudiated them despite the length entreaties of many especially Marcuse.
Should Penny Webster be disqualified under the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, because she and her husband have entered into transactions with the Auckland Council Group, totalling $32,189 during 2012, for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited ?
Disqualifying contracts between local authorities and their members
(1) Except as provided in subsection (3), no person shall be capable of being elected as or appointed to be or of being a member of a local authority or of any committee of a local authority, if the total of all payments made or to be made by or on behalf of the local authority in respect of all contracts made by it in which that person is concerned or interested exceeds $25,000 in any financial year.
SHOULD PENNY WEBSTER BE ELIGIBLE TO STAND AS AN AUCKLAND COUNCIL CANDIDATE?
I have just rung the OAG (PA to Lynn Provost ) and asked if Penny Webster had applied for and received any dispensation, given that in 2012 All Rural Fencing Ltd had ‘entered into transactions with the Auckland Council Group totaling $32,189 for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited .
32 RELATED PARTIES
Related parties
Related parties are defined in the group’s accounting policies.
The group enters into numerous transactions such as rates, water charges and the sale of goods or services with related parties in the ordinary course of business and on an arm’s length basis.
No disclosure has been made for these transactions.
Certain related parties have directorships and trustee positions in a number of entities to which the group transacts in the normal course of business, on standard terms. No disclosure is made for these relationships as the related parties do not have a controlling interest in the council or the entity that they are a director or trustee. The group transacts with entities that are related by virtue of related parties having a controlling interest in the related entity as detailed below:
The group entered into transactions totalling $32,189 with All Rural Fencing Limited during the year
(2012: $920). An amount of $4,313 was payable at balance date (2012: $nil).
The council entered into transactions totalling $4,313 with All Rural Fencing Limited during the year
(2012: $920). An amount of $4,313 was payable at balance date (2012: $nil)
______________________________________________________________________________
“Rodney councillor Penny Webster says that at a time when household budgets are tight, the council cannot afford the $12 million to $15 million cost of mowing berms for the whole region. ..”
The blinding hypocrisy of Auckland Councillor Penny Webster sickens me. Councillor Penny Webster, (Chair of the Auckland Council Strategy and Finance Committee), wants citizens and ratepayers to provide their lawn-mowing services free of charge, although there is no legal requirement to so do, while she and her husband have their snouts in the public through transactions with the Auckland Council Group, totalling $32,189 during 2012, for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited.
In my considered opinion, this is a clear ‘conflict of interest’.
As an anti-corruption /anti-privatisation ‘Public Watchdog’, I am totally opposed to any elected representatives personally profiting from contracts with Council or Council-Controlled-Organisations (CCOs) .
I believe in the ‘public service model’, where people seek public office to look after the public and the public interest, not to ‘feather their own nests’, and enrich themselves from the public purse.
I also asked why the statutory requirements of the Public Records Act 2005, (s.17) had not been met in the Auckland Council 2012 -2013 Annual Report, because there are no ‘devilish details’ provided regarding contracts with the private sector.
Recordkeeping requirements
Subpart 1—Key duties
17 Requirement to create and maintain records
(1)Every public office and local authority must create and maintain full and accurate records of its affairs, in accordance with normal, prudent business practice, including the records of any matter that is contracted out to an independent contractor.
______________________________________________________________________________
Here’s the 2012 – 2013 Auckland Council Annual Report:
See if you can find the NAMES of the consultants/contractors ; SCOPE / TERM VALUE of contracts between Auckland Council / Auckland Council CCOs / Auckland Council Local Boards?
I couldn’t.
In my considered opinion, the problem with Auckland Council, as proven by this 2012- 2013 Annual Report – is that ‘the books’ are NOT open – and we are NOT given the ‘devilish detail’ which explains exactly where our public monies are being spent, invested or borrowed.
This is why, if and when I am elected Mayor pf Auckland Council, I will establish an Auckland Mayoral ‘Commission Against Corruption’, and will ‘open the books’, in order to find out where every dollar of citizen and ratepayer’s monies are being spent, invested and borrowed.
This Auckland Mayoral ‘Commission Against Corruption’ will be staffed by a small team of forensic investigators, (whom I shall appoint, and who will report directly to me), funded directly from the Mayoral Office, using the budget which is set aside in order to help achieve the Auckland ‘Mayoral Vision.’
My Auckland Mayoral Vision is – to stop the corrupt corporate control of the Auckland region.
Here is my ‘Action Plan’ to stop ‘white collar’ crime, corruption and ‘corporate welfare’:
For those who really want to know who is running the Auckland region, ‘like a business, by business, for business’ – check for yourselves http://www.committeeforauckland.co.nz (membership).
It is essential to his procedure that H. in providing a correct or authentic term for, or account of, a phenomena (such as man, time or truth) he does not simply counterpose it to the degenerate term or account current, but attempts to explain why the degeneration occurred, for example, in demonstrating that Descartes was mistaken to regard man as res cogitans one must show, n the correct account of man, how the mistake arose.For misinterpretation is not sheer, unaccountable error, but a ‘possibility’ to which Dasein is essentially prone.
For Heidegger, unlike Descartes, Dasein is essentially in the world and is inseparable from it: In understanding the world, Being-in is always understood along with it, while understanding of existence ( Existenz like the movie ) as such is always an understanding of the world. The world is not primarily the world of the sciences, but the everyday lifeworld (Husserl).It is disclosed to us not by scientific knowledge per se, but by pre-scientific experiences, by care and by emotions. Entities in the world are not primarily objects of theoretical cognition, but tools that are ‘ready to hand’ ( zuhanden ) such as a hammer ,to be used rather than studied and observed. Theoretical cognition, like when observing a hammer disinterestedly (or a RWNJ) is a secondary phenomenon, which occurs more readily when a tool fails to give satisfaction. Tools are not independent of each other but belong to ‘context of significance’ in which items such as hammers, nails and IT ‘refer’ to each other and ultimately to Dasein and it’s purposes.
Just as Dasein is in the world, so it essentially ‘with’ others of the same type as itself. It does not first exist as an isolated subject and then subsequently acquire knowledge of and relations to others; it is with others from the start. However, it’s integrity is threatened by others, as being together with others Dasein is ‘captured’ by others. Itself, it is not; others usurp it’s being. The self of everyday Dasein is the ‘they-self’, as distinct from the authentic self, the self that possesses itself. ‘They’ is the German man (one, you: we ) :the they-self does and believes what one does and believes rather than what it has independently and authentically decided upon.(This theory of the ‘they’ or ‘one’ is influenced by Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Illyich : Ivan’s carefully redecorated house seems quite exceptional to him, yet it contains “all the things people of a certain class have in order to resemble other people of that class’ ). To summarize, thus far, the account of everyday life that H. first presented as a neutral account of the bedrock condition of man, becomes an account of man’s fallenness’ and inauthenticity.
The primary form of discourse, for H. is not explicit assertion, for example, “This hammer is heavy” but such utterances as “Too Heavy! Give me a lighter one” made in a work situation. Truth too, is not a primarily the correspondence between an assertion or proposition and a state of the world but the disclosure of the world to and by Dasein , unmediated by concepts, propositions or inner mental sates; ultimately, truth is ‘ Dasein’s disclosedness (supported by an appeal to the Greek word for truth aletheia which he claimed means ‘unconcealment’.) Meaning, like truth, is extruded from the mind- “Mill’s verbal propositions cannot be completely severed from the beings they intend.Names, words in their broadest sense , have no a priori fixed measure in their significative content. Names, or again, their meanings, change with transformations in our knowledge of things, and the meanings of names and words always change according to the predominance of a specific line of vision toward the the thing somehow named by the name. All significations, including those that appear mere verbal meanings, arise from reference to things”. ( The basic Problems of Phenomenology : 1927; tr, Bloomington, 1982).
I like the way you put that, “worlding”.
Will just finish with some reference, death, the wonderful Time , decline , Holderlin and some thought (not on Friday afternoon though, took most of the morning as I had not been back to the highlighting for about two weeks 😉 ) Highlighting is then blended with the overlooked carefully.
Man, it’s 20C today, the same predicted for the next week, although with some rain. The forecast for temperature is generally consistent, however the rainfall can vary widely from that predicted. Some of us are anticipating another warmer summer.
Anyway, Ad, many of these “obscurantist” suggestions may well capture the lived experience of pre-technological peoples arisng at present. Many are essentially narratives of the decline or return of Western civilization.
grounded narratives : Gotta love them., very helpful. 😀
furthermore, building upon McFlock’s suggestion and evidence of the roles of traders, pirates and brigands (my terms) in the expansion and establishment of nation-states, there may be an analogy at present , in a period of continued globalization, mercantile expansion , particularly by China , information-connectivity and flows under threat from piracy (and the authoritarian State ) the world-wide web of organised crime and the amorality of many of the wealthy… through to corporate rapacity ,establishing pan-continental entities.
If we reduce the possible Harrison/Gibson mega-corp into its component parts (capitalist shareholders), and those parts become beholden to patronage and nepotism, it might be regarded as a social devolution back to hereditary monarchies. After all, it was loyalty to one’s lord and liege that preceded cohesive “national” identity, by and large. Different brand on the armour, but the game stays the same (preservation of personal and hereditary power).
Personally, I reckon that the main way to avert that dystopia is to strengthen international structures that have a democratic foundation – e.g. give the UN more power and self-determination, remove the veto, and then start looking at ways to have as few representative tiers between an individual and the top of the UN as possible.
More Corporate Welfare from this corrupt Government.
Joyce has just promised to borrow more money today to bankroll a team of 3-peat losers in the next instalment of the Billionaires Piss-up on San Francisco Bay.
Can someone please bring some reality to this outrageous waste of our money.
The America’s Cup does absolutley nothing for the hungry kids in this country.
Can someone in Wellington please stand up and scream NO MORE CORPORATE WELFARE.
Fuck off Team New Zealand. Stop crying and go fund your own rich boys wank-fest.
That’s cool, I will do that. You and your ilk just make sure as parents you feed your fucking kids. Don’t send them to school hoping I will pay to feed them.
Yes. There is meant to be a thumbnail image in there that has the required sizing. Unfortunately the generation of the thumbnail has a bug in it that makes the CPU usage at the server go up dramatically when the site is under load. So it is currently turned off and waiting for either the plugin author to fix, or me to find some unencumbered time to debug and recode.
I suppose I could patch the CSS with a min-height. But at present it is a nice reminder for me to fix it.
couple a points:
-7.9B exports, year to August, dominated by commodities not ‘value-added’.
– China Exports to NZ have grown to 8.2B
-“worry SMEs may have all their eggs in one basket”- Finny
whereas, as any critic of corporate globalization might argue, The TPPA is Corporate Protectionism before Sovereignty Protectionism
Thanks for the link cv. Brett far from having a chip I was looking for facts about who holds the us debts. You have spent half a thread complaining about what a poster on a blog said. On the evidence of this thread it is you who needs to get some perspective.
Turoa ski field today confirmed 15,000 litres was spilled after a pipe disconnected from a diesel storage tank.
A spokesperson said the company was first aware there had been a spill on Monday, but due to heavy rain did not realise the extent of the spill right away.
Although the company says it complied with its safety and resource consent requirements, it will be doing an independent audit to make sure such an accident does not happen again.
Yes, but are they going to be charged the millions of dollars to clean it up or is it going to be another example of socialised loss and privatised profits?
Lynn, my name and email keeps dropping out of the Name/Mail boxes when I go to make a post. Intermittently (sometimes it seems to retain them). You are probably aware of this, but thought it worth mentioning again just in case.
I have a similar problem, using Chrome – but once I enter name/email details they remain – even if I close the browser or logout of windows and come back. But if I power off the computer the name/email details have disappeared next time I come back.
Browser is Chrome…
Yeah, I thought it might be a setting too, which is why I’ve not bothered about it until others have been saying about disappearing formfill, but I can’t figure out which setting it might be…
I was not sure if I should post this comment here, but since this “protest” by an apparently desperate, aggrieved complainant in the foyer of the HDC Office in Wellington is freely available via You Tube, it should be OK to do so.
There seem to be a fair number of complaints the office is not addressing to the satisfaction of the affected.
Not long ago there was also a brief news article on the 1ZB website on 24 July, stating that HDC face funding issues, are having too high a workload, and would face deficits for years to come.
Annette King then appealed to Minister of Health Tony Ryall to listen to the HDC Office and provide the funding they need.
I have heard nothing more on that.
So we seem to be having a shocking state of affairs, getting worse by the day under this horrible government, leaving sick and disabled with incapacity not only exposed to biased WINZ doctors, who assist in throwing them off benefits and forcing them into insecure, often unsuitable jobs, we also have mentally ill not getting treatment they need, and getting bumped off by HDC.
Mr Ryall, you are facing a “state of emergency” soon!
Welcome to supposedly “transparent”, “just” and “uncorrupted” New Zealand, where your rights are claimed to be “respected”, and where your concerns are meant to be “listened” to by such offices!?
To ALL sick, disabled and with incapacity for work – on WINZ benefits: Download and read the PDF submission to be found via this link, and READ IT, please!
MSD’s Principal Health Advisor Dr Bratt and his team seem to be preparing new ways of outsourcing Work Capability Assessments, to be done by selected professionals!
This smells too much like the “stench” that has been attached to the involvement of Atos Healthcare as the private assessor for the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) in the UK.
I have not heard or read anything about MSD’s plans in this direction yet, but it sounds extremely worrying, hence the serious concerns also, the New Zealand Medical Association (NZMA) expresses.
Something is being prepared to involve people to make assessments for WINZ, who are not even proper medical experts.
I will try to keep you posted, but this is a must read, and must be taken very seriously!
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
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:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
Photo by Alvan Nee on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
Buzz from the Beehive One minister is talking tough while a colleague – whose ministry had acted tough and drawn a barrage of flak – has shown an official softening. Some ministers are doing what Labour was good at, which is distributing public funds to causes regarded as worthy or ...
A ballot for 4 Member's Bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn: Insurance Contracts Bill (Duncan Webb) Income Tax (Clean Transport FBT Exclusion) Amendment Bill (Julie Anne Genter) Crimes (Increased Penalties for Slavery Offences) Amendment Bill (Greg Fleming) Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) ...
One of the strongest narratives about "our" spy agencies is that they are basically institutional traitors, working for foreign powers (or just themselves), without any control or oversight by the elected government. And today, we have yet another report from the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security which explicitly confirms this. ...
“It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April to meet the Prime Minister’s ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track 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 publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
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 publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Hesp, Professor, Flinders University Patrick Hesp In some parts of Australia, coastal dunes are retreating from the ocean at an alarming rate, as waves carve up the beach and wind blows the sand inland. But coastal communities are largely ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Heemsbergen, Senior Lecturer, Digital, Political, Media, Deakin University With an impressive 60% of the US smartphone market, Apple is undeniably big, but not a clear monopoly. Yet, years of innovation by Apple have effectively given the company its own exclusive ...
Whether you’re facing layoffs or are just an emotional junior staffer, it’s always a good idea to scout out a good crying place before you need it. It’s an incredibly hard time for Wellington. Across the city, thousands of public servants are hearing tough news about redundancies and layoffs. Government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Miller-Jones, Professor, Curtin University Nuclear explosions on a neutron star feed its jets. Danielle Futselaar and Nathalie Degenaar, Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, CC BY-SA How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daryl Adair, Associate Professor of Sport Management, University of Technology Sydney Earlier this week, independent MP Andrew Wilkie accused the AFL of conducting “off the books” illicit drug testing to identify players using substances of abuse, then inappropriately withdrawing them from matches ...
The Government’s announcement that it will scrap plans for a vast marine sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands is ‘shameful’ and will make it impossible for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its international commitments, says the World Wide Fund for Nature ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Shutterstock The federal government has bowed to pressure from the car industry, announcing it will relax proposed emissions rules for utes and vans and delay enforcement of the new standards ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Rutland, Professor Emerita, University of Sydney In his latest book, Jewish Life in Medieval Spain, Jonathan Ray focuses on the tumult of the 14th century in Spain – a time of the plague, civil strife and war between the two largest ...
While creating a slate of world-class shows, Whakaata Māori also developed a generation of world-class creatives. Television is an odd word. It mixes the Ancient Greek and Latin languages, and its most literal meaning is “far-off sight”. In the contemporary and living language of te reo Māori, “whakaata” as a ...
Yesterday the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. This significant step and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza prompted an urgent debate in the New Zealand Parliament. Leader ...
The Government’s decision to reduce access to continuous glucose monitors (CGM) not only threatens the lives of children with type 1 diabetes and increases the potential for ‘Dead in Bed’ syndrome, but also threatens the health of their parents an ...
Apples are available year-round, but the wide variety on offer involves intensive scientific research – and large-scale commercialisation. What’s beautiful, red, sweet and crunchy? Tony Martin’s favourite kind of apple: Sassy. The CEO of apple and pear breeding organisation Prevar, Martin’s fondness for Sassy represents professional success as well as ...
Family violence specialist service Shine is calling on employers to stop asking for proof of domestic violence in order for employees to access domestic violence leave. The call comes five years after the introduction of the Domestic Violence ...
The Deputy Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is calling for public submissions on the Budget Policy Statement 2024. The Budget Policy Statement 2024 (BPS) sets out the Government's priorities for the 2024 Budget. It explains the approach ...
Brutal government spending cuts that will see the size of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples slashed by 40% will hit Pasifika communities hard, the PSA says. The Ministry has told staff that it is seeking voluntary redundancies, and to redeploy and reassign ...
I live with five people I mostly love, but our different ideas about generosity are starting to really irk me.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,This is a bit of a random one but here goes. I’m 22 and work an OK job (OK meaning I get paid ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maria Nicholas, Senior Lecturer in Language and Literacy Education, Deakin University Earlier this month, the New South Wales government announced it would roll out programs for gifted students in every public school in the state. This comes amid concerns gifted school ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Rudge, Law lecturer, University of Sydney Massachusetts General Hospital In a world first, we heard last week that US surgeons had transplanted a kidney from a gene-edited pig into a living human. News reports said the procedure was a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tombs, Howard Paterson Chair of Theology and Public Issues, University of Otago The 5th-century Maskell panel showing Jesus in a loincloth.British Museum, CC BY-NC-SA When Jesus is shown on the cross, he is almost always depicted wearing a loincloth around ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University Shutterstock When you think about a red object, you might picture a red carpet, or the massive ruby in the Queen’s crown. Indeed, Western monarchies and marketing from brands such ...
COMMENTARY:Jewish Voice for Peace The UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza on Monday — and for the first time since the beginning of the Israeli military’s genocide of Palestinians, the United States abstained rather than vetoing it. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, ...
Asia Pacific Report A New Zealand investigative journalist and author says the US spy system hosted by the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) appears to be a controversial intelligence system used in global capture-kill operations. Writing a commentary for RNZ News today, Nicky Hager, author of Secret Power, a 1996 ...
While Nicola Willis wouldn’t give any details on its size, she said a package of tax cuts is definitely still coming in this year’s budget, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the investigation into the Department of Internal Affairs after it was revealed that the Department’s Chief Executive personally reached out to expedite a DJs passport application. Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns ...
Finance minister Nicola Willis delivers her first budget statement, and unwittingly helps Joel MacManus save his relationship. Nicola Willis strode into the Beehive Theatrette. Around me, on the green foldout seats, were the country’s top business and political journalists. They were all here to see her announce the Budget Policy ...
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On a Thursday in February, at Wellington’s Conservation House, the Conservation Authority, a statutory body advising the eponymous department and minister, Tama Potaka, opened its 195th meeting. Under consideration that afternoon was an agenda item written by Tim Bamford, chief advisor in the Department of Conservation’s biodiversity, heritage and visitors ...
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A lengthy response to the recently released draft Government policy statement on transport will soon be delivered from Auckland Council to Minister of Transport Simeon Brown. A submission raising concerns about funding distribution and the plan’s treatment of Auckland passed through the council’s transport committee on Wednesday, despite some councillors ...
The unidentified foreign intelligence operation discussed in a scathing report by New Zealand’s Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) last week appears to be a controversial United States intelligence system. The IGIS report said the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) decision to host a foreign system from 2012-2020 was “improper” ...
As a young gymnast, Aimee Didierjean was always conscious of making sure her underwear wasn’t showing on the competition floor. A peek of a bra strap, or briefs if a leotard rode up, would cost a gymnast points in her routines. “When I was growing and going through puberty, it ...
Jubi/West Papua Daily Repeated cases of Indonesian military (TNI) soldiers torturing civilians in Papua have been evident, as seen in the viral video depicting the torture of civilians in the Puncak Regency allegedly done by soldiers of Raider 300/Brajawijaya Infantry Battalion. There is a pressing need for stringent law enforcement ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra In 2023, Anthony Albanese was shooting for the moon, his eyes on the Voice referendum. On one view, he looked like the idealist reflecting his left-wing roots. In 2024, we’re seeing a pragmatic, determined, ...
The House - The principle that all MPs are honourable and that they should be taken at their word has been tested multiple times this week in Parliament. ...
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Asia Pacific Report Two of the global Freedom Flotilla ships are being prepared in Turkey and almost ready for the upcoming humanitarian mission to Gaza. It is expected that the flotilla will include a New Zealand medical team. Kia Ora Gaza is a member of the international Freedom Flotilla Coalition ...
coffee heads-up for ya..
http://www.alternet.org/personal-health/are-you-drinking-one-cup-coffee-too-many-study-says-overconsumption-could-send-you
“..Over the years, there has been an extensive health debate over whether coffee is really good or bad for our bodies – with strong arguments and research coming from both sides of the fence.
Some research suggests that coffee can prevent strokes – delay the onset of diabetes and heart disease.
Other findings indicate it might lead to some forms of cancer – and adversely affect the metabolism.
The most recent study from the Mayo Clinic published on August 15 reveals that drinking more than 28 cups a week can harm your health considerably –
– with those consuming more than four cups a day twice as likely to die than those who are non-drinkers..”
whoar..!
..eh..?
phillip ure..
“…with those consuming more than four cups a day twice as likely to die than those who are non-drinkers..”
Dude, with one possible exception everyone who has ever been born has died so I am not sure what this sentence even means.
Since we are all gonna die of something someday, I’ll take my chances with the coffee. Probably better to live a fun life and die at 80 than be petrified of an expresso and live to be 102 when you are blind, deaf and the only thing you have to look forward to in your life is getting your nappies changed.
Its the probability of dying within the set period of time studied, not a timeline which stretches forward to infinity.
Hungarian creamer with that latte?
NZ 250M export infant baby formula market in China nearly wiped out; many exporters orders halved, some cancelled. China preferring infant formula sourced from Hungary for now.
-RNZ (interview with an industry Exporter) Checkpoint.
28 a week? Oh am I in trouble. When I was younger back in the BBS days I existed on Coffee and Nicotine (As did Most Sysops Back Then) Now I am older, I have given up the Nicotine. But give up Coffee Now thats a whole nother story.
Breakfast of champions!
Ahh, the memories.
Although I have also given up tobacco, caffeine is still my very good friend and companion.
Drinkers <55 years mortality from any cause of death over a 17 year period.
Seems to me that would include a lot of folks who use it as a sleep substitute in stressful or extended-duration workplaces.
Damn had just settled down with my first cup of coffee for the day, and about to take a sip….
Apparently coffee protects against liver damage from alcohol – so if you had a glass of wine last night feel comfortable with your cup of coffee this morning 😉
heh..!
phillip ure..
Another National Party political broadcast courtesy of an anonymous author at the NZ Herald: “Solid energy shows pitfalls of public ownership”.
A real stretch that one!
The finance industry continue to send articles to the Herald.
Which they just repeat….without any critical analysis…
Must pay good advertising…
“Investors warm to Meridian share offer”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11134387
What a dreadful disgrace for the 4th estate.
Don’t you just hate it when they report facts that don’t fit in with your ideology.
Thank God for the delusional sanctuary of the blogs.
Like Kiwiblog you mean?
Yes, only Kiwiblog.
pump ‘n dump
Anyone else feeling slight queasiness with the collective sympathy-fest around the Team NZ homecoming? Isn’t that strange how the government and the middle classes are happy to throw millions at rich yachtsmen but very reluctant to fund food for schoolchildren? And I dont think that the rest of our not-so-well pampered and funded sportspeople are feeling happy right now either.
Someone somewhere needed a feel good parade, and by the looks, Team New Zealand lucked in.
That they lost with what can arguably be called the biggest choke in sporting history appears to be totally beside the point.
A precedent setting paradigm shift in NZ culture in rewarding humiliating failure?
Its local body election time. Nuff said.
@ andy..plus national is dropping in the polls..
..and one of the most disturbing outcomes for me from nationals’ drop..
..is that joyce has gone from five years of being an arrogant/crowing/get-fucked! kinda person..
..to a form of cloying ‘niceness’..
..it is downright spooky to behold…
..and it is so obviously fake..
..it just brings into focus how hideous he is..
..phillip ure..
will there be a choke-medallion struck for them..?
..maybe showing the nz boat trailing far behind..?
..and wasn’t it such a ‘choke’ in slow-motion..?
..philllip ure..
Don’t know old boy….certain je ne sais about any chap that can be on top eight times and still not come first…..
I agree, theres better things to spend money on
But we funded the winner too, apparently Larry the billionaire ‘owns’ the NZ boatyard in which the ‘American’ boat was built, the tax breaks so far given are said to have Larry wanting to do it all over again…
The opposition should be going hard on solid energy. It sums up the NACT, profit stripping via debt, hobbling its business model, ignoring its board then tossing jobs and ownership away.
And going hard on overpaid executives…..
“$800,000 salaries for top city staff the market rate, says mayor
Auckland Mayor Len Brown last night defended salaries of nearly $800,000 a year for two senior council executives, telling a public meeting, “You have got to meet the…
The just-published 2013 annual report shows council chief executive Doug McKay’s salary increased by $15,656 to $782,887 and Watercare CEO Mark Ford’s salary rose $70,000 to between $780,000 and $790,000.
In the same year, the number of council staff earning more than $100,000 rose to 1500, and 113 staff earned more than $200,000.”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11134465
And the threats to ACC…
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/personal-finance/news/article.cfm?c_id=12&objectid=11133670
This Horizon exit Poll has Mr Palino only 4% behind Mr Brown. North Shore and Franklin strongest support for Palino. However the numbers counted seem pretty low.
http://www.horizonpoll.co.nz/page/332/auckland-mayoralty-race-close-in-mid-voting-exit-poll?gtid=6829475094243EYF
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/10/04/the-goal-and-the-movement-the-debate-between-john-moore-and-chris-trotter-continues/
An interesting blog from Chris Trotter on a matter much discussed within these pages.
My own recent experience of trying to do things differently in a group – to be genuinely democratic, consensual, non-hierarchical…even with lashings of goodwill – makes me feel like running for the hills (once I’ve finished tearing my hair out, that is).
@ just saying..did you join the green party..?
phillip ure..
lol
No.
How bad is it that I have no idea who John Moore is?
Me neither. Seems like a little in-group discussing BIG THINGS amongst themselves.
Re Domost print edition
Headline
The Maid, the Kiwi and the stolen sperm
A salacious little story – NOT front page new.
BUT what I found absolutely disgraceful was the publication of the a large photo of the 3 year old child with the by line of Unwanted child
Has Bill English ceded his Job to Governor of the Reserve Bank of Auckland.
The OCR mechanism is a blunt tool unsuited to the extraordinary times we still find ourselves in. I hope David and David are going to follow through with rhetoric on the Reserve Bank and not become captured by orthodox lobby of the self interested
http://blog.labour.org.nz/2012/10/18/ostrich-economics/
http://blog.labour.org.nz/2012/09/19/today-theyre-terrified/
http://blog.labour.org.nz/2012/09/12/meeting-with-joseph-stiglitz/
http://blog.labour.org.nz/2012/09/10/olivier-blanchard-putting-a-twist-in-monetary-policy/
Hope we hear more from David and David on their alternative vision for our monetary and fiscal future, because the system we have is broken.
I don’t see why we shouldn’t make the job of governor of the reserve bank an elected one. After all, he has an important role in setting policy for OUR economy.
I disagree, far to open to abuse (by both sides)
Hell No! We could end up with something like the Parliament’s Question Time, with that Impartial *cough* Speaker.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11133827
“Nearly 45 per cent of respondents supported charter schools because they felt they would provide a different approach to education.”
– Thats surprising given the amount of lies the PPTA have spread, I’d have thought the support would have been much lower
– Choice: PPTA don’t like it
Lies? That’s a big call, given your own fundamental untruthiness. Care to list the untrue claims the teachers have made?
So more neo-liberal privatisation –your ideological solution to everything?
It’s really worked so far!
Return to Kiwiblog and the Sewerblog, where your pernicious ideas will gain traction, no doubt.
@ charter schools..
i found this one this this morn..
..totally relevant..eh..?
http://www.alternet.org/education/diane-ravitch-charter-schools-are-colossal-mistake-heres-why
“..The campaign to “reform” schools by giving public money to private corporations –
– is a distraction from our system’s real problems: –
– poverty and racial segregation..”
phillip ure..
snapper
That would indicate that 45% of respondents haven’t been keeping up with the research that shows charter schools are a waste of time and money.
This sadly shows you how a corrupt media with shills like John Roughan and Mike Hosking can influence opinion when they get unopposed airtime on the corporate news wires.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11127224
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/auckland/shows/breakfast/highlights/mhb-mikes-editorial-19sep2013
Just another reason for a media independent of corporations.
Review of fourth annual RightsWatch Conference of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), presented this year in partnership with Ryerson University.
“Civil Liberties and Democracy in the Digital Age: Privacy, Media and Free Expression” held in Toronto on Friday and Saturday, September 20th and 21st.
http://truthandshadows.wordpress.com/2013/10/03/months-remain-to-stop-global-surveillance-machine/#more-1615
After signing New Zealand up. John Key says that he does not expect that the major emitters who are dialogue partners to the Pacific Islands Forum, the US, China, India, (or as it turned out, even full member Australia), to sign up to the Majuro Declaration on climate change.
Maybe the political leaders of these nations feel that if they did sign this international agreement, they might be bound to honour it?
John Key has no such qualms.
Honour the Majuro Declaration
Cancel the Bail Out
Shut Down Solid Energy
Restart Rauauru Ma Raki
Good to see an update of the NZ on Screen playlist in the sidebar. There are some interesting looking titles there that I haven’t yet seen.
I call that the ghost of Lyn. That is why they’re all docos or near docos. I’ll extend the list and put in a weekly randomiser.
Oh my, just been given a link to a webpage that is more left than here, (didnt think it was possible) The Daily Blog?
Such disgusting items, such as the USA was behind the Kenyan Mall attacks,and it would appear its great that America has shut down, because millions of babies wont be killed world wide?
Does the left in NZ really believe that BS, are you that precious about the USA?
Surly not even Temana or the green party supporters are on this level.
Totally repugnant page.
[lprent: I’m surprised that you’re been able to miss TDB? Have you ever looked at the Feed on the right of this site which amongst everything from No Minister to some really really local left sites (and the odd science site as well because I like them). The Daily Blog makes up a good quarter of the feed on most days. ]
“the USA was behind the Kenyan Mall attacks”
link?
go to comments
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/10/03/a-brief-word-on-america-shutting-down/
Vile repugnant disgusting stuff.
I don’t know about the Kenyan Mall, but the Americans have definitely been providing infantry training and weapons to islamist Al Qaeda fighters in Syria.
Citation, video, evidence, testimony?
Time to get over the fact that you have been supporting a foreign invasion of Syria and a Qatari/Saudi regime change programme targetting the Syrian government, Jenny.
I have trouble getting over the fact that you have publicly advocated the use of sarin against the rebels on this site and haven’t been banned.
You should read the policy. You clearly still have no idea what are ban-able offences.
You advocated the use of sarin against the rebels on this site? Which ones?
oh gawd who knows what Jenny is referring to. (edit lolz weka very funny… :D)
Yes, what you said there is vile and disgusting.
Draco:
No what the writers and the people in the comment section is vile and disgusting.
You’re really funny. Get used to it mate, the US Gov cannot govern itself let alone the homeland.
and the organised criminal extremes their society (might is right) have bred: Mob, Irish, Hispanics, Russians, Crips, Bloods, Aryans and NLR, Central and South American gangs and so on, and that’s not including their own internal terrorists, the Patriot-aligned and their NGO / Defense Contract private mercenary armies. Gee, that sure worked out well.
I think ‘ANT’ is off in a couple of things in that comment, but you completely misrepresent what is said.
‘Complicit in’ is not the same as ‘was behind’.
I know that you hate people criticising the US, it’s the weird little chip you carry on your own shoulder Brett, but it is simply a fact that they work with all sorts of unsavoury people around the world, and do all sorts of awful things. They really do.
Now that doesn’t mean that they are behind every bad thing that happens, but it does mean that it isn’t ‘vile’ to talk about things they are doing, and ask questions and what not.
It isn’t ‘out of the question’ that US actions in Africa are inflaming things. It isn’t ‘out of the question’ that the US funds and trains people who go on to do very bad things.
hmm, don’t know why this turned up here, will move it down thread.
It’s a reply to Brett at 14.1.1
Yeah, but I thought I was posting at the bottom of the thread. Something funny about when the name/mail fields drop out…
I was originally going to post in this conversation with Brett, and then I thought better of it 😉
Wise move.
Oh my, just been given a link to a webpage that is more left than here
….SNIP…
You are out of your depth. You know nothing. Why are you here?
Sounds like bollocks to me. Never seen those articles on tdb and I have a look most days.
So that leaves 2 options: either you’re making shit up or blindly repeating shit that other people have made up.
richard
Go to comments section. (before they’re deleted)
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/10/03/a-brief-word-on-america-shutting-down/
Yeah I can’t see any article suggesting the US were behind the Kenyan Mall attacks, you better link to it Brett. I gave your stupid comment a thumbs down too.
With you using the word repugnant, I think you must be talking about the whale-snot website, silly boy.
Again go to comments section.
geeze louise.
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/10/03/a-brief-word-on-america-shutting-down/
If it is a comment by a reader it doesn’t mean it was written by the blog, you egg head.
“Ant” wrote: “There was a recent story on globalresearch.ca that says western intelligence agencies were complicit in the Kenya mall attacks. According to the story, the attacks may be a part of a geopolitical strategy to counter the rising influence of China in Africa.”
SO, you are a fucking liar Brett.
You should know by now that people here are not as stupid as you would like them to be. Only someone as stupid as you will swallow the garbage you throw around.
Fender:
Scroll down and read the other comments.
Again the site moderates the comments, so be quick, but normally
is something vile is written about the usa, they stay up.
But you said: “Oh my, just been given a link to a webpage that is more left than here……”
So that means: “…. but normally is something vile is written about the usa, they stay up.” is yet another lie.
Better watch it, you may get nicknamed Hooton#2.
This site is moderated too.
Yet the lies you regurgitate here are not removed.
Whats your point?
Are there any examples of anything ‘vile’ that has been left up?
The commment from ‘Ant’ is abit wrong headed in a few respects from my point of view (it’s a bit simplistic about Saudi Arabia and AQ), but what is vile about it?
the rest of the comments, what’s wrong with them?
If there are ‘vile’ tweets that have been moderated, that kind of suggests that your idea about TDB being a vile cesspit is wrong, doesn’t it?
Or are you saying that if they leave them up, that’s awful, but if they take them down, why, that’s awful too!
Yep, Brett’s face is runny with rotten egg on this one.
Go to the link, its right there, western governments behind kenya mall attacks,
Martyn is celebrating the usa government shutdown because it means no drone
attacks against thousands and thousands and thousands of children.
How is that not completely vile.
What’s wrong with a ceasation of drone attacks in civilian areas? Seems ok to me.
Because drone attacks have nothing to do with the usa shutting down, and im guessing if there was a tragic event in the states like an earthquake or another massacre, someone would write….
What about iraq?
or
What about drones??
What of course has nothing to do with the actual incident that took place.
So what is wrong with the ceasation of drone attacks on civilian areas? Seems like a good thing to have happen, even if it is simply due to running out of budget.
Oh look, bomber is correct – again.
http://killerapps.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/10/02/exclusive_air_force_grounds_fighter_jets_as_shutdown_takes_hold
Ok.
So it’s ‘vile’ to oppose drone strikes.
And you imagine that there would be all sorts of vile things said about things that haven’t happened.
Well I think that in a hypothetical universe where the US launched a nuclear strike in response to a cyber attack on their power grid, (which is something they have not taken off the table), you would criticise anyone who objected to it.
What a vile disgusting monster you are Brett.
Pascal:
Again your ideology is not letting you see my point, go back to my post where I mention James Robinson post on stuff, he totally sums it up perfectly.
Perhaps you could explain your point then Brett. I’ve read the thing from stuff a few times now. Perhaps you could explain it’s relevance?
What is so vile about saying that a side benefit of the shutdown might be that a few bombs don’t get dropped.
That may or may not be true, but what is ‘vile’ about saying it?
Brett’s point is that it’s morally wrong to discuss violence done by the US in other places while recognising violence in places other than the US, and that it is morally wrong to discuss violence done by the US while recognising violence or unfortunate events that take place in the US.
Which drastically limits the morally acceptable opportunities to discuss violence committed by the US, but I’m sure that such an outcome is completely inadvertent.
lol
Commentator refers to wingnut web site = vile attack on the US must make you the stupidest man on the internets today – congratulations fella.
btw, bomber is correct.
The study by Stanford Law School and New York University’s School of Law calls for a re-evaluation of the practice, saying the number of “high-level” targets killed as a percentage of total casualties is extremely low — about 2%.
[…]
TBIJ reports that from June 2004 through mid-September 2012, available data indicate that drone strikes killed 2,562 – 3,325 people in Pakistan, of whom 474 – 881 were civilians, including 176 children. TBIJ reports that these strikes also injured an additional 1,228 – 1,362 individuals,” according to the Stanford/NYU study.
http://edition.cnn.com/2012/09/25/world/asia/pakistan-us-drone-strikes/index.html
edit: Stanford/NYU study.
http://www.livingunderdrones.org/report/
So Pratt Dale, you support the use of ‘drone attack’ against children then…
FFS, Okay I posted this at my blog and here once I think, this is blogger james robinson response to someone who wrote..
“what about Iraq” In response to James writing about the boston bombing.
It sums up my whole feeling…
JAMES ROBINSON
“The “what-about-Iraq” comments here miss the point.
I stewed on them for a couple of days and what I have to say is this.
If you grieve a friend of yours dying, are you being
disrespectful to everyone else that died that day? No.
I lived in Boston. I live in America. This was big news to me.
I’m well versed in Iraqi policy and America’s failings there.
And don’t just zero in on Iraq because its in the news.
People are dying in huge numbers in places that America
didn’t invade too. There’s a lot of bad stuff out there, always
happening. That doesn’t mean that seeing bombs going off in
my former home isn’t somewhat traumatic. I hope I never have
to sit next to you guys at a dinner party.”
So it’s just your personal feelings then? And you’re not saying anything about anybody else’s feelings and attitudes, just your own?
Well in that case, that’s fine.
For a second there I thought you were being a busybody about what other people thought of the issues.
That makes no sense at all Brett.
That guy is justified to be upset, but what does it have to with the drone strike strategy, or anything else?
Pascal
Because whenever there is a major disaster in the usa or a tragic event, people bring up other international issues, that have nothing to so with what has just happened.
The left seems to have a rage in them if people dare give sympathy to the people of the usa.
So why don’t you give actual examples of them doing that, instead of imagining it would happen?
And why do you say it’s ‘the left’ that do it? Does everyone on the left do it? Does no one on the right do it? Or does it only concern you when it is from the left, or about the US.
And does no one on the left give sympathy to the US, ever/ Pretty sure that’s a pile of bullshit. So what the hell are you talking about.
It looks like you just hate to see the US criticised. Why is that?
Brett Dale,
2,500 people die a month in the US from guns. Each month, every month.
The person being selective is you.
Iprent:
I dont look at feeds or ads on webpages, i find them annoying, so TDB is not new then?
The daily Blog has been around since the beginning of March this year. Try to keep up.
PS. You could learn a lot from those feeds Brett Dale……..
Martin Heidegger prepared the ground for his major work, Sein und Zeit (1927; tr.Oxford 1962) with a series of lucid and solid, if unremarkable writings which anticipated the themes of his mature work.
In “The Problem of Reality in Modern Philosophy (1912) he argues against various versions of idealism, including Kant’s critical idealism, in favour of critical realism. “New Investigations of Logic (1912) assessed recent works on logic, including those of Russell, Whitehead and Frege through Husserl’s critique of psychologism. In keeping with his doctrine of truth as unconcealment , H. had little truck with ‘logic of assertion’ traditions; Analogous to the later Wittgenstein, H. was more inclined to base arithmetic on everyday activities like counting and measurement.His doctoral dissertation The Doctrine of the Judgement in Psychologism (1914) continued this opposition to the reduction of logic to psychological processes; his habilitation thesis Dun Scotus’s Doctrine of Categories and Meaning demonstrates a respect for metaphysics, history, and subjectivity that flows through his later work.
( His initial support for Naz1sm was due to his abhorence of technological and industrialized mass society, which he associated with the USA and the USSR. Although recently elected Rector of Freiberg in 1933, he resigned in 1934, and in 1945 was forbidden to teach until 1951, due to his associations with Naz1sm ) .
Being and Time crystallized his study of virtually the entire breadth of past and contemporary philosophy at that time, it’s central concern being the ‘question of being’. Since the Greeks, being ( Sein ) had not been well-integrated into Time; it had been insulated from change as presence , excluding past and future. This exclusion embraced not only temporal presence, but also the atemporal, eternal presence of , for example, Plato’s Forms
H. revived investigation of the ‘sense of being’ through engagement in a ‘fundamental ontology’ underpinning the ‘regional’ ontologies dealing with the being of particular realms of entity ; nature and history for example.
This examination requires consideration of the entity , Dasein (literally, ‘to be there’ ). H. uses this term for several reasons: it does not require commitment to a view of humans as biological entities, as consciousness, or as essentially rational; Dasein has no determinate essence, hmmm, ; it’s being consists in it’s possibilities, “To be or not to be, that is the question”. It is there in the world, yet not confined to a particular place (or time). It is the entity that asks “What is being?” and whose understanding of being is itself, an essential feature of it’s being.
Although Dasein is essentially ontological, the philosopher cannot simply adopt Dasein’s own understanding of itself and other entities. For Dasein tends to systematically misinterpret itself and it’s world, for example, regarding itself as a thing equivalent to other things leading to much of the vocabulary of traditional philosophy- ‘consciousness’, ‘subject-object’ to be infected with such misunderstandings. Thus H. , like analytical philosophers such as Wittgenstein, J.L. Austin and Ryle avoids such terminology, preferring more grounded terms such as ‘care’ ( Sorge ) which carry no burden of philosophical assumptions. (Bear in mind that H. holds that silence is an ‘essential possibility of discourse’). Like Husserl, he attempts to describe ‘the things themselves’ without the help of theories and preconceptions, yet unlike Husserl, he holds that this requires a determined rethinking of philosophical language.
cuppa time.
You’re letting Head-Gear off far too lightly in 1933. He never gave up his membership, and never repudiated them despite the length entreaties of many especially Marcuse.
You are correct. You went there. 😉 Nonetheless, it always comes up.
FYI
Auckland Councillor Penny Webster (Chair of the Auckland Council Strategy and Finance Committee) is standing again as a candidate in this election.
http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/EN/AboutCouncil/HowCouncilWorks/Elections/Documents/rodneywardcandidateprofiles.pdf
Should Penny Webster be disqualified under the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, because she and her husband have entered into transactions with the Auckland Council Group, totalling $32,189 during 2012, for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited ?
http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/EN/planspoliciesprojects/reports/annual_report/Documents/annualreport20122013volume3.pdf (Pg 80 ) ]
______________________________________________________________________________
All Rural Fencing Limited (NZ Companies Office)
http://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/1512665/directors
______________________________________________________________________________
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1968/0147/latest/DLM390003.html#DLM390021
Disqualifying contracts between local authorities and their members
(1) Except as provided in subsection (3), no person shall be capable of being elected as or appointed to be or of being a member of a local authority or of any committee of a local authority, if the total of all payments made or to be made by or on behalf of the local authority in respect of all contracts made by it in which that person is concerned or interested exceeds $25,000 in any financial year.
______________________________________________________________________________
SHOULD PENNY WEBSTER BE ELIGIBLE TO STAND AS AN AUCKLAND COUNCIL CANDIDATE?
I have just rung the OAG (PA to Lynn Provost ) and asked if Penny Webster had applied for and received any dispensation, given that in 2012 All Rural Fencing Ltd had ‘entered into transactions with the Auckland Council Group totaling $32,189 for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited .
The question that also needs to be asked is why Penny Webster, and ONLY Penny Webster was mentioned in the Auckland Council 2012 – 2013 Annual Report – 32 RELATED PARTIES ?
[ http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/EN/planspoliciesprojects/reports/annual_report/Documents/annualreport20122013volume3.pdf (Pg 80 ) ]
32 RELATED PARTIES
Related parties
Related parties are defined in the group’s accounting policies.
The group enters into numerous transactions such as rates, water charges and the sale of goods or services with related parties in the ordinary course of business and on an arm’s length basis.
No disclosure has been made for these transactions.
Certain related parties have directorships and trustee positions in a number of entities to which the group transacts in the normal course of business, on standard terms. No disclosure is made for these relationships as the related parties do not have a controlling interest in the council or the entity that they are a director or trustee. The group transacts with entities that are related by virtue of related parties having a controlling interest in the related entity as detailed below:
The group entered into transactions totalling $32,189 with All Rural Fencing Limited during the year
(2012: $920). An amount of $4,313 was payable at balance date (2012: $nil).
The council entered into transactions totalling $4,313 with All Rural Fencing Limited during the year
(2012: $920). An amount of $4,313 was payable at balance date (2012: $nil)
______________________________________________________________________________
“Rodney councillor Penny Webster says that at a time when household budgets are tight, the council cannot afford the $12 million to $15 million cost of mowing berms for the whole region. ..”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11133160
______________________________________________________________________________
The blinding hypocrisy of Auckland Councillor Penny Webster sickens me. Councillor Penny Webster, (Chair of the Auckland Council Strategy and Finance Committee), wants citizens and ratepayers to provide their lawn-mowing services free of charge, although there is no legal requirement to so do, while she and her husband have their snouts in the public through transactions with the Auckland Council Group, totalling $32,189 during 2012, for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited.
In my considered opinion, this is a clear ‘conflict of interest’.
As an anti-corruption /anti-privatisation ‘Public Watchdog’, I am totally opposed to any elected representatives personally profiting from contracts with Council or Council-Controlled-Organisations (CCOs) .
I believe in the ‘public service model’, where people seek public office to look after the public and the public interest, not to ‘feather their own nests’, and enrich themselves from the public purse.
______________________________________________________________________________
I also asked why the statutory requirements of the Public Records Act 2005, (s.17) had not been met in the Auckland Council 2012 -2013 Annual Report, because there are no ‘devilish details’ provided regarding contracts with the private sector.
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2005/0040/latest/DLM345729.html
Recordkeeping requirements
Subpart 1—Key duties
17 Requirement to create and maintain records
(1)Every public office and local authority must create and maintain full and accurate records of its affairs, in accordance with normal, prudent business practice, including the records of any matter that is contracted out to an independent contractor.
______________________________________________________________________________
Here’s the 2012 – 2013 Auckland Council Annual Report:
http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/EN/planspoliciesprojects/reports/annual_report/Documents/annualreport20122013volume3.pdf
See if you can find the NAMES of the consultants/contractors ; SCOPE / TERM VALUE of contracts between Auckland Council / Auckland Council CCOs / Auckland Council Local Boards?
I couldn’t.
In my considered opinion, the problem with Auckland Council, as proven by this 2012- 2013 Annual Report – is that ‘the books’ are NOT open – and we are NOT given the ‘devilish detail’ which explains exactly where our public monies are being spent, invested or borrowed.
This is why, if and when I am elected Mayor pf Auckland Council, I will establish an Auckland Mayoral ‘Commission Against Corruption’, and will ‘open the books’, in order to find out where every dollar of citizen and ratepayer’s monies are being spent, invested and borrowed.
This Auckland Mayoral ‘Commission Against Corruption’ will be staffed by a small team of forensic investigators, (whom I shall appoint, and who will report directly to me), funded directly from the Mayoral Office, using the budget which is set aside in order to help achieve the Auckland ‘Mayoral Vision.’
My Auckland Mayoral Vision is – to stop the corrupt corporate control of the Auckland region.
Here is my ‘Action Plan’ to stop ‘white collar’ crime, corruption and ‘corporate welfare’:
http://www.pennybright4mayor.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/ANTI-CORRUPTION-WHITE-COLLAR-CRIME-CORPORATE-WELFARE-ACTION-PLAN-Ak-Mayoral-campaign-19-July-2013-2.pdf
For those who really want to know who is running the Auckland region, ‘like a business, by business, for business’ – check for yourselves http://www.committeeforauckland.co.nz (membership).
Penny Bright
What have you been paid for in the last term, working either for or against Council, in $$?
Also, what assets do you own, including addresses of properties?
I don’t get paid Ad.
I’m lucky enough to own a freehold home, from which I receive income from flatmates.
No pay – no benefit – effectively a ‘self-funded’ Public Watchdog, who CHOOSES to do what I do – full time.
Puts me in a rather unusual position.
Kind regards,
Penny Bright
It is essential to his procedure that H. in providing a correct or authentic term for, or account of, a phenomena (such as man, time or truth) he does not simply counterpose it to the degenerate term or account current, but attempts to explain why the degeneration occurred, for example, in demonstrating that Descartes was mistaken to regard man as res cogitans one must show, n the correct account of man, how the mistake arose.For misinterpretation is not sheer, unaccountable error, but a ‘possibility’ to which Dasein is essentially prone.
For Heidegger, unlike Descartes, Dasein is essentially in the world and is inseparable from it: In understanding the world, Being-in is always understood along with it, while understanding of existence ( Existenz like the movie ) as such is always an understanding of the world. The world is not primarily the world of the sciences, but the everyday lifeworld (Husserl).It is disclosed to us not by scientific knowledge per se, but by pre-scientific experiences, by care and by emotions. Entities in the world are not primarily objects of theoretical cognition, but tools that are ‘ready to hand’ ( zuhanden ) such as a hammer ,to be used rather than studied and observed. Theoretical cognition, like when observing a hammer disinterestedly (or a RWNJ) is a secondary phenomenon, which occurs more readily when a tool fails to give satisfaction. Tools are not independent of each other but belong to ‘context of significance’ in which items such as hammers, nails and IT ‘refer’ to each other and ultimately to Dasein and it’s purposes.
Just as Dasein is in the world, so it essentially ‘with’ others of the same type as itself. It does not first exist as an isolated subject and then subsequently acquire knowledge of and relations to others; it is with others from the start. However, it’s integrity is threatened by others, as being together with others Dasein is ‘captured’ by others. Itself, it is not; others usurp it’s being. The self of everyday Dasein is the ‘they-self’, as distinct from the authentic self, the self that possesses itself. ‘They’ is the German man (one, you: we ) :the they-self does and believes what one does and believes rather than what it has independently and authentically decided upon.(This theory of the ‘they’ or ‘one’ is influenced by Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Illyich : Ivan’s carefully redecorated house seems quite exceptional to him, yet it contains “all the things people of a certain class have in order to resemble other people of that class’ ). To summarize, thus far, the account of everyday life that H. first presented as a neutral account of the bedrock condition of man, becomes an account of man’s fallenness’ and inauthenticity.
The primary form of discourse, for H. is not explicit assertion, for example, “This hammer is heavy” but such utterances as “Too Heavy! Give me a lighter one” made in a work situation. Truth too, is not a primarily the correspondence between an assertion or proposition and a state of the world but the disclosure of the world to and by Dasein , unmediated by concepts, propositions or inner mental sates; ultimately, truth is ‘ Dasein’s disclosedness (supported by an appeal to the Greek word for truth aletheia which he claimed means ‘unconcealment’.) Meaning, like truth, is extruded from the mind- “Mill’s verbal propositions cannot be completely severed from the beings they intend.Names, words in their broadest sense , have no a priori fixed measure in their significative content. Names, or again, their meanings, change with transformations in our knowledge of things, and the meanings of names and words always change according to the predominance of a specific line of vision toward the the thing somehow named by the name. All significations, including those that appear mere verbal meanings, arise from reference to things”. ( The basic Problems of Phenomenology : 1927; tr, Bloomington, 1982).
Time, for a shower and some exercise.
Turn yourself more to the post WWII works; more relevant, less wilfully obscurantist, more suitably damaged in response to worlding.
I like the way you put that, “worlding”.
Will just finish with some reference, death, the wonderful Time , decline , Holderlin and some thought (not on Friday afternoon though, took most of the morning as I had not been back to the highlighting for about two weeks 😉 ) Highlighting is then blended with the overlooked carefully.
Man, it’s 20C today, the same predicted for the next week, although with some rain. The forecast for temperature is generally consistent, however the rainfall can vary widely from that predicted. Some of us are anticipating another warmer summer.
Anyway, Ad, many of these “obscurantist” suggestions may well capture the lived experience of pre-technological peoples arisng at present. Many are essentially narratives of the decline or return of Western civilization.
grounded narratives : Gotta love them., very helpful. 😀
furthermore, building upon McFlock’s suggestion and evidence of the roles of traders, pirates and brigands (my terms) in the expansion and establishment of nation-states, there may be an analogy at present , in a period of continued globalization, mercantile expansion , particularly by China , information-connectivity and flows under threat from piracy (and the authoritarian State ) the world-wide web of organised crime and the amorality of many of the wealthy… through to corporate rapacity ,establishing pan-continental entities.
Hmmmm.
If we reduce the possible Harrison/Gibson mega-corp into its component parts (capitalist shareholders), and those parts become beholden to patronage and nepotism, it might be regarded as a social devolution back to hereditary monarchies. After all, it was loyalty to one’s lord and liege that preceded cohesive “national” identity, by and large. Different brand on the armour, but the game stays the same (preservation of personal and hereditary power).
Personally, I reckon that the main way to avert that dystopia is to strengthen international structures that have a democratic foundation – e.g. give the UN more power and self-determination, remove the veto, and then start looking at ways to have as few representative tiers between an individual and the top of the UN as possible.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/9244730/Driver-jailed-for-fatal-crash
So let’s just send him to prison. Great stuff.
Anyone know how i can find out a list of major lenders to the USA?
Fuck you guys need to get the chip off your shoulder about the USA.
http://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/tic/Documents/mfh.txt
More Corporate Welfare from this corrupt Government.
Joyce has just promised to borrow more money today to bankroll a team of 3-peat losers in the next instalment of the Billionaires Piss-up on San Francisco Bay.
Can someone please bring some reality to this outrageous waste of our money.
The America’s Cup does absolutley nothing for the hungry kids in this country.
Can someone in Wellington please stand up and scream NO MORE CORPORATE WELFARE.
Fuck off Team New Zealand. Stop crying and go fund your own rich boys wank-fest.
+1
Vote the fuckers out!
And you feed your own fucking kids.
and you go fuck yourself. No one else will. 🙂
That’s cool, I will do that. You and your ilk just make sure as parents you feed your fucking kids. Don’t send them to school hoping I will pay to feed them.
I , I , I , me , me, me, blah fucking blah blah blah me, me me……..dumbest arse
Yacht race for millionaires ≈ feeding hungry children.
Sigh.
Here’s a hint: a normal human being does not feel compelled to help a millionaire win a yacht race.
Lprent,
The feed headings on the right of the page appear to be out of whack.
The field denoting which blog the feed is from appears below the .
Makes it look like “Statistics show Government action needed on gender pay gap” is from the Skeptical Science blog.
I’m viewing the page on Chrome Version 29.0.1547.76 m
Yes. There is meant to be a thumbnail image in there that has the required sizing. Unfortunately the generation of the thumbnail has a bug in it that makes the CPU usage at the server go up dramatically when the site is under load. So it is currently turned off and waiting for either the plugin author to fix, or me to find some unencumbered time to debug and recode.
I suppose I could patch the CSS with a min-height. But at present it is a nice reminder for me to fix it.
min-height: 8am seems to work ok.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11134352
Phil Goff and Helen Clarks finest moment (the Greens and NZfirst didn’t want it to happen)
Nah. Their finest moment was when they kept us out of that stupid invasion of Iraq, (National and Act didn’t want it to happen).
Good Article
When China Rules The World
couple a points:
-7.9B exports, year to August, dominated by commodities not ‘value-added’.
– China Exports to NZ have grown to 8.2B
-“worry SMEs may have all their eggs in one basket”- Finny
whereas, as any critic of corporate globalization might argue, The TPPA is Corporate Protectionism before Sovereignty Protectionism
Thanks for the link cv. Brett far from having a chip I was looking for facts about who holds the us debts. You have spent half a thread complaining about what a poster on a blog said. On the evidence of this thread it is you who needs to get some perspective.
15,000 litres of diesel flowed into town’s water supply
Yes, but are they going to be charged the millions of dollars to clean it up or is it going to be another example of socialised loss and privatised profits?
Yes, I heard of that tragic leak yesterday Draco;
check out the link below.
From the ABC
US Treasury warns debt stoush could spark Financial Crisis
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-10-04/us-treasury-warns-debt-ceiling-stoush-could-spark-financial-cri/4998370
If no Safe haven in US Treasury Bills.
The inmates are running the asylum
and that’s Cronkite turning over tonight. 😀
“Glorh-reee , Glorh-ree , Hal-ley-looo -yah…Glorh-ree , Glorh-ree Hal-ley-looo -yah…” 😀
time for the garden now. Cooler!
Lynn, my name and email keeps dropping out of the Name/Mail boxes when I go to make a post. Intermittently (sometimes it seems to retain them). You are probably aware of this, but thought it worth mentioning again just in case.
They come via cookies from your browser. Try another browser and see if it does the same thing. I will look at it later.
Doing a few tests now. Before I was posting in Firefox…
Posting now in Safari.
Ok, seems to be ok in Safari. Have dumped all the Firefox cookies (there were a huge amount from ts, is that normal?) and restarted. Testing again.
ok, seems to be all good now, back in Firefox.
Cool
Problem is re-occuring in Firefox this morning.
Oh, and my avatar has reverted back to the normal one. Last night I got a new one after I dumped all the standard cookies. See here http://thestandard.org.nz/vote-2/#comment-705758
Is that weird? Something loading out of the cache?
I have a similar problem, using Chrome – but once I enter name/email details they remain – even if I close the browser or logout of windows and come back. But if I power off the computer the name/email details have disappeared next time I come back.
What browser? It sounds like a setting….
Sounds like I should figure out how to handle the loghin registration problem—-
Browser is Chrome…
Yeah, I thought it might be a setting too, which is why I’ve not bothered about it until others have been saying about disappearing formfill, but I can’t figure out which setting it might be…
Probably an chrome update. But I will check the cookie timeouts after I recover my car. Too many beers to drive last night.
A walk after a night out is a good thing….
Seems that if I leave The Standard open for awhile the name/email disappears too – could be cookie-related.
poltergeist
The Health and Disability Commissioner and unresolved “mental health” complaints – a desperate protester:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7nBukTQcDA
I was not sure if I should post this comment here, but since this “protest” by an apparently desperate, aggrieved complainant in the foyer of the HDC Office in Wellington is freely available via You Tube, it should be OK to do so.
There seem to be a fair number of complaints the office is not addressing to the satisfaction of the affected.
Not long ago there was also a brief news article on the 1ZB website on 24 July, stating that HDC face funding issues, are having too high a workload, and would face deficits for years to come.
Annette King then appealed to Minister of Health Tony Ryall to listen to the HDC Office and provide the funding they need.
I have heard nothing more on that.
So we seem to be having a shocking state of affairs, getting worse by the day under this horrible government, leaving sick and disabled with incapacity not only exposed to biased WINZ doctors, who assist in throwing them off benefits and forcing them into insecure, often unsuitable jobs, we also have mentally ill not getting treatment they need, and getting bumped off by HDC.
Mr Ryall, you are facing a “state of emergency” soon!
“The Health and Disability (Complaints) Concealer” –
using the police to trespass a disgruntled complainant and protester, You Tube video with “part 2”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgrXLbAWt2I
Welcome to supposedly “transparent”, “just” and “uncorrupted” New Zealand, where your rights are claimed to be “respected”, and where your concerns are meant to be “listened” to by such offices!?
Shame, shame, shame on you – HDC Office!
Highest ALERT!!!
To ALL sick, disabled and with incapacity for work – on WINZ benefits: Download and read the PDF submission to be found via this link, and READ IT, please!
http://www.nzma.org.nz/sites/all/files/sub-WorkAbilityAssessments-Providers.pdf
MSD’s Principal Health Advisor Dr Bratt and his team seem to be preparing new ways of outsourcing Work Capability Assessments, to be done by selected professionals!
This smells too much like the “stench” that has been attached to the involvement of Atos Healthcare as the private assessor for the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) in the UK.
I have not heard or read anything about MSD’s plans in this direction yet, but it sounds extremely worrying, hence the serious concerns also, the New Zealand Medical Association (NZMA) expresses.
Something is being prepared to involve people to make assessments for WINZ, who are not even proper medical experts.
I will try to keep you posted, but this is a must read, and must be taken very seriously!