For 162 days, from October 15th 2011 until March 25th 2012, protesters camped out in a corner of Hagley Park as part of a global protest against wealth inequality. Over that time what The Press described as “one of Christchurchs most unusual communities”
[…]
My goal is to raise enough money for the recording equipment needed to conduct this oral history project, and self publish a book- with copies being donated to the Alexander Turnbull Library, Christchurch City Libraries, Archives New Zealand and the Canterbury Museum archive. This will provide an important historical record looking at what was going on locally in the early 2010s- an era where Time magazine made “The Protester” their person for the year.
As the MSM are already writing off the occupy movement, I reckon it’s a good idea to put some of the NZ/Aotearoa voices from the movement on record.
Also will be interesting to see how successful the crowd funding is.
A person who supports a mass murderer and torturer deserves a daily goading, (at least). CVs poisonous racism and Islamaphobia is on open display on this website and is not being challenged by you Bill.
I will continue to confront racists and apologists for crimes against humanity. Bill, you can protect them from my criticism if you choose.
But I will not ignore racists or stop criticising them.
Personally I think it would be more honourable for you to either argue against my position using facts, or argue CV’s case if that is what you feel.
Sincerely Jenny
[ If you have a position on events in Syria, then by all means argue your case in the appropriate thread or section of open mike. For days now, you’re basic thrust has been to inaccurately malign CV at every opportunity while showing no concern for how your off topic interjections mess up debate/discussion. To the best of my knowledge there have been no comments made by CV that exhibit either ‘poisoness racism’ or ‘Islamaphobia’. If you can link to such comments then I strongly suggest that you do so. Otherwise, and bearing in mind that I’ve had enough of all this nonsense, end it. Not one more word pertaining to CV’s supposed racism, Islamophobia or otherwise using his comments to ‘have a go’. I hope that’s clear. I really dislike imposing ‘holidays’ on people, but from where I’m sitting it appears you are intent on packing your bags. Please prove me wrong. – Bill]
Jenny I don’t have a problem with you arguing against racism, but you engage in slander far too often for your posts to be that useful. Many of your posts about CV contain content that isn’t fact based and is merely your (negative) assertion/opinion. You seem to not understand the difference between fact and opinion. Unfortunately it’s starting to make me question the integrity of everything else you say.
Speaking of facts, are you going to respond to my post 1.1.1?
I have characterised Colonial Viper’s depiction of the Arab people who have waged the Arab Spring as being agents of the West as “racist”.
Colonial Viper’s subtext, being that the Arabs are too cowardly and timid to take on these mostly Western backed regimes.
You will notice that CV himself has never defended himself from these accusations.
I imagine though that he has submitted many bitter complaints to the moderators on being challenged on his racism.
[No Jenny, s/he hasn’t. We get the point, you have a thing against CV. Please take the hint from the growing response here and consider your point well made eh? – thanks – r0b]
Weka I think it is a bit of stretch to accuse me of lying. where is the lie? As I have admitted I was indulging in satire to make a point. The point being while he is content to see Arab Spring protesters mowed down by the army on the orders of the government, that even Colonial Viper (hopefully) would object to see unarmed protesters being mown down with machine guns if it happened in this country.
As for a response to your comment 1.1.1. To make it clear I was using satire to make a point. CV did not actually say that peaceful New Zealand unarmed protesters were all foreigners that deserved to be shot to death. But, he has argued this very case for the peaceful protesters who first confronted Bashar Assad’s regime.
right. But can you see that for anyone not inside your head, or aware of your feelings about CV, the post about Occupy is nothing close to satire and makes absolutely no sense. Any new reader here is going to think CV is an arse. For regulars it just comes across as someone with a grudge who uses off topic posts at every chance to have a go at someone else.
Any new reader here is going to think CV is an arse. For regulars it just comes across as someone with a grudge who uses off topic posts at every chance to have a go at someone else.
Fair enough if you are trying to support CV, but “uses off topic posts at every chance to have a go at someone else” is hardly out of the ordinary here. Are you speaking against repeat harassment here in general, or just in this case?
I’m not supporting CV, I’m objecting to Jenny’s behaviour. It’s tedious and interferes with the flow of conversation. I haven’t been reading hardly any of the comments on Syria, so I don’t know what Jenny is on about. From the little I know of CV, her criticisms don’t match outside of the Syria issue, and I doubt they even make sense within the Syria issue. She just comes across as irrational or with a bug up her arse, and as I’ve pointed out doesn’t seem to understand what arguing the facts is. I’m sick of it.
The difference between what Jenny is doing, and the general rough and tumble here, is that she is now stalking CV and being a tr*ll. It doesn’t particularly surprise me that you don’t get the difference, you always seem to not understand the culture of this place, or certain social norms here.
Either that or your question is a disingenuous nod to how you feel you’ve been treated.
The difference between what Jenny is doing, and the general rough and tumble here, is that she is now stalking CV and being a tr*ll.
That you would make a statement like that suggests that you seem to not understand the culture of this place, and are oblivious to certain social norms here.
I don’t have a problem with either CV or Jenny, I don’t follow much of either but it’s easy to ignore what doesn’t interest you, if you choose. Some choose to stalk, that’s obviously frowned on at times, but it is common and often supported.
Please give me an example of someone being stalked in the past week, other than CV.
Whether you have a problem with CV or Jenny or not is completely irrelevant. What matters is whether it affects the site. Plenty of people, including two moderators, say it does. You really think that your personal experience matters more than that?
but it’s easy to ignore what doesn’t interest you, if you choose
LOL. So says the man who has been banned multiple times for behaviour that pisses off lots of people and disrupts the site.
“But, he has argued this very case for the peaceful protesters who first confronted Bashar Assad’s regime”
Cite for this.
This is what Bill is talking about. CV has pointed out that AQ and other groups are involved in the syrian civil war. He’s right about that. Here’s an interview with some of them:
From what I’ve seen you think that all this is just propaganda, and from that you make the rather astounding leap that CV is a a racist islamaphobe who bla blah blah. Your failure to actually argue case is what the problen seems to be.
What this shows graphically, is where the blind get it so very wrong when doggedly beieving in a cause.
The intention is good (although becoming questionable given the rantings), the cause is worthy, but the lack of holistic self awareness casts a very dark shaddow of negative energy in the direction of the targeted recipients of the good intentions.
Having spent some time participating in the local active scene, it appears that it is all too common, for those involved to lack the self awareness, and hence the abilities to really make a difference. In fact they become a driver for turning people away from good causes and important issues, who might otherwise build numbers to make some genuine positive change.
Because of these types of people, the active community is destined to always be “fringe loonies”, and that is a real shame, but will not change until some people of integrity, and leadership appear, and get involved.
In the meantime, the Jennys of the active world will in fact help the well intended causes to lose ground, by simply turning people away through shear blody minded ignorance!
Depends who one sees as peers, if indeed they see things that way at all.
The other point is that many on here have posted links about Syria, cv, bill, P’s B, myself, and others, yet its seems only cv is getting the treatment, which indicates some other problem/factors are at play.
Yeah that’s an interesting observation. Disagreement over my energy depletion vs climate change position preceeded Jenny’s objections to my Syria statements.
Yeah that’s an interesting observation. Disagreement over my energy depletion vs climate change position preceeded Jenny’s objections to my Syria statements.
Colonial Viper
That is right CV you have generally been the voice that leads the charge for conservative BAU fossil fuel use that will condemn us all.
It came as little surprise to me that you also support the status quo in the Middle East.
Are the two linked?
Yes, in that they are both a product of a misanthropic world view that argues that human beings are powerless to defeat repressive political regimes, or powerful vested interest.
I have always begged to differ and have cited examples from New Zealand and world history to disprove this widely perceived world view.
PS. And you shouldn’t be so coy CV. I have made this “interesting observation” to you previously myself.
That is right CV you have generally been the voice that leads the charge for conservative BAU fossil fuel use that will condemn us all.
More mistaken opinion stated as fact.
Please provide three links to places where CV has promoted fossil fuel use in the way that conservative typically do, and where he has lead the way on this.
The other point is that many on here have posted links about Syria, cv, bill, P’s B, myself, and others, yet its seems only cv is getting the treatment, which indicates some other problem/factors are at play.
muzza
Quite correct Muzza, It is because I fear that CV’s views are silently held by many others here that he gets the treatment.
If I thought that he was just a lone right wing nutter I would ignore him.
Unfortunately for him being the most vociferous in his support for this murderer and torturer he gets the full force of my fury. To his credit he has dared to raise his head above the parapet.
A deserved slap in the face for kiwi quislings like Colonial Viper who support the Assad regime in it’s murder and torture and deride and defame the Syrian people’s attempts to rid themselves of the tyrant.
I was trying to refrain from commenting on what has gone on today re your apparent obsession with CV, but obviously everything that has been said, including by the moderators, has gone over your head and you could not help yourself with this latest:
A deserved slap in the face for kiwi quislings like Colonial Viper who support the Assad regime in it’s murder and torture and deride and defame the Syrian people’s attempts to rid themselves of the tyrant.
If you had left out ‘like CV’ , I would feel some respect for you and your views, but you have now lost me and I will no longer be reading any of your comments.
People that turn a blind eye to Al Qaeda and the like?….
Pascal’s bookie
This is just the propaganda put about by the regime. By parroting it, it is you PB who is willfully turning a blind eye to the mass murder of peaceful civilian protesters and the torture and murder of the families of army deserters that preceded the armed insurrection.
But jihad has become a distinctive rallying cry. The commander of the newly unified brigades of the Free Syrian Army fighting in Aleppo was shown in a YouTube video on Sunday exhorting men joining the rebellion there by telling them: “Those whose intentions are not for God, they had better stay home, whereas if your intention is for God, then you go for jihad and you gain an afterlife and heaven.”
“This is just the propaganda put about by the regime. By parroting it, it is you PB who is willfully turning a blind eye to the mass murder of peaceful civilian protesters and the torture and murder of the families of army deserters that preceded the armed insurrection”
–Where to begin with this one…
1: Propaganda from the regime – What regime would have the control over the links posted from the various sources, we have been posting, and where does Al Jazeera, and Anita McNaught fit into that regime you talk about? Sounds all very confused to me Jenny, not to mention contradictory!
2: Mass Murder of peaceful civilian protesters – You keep spouting this, yet can’t recall seeing where you provided a link which was not easily negated by many others. And I have not heard you make any mention of the numerous Syrians who actually support Assad, I guess that doesn’t much matter, cos it makes a rather big hole on your belief system.
3: Deserters – Um, yeah there has been a heap of them right, but there has been many more caught and killed who have been shipped into Syria to fight the military, who are deserters and mercenaries who have been murdering and killing innocent civillians too, yet you continue to ignore these deserters who are a rag tag bunch of rent a jihadi working for the paycheck of the Qatari. Saudi, NATO warmongers
4: Speaking of Qatar, Bharain, Saudi etc – No mention from you about the civillians getting crushed on regular basis, murdered, tortured etc by those regimes, unless I missed it, another rather gaping hole in your discussion points
Jenny the key thing to remember is that on any side of a debate, no one can be entirely right or wrong, there is simply too many complex issue at play here, it can only be a case of read as many points of views and materials from as many sources as it take to form an opinion, then keep reading more and be prepared for your opinion to evolve, thats really the best any of us can do eh. Sticking to a position which has been reasonably well proven to be incorrect, and then hurling abuse at people who point this out, really just makes you lose credibility, and also negatively impacts how well your message could be recieved, surely you can see that is unhelpful to those you claim to support?
In war, truth is the first casualty. Aeschylus Greek tragic dramatist (525 BC – 456 BC)
“This is just the propaganda put about by the regime.”
Here’s an interview conducted by a war correspondent with some of the rebels. I’ll include a longish quote because I have the feeling you’re not inclined to read links, so it will pay to get the evidence into this thread:
But these were not average members of the Free Syrian Army. Abu Khuder and his men fight for al-Qaida. They call themselves the ghuraba’a, or “strangers”, after a famous jihadi poem celebrating Osama bin Laden’s time with his followers in the Afghan mountains, and they are one of a number of jihadi organisations establishing a foothold in the east of the country now that the conflict in Syria has stretched well into its second bloody year.
They try to hide their presence. “Some people are worried about carrying the [black] flags,” said Abu Khuder. “They fear America will come and fight us. So we fight in secret. Why give Bashar and the west a pretext?” But their existence is common knowledge in Mohassen. Even passers-by joke with the men about car bombs and IEDs.
According to Abu Khuder, his men are working closely with the military council that commands the Free Syrian Army brigades in the region. “We meet almost every day,” he said. “We have clear instructions from our [al-Qaida] leadership that if the FSA need our help we should give it. We help them with IEDs and car bombs. Our main talent is in the bombing operations.” Abu Khuder’s men had a lot of experience in bomb-making from Iraq and elsewhere, he added.
Abu Khuder spoke later at length. He reclined on a pile of cushions in a house in Mohassen, resting his left arm which had been hit by a sniper’s bullet and was wrapped in plaster and bandages. Four teenage boys kneeled in a tight crescent in front of him, craning their necks and listening with awe. Other villagers in the room looked uneasy.
Abu Khuder had been an officer in a mechanised Syrian border force called the Camel Corps when he took up arms against the regime. He fought the security forces with a pistol and a light hunting rifle, gaining a reputation as one of the bravest and most ruthless men in Deir el-Zour province and helped to form one of the first FSA battalions.
He soon became disillusioned with what he saw as the rebel army’s disorganisation and inability to strike at the regime, however. He illustrated this by describing an attempt to attack the government garrison in Mohassen. Fortified in a former textile factory behind concrete walls, sand bags, machine-gun turrets and armoured vehicles, the garrison was immune to the rebels’ puny attempt at assault.
“When we attacked the base with the FSA we tried everything and failed,” said Abu Khuder. “Even with around 200 men attacking from multiple fronts they couldn’t injure a single government soldier and instead wasted 1.5m Syrian pounds [£14,500] on firing ammunition at the walls.”
Then a group of devout and disciplined Islamist fighters in the nearby village offered to help. They summoned an expert from Damascus and after two days of work handed Abu Khuder their token of friendship: a truck rigged with two tonnes of explosives.
That describes defectors from the regime, joining up with the FSA, becoming disillusioned with the capabilities of the FSA and hooking up with Al Qaeda. Which is entirely understandable and predictable. It’s what happens in civil wars. It is not some romantic fucking game where the good guys win as long as their hearts stay pure.
It is entirely predictiable and expected that AQ will move into the chaos of Syria, and just as predictible that the rebels will see this as usefull. Denying it is just ignorant.
That describes the kidnapping and killing of a tv presenter by the rebels. Again, entirely the sort of thing you expect to see happenning when pluralism breaks down in a country going through a civil war. This journo was broadcasting propagnda, so they captured him and slaughtered him, and are using his slaughter in their own propaganda. That’s what civil war looks like.
So what do you think should be done?
Be specific. I want to hear what you think the NZ govt should do, and what you think ‘the left’ should do.
We warned previously that there was no place in the middle for anyone, the regime would not accept that. And the people of Jihad, with the clarity of their way and the strength of their belief, would not accept that either. It is upon all to decide to choose one of the two sides; which team to support, to stand before God, most high, and make this choice.
By the favor of God for the Mujahideen in the al-Nusra front, the heroes of the western [don’t know], over the media Shabih Mohammed Said, on the date July 19, 2012, was killed after an interrogation. The Shabih Mohammed al-Said worked for the Syrian satellite station, and previously presented for the program “Hadith al-Balad” [Talk of the Nation].
Perhaps, through this operation, and others like it, [we will] express to everyone who supports this tyrannical regime will repent to God, and the swords of the Mujahideen will reap their heads and purify the land of Sham [historical name for Syria] from their filth, in shaa allah.
It seems clear to me Bill that you are taking sides, many times CV has supported a proven mass murderer and torturer. I also see that further down this thread you also object to me challenging CV for his continual support for continueing with policies that will seriously increase global warming.
I also notice that you have never criticised CV for deriding those he scapegoats as “middle class”.
My apologies to Carol for disrupting her thread. I thought my satirical comment would be just passed by. But it seems the apologists for Assad decided to make a stand.
It also seemed that whenever Police were there to uphold the law there were plenty of Occupy supporters recording “brutality”.. perhaps ask some of them?
What’s your point Mark? $1200 for the whole project, including self publishing a book and giving copies of the audio to various museums, doesn’t seem excessive. There is also a quality issue in recording oral histories that would affect what equipment was bought.
And they typically don’t understand the quality difference between professional/studio grade equipment and cheap consumer crap. A Sony consumer grade video camera might be $500. A Sony professional video camera might start at $50,000. And the entire range inbetween.
Indeed. And for this particular project the researcher is hoping to lodge the recordings in the archives of Alexander Turnbull, and other libraries and a museum. I understand they usually prefer “archival quality” recordings:
To record oral history you will need to use the best-quality equipment you can buy, borrow or hire. Poor sound recordings will be of little use to researchers in the future.
I have just watched the replay of The Nation on TV3 and more particularly the Colin Craig interview. Louisa Wall was great and really dominated. Craig achieved an unusual status, he was odious, overbearing and smarmy all at the one time. He kept on overtaking Wall who to her credit stood her ground and managed with some very concise responses ridiculed what he was saying.
Craig has some unusual views. Apparently homosexuality is a lifestyle choice while at the time is evidence of abuse as a child. He is also fully in favour of there being a referendum on the subject but is opposed the a Parliamentary Select Committee from hearing submissions on the bill. How undemocratic is that? Louisa’s response that New Zealand gave the vote to women in 1893 without the need for a referendum whereas it took Switzerland until 1971 for the first Canton to give women the vote with the benefit of a referendum.
IMHO the issue is purely one of human rights. Why should gay and lesbian couples be discriminated against?
The Green MPs are all supportive. There are 8 Labour MPs who have not declared a position or have not decided yet. Jones and Sio have not declared, Twyford, O’Connor, Cosgrove, Huo, Prasad and Robertson have declared they are undecided.
I hear that O’Connor, Robertson and O’Connor are unlikely to vote in favour.
Shame on them. MPs in a progressive party should prefer principle over red neck populism every time.
Louisa Wall has impressed me since her bill was drawn from the ballot, she has worked strongly and positively to get support, and uses good fact based arguments. I was a bit doubtful about her abilities, but she’s proven to be a very good MP.
Colin Craig keeps shooting anti marriage equality in the feet.
I don’t think MPs with different views should be shamed, all MPs have a right to vote on their conscience. Democracy shouldn’t demand everyone back one side.
Interesting contrast between Wall and Cosgrove, who both had bills drawn at the same time.
Cosgrove, fading old school MP – his approach was a cranky attack on National saying if they didn’t support his bill it meant something irrelevant and totally unsupported by facts. He presumably chose his bill as a political attack weapon.
Wall, up and coming fresh approach MP – her approach was to work with MPs from other parties to build support for her bill based on well expressed facts. Her bill was the right approach at the right time and an very good example of an appropriate Member’s bill
Result.
Cosgrove’s bill is doomed from the start and largely ignored.
Wall’s bill looks assured of success with increasingly popular support.
They wouldn’t, CV! I think it’s likely that 2 socially conservative Labour MP’s (O’Connor and Cosgrove) will abstain, but I would be very surprised if any MP on the left votes against the bill.
Ms Wall re-emphasised yesterday that her legislation would change the state’s definition of marriage, not the church’s definition, and religious institutions would be free to opt out of marrying same-sex couples.
What legislation, i.e. which section of which act, would allow religious institutions to opt out of marrying same-sex couples?
Human Rights Act 1993
Section 21 Prohibited grounds of discrimination
(1) For the purposes of this Act, the prohibited grounds of discrimination are—
…
(m) sexual orientation, which means a heterosexual, homosexual, lesbian, or bisexual orientation.
Did I just hear that the Govt are getting a new valuation for the rezone houses, so they can charge the insurance companies.
How come they don’t use the 2007 valuations the forced on the red zoners. That would be a zero sum game. Are they expecting to make windfall profit. If that is so that is DISGRACEFUL.
You are assuming the valuation will be higher. It may not be.
I’ve always seen that 2007 valuation as fair as house prices had dropped in many parts of Christchurch since 2007.
One of our family friends had just gone unconditional, two days before the first quake, were selling their house and moving to Hamilton. They had sold for $20,000 less than the GV. The buyer was allowed to pull out as the house was wrecked and subsequently they received an extra $20,000.
The issue really isn’t the use of the valuation, the issue is the increased cost of land and the increased cost of building.
For many who are moving or have moved to other towns and to Aussie it’s a non-issue.
For those staying and building it the costs are higher than their previous home was worth.
In saying that many house insurance policies are now not for a value but for a square footage at a certain quality of material. A value shouldn’t matter in those circumstances.
there’s no way there’s 14B of proven, extractable oil. Those kinds of figures would put the oil field there amongst the largest in the world, up with the fields in Russia, Iraq and Iran.
there’s no way there’s 14B of proven, extractable oil. Those kinds of figures would put the oil field there amongst the largest in the world, up with the fields in Russia, Iraq and Iran.
Colonial Viper
Are you actually questioning the veracity of oil companies CV?
Or, are you just trying to downplay the size of this oil field as minor, and a little drilling won’t hurt anyone?
[ Jenny. Did you not see my moderators edit on your previous comment up the thread? Or did you choose to ignore it? I’ll be nice and assume the former. But any more comments from you that attempt to goad or snipe at CV will result in a ban. – Bill]
On the scale of goading and sniping here this seems very mild. Is this isolated adminishing, or setting a new standard? (Serious question to establish an understanding of what is deemed unacceptable).
Bill. Did you not see my polite comment on your moderators edit up the thread.
I’ll be nice and assume you didn’t. Banning me while leaving Colonial Viper free to spew his warmist and racist propaganda unchallenged, risks bringing this site into disrepute.
If you disagree with what I am saying why not argue the case. Point out if you can where I am going wrong.
Or if you support Colonial Viper’s position why not say so. And argue in his defence.
But don’t try and claim that you are not partizan.
Your threats already against me already show that.
FFS C.V. is allowed to have his own opinion… you calling him out everyday with an unprovoked snide remark is tiresome at best…
Just post your opinion and leave the personal shit out of it… all it does is detract from your argument…
sheesh! – Wish journos would do a bit of journalism. That 14 billion figure is basically b/s. If you go to TAG’s website, it takes about 2 seconds to find that they reckon there is 1.74 billion barrels of undiscovered conventional oil and 12.65 billion barrels of undiscovered unconventional oil http://www.tagoil.com/reports.asp
14B? Not talking it up to attract the money and more support? What is the basis for that figure?
Exploration consents had been granted months ago, bypassing the public and mayor. And going further back, a former Natz MP was paid by the oil company for consultancy work in the area before his parliamentary stint.
From what I wrote back in April from a post called “New Zealand’s Potential for Oil Independence in an Uncertain World”:
“Elsewhere in New Zealand limited exploration has occurred in the East Coast Basin, Canterbury Basin and the Great South Basin. Currently the most promising area is the East Coast Basin.Two fields, one north of Gisborne and one between Napier and Danneverke are currently being explored. TAG Oil believes there is an undiscovered resource potential of 12.65 billion barrels of unconventional original oil in place (OOIP) and 1.74 billion barrels of conventional OOIP. The potential recovery rates of 12% are similar to that of the North Dakota Bakken deposit in the United States. This means roughly 1.52 billion barrels of unconventional oil and 182 million barrels of conventionaloil are thought to be recoverable from this area.
Being generous and assuming TAG Oil’sestimates are correct there are currently 2.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil from both the Taranaki and East Coast Basin. This would give us another forty-two years before these fields ran dry at 2010 consumption. If we expect our economy to grow however we would assume that our oil consumption would grow each year and so it is likely we would require far more oil during this time period.”
“Like, none,” he said. “It’s unsustainable.”
But what is the Government’s response?
So far there is none, beyond some rather sinister observations about the mounting cost to the taxpayer of housing subsidies, chiefly the accommodation supplement, and how they can probably be “targeted better”.
Investors have responded to signals from the tax system: the prospect of high leverage and untaxed income, in the form of capital gains, from rental properties compared with the disheartening front-loaded taxation of superannuation schemes.
In addition there is a subsidy, in the form of the accommodation supplement, flowing from taxpayers to landlords. The Government and Labour are now questioning whether that represents value for money.
Maybe we also need to acknowledge the possibility that our parents and grandparents were smarter than we are. They were not wedded to the idea, dominant since the mid-1980s, that whatever the problem, the solution is a market.
Faced with an inadequate supply of decent housing, they built state houses – and would be astonished at the prices some of them now change hands for. And they made State Advances loans available, at concessionary interest rates, for first-home buyers who could only use them to buy new homes subject to size limits.
That policy targeted what are again the missing lowest rungs of the housing ladder. Right now the Government can borrow 10-year money for 3.4 per cent. Housing Minister Phil Heatley, on TV3’s The Nation on Saturday, said the Government already had $15 billion invested in 70,000 state houses.
“We’re in no position to build more and more state houses, you know, we’re just not in that position.”
Well, why not? The need to rein in public debt? When it suits it, as with state asset sales, the Government likes to pretend there is only one side to its balance sheet, the debt side. But there is a world of difference between increasing public debt in order to fund an operating deficit, and increasing it to fund the acquisition of long-lived assets.
I don’t see this as just a National party problem. Labour are very quiet on this issue too.
It is a ridiculous state of affairs. We keep giving more & more taxpayers money to people so they can afford to pay their rent or mortgage and that money keeps pushing up the rent & mortgage. We can never catch up.
This country spent $22billion on social welfare last year ( including superannuation). At a rough guess I’d say about a quarter of that went to pay rents. $5billion a year of taxpayers money subsidising private landlords. The state could build 16,000 houses every year with that. It would take only what, 5-6years(?), to solve the housing problem and cut $5billion off the social welfare bill. What a crazy world this is.
and considering that the government doesn’t have to pay interest on money it prints it also doesn’t need a financial return from building those houses. The social return, less poverty and illness etc, would be enough.
From the 1960’s onward the State has built less and less State Housing, engaged in various sell-offs to both tenants and where it got really ugly, to the private sector,
we only need to look at the basic riffmatic to gain an insight into ‘the problem’ on a basic level and such a basic level of understanding does not include the huge rise in the proportion of the have-nots’ in our society brought about by Roger(spit)nomics and the later governments that adhere to such warped ‘thinking’,
When we had a population of some 3 million souls we had as State Housing some 75,000 households, our economy had ’employment’ for most of them,
NOW, we have a population of 4 million+ and only 69,000 State Housing units, most of the tenants can find no employment in our economy and further to that the proportion of the have -nots in our society has risen at a far greater rate as would be expected within the 1 million growth of that population…
Exactly. Train more people to build houses. Employ more people. House more people. Spend a little bit extra. What is the point of Government if not ensuring the wellbeing of people!?
The problem with ‘the housing problem’ if you will excuse my lingo is that it is a problem on so many different levels of both society and economy that to address ‘it’ and propose solutions in just one comment is fraught to say the least,
I believe that there is a study going on at the moment with input from major players at the sharp end of ‘homelessness’, like the Wellington City Mission,Salvation Army etc which is quantifying the actual state of ‘homelessness’ in all it’s stages, not only the obvious street presence of homeless people but attempting to put numbers on those who are forced to share accomodation,(over-crowding),and the transient homeless who have the family/social networks to be able to keep themselves off of the streets without having the benefit of an actual home,
the proposal seems to include showing ‘the real cost’ of homelessness where in supposedly saving a dollar by ignoring the need for social housing Governments are actually being forced to spend more in the Health,Justice,and, Police budgets, something successive Governments seem more than happy to do,
One study(sorry i didn’t save the link),of 1 homeless male in the US showed that He cost the State 1 million dollars over a 10 year period in various costs in the Health,police and justice budgets, the particular individual may well have been the worse case scenario that could be found but it highlights the shortsightedness of New Zealand Governments ignoring low cost social housing…
PS, thanks for highlighting that article by the Herald’s Economics Editor, Brian Fallow, which i had missed, one of the more thoughtful pieces of journalism i have read from the august Herald…
As another afterthought to what i have commented above, it does seem totally f**king perverse that those who are at the sharp end of providing relief to the homeless are those that reliant upon charity in most cases are left to fund the study into the cost of homelessness,
Governments past and present with the 60 billion dollars a year gained from all of us via taxation should know the true cost to the economy that homelessness creates,
It’s easy for Heatley and English to sob about the cost of housing people as ‘unaffordable’ when there is no definitive knowledge of the costs from the other side of the bean counting ledger when we don’t…
It would mildly limit the profits made by the massive financial speculation industry, particularly in their use of manipulative, automated high frequency trading strategies.
It would mildly limit the profits made by the massive financial speculation industry, particularly in their use of manipulative, automated high frequency trading strategies.
Colonial Viper
That is right CV, but a very “mild” restriction on the speculative Financial Transactions of the rich will reap huge rewards, returning $billions of dollars to the public purse. Enough money I have been informed that the amount of tax raised from a less than 1cent tax on every dollar on Financial Transactions would amount to the same amount of money presently made by regressive GST taxes on the poor.
The percentage rates that are being talked about internationally for Financial Transaction Taxes are very small, ranging from 1% to as low as 0.05%.
Tax Justice New Zealand The case for Financial Transaction Taxes in NZ: A Fact Sheet
A 0.1% general FTT could raise over $NZ1.6 billion (0.88% of New Zealand’s GDP). Based on the revenue estimates compiled in an extensive 2008 research study by the Austrian Institute of Economic Research. Their statistical estimates factor in a reduction in trade volume resulting from the implementation of the tax, which would discourage speculation. (Source: A General Financial Transaction Tax, Stephen Schulmeister, Austrian Institute of Economic Research, 2008.)
Tax Justice New Zealand The case for Financial Transaction Taxes in NZ: A Fact Sheet
Not sure about perceived problem, but put it this way, there are hundreds of billions of dollars worth of financial transactions (bets) made on the $NZ alone each, year and most if not all are untaxed, so imagine what could be done with a 1% sales tax applied. Globally I believe it to be tens-hudreds of trillions each year in financial transactions, all with zero behind them, yet all with real negtive consequences for sovereign nations down to individuals. Most if not all of those transactions are untaxed!1
The real issue is simply one of appetite, and powerful forces preventing such taxes on the financial industry coming to fruition. Finance controls all aspects of global goings on, from top down. People want to deny this, but the fact remains, the financial industry is all powerful, and controls those who would legislate such taxes.
If there was a global will to do so, this would happen, along with some big players being prosecuted and locked awy for a long time. Its not happened, and I question if it ever will, so on that basis, no appetite to prosecute, means no appetite to reform/tax to the benefit of the rest of us!
Typical would be: too complex to implement, too costly to run, it would cause capital to flee, it would damage the financial services industry and hurt jobs in a valuable economic sector, financial business would go elsewhere, blah blah blah.
Here’s the way I look at it: the finance sector imposes their own taxes on many of our daily transactions now. They call them “charges” and “fees”. Credit card companies are an example. You buy something from a shop with your visa card, the credit company clips 2% from that transaction, from the store owner. You pull money out of an other bank ATM, you get clipped 50c or $1.
So, the thieving lying scumbags are absolutely fine with an FTT just as long as the proceeds are going to them.
The biggest tax is the interest that private banks charge us accounting for somewhere near 50% of all prices.
So, the thieving lying scumbags are absolutely fine with an FTT just as long as the proceeds are going to them.
And that sums up the financial industry well. It’s nothing but a tax on everyone else and, due to the compounding nature of interest, that tax increases year by year until the financial industry pretty much owns everything.
Weka, there is no rationale, its plain and simple fear mongering my those who control the financial industry.
CV cites some excuses which are run out through the media, but the reality is simply that there is no appetite by TPTB/governments to go up against their pay masters.
I think the past 4.5 years should illustrate pretty clearly who is pulling the strings, and the rationale, or lack of it you are seeking, can be found in the same place!
Hi muzza, I get the dynamics behind why it doesn’t happen. I was just curious how it got spun. I’m assuming politicians (and others) don’t just say, oh we don’t want to do that because the people really running the country/world wouldn’t like it 😉
Yeah I hear you there Weka, and actually its not a topic which gets alot of air time anyway such as it is. It did get some time for a short while, but has largly been “off the menu” for reasons we seen to agree on, mostly to do with power and influence, which pretty much would tell the story.
“The beauty of financial transaction taxes is that they can target the super-rich who aren’t paying enough tax; it’s almost impossible to avoid; and modern technology makes it a simple and low cost form of tax collection,”
I had a quick look at the accommodation supplement and in Auckland it is a maximum of just over $200 per week. When doing the calculation the first $130 of rent is deducted and then 75% of the balance up to the cap can be claimed depending on income etc..
So if a low earning family receives the $200 from the state and pay the $130 themselves plus 25% of the difference then the state funds $10400 per annum and the individual some $7000+ p.a.
If the state borrows at 3.4% then it could fund a house worth some $300,000 and after paying interest instead of the supplement be cash square and have an asset. But the renter still pays some rent, say the $7000 which goes towards the maintenance and paying down the capital sum so over time the govt owns the house.
It would vary from region to region but where there is an actual shortage of housing stock then this should work. If there are surplus houses in a region then the govt shouldn’t add to the housing stock.
Can’t afford it, more likely “we can’t afford not to” and it would beat idiot roads hands down.
The State, based upon ‘economies of scale’ could build the needed social housing for far less than 300 thousand per housing unit,
The fact is Money, or more to the point the expansion of the amount of money as wealth can be logically generated either by ‘borrowing’ to create increased production or ‘created’ to build an asset to the value of the money so created therefor justifying the ‘creation’ of that money,
The State in response to the Christchurch earthquakes built and located in Christchurch’s Hagley park a number of housing units at a cost of 100 thousand dollars each, it is actually not the cost of such State House building that is the problem here in any way, it is the WILL of Government to actually do so…
Aha, it is really only ‘the Will’ of Government that holds us back in the housing area, sheesh the Chinese can build whole cities for 250,000 people from scratch in 3 years, roads, shopping malls, schools, everything, they make what we accomplish look primitive…
“Can’t afford it, more likely “we can’t afford not to” and it would beat idiot roads hands down.”
It ticks all the boxes doesn’t it? Whichever angle you look at it from it benefits the Crown accounts and provides both social & economic goods. More trade jobs, more disposable income for people on lower incomes, less Govt expenditure… pick a goal from the left side of the fence and the peg fits in the hole. And all Labour seem to want is a CGT that will push house prices & rents up further and cost the taxpayer even more in social welfare payments.
If labour were smart they would put half the CGT tax gained into paying off debt and the other half in tax breaks for those on lower incomes who can’t avoid taxes like capital gaingters.
Can you not see how daft that is? CGT will push rents up, there’s no question of that. So Labour bring in a CGT and give a tax rebate to lower income earners. That tax rebate goes to pay most, but not all, of the higher rents which in turn pays the landlords CGT which gets given back in rebates to the low income earner… only the portion of the pie gets smaller for the low income earner each time & they end up paying more & more of their nett income in housing costs.
Unless the housing problem is fixed first a CGT will be paid by the renters, not by the landlords. It will just make the poor even worse off.
Well, you do have to consider, CV, that even though logically there is no reason why a CGT would increase rents, plenty of greedy-bastard landlords will probably use it as an excuse to do so.
“… even though logically there is no reason why a CGT would increase rents,”
There is a cast-iron logical reason. Property investors are presently getting a return on their investment via a combination of rent and capital gain. If you cut back the capital gain through regulation the investor will claw back that loss in return through rents. Since every property investor will be affected the same it will result in all of them increasing rents over a period of time.
The one thing you can’t do is force the return on an investment down through taxes, the % return always bounces back unless the risk profile changes.
The one thing you can’t do is force the return on an investment down through taxes
Of course you can, and it has been successfully done many times. Its called structuring the market to get the social and economic objectives you want for your country.
Property investors are presently getting a return on their investment via a combination of rent and capital gain.
So we get rid of property speculators, and help create a class of professional landlords who make an income from renting properties, not trading them at increasing prices and increasing mortgage debt.
And there is absolutely no doubt that a CGT will push rents up. It has to.
No it doesn’t. A CGT doesn’t increase any costs of house ownership. Landlords who make an income from renting houses will experience no change. Property speculators expecting untrammeled capital gains will not be happy of course.
You must be joking if you think a CGT will make houses more affordable.
Well its far too weak a step, but it will tend to divert capital away from the property market.
“Landlords who make an income from renting houses will experience no change.”
Thanks but there’s no point in debating with you on this, you’re away with the fairies. Pretty much every property investor disagrees with you. It’s basic arithmetic fer crissake!
The market doesn’t need property speculators. We need professional landlords.
Pretty much every property investor disagrees with you. It’s basic arithmetic fer crissake!
Not a surprise that property speculators would be annoyed at a CGT.
And your maths is wrong. CGT does not increase the costs of running a rental property. Professional landlords won’t be affected by it at all, but property flippers will be.
“And your maths is wrong. CGT does not increase the costs of running a rental property. Professional landlords won’t be affected by it at all, but property flippers will be.”
Don’t be ridiculous. Professional landlords count capital gain into the returns they get from their investment property. They can get 4.7% on term deposit right now, why would anyone invest in property that returns less than that from rents alone.
Rents decoupled from house prices years ago, if rents were to provide the sole return on rental properties now they’d have to go up a hell of a lot more.
“Push house prices back down and rental returns will go up enough to sustain a true professional landlord class.”
What, and you think a CGT will achieve that? Bollocks it will. The minute returns from houses fall the number of new houses being built also falls. If the return isn’t enough people will invest elsewhere instead, ie term deposits.
That slowdown in new house building leads to higher rents through shortage of rentals. Those higher rents gradually lead to a better market return from property which attracts investors back in again. That increased demand from investors pushes house prices up again…. and the endless cycle continues. A CGT won’t change anything there.
Have you not been watching the housing market over the last five years? It’s been pretty damned obvious.
On a bit of an unrelated topic, has someone been feeding the Minister of riffmatic and Bean Counting Bill English truth syrup or something???,
Last week it was English openly admitting that what the economy faces ie: recession/depression aint going away for the next ten at least, years that is,
Now He is putting His hand up to being part of Governments that have simply ignored the (known?) need to build housing for renting on the basis of income,
Admitting the facts is fine as far as i am concerned by the Minister, does He tho have a plan to fix what the known ailment is???….
Protecting those who don’t pay any tax doh.I hit homer
any landlords would give up and flood more houses into the market bringing ownership back into the NZ psyche which helps stabilize families.
Actually, if the government built houses (high density, both row houses and high rise apartments) to meet demand and rented them out at 25% of income house prices and rents would fall making a CGT unneeded.
Still, I’d say a Comprehensive Capital Tax as outlined in the Big Kahuna would be an excellent option to put in place.
Remember the wonderfull State Loans Scheme .Plus State insurance?
Which enabled working people to buy their own well built houses. Labour needs to revise such a scheme as soon as it returns to government.
Most off the well built houses us older folk are still enjoying were state loaned houses. Why ever was it stopped? Because of the greedy slime bag Tories.
You are of course right, The provision of 20,000 State rental units in Auckland City would immediately kill off high demand for rentals in that city thus overcoming on the rental side of the property equation the supply/demand impetus in that market,
My view is that the State should in fact become the majority landlord across the whole new Zealand rental market and when the building program has housed at 25% of income all those on low and fixed incomes tenancies should be made available to others on higher incomes at the same rental of 25% of income,
The present National Government is talking from a position of trying to curtail the annual expense of the subsidy to HousingNZ of some 600 million dollars and the only means of addressing the direct subsidization of HousingNZ that does not further deflate the local New Zealand economy by further reducing the discretionary spending of the 69,000 HousingNZ households would be to dramatically increase the stock of HousingNZ homes to the point where Social Demand is zero and tenancies could be offered to tenants earning 1000 dollars a week at 25% of income thus adding an element of cross-subsidization to the HousingNZ books,
Obviously for that to occur, Government would have to have been smart enough to have produced it’s own printed monies to enable such a building program and would also have to have been looking at the economics of it all through a smart lens other than what could enrich the core of its voting bloc,
Alas, such is the nature of the chimps in the jungle mememe economics currently to the fore that i couldn’t begin to imagine such a society that would embrace such an elegant solution to matters of housing for at least 1000 years…
Roads of No Significance are a case in point to what i commented on above, obviously a quantifiable value can be placed upon a road, ie: X road is worth a billion or whatever,
In theory such a method of ‘counting our beans’ gives us an asset, but, it’s hardly an asset that can be ‘realized’,
So,
It is logical for a Government to simply create the amount of money needed to build X road as the creation of the road at X value as an asset justifies having expanded the money supply by the X of that roads value,
It is the economics of the primitive chimpanzee to create a fiscal drag upon an economy by ‘borrowing’ to create the infrastructural assets of the State when that State is quite capable of creating the expansion of the money supply as the States asset values increase,
My one codicil,(a small nod to the present economic paradigm), is that where we have an ‘inflation target’ such expansion of the money supply to build assets should,(must), be allowed so as to occur within such inflation targets…
That’s easy – just adjust taxes in line with the spending. The Comprehensive Capital Tax is also essential as it would tax the money sitting in bank accounts.
The other positive is that for every Household that is created the level of economic activity in the wider economy is increased,
IE: such households must have furnishing and these are constantly changed/upgraded on an ongoing basis, i call this the ‘broken dinner plate example’ where if you have 10,000 households X amount of dinner plates will be broken and need replacing in any given period, raise the number of households to 15,000 and the number of broken dinner plates becomes X+x…
Exactly, Daveo. I love how Peters and Lhaws are both now acting like a referendum is the “sensible” thing to do, ignoring that (a) the government clearly has no appetite to order a binding one on this issue and (b) they themselves have no inclination at all to get it done themselves.
Nope, Laws and Peters are idiots. They might possibly be right that morality laws should be decided by the public, in which case people who object to gay marriage on the basis of morality should get a referendum petition organised.
But the current proposed legislation isn’t a morality issue, it simply one of equality and human rights.
Amazingly enough, I’m going to have to agree with Lhaws on that as well. Of course, I think it should be true of all major policy. State asset sales should have gone to referendum – instead it got rushed through as fast as the government could push and the government ignored the will of the people while doing so and I don’t think we’ll be seeing Lhaws calling for that to be put to referendum.
The issue of whether gay people have the same rights as everyone else was settled with the homosexual law reform bill. The current bill is merely an adjustment to bring marriage law into line with that. I don’t see why the validity of homosexuality should be put to the test of public opinion.
Needless to day Laws isn’t arguing for referenda for major policy, just the ones he deems to be issues of morality.
Where policy is actually changed rather than amended.
I don’t see why the validity of homosexuality should be put to the test of public opinion.
I don’t see why we’re being held back by a few people who happen to be our servants.
I actually think that all fundamental rights need to be put to referendum and then made supreme law. For starters it tends to settle the basis for the laws that are passed and it also prevents the government from riding roughshod over those rights.
Needless to day Laws isn’t arguing for referenda for major policy, just the ones he deems to be issues of morality.
No he’s not, he’s asking for referendum on policies he doesn’t like and thinks the referendum will stop.
“The left helps the poor help themselves”
“Green Party cares about the environment”
“$5 per day will give 3 kids breakfast and lunch”
“Holiday highway will be used by all people”
I suspect bad12 is correct. When your $2M home sells for $3M, how much tax do you pay on that $1M of unearned income?
That’s right, zero.
and pay little or no tax nett of credits.
The whole net tax argument the Right wing makes. If the bottom tier of society had a chance to accumulate some net assets and some decent income, perhaps they could become net tax payers too.
When your $2M home sells for $3M, how much tax do you pay on that $1M of unearned income?
Incorrect. It’s not income, it’s capital gain.
That’s right, zero.
No, it depends. If you sell a house with the intention of making a capital gain then that gain is taxed.
If you’re a speculator you buy a property always intending to sell it. The property is treated like “trading stock” and your profit or loss from selling the property is taxable. Speculating can be a one-off purchase and sale of a property.
If you’re a dealer you are similar to a speculator buying properties for resale, but you have established a regular pattern of buying and selling. This includes rental properties.
Dealers and speculators must pay income tax on any gain they make from reselling their property.
– IRD
Dealing and speculating has investigated more rigourously by IRD over recent years.
Of course not, CV. “Income” is something common plebs have to work for. “Capital gain” is the reward rich people get for being so much cleverer than the rest of us.
IRD: “as a general rule, buying and selling a family/private home usually has no tax consequences. However, if a property is purchased with the intention of resale, or there is a regular pattern of buying and selling homes, then this may be considered property speculation or dealing for tax purposes.”
If you buy a house for $2m with the intent of selling it for capital gain then that capital gain is taxable.
An increase from $2m to $3m would indicate it was owned for a substaintial period of time or it was improved or speculated, the latter being more likely to be taxable gain.
Pete, from personal experience, I can tell you that your assertions are wholly incorrect.
It has to be demonstrated that you are trading in property. If you buy a whole bunch of properties and then flog them off in such a way that you are not seen to be reliant on the proceeds, it is deemed a capital gain,
“If you’re an investor you buy a property to use it to generate ongoing rental income and not with any firm intent of resale. The property is a capital asset and any later profit or loss from selling the property is capital and isn’t taxable (apart from clawing back any depreciation, which is now recoverable). ”
A builder, on the other hand, who makes his living building and selling and building and selling and building etc, is trading in property because that is his/her primary business.
The irony of this shouldn’t be lost on anyone; I paid no tax on capital gains, yet built nothing.
The builder who actually constructed the properties was taxed to the hilt.
The problem here is not just the inequity of this current situation, but the fact that the law is so vague and we’re debating the interpretation of who is luiable or not liable to pay tax. Any law so open to subjective interpretation is not a particularly helpful law.
Far easier and fairer if both dealers and rental investors paid the same amount. Then everyone is treated reasonably equally.
Then we don’t arrive at silly propositions such as your artificial definitions, a-la “Incorrect. It’s not income, it’s capital gain.”
There are valid arguments about what capital gains should be taxed – to do that the difference between income and capital gain is important, and not an ‘artificial definition’.
As is the definition of a family home. It would be easier and perhaps more fair for capital gain to be taxed on them as well. But there would be significant flow on consequences.
And you are missing a basic difference, flicking on or sitting on.
A builder (or a doer upper) can claim on any expenses but any capital gained is taxable. Houses in this category are usually turned over quickly.
Most rental investors hold a property for quite a few years.They will usually gain capital but not always, and that will be offset by inflation and possibly by expenses. If a rental investor sells a house quickly they are more likely to lose on expenses and capital.
The problem here is not just the inequity of this current situation, but the fact that the law is so vague and we’re debating the interpretation of who is luiable or not liable to pay tax. Any law so open to subjective interpretation is not a particularly helpful law.
QFT
Our laws are a mess and I think a government should be looking at writing new law from the ground up and throwing the old laws and precedents out. The old laws and precedents really are just getting in the way of rationalising our laws.
So, 20 out of 60 comments in this thread so far have the word ‘Jenny’ in them, and as far as I can tell they are all about Jenny’s thing about CV.
33%, I think that beats Pete George by quite a way.
The difference between what Jenny is doing, and the general rough and tumble here, is that she is now stalking CV and being a tr*ll. It doesn’t particularly surprise me that you don’t get the difference, you always seem to not understand the culture of this place, or certain social norms here.
And you don’t get the difference between Jenny ‘stalking’ CV and what you’re doing?
You said ” I haven’t been reading hardly any of the comments on Syria, so I don’t know what Jenny is on about” but “tedious and interferes with the flow of conversation”. And then “I’m sick of it.”
Are you trying to talk up a bitch to ban campaign against Jenny based on that?
Yeah it’s a pity that both party’s cannot engage in the debate without it becoming personal, it makes the points both are trying to make a hard read,
We all need remember here that we all, well maybe excluding 🙄 ,are representative of the thoughts and ideals of the broad Left here and when we begin to address each others ideas on a personal basis the actual Facts become lost in the heat of personal vindication…
Rich people are more unethical and likely to cheat, break the law or plain behave badly towards other people, a new study has found.
Rich people also shared “feelings of entitlement and inattention to the consequences of one’s actions on others” that may play into their moral decisions, study authors said.
ABC quoted the authors as saying the differences in ethical behavior could be explained, at least in part, by the upper-class participants’ more favorable attitude toward greed.
So, there we have it. Proof that the problems we face as a society (poverty, deprivation, inequality) stem almost wholly from the rich.
In follow-up laboratory studies, upper-class individuals were more likely to exhibit unethical decision-making tendencies (study 3), take valued goods from others (study 4), lie in a negotiation (study 5), cheat to increase their chances of winning a prize (study 6), and endorse unethical behavior at work (study 7)
Paul Brennan breaks down reading news item about deaths of New Zealand soldiers
National Radio, Sunday 5 August 2012
Anybody else hear this? Reading the 3 p.m. news, about the two New Zealand soldiers killed in Afghanistan, Paul Brennan started to choke up with emotion. It soon became clear he could not continue, and a brief snatch of music was put on. He returned after five or so seconds and read out only two more items in a drastically reduced news broadcast.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “I had a very big frog in my throat.”
Then at 4 p.m., Brennan started reading the same news item, and choked up again.
Time for the opposition to think about what they are doing.
Sadly, most of the Labour caucus are happy with what they’re doing. They keep failing, but they keep their jobs. It’s not like anything else matters to them.
I’d like to publicly apologise for remaining loyal to Labour at the last election. It was a sympathy vote for Goff (who had done OK in the campaign) but I should have switched to the Greens.
I seriously – stupidly – thought that after a defeat, Labour would change. I was wrong.
The results are entirely predictable, and everyone knows it. Including the fucking Labour caucus. They just don’t care.
Although i couldn’t bring myself to vote for Labour 2011 i too was impressed with the manner in which Goff campaigned, despite being maligned daily by the media He never at any point seemed to be deterred,
My belief is that had Goff not gone into the election blindsiding the blue collar working class with the message that a vote for Labour was a vote to raise the pension age another 2 years the out-come of the 2011 election would have been far far closer,
I am not saying that Labour would have won, but, on my reading the Maori Party would not at present be the Poodles of National had Goff not been handed such a poison chalice as an election policy,
My present reading of the polls is that after months of vocal opposition to asset sales both Shearer and Norman gave all and sundry a kick in the nuts by both announcing pompously on the same day that neither Labour or the Greens would be taxing those who bought the assets until they bled so as to enable a Labour/Green Government to put the assets back in the ownership of all the people,
Both Shearer and Norman need to harden the f**k up and decide exactly who they wish to represent in the electorate,it doesn’t take a mental giant to realize that the Slippery National Government has already BOUGHT the middle class by cleaning out the treasury and now with its intentions of selling off half the family silver via asset sales,
If the pair of them can gain an education thus far it is only a simple step to understand that with the addition of NZFirst and The Conservatives the middle class vote in New Zeland is all tapped out so the f**king pair of them can stop stooping to sucking at the tit of who can play Mr Straight ”i aint scaring the horses” the best and start talking as if they have something to offer the REAL working class that both their Party’s would traditionally be thougt to have seen as their voter bases…
My belief is that had Goff not gone into the election blindsiding the blue collar working class with the message that a vote for Labour was a vote to raise the pension age another 2 years the out-come of the 2011 election would have been far far closer,
Agreed. That BS shift to the Right lost Labour core votes without winning over any centre or Right votes. I reckon Labour lost 2-3 MPs out of it.
Aha, that’s my reading of it as well, had such not occurred i beleive that we would still have a Slippery lead National Government, But, He would not have had the luxury of being able to pass ANYTHING through the Legislature without the support of His whole coalition…
You can’t forget that Slippery is a gambler by trade and by training. A good one too, with good luck. He bet on an updraft from an AB win, amongst many other factors, and he got it. The tea tape scandal was a bit more of a firefight, but he played that one as well as he could, even after it started to go sideways.
I would think their successes in the members’ ballots (and yes, I tip my hat to Mr Dunne for his support) are positive initiatives, but we have a Westminster system consisting of a government and Her Majesty’s loyal opposition. They would be remiss in their constitutional duties if they failed to hold the government to account and force it to make its case for its policies.
Secondly, remember that MMP was chosen – twice – because it slows down government. Consensus has to be built. We have no upper chamber, no head of state who can in practice veto legislation, no fundamental rights the courts can use to overturn outrageous legislation. The scrutiny offered in the House and in Select Committee is the only safeguard we have against the tyranny of the majority. And a weak safeguard at that, as we learned with CERA. Sure, if being nice is a tool in achieving that role of scrutiny, fine. But to make it easy on the government or let it do what it wants is a constitutional path to nowhere. And I would expect no different from the opposition when Labour next takes the treasury benches.
Time for people to wake up and accept that that political system as we know it be is a bad joke, and not answering to this country an dhas not for some time…
Until some of those who are “comfortable” and vain/conceited enough that they think the political system is currently working for them, get a bloody good wake up call, we are going to continue to be pumped hard.
Wonder how many years until those “comfortable” people who may well have talked down at the “underclass”, find themselves facing becoming part of the “underclasss”
The fact so many still seem oblivious to where this is all heading makes me shake my head!
EDIT: No the Greens will not be the left for long, and those who vote for them, will be in for a very nasty shock in good time!
Wonder how many years until those “comfortable” people who may well have talked down at the “underclass”, find themselves facing becoming part of the “underclasss”
They already are but they’re either a) not aware of that yet or b) in denial of it.
Well, it’s been a while since Labour went down to 32% in a CM poll (haven’t really looked at the 3news one). For much of the last year, 32% has been an object of anticipation.
yep – they flogged off the council owned bus company to the private sector for a couple of mil. Reckoned it solved conflict of interest issues so they could improve the bus services.
Buses still shit, just more expensive.
Another ‘polling amusement’, who here really believes that NZFirst are polling under the 4% it did at the 2008 elections after months of attacks from both the press and opposition???,
If you have to suspend your belief over any part of a poll, (based upon logic), then it makes the other parts of the poll just as suspect…
It makes you have to ask yet again, WHEN are they getting rid of this loser? He’s nothing but the BUTT of Shonkys jokes. He CANNOT string 2 words together without the stammering. He was put in AGAINST the wishes of the rank and file. He is USELESS! The sooner he goes and takes the rabble that call themselves Labour with him, them maybe Labour can do the serious rebuilding that it needs. At the moment 2014 National will win again, unless Shonky is caught with his hand in the cookie jar or committing murder.
“State housing is a function of central Government – it’s that simple'” says Tamaki Housing Group’s Sue Henry.
PRESS RELEASE: Tamaki Housing Group: “National Government threatening to break their promise on market rents.”
“It’s reprehensible for greedy self-interested church, iwi and charity groups to even contemplate stepping into this role.”
“It’s ironical that only a week ago, Housing Minister Phil Heatley said on nationwide television that market rents would not be reintroduced for Housing NZ tenants.
“Why should Housing NZ tenants be forced through rent increases they can’t afford to subsidise multiple, parasitical groups in the private sector?”
“Shame on Dianne Robertson CEO of Auckland City Mission, and Major Campbell Roberts, CEO of the Salvation Army, for helping to concoct this policy beside developers, international bankers and property consultants, to push for temporary tenancy agreements, higher rents and the privatisation of the State housing stock (through transferrals) and destabilisation of 70,000 vulnerable families across New Zealand.”
“It is a disgrace to discover that Dianne Robertson CEO of Auckland City Mission, and Major Campbell Roberts, CEO of the Salvation Army, are members of the ‘invitation only’ hugely powerful, private sector corporate lobby group – the Committee for Auckland,” concludes Ms Henry.
Ummm i am happy to attack National and it’s Housing Minister on matters of ‘fact’ and over the lowering of the level of the numbers overall of State Houses,
But,
I cannot see where the Herald article you have linked to shows Heatley threatening to bring back the ugly ‘market rent regime’ for State Houses,
In the Herald article provided Heatley says when talking about what His CONsultants group will be looking at vis a vis State House rentals ”Nothing will be ruled out EXCEPT market rents”…
LOL. So says the man who has been banned multiple times for behaviour that pisses off lots of people and disrupts the site.
By and large, I do not support anything PG says, but I do think that he has never deserved to be banned even for 5 minutes. You can simply ignore what he says if you don’t like it! (As I ignore idiots such as QoT and TR Putz..)
The rolleyes smiley campaign against him is incredibly juvenile.
It’d be a lot more convincing if she’d stop consistently mentioning me … and then engaging with me when I point this out … and then throwing around truly hilarious accusations about my gender, location, and hair colour.
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Simon Clark. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). This year you will be lied to! Simon Clark helps prebunk some misleading statements you'll hear about climate. The video includes ...
It is all very well cutting the backrooms of public agencies but it may compromise the frontlines. One of the frustrations of the Productivity Commission’s 2017 review of universities is that while it observed that their non-academic staff were increasing faster than their academic staff, it did not bother to ...
Buzz from the Beehive Two speeches delivered by Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters at Anzac Day ceremonies in Turkey are the only new posts on the government’s official website since the PM announced his Cabinet shake-up. In one of the speeches, Peters stated the obvious: we live in a troubled ...
1. Which of these would you not expect to read in The Waikato Invader?a. Luxon is here to do business, don’t you worry about thatb. Mr KPI expects results, and you better believe itc. This decisive man of action is getting me all hot and excitedd. Melissa Lee is how ...
…it has a restricted jurisdiction which must not be abused: it is not an inquisitionNOTE – this article was published before the High Court ruled that Karen Chhour does not have to appear before the Waitangi Tribunal Gary Judd writes – The High Court ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – One of reasons Oranga Tamariki exists is to prevent child neglect. But could the organisation itself be guilty of the same?Oranga Tamariki’s statistics show a decrease in the number and age of children in care. “There are less children ...
David Farrar writes: Graeme Edgeler wrote in 2017: In the first five years after three strikes came into effect 5248 offenders received a ‘first strike’ (that is, a “stage-1 conviction” under the three strikes sentencing regime), and 68 offenders received a ‘second strike’. In the five years prior to ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in politics. That’s refreshing and will be extremely ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the two days to 6:06am on Thursday, April 25:Politics: PM Christopher Luxon has set up a dual standard for ministerial competence by demoting two National Cabinet ministers while leaving also-struggling ...
Hi,Today I mainly want to share some of your thoughts about the recent piece I wrote about success and failure, and the forces that seemingly guide our lives. But first, a quick bit of housekeeping: I am doing a Webworm popup in Los Angeles on Saturday May 11 at 2pm. ...
It is hard to see what Melissa Lee might have done to “save” the media. National went into the election with no public media policy and appears not to have developed one subsequently. Lee claimed that she had prepared a policy paper before the election but it had been decided ...
Open access notablesIce acceleration and rotation in the Greenland Ice Sheet interior in recent decades, Løkkegaard et al., Communications Earth & Environment:In the past two decades, mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet has accelerated, partly due to the speedup of glaciers. However, uncertainty in speed derived from satellite products ...
Buzz from the Beehive A statement from Children’s Minister Karen Chhour – yet to be posted on the Government’s official website – arrived in Point of Order’s email in-tray last night. It welcomes the High Court ruling on whether the Waitangi Tribunal can demand she appear before it. It does ...
Mr Bombastic:Ironically, the media the academic experts wanted is, in many ways, the media they got. In place of the tyrannical editors of yesteryear, advancing without fear or favour the interests of the ruling class; the New Zealand news media of today boasts a troop of enlightened journalists dedicated to ...
It's hard times try to make a livingYou wake up every morning in the unforgivingOut there somewhere in the cityThere's people living lives without mercy or pityI feel good, yeah I'm feeling fineI feel better then I have for the longest timeI think these pills have been good for meI ...
In 1974, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Nixon, finding that the President was not a King, but was subject to the law and was required to turn over the evidence of his wrongdoing to the courts. It was a landmark decision for the rule ...
Every day now just seems to bring in more fresh meat for the grinder.In their relentlessly ideological drive to cut back on the “excessive bloat” (as they see it) of the previous Labour-led government, on the mountains of evidence accumulated in such a short period of time do not ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Megan Valére SosouMarket gardening site of the Itchèléré de Itagui agricultural cooperative in Dassa-Zoumè (Image credit: Megan Valère Sossou) For the residents of Dassa-Zoumè, a city in the West African country of Benin, choosing between drinking water and having enough ...
Buzz from the Beehive Melissa Lee – as may be discerned from the screenshot above – has not been demoted for doing something seriously wrong as Minister of ...
Morning in London Mother hugs beloved daughter outside the converted shoe factory in which she is living.Afternoon in London Travelling writer takes himself and his wrist down to A&E, just to be sure. Read more ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – The recent announcement of the University Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Peter Gluckman, makes very clear where the Government’s focus and priorities lie. The remit of the Advisory Group is that Group members will consider challenges and opportunities for improvement in the university sector including: ...
Eric Crampton writes – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand desperately wants to find reasons to have workstreams in climate change. It makes little sense. They’ve run another stress test on the banks looking to see if they could find a prudential regulation case. They couldn’t. They ...
Rob MacCullough writes – Pundits from the left and the right are arguing that National’s Fast Track Bill that is designed to speed up infrastructure decisions could end up becoming mired in a cesspool of corruption. Political commentator ...
Looking at the headlines this morning it’s hard to feel anything other than pessimistic about the future of humanity.Note that I’m not speaking about the future of mankind, but the survival of our humanity. The values that we believe in seem to be ebbing away, by the day.Perhaps every generation ...
Swabbing mixed breed baby chicks to test for avian influenzaUh oh. Bird flu – often deadly to humans – is not only being transmitted from infected birds to dairy cows, but is now travelling between dairy cows. As of last Friday, Bloomberg News reports, there were 32 American dairy herds ...
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 ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
Photo # 1 I am a huge fan of Singapore’s approach to housing, as described here two years ago by copying and pasting from The ConversationWhat Singapore has that Australia does not is a public housing developer, the Housing Development Board, which puts new dwellings on public and reclaimed land, ...
Buzz from the Beehive Reactions to news of the government’s readiness to make urgent changes to “the resource management system” through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes don’t go far enough. Greenpeace says ...
I’m starting to wonder if Anna Burns-Francis might be the best political interviewer we’ve got. That might sound unlikely to you, it came as a bit of a surprise to me.Jack Tame can be excellent, but has some pretty average days. I like Rebecca Wright on Newshub, she asks good ...
Chris Trotter writes – Willie Jackson is said to be planning a “media summit” to discuss “the state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalism”. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes – This morning [April 21], the Wellington High Court is hearing a judicial review brought by Hon. Karen Chhour, the Minister for Children, against a decision of the Waitangi Tribunal. This is unusual, judicial reviews are much more likely to brought against ministers, rather than ...
Both of Parliament’s watchdogs have now ripped into the Government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s political economy and beyond on the morning of Tuesday, April 23 are:The Lead: The Auditor General,John Ryan, has joined the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Sarah SpengemanPeople wait to board an electric bus in Pune, India. (Image credit: courtesy of ITDP) Public transportation riders in Pune, India, love the city’s new electric buses so much they will actually skip an older diesel bus that ...
The infrastructure industry yesterday issued a “hurry up” message to the Government, telling it to get cracking on developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects.The hiatus around the change of Government has seen some major projects cancelled and others delayed, and there is uncertainty about what will happen with the new ...
Hi,Over the weekend I revisited a podcast I really adore, Dead Eyes. It’s about a guy who got fired from Band of Brothers over two decades ago because Tom Hanks said he had “dead eyes”.If you don’t recall — 2001’s Band of Brothers was part of the emerging trend of ...
Buzz from the Beehive The 180 or so recipients of letters from the Government telling them how to submit infrastructure projects for “fast track” consideration includes some whose project applications previously have been rejected by the courts. News media were quick to feature these in their reports after RMA Reform Minister Chris ...
It would not be a desirable way to start your holiday by breaking your back, your head, or your wrist, but on our first hour in Singapore I gave it a try.We were chatting, last week, before we started a meeting of Hazel’s Enviro Trust, about the things that can ...
Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure that the new Fast-Track Approvals Bill – currently being pushed through by the ...
Feel worried. Shane Jones and a couple of his Cabinet colleagues are about to be granted the power to override any and all objections to projects like dams, mines, roads etc even if: said projects will harm biodiversity, increase global warming and cause other environmental harms, and even if ...
Bryce Edwards writes- The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. ...
Michael Bassett writes – If you think there is a move afoot by the radical Maori fringe of New Zealand society to create a parallel system of government to the one that we elect at our triennial elections, you aren’t wrong. Over the last few days we have ...
Without a corresponding drop in interest rates, it’s doubtful any changes to the CCCFA will unleash a massive rush of home buyers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, April 22 included:The Government making a ...
Sunday was a lazy day. I started watching Jack Tame on Q&A, the interviews are usually good for something to write about. Saying the things that the politicians won’t, but are quite possibly thinking. Things that are true and need to be extracted from between the lines.As you might know ...
In our Weekly Roundup last week we covered news from Auckland Transport that the WX1 Western Express is going to get an upgrade next year with double decker electric buses. As part of the announcement, AT also said “Since we introduced the WX1 Western Express last November we have seen ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 29 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Stats NZ releases its statutory report on Census 2023 tomorrow.Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivers a pre-Budget speech at ...
A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 14, 2024 thru Sat, April 20, 2024. Story of the week Our story of the week hinges on these words from the abstract of a fresh academic ...
The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. The Government says this will ...
This is a column to say thank you. So many of have been in touch since Mum died to say so many kind and thoughtful things. You’re wonderful, all of you. You’ve asked how we’re doing, how Dad’s doing. A little more realisation each day, of the irretrievable finality of ...
Identifying the engine type in your car is crucial for various reasons, including maintenance, repairs, and performance upgrades. Knowing the specific engine model allows you to access detailed technical information, locate compatible parts, and make informed decisions about modifications. This comprehensive guide will provide you with a step-by-step approach to ...
Introduction: The allure of racing is undeniable. The thrill of speed, the roar of engines, and the exhilaration of competition all contribute to the allure of this adrenaline-driven sport. For those who yearn to experience the pinnacle of racing, becoming a race car driver is the ultimate dream. However, the ...
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Struts are an essential part of a car’s suspension system. They are responsible for supporting the weight of the car and damping the oscillations of the springs. Struts are typically made of steel or aluminum and are filled with hydraulic fluid. How Do Struts Work? Struts work by transferring the ...
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Introduction Computer-Assisted Translation (CAT) has revolutionized the field of translation by harnessing the power of technology to assist human translators in their work. This innovative approach combines specialized software with human expertise to improve the efficiency, accuracy, and consistency of translations. In this comprehensive article, we will delve into the ...
In today’s digital age, mobile devices have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. Among the vast array of portable computing options available, iPads and tablet computers stand out as two prominent contenders. While both offer similar functionalities, there are subtle yet significant differences between these two devices. This ...
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Voice Memos is a convenient app on your iPhone that allows you to quickly record and store audio snippets. These recordings can be useful for a variety of purposes, such as taking notes, capturing ideas, or recording interviews. While you can listen to your voice memos on your iPhone, you ...
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Powering up and shutting down your ASUS laptop is an essential task for any laptop user. Locating the power button can sometimes be a hassle, especially if you’re new to ASUS laptops. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on where to find the power button on different ASUS laptop ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
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Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
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Interesting Occupy Christchurch oral history project, aiming to get it off the ground using crowd funding:
https://www.pledgeme.co.nz/Crowd/Details/313#review
As the MSM are already writing off the occupy movement, I reckon it’s a good idea to put some of the NZ/Aotearoa voices from the movement on record.
Also will be interesting to see how successful the crowd funding is.
According to Colonial Viper the peaceful Occupy protesters are all foreigners that fully deserve to be mowed down with machine gun fire.
Oh wait, I am mistaken. Colonial Viper is a racist who thinks this treatment only suitable for Arabs.
[ Jenny. This daily goading of CV is getting very tiresome. See this as a polite request for you to pull your head in – Bill]
Links to back up that statement please.
A person who supports a mass murderer and torturer deserves a daily goading, (at least). CVs poisonous racism and Islamaphobia is on open display on this website and is not being challenged by you Bill.
I will continue to confront racists and apologists for crimes against humanity. Bill, you can protect them from my criticism if you choose.
But I will not ignore racists or stop criticising them.
Personally I think it would be more honourable for you to either argue against my position using facts, or argue CV’s case if that is what you feel.
Sincerely Jenny
[ If you have a position on events in Syria, then by all means argue your case in the appropriate thread or section of open mike. For days now, you’re basic thrust has been to inaccurately malign CV at every opportunity while showing no concern for how your off topic interjections mess up debate/discussion. To the best of my knowledge there have been no comments made by CV that exhibit either ‘poisoness racism’ or ‘Islamaphobia’. If you can link to such comments then I strongly suggest that you do so. Otherwise, and bearing in mind that I’ve had enough of all this nonsense, end it. Not one more word pertaining to CV’s supposed racism, Islamophobia or otherwise using his comments to ‘have a go’. I hope that’s clear. I really dislike imposing ‘holidays’ on people, but from where I’m sitting it appears you are intent on packing your bags. Please prove me wrong. – Bill]
Jenny I don’t have a problem with you arguing against racism, but you engage in slander far too often for your posts to be that useful. Many of your posts about CV contain content that isn’t fact based and is merely your (negative) assertion/opinion. You seem to not understand the difference between fact and opinion. Unfortunately it’s starting to make me question the integrity of everything else you say.
Speaking of facts, are you going to respond to my post 1.1.1?
I think a Citation is required here Weka.
citation:
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-05082012/comment-page-1/#comment-502588
You will have to better than that Weka.
I have characterised Colonial Viper’s depiction of the Arab people who have waged the Arab Spring as being agents of the West as “racist”.
Colonial Viper’s subtext, being that the Arabs are too cowardly and timid to take on these mostly Western backed regimes.
You will notice that CV himself has never defended himself from these accusations.
I imagine though that he has submitted many bitter complaints to the moderators on being challenged on his racism.
[No Jenny, s/he hasn’t. We get the point, you have a thing against CV. Please take the hint from the growing response here and consider your point well made eh? – thanks – r0b]
I said that you post assertion as fact. You asked for my back up. I posted the link.
example:
You’ve since acknowledged that CV never said or implied such a thing. You lied, and you used the lie to smear CV. It’s bullshit.
Weka I think it is a bit of stretch to accuse me of lying. where is the lie? As I have admitted I was indulging in satire to make a point. The point being while he is content to see Arab Spring protesters mowed down by the army on the orders of the government, that even Colonial Viper (hopefully) would object to see unarmed protesters being mown down with machine guns if it happened in this country.
From what I read, that’s far from being the only thing going on in your imagination.
As for a response to your comment 1.1.1. To make it clear I was using satire to make a point. CV did not actually say that peaceful New Zealand unarmed protesters were all foreigners that deserved to be shot to death. But, he has argued this very case for the peaceful protesters who first confronted Bashar Assad’s regime.
right. But can you see that for anyone not inside your head, or aware of your feelings about CV, the post about Occupy is nothing close to satire and makes absolutely no sense. Any new reader here is going to think CV is an arse. For regulars it just comes across as someone with a grudge who uses off topic posts at every chance to have a go at someone else.
Fair enough if you are trying to support CV, but “uses off topic posts at every chance to have a go at someone else” is hardly out of the ordinary here. Are you speaking against repeat harassment here in general, or just in this case?
🙄
I’m not supporting CV, I’m objecting to Jenny’s behaviour. It’s tedious and interferes with the flow of conversation. I haven’t been reading hardly any of the comments on Syria, so I don’t know what Jenny is on about. From the little I know of CV, her criticisms don’t match outside of the Syria issue, and I doubt they even make sense within the Syria issue. She just comes across as irrational or with a bug up her arse, and as I’ve pointed out doesn’t seem to understand what arguing the facts is. I’m sick of it.
The difference between what Jenny is doing, and the general rough and tumble here, is that she is now stalking CV and being a tr*ll. It doesn’t particularly surprise me that you don’t get the difference, you always seem to not understand the culture of this place, or certain social norms here.
Either that or your question is a disingenuous nod to how you feel you’ve been treated.
The difference between what Jenny is doing, and the general rough and tumble here, is that she is now stalking CV and being a tr*ll.
That you would make a statement like that suggests that you seem to not understand the culture of this place, and are oblivious to certain social norms here.
I don’t have a problem with either CV or Jenny, I don’t follow much of either but it’s easy to ignore what doesn’t interest you, if you choose. Some choose to stalk, that’s obviously frowned on at times, but it is common and often supported.
Please give me an example of someone being stalked in the past week, other than CV.
Whether you have a problem with CV or Jenny or not is completely irrelevant. What matters is whether it affects the site. Plenty of people, including two moderators, say it does. You really think that your personal experience matters more than that?
LOL. So says the man who has been banned multiple times for behaviour that pisses off lots of people and disrupts the site.
“But, he has argued this very case for the peaceful protesters who first confronted Bashar Assad’s regime”
Cite for this.
This is what Bill is talking about. CV has pointed out that AQ and other groups are involved in the syrian civil war. He’s right about that. Here’s an interview with some of them:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/30/al-qaida-rebels-battle-syria?CMP=twt_gu
From what I’ve seen you think that all this is just propaganda, and from that you make the rather astounding leap that CV is a a racist islamaphobe who bla blah blah. Your failure to actually argue case is what the problen seems to be.
The regime of Basher Assad beloved by so called Western leftists is condemned by the elected Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas
http://kiaoragaza.wordpress.com/2012/08/04/palestinian-refugees-shelled-by-syrian-regime-14-dead/
…….I think you have a few issues…………………
What this shows graphically, is where the blind get it so very wrong when doggedly beieving in a cause.
The intention is good (although becoming questionable given the rantings), the cause is worthy, but the lack of holistic self awareness casts a very dark shaddow of negative energy in the direction of the targeted recipients of the good intentions.
Having spent some time participating in the local active scene, it appears that it is all too common, for those involved to lack the self awareness, and hence the abilities to really make a difference. In fact they become a driver for turning people away from good causes and important issues, who might otherwise build numbers to make some genuine positive change.
Because of these types of people, the active community is destined to always be “fringe loonies”, and that is a real shame, but will not change until some people of integrity, and leadership appear, and get involved.
In the meantime, the Jennys of the active world will in fact help the well intended causes to lose ground, by simply turning people away through shear blody minded ignorance!
There is also the issue of being unable to take feedback from one’s peers.
Depends who one sees as peers, if indeed they see things that way at all.
The other point is that many on here have posted links about Syria, cv, bill, P’s B, myself, and others, yet its seems only cv is getting the treatment, which indicates some other problem/factors are at play.
Pick a number….
Yeah that’s an interesting observation. Disagreement over my energy depletion vs climate change position preceeded Jenny’s objections to my Syria statements.
Plus the criticisms of the middle classes. It’s not like you’re the only person who makes those points.
That is right CV you have generally been the voice that leads the charge for conservative BAU fossil fuel use that will condemn us all.
It came as little surprise to me that you also support the status quo in the Middle East.
Are the two linked?
Yes, in that they are both a product of a misanthropic world view that argues that human beings are powerless to defeat repressive political regimes, or powerful vested interest.
I have always begged to differ and have cited examples from New Zealand and world history to disprove this widely perceived world view.
PS. And you shouldn’t be so coy CV. I have made this “interesting observation” to you previously myself.
More mistaken opinion stated as fact.
Please provide three links to places where CV has promoted fossil fuel use in the way that conservative typically do, and where he has lead the way on this.
It is the blind supporters of murders and torturers who turn people away from the left.
People that turn a blind eye to Al Qaeda and the like? Yeah, it’s a problem.
Not afraid to take a stand, New Zealand’s own Anita McNaught goes to the front line.
http://kiaoragaza.wordpress.com/2012/08/04/rebel-fighters-consolidating-hold-in-east-aleppo-reporter/
A deserved slap in the face for kiwi quislings like Colonial Viper who support the Assad regime in it’s murder and torture and deride and defame the Syrian people’s attempts to rid themselves of the tyrant.
I was trying to refrain from commenting on what has gone on today re your apparent obsession with CV, but obviously everything that has been said, including by the moderators, has gone over your head and you could not help yourself with this latest:
A deserved slap in the face for kiwi quislings like Colonial Viper who support the Assad regime in it’s murder and torture and deride and defame the Syrian people’s attempts to rid themselves of the tyrant.
If you had left out ‘like CV’ , I would feel some respect for you and your views, but you have now lost me and I will no longer be reading any of your comments.
This is just the propaganda put about by the regime. By parroting it, it is you PB who is willfully turning a blind eye to the mass murder of peaceful civilian protesters and the torture and murder of the families of army deserters that preceded the armed insurrection.
New York Times describes increasing religious radicalisation of Syrian conflict, and role of foreign fighters
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/world/middleeast/as-syrian-war-drags-on-jihad-gains-foothold.html?pagewanted=all
“This is just the propaganda put about by the regime. By parroting it, it is you PB who is willfully turning a blind eye to the mass murder of peaceful civilian protesters and the torture and murder of the families of army deserters that preceded the armed insurrection”
–Where to begin with this one…
1: Propaganda from the regime – What regime would have the control over the links posted from the various sources, we have been posting, and where does Al Jazeera, and Anita McNaught fit into that regime you talk about? Sounds all very confused to me Jenny, not to mention contradictory!
2: Mass Murder of peaceful civilian protesters – You keep spouting this, yet can’t recall seeing where you provided a link which was not easily negated by many others. And I have not heard you make any mention of the numerous Syrians who actually support Assad, I guess that doesn’t much matter, cos it makes a rather big hole on your belief system.
3: Deserters – Um, yeah there has been a heap of them right, but there has been many more caught and killed who have been shipped into Syria to fight the military, who are deserters and mercenaries who have been murdering and killing innocent civillians too, yet you continue to ignore these deserters who are a rag tag bunch of rent a jihadi working for the paycheck of the Qatari. Saudi, NATO warmongers
4: Speaking of Qatar, Bharain, Saudi etc – No mention from you about the civillians getting crushed on regular basis, murdered, tortured etc by those regimes, unless I missed it, another rather gaping hole in your discussion points
Jenny the key thing to remember is that on any side of a debate, no one can be entirely right or wrong, there is simply too many complex issue at play here, it can only be a case of read as many points of views and materials from as many sources as it take to form an opinion, then keep reading more and be prepared for your opinion to evolve, thats really the best any of us can do eh. Sticking to a position which has been reasonably well proven to be incorrect, and then hurling abuse at people who point this out, really just makes you lose credibility, and also negatively impacts how well your message could be recieved, surely you can see that is unhelpful to those you claim to support?
In war, truth is the first casualty. Aeschylus Greek tragic dramatist (525 BC – 456 BC)
“This is just the propaganda put about by the regime.”
Here’s an interview conducted by a war correspondent with some of the rebels. I’ll include a longish quote because I have the feeling you’re not inclined to read links, so it will pay to get the evidence into this thread:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/30/al-qaida-rebels-battle-syria?CMP=twt_gu
That describes defectors from the regime, joining up with the FSA, becoming disillusioned with the capabilities of the FSA and hooking up with Al Qaeda. Which is entirely understandable and predictable. It’s what happens in civil wars. It is not some romantic fucking game where the good guys win as long as their hearts stay pure.
It is entirely predictiable and expected that AQ will move into the chaos of Syria, and just as predictible that the rebels will see this as usefull. Denying it is just ignorant.
Here’s another link:
http://www.rt.com/news/syrian-host-saeed-executed-868/
That describes the kidnapping and killing of a tv presenter by the rebels. Again, entirely the sort of thing you expect to see happenning when pluralism breaks down in a country going through a civil war. This journo was broadcasting propagnda, so they captured him and slaughtered him, and are using his slaughter in their own propaganda. That’s what civil war looks like.
So what do you think should be done?
Be specific. I want to hear what you think the NZ govt should do, and what you think ‘the left’ should do.
And here’s a link to the statement from the group that excecuted the journalist:
http://austintice.blogspot.co.nz/2012/08/web-resources-on-alleged-execution-of.html#!/2012/08/web-resources-on-alleged-execution-of.html
“The regime of Basher Assad beloved by so called Western leftists…”
Really?!
Gosh.
I must’ve missed the email instructing me to love Assad.
So, how’s that worship of Dear Leader working out for you, Jen?
By the way, Jenny, in case I shatter your delusions, you might want to take a squizz at this: http://fmacskasy.wordpress.com/2012/02/29/bloggers-lament-the-ultimate-sacrifice-for-freedom/
Whatever weird thing you’re doing, I think this is closer to reality.
It seems clear to me Bill that you are taking sides, many times CV has supported a proven mass murderer and torturer. I also see that further down this thread you also object to me challenging CV for his continual support for continueing with policies that will seriously increase global warming.
I also notice that you have never criticised CV for deriding those he scapegoats as “middle class”.
< 🙄 >
One man’s mass murderer and torturer is another’s freedom fighter.
Pardon me if I do not share your view of Al Queda as “freedom fighters”.
Seems like you start from the premise “Palestinian good, Israeli bad” and then go careering off on a tangent from there.
More thought required.
Thanks Carol, great project. Looks like they reached their target already too.
My apologies to Carol for disrupting her thread. I thought my satirical comment would be just passed by. But it seems the apologists for Assad decided to make a stand.
“My goal is to raise enough money for the recording equipment needed to conduct this oral history”
I suggest that this is not expensive equipment.
http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/SearchResults.aspx?searchType=all&searchString=voice+recorder&rptpath=all&type=Search&generalSearch_keypresses=15&generalSearch_suggested=14
It also seemed that whenever Police were there to uphold the law there were plenty of Occupy supporters recording “brutality”.. perhaps ask some of them?
What’s your point Mark? $1200 for the whole project, including self publishing a book and giving copies of the audio to various museums, doesn’t seem excessive. There is also a quality issue in recording oral histories that would affect what equipment was bought.
It’s a bargain basement price and won’t include paying for anyone’s time either.
Many people seem to think that because they got iPhoto and Garageband with their macbook that everything can be done for free now.
And they typically don’t understand the quality difference between professional/studio grade equipment and cheap consumer crap. A Sony consumer grade video camera might be $500. A Sony professional video camera might start at $50,000. And the entire range inbetween.
Indeed. And for this particular project the researcher is hoping to lodge the recordings in the archives of Alexander Turnbull, and other libraries and a museum. I understand they usually prefer “archival quality” recordings:
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/hands/preparation-a-guide-to-recording-oral-history
I have just watched the replay of The Nation on TV3 and more particularly the Colin Craig interview. Louisa Wall was great and really dominated. Craig achieved an unusual status, he was odious, overbearing and smarmy all at the one time. He kept on overtaking Wall who to her credit stood her ground and managed with some very concise responses ridiculed what he was saying.
Craig has some unusual views. Apparently homosexuality is a lifestyle choice while at the time is evidence of abuse as a child. He is also fully in favour of there being a referendum on the subject but is opposed the a Parliamentary Select Committee from hearing submissions on the bill. How undemocratic is that? Louisa’s response that New Zealand gave the vote to women in 1893 without the need for a referendum whereas it took Switzerland until 1971 for the first Canton to give women the vote with the benefit of a referendum.
IMHO the issue is purely one of human rights. Why should gay and lesbian couples be discriminated against?
The Green MPs are all supportive. There are 8 Labour MPs who have not declared a position or have not decided yet. Jones and Sio have not declared, Twyford, O’Connor, Cosgrove, Huo, Prasad and Robertson have declared they are undecided.
I hear that O’Connor, Robertson and O’Connor are unlikely to vote in favour.
Shame on them. MPs in a progressive party should prefer principle over red neck populism every time.
Louisa Wall has impressed me since her bill was drawn from the ballot, she has worked strongly and positively to get support, and uses good fact based arguments. I was a bit doubtful about her abilities, but she’s proven to be a very good MP.
Colin Craig keeps shooting anti marriage equality in the feet.
I don’t think MPs with different views should be shamed, all MPs have a right to vote on their conscience. Democracy shouldn’t demand everyone back one side.
Oops I meant to say Cosgrove. And if an MP in a progressive party does not support human rights then they should be shamed.
Interesting contrast between Wall and Cosgrove, who both had bills drawn at the same time.
Cosgrove, fading old school MP – his approach was a cranky attack on National saying if they didn’t support his bill it meant something irrelevant and totally unsupported by facts. He presumably chose his bill as a political attack weapon.
Wall, up and coming fresh approach MP – her approach was to work with MPs from other parties to build support for her bill based on well expressed facts. Her bill was the right approach at the right time and an very good example of an appropriate Member’s bill
Result.
Cosgrove’s bill is doomed from the start and largely ignored.
Wall’s bill looks assured of success with increasingly popular support.
🙄
Why would a gay MP be expected to vote against this Bill?
They wouldn’t, CV! I think it’s likely that 2 socially conservative Labour MP’s (O’Connor and Cosgrove) will abstain, but I would be very surprised if any MP on the left votes against the bill.
Ross Robertson, not Grant Robertson.
And if in a bizarro-world situation Grant R. did vote against it wouldn’t be unprecedented since Finlayson is already down as a “no”.
Wotz wrong with Finlayson? Maybe Colin Craig might know?
I have a question about the gay marriage bill.
According to the NZ Herald…
What legislation, i.e. which section of which act, would allow religious institutions to opt out of marrying same-sex couples?
Conversely, which section of which Act makes it compulsory for religious institutions to marry anyone???,
I was always under the impression that a couple wishing to marry in a church had to ask the churches permission…
Human Rights Act 1993
Section 21 Prohibited grounds of discrimination
(1) For the purposes of this Act, the prohibited grounds of discrimination are—
…
(m) sexual orientation, which means a heterosexual, homosexual, lesbian, or bisexual orientation.
None of which is going to get Destiny Church (and others) to do anything differently.
Did I just hear that the Govt are getting a new valuation for the rezone houses, so they can charge the insurance companies.
How come they don’t use the 2007 valuations the forced on the red zoners. That would be a zero sum game. Are they expecting to make windfall profit. If that is so that is DISGRACEFUL.
You are assuming the valuation will be higher. It may not be.
I’ve always seen that 2007 valuation as fair as house prices had dropped in many parts of Christchurch since 2007.
One of our family friends had just gone unconditional, two days before the first quake, were selling their house and moving to Hamilton. They had sold for $20,000 less than the GV. The buyer was allowed to pull out as the house was wrecked and subsequently they received an extra $20,000.
The issue really isn’t the use of the valuation, the issue is the increased cost of land and the increased cost of building.
For many who are moving or have moved to other towns and to Aussie it’s a non-issue.
For those staying and building it the costs are higher than their previous home was worth.
In saying that many house insurance policies are now not for a value but for a square footage at a certain quality of material. A value shouldn’t matter in those circumstances.
14 Billion barrels of oil. Hmmm that should be worth a pretty penny, but who will get the money ? And who could be left with a cleanup?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/7416887/Oil-company-going-ahead-with-East-Coast-operation
there’s no way there’s 14B of proven, extractable oil. Those kinds of figures would put the oil field there amongst the largest in the world, up with the fields in Russia, Iraq and Iran.
Are you actually questioning the veracity of oil companies CV?
Or, are you just trying to downplay the size of this oil field as minor, and a little drilling won’t hurt anyone?
[ Jenny. Did you not see my moderators edit on your previous comment up the thread? Or did you choose to ignore it? I’ll be nice and assume the former. But any more comments from you that attempt to goad or snipe at CV will result in a ban. – Bill]
🙄
Bill, I thought you were only against my challenging of Colonial Viper’s support for a murderous torturer.
Bill are you now expanding this to protecting Colonial Viper’s open support for climate change pollution as well?
Bill is right – you should have been given this warning weeks ago. When did you stop beating your children?
On the scale of goading and sniping here this seems very mild. Is this isolated adminishing, or setting a new standard? (Serious question to establish an understanding of what is deemed unacceptable).
🙄
Bill. Did you not see my polite comment on your moderators edit up the thread.
I’ll be nice and assume you didn’t. Banning me while leaving Colonial Viper free to spew his warmist and racist propaganda unchallenged, risks bringing this site into disrepute.
If you disagree with what I am saying why not argue the case. Point out if you can where I am going wrong.
Or if you support Colonial Viper’s position why not say so. And argue in his defence.
But don’t try and claim that you are not partizan.
Your threats already against me already show that.
[ This one? http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-05082012/comment-page-1/#comment-502602. Yes. So now we are clear that all relevant comments have been seen. That’s good. – Bill]
FFS C.V. is allowed to have his own opinion… you calling him out everyday with an unprovoked snide remark is tiresome at best…
Just post your opinion and leave the personal shit out of it… all it does is detract from your argument…
Is CV Julian Assange??????
not touching that one with a freaking bargepole 🙂
“risks bringing this site into disrepute”
I am pretty sure this site is as low as it can go already.
Ko ngā wairua poke hātana e noho ana i te Paerewa nei
Hi Jenny
I think that really you fancy CV.He’s very intelligent! Ask him out on a date and you guys can discuss your apparent differences. :-))
sheesh! – Wish journos would do a bit of journalism. That 14 billion figure is basically b/s. If you go to TAG’s website, it takes about 2 seconds to find that they reckon there is 1.74 billion barrels of undiscovered conventional oil and 12.65 billion barrels of undiscovered unconventional oil http://www.tagoil.com/reports.asp
14B? Not talking it up to attract the money and more support? What is the basis for that figure?
Exploration consents had been granted months ago, bypassing the public and mayor. And going further back, a former Natz MP was paid by the oil company for consultancy work in the area before his parliamentary stint.
From what I wrote back in April from a post called “New Zealand’s Potential for Oil Independence in an Uncertain World”:
“Elsewhere in New Zealand limited exploration has occurred in the East Coast Basin, Canterbury Basin and the Great South Basin. Currently the most promising area is the East Coast Basin.Two fields, one north of Gisborne and one between Napier and Danneverke are currently being explored. TAG Oil believes there is an undiscovered resource potential of 12.65 billion barrels of unconventional original oil in place (OOIP) and 1.74 billion barrels of conventional OOIP. The potential recovery rates of 12% are similar to that of the North Dakota Bakken deposit in the United States. This means roughly 1.52 billion barrels of unconventional oil and 182 million barrels of conventionaloil are thought to be recoverable from this area.
Being generous and assuming TAG Oil’sestimates are correct there are currently 2.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil from both the Taranaki and East Coast Basin. This would give us another forty-two years before these fields ran dry at 2010 consumption. If we expect our economy to grow however we would assume that our oil consumption would grow each year and so it is likely we would require far more oil during this time period.”
http://www.southernlimitsnz.com/2012/04/new-zealands-potential-for-oil.html
Private oil company rights. So none of that oil can be directed to stay in NZ anyway. Unless the oil operations were nationalised.
This National led Government reneges on its governance role and supports business and environmental anarchy: http://localbodies-bsprout.blogspot.co.nz/2012/08/national-government-supports-anarchy.html
Well said.
+1
I don’t see this as just a National party problem. Labour are very quiet on this issue too.
It is a ridiculous state of affairs. We keep giving more & more taxpayers money to people so they can afford to pay their rent or mortgage and that money keeps pushing up the rent & mortgage. We can never catch up.
This country spent $22billion on social welfare last year ( including superannuation). At a rough guess I’d say about a quarter of that went to pay rents. $5billion a year of taxpayers money subsidising private landlords. The state could build 16,000 houses every year with that. It would take only what, 5-6years(?), to solve the housing problem and cut $5billion off the social welfare bill. What a crazy world this is.
+1
and considering that the government doesn’t have to pay interest on money it prints it also doesn’t need a financial return from building those houses. The social return, less poverty and illness etc, would be enough.
From the 1960’s onward the State has built less and less State Housing, engaged in various sell-offs to both tenants and where it got really ugly, to the private sector,
we only need to look at the basic riffmatic to gain an insight into ‘the problem’ on a basic level and such a basic level of understanding does not include the huge rise in the proportion of the have-nots’ in our society brought about by Roger(spit)nomics and the later governments that adhere to such warped ‘thinking’,
When we had a population of some 3 million souls we had as State Housing some 75,000 households, our economy had ’employment’ for most of them,
NOW, we have a population of 4 million+ and only 69,000 State Housing units, most of the tenants can find no employment in our economy and further to that the proportion of the have -nots in our society has risen at a far greater rate as would be expected within the 1 million growth of that population…
Exactly. Train more people to build houses. Employ more people. House more people. Spend a little bit extra. What is the point of Government if not ensuring the wellbeing of people!?
The problem with ‘the housing problem’ if you will excuse my lingo is that it is a problem on so many different levels of both society and economy that to address ‘it’ and propose solutions in just one comment is fraught to say the least,
I believe that there is a study going on at the moment with input from major players at the sharp end of ‘homelessness’, like the Wellington City Mission,Salvation Army etc which is quantifying the actual state of ‘homelessness’ in all it’s stages, not only the obvious street presence of homeless people but attempting to put numbers on those who are forced to share accomodation,(over-crowding),and the transient homeless who have the family/social networks to be able to keep themselves off of the streets without having the benefit of an actual home,
the proposal seems to include showing ‘the real cost’ of homelessness where in supposedly saving a dollar by ignoring the need for social housing Governments are actually being forced to spend more in the Health,Justice,and, Police budgets, something successive Governments seem more than happy to do,
One study(sorry i didn’t save the link),of 1 homeless male in the US showed that He cost the State 1 million dollars over a 10 year period in various costs in the Health,police and justice budgets, the particular individual may well have been the worse case scenario that could be found but it highlights the shortsightedness of New Zealand Governments ignoring low cost social housing…
PS, thanks for highlighting that article by the Herald’s Economics Editor, Brian Fallow, which i had missed, one of the more thoughtful pieces of journalism i have read from the august Herald…
As another afterthought to what i have commented above, it does seem totally f**king perverse that those who are at the sharp end of providing relief to the homeless are those that reliant upon charity in most cases are left to fund the study into the cost of homelessness,
Governments past and present with the 60 billion dollars a year gained from all of us via taxation should know the true cost to the economy that homelessness creates,
It’s easy for Heatley and English to sob about the cost of housing people as ‘unaffordable’ when there is no definitive knowledge of the costs from the other side of the bean counting ledger when we don’t…
Looks like the sky is going to fall on France’s head.
Anyone want to have a go at explaining, in lay terms, what is the perceived problem with a financial transaction tax?
It would mildly limit the profits made by the massive financial speculation industry, particularly in their use of manipulative, automated high frequency trading strategies.
Yeah, but I’m assuming that’s not the rationale given in opposition to an FTT
Perhaps, but its always useful to remember that’s where any objections are really coming from.
True. I would expect a philosophical objection to sharing wealth as well.
That is right CV, but a very “mild” restriction on the speculative Financial Transactions of the rich will reap huge rewards, returning $billions of dollars to the public purse. Enough money I have been informed that the amount of tax raised from a less than 1cent tax on every dollar on Financial Transactions would amount to the same amount of money presently made by regressive GST taxes on the poor.
Not sure about perceived problem, but put it this way, there are hundreds of billions of dollars worth of financial transactions (bets) made on the $NZ alone each, year and most if not all are untaxed, so imagine what could be done with a 1% sales tax applied. Globally I believe it to be tens-hudreds of trillions each year in financial transactions, all with zero behind them, yet all with real negtive consequences for sovereign nations down to individuals. Most if not all of those transactions are untaxed!1
The real issue is simply one of appetite, and powerful forces preventing such taxes on the financial industry coming to fruition. Finance controls all aspects of global goings on, from top down. People want to deny this, but the fact remains, the financial industry is all powerful, and controls those who would legislate such taxes.
If there was a global will to do so, this would happen, along with some big players being prosecuted and locked awy for a long time. Its not happened, and I question if it ever will, so on that basis, no appetite to prosecute, means no appetite to reform/tax to the benefit of the rest of us!
Yes, I understand the value of a FTT. What I’m asking is what rationales get used for saying it’s a bad idea. eg the sky will fall in.
Typical would be: too complex to implement, too costly to run, it would cause capital to flee, it would damage the financial services industry and hurt jobs in a valuable economic sector, financial business would go elsewhere, blah blah blah.
So nothing of substance then. Just rhetoric.
Here’s the way I look at it: the finance sector imposes their own taxes on many of our daily transactions now. They call them “charges” and “fees”. Credit card companies are an example. You buy something from a shop with your visa card, the credit company clips 2% from that transaction, from the store owner. You pull money out of an other bank ATM, you get clipped 50c or $1.
So, the thieving lying scumbags are absolutely fine with an FTT just as long as the proceeds are going to them.
The biggest tax is the interest that private banks charge us accounting for somewhere near 50% of all prices.
And that sums up the financial industry well. It’s nothing but a tax on everyone else and, due to the compounding nature of interest, that tax increases year by year until the financial industry pretty much owns everything.
Weka, there is no rationale, its plain and simple fear mongering my those who control the financial industry.
CV cites some excuses which are run out through the media, but the reality is simply that there is no appetite by TPTB/governments to go up against their pay masters.
I think the past 4.5 years should illustrate pretty clearly who is pulling the strings, and the rationale, or lack of it you are seeking, can be found in the same place!
Hi muzza, I get the dynamics behind why it doesn’t happen. I was just curious how it got spun. I’m assuming politicians (and others) don’t just say, oh we don’t want to do that because the people really running the country/world wouldn’t like it 😉
Yeah I hear you there Weka, and actually its not a topic which gets alot of air time anyway such as it is. It did get some time for a short while, but has largly been “off the menu” for reasons we seen to agree on, mostly to do with power and influence, which pretty much would tell the story.
Good question Weka – the objections I’ve heard so far leave me strangely unmoved.
Here you go Weka
For a very good introduction of what a Financial Transactions Tax is, you couldn’t go far past the Tax Justice New Zealand Fact Sheet.
http://www.nogstonfood.org/2011/08/18/the-case-for-financial-transaction-taxes-in-new-zealand-a-fact-sheet/
I had a quick look at the accommodation supplement and in Auckland it is a maximum of just over $200 per week. When doing the calculation the first $130 of rent is deducted and then 75% of the balance up to the cap can be claimed depending on income etc..
So if a low earning family receives the $200 from the state and pay the $130 themselves plus 25% of the difference then the state funds $10400 per annum and the individual some $7000+ p.a.
If the state borrows at 3.4% then it could fund a house worth some $300,000 and after paying interest instead of the supplement be cash square and have an asset. But the renter still pays some rent, say the $7000 which goes towards the maintenance and paying down the capital sum so over time the govt owns the house.
It would vary from region to region but where there is an actual shortage of housing stock then this should work. If there are surplus houses in a region then the govt shouldn’t add to the housing stock.
Can’t afford it, more likely “we can’t afford not to” and it would beat idiot roads hands down.
Could the state build these houses at 300k.
Interesting proposal.
The State, based upon ‘economies of scale’ could build the needed social housing for far less than 300 thousand per housing unit,
The fact is Money, or more to the point the expansion of the amount of money as wealth can be logically generated either by ‘borrowing’ to create increased production or ‘created’ to build an asset to the value of the money so created therefor justifying the ‘creation’ of that money,
The State in response to the Christchurch earthquakes built and located in Christchurch’s Hagley park a number of housing units at a cost of 100 thousand dollars each, it is actually not the cost of such State House building that is the problem here in any way, it is the WILL of Government to actually do so…
The only issued would be land…. If they made some available through law change then they could do it easily…..
Aha, it is really only ‘the Will’ of Government that holds us back in the housing area, sheesh the Chinese can build whole cities for 250,000 people from scratch in 3 years, roads, shopping malls, schools, everything, they make what we accomplish look primitive…
We might be able to build a sports stadium in 3 years. Maybe.
“Can’t afford it, more likely “we can’t afford not to” and it would beat idiot roads hands down.”
It ticks all the boxes doesn’t it? Whichever angle you look at it from it benefits the Crown accounts and provides both social & economic goods. More trade jobs, more disposable income for people on lower incomes, less Govt expenditure… pick a goal from the left side of the fence and the peg fits in the hole. And all Labour seem to want is a CGT that will push house prices & rents up further and cost the taxpayer even more in social welfare payments.
If labour were smart they would put half the CGT tax gained into paying off debt and the other half in tax breaks for those on lower incomes who can’t avoid taxes like capital gaingters.
Can you not see how daft that is? CGT will push rents up, there’s no question of that. So Labour bring in a CGT and give a tax rebate to lower income earners. That tax rebate goes to pay most, but not all, of the higher rents which in turn pays the landlords CGT which gets given back in rebates to the low income earner… only the portion of the pie gets smaller for the low income earner each time & they end up paying more & more of their nett income in housing costs.
Unless the housing problem is fixed first a CGT will be paid by the renters, not by the landlords. It will just make the poor even worse off.
Totally false. A CGT will suppress house price increases, making homes more affordable.
I appreciate the fact that the govt must sort out the affordable housing supply side.
Well, you do have to consider, CV, that even though logically there is no reason why a CGT would increase rents, plenty of greedy-bastard landlords will probably use it as an excuse to do so.
And that’s on a generous day as greedy landlords don’t need any excuse at all.
“… even though logically there is no reason why a CGT would increase rents,”
There is a cast-iron logical reason. Property investors are presently getting a return on their investment via a combination of rent and capital gain. If you cut back the capital gain through regulation the investor will claw back that loss in return through rents. Since every property investor will be affected the same it will result in all of them increasing rents over a period of time.
The one thing you can’t do is force the return on an investment down through taxes, the % return always bounces back unless the risk profile changes.
Of course you can, and it has been successfully done many times. Its called structuring the market to get the social and economic objectives you want for your country.
So we get rid of property speculators, and help create a class of professional landlords who make an income from renting properties, not trading them at increasing prices and increasing mortgage debt.
I said rents there, not house prices. And there is absolutely no doubt that a CGT will push rents up. It has to.
You must be joking if you think a CGT will make houses more affordable. Read the link higher up, they’re not even building ‘affordable’ housing.
No it doesn’t. A CGT doesn’t increase any costs of house ownership. Landlords who make an income from renting houses will experience no change. Property speculators expecting untrammeled capital gains will not be happy of course.
Well its far too weak a step, but it will tend to divert capital away from the property market.
“Landlords who make an income from renting houses will experience no change.”
Thanks but there’s no point in debating with you on this, you’re away with the fairies. Pretty much every property investor disagrees with you. It’s basic arithmetic fer crissake!
The market doesn’t need property speculators. We need professional landlords.
Not a surprise that property speculators would be annoyed at a CGT.
And your maths is wrong. CGT does not increase the costs of running a rental property. Professional landlords won’t be affected by it at all, but property flippers will be.
“And your maths is wrong. CGT does not increase the costs of running a rental property. Professional landlords won’t be affected by it at all, but property flippers will be.”
Don’t be ridiculous. Professional landlords count capital gain into the returns they get from their investment property. They can get 4.7% on term deposit right now, why would anyone invest in property that returns less than that from rents alone.
Rents decoupled from house prices years ago, if rents were to provide the sole return on rental properties now they’d have to go up a hell of a lot more.
Not a surprise that property speculators would be annoyed at a CGT.
It shouldn’t annoy them, they are already subject to tax on capital gains.
Push house prices back down and rental returns will go up enough to sustain a true professional landlord class.
One which makes a living from rental income. Not a class of pretend landlords who happen to rent out properties inbetween flipping them.
Well they can always exit the property speculation market and the state can take a bigger role in the providing affordable housing and rentals.
“Push house prices back down and rental returns will go up enough to sustain a true professional landlord class.”
What, and you think a CGT will achieve that? Bollocks it will. The minute returns from houses fall the number of new houses being built also falls. If the return isn’t enough people will invest elsewhere instead, ie term deposits.
That slowdown in new house building leads to higher rents through shortage of rentals. Those higher rents gradually lead to a better market return from property which attracts investors back in again. That increased demand from investors pushes house prices up again…. and the endless cycle continues. A CGT won’t change anything there.
Have you not been watching the housing market over the last five years? It’s been pretty damned obvious.
You skipped the part where I said the state can play a much larger role in the housing market, exactly like it used to.
As English already said, the current market ignores affordable accomodation for the bottom quarter of the population.
Easily answered by limiting mortgage credit for the property market.
On a bit of an unrelated topic, has someone been feeding the Minister of riffmatic and Bean Counting Bill English truth syrup or something???,
Last week it was English openly admitting that what the economy faces ie: recession/depression aint going away for the next ten at least, years that is,
Now He is putting His hand up to being part of Governments that have simply ignored the (known?) need to build housing for renting on the basis of income,
Admitting the facts is fine as far as i am concerned by the Minister, does He tho have a plan to fix what the known ailment is???….
And don’t forget English’s comment last year that the way NZ used prisons “were a moral and financial failure”. Its spacey I know.
Protecting those who don’t pay any tax doh.I hit homer
any landlords would give up and flood more houses into the market bringing ownership back into the NZ psyche which helps stabilize families.
Actually, if the government built houses (high density, both row houses and high rise apartments) to meet demand and rented them out at 25% of income house prices and rents would fall making a CGT unneeded.
Still, I’d say a Comprehensive Capital Tax as outlined in the Big Kahuna would be an excellent option to put in place.
Remember the wonderfull State Loans Scheme .Plus State insurance?
Which enabled working people to buy their own well built houses. Labour needs to revise such a scheme as soon as it returns to government.
Most off the well built houses us older folk are still enjoying were state loaned houses. Why ever was it stopped? Because of the greedy slime bag Tories.
We won’t get that from Labour as they’re far too enamoured of the free-market BS and enriching banks.
You are of course right, The provision of 20,000 State rental units in Auckland City would immediately kill off high demand for rentals in that city thus overcoming on the rental side of the property equation the supply/demand impetus in that market,
My view is that the State should in fact become the majority landlord across the whole new Zealand rental market and when the building program has housed at 25% of income all those on low and fixed incomes tenancies should be made available to others on higher incomes at the same rental of 25% of income,
The present National Government is talking from a position of trying to curtail the annual expense of the subsidy to HousingNZ of some 600 million dollars and the only means of addressing the direct subsidization of HousingNZ that does not further deflate the local New Zealand economy by further reducing the discretionary spending of the 69,000 HousingNZ households would be to dramatically increase the stock of HousingNZ homes to the point where Social Demand is zero and tenancies could be offered to tenants earning 1000 dollars a week at 25% of income thus adding an element of cross-subsidization to the HousingNZ books,
Obviously for that to occur, Government would have to have been smart enough to have produced it’s own printed monies to enable such a building program and would also have to have been looking at the economics of it all through a smart lens other than what could enrich the core of its voting bloc,
Alas, such is the nature of the chimps in the jungle mememe economics currently to the fore that i couldn’t begin to imagine such a society that would embrace such an elegant solution to matters of housing for at least 1000 years…
This is false. A CGT will suppress house price increases. Which is why you don’t like it, as a guess.
Roads of No Significance are a case in point to what i commented on above, obviously a quantifiable value can be placed upon a road, ie: X road is worth a billion or whatever,
In theory such a method of ‘counting our beans’ gives us an asset, but, it’s hardly an asset that can be ‘realized’,
So,
It is logical for a Government to simply create the amount of money needed to build X road as the creation of the road at X value as an asset justifies having expanded the money supply by the X of that roads value,
It is the economics of the primitive chimpanzee to create a fiscal drag upon an economy by ‘borrowing’ to create the infrastructural assets of the State when that State is quite capable of creating the expansion of the money supply as the States asset values increase,
My one codicil,(a small nod to the present economic paradigm), is that where we have an ‘inflation target’ such expansion of the money supply to build assets should,(must), be allowed so as to occur within such inflation targets…
That’s easy – just adjust taxes in line with the spending. The Comprehensive Capital Tax is also essential as it would tax the money sitting in bank accounts.
The other positive is that for every Household that is created the level of economic activity in the wider economy is increased,
IE: such households must have furnishing and these are constantly changed/upgraded on an ongoing basis, i call this the ‘broken dinner plate example’ where if you have 10,000 households X amount of dinner plates will be broken and need replacing in any given period, raise the number of households to 15,000 and the number of broken dinner plates becomes X+x…
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/7415548/Peters-has-got-this-one-dead-right
Laws is right with this one (sadly so is WinstonFirst)
If Laws wants a referendum, he can get off his backside and organise a petition for one. Just like everyone else has to do.
Exactly, Daveo. I love how Peters and Lhaws are both now acting like a referendum is the “sensible” thing to do, ignoring that (a) the government clearly has no appetite to order a binding one on this issue and (b) they themselves have no inclination at all to get it done themselves.
Oh, and it costs money and stuff.
Interestingly, wasn’t Laws was in first in NZF years ago?
Nope, Laws and Peters are idiots. They might possibly be right that morality laws should be decided by the public, in which case people who object to gay marriage on the basis of morality should get a referendum petition organised.
But the current proposed legislation isn’t a morality issue, it simply one of equality and human rights.
Amazingly enough, I’m going to have to agree with Lhaws on that as well. Of course, I think it should be true of all major policy. State asset sales should have gone to referendum – instead it got rushed through as fast as the government could push and the government ignored the will of the people while doing so and I don’t think we’ll be seeing Lhaws calling for that to be put to referendum.
Where’s the line that determines ‘major policy’?
The issue of whether gay people have the same rights as everyone else was settled with the homosexual law reform bill. The current bill is merely an adjustment to bring marriage law into line with that. I don’t see why the validity of homosexuality should be put to the test of public opinion.
Needless to day Laws isn’t arguing for referenda for major policy, just the ones he deems to be issues of morality.
Laws isn’t the only one that does that.
I agree, this is a relatively minor sorting out and doesn’t warrant a referendum. But to a few people it’s a Very Big Deal.
Where policy is actually changed rather than amended.
I don’t see why we’re being held back by a few people who happen to be our servants.
I actually think that all fundamental rights need to be put to referendum and then made supreme law. For starters it tends to settle the basis for the laws that are passed and it also prevents the government from riding roughshod over those rights.
No he’s not, he’s asking for referendum on policies he doesn’t like and thinks the referendum will stop.
Surprise surprise, further tax facts confirmed.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/money/7416899/Figures-suggest-wealthy-carry-tax-burden
Now for the headlines we will never see:
“The left helps the poor help themselves”
“Green Party cares about the environment”
“$5 per day will give 3 kids breakfast and lunch”
“Holiday highway will be used by all people”
The bottom half of the population have no net assets and plenty of debt, and the top 5% of the population own most of the country’s wealth.
SO OF COURSE the richest pay the most tax. They benefit from this inequitable capitalist system the most.
After all, they can afford to without going hungry and without giving up their Mercedes.
As a proportion of income the top 40% of New Zealand pays less tax than the ‘rest’ of us,(60%)…
Odd and very dubious claim. Citation?
Many of ‘the rest of us’ have little or no income, and pay little or no tax nett of credits.
I suspect bad12 is correct. When your $2M home sells for $3M, how much tax do you pay on that $1M of unearned income?
That’s right, zero.
The whole net tax argument the Right wing makes. If the bottom tier of society had a chance to accumulate some net assets and some decent income, perhaps they could become net tax payers too.
When your $2M home sells for $3M, how much tax do you pay on that $1M of unearned income?
Incorrect. It’s not income, it’s capital gain.
That’s right, zero.
No, it depends. If you sell a house with the intention of making a capital gain then that gain is taxed.
Dealing and speculating has investigated more rigourously by IRD over recent years.
You mean that extra million in my bank account is not really money at my disposal?
Of course not, CV. “Income” is something common plebs have to work for. “Capital gain” is the reward rich people get for being so much cleverer than the rest of us.
It depends.
IRD: “as a general rule, buying and selling a family/private home usually has no tax consequences. However, if a property is purchased with the intention of resale, or there is a regular pattern of buying and selling homes, then this may be considered property speculation or dealing for tax purposes.”
If you buy a house for $2m with the intent of selling it for capital gain then that capital gain is taxable.
An increase from $2m to $3m would indicate it was owned for a substaintial period of time or it was improved or speculated, the latter being more likely to be taxable gain.
Pete, from personal experience, I can tell you that your assertions are wholly incorrect.
It has to be demonstrated that you are trading in property. If you buy a whole bunch of properties and then flog them off in such a way that you are not seen to be reliant on the proceeds, it is deemed a capital gain,
“If you’re an investor you buy a property to use it to generate ongoing rental income and not with any firm intent of resale. The property is a capital asset and any later profit or loss from selling the property is capital and isn’t taxable (apart from clawing back any depreciation, which is now recoverable). ”
Source: http://www.ird.govt.nz/property/property-common-mistakes/mistake-dealing-with-investment/#facts
A builder, on the other hand, who makes his living building and selling and building and selling and building etc, is trading in property because that is his/her primary business.
The irony of this shouldn’t be lost on anyone; I paid no tax on capital gains, yet built nothing.
The builder who actually constructed the properties was taxed to the hilt.
The problem here is not just the inequity of this current situation, but the fact that the law is so vague and we’re debating the interpretation of who is luiable or not liable to pay tax. Any law so open to subjective interpretation is not a particularly helpful law.
Far easier and fairer if both dealers and rental investors paid the same amount. Then everyone is treated reasonably equally.
Then we don’t arrive at silly propositions such as your artificial definitions, a-la “Incorrect. It’s not income, it’s capital gain.”
There are valid arguments about what capital gains should be taxed – to do that the difference between income and capital gain is important, and not an ‘artificial definition’.
As is the definition of a family home. It would be easier and perhaps more fair for capital gain to be taxed on them as well. But there would be significant flow on consequences.
And you are missing a basic difference, flicking on or sitting on.
A builder (or a doer upper) can claim on any expenses but any capital gained is taxable. Houses in this category are usually turned over quickly.
Most rental investors hold a property for quite a few years.They will usually gain capital but not always, and that will be offset by inflation and possibly by expenses. If a rental investor sells a house quickly they are more likely to lose on expenses and capital.
QFT
Our laws are a mess and I think a government should be looking at writing new law from the ground up and throwing the old laws and precedents out. The old laws and precedents really are just getting in the way of rationalising our laws.
Well, its helpful to some parties including professional advisors with clients who have a lot of money on the line.
* 🙄 * bout the only citation you are getting from me…
So, 20 out of 60 comments in this thread so far have the word ‘Jenny’ in them, and as far as I can tell they are all about Jenny’s thing about CV.
33%, I think that beats Pete George by quite a way.
The difference between what Jenny is doing, and the general rough and tumble here, is that she is now stalking CV and being a tr*ll. It doesn’t particularly surprise me that you don’t get the difference, you always seem to not understand the culture of this place, or certain social norms here.
And you don’t get the difference between Jenny ‘stalking’ CV and what you’re doing?
You said ” I haven’t been reading hardly any of the comments on Syria, so I don’t know what Jenny is on about” but “tedious and interferes with the flow of conversation”. And then “I’m sick of it.”
Are you trying to talk up a bitch to ban campaign against Jenny based on that?
It almost sounds like Jenny got jilted by CV and is now wrecking her vengeance on the boards…
(I’m not in any way suggesting they had a relationship but her posts read like something about a woman scorned :))
I had the same thought!
Pete, try reading your comments back to yourself out loud before you post them.
I reckon you’ve dropped several IQ points this weekend and as you’ve so often demonstrated it’s not like you had an overabundance to work from.
Yeah it’s a pity that both party’s cannot engage in the debate without it becoming personal, it makes the points both are trying to make a hard read,
We all need remember here that we all, well maybe excluding 🙄 ,are representative of the thoughts and ideals of the broad Left here and when we begin to address each others ideas on a personal basis the actual Facts become lost in the heat of personal vindication…
Study proves that rich people are more likely to be complete arseholes.
So, there we have it. Proof that the problems we face as a society (poverty, deprivation, inequality) stem almost wholly from the rich.
Good thing that no left-wing politicians could be considered rich then eh
^ 🙄 ^ eh…
I suggest you go back to school and improve your reading comprehension.
Interesting stuff.
Paul Brennan breaks down reading news item about deaths of New Zealand soldiers
National Radio, Sunday 5 August 2012
Anybody else hear this? Reading the 3 p.m. news, about the two New Zealand soldiers killed in Afghanistan, Paul Brennan started to choke up with emotion. It soon became clear he could not continue, and a brief snatch of music was put on. He returned after five or so seconds and read out only two more items in a drastically reduced news broadcast.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “I had a very big frog in my throat.”
Then at 4 p.m., Brennan started reading the same news item, and choked up again.
Clearly, it was not a frog in the throat.
Googled his bio… he’s an aviation enthusiast and has been on a number of overseas ‘adventures’. Perhaps he knows one of the soldiers killed.
Perhaps he knows one of the soldiers killed.
That’s exactly what I thought, Anne.
Tvone and 3 are running polls tonight.
Tvone has National up 1 at 48%, Labour at 32 and the Greens at 12%
Tv3 has National at 50.6% , Labour at 30.8% and the Greens at 11.2%.
Shearer is going backwards.
I feel like I am in a time warp because the Government has been absolute shyte.
Time for the opposition to think about what they are doing.
Anyone here still believe that National doesn’t have a credible shot at a third term?
Time for the opposition to think about what they are doing.
Sadly, most of the Labour caucus are happy with what they’re doing. They keep failing, but they keep their jobs. It’s not like anything else matters to them.
I’d like to publicly apologise for remaining loyal to Labour at the last election. It was a sympathy vote for Goff (who had done OK in the campaign) but I should have switched to the Greens.
I seriously – stupidly – thought that after a defeat, Labour would change. I was wrong.
The results are entirely predictable, and everyone knows it. Including the fucking Labour caucus. They just don’t care.
Although i couldn’t bring myself to vote for Labour 2011 i too was impressed with the manner in which Goff campaigned, despite being maligned daily by the media He never at any point seemed to be deterred,
My belief is that had Goff not gone into the election blindsiding the blue collar working class with the message that a vote for Labour was a vote to raise the pension age another 2 years the out-come of the 2011 election would have been far far closer,
I am not saying that Labour would have won, but, on my reading the Maori Party would not at present be the Poodles of National had Goff not been handed such a poison chalice as an election policy,
My present reading of the polls is that after months of vocal opposition to asset sales both Shearer and Norman gave all and sundry a kick in the nuts by both announcing pompously on the same day that neither Labour or the Greens would be taxing those who bought the assets until they bled so as to enable a Labour/Green Government to put the assets back in the ownership of all the people,
Both Shearer and Norman need to harden the f**k up and decide exactly who they wish to represent in the electorate,it doesn’t take a mental giant to realize that the Slippery National Government has already BOUGHT the middle class by cleaning out the treasury and now with its intentions of selling off half the family silver via asset sales,
If the pair of them can gain an education thus far it is only a simple step to understand that with the addition of NZFirst and The Conservatives the middle class vote in New Zeland is all tapped out so the f**king pair of them can stop stooping to sucking at the tit of who can play Mr Straight ”i aint scaring the horses” the best and start talking as if they have something to offer the REAL working class that both their Party’s would traditionally be thougt to have seen as their voter bases…
Agreed. That BS shift to the Right lost Labour core votes without winning over any centre or Right votes. I reckon Labour lost 2-3 MPs out of it.
had the all blacks lost the right would have been savaged.
Aha, that’s my reading of it as well, had such not occurred i beleive that we would still have a Slippery lead National Government, But, He would not have had the luxury of being able to pass ANYTHING through the Legislature without the support of His whole coalition…
You can’t forget that Slippery is a gambler by trade and by training. A good one too, with good luck. He bet on an updraft from an AB win, amongst many other factors, and he got it. The tea tape scandal was a bit more of a firefight, but he played that one as well as he could, even after it started to go sideways.
I feel like I am in a time warp because the Government has been absolute shyte.
Many people obviously don’t see it that way.
Time for the opposition to think about what they are doing.
Yes. They could trying to be more positive and show that they can do rather than trying to stop other people doing things, people tend to prefer that.
🙄 Everyone get behind the largest party and work against the interests and wishes of those who voted for you.
Ko rāua mārire hoki ngā tāngata pākiwaha i kōrero whakakake noa, rūpahu noa.
I would think their successes in the members’ ballots (and yes, I tip my hat to Mr Dunne for his support) are positive initiatives, but we have a Westminster system consisting of a government and Her Majesty’s loyal opposition. They would be remiss in their constitutional duties if they failed to hold the government to account and force it to make its case for its policies.
Secondly, remember that MMP was chosen – twice – because it slows down government. Consensus has to be built. We have no upper chamber, no head of state who can in practice veto legislation, no fundamental rights the courts can use to overturn outrageous legislation. The scrutiny offered in the House and in Select Committee is the only safeguard we have against the tyranny of the majority. And a weak safeguard at that, as we learned with CERA. Sure, if being nice is a tool in achieving that role of scrutiny, fine. But to make it easy on the government or let it do what it wants is a constitutional path to nowhere. And I would expect no different from the opposition when Labour next takes the treasury benches.
Time for people to wake up and accept that that political system as we know it be is a bad joke, and not answering to this country an dhas not for some time…
Until some of those who are “comfortable” and vain/conceited enough that they think the political system is currently working for them, get a bloody good wake up call, we are going to continue to be pumped hard.
Wonder how many years until those “comfortable” people who may well have talked down at the “underclass”, find themselves facing becoming part of the “underclasss”
The fact so many still seem oblivious to where this is all heading makes me shake my head!
EDIT: No the Greens will not be the left for long, and those who vote for them, will be in for a very nasty shock in good time!
They already are but they’re either a) not aware of that yet or b) in denial of it.
Well, it’s been a while since Labour went down to 32% in a CM poll (haven’t really looked at the 3news one). For much of the last year, 32% has been an object of anticipation.
It’s the trends that one should watch.
Hey Mcflock, speaking fo trends, do you reckon the Cantabs are going get left with a situation like Dunners, when they get their shiney new stadium?
Pretty much. They’ll have a shiny stadium and poverty as an excuse to cut social services and userpays water.
plus sell off a few more public assets, with a few ‘public-private partnerships’ throw in for good measure.
yep – they flogged off the council owned bus company to the private sector for a couple of mil. Reckoned it solved conflict of interest issues so they could improve the bus services.
Buses still shit, just more expensive.
Another ‘polling amusement’, who here really believes that NZFirst are polling under the 4% it did at the 2008 elections after months of attacks from both the press and opposition???,
If you have to suspend your belief over any part of a poll, (based upon logic), then it makes the other parts of the poll just as suspect…
It makes you have to ask yet again, WHEN are they getting rid of this loser? He’s nothing but the BUTT of Shonkys jokes. He CANNOT string 2 words together without the stammering. He was put in AGAINST the wishes of the rank and file. He is USELESS! The sooner he goes and takes the rabble that call themselves Labour with him, them maybe Labour can do the serious rebuilding that it needs. At the moment 2014 National will win again, unless Shonky is caught with his hand in the cookie jar or committing murder.
Many people obviously don’t see it that way.
Nah, because like you… they are shallow, mindless thick-heads. 🙄
4 August 2012
“State housing is a function of central Government – it’s that simple'” says Tamaki Housing Group’s Sue Henry.
PRESS RELEASE: Tamaki Housing Group: “National Government threatening to break their promise on market rents.”
“It’s reprehensible for greedy self-interested church, iwi and charity groups to even contemplate stepping into this role.”
“It’s ironical that only a week ago, Housing Minister Phil Heatley said on nationwide television that market rents would not be reintroduced for Housing NZ tenants.
(The Nation TV3 http://www.landlords.co.nz/read-article.php?article_id=4406 )
Today, he has done a complete about-face on this issue ( NZ Herald Saturday 4 August 2012)”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10824497
“Why should Housing NZ tenants be forced through rent increases they can’t afford to subsidise multiple, parasitical groups in the private sector?”
“Shame on Dianne Robertson CEO of Auckland City Mission, and Major Campbell Roberts, CEO of the Salvation Army, for helping to concoct this policy beside developers, international bankers and property consultants, to push for temporary tenancy agreements, higher rents and the privatisation of the State housing stock (through transferrals) and destabilisation of 70,000 vulnerable families across New Zealand.”
(April 2010 Housing Shareholders Advisory Group Report
http://www.dbh.govt.nz/UserFiles/File/Publications/Sector/pdf/vision-for-social-housing-nz.pdf )
“It is a disgrace to discover that Dianne Robertson CEO of Auckland City Mission, and Major Campbell Roberts, CEO of the Salvation Army, are members of the ‘invitation only’ hugely powerful, private sector corporate lobby group – the Committee for Auckland,” concludes Ms Henry.
http://www.committeeforauckland.co.nz/membership/member-organisations
Sue Henry
Ph (09) 575 6344
Ummm i am happy to attack National and it’s Housing Minister on matters of ‘fact’ and over the lowering of the level of the numbers overall of State Houses,
But,
I cannot see where the Herald article you have linked to shows Heatley threatening to bring back the ugly ‘market rent regime’ for State Houses,
In the Herald article provided Heatley says when talking about what His CONsultants group will be looking at vis a vis State House rentals ”Nothing will be ruled out EXCEPT market rents”…
By and large, I do not support anything PG says, but I do think that he has never deserved to be banned even for 5 minutes. You can simply ignore what he says if you don’t like it! (As I ignore idiots such as QoT and TR Putz..)
The rolleyes smiley campaign against him is incredibly juvenile.
That’s some top quality ignoring, Vic 🙄
It’d be a lot more convincing if she’d stop consistently mentioning me … and then engaging with me when I point this out … and then throwing around truly hilarious accusations about my gender, location, and hair colour.