Nellie Hunt’s family is not the only case of homelessness in Christchurch, there are many, many more. Where is the Government’s help for people in need? Where is the emergency housing?
Shame on you, New Zealand government!
And so the tip of the ‘housing’ ice-berg becomes public, i commented a week or so ago after watching the shameful Paula Bennett at a ‘public meeting’ decrying the owner of a rack-renting Auckland ‘holiday park’ which houses 300 beneficiaries,(including children),in less than ideal conditions for amounts of rent that should provide luxury apartments,
Bennett’s problem with the owner, He was creaming it to the tune of 30 grand a week all provided via His beneficiary tenants by the State,
Meanwhile in other parts of Auckland un-Housing Minister Nick Smith is busily ripping apart the States Housing estate and flicking it off as fast as He can to private interests,
i pointed out in that comment that Slippery’s National Government will not be happy until they see whole families sleeping rough in the doorways of our major cities,(while pointing out that in Hamilton there was at the time 120 State Houses triumphantly announced as for sale by Smith when the number of those on the ‘urgent’ waiting list of HousingNZ was 120 odd families),
Understand tho, that the homeless family in Christchurch will not provoke this National Government into urgent action, far from it, everything they do surrounding the State provision of homes for poor families has as it’s final outcome the very situation that has occurred in Christchurch and if a ‘tent town’ begins to emerge in that City watch as National send in the cops to bust it up…
A ‘hat-tip’ to the Maori Wardens of Christchurch for providing ‘security’ to the whanau in ‘tent-town’ Christchurch,
Nellie and Her kids are the living face of the contempt in which i hold the Maori Party for sitting at the table from which Slippery’s National Government refuse to even brush the merest of crumbs in the direction of the poor,
Where i must ask are the ‘gains’ for Maori from such a coalition arrangement, the Hunt family just the tip of the ice-berg of poverty and homelessness helped along by this National Governments trashing of the States Housing stock across the whole country while the Maori Party sits idly by in mute silence…
From what I’ve read, a HNZ subsidiary company is to buy Hobsonville Pt land from the defence force, to allow the PPP development of housing to proceed immediately. However, as Key campaigned that peppering this development with social or state housing was “economic vandalism”, only 20% of the houses built will even be under $485,000 to purchase.
20% was intended to be “affordable/social housing” in the first stage of the Hobsonville development.
This did not end up being the case, as you mention – a good review can be found in the Salvation Army publication Adding It All Up.
Opportunities for local/national government to provide low cost housing with well-positioned land they already own continue to be ardently avoided by the use of PPP’s.
I can remember when the “accommodation benefit/supplement” came in years ago to “top up” beneficiaries incomes. Immediately landlords put up the cost of accommodation. In those days it was only $10-20 a week, so, yes I am going back in time, but even then I queried how sensible it was to be passing over this money to private landlords. Within a few years, it grew to such an extent that people were virtually guaranteed an income by the state, and I’m not talking about beneficiaries, but private landlords.
National were warned time and again after the February earthquakes that Christchurch faced a housing crisis, and what did Gerry do? Nothing, but blow alot of hot air around and deny everything.
yea ‘pinuid’ is pretty good! – evocative of lime green and purple gingham table cloths – run up on the elna, as someone on here once suggested.
He’s the 21st Century safari suit!
Oddly enough (if the ‘latest comments’ box is anything to go by), it seems the Open Mike of 28 Nov (ie almost a fortnight ago ! ) is currently at least as popular as todays. Go figure.
Southland Times came up with a different editorial than the Herald, on the delegation to Nelson Mandela’s funeral. (Although I notice it couldn’t quite resist the small boot into Cunliffe at the end. The strain not to was obviously too much).
Haven’t read the southland one yet, so thanks for the link.
Who does one OIA to find out if the PM ever actually considered taking John Minot, or said he did after seeing a few days of people saying he should go?
Xox
Walking through the tunnel to Wellington railway station, the first time in a while, I was shocked, saddened and angry to see homeless people and Beggars sitting on the tiled floor, head bowed down. Is this the ‘Brighter Future’ we were hoping for JK? I am ashamed by our current government. It’s not working John, and you know it. Time for a holiday John? Merry Christmas.
That’s a pathetic comment on too many levels to list BM and you f**king know it, simply trite bullshit attempting to deflect attention away from this National Governments total abdication of providing the monies and services which would keep those who are least able to help themselves from being forced into such a situation…
I disagree, great opportunity here to contribute to the “village”
Don’t wait for the government to solve the issue, extend your hand and offer those poor homeless a place to stay.
With Wellington being such a thriving hub of leftism, I’m actually quite shocked to learn that there are actually people living on the streets, this is indeed shameful stuff.
I think the left really need to take a good hard look at themselves, disgraceful.
You get more pathetic by the comment BM, i doubt YOU if confronted by a homeless person would offer anything except your contempt so you really should shut the fuck up about things you obviously know little about and care even less for…
Yes, BM would only offer contempt – typical of people who expect those with the least to give up the most for their fellow humans.
…People are saying I don’t need anything but my own ability to earn a profit. I’m not connected to society. I don’t care how the road got built, I don’t care where the firefighter comes from, I don’t care who educates the kids other than my kids. I am me. It’s the triumph of the self. I am me, hear me roar.
That we’ve gotten to this point is astonishing to me because basically in winning its victory, in seeing that Wall come down and seeing the former Stalinist state’s journey towards our way of thinking in terms of markets or being vulnerable, you would have thought that we would have learned what works. Instead we’ve descended into what can only be described as greed. This is just greed. This is an inability to see that we’re all connected…
What I think the government should do, is go through all the state house rentals and find all the ones that are under utilized
eg: one person living in a two-three bedroom house, etc.
The current homeless person can then be offered the free spare bedroom in the state house.
A real win win situation, the current tenant gets a new flat mate to help share the chores while the homeless person gets a roof over their head and a dry bed.
I might shoot an email off to Paula, I’m sure she’d think this is a fantastic idea.
BM, you are one of a whole nation and society, one of us, yet you stand yourself aside. Does it get lonely being a miserable miserly spirit? Maybe you need to read Dickens tale of Scrooge. There is so much more joy out there you appear to be missing. Rich in pocket, poor in spirit.
Still its coming up to Christmas, so I will offer St Francis prayer to you as a present that may help your state of mind.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.
Perhaps donate something of yourself or your money to the “beggars”…..
B.M.. – The S.P.C.A. have new premises here in Wellington. It’s bright and airy, comes with its own room, a free dog roll, and for you critters needing it, a rabies shot is on the house. I’m sure a room could be found for someone as extraordinary as you, B.M. Who knows, Paula might visit.
The inference from your comment, BM, is that individuals who are part of ‘the right’ are less likely than those who identify as being on ‘the left’ to take in homeless people as an act of charity?
This, despite the fact – as your comment illustrates – that ‘the right”s solution to homelessness is personal charity.
Given adherence to that solution, shouldn’t it be members of ‘the right’ who take in the homeless? Obviously, they aren’t, which would usually be called ‘hypocrisy’.
Those on ‘the left’ – irrespective of their individual commitments to charitable efforts – are very often distinguished in their beliefs by the view that solutions to widespread social problems involve structural changes and collective efforts rather than through individual charitable effort (though these are of course commendable where possible).
BM
You are so cynical and mendacious. Even the Good Samaritan didn’t take the needy one home. He saw that there was attention to his needs and left money to pay for it. Helping someone who is in need is a good deed. It doesn’t require you to take them home and do the fairy godmother bit. Jesus approach was do what you can, it seems.
But a certain Samaritan, as he travelled, came where he was. When he saw him, he was moved with compassion, came to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. He set him on his own animal, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him.
On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, and gave them to the host, and said to him, ‘Take care of him. Whatever you spend beyond that, I will repay you when I return.’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_Good_Samaritan
Well actually BM, my student neighbours have done just that on occasion, and some of us assist them with transport occasionally.
It’s not just the tunnel either. One only has to walk from one side of the city to the other, and around the inner suburbs to see people (particularly youth) begging, and signs of their living rough.
1st world country? My arse!
Have you ever stopped to talk to any of them BM? – i.e. to find out their circumstances, or do you prefer to just make assumptions?
Clever NSA geeks, paid to play world of warcraft and second life…but this is what happens to a mass surveillance state which has to justify its own existence.
This is the USA equivalent of the East German Stasi who infiltrated pensioner stamp collecting clubs.
The NSA document, written in 2008 and titled Exploiting Terrorist Use of Games & Virtual Environments, stressed the risk of leaving games communities under-monitored, describing them as a “target-rich communications network” where intelligence targets could “hide in plain sight”.
Games, the analyst wrote “are an opportunity!”. According to the briefing notes, so many different US intelligence agents were conducting operations inside games that a “deconfliction” group was required to ensure they weren’t spying on, or interfering with, each other.
If properly exploited, games could produce vast amounts of intelligence, according to the the NSA document. They could be used as a window for hacking attacks, to build pictures of people’s social networks through “buddylists and interaction”, to make approaches by undercover agents, and to obtain target identifiers (such as profile photos), geolocation, and collection of communications.
South Africa in this respect is just one version of the recurrent story of the contemporary left. A leader or party is elected with universal enthusiasm, promising a “new world” – but, then, sooner or later, they stumble upon the key dilemma: does one dare to touch the capitalist mechanisms, or does one decide to “play the game”? If one disturbs these mechanisms, one is very swiftly “punished” by market perturbations, economic chaos and the rest. This is why it is all too simple to criticise Mandela for abandoning the socialist perspective after the end of apartheid: did he really have a choice? Was the move towards socialism a real option?
Tiny black political elite as fig-leaf, otherwise little has changed.
Interesting post from Chris Trotter on Bowalley Road today. He’s pretty much spot-on as far as I’m concerned. Good to see analysis of Mandela that moves beyond the mawkish and saccharine.
did he really have a choice? Was the move towards socialism a real option?
Two pertinent questions and they lead to an interesting question: If a country can’t do what it’s population wants then who the hell is actually in control?
That’s been long answered – worldwide there has been a corporate coup d’etat, led by the banking fraternity. The TPPA is another example of this – the US gov is not negotiating on behalf of their people, but on behalf of their corporates.
Given that the ANC gained political power but ceded financial power to the ‘outgoing’ white elites who had ties and well established relationships with international financial institutions….
Mana Party leader Hone Harawira says he will go to South Africa this week to represent the anti-apartheid movement at the funeral of former president Nelson Mandela.
Yeah well done Hone, but for me you can only represent me as a rank and file member of the protest movement. In any other capacity forget it. And on Hones example any other 1981 veteran who can get there should take equal standing next to Hone on my behalf. Just to make sure Hone remembers, it is not about him, its about “us”, that huge chunk of NZers who stood up together and said enough was enough. I don’t see a lot of them grandstanding or sliding in on the official events with the Nact photo op posers.
you could go if you want – it would be great you could travel around with Hone I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.
” He would not be involved in any of the official proceedings but said this would allow him to do and say what he pleased.
“Honestly I’m just going to pay my respects on behalf of the anti-tour movement of 1981 in particular, and all those others who marched against apartheid over the years and have supported Nelson Mandela in his drive for freedom,” he said. ”
Hone imo isn’t grandstanding or sliding in – he believes and then takes actions in alignment with his beliefs – I personally like that.
Lets hope Hone is “for real”. I recall “Hone Activist Events” such as assaulting engineering students with baseball bats. I recall him making racist statements, saying that pakeha boyfriends would not be welcome for his daughters. I for one have little faith in Hone. So Mars if that is the type gent you wish to represent “us”, count me out, I would rather be one of “them”.
Those examples all have a context that you seemed to have missed – bought the hook, line and sinker there I think bored – just like they wanted you to. Noted that you would rather be one of them – you’ve been going down that line for a while and fair enough, good for you. As for Hone representing me and those anti-tour protestors that stood side by side with him – yep I’m proud that he is doing so and he is exactly the type of gent that I align with.
My mother once told me that funerals are ultimately about the living, not the dead. She was certainly right in Mandela’s case. It’s all me me me from everybody.
Here’s the real truth. Mandela doesn’t give a fuck who is there. And neither do I.
Hmm, the ends justify the means….so violence against the individual is politically correct if you have a really good reason? So what say I dont agree with you about frogs rights, my position is in my mind water tight, so to move it ahead I bash you. All good.
Why does what sort of boyfriend Hone would feel comfortable with for his daughter have anything to do with you? Were you stalking her, Ennui?
As for the racist dickheads of the haka party, pakeha should have been there with baseball bats stopping it long before He Taua stepped in.
Meanwhile in the land of the guest worker, that certain people hold up as everything great and good about (neo-liberal) capitalist, dem-fac-ocracy… (especially since the celtic tiger fell over and is now limping)…
Singapore’s prime minister has urged citizens not to show animosity towards migrant workers following the first rioting in 40 years in the wealthy state, which prides itself on being an island of calm in an often chaotic region.
The disorder involved mostly Indian guest workers and broke out in the Little India district on Sunday night after an Indian worker was hit and killed by a bus driven by a Singaporean. Cars were set alight and 18 people injured as crowds hurled stones at authorities.
It followed recent signs of tensions between citizens and the growing numbers of migrant workers, who have provided the bulk of the workforce constructing the country’s impressive skyline, transport and other infrastructure. About a quarter of Singapore’s 5.4 million residents are transient workers, compared with a tenth in 1990, according to government statistics.
Database is running high on CPU and open handles and has been all morning. I can’t see any particular reason why but I suspect that we’re getting a good read of the whole system from someone. I’ll have a peek and maybe curtail their scans.
I’ve put a more severe policy on for bots, and switched from throttling to blocking. Doesn’t affect google because they do every properly. But it looks like we’re getting scanned by a fast msnbots and fast bingbots. I should see the open database handles drop from ~40 to something more acceptable.
I think I figured it out. There is something wrong on the VPN at the host site. The servers when talking to each other were having problems with routings (as far as I could see they talked via the US?). Shifting it to talk on non vpn IP’s appears to have largely fixed it.
I have no idea if that is my configuration of theirs…. Job for later.
I liked this verbiage from Cameron. Every word reverberating with deep emotion and sincerity.
continually bears humanity ever upwards away from brutality and darkness and towards something better.
‘But is not so. Progress is not just handed down as a gift, it is won through struggle: …the struggle of men and women who believe things can be better, who refuse to accept the world as it is, but dream of what it can be.
‘Nelson Mandela was the embodiment of that struggle. He did not see himself as a helpless victim of history, he wrote it.’ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2520808/Cameron-hails-Mandela-towering-figure-tweets-picture-reindeer-Little-Ant-Dec-Commons-tributes.html
plus item –
Shopkeeper was quizzed for eight HOURS by police – and had his computer seized and his DNA swabbed – after cracking ‘bad taste’ Nelson Mandela jokes on the internet.
RT
That was a terrific piece on Key and Mandela. the Mighty and Mini-me of politics and leadership.
Yasmine in Tunis wrote a tremendous piece for Huffington.
Politicians that don’t command respect like Judith Collins demean themselves by throw-away remarks going on twitter such as the one about ‘Cunners’ – a weak sounding term coming from a loose thinking mind.
I notice the hairdo contributing his “catty schoolgirl” snide jibe as well. Christ, how the hell do these kindy-level thinkers ever get freakin elected.
John Minto tells it like it is and thank goodness he does.
Mandela brought South Africa out of the apartheid era of racial oppression.
We should celebrate the life of this leader of the anti-apartheid struggle but we should never be blinded to his failings. He never claimed to walk on water and no one should pretend he did.
Mandela was a great man in so many ways and as a paragon of forgiveness it is hard to think of someone who displays that attribute more – but he was a man and he had his mistakes and failings and it honours him to accept that rather than pretend he was a saint.
National gives loan sharks free license for some to pray on the poor, well it would not do the same for the rich right? well, maybe that explains SCF, and the miriad of other finance companies gone bust. You see National don’t believe in protection, so what does it believe in? Well seizing assets gained from crime. Nice, since eventually we will start to revisit wealth accumulated via crimes against the environment, unless National’s detractors are right, that they are a rich prick party.
Yesterday on Open Mike there was some discussion around the spelling of Russel Norman’s name. I go a step beyond that and have a pet name for him, which is taken from Russell Crow’s stage name when he was a “musician”. Rus le Roq was his name(not a fan of Russell Crow incidentally)
I like Russel Norman. I’ve heard him speak publicly and the way he spoke cemented my appreciation of him, where as I had previously been a bit uncertain. He’ll always be Rus le Roq to me.
On the topic of spelling: Thank you phillip ure for spelling “eh” correctly. Not many folks know how to spell this often used word. For instance, last night on 3 News they had subtitled the speech of person featured in an article about a loan shark’s office in South Auckland and gasp! They spelt “eh” as “ay”. (not the first time they have misspelt eh either!) Even worse, the L&P advertising campaign is “It’s a bit different aye”. Aye is Scots for yes and is pronounced eye, as far as I am aware. Could be wrong. Don’t know what the world is coming to eh.
*With apologies for my frequent spelling and grammatical errors.
Apparently. I raised it with some folks I know who work in advertising. They blame it on the young ‘uns……but maybe to put all the blame on them is not sharing the responsibility………..
Rosie you’re always interesting. RT if they shoot messengers with bad news, what do they do for those with good? Think about it. A quaff of good ale sir, to your health or something.
This is a nice bit of news, the most encouraging thing from a judge I’ve read for yonks.
Oldfield successfully appealed against Home Secretary Theresa May’s decision to kick him out of the country on the grounds that his presence was “not conducive to the public good”.
Immigration tribunal Judge Kevin Moore, in overturning the deportation order, said Oldfield was an asset to Britain.
“There is no doubt in my view to your character and commitment and the value you are to UK society generally,” the judge said.
Oldfield, originally from Sydney, has a British wife, Deepa Naik, 36, and a five-month-old baby daughter. He’s lived in the UK for more than a decade.
Interesting results from the census (excel document). For the first time, Catholicism is now the country’s largest religious denomination with 491,421 adherents. Anglicanism stands at 459,771. Both stood at over 500,000 each in the 2006 census and the country continues a secular trend – the largest group of all, those with no religion, stands at 1.6 million. So having a monarch at the head of an established church is going to grow as an issue over time, I think.
Underemployment seems to be a trend too. 42,267 report their main job at 10 hours per week. 84,528 at 20 hours and 89,997 at 30 hours.
There were 153,210 unemployed people seeking work, which rouhly matches the 150,000 people reported unemployed in the September Household Labour Force Survey.
—Jeremy Hansen, The Panel, Tuesday 10 December 2013
More liars….
No. 37 Alan Seay: “You know, we respect the rights of people to protest….”
No. 36 Paul Dykzeul: “No we won’t be changing the Listener; it’s got a terrific editor….”
No. 35 Mark Jennings: “I think Paul’s a bright guy and he will be able to bring a discipline to his performance….”
No. 34 Willie Jackson: “I thought we’d been sensitive with her yesterday….”
No. 33 Supt. Bill Searle: “I think what’s happened here is the police officers have done their very best….”
No. 32 Sonny-Bill Williams: “It’s good to get the win over Papua-New Guinea, a strong Papua-New Guinea side, aahhhh….”
No. 31 John Palino: “Suggestions that I am somehow orchestrating some grand right-wing conspiracy to unseat Len after the election are so wrong…”
No. 30 Alan Dershowitz: “I will give $10,000 to the PLO if you can find a historical fact in my book that you can prove to be false.”
No. 29 John Banks: “I have nothing to hide and nothing to fear. And never, ever would I ever knowingly sign a false electoral return. Never ever would I ever.”
No. 28 John Kerry: “…we are especially sensitive, Chuck and I, to never again asking any member of Congress to take a vote on faulty intelligence.”
No. 27 Lyse Doucet: “I am there for those without a voice.”
No. 26 Sam Wallace: “So here we are—Otahuhu. It’s just a great place to be, really.”
No. 25 Margaret Thatcher: “…no British government involvement of any kind…with Khmer Rouge…”
No. 24 John Key: “…at the end of the day I, like most New Zealanders, value the role of the fourth estate…”
No. 23 Jay Carney: “…expel Mr Snowden back to the U.S. to face justice…”
No. 22 Mike Bush: “Bruce Hutton had integrity beyond reproach.”
No. 21 Tim Groser: “I think the relationship is genuinely in outstanding form.”
No. 20 John Key: “But if the question is do we use the United States or one of our other partners to circumvent New Zealand law then the answer is categorically no.”
No. 19 Matthew Hooton: “It is ridiculous to say that unions deliver higher wages! They DON’T!”
No. 18 Ant Strachan: “The All Blacks won the RWC 2011 because of outstanding defence!”
No. 17 Stephen Franks: “Peter has been such a level-headed, safe pair of hands.”
No. 16 Phil Kafcaloudes: “Tony Abbott…hasn’t made any mistakes over the past eighteen months.”
No. 15 Donald Rumsfeld: “I did not lie… Colin Powell did not lie.”
No. 14 Colin Powell: “a post-9/11 nexus between Iraq and terrorist organizations…connections are now emerging…”
No. 13 Barack Obama: “Simply put, these strikes have saved lives.”
No. 12 U.K. Ministry of Defence: “Protecting the Afghan civilian population is one of ISAF and the UK’s top priorities.”
No. 11 Brendan O’Connor: “Australia’s approach to refugees is compassionate and generous.”
No. 10 Boris Johnson: “Londoners have… the best police in the world to look after us and keep us safe.”
No. 9 NewstalkZB PR dept: “News you NEED! Fast, fair, accurate!”
No. 8 Simon Bridges: “I don’t mean to duck the question….”
No. 7 Nigel Morrison: “Quite frankly, they’ve been VERY tough.”
No. 6 Herald PR dept: “Congratulations—you’re reading New Zealand’s best newspaper.”
No. 5 Rawdon Christie: “…a FORMIDABLE replacement, it seems, is Claudette Hauiti.”
No. 4 Willie and J.T.: “The X-Factor. Nah, nah, there’s some GREAT talent there!”
No. 3 John Key: “Yeah we hold MPs to a higher standard.”
No. 2 Colin Craig: “Oh, I have a GREAT sense of humour.”
No. 1 Barack Obama: “Margaret Thatcher was one of the great champions of freedom and liberty.”
Have you even read the column?
No, I haven’t, because although Paul Thomas has written a couple of good football books, and some entertaining thrillers, he lacks the knowledge and the seriousness to write about political or philosophical matters. His column is normally about as interesting and authoritative as the garbage churned out by Kerre McIvor (née ohoWmad) or Murray Deaker or Tony “Bootboy” Veitch.
It was indeed very good.
I’ll take your word for it. I’m glad to hear he’s finally written something worth reading.
Calling him a “liar” and lumping him in with Thatcher and Banks and all is stupid.
Oh come on, gobsmacked! Lighten up a little! “Liars of Our Time” is a wide-ranging series, taking in the psychopathic/fanatic (No. 25, 30), the moronic (No. 2, 4, 10, 18, 29), the professionally dishonest (No. 1, 3, 8, 20, 22, 31, 37) and the hapless (No. 26). There are several other categories I haven’t mentioned here, but you get the drift, I hope: some of the liars here are serious, professional liars, while others are harmless. Jeremy Hansen’s foolish laudatory comment about an undistinguished column-filler fall into the latter category.
In solidarity with the millions of black South Africans who are now worse off under the ANC’s neo-liberal ‘economic apartheid’ reforms – why I would NOT attend Nelson Mandela’s funeral.
ANTI-APARTHEID BACKGROUND:
In 1972, I joined the Halt All Racist Tours movement, in my 7th form year as an 18 year old.
In 1981, I was one of twelve anti-apartheid activists elected to the ‘demonstration committee’ of the MOST (Mobilisation to Stop the Tour) – tasked with organising protests in Auckland against the Springbok Tour.
The purpose of the protests, was to ‘stretch the thin blue line’ and through non-violent civil disobedience, make the 1981 Springbok Tour ‘un-policeable’, so it would be called off.
This was in solidarity with millions of black South Africans, who not only did not have the same civil and political human rights as the white minority, but were also being denied basic economic, social and cultural rights.
(The effectiveness of the sports boycott in putting pressure on the apartheid regime, is explained here:
Desmond Tutu: Sports boycott crucial to ending apartheid
However, the purpose of these anti-Springbok Tour protests, in calling for an end to apartheid, was not for the black South African majority to end up being worse off.
But that is exactly what has happened in ‘post-apartheid’ South Africa.
Why?
Because the ANC government, elected in 1994, broke their promises, effectively did a 180 degree ‘U turn’ and introduced the same neo-liberal ‘Rogernomics’ reforms, without consultation or mandate as did the 1984 – 1987 Labour Government here in New Zealand.
Sorry to be the one to ‘blow the whistle’ and ‘pop the hot air balloon’, but this wave of neo-liberal reforms started on Nelson Mandela’s watch, when he was President of South Africa from 1994 – 1999.
Nelson Mandela supported privatisation, and it started on ‘his watch’.
PRIVATISING SOUTH AFRICA BY DICTUM: A REVIEW
Michael J. Meyer
(Department of Development Studies, University of North West)
1. Introduction
Mindful of the experience in the Third World in general, and Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)in particular, where in some instances the privatisation of state assets was turned into a farce because of corruption, nepotism patronage and insider dealing, in South Africa (SA) the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) insisted from the outset that the privatisation process is shrouded in secrecy and should be made transparent.
As a consequence COSATU objected to the African National Congress’s (ANC) adoption of a privatisation policy at its December 1994 Conference, which was endorsed without any form of consultation with the labour movement -the ANC’s strongest social partner.’ In order to forestall any unilateral action on the part of the ANC the labour movement insisted on participation and transparency, calling on the ANC to be accountable, not only to its allies but also the masses on any decision taken
on the issue of privatisation.
1 COSATU 6th National Congress: 16-19 September 1997, Book 4, Resolutions, Discussion
Documents (1997), p. 33.
Over and above the intense hostility and pressure, particularly from COSATU, which government faces on restructuring and privatisation, President Mandela intractably remarked, that:
“Privatisation is the fundamental policy of the ANC, and is going to be implemented …Just because we [government and COSATU] have a working relationship, and they [COSATU] helped put us in power, does not mean that we are happy with everything they say.’ 49
49 Sunday Times, 26 May 1996.
COSATU-aligned unions reciprocated this statement calling for full participation and state transparency, failing which further mass action will go ahead if the sale of state assets were implemented unilaterally. 5O
[50 Labour consultants Andrew Levy and Associates claim in their second quarter Strike Report, that the “Stage is set for a showdown between government and trade unions on the issue of restructuring…” They further claim that there is a strong likelihood of a sharp rise in strikes related to restructuring of SOE’s (The Star, 28 June 1996). ]
This endorsed the threatening deadlock between govemment and organised labour.
Referring to privatisation, President Mandela reiterated Mboweni’s threat, declaring that govemment will “go it alone” if labour, business and government could not form a successful partnership.51
[51 Sunday Times, 26 May 1996.]
_____________________________________________________________________________
CENTRE FOR CIVIL SOCIETY RASSP RESEARCH REPORTS 2005, VOL.1
Saranel Benjamin, Durban, September 2005
“Introduction
The ANC’s 1994 national election campaign was not only premised on delivering democracy and freedom to the citizens of South Africa but was also strongly rooted in the memory of apartheid’s denial of basic resources to black people.
Riding on the crest of the Reconstruction and Development Programme (the ANC’s proposed economic plan for the post-liberation era based on redistribution of the country’s wealth to the poor), the ANC promised to right the wrongs of the past and to give the people what had long been denied them.
Election posters blazing with the black green and gold party colours screamed out to the poor:
“A better life for all!”, “Free basic services!”. “Jobs for all!”,
with a promise to redistribute the wealth accumulated by the apartheid government, white business and the white population.
The poor, trusting the rhetoric, voted in their millions to put the ANC into power as the first democratic government.
When the ANC capitulated to the charms of a market-driven economy, the party ditched clauses from the Freedom Charter and the RDP and emerged with a macro-economic policy that was a ‘fairly standard neoliberal one”. 1
[1 Adam Habib and Vishnu Padaychee (2000), “Economic Policy and Power Relations in South Africa’s Transition to Democracy” in World Development, (vol.28, no.2)3. ]
The choice of a market-driven policy that would ensure maximum profit accumulation by the already rich was made in full knowledge of South Africa’s stratified economy.
South Africa, writes John Saul, is a country where the “the poorest 60% of household’s share of total expenditure is a mere 14%, while the the richest quintile’s share is 69% and where, across the decade of the nineties, a certain narrowing of the income gap between black and white (as a growing number of blacks have edged themselves into elite circles) has been paralleled by an even greater widening gap between rich and poor”. 2
[2 John Saul, (2002), “Cry for the Beloved Country: the Post-Apartheid Denouement” (RAU Sociology), http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs 8. ]
The Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) policy drew from the main tenets of neoliberalism as installed globally with the main objective of creating an environment which enables maximum private investment.
Hence GEAR proposed cuts in government spending to reduce the deficit, the introduction of tax concessions for big business, a reduction of tariff barriers (in the clothing, textile,leather and car manufacturing industries), the privatization of government assets (which included the provision of basic services), a reduction in state welfare programmes and a more flexible labour market.
Adelzadeh 3
[3 In Hein Marais (2001), South Africa: Limits to Change, (Cape Toen: University of Cape Town Press) 163] and Saul both agree that the ANC had “come full circle, back to the late apartheid government’s Normative Economic Model.
For the central premise of South Africa’s economic policy now could clearly be clearer: ask not what capital can do for South Africa, but what South Africa can do for capital…”4
[4 Saul 12]
The ANC pushed for GEAR, arguing that the policy framework could help achieve economic growth, attract foreign investment , boost employment and increase socio-economic equality. the verdict so far has been resoundingly negative:
“GEAR has been associated with massive deindustrialization and job-shedding through reduced tariffs on imports, capital flight as as controls over investments are relaxed, attempts to downsize the costs and size of the public sector, and real cuts in education, health and social welfare spending”. 5
[5 Saul 13 ]
This neo-liberal economic framework precludes the the development of any form of social security system for the growing band of unemployed, informal sector workers and the poor. GEAR argues for a decline in state expenditure and, in keeping with global trends, this translates into cutting back on state welfare programmes.
The harsh effects of the GEAR policy have been felt most by those who came into the era of democracy poor. These were black, working class people.
Most were black, women, urban and rural. GEAR has left the poor more vulnerable to increasing poverty and has debilitated most workers by decimating the industries they work in. …”
____________________________________________________________________________
Through my involvement with the Auckland Water Pressure Group, I, (and others) made contact with some directly involved in the ‘social movements’, who were fighting back against these ANC-led neoliberal reforms, particularly the fight against water privatisation and the introduction of pre-paid water meters by groups such as the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF).
More information about the fightback by the ‘social movements’ in South Africa, is available here: http://www.ukzn.za/ccs
“SEEK TRUTH FROM FACTS”!
Penny Bright
1981 Springbok Tour protestor
‘Anti-corruption/anti-privatisation Public Watchdog’
Also people have become very cynical surrounding the media and the way they pimp out the “poor”.
It seems just about every “oh woe is me story” they put out there is rather short on facts and long on bullshit.
With message boards, blogs, twitter etc, it never takes too long before the real facts come out and surprise, it’s never anything like what the media say it is.
No one believes anything they read in the MSM now, most people are like “yeah, yeah what a load of shit, fuck they must think we’re idiots”.
Well, you could, but there wouldn’t be any point as after anyone’s read the first line of your comments you’ve usually already exceeded their level of interest.
When the funeral is over perhaps everyone can get past their nostalgia and back to firing insults at each other about all the other shit someone else is always to blame for.
It’s history all right, but after all the grand speeches extolling him and what he stood for, they’ll all go back to advancing the interests of the wealthy and powerful at the expense of the poor and their speech notes will just blow away with the wind.
For what it’s worth, I reckon Key made the right call to include Cunliffe. No one will ever agree on who else would’ve been better. If there can only be two at the funeral the PM and the Leader of the Opposition is a good representation for this country.
I agree, Key was right to invite Cunliffe to be the 2nd. In fact it was his only option, politically.
But Cunliffe could earn a heap of mana by giving up his seat to Sharples. Symbolism matters, and if another rich white guy steps aside for the Maori protestor and leader from 1981, that’s strong symbolism – and, more cynically, bloody good headlines in the clear contrast between generous Cunliffe and Key vs Minto.
I wouldn’t blame Cunliffe for keeping his seat, it’s an occasion you wouldn’t want to miss. But there’s bonus points if he doesn’t.
Looks like Cunliffe IS going to offer his seat to Sharples.
However, Mr Cunliffe said he is considering giving up his place to Pita Sharples. “I think it’s important that a New Zealand Maori is represented and I think that he did a lot of work in the anti-apartheid movement.”
Far out. Cunners should just make the call and do it then, not talk about “considering it”. Gobsmacked’s “bonus points” is valid – Cunners would gain a lot of respect & support for this.
However, Mr Cunliffe offered to give up his place to Dr Sharples. “I think it’s important that a New Zealand Maori is represented and I think that he did a lot of work in the anti-apartheid movement.”
“David Cunliffe is on his way to meet the Prime Minister to formally give up his place at Mandela memorial to Pita Sharples. Will PM accept?”
Key’s advisers will be spewing. And the rumour is senior Nats (ahem Blinglish, Tau) advised to invite Minto and Key was going with it, till others (ahem Collins) said no way.
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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 ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
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 ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
I was initially resistant to the idea often suggested to me that the Government should deliver an arts strategy. The whole point of the arts and creativity is that people should do whatever the hell they want, unbound by the dictates of politicians in Wellington. Peter Jackson, Kiri Te Kanawa, Eleanor ...
Opinion by Lynley Hood. Forty years on from my 1985 Fulbright Grant, my disquiet over the war in Gaza evoked some troubling questions. The answer to my first question – What is the primary purpose of the Fulbright Programme? – was on the Fulbright NZ website. It says: US Senator, ...
The ministers responsible for green-lighting major projects need to be open about potential conflicts of interest, says Transparency International. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Powell, Professor, Family and Sexual Violence, RMIT University It has been a particularly distressing start to the year. There is little that can ease the current grief of individuals, families and communities who have needlessly lost a loved one to men’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Lichen, the first described example of symbiosis.AdeJ Artventure/Shutterstock Once known only to those studying biology, the word symbiosis is now widely used. Symbiosis is the intimate ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kim Hemsley, Head, Childhood Dementia Research Group, Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute, College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University Olena Ivanova/Shutterstock “Childhood” and “dementia” are two words we wish we didn’t have to use together. But sadly, around 1,400 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University The government’s Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee has just published its second report. It was set up by Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Minister for Social Services Amanda Rishworth in 2022 to provide: ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Queensland state election will be held in October. A YouGov poll for The Courier Mail, conducted April 9–17 from a sample ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Naeni, PhD candidate at Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University There’s been much talk in recent months about what a possible second Donald Trump presidency in the United States could mean for Europe, Russia’s war in Ukraine, the ...
A brief round-up of submissions on the controversial proposed law. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week, submissions on the controversial Fast-track Approvals Bill closed just hours after the government released a list of stakeholder organisations who were sent letters advising how they could ...
A poem from Robin Peace’s new collection Detritus of Empire: feather / grass / rock. Cereal giving I see a woman’s hands, see her curious hands break a stalk as she walks through the tall prairie, the savannah, the steppe, wherever it was. See her idly bite the grass that ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)A handsomely produced (debossed cover, lovely ...
The Commissioner's decision validates the longstanding efforts of the local community and ensures that Awataha Marae will be managed to serve the needs of the local community, particularly for hosting tangihanga. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tristan Salles, Associate professor, University of Sydney Examples of Australian landscapes.Unsplash Seventy thousand years ago, the sea level was much lower than today. Australia, along with New Guinea and Tasmania, formed a connected landmass known as Sahul. Around this time – ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Felicity Castagna, Lecturer, Creative Writing, Western Sydney University Day Day Market, ParramattaPhoto: Garry Trinh I live on the edge of Parramatta, Australia’s fastest-growing city, on the kind of old-fashioned suburban street that has 1950s fibros constructed in the post-war housing boom, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Ryan, Teaching Fellow in Economics, University of Waikato GettyImagesfatido/Getty Images There is an ongoing global debate over whether the high inflation seen in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic can be lowered without a recession. New Zealand is not ...
The ‘Wicked Game’ heartthrob is in his late 60s now. That didn’t stop him putting on a lively, goofy and very sparkly show. Apart from ‘Wicked Game’, which graces a sultry playlist of mine simply called 💋, my last sustained Chris Isaak listening session took place when I was about ...
Analysis - Two ministers were stripped of portfolios in a warning to Cabinet, drama broke out at the Waitangi Tribunal, and the gang patch ban bill ran into opposition. ...
Tara Ward makes an impassioned plea for some vital pop culture merch. In April 1999, I became obsessed with a new reality television show called Popstars. Every Tuesday night, five strangers transformed into music royalty before my very eyes as Joe, Keri, Carly, Erika and Megan were chosen to form ...
PNG Post-Courier In the early hours of ANZAC Day, aerial photographs captured an impressive gathering of Australians and Papua New Guineans at Isurava in the Northern (Oro) Province. The solemn dawn service yesterday was held at a site steeped in history, where some of the fiercest battles of World War ...
The PSA is shocked that Oranga Tamariki has used the cost cutting drive to downgrade its commitment to Te Ao Māori and remove many specialist Māori roles. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Kemish, Adjunct Professor, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, The University of Queensland There can be no more powerful symbol of the relationship between Australia and Papua New Guinea than the prime ministers of these neighbouring countries walking together on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sharon Robinson, Distinguished Professor and Deputy Director of ARC Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future (SAEF), University of Wollongong, University of Wollongong Andrew Netherwood Over the last 25 years, the ozone hole which forming over Antarctica each spring has started to shrink. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Viktoria Kahui, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Economics, University of Otago Getty Images/Amy Toensing Biodiversity is declining at rates unprecedented in human history. This suggests the ways we currently use to manage our natural environment are failing. One emerging concept focuses on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Colin Bednall, Associate Professor in Management, Swinburne University of Technology marvent/Shutterstock Finding the best person to fill a position can be tough, from drafting a job ad to producing a shortlist of top interview candidates. Employers typically consider information from ...
Wondering where to host your next BYO? Whether its a small gathering or a massive party, we’ve got some recommendations. I was first introduced to the concept of BYOs at Dunedin’s India Gardens, a legendary but sadly defunct establishment, which purveyed enormous quantities of mango chicken to Aotearoa’s drunkest future ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julien Cooper, Honorary Lecturer, Department of History and Archaeology, Macquarie University Julien Cooper The hyper-arid desert of Eastern Sudan, the Atbai Desert, seems like an unlikely place to find evidence of ancient cattle herders. But in this dry environment, my new ...
The sector says it’s hopeful her replacement Paul Goldsmith will be able to throw it a lifeline, after six months with a minister deemed missing in action, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign ...
The government can't just rely on axing public sector jobs and has to do more to cut spending, says the chief economist at a free market think tank. ...
Rock The Vote NZ, known for its advocacy for minor party unity and its role within the Freedoms NZ Coalition during the 2023 General Election, celebrates this merger as a strategic enhancement of its operational strength and outreach. ...
Nearly everyone has experienced the frustration of something you use breaking and being difficult or expensive to fix. Proposed legislation could change that. It’s been raining on and off all Sunday afternoon but people are lining up outside a building in a corner of Gribblehirst Park in Sandringham, Auckland. In ...
What does a forever relationship look like when you don’t believe in marriage? And how do you celebrate it? This essay is part of our Sunday Essay series, made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.I’m going to do it, right now. I’m going to say ...
The Prime Minister has committed to resuming direct flights to Thailand. But it’s not a promise he will be able to deliver on anytime soon. The post Prime Minister jumps the gun in Thailand appeared first on Newsroom. ...
It’s not that long ago Eliza McCartney was seriously wondering if the Paris Olympics would be her pole vaulting swansong. After years of being hounded by injury after injury, the Rio Olympics bronze medallist was still confident she would compete at her second Olympics in Paris in July, unless something ...
FICTION 1 Take Two by Danielle Hawkins (Allen & Unwin, $36.99) There’s commercial fiction, like this book, and then there’s quality fiction, quality writers, quality literature; the forthcoming Auckland Writers Festival is full of quality, and ReadingRoom has two tickets to give away to the following events: Paul Lynch (Dublin ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Friday 26 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
You can’t have missed the Gallipoli story as the movies, documentaries, essays and books capture what it was like for New Zealand troops in their eight-month campaign on the Peninsula. But this Anzac Day the Auckland War Memorial Museum has published a book that sheds light on a little-known aspect of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra In the free-for-all between the Australian government and Big Tech boss Elon Musk this week, the government had to be on a winner. Most people would have little sympathy with Musk’s vociferous opposition to ...
Asia Pacific Report Chief Mandla Mandela, a member of the National Assembly of South Africa and Nelson Mandela’s grandson, has joined the Freedom Flotilla in istanbul as the ships prepare to sail for Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. Mandela is also the ambassador for the Global Campaign to Return to ...
Pacific Media Watch Journalists who report on environmental issues are encountering growing difficulties in many parts of the world, reports Reporters Without Borders. According to the tally kept by RSF, 200 journalists have been subjected to threats and physical violence, including murder, in the past 10 years because they were ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. 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 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Senior Lecturer, Canberra School of Politics, Economics and Society, University of Canberra BagzhanSadvakassov/Upsplash, CC BY-SA Australia’s inflation rate has fallen for the fifth successive quarter, and it’s now less than half of what it was back in late 2022. ...
ACT's Rural Communities and Veterans spokesman Mark Cameron responds to cancellations and protests of ANZAC Day commemorations in Wellington. He says, "These pitiful attempts to detract from ANZAC Day are not at all indicative of the feelings of mainstream ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Meighen McCrae, Associate Professor of Strategic & Defence Studies, Australian National University American and Australian stretcher bearers working together near the front line during the Battle of Hamel in 1918.Australian War Memorial While the AUKUS alliance is new, the Australian-American partnership ...
Pōneke based peace activists staged a silent protest at the ANZAC day service to highlight New Zealand’s complicity in war and genocide, and urge the government to take concrete steps to stop the genocide in Palestine. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Magdalena M.E. Bunbury, Postdoctoral Researcher, James Cook University Burial with a horse at the Rákóczifalva site, Hungary (8th century AD).Sándor Hegedűs, Hungarian National Museum, CC BY How do we understand past societies? For centuries, our main sources of information have been ...
Amanda Thompson doesn’t really do Anzac Day. But what she does do is remember the people she knew who had a lifetime to remember stuff they didn’t really want to, because of a war they didn’t ask for. And she does make Anzac biscuits.First published in 2021.All my ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kathryn Willis, Postdoctoral Researcher, CSIRO Xavier Boulenger/Shutterstock In the two decades to 2019, global plastic production doubled. By 2040, plastic manufacturing and processing could consume as much as 20% of global oil production and use up 15% of the annual carbon ...
With our collective remembrance, and steadfast belief in our common humanity, we strengthen our hope and resolve to do what we can to foster dialogue and understanding, and to heal divisions in our pursuit of peace. ...
Principal reasons for the opposition is the loss of the public’s democratic right to have “a fair say” and the vital need for a government free from corruption, said Casey Cravens of Dunedin, president of the New Zealand Federation of Freshwater ...
Never mind the scoreboard – in the 2000 Bledisloe Cup decider, the real trans-Tasman battle was won before kickoff.First published in 2016. The dawn of the new millennium was a dark time for the All Blacks. Their final game pre-Y2K was a 22-18 loss to South Africa in the ...
I’m on the wrong side of 40, I never pursued creative work and now my job is killing my soul. Help! Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,May I start with the least original conversation opener you’re likely to hear around the motu at the moment, particularly in Wellington: ...
“Never again - No AUKUS” was the message of the wreath laid at this morning’s national ANZAC Day commemorative service at Pukeahu National War Memorial Park this morning by the Stop AUKUS group. ...
Until this month, Auckland swimmer Hazel Ouwehand had never met a qualifying time in an Olympic event for a New Zealand team, even as a junior. Now she’s very likely off to the Paris Olympics after swimming well under the qualifying standard in the 100m butterfly twice – both in ...
While Anzac Day has experienced a resurgence in recent years, our other day of remembrance has slowly faded from view.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand. Original illustrations by Hope McConnell.First published in 2022.The high school’s head girl and ...
Nellie Hunt’s family is not the only case of homelessness in Christchurch, there are many, many more. Where is the Government’s help for people in need? Where is the emergency housing?
Shame on you, New Zealand government!
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/9496170/Hunt-family-fights-on-in-Waltham-Park/
Come on,
Have you no faith in the market.?
Any day now .
You’ll see
@Scotty
😆
And so the tip of the ‘housing’ ice-berg becomes public, i commented a week or so ago after watching the shameful Paula Bennett at a ‘public meeting’ decrying the owner of a rack-renting Auckland ‘holiday park’ which houses 300 beneficiaries,(including children),in less than ideal conditions for amounts of rent that should provide luxury apartments,
Bennett’s problem with the owner, He was creaming it to the tune of 30 grand a week all provided via His beneficiary tenants by the State,
Meanwhile in other parts of Auckland un-Housing Minister Nick Smith is busily ripping apart the States Housing estate and flicking it off as fast as He can to private interests,
i pointed out in that comment that Slippery’s National Government will not be happy until they see whole families sleeping rough in the doorways of our major cities,(while pointing out that in Hamilton there was at the time 120 State Houses triumphantly announced as for sale by Smith when the number of those on the ‘urgent’ waiting list of HousingNZ was 120 odd families),
Understand tho, that the homeless family in Christchurch will not provoke this National Government into urgent action, far from it, everything they do surrounding the State provision of homes for poor families has as it’s final outcome the very situation that has occurred in Christchurch and if a ‘tent town’ begins to emerge in that City watch as National send in the cops to bust it up…
A ‘hat-tip’ to the Maori Wardens of Christchurch for providing ‘security’ to the whanau in ‘tent-town’ Christchurch,
Nellie and Her kids are the living face of the contempt in which i hold the Maori Party for sitting at the table from which Slippery’s National Government refuse to even brush the merest of crumbs in the direction of the poor,
Where i must ask are the ‘gains’ for Maori from such a coalition arrangement, the Hunt family just the tip of the ice-berg of poverty and homelessness helped along by this National Governments trashing of the States Housing stock across the whole country while the Maori Party sits idly by in mute silence…
From what I’ve read, a HNZ subsidiary company is to buy Hobsonville Pt land from the defence force, to allow the PPP development of housing to proceed immediately. However, as Key campaigned that peppering this development with social or state housing was “economic vandalism”, only 20% of the houses built will even be under $485,000 to purchase.
20% was intended to be “affordable/social housing” in the first stage of the Hobsonville development.
This did not end up being the case, as you mention – a good review can be found in the Salvation Army publication Adding It All Up.
Opportunities for local/national government to provide low cost housing with well-positioned land they already own continue to be ardently avoided by the use of PPP’s.
fervidly
I can remember when the “accommodation benefit/supplement” came in years ago to “top up” beneficiaries incomes. Immediately landlords put up the cost of accommodation. In those days it was only $10-20 a week, so, yes I am going back in time, but even then I queried how sensible it was to be passing over this money to private landlords. Within a few years, it grew to such an extent that people were virtually guaranteed an income by the state, and I’m not talking about beneficiaries, but private landlords.
National were warned time and again after the February earthquakes that Christchurch faced a housing crisis, and what did Gerry do? Nothing, but blow alot of hot air around and deny everything.
tony ryall on breakfast television..
..ryall seems to have reached a stage of advanced-smarm:
– where he is/seems unable to turn his (usual) semi-permanent smirk off..
..it’s not a good look..
..ryall..the unctuous one..
(synonyms for ‘unctuous’..:..)
“..sycophantic – ingratiating – obsequious – fawning – servile – self-abasing – grovelling – subservient – wheedling – cajoling – crawling – cringing – Uriah Heepish – humble – toadying – hypocritical – insincere – flattering – adulatory – honey-tongued – silver-tongued – gushing – effusive – suave – urbane – glib – smooth – smooth-tongued – smooth-spoken smooth-talking – slick – slippery – saccharine – oily – oleaginous – greasy – cloying – nauseating – sickening –
– smarmy – slimy – bootlicking – forelock-tugging – phoney – sucky – soapy –
– brown-nosing – apple-polishing – arse-licking – bum-sucking- kiss-ass – saponaceous – pinguid..”
(ed:..i particularly like ‘saponaceous’..and ‘pinguid’…eh..?..)
phillip ure..
yea ‘pinuid’ is pretty good! – evocative of lime green and purple gingham table cloths – run up on the elna, as someone on here once suggested.
He’s the 21st Century safari suit!
oops pinGuid
Oddly enough (if the ‘latest comments’ box is anything to go by), it seems the Open Mike of 28 Nov (ie almost a fortnight ago ! ) is currently at least as popular as todays. Go figure.
Southland Times came up with a different editorial than the Herald, on the delegation to Nelson Mandela’s funeral. (Although I notice it couldn’t quite resist the small boot into Cunliffe at the end. The strain not to was obviously too much).
Haven’t read the southland one yet, so thanks for the link.
Who does one OIA to find out if the PM ever actually considered taking John Minot, or said he did after seeing a few days of people saying he should go?
Xox
Walking through the tunnel to Wellington railway station, the first time in a while, I was shocked, saddened and angry to see homeless people and Beggars sitting on the tiled floor, head bowed down. Is this the ‘Brighter Future’ we were hoping for JK? I am ashamed by our current government. It’s not working John, and you know it. Time for a holiday John? Merry Christmas.
Did you invite them back to stay at your house?
Offer them a meal and a bed?
That’s a pathetic comment on too many levels to list BM and you f**king know it, simply trite bullshit attempting to deflect attention away from this National Governments total abdication of providing the monies and services which would keep those who are least able to help themselves from being forced into such a situation…
I disagree, great opportunity here to contribute to the “village”
Don’t wait for the government to solve the issue, extend your hand and offer those poor homeless a place to stay.
With Wellington being such a thriving hub of leftism, I’m actually quite shocked to learn that there are actually people living on the streets, this is indeed shameful stuff.
I think the left really need to take a good hard look at themselves, disgraceful.
You get more pathetic by the comment BM, i doubt YOU if confronted by a homeless person would offer anything except your contempt so you really should shut the fuck up about things you obviously know little about and care even less for…
Yes, BM would only offer contempt – typical of people who expect those with the least to give up the most for their fellow humans.
I hear that was a good show, The Wire
Just had a thought.
What I think the government should do, is go through all the state house rentals and find all the ones that are under utilized
eg: one person living in a two-three bedroom house, etc.
The current homeless person can then be offered the free spare bedroom in the state house.
A real win win situation, the current tenant gets a new flat mate to help share the chores while the homeless person gets a roof over their head and a dry bed.
I might shoot an email off to Paula, I’m sure she’d think this is a fantastic idea.
Maybe if it gets really bad, they’ll be after your spare bedroom, BM. I trust that fence is high…
BM, you are one of a whole nation and society, one of us, yet you stand yourself aside. Does it get lonely being a miserable miserly spirit? Maybe you need to read Dickens tale of Scrooge. There is so much more joy out there you appear to be missing. Rich in pocket, poor in spirit.
Still its coming up to Christmas, so I will offer St Francis prayer to you as a present that may help your state of mind.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.
Perhaps donate something of yourself or your money to the “beggars”…..
I did one of those spirituality tests a while ago.
I got a zero.
But thanks for your kinds words anyway, fal la la la la la la la la.
Merry Xmas every one.
maybe you are more or less than you Think you are BM
Or thinking about what you would like to be BM here’s a few options to choose from.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rATftJiWdkw
maybe “he’d rather be a mule”.
“Hitchin’ a Ride …hitchin’ a ride”
Yeah… it’s a wonder nobody has thought of this before… surely there are no downsides…
B.M.. – The S.P.C.A. have new premises here in Wellington. It’s bright and airy, comes with its own room, a free dog roll, and for you critters needing it, a rabies shot is on the house. I’m sure a room could be found for someone as extraordinary as you, B.M. Who knows, Paula might visit.
The inference from your comment, BM, is that individuals who are part of ‘the right’ are less likely than those who identify as being on ‘the left’ to take in homeless people as an act of charity?
This, despite the fact – as your comment illustrates – that ‘the right”s solution to homelessness is personal charity.
Given adherence to that solution, shouldn’t it be members of ‘the right’ who take in the homeless? Obviously, they aren’t, which would usually be called ‘hypocrisy’.
Those on ‘the left’ – irrespective of their individual commitments to charitable efforts – are very often distinguished in their beliefs by the view that solutions to widespread social problems involve structural changes and collective efforts rather than through individual charitable effort (though these are of course commendable where possible).
nah mate – this is pure deflection from you – and you, and we, know it
BM
You are so cynical and mendacious. Even the Good Samaritan didn’t take the needy one home. He saw that there was attention to his needs and left money to pay for it. Helping someone who is in need is a good deed. It doesn’t require you to take them home and do the fairy godmother bit. Jesus approach was do what you can, it seems.
But a certain Samaritan, as he travelled, came where he was. When he saw him, he was moved with compassion, came to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. He set him on his own animal, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him.
On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, and gave them to the host, and said to him, ‘Take care of him. Whatever you spend beyond that, I will repay you when I return.’
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_Good_Samaritan
Well actually BM, my student neighbours have done just that on occasion, and some of us assist them with transport occasionally.
It’s not just the tunnel either. One only has to walk from one side of the city to the other, and around the inner suburbs to see people (particularly youth) begging, and signs of their living rough.
1st world country? My arse!
Have you ever stopped to talk to any of them BM? – i.e. to find out their circumstances, or do you prefer to just make assumptions?
Yes.
NSA analysts play online gaming for spy work
Clever NSA geeks, paid to play world of warcraft and second life…but this is what happens to a mass surveillance state which has to justify its own existence.
This is the USA equivalent of the East German Stasi who infiltrated pensioner stamp collecting clubs.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/09/nsa-spies-online-games-world-warcraft-second-life?CMP=twt_gu
Maybe Mandela is liked by the Right Wing because the Elite are still in charge of S.A.
And lessons for NZ…
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/09/if-nelson-mandela-really-had-won
Tiny black political elite as fig-leaf, otherwise little has changed.
Interesting post from Chris Trotter on Bowalley Road today. He’s pretty much spot-on as far as I’m concerned. Good to see analysis of Mandela that moves beyond the mawkish and saccharine.
This one?
Two pertinent questions and they lead to an interesting question: If a country can’t do what it’s population wants then who the hell is actually in control?
That’s been long answered – worldwide there has been a corporate coup d’etat, led by the banking fraternity. The TPPA is another example of this – the US gov is not negotiating on behalf of their people, but on behalf of their corporates.
+1
Time to get rid of the corporatism.
Given that the ANC gained political power but ceded financial power to the ‘outgoing’ white elites who had ties and well established relationships with international financial institutions….
DTB
You always put the easy questions first.
Good on you Hone – leadership in action
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9497375/Hone-Harawira-heading-to-Mandela-funeral
Yeah well done Hone, but for me you can only represent me as a rank and file member of the protest movement. In any other capacity forget it. And on Hones example any other 1981 veteran who can get there should take equal standing next to Hone on my behalf. Just to make sure Hone remembers, it is not about him, its about “us”, that huge chunk of NZers who stood up together and said enough was enough. I don’t see a lot of them grandstanding or sliding in on the official events with the Nact photo op posers.
you could go if you want – it would be great you could travel around with Hone I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.
” He would not be involved in any of the official proceedings but said this would allow him to do and say what he pleased.
“Honestly I’m just going to pay my respects on behalf of the anti-tour movement of 1981 in particular, and all those others who marched against apartheid over the years and have supported Nelson Mandela in his drive for freedom,” he said. ”
Hone imo isn’t grandstanding or sliding in – he believes and then takes actions in alignment with his beliefs – I personally like that.
Lets hope Hone is “for real”. I recall “Hone Activist Events” such as assaulting engineering students with baseball bats. I recall him making racist statements, saying that pakeha boyfriends would not be welcome for his daughters. I for one have little faith in Hone. So Mars if that is the type gent you wish to represent “us”, count me out, I would rather be one of “them”.
Those examples all have a context that you seemed to have missed – bought the hook, line and sinker there I think bored – just like they wanted you to. Noted that you would rather be one of them – you’ve been going down that line for a while and fair enough, good for you. As for Hone representing me and those anti-tour protestors that stood side by side with him – yep I’m proud that he is doing so and he is exactly the type of gent that I align with.
My mother once told me that funerals are ultimately about the living, not the dead. She was certainly right in Mandela’s case. It’s all me me me from everybody.
Here’s the real truth. Mandela doesn’t give a fuck who is there. And neither do I.
Good stuff Mars, we align differently. That is somehow very reassuring.
Same here – and we both like protecting long-finned eels 🙂
“I recall “Hone Activist Events” such as assaulting engineering students with baseball bats”
yet you dont recall how this happened or why? – therein lies the answer
Hmm, the ends justify the means….so violence against the individual is politically correct if you have a really good reason? So what say I dont agree with you about frogs rights, my position is in my mind water tight, so to move it ahead I bash you. All good.
Why does what sort of boyfriend Hone would feel comfortable with for his daughter have anything to do with you? Were you stalking her, Ennui?
As for the racist dickheads of the haka party, pakeha should have been there with baseball bats stopping it long before He Taua stepped in.
I’m happy for Hone to represent me.
Meanwhile in the land of the guest worker, that certain people hold up as everything great and good about (neo-liberal) capitalist, dem-fac-ocracy… (especially since the celtic tiger fell over and is now limping)…
a Total Recall ‘Colony’.
The events in Singapore are a Big Deal and will have the global 0.1% on edge. If it can happen in mild mannered, heavily ordered Singapore…
meanwhile Back at the Funny Farm, windows reflect the Shine
Being the 10th, “you pulled the Deuce this time”. 😎
One unhappy guy in a hoodies can ruin a nice picture. No wonder he wants a personal photographer. Shoulda cropped.
s y d- link leads to Herald front page which updates regularly 😎
Correct link
gawd. this is the herald thats been ‘celebrity’ edited/curated whatever by john kirwan.
im having troubles with TS today…on a go slow…dropping out…was this photo.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11169619
if looks could kill…
Database is running high on CPU and open handles and has been all morning. I can’t see any particular reason why but I suspect that we’re getting a good read of the whole system from someone. I’ll have a peek and maybe curtail their scans.
I’ve put a more severe policy on for bots, and switched from throttling to blocking. Doesn’t affect google because they do every properly. But it looks like we’re getting scanned by a fast msnbots and fast bingbots. I should see the open database handles drop from ~40 to something more acceptable.
Actually dropping an extra server in seems to have helped.
Dunno what’s going on then. It’s even slower for me than yesterday. No such probs with the usual newsotainment sites or Bomber’s Daily Rants.
I think I figured it out. There is something wrong on the VPN at the host site. The servers when talking to each other were having problems with routings (as far as I could see they talked via the US?). Shifting it to talk on non vpn IP’s appears to have largely fixed it.
I have no idea if that is my configuration of theirs…. Job for later.
It’s working fine now Lyn. I’m getting no delays in reaching TS, or in clicking on and reading, or in posting, comments at the moment.
Yeah. Well it is a pain bearing in mind it was working before the weekend.
Key’s Apartheid Amnesia Makes The Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/yasmine-ryan/apartheid-new-zealand_b_4411734.html
Top Man! he he
Well spotted Rogue. Does not exactly make us proud our New Zealand Prime Minister. Queasy me.
John Key is the best prime minister of this country the United States has ever had. Or had over, perhaps might be more accurate.
I liked this verbiage from Cameron. Every word reverberating with deep emotion and sincerity.
continually bears humanity ever upwards away from brutality and darkness and towards something better.
‘But is not so. Progress is not just handed down as a gift, it is won through struggle: …the struggle of men and women who believe things can be better, who refuse to accept the world as it is, but dream of what it can be.
‘Nelson Mandela was the embodiment of that struggle. He did not see himself as a helpless victim of history, he wrote it.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2520808/Cameron-hails-Mandela-towering-figure-tweets-picture-reindeer-Little-Ant-Dec-Commons-tributes.html
plus item –
Shopkeeper was quizzed for eight HOURS by police – and had his computer seized and his DNA swabbed – after cracking ‘bad taste’ Nelson Mandela jokes on the internet.
RT
That was a terrific piece on Key and Mandela. the Mighty and Mini-me of politics and leadership.
Yasmine in Tunis wrote a tremendous piece for Huffington.
inside information
At least this oxygen thief remembers where they stood in 1981. There are none so bitter as Tories who find themselves on the wrong side of history.
Politicians that don’t command respect like Judith Collins demean themselves by throw-away remarks going on twitter such as the one about ‘Cunners’ – a weak sounding term coming from a loose thinking mind.
I notice the hairdo contributing his “catty schoolgirl” snide jibe as well. Christ, how the hell do these kindy-level thinkers ever get freakin elected.
and re-elected and re-elected and…
My conclusion is that entering Parliament causes some kind of regression to childhood.
John Minto tells it like it is and thank goodness he does.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11169600
Mandela was a great man in so many ways and as a paragon of forgiveness it is hard to think of someone who displays that attribute more – but he was a man and he had his mistakes and failings and it honours him to accept that rather than pretend he was a saint.
National gives loan sharks free license for some to pray on the poor, well it would not do the same for the rich right? well, maybe that explains SCF, and the miriad of other finance companies gone bust. You see National don’t believe in protection, so what does it believe in? Well seizing assets gained from crime. Nice, since eventually we will start to revisit wealth accumulated via crimes against the environment, unless National’s detractors are right, that they are a rich prick party.
Superficial fluff for the day.
Yesterday on Open Mike there was some discussion around the spelling of Russel Norman’s name. I go a step beyond that and have a pet name for him, which is taken from Russell Crow’s stage name when he was a “musician”. Rus le Roq was his name(not a fan of Russell Crow incidentally)
Here’s Rus le Roq in action on Shazam in 1985
http://www.nzonscreen.com/title/shazam-feat-russell-crowe-1985
I like Russel Norman. I’ve heard him speak publicly and the way he spoke cemented my appreciation of him, where as I had previously been a bit uncertain. He’ll always be Rus le Roq to me.
On the topic of spelling: Thank you phillip ure for spelling “eh” correctly. Not many folks know how to spell this often used word. For instance, last night on 3 News they had subtitled the speech of person featured in an article about a loan shark’s office in South Auckland and gasp! They spelt “eh” as “ay”. (not the first time they have misspelt eh either!) Even worse, the L&P advertising campaign is “It’s a bit different aye”. Aye is Scots for yes and is pronounced eye, as far as I am aware. Could be wrong. Don’t know what the world is coming to eh.
*With apologies for my frequent spelling and grammatical errors.
@ rosie..
..illiterate copywriters..eh..?
phillip ure..
Apparently. I raised it with some folks I know who work in advertising. They blame it on the young ‘uns……but maybe to put all the blame on them is not sharing the responsibility………..
Except that “Eh” doesn’t look like it sounds like “Aye”. Aye ?
Ubuntu versus Wetiko or why it makes perfect sense for John Key to go to Mandela’s funeral without John Minto
Reserve Bank Folds
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11170067
on LVR ‘speed-limits’ for new residential construction. (a little Ke a whispered in their ear)
Rosie you’re always interesting. RT if they shoot messengers with bad news, what do they do for those with good? Think about it. A quaff of good ale sir, to your health or something.
This is a nice bit of news, the most encouraging thing from a judge I’ve read for yonks.
Oldfield successfully appealed against Home Secretary Theresa May’s decision to kick him out of the country on the grounds that his presence was “not conducive to the public good”.
Immigration tribunal Judge Kevin Moore, in overturning the deportation order, said Oldfield was an asset to Britain.
“There is no doubt in my view to your character and commitment and the value you are to UK society generally,” the judge said.
Oldfield, originally from Sydney, has a British wife, Deepa Naik, 36, and a five-month-old baby daughter. He’s lived in the UK for more than a decade.
The Australian swam into the path of the Oxford and Cambridge rowing crews as they raced down the Thames in April 2012 to protest against elitism.
He was subsequently jailed for seven weeks.
Here’s a different link to the same story. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/10506059/Boat-race-protester-Trenton-Oldfield-wins-bid-to-stay-in-UK.html
as long as it’s not too hot, maybe somewhere Asian 😉
comment #77, ‘think about it’.
Interesting results from the census (excel document). For the first time, Catholicism is now the country’s largest religious denomination with 491,421 adherents. Anglicanism stands at 459,771. Both stood at over 500,000 each in the 2006 census and the country continues a secular trend – the largest group of all, those with no religion, stands at 1.6 million. So having a monarch at the head of an established church is going to grow as an issue over time, I think.
Underemployment seems to be a trend too. 42,267 report their main job at 10 hours per week. 84,528 at 20 hours and 89,997 at 30 hours.
There were 153,210 unemployed people seeking work, which rouhly matches the 150,000 people reported unemployed in the September Household Labour Force Survey.
Thanks Pete (I won’t bite, ‘Honest Injun’)
this just happened..
http://whoar.co.nz/2013/the-mandela-speeches-in-the-nz-parliament-a-mini-review/
phillip ure..
So did this.
Bee have
With friends like this…
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/mass-murder-in-the-middle-east-is-funded-by-our-friends-the-saudis-8990736.html
US Fifth Fleet
Am I in moderation for a reason? Not disputing it at all, just wondering what it was.
[Bunji: not that I can find…]
PB Ha ha your turn. I used to be the favourite for moderation. I was feeling picked on.
LIARS OF OUR TIME
No. 38: Jeremy Hansen
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
“I read a great column by Paul Thomas in the Herald….”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
—Jeremy Hansen, The Panel, Tuesday 10 December 2013
More liars….
No. 37 Alan Seay: “You know, we respect the rights of people to protest….”
No. 36 Paul Dykzeul: “No we won’t be changing the Listener; it’s got a terrific editor….”
No. 35 Mark Jennings: “I think Paul’s a bright guy and he will be able to bring a discipline to his performance….”
No. 34 Willie Jackson: “I thought we’d been sensitive with her yesterday….”
No. 33 Supt. Bill Searle: “I think what’s happened here is the police officers have done their very best….”
No. 32 Sonny-Bill Williams: “It’s good to get the win over Papua-New Guinea, a strong Papua-New Guinea side, aahhhh….”
No. 31 John Palino: “Suggestions that I am somehow orchestrating some grand right-wing conspiracy to unseat Len after the election are so wrong…”
No. 30 Alan Dershowitz: “I will give $10,000 to the PLO if you can find a historical fact in my book that you can prove to be false.”
No. 29 John Banks: “I have nothing to hide and nothing to fear. And never, ever would I ever knowingly sign a false electoral return. Never ever would I ever.”
No. 28 John Kerry: “…we are especially sensitive, Chuck and I, to never again asking any member of Congress to take a vote on faulty intelligence.”
No. 27 Lyse Doucet: “I am there for those without a voice.”
No. 26 Sam Wallace: “So here we are—Otahuhu. It’s just a great place to be, really.”
No. 25 Margaret Thatcher: “…no British government involvement of any kind…with Khmer Rouge…”
No. 24 John Key: “…at the end of the day I, like most New Zealanders, value the role of the fourth estate…”
No. 23 Jay Carney: “…expel Mr Snowden back to the U.S. to face justice…”
No. 22 Mike Bush: “Bruce Hutton had integrity beyond reproach.”
No. 21 Tim Groser: “I think the relationship is genuinely in outstanding form.”
No. 20 John Key: “But if the question is do we use the United States or one of our other partners to circumvent New Zealand law then the answer is categorically no.”
No. 19 Matthew Hooton: “It is ridiculous to say that unions deliver higher wages! They DON’T!”
No. 18 Ant Strachan: “The All Blacks won the RWC 2011 because of outstanding defence!”
No. 17 Stephen Franks: “Peter has been such a level-headed, safe pair of hands.”
No. 16 Phil Kafcaloudes: “Tony Abbott…hasn’t made any mistakes over the past eighteen months.”
No. 15 Donald Rumsfeld: “I did not lie… Colin Powell did not lie.”
No. 14 Colin Powell: “a post-9/11 nexus between Iraq and terrorist organizations…connections are now emerging…”
No. 13 Barack Obama: “Simply put, these strikes have saved lives.”
No. 12 U.K. Ministry of Defence: “Protecting the Afghan civilian population is one of ISAF and the UK’s top priorities.”
No. 11 Brendan O’Connor: “Australia’s approach to refugees is compassionate and generous.”
No. 10 Boris Johnson: “Londoners have… the best police in the world to look after us and keep us safe.”
No. 9 NewstalkZB PR dept: “News you NEED! Fast, fair, accurate!”
No. 8 Simon Bridges: “I don’t mean to duck the question….”
No. 7 Nigel Morrison: “Quite frankly, they’ve been VERY tough.”
No. 6 Herald PR dept: “Congratulations—you’re reading New Zealand’s best newspaper.”
No. 5 Rawdon Christie: “…a FORMIDABLE replacement, it seems, is Claudette Hauiti.”
No. 4 Willie and J.T.: “The X-Factor. Nah, nah, there’s some GREAT talent there!”
No. 3 John Key: “Yeah we hold MPs to a higher standard.”
No. 2 Colin Craig: “Oh, I have a GREAT sense of humour.”
No. 1 Barack Obama: “Margaret Thatcher was one of the great champions of freedom and liberty.”
Have you even read the column? It was indeed very good.
Calling him a “liar” and lumping him in with Thatcher and Banks and all is stupid.
Have you even read the column?
No, I haven’t, because although Paul Thomas has written a couple of good football books, and some entertaining thrillers, he lacks the knowledge and the seriousness to write about political or philosophical matters. His column is normally about as interesting and authoritative as the garbage churned out by Kerre McIvor (née ohoWmad) or Murray Deaker or Tony “Bootboy” Veitch.
It was indeed very good.
I’ll take your word for it. I’m glad to hear he’s finally written something worth reading.
Calling him a “liar” and lumping him in with Thatcher and Banks and all is stupid.
Oh come on, gobsmacked! Lighten up a little! “Liars of Our Time” is a wide-ranging series, taking in the psychopathic/fanatic (No. 25, 30), the moronic (No. 2, 4, 10, 18, 29), the professionally dishonest (No. 1, 3, 8, 20, 22, 31, 37) and the hapless (No. 26). There are several other categories I haven’t mentioned here, but you get the drift, I hope: some of the liars here are serious, professional liars, while others are harmless. Jeremy Hansen’s foolish laudatory comment about an undistinguished column-filler fall into the latter category.
In solidarity with the millions of black South Africans who are now worse off under the ANC’s neo-liberal ‘economic apartheid’ reforms – why I would NOT attend Nelson Mandela’s funeral.
ANTI-APARTHEID BACKGROUND:
In 1972, I joined the Halt All Racist Tours movement, in my 7th form year as an 18 year old.
In 1981, I was one of twelve anti-apartheid activists elected to the ‘demonstration committee’ of the MOST (Mobilisation to Stop the Tour) – tasked with organising protests in Auckland against the Springbok Tour.
The purpose of the protests, was to ‘stretch the thin blue line’ and through non-violent civil disobedience, make the 1981 Springbok Tour ‘un-policeable’, so it would be called off.
This was in solidarity with millions of black South Africans, who not only did not have the same civil and political human rights as the white minority, but were also being denied basic economic, social and cultural rights.
(The effectiveness of the sports boycott in putting pressure on the apartheid regime, is explained here:
Desmond Tutu: Sports boycott crucial to ending apartheid
http://www.tamilguardian.com/article.asp?articleid=3093 )
However, the purpose of these anti-Springbok Tour protests, in calling for an end to apartheid, was not for the black South African majority to end up being worse off.
But that is exactly what has happened in ‘post-apartheid’ South Africa.
Why?
Because the ANC government, elected in 1994, broke their promises, effectively did a 180 degree ‘U turn’ and introduced the same neo-liberal ‘Rogernomics’ reforms, without consultation or mandate as did the 1984 – 1987 Labour Government here in New Zealand.
Sorry to be the one to ‘blow the whistle’ and ‘pop the hot air balloon’, but this wave of neo-liberal reforms started on Nelson Mandela’s watch, when he was President of South Africa from 1994 – 1999.
Nelson Mandela supported privatisation, and it started on ‘his watch’.
http://dspace.nwu.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10394/6332/No_42(1997)_Meyer_MJ.pdf?sequence=1
PRIVATISING SOUTH AFRICA BY DICTUM: A REVIEW
Michael J. Meyer
(Department of Development Studies, University of North West)
1. Introduction
Mindful of the experience in the Third World in general, and Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)in particular, where in some instances the privatisation of state assets was turned into a farce because of corruption, nepotism patronage and insider dealing, in South Africa (SA) the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) insisted from the outset that the privatisation process is shrouded in secrecy and should be made transparent.
As a consequence COSATU objected to the African National Congress’s (ANC) adoption of a privatisation policy at its December 1994 Conference, which was endorsed without any form of consultation with the labour movement -the ANC’s strongest social partner.’ In order to forestall any unilateral action on the part of the ANC the labour movement insisted on participation and transparency, calling on the ANC to be accountable, not only to its allies but also the masses on any decision taken
on the issue of privatisation.
1 COSATU 6th National Congress: 16-19 September 1997, Book 4, Resolutions, Discussion
Documents (1997), p. 33.
Over and above the intense hostility and pressure, particularly from COSATU, which government faces on restructuring and privatisation, President Mandela intractably remarked, that:
“Privatisation is the fundamental policy of the ANC, and is going to be implemented …Just because we [government and COSATU] have a working relationship, and they [COSATU] helped put us in power, does not mean that we are happy with everything they say.’ 49
49 Sunday Times, 26 May 1996.
COSATU-aligned unions reciprocated this statement calling for full participation and state transparency, failing which further mass action will go ahead if the sale of state assets were implemented unilaterally. 5O
[50 Labour consultants Andrew Levy and Associates claim in their second quarter Strike Report, that the “Stage is set for a showdown between government and trade unions on the issue of restructuring…” They further claim that there is a strong likelihood of a sharp rise in strikes related to restructuring of SOE’s (The Star, 28 June 1996). ]
This endorsed the threatening deadlock between govemment and organised labour.
Referring to privatisation, President Mandela reiterated Mboweni’s threat, declaring that govemment will “go it alone” if labour, business and government could not form a successful partnership.51
[51 Sunday Times, 26 May 1996.]
_____________________________________________________________________________
CENTRE FOR CIVIL SOCIETY RASSP RESEARCH REPORTS 2005, VOL.1
Saranel Benjamin, Durban, September 2005
“Introduction
The ANC’s 1994 national election campaign was not only premised on delivering democracy and freedom to the citizens of South Africa but was also strongly rooted in the memory of apartheid’s denial of basic resources to black people.
Riding on the crest of the Reconstruction and Development Programme (the ANC’s proposed economic plan for the post-liberation era based on redistribution of the country’s wealth to the poor), the ANC promised to right the wrongs of the past and to give the people what had long been denied them.
Election posters blazing with the black green and gold party colours screamed out to the poor:
“A better life for all!”, “Free basic services!”. “Jobs for all!”,
with a promise to redistribute the wealth accumulated by the apartheid government, white business and the white population.
The poor, trusting the rhetoric, voted in their millions to put the ANC into power as the first democratic government.
When the ANC capitulated to the charms of a market-driven economy, the party ditched clauses from the Freedom Charter and the RDP and emerged with a macro-economic policy that was a ‘fairly standard neoliberal one”. 1
[1 Adam Habib and Vishnu Padaychee (2000), “Economic Policy and Power Relations in South Africa’s Transition to Democracy” in World Development, (vol.28, no.2)3. ]
The choice of a market-driven policy that would ensure maximum profit accumulation by the already rich was made in full knowledge of South Africa’s stratified economy.
South Africa, writes John Saul, is a country where the “the poorest 60% of household’s share of total expenditure is a mere 14%, while the the richest quintile’s share is 69% and where, across the decade of the nineties, a certain narrowing of the income gap between black and white (as a growing number of blacks have edged themselves into elite circles) has been paralleled by an even greater widening gap between rich and poor”. 2
[2 John Saul, (2002), “Cry for the Beloved Country: the Post-Apartheid Denouement” (RAU Sociology), http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs 8. ]
The Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) policy drew from the main tenets of neoliberalism as installed globally with the main objective of creating an environment which enables maximum private investment.
Hence GEAR proposed cuts in government spending to reduce the deficit, the introduction of tax concessions for big business, a reduction of tariff barriers (in the clothing, textile,leather and car manufacturing industries), the privatization of government assets (which included the provision of basic services), a reduction in state welfare programmes and a more flexible labour market.
Adelzadeh 3
[3 In Hein Marais (2001), South Africa: Limits to Change, (Cape Toen: University of Cape Town Press) 163] and Saul both agree that the ANC had “come full circle, back to the late apartheid government’s Normative Economic Model.
For the central premise of South Africa’s economic policy now could clearly be clearer: ask not what capital can do for South Africa, but what South Africa can do for capital…”4
[4 Saul 12]
The ANC pushed for GEAR, arguing that the policy framework could help achieve economic growth, attract foreign investment , boost employment and increase socio-economic equality. the verdict so far has been resoundingly negative:
“GEAR has been associated with massive deindustrialization and job-shedding through reduced tariffs on imports, capital flight as as controls over investments are relaxed, attempts to downsize the costs and size of the public sector, and real cuts in education, health and social welfare spending”. 5
[5 Saul 13 ]
This neo-liberal economic framework precludes the the development of any form of social security system for the growing band of unemployed, informal sector workers and the poor. GEAR argues for a decline in state expenditure and, in keeping with global trends, this translates into cutting back on state welfare programmes.
The harsh effects of the GEAR policy have been felt most by those who came into the era of democracy poor. These were black, working class people.
Most were black, women, urban and rural. GEAR has left the poor more vulnerable to increasing poverty and has debilitated most workers by decimating the industries they work in. …”
____________________________________________________________________________
Through my involvement with the Auckland Water Pressure Group, I, (and others) made contact with some directly involved in the ‘social movements’, who were fighting back against these ANC-led neoliberal reforms, particularly the fight against water privatisation and the introduction of pre-paid water meters by groups such as the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF).
More information about the fightback by the ‘social movements’ in South Africa, is available here: http://www.ukzn.za/ccs
“SEEK TRUTH FROM FACTS”!
Penny Bright
1981 Springbok Tour protestor
‘Anti-corruption/anti-privatisation Public Watchdog’
bryce edwards in the odt ‘i’m bored with child poverty’…well fuck you bryce edwards!
Is this the article you’re referring to?
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/284747/poverty-issues-boring-public-academic
Doesn’t read like he’s bored with it, he’s saying the public is getting bored with it.
He speaks the truth.
Also people have become very cynical surrounding the media and the way they pimp out the “poor”.
It seems just about every “oh woe is me story” they put out there is rather short on facts and long on bullshit.
With message boards, blogs, twitter etc, it never takes too long before the real facts come out and surprise, it’s never anything like what the media say it is.
No one believes anything they read in the MSM now, most people are like “yeah, yeah what a load of shit, fuck they must think we’re idiots”.
Keep up the good work BM
Could not agree more
Well, you could, but there wouldn’t be any point as after anyone’s read the first line of your comments you’ve usually already exceeded their level of interest.
Thank you.
I’m happy you see value in my ramblings.
This.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/08/david-simon-capitalism-marx-two-americas-wire
edit: video
http://davidsimon.com/festival-of-dangerous-ideas-2013/
So it seems only 2 people from NZ can go to Mandela’s funeral …
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11170259
Cunliffe should let Sharples go in his place. Good principle – and good politics too!
+1
Oh dear, the best laid plans of mice and men….
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11170259
When the funeral is over perhaps everyone can get past their nostalgia and back to firing insults at each other about all the other shit someone else is always to blame for.
How did that happen? Positive gobsmacked wasn’t there with the same link. Unless he’s been a naughty boy and is in moderation. 😛
Nelson Mandela’s service is going to be stream lived on tvnz, Im guessing it will also be on BCC, CNN on sky.
No matter who attends and who speaks, it’s history and people should watch.
It’s history all right, but after all the grand speeches extolling him and what he stood for, they’ll all go back to advancing the interests of the wealthy and powerful at the expense of the poor and their speech notes will just blow away with the wind.
For what it’s worth, I reckon Key made the right call to include Cunliffe. No one will ever agree on who else would’ve been better. If there can only be two at the funeral the PM and the Leader of the Opposition is a good representation for this country.
Yes he did. I guess he couldn’t do anything else.
Hey Brett… what time does it start on TV1?
Anne:
Tvnz is not covering it. 🙁
They will have live coverage of it, on their webpage.
CNN is going to hav e live coverage also.
Thanks Brett… will watch it online.
I agree, Key was right to invite Cunliffe to be the 2nd. In fact it was his only option, politically.
But Cunliffe could earn a heap of mana by giving up his seat to Sharples. Symbolism matters, and if another rich white guy steps aside for the Maori protestor and leader from 1981, that’s strong symbolism – and, more cynically, bloody good headlines in the clear contrast between generous Cunliffe and Key vs Minto.
I wouldn’t blame Cunliffe for keeping his seat, it’s an occasion you wouldn’t want to miss. But there’s bonus points if he doesn’t.
Good point, well made. But on the other hand the reality now is that Sharples is part of Key’s government. It is better the Opposition is represented.
Looks like Cunliffe IS going to offer his seat to Sharples.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/230389/pm-forced-to-cut-back-mandela-delegation
Far out. Cunners should just make the call and do it then, not talk about “considering it”. Gobsmacked’s “bonus points” is valid – Cunners would gain a lot of respect & support for this.
Damn, I’ve just outed myself!
Good broadband here in South Africa …
The Radio NZ story has now changed to:
But no word whether Sharples has accepted…
https://twitter.com/rnzdemelza/status/410319857519833088
RNZ reporter Demelza Leslie:
“David Cunliffe is on his way to meet the Prime Minister to formally give up his place at Mandela memorial to Pita Sharples. Will PM accept?”
Key’s advisers will be spewing. And the rumour is senior Nats (ahem Blinglish, Tau) advised to invite Minto and Key was going with it, till others (ahem Collins) said no way.
According to Hilary Barry on Radio Live just now, there may be places for five after all.
But in any case, Cunliffe is impressing the voters …
https://twitter.com/search?q=sharples%20cunliffe&src=typd&f=realtime
My fave tweet: Cunliffe offers place to Sharples, who offers it to Hone, who offers it to Minto …
New Privacy Commissioner: John Edwards
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11170243
End of an era I reckon. Marie Shroff has done an excellent job in the face of obfuscation and obduracy from bureaucrats and politicians.
“It was certainly a period of time where politics were prominent and I was fascinated by it.” lol
Farkin lol alright.
It was a remark who are from a man I found is bullshitting and I was be disgusted by them.
Texas fracking quakes stirring residents and home owners fear
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak6vd7L-PWM
Dr Sharples and mckinnion are there?
WT……
In New Zealand, ACE qualifications are accepted for university entrance.
http://leavingfundamentalism.wordpress.com/2013/12/09/33-jaw-droppingly-bad-multiple-choice-questions-from-accelerated-christian-education/
A couple of live streams from SA.
SABC TV
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WBoWoRZ20w#t=353149
eNCA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbIhuEyo0sI#t=532255