Open mike 14/12/2014

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, December 14th, 2014 - 117 comments
Categories: open mike - Tags:

Paula Bennett christmas square-1Open mike is your post.

The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this.

The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).

Step up to the mike …

117 comments on “Open mike 14/12/2014 ”

  1. Manuka AOR 1

    With the ending of the IMP coalition, Mana are returning to work at ground level. “Everybody’s really focussed on getting back to stuff in their communities, which is what I’m doing as well, and rebuilding from that level,” – Hone Harawira. http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/internet-mana-coalition-comes-to-an-end-2014121313#axzz3LnYhiuoW

    It’s good advice for all of us, I think. While keeping an eye on our politicians and what’s happening “up there”, actual change often begins at local community level.

  2. Manuka AOR 2

    It’s a bit depressing reading various news summations of the year’s political events. I think Bryce Edwards is onto something when he says, “Labour fluffed its biggest opportunity – taking advantage of the huge upsurge of concern about inequality. Labour should have “owned” this issue, but instead National succeeded in convincing many that it was dealing with the problem.” http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11373917

    The problems arising from inequality won’t go away. The Nats have not even begun to deal with it and I suspect have no genuine intention of doing so. They will try and ignore it and hope it just fades from public concern, but it won’t. Hopefully through 2015 Labour can really take this on and bring out realistic options for resolving at least some of the worst aspects of the problem.

    • Pete George 2.1

      Edwards also wrote about ‘scandal fatigue’.

      Most significant of all was Nicky Hager’s Dirty Politics, which produced the biggest scandal of the year and helped bring Collins down. The substance of the book will continue to be discussed for some time.

      But overall, these controversies seemed to produce something of a scandal fatigue for many New Zealanders. The media covered the debates in detail but for most, these simply weren’t issues that mattered. Perhaps the overload of scandal, controversy and personality politics spooked voters.

      One of the biggest problems is that if a scandal comes to light that has sufficient evidence and seriousness to genuinely warrant holding politicians to account it’s impact will be severely diminished if it is seen as ‘just another round of mud slinging’.

      ‘Dirty Politics’ is as relevant to the next three years as ‘Vote Positive’ – there could be some flow on effect but it was largely a failed campaign slogan.

      How about ‘act Positive’? Little and Labour would win much more support if they launch into the next three year campaign looking like a positive alternative.

      And John Key needs to get over his annoyance and arrogance and concentrate on getting his Government on being positive about making New Zealand a bit better.

      Positive politics will do far more for people and the country in the future than pissing in the dark past.

      • The Al1en 2.1.1

        Dirty politics wasn’t a failed election campaign slogan, in fact it wasn’t even a left wing slogan, it was the title of a book. Any link between it and a campaign is in your head only.

        “it’s impact will be severely diminished if it is seen as ‘just another round of mud slinging’.”

        To who, you? Quelle surprise. Unlike you I wouldn’t think of speaking for everyone else, but to me (and I’m sure plenty of those in opposition sick of a corrupt national government) it won’t be mud slinging at all, it’ll be more like nails in coffins. To the nats it’ll be more like pins in eyes. That’s a good thing.

        As for positive politics, money where your mouth is and make the start. Tell peter dunne to fuck off cause he’s shit.

        • Pete George 2.1.1.1

          Funny contradiction.

          It’s not for me to tell Dunne what to do, I didn’t vote for him nor had anything to do with him being democratically elected and appointed to Ministerial responsibilities. He may make up his own mind before his electorate does it for him. His long career is obviously waning and he’s looking jaded.

          • The Al1en 2.1.1.1.1

            No contradiction, it’s exactly the opposite, which is why I mentioned it.
            It’s undeniable that peter dunne fucking off will be a positive thing for NZ and NZ politics.
            Not for you to tell dunne, but okay for you to come on here and tell us the lay of the land. I’m calling hypocrite on that one.

            You should do a dunne. It would be your biggest and best contribution to the nation. Fact check that.

        • Tracey 2.1.1.2

          Notice how PG almost quotes the 2014 campaign strategy of Labour which failed and proposes it as though he just thought of it and it will win 2017?

          “How about ‘act Positive’? Little and Labour would win much more support if they launch into the next three year campaign looking like a positive alternative.”

        • batweka 2.1.1.3

          pins in the eyes, that’s good. It’s also the gift that will keep on giving.

          DP collaborators like Petey will keep up with the whitewash, but today’s effort is a D. Paul got it downthread, very dull pg.

        • Halfcrown 2.1.1.4

          “As for positive politics, money where your mouth is and make the start. Tell peter dunne to fuck off cause he’s shit.”

          Very well said.

      • Paul 2.1.2

        Very dull, pg

      • Manuka AOR 2.1.3

        Mr G: “if a scandal comes to light that has sufficient evidence and seriousness to genuinely warrant holding politicians to account it’s impact will be severely diminished if it is seen as ‘just another round of mud slinging’.”

        What came to light via Nicky Hager’s book was rather more than “a scandal”. It showed how corruption has entered NZ parliament and governmental processes. The question of the public’s interest or lack of it in the matter is irrelevant to that of a) impartial justice and b) cleaning up the halls of power so that such corruption does not re-emerge elsewhere.

        • batweka 2.1.3.1

          yep, and most people aren’t following politics that closely anyway, so the assertion that most people aren’t bothered about DP is a redundancy. PG thinks that nothing is valid until it’s gotten the stamp of approval from muddle NZ.

      • North 2.1.4

        Yes PG @ 2.1 it’s a dark yesterday which continues into today. Your only answer is to offer sloganised non-sequitur. Disingenuity your specialty is it or do you truly hold that John Key has delivered the higher standards of governance promised ?

        Corruption deployed at the highest level and the ongoing effects of that are not expunged by electoral victory. Rather it means that for myriad reasons, major among them a neutered media, those cynically engaging that corruption got away with it. In a democracy the healthy workings of which were long depleted by that very corruption.

        But there you go again, the Pious Champion of Democracy – ” And John Key needs to get over his annoyance and arrogance and concentrate on getting his Government on being positive about making New Zealand a bit better. ”

        Wow ! – the high aspiration you embrace. NZ to be “……..a ‘bit’ better.” With a prime minister who’s remarkably incompetent or an unmitigated liar or both.

        • Pete George 2.1.4.1

          Most political improvements are incremental – a bit better is as good as change usually gets for most people and most governments.

          Dreams of massive shifts to an ideological nirvana never happen in real life.

          • Once wasTim 2.1.4.1.1

            “Dreams of massive shifts to an ideological nirvana never happen in real life.”

            Actually they do. We call them wars – nirvana depending on which side you’re on.
            Atm, I’m not especially keen on the direction we’re headed but we sure as hell are headed for a tipping point.

          • Ecosse_Maidy 2.1.4.1.2

            Mr George, just when we thought it was safe, you show up back in the water. I try not to pay attention to your distraction nonsense, yet needed something to amuse myself before your next inevitable self exile, or exile with help.. So, for PG’s ego to last One Month, Evens. Six Weeks 5-1, Two Months 10-1. Three Months 4000-1. Paula Bennett to become a Nun , The Pope To Go On A Nude One Man Heavy Metal tour, sponsored by a condom company, Keys to grow back his hair, Your New Zealand Blog site to be overwhelmed with new members. RNZ to be stupid enough to ask for your double talk as an honest broker, again 4999-1. Pete George to Last Four Months 5000-1.

      • Skinny 2.1.5

        When the news broke of Hager’s new book Dirty Politic!s I thought this is not good timing, of course the MSM played games of putting voters off the Left. For some reason Nicky comes across as a twerp and tends to piss people like me off.

        • phillip ure 2.1.5.1

          @ skinny..

          in my list of xmas presents for politicians:

          ..nicky hager:..a copy of the book:..’how i inadvertantly wrecked two elections for the left’..

          • ankerawshark 2.1.5.1.1

            Skinny and PU,…………………..Re Nicky, surely not a back lash. Nicky did an incredible job . He raced to get the book written prior to the election (don’t think he could have done it any sooner). If he hadn’t published before the election, my best bet is everyone would have berated him for that.

            Nicky is responsible for what happened next and we can hardly blame the election loss on him! I still put the majority of the responsibility on the msm, who completely maligned DC and continued their love affair with Shokey.

            • phillip ure 2.1.5.1.1.1

              @ anker..

              ..for me..it’s not a ‘backlash’..it’s a hindsight-drenched observation..

              ..with a key-word being ‘inadvertantly’…

              ..i too was surprised at the public/media seeming indifference to the corruption-revelations..

              ..and to the revelations from greenwald/snowden..

              ..it was not the medias’ finest-hour..that whole election-campaign..

              ..in fact..it was one of their worst..

              ..hysterical/ego-driven/gibbering-idiots..most of them..

              ..seemingly driven by gust/eddies of wind..

              ..and with a grip on not very much at all..

              .(i’ve been reading corkerys’ p.r-explained how-to manual..hence the salty language..)

          • Skinny 2.1.5.1.2

            My partner paid the money and got the book. It annoyed me as she wouldn’t get Hollow Men out from our local library that she uses regularly. I was that pissed off that I haven’t even bothered reading yet, will wait till I go on a camping holiday. Politics is dirty we all know that, I enjoyed cracking NACT with my own adaptation locally.

        • Murray Rawshark 2.1.5.2

          Whether he comes across as a twerp or not would be largely irrelevant in a more mature society. It’s what he says that should matter, but we haven’t got to that stage yet.
          The business of content vs style is what allows Key to get away with so much, and I’d say Hager is far less of a twerp than David Farrar.

        • John Shears 2.1.5.3

          Have you actually read the book?

      • Rosie 2.1.6

        Geez, you know the scroll wheel on the mouse is in for some over time when PG is back in town.

        • Once wasTim 2.1.6.1

          @ Rosie ….. use that scroll wheel ‘incrementally’. Alternatively just take a PG bypass

      • One Anonymous Bloke 2.1.7

        🙄

  3. “..5 WTF Marijuana Moments of 2014..

    ..Some of the craziest lies spun about the drug..”

    (cont..)

    http://www.alternet.org/drugs/5-wtf-marijuana-moments-2014

  4. Wairua 5

    Obama campaigners back Senator Elizabeth Warren’s challenge to Hillary ..

    https://tvnz.co.nz/world-news/obama-campaigners-back-female-senator-challenge-hillary-clinton-6205731

  5. Molly 6

    Interesting letter to the editor in the Franklin County News this week – one of the true-blue electorates:

    What is up with John Key?

    “Christmas is upon us and the water cooler and sorting table banter will shift to repartee around the barbecue.

    Recent political articles in the Herald, our own Franklin County News’ John Allen’s and last weekend TV3’s The Nation’s report on John Key’s black ops man Jason Ede would have raised consternation in many a household in the Franklin area and may well become a subject chewed over with the charcoaled sausage.

    The Herald’s newly appointed satirist Steve Braunias with his Secret Diary of John Key poked fun at Houdini like mental gymnastics of our PM, as have many other mainstream media commentators.

    I have to remind myself that this was the same mainstream media that listened to and was influenced by the Hobbits of ‘muddle’ National Party leadership.

    Perhaps the most telling comment was made by the wellconnected Fran O’Sullivan who attended the Deloitte Top 200 Business Awards. This prestigious event was a golden opportunity for the business elite and powerbrokers to network.

    What surprised her was that the first question on the lips of leading company chairmen and chief executives was, ‘‘what is up with John Key’’? Perhaps nothing is up with John Key, is this not as he has always been? You do not have to be practising medicine very long before you discover that some patients appear to have a greater investment in having their doctors think well of them than they do of our their own health and wellbeing.

    A term often used is the narcissistic fibber. Their body language is often the first thing to give them away but this must be observed over a period of time before coming to a conclusion.

    They automatically react to minimise their potential shame, as though shame would annihilate them.

    You have to work around their foibles to get the information that you need.

    It becomes part of the day’s work and sometimes they remain elusive and frustrating. Their persistence becomes legionary. So much for the doctor/patient relationship.

    But what happens when a country is involved? Unfortunately narcissism has become a norm in our society.

    Our politicians, our institutions, our culture are steeped in narcissism – we have a culture that overvalues image at the expense of truth.

    The proliferation of material things has become a measure of progress; wealth occupies a higher position than wisdom; and notoriety is more admired than dignity.

    Our politicians, our institutions, our culture are steeped in narcissism – we have a culture that overvalues image at the expense of truth.

    Lying to our doctors is but a symptom of this wider picture.

    Why does John Key persist with Cameron Slater? Does he not realise perception and intuition count and the public is becoming suspicious of the reality of this toxic relationship? It is starting to appear that John Key has something to hide? Anyone who has taken the trouble to download Nicky Hager’s book would recognise how well researched it is and will become a standard text for most students interested in political science.

    Calling the Pulitzer winning journalist Glenn Greenwald a ‘loser’ was beyond the pale.

    I currently belong to the National Party and I definitely feel uneasy about our PM’s antics.

    I would like to think I am not the only Party member in Hunua who shares this unease? This is not the National party my parents and grandparents supported and admired. “

    Encouragement to all those who commented on various media about how National Party members and supporters should take note of the current machinations of the National Party. People are starting to take notice. And kudos to the FCN editor who printed it in full – although this may be a deliberate provocation – but it does the job.

    • Manuka AOR 6.1

      Good News! People around NZ are finally beginning to wake up…

      Here’s the ‘Secret Diary’: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/10392141/The-secret-diary-of-John-Key

    • Clemgeopin 6.2

      Very good letter. But the only way things can change is if the National party caucus members and party leadership realise that the tide is turning and see the writing on the wall that Key has now actually become a liability for them and the country, not a strength.

      • Draco T Bastard 6.2.1

        That won’t change anything except the smiley face that National wears to hide it’s intentions.

    • Rosie 6.3

      That’s a well written letter – I hope the questioning of Key by Nat members begins to snowball and one day even coalesce into a backlash.

      I had always thought that the more traditional Nat members and voters would be uncomfortable with the loose morals and deception of the Key regime. Those members who have expectations of certain standards being maintained by their Party must feel some disappointment and a feel like they are at a distance from the Party as values begin to clash.

      • Once wasTim 6.3.1

        Very true… that line “A term often used is the narcissistic fibber” has until now only been counterbalanced by Nat ideologues voting with their wallets in mind (which is why I’ve been bloody surprised at the likes of Chris Finlayson – who I’d have thought wouldn’t have. He knows what a philistine the prick actually is – and as someone one here said – his PMship has always been a vanity project. I suspect its a BoQ’s quest not to come across as snobbish and someone who’s down with the leopard skin and ugg boot members. You’re not succeeding Chris – too late by 20 years).
        I’d love to know what a Bolger, or a McKinnon, or even a Holyoake (unconstrained by his suspender belt) thinks of #TeamKey

        • Murray Rawshark 6.3.1.1

          Holyoake would have understood Key and Collins very well. His corrupt machinations regarding Tuwharetoa land down by Taupo were at least as bad as anything this regime has done.

  6. Morrissey 7

    Israel is “investing in new fences” to “insulate itself against the chaos”
    An especially nasty propagandist given a platform this morning

    Radio NZ National, Sunday 14 December 2014

    I’ve just heard one of the most cynical, outrageous liars to ever besmirch the airwaves in this country. Wallace Chapman interviewed—or more accurately, ceded the airwaves to—one Jonathon Spyer, who is billed on the Radio NZ website as a “journalist and analyst”…..

    “Journalist and analyst Dr Jonathon Spyer is a former official of the Israel Government’s press office and advised Cabinet ministers on international affairs. His journalism is published in major outlets like the Jerusalem Post, The Guardian and the Middle East Review of International Affairs. He holds a PHD in International Relations from the London School of Economics and currently he is a senior research fellow at the Center for Global Research in International Affairs in Israel. He’s been in New Zealand this week, speaking at the Institute of International Affairs about Israel, and rising violence in the Middle East.”
    http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday

    Early in the interview, Spyer spoke about his trips to Syria with the “Free Syrian Army”—he says they’re the good guys, notwithstanding the fact that they cut out and eat human hearts on camera—-and expressed how distressed he was “to see one of the greatest cities in the Middle East reduced to rubble…. The Syrian war is the biggest catastrophe to hit the Levant in more than a decade.”

    After hearing his praise for the brave terrorists in Syria, it came as no surprise to hear him speaking so disparagingly of Iran, which according to him “does nothing for the greater good.” In contrast, of course, to Israel, which “seeks to INSULATE itself against the chaos in the region. So it’s investing in new fences and drones…. It’s trying to insulate itself against that chaos. Israel does not want to get drawn into this quagmire.”

    Wallace Chapman probably tells himself he tried to hold his guest to account by daring to mention the blockade of Gaza and the Occupation of the West Bank. But he was weak and cautious throughout, and kept calling it a “brutal conflict”, as if there was some kind of parity between the two sides.

    Spyer was permitted to unload, uninterrupted, the most extreme, contentious statements…

    JONATHON SPYER: Unfortunately as long as Hamas remains in control of Gaza, and as we know that organization is committed to Israel’s demise.…

    WALLACE CHAPMAN: Haven’t they recanted from that?

    JONATHON SPYER: Their statements still reflect not only an anti-Israel but anti-Jewish view of the world.

    WALLACE CHAPMAN: There was that question of proportionality, what some say is collective punishment.

    JONATHON SPYER: [concerned tone] Mmmmm, mmmm.

    WALLACE CHAPMAN: Some Israeli politicians seemed to think it was OKAY.

    JONATHON SPYER: Yeah, I don’t think anyone thinks it’s okay. ….

    et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseam….

    The host was obviously as repulsed by this fellow as I or anybody else was. It’s a real pity that he did not seem prepared to question him rigorously and challenge the lies he told. I sent the obviously appalled, but fatally diffident, Wallace Chapman the following e-mail….

    Why did you bill Jonathon Spyer as a “journalist and analyst”?

    Dear Wallace,

    I am offended by the platform you gave to the notorious Israeli apologist Jonathon Spyer. He recycled the most callous, cynical lies during the interview. Your website bills him as a “journalist and analyst”; in fact he is the very opposite.

    Perhaps the most blackly comic moment came when Spyer, an apologist for the destruction of Gaza, expressed how distressed he was “to see one of the greatest cities in the Middle East reduced to rubble.” He was, hypocritically, talking about Aleppo.

    He then went on to describe the Syrian conflict as “the biggest catastrophe to hit the Levant in more than a decade”. Only a dedicated Israeli apologist could say that.

    Yours sincerely,
    Morrissey Breen
    Northcote Point

    • Skinny 7.1

      I found Wallace’s interview far too on the fence, typical of his PC crap. The Israel’s get away with war crimes, meanwhile the Arabs fight back against the latest weaponry with basically sticks & stones. Disgraceful goings on.

      • phillip ure 7.1.1

        my w.t.f! moment with chapman came when i found out..

        ..that when a teenager..he was a fan of kenny g.

        ..and other assorted soft-rock atrocities..

        ..i have been unable to take him seriously since then..

        ..and to me..with his ongoing ‘affability’..no matter what..

        .he seems to be a mora mini-me..

        • Skinny 7.1.1.1

          Oh dear Kenny G lol. Don’t rate him at all now Phil.

        • greywarshark 7.1.1.2

          @ phillip ure
          Don’t mix Wallace with Jim Mora. Wallace has real integrity and he deserves better than your facile put-down. If you find fault tell him rather than giving him the tall poppy treatment here.

          • phillip ure 7.1.1.2.1

            r u also a fan of kenny g..there..greyshark..?

            • greywarshark 7.1.1.2.1.1

              phillip u
              I bow to your greater knowledge of music. Know nothing of Kenny G. I live in The Moment I think. And this one passed me by. I still like Acker Bilk, and I know he’s old hat.
              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=447yaU_4DF8

              I don’t like hearing our little outgrowth of intelligent broadcasting run down.
              Some criticism to be passed on to benefit them but not rubbishing. Nurture what we have. Get a change and it is possible it would be a downward one.

  7. Clemgeopin 8

    We learn something new everyday!
    How-cats-won-the-internet-and-helped-kickstart-the-Arab-Spring.

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/digital-living/64139357/Memewhile-how-cats-won-the-internet-and-helped-kickstart-the-Arab-Spring

  8. Penny Bright 9

    Those who are fervent supporters of Cathy Odgers and/or Cameron Slater (WhaleOil) – might be advised to read this post from Richard Smith from ‘Naked Capitalism’ – an international alternative finance blog, which has apparently had over 60 million hits since 2007?

    “Summing up: we had already found Odgers in close proximity to post-Soviet moneylaundering, US ponzis, Australian superannuation frauds and imploding New Zealand shadow banks. Now the HCI Hamilton US microcap boiler room dodginess, and the GXG ramifications, extend an already sprawling picture. Pull at the string named ‘Odgers’ and all manner of nasty stuff keeps turning up at the other end. That’s business as usual when you dig into scams, and now, evidently, when you dig into Odgers, too.

    On top of all that normal scam stuff, there are, by way of exotic intensifiers, Odgers’ direct connections to media manipulation, including, FFS, national-press-level op-ed gigs at the NZ Herald and NBR, and to successful smear jobs on regulators and on enforcers.

    And lastly, there are Odgers’ strong connections to government ministers, and to the PM himself, via his Office.

    Those connections are unique, for someone with Odgers’ burgeoning track record of proximity to major financial crime after major financial crime.

    More precisely, they are connections that are unique in Western democracies, as far as I know.

    The whole thing builds up into quite a nice generic case study of what sufficiently uninhibited, or incompetent, but anyway well-connected offshore lawyers can get embroiled in.

    Clearly, both politicians and journalists should be wary of being beholden to Odgers in any way, but equally clearly, that’s a warning that is far too late. ”

    http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2014/10/new-zealand-investment-fraud-typhoid-cathy-odgers-typhoid-mary-lucy-lawless-still-xena-warrior-princess.html

    New Zealand: if Investment Fraud was Typhoid, Cathy Odgers Would be Typhoid Mary, (but Lucy Lawless Would Still be Xena, Warrior Princess)

    Posted on October 14, 2014 by Richard Smith

    In a moment, we offer the latest sightings of the wake left by Cathy Odgers, including two brief, but searing, personal appearances by the lady herself.

    First, though, here are some running repairs to my post of 22nd August, which set out Cathy Odgers’ role in a network of shell companies strongly associated with $multibillion moneylaundering activities in the former Soviet Union, and also, her very unfortunate, very close connection with Jack Flader, the CEO of GCSL, where Odgers was legal counsel. Flader was fingered by an Australian parliamentary enquiry as the ‘mastermind’ of an AUD200Mn superannuation fraud. Flader’s name crops up in connection with a $1Bn US Ponzi, too.

    In that August post, I described Cathy Odgers as:

    an expatriate New Zealand lawyer specializing in the offshore trust business, for instance in Hong Kong and Samoa.

    That’s out of date now. Back in August, the “Samoa” link took me to this page, with Cathy Odgers, in her professional rig, resembling nothing so much as a dome-headed alien wearing a precarious toupee of uncertain tint:

    Pacific 2

    Today, the page looks like this:

    Pacific Fiduciaries recent Capture

    It appears that the space formerly required for Ms Odgers’ image is now occupied by pictures of lumps of wood, carved into letters. Hurried web page redesign can deliver striking results like that. I quite like the contrast with the rest of the site’s style: bonkers.

    Within days of that August blog post, Ms Odgers had turned in her directorship at Jeeves Group of Hong Kong (some time around 25th August) and her New Zealand lawyer’s practicing certificate (early September, as near as I can make out). So, though I can’t be terribly precise, nor accurate, I would guess that her disappearance from Pacific Fiduciaries fits into the same sort of timeframe. By ‘disappearance’ I don’t actually mean ‘resignation’, though. As of 11th October, Odgers was still a director of Pacific Fiduciaries (Samoa), according to the Samoa Companies Registry (look up company number 0530).

    While all that resigning and disappearing was going on, another story was breaking: of Odgers’ involvement in two successful paid-for media campaigns to smear the head of the Serious Fraud Office, Adam Feeley, and then the head of the Financial Markets Authority, Sean Hughes. The gentleman paying for the campaign was apparently Mark Hotchin, who was under investigation, first (ahem) by the Serious Fraud Office, and then (ahem) by the Financial Markets Authority, in connection with the $500Mn implosion of his company Hanover Finance, a New Zealand shadow bank.

    The story broke when Odgers leaked ‘smoking gun’ emails to the Prime Minister’s office, emails in which Justice Minister Collins appeared to be conniving at Feeley’s demise. That leak precipitated the resignation of Judith Collins, who, via her entanglement with the “Dirty Politics” scandal, was already something of an embarrassment to the National party in the late stages of an election campaign. Collins’ resignation pretty much contained the “Dirty Politics” fallout for Key. Thus boosted, Key and party retained power, quite comfortably, in the ensuing election.

    After the Collins email leak, and with the sense, one imagines, of a difficult job well done, and with a yen for pastures new, Ms Odgers set off for a spot of globetrotting.

    The Quest For Odgers now offers a spot of light relief. While Odgers went walkabout, actress Lucy Lawless speculated briefly, in a mostly serious NZ Herald piece, about portraying Odgers in a film of the Odgers-Collins-Whaleoil political scandal.

    Lucy Lawless, by the way, is an NZ Green Party activist, when she gets the time, but is better known internationally for her late-90s TV portrayal of teenager-and-gay-icon Xena, Warrior Princess. If you are not a former late-90s teenager, nor gay, nor the right kind of middle-aged lecher to have found her already, you can get some of the idea of Xena from a publicity pose:

    xena hi res

    In her Herald piece, Lawless concluded that Odgers would not be the juiciest role.

    This putdown by the impressive Lawless briefly goaded the less-impressive Odgers out of globetrotting radio silence, which she is anyway constitutionally incapable of maintaining for long. Via the Whaleoil blog, Odgers popped up in a Manhattan Halloween fancy dress shop with a counter-offer: she, Odgers, would portray Xena, Warrior Princess, thus (in another wig, non-professional, this time):

    imagee

    Faced with this apparition, surely the best, honest advice one could offer Ms Odgers would be to stick with the day job; except, of course, that she doesn’t seem to have one, at the moment. But I think Ms Odgers was merely being a little waggish, in that pic, and indulging her fondness for attention, which had gone unsatisfied for a long couple of weeks. I don’t think that she is out of a job, either.

    So much for the running repairs, recap and light relief; let’s get serious, and revert to savouring the heady aroma that hits the nostrils whenever one starts to sniff at any of Ms Odgers’ recent professional berths. There’s a new example, the aforementioned Pacific Fiduciaries (Samoa), and the going is about to get a little tougher, so pay attention.

    Pacific Fiduciaries (Samoa) was formerly part of dodgy Jack Flader’s GCSL empire. Since it’s in the offshore trust business, it is a low profile sort of an entity, but oddly enough, its name cropped up just a few days ago, in connection with an announcement on the European microcap stock exchange, GXG Markets:

    …………………………..
    …………………………..

    What if they do make it through? Well, it’s been a while since I was a registered professional investment advisor, but here’s a word to the wise: in my strictly amateur opinion, those stocks don’t really look set to be stellar long term performers.

    Full disclosure: I am, perforce, flat of all of them, but now, given the Odgers connection, I am certainly a keen spectator.

    Summing up: we had already found Odgers in close proximity to post-Soviet moneylaundering, US ponzis, Australian superannuation frauds and imploding New Zealand shadow banks. Now the HCI Hamilton US microcap boiler room dodginess, and the GXG ramifications, extend an already sprawling picture. Pull at the string named ‘Odgers’ and all manner of nasty stuff keeps turning up at the other end. That’s business as usual when you dig into scams, and now, evidently, when you dig into Odgers, too.

    On top of all that normal scam stuff, there are, by way of exotic intensifiers, Odgers’ direct connections to media manipulation, including, FFS, national-press-level op-ed gigs at the NZ Herald and NBR, and to successful smear jobs on regulators and on enforcers.

    And lastly, there are Odgers’ strong connections to government ministers, and to the PM himself, via his Office.
    Those connections are unique, for someone with Odgers’ burgeoning track record of proximity to major financial crime after major financial crime. More precisely, they are connections that are unique in Western democracies, as far as I know.
    The whole thing builds up into quite a nice generic case study of what sufficiently uninhibited, or incompetent, but anyway well-connected offshore lawyers can get embroiled in.

    Clearly, both politicians and journalists should be wary of being beholden to Odgers in any way, but equally clearly, that’s a warning that is far too late.

    …………………..
    ______________________________________________________________________________________

    I wonder what Cameron Slater will say to this?

    (I would post this directly on HIS WhaleOil blog – but I’m banned …………….

    Hopefully Cathy Odgers will see this and put her side of the story, and her ‘story’ will be based upon FACTS and substantiated with EVIDENCE, because in my considered opinion, and personal experience, she tends to spin things a little and ‘make sh*t up’?

    Kind regards,

    Penny Bright

    • b waghorn 9.1

      ‘Please allow me to introduce my self ‘springs to mind.

      • Once wasTim 9.1.1

        as in “Sympathy for the Devil”?
        what a good choice …. I’ll wind up the gramophone and platter the vinyl forthwith

        • b waghorn 9.1.1.1

          Might have to search it up on the spotify myself.:-)

        • Once wasTim 9.1.1.2

          btw …. I’ll be having a bloody good beggar’s banquet of a Christmas DEVOID of commercialism, bullshit consumerism (aside from a bit of leggo for grandson), and laughing my arse off at the recent Mt Vic arrivals attempting their various gentrification projects behind PIN numbered ‘access points’ (no doubt, I’ll BET there’ll be a fair few coming back from their little jaunts ready to tell the MSM how they feel totally “VIOLATED” because their attempts at avoiding contact with society have been breached. Funny as a fart in my mind

    • les 9.2

      nice work penny…Odgers looks like Ellen De Generes and Homer Simpson had a baby and pissed on it!

      • James 9.2.1

        I thought it was generally accepted that making comments simpy based on someones appearance was frowned upon.

        Im sure if I made comments about the looks higher profile leftie women I would be banned in a heartbeat.

        Usual story tho’ its ok to do it if its to someone we dont like.

  9. Tracey 10

    first collins. now goff working for SST. if he isnt tilting for auckland mayor i will go “hee”

    media has gone to hell in a handbasket when goff is portrayed as the left answer to colliis… for balance.

    :roll:.

  10. b waghorn 11

    I had a message shared to my face book last night about a dairy farmer committing suicide in the last few days basically asking people to remember that they are human too.
    I don’t know the person who died or the person who wrote it but the feeling I got was how dairy farmers feel despised by much of nz.
    Please remember they are just people that are sold the line that borrowing up large and working your Arse! off is the key to happiness.

    • Rosie 11.1

      Sorry to hear of the suicide b waghorn. I had heard that farmers are slightly over represented in suicide stats, by occupation. There has been some suggestions that the sometimes isolated life of a farmer, their long work hours and financial stress can lead to depression, and ultimately suicide in some.

      Being socially marginalised is another factor in all groups who suicide. It would be tragic if in this instance the farmer felt despised as an individual, if that is in fact the case rather than an assumption.

      There is a difference however between how some feel anger towards the poorly regulated (in animal welfare and environmental terms) system of farming in NZ and the individual themselves – and thoughtful people would not target their anger towards an individual they do not know. They would also know not to burden the individual alone when the regulatory system is at fault.

      I sincerely hope that the family of the farmer and his/her friends and members of the farming community have all the support they need – loss to suicide is such a hard grief to bear.

      • Clotilde 11.1.1

        Suicide- how utterly sad! Most people who commit suicide feel there is no way out, a prisoner with no end in site. A revolving circle, helplessness, heartache and loneliness all wrapped in one. These people are stuck with tunnel vision and can’t see a end in site (to their misery) and often recluse into themselves or the opposite- take it out on everyone around them, including strangers, but especially family members (followed by empty repeated false apologies, that mean absolutely nothing). Their perception is distorted and they can’t find the solution to their very complex illness and inner battle. There is a way out but most people need help – thank God there are many organizations (like Lifeline) that reach out and rescue people, especially in emergencies!! Though you can’t help people who won’t help themselves, people need to find the strength from within and battle the fear that lives inside of them. That is the most important point of all!

      • left for deadshark 11.1.2

        Sadly more farmers suicide,than died on quad bike accidents in this country.

    • Jimmy 11.2

      Yes I had the same facebook message shared with me.
      Im not sure when the Urban Country divide suddenly turned into a chasm.
      It seems about the time the country was having the endless price of milk debate.
      You only have to see the uninformed comments on the stuff website too realise, how farmers feel a little ostricised.
      And the current financially unsustainable dairy payout is causing a lot of worry in the community.
      And Rosie farmers definately dont feel like they are under regulated on their propertys.
      Rules, inspections, compliance, abound in the dairy farmers life.

      • Rosie 11.2.1

        “And Rosie farmers definately dont feel like they are under regulated on their propertys.
        Rules, inspections, compliance, abound in the dairy farmers life.”

        I know they do have a certain amount regulatory framework to deal with, I still have family on dairy farms, but how effective is it really?
        Just like we have health and safety regs but have really appalling rates of workplace injury and 51 workplace deaths in one year, for a country the size of NZ, it’s a lot when we are supposedly protected by law.

        • b waghorn 11.2.1.1

          When you flush the toilet Rosie what happens? Probably gone and forgotten. Now farmers have 100% responsibility for there own waste and that can be quiet expensive but dairy farmers are also responsible for on average the waste of 300 cows while they are in the shed and increasingly in the paddock to and they are mostly taking that responsibility seriously but the same msm that most here on standard berate do a top Job of attacking any mishaps in the systems and painting the whole lot as crooks.

          • Rosie 11.2.1.1.1

            Hi waghorn. Having being surrounded through out my life by men who work as drainage contractors and work on waste water engineering projects I am kind of up on human sewerage systems, for better or for worse.

            Nobody has a right to pollute. We have a responsibility to our environment first and foremost. We’ve seen the environmental degradation that comes from dirty dairying increase over the years as our dairy herd populations increase. People are rightly concerned about this.

            I get the feeling you are angling at blaming people who criticise, whoever those “people” may be, for the death of the farmer. I don’t want to trivialise his/her death by arguing about farming practices.

            Unless you personally know this farmer you simply can’t make assumptions about what was most likely very complex circumstances that led to his/her suicide.

        • Jimmy 11.2.1.2

          I cant give a difinitive answer as to how effective the regs are, all I know is if they arent working I dont want anymore of them.

      • Draco T Bastard 11.2.2

        And Rosie farmers definately dont feel like they are under regulated on their propertys.

        And yet our streams and water ways are still getting worse from their actions.

        Lesson: Either not enough regulation, lack of enforcement of the existing regulation or both.

        • b waghorn 11.2.2.1

          It’s the endless pursuit of more draco if a farmer could afford to milk 2 cows a ha instead of having to push to 4 per ha the rivers would probably be fine .

        • Jimmy 11.2.2.2

          Sounds like the NRA answer to american gun control, just need more guns.

      • RedLogix 11.2.3

        In my experience around the back country Jimmy farmers are generally the good guys. There are bad exceptions, but they a minority. And on the other side of the coin there are some real pioneering farmers who are absolute heroes whom we can all admire.

        But the industry as a whole is not in good shape. As you say the relationship between town and country has never been worse, and far too much of it seems stuck in financial and ecological ruts no-one seems willing to talk about.

        A big part of the problem for me is too many farmers caught up in the terrible trap of farming for capital gain, rather than sustainable cash flow.

        • b waghorn 11.2.3.1

          Its the banks red the fucking banks are the problem. There mission is to have farmers in debt for life or till they sell but they convince them they are there to help.

          • Jimmy 11.2.3.1.1

            I agree the banks are partially to blame, Ive also noticed a step change in the banks at the moment Im not sure why, but they seem willing to lend more money at the moment.
            I think they are trying to get rid of the at risk farms (high debt, or not terribly good at getting production farmers) off their books, so are willing to lend more money at better interest rates to what they consider better risk farmers.
            Anyway Im off to milk talk later.

            • b waghorn 11.2.3.1.1.1

              Just so you know jimmy i’m a shepherd with just enough knowledge to be dangerous.Likely to get myself in trouble here for here say but an ex employer of mines wife had worked for robber bank and they were payed healthy bonuses for selling debt and in his words ‘she wasn’t to worried about risk’ .
              I wish I could find it again but I found a article circa early 1900s about the nz gov and banks deciding the best way to up productivity in nz was to have farmers more in debt.

              • Draco T Bastard

                I wish I could find it again but I found a article circa early 1900s about the nz gov and banks deciding the best way to up productivity in nz was to have farmers more in debt.

                Under such a system they’re not measuring productivity but GDP and, as Steve Keen has shown, driving up debt also drives up GDP.

                • b waghorn

                  Any chance of a very basic explanation of GDP and how debt effects it.

                  • Colonial Rawshark

                    In basic terms GDP is the sum of all the $ value of economic activity which takes place in society.

                    GDP is a very rough measure – some would say a very faulty measure.

                    http://sangecon.wordpress.com/2010/04/12/limitations-of-gdp-gross-domestic-products/

                    In the USA putting black people in private prisons is very expensive: and increases GDP. Same as pouring money into gargantuan and failure prone defence projects: also increases GDP. You can see how these things can increase “economic growth” but in fact, are completely uneconomic activities in that they harm people and they harm communities.

                    Re: debt – the recognition here is that the money supply in our economies is almost all debt based. Spending $100 on your credit card pushes $100 into economic circulation. (Debt based spending power/debt based money creation).

                    Paying your credit card off essentially destroys money out of economic civilisation.

                    • b waghorn

                      Thanks . please don’t think I’m being cheeky but if every one got out of debt(not likely I know) what would happen

                    • Colonial Rawshark

                      The UN has defined 5 types of “uneconomic growth.”

                      http://steadystate.org/discover/downsides-of-economic-growth/

                    • b waghorn

                      That link should come with a warning for being mind altering. Cheers

                    • Draco T Bastard

                      if every one got out of debt(not likely I know) what would happen

                      The worlds money supply would decrease by ~97%. Due to the multiplier effect monetary velocity would decrease by a multiple of that.

                      Essentially, the economy would grind to a halt. Effectively, what happened in the Great Depression and what the EU, US and UK held off with their massive Quantitative Easing after the GFC hit.

                    • b waghorn

                      @ draco so Q easing was to put enough money into the system so that enough people could sustain there debt to stop all out collapse of the financial sector.?

              • Molly

                Dairy debt trebled in the last decade.

                Meeting the costs of that debt must have increased the financial burden of farmers. And influenced their choices to increase herds on their lands, (and subsequently have to deal with more imported feed and more waste). A downward spiral.

                I always wonder whether the decision to run Fonterra like a business had something to do with the increased debt. Traditional farmers often seemed to me to have a good grasp of caretaking of land and water.

                Also, as our level of stock cannot be accommodated by pasture alone, our imports of PKE (Palm Kernel Expeller) has grown rapidly. According to some sources we are the 3rd/4th largest purchaser in the world.

                So, following such an intensive, debt laden business model is not just affecting our farmers, our land and our waterways but contributes to environmental degradation and loss of communities and diversity in other countries too.

                Over in the States, where large-scale corporate farming has been going on for decades there are some small scale movements happening. There are alternatives, but the farming community is quite conservative, and disquiet about current practices needs to reach a level where farmers themselves are willing to practice alternative methods AND then talk to other farmers about it.

    • Once wasTim 11.3

      @ B Wag…
      I too feel sad, AND pissed off at the needless lives lost. There will be more I suspect as Fonterra stumbles, banks do their numbers, and the likes of Blinglishes work out what’s an expedient number of sacrificial lambs.
      It’s reminiscent of the incredible numbers of Indian farmers doing likewise as the result of big-corporate promises of better results. Some sign up out of naivety and the promise of better results. Others purely out of greed. Either way though – there’s a common thread.
      – Collateral damage
      – Casualties of ideological wars (whilst the likes of PG tips do numbers and pontificate
      Opportunists engage
      ……
      next

      • b waghorn 11.3.1

        It’s human nature to get excited about things and dream big and when you have lending agencies that no doubt have a % failure rate built into there lending there will be a cost as far as I can see there’s only two solution s control the lenders or change the system completly?

    • greywarshark 11.4

      I think this situation has been developing for a long time. Unfortunately ordinary small farmers need to group together in a small farmers union and discuss amongst themselves their real problems without a lot of National right wing bias and disinformation.

      If farmers want to know how to farm and remain human they need to look beyond Fed Farmers bullshit, simplistic stuff, avoiding real issues. Godwins-law like it won’t be long before ‘resilience’ is mentioned as deep-seated problems are passed over. The whole sector has gone into space as far as prices go as the money-hungry like the Crafars buy up multiple farms and game the system. How can the ordinary man and woman manage?

  11. joe90 12

    We could call it the Mana Party.

    .

    More importantly, the establishment centrists have clearly failed the country. The public has never had less faith in social or government institutions than it does today. Every other month seems to produce some new moral or institutional crisis demonstrating the failure of American elites to police their own. Wages refuse to go up no matter what happens with the rest of the economy, and the middle class is shrinking and unstable. The only utterly indefensible position is that major changes aren’t necessary, and that due respect for the mores of the Washington elite should trump blunt talk and sharp moves away from the status quo.

    […]

    So why, exactly, shouldn’t the progressive wing have its own response? One that promotes policies that are not only objectively wiser and proven right, but are also politically popular per public polling? The American people want comprehensive immigration reform. They want to reduce both wealth and income inequality. If the deficit must be reduced (and it’s not entirely clear that it must be), they want it reduced by taxing the obscenely wealthy. They want Wall Street curbed, and to break up banks that are too big to fail. They want to take action on climate change and move faster toward renewable energy. They want cheaper healthcare. They want more privacy protections, and fewer military interventions overseas.

    […]

    So why shouldn’t there be a coalition in Washington that stands up for them? Why shouldn’t there be a group that threatens to primary leaders, play hardball with budget negotiations and upend longstanding traditions to achieve those legislative goals? What could possibly be wrong with that, when done in the service of the right policies? We already know from experience with the Tea Party that such an approach can be successful in defeating the centrists from a tactical standpoint.

    http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2014_12/why_shouldnt_the_left_have_its053299.php

  12. Draco T Bastard 13

    If all New York commuters drove, Manhattan would need an obscene amount of roadways

    What would it look like if all of those commuters entered Manhattan by car, instead of the 16 percent that currently do?

    It’s an exercise that will definitely make you thankful for public transport.

    And yet our governments keep building more roads and essentially ignoring public transport.

  13. Clemgeopin 14

    It all started when police in Tarrant, Alabama, were called to the local Dollar Store last weekend for a report of a woman trying to steal eggs.

    Helen Johnson, 47, says she was desperate trying to feed her two grandchildren, but it turned out she didn’t even have enough money to buy them a carton of eggs.

    So she slipped three inside her pocket, only to be caught by a store worker. (Adding insult to injury, the eggs also broke inside her jacket pocket.)

    When police Officer William Stacy arrived and told her to stay put she thought, “‘Oh my God I’m going to jail for eggs. My grandkids are not going to eat. What am I going to do.”

    But rather than slap handcuffs on her, Stacy came back outside with a carton of eggs that he had bought for her. He also told her the store wouldn’t be pressing charges.

    The good-hearted cop said his own mother had sometimes struggled to feed him and his sister growing up, and having been been to Johnson’s home once before, he’d caught a glimpse of her living conditions. The family sleeps on mattresses in the sparsely furnished home.

    “The story she told me Saturday matched up with what I had seen when I was there,” said Stacy. “I felt like it was the right thing to do. I didn’t want to pass judgment on her.”

    “She started crying, she got very emotional and was very apologetic,” Stacy told Al.com. “She tried to give me the money she had on her, $1.25.”

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/64139456/Good-hearted-cop-buys-eggs-for-shoplifter-trying-to-feed-family

  14. On a completely different subject: I was watching a studio audience programme with Norman Finkelstein on al-Jazeera yesterday and one of the points made was how limited Gandhian tactics were, especially when confronted with a state that was perfectly prepared to resort to brute force like Israel with the Palestinians. It reminded me of a couple of pieces:
    http://rdln.wordpress.com/2012/10/11/how-successful-wasis-gandhian-peaceful-disobedience/
    http://rdln.wordpress.com/2012/10/02/creepy-old-gandhi-demystifying-the-mahatma/

    Phil

    • swordfish 15.1

      I think Finkelstein’s argument was the polar opposite: that Gandhian tactics of non-violence by Palestinians would be particularly useful (and not least because of Israel’s frequent resort to brute force).

      He argues: “Gandhi’s tactics can work in certain circumstances, they can’t work in others. If you’re in the middle of a forest in India and the Indian Army is coming in and just wiping you out – nobody in the World cares because nobody knows what the heck is going on in that little forest in India. So non-violence is not going to work there. But in a place like Israel-Palestine where, for historic reasons, Palestine is very much in the eye of the World, very much on the international agenda, in places like that, yes, I think non-violent resistance can work.”

      Finkelstein’s broader argument over the last few years has been that Israel’s inevitable uber-violent reaction against peaceful mass-Palestinian protest marches to Israel’s Separation/Apartheid Wall/De-Facto Border could be a game-changer, finally mobilising World opinion (already, of course, increasingly hostile to Israel’s brutality) to demand a decisive end to Israel’s on-going Occupation, ethnic-cleansing and flagrant violation of International Law.

      • Oops, yes, you’re right. He made the general point about Gandhian tactics only being useful sometimes, and gave the Indian case, where the tribal indigenous population in the forests is being murdered by the Indian army to facilitate big mining companies, but then went on to suggest that the Palestinians could use them effectively because the eyes of the world are on the occupied territories.

        The Palestinians of course do use unarmed struggle – the intifadas have been largely unarmed. But the Israelis turn on heavy state violence so the Palestinians are faced with the situation of armed resistance or getting killed in non-armed protests. This is a situation in which Gandhian tactics simply get Palestinians killed.

        I thought that programme was very interesting – it’s a real comment on TV stations here that we don’t have this kind of show.

        Phil

        • swordfish 15.1.1.1

          Yep. Real Current Affairs. Sharp, critical, incisive and covering multiple viewpoints. Something we haven’t had here for two decades.

          People who blame Palestinian violence for the situation need to remember that Israel’s extension of the Occupation is even more rapid during official ceasefires and whenever the Palestinians are relatively quiet and peaceful in their resistance. In that sense, Palestinian violence (as a response to violent Israeli Occupation) has actually been somewhat successful over the last decade in slowing down the ethnic-cleansing. Albeit at the enormous cost of allowing Israel a pretext to massacre and destroy, while at the same time gifting it a useful Hasbara strategy to demonise the Palestinians. (I hasten to add that I personally oppose violent tactics – they’re both immoral and, ultimately at least – counter-productive)

          I should point out, though, that Finkelstein would disagree with you, Philip, when you suggest that “This is a situation in which Gandhian tactics simply get Palestinians killed.” He’d argue that this is the whole point. When unarmed, peaceful Palestinians (on mass protest marches to the de-facto border, loudly demanding their full rights under International Law) are met with the almost inevitable overwhelming violence from the Israeli military – all in full sight of the World’s media – then that’s the game-changer that mobilises World public opinion (Just as televised police violence against civil rights protesters in the Southern US did in the early/mid 60s and as the televised Sharpville Massacre (1960) and, more so, Soweto (1976) galvanised World public opinion over Apartheid SA).

  15. greywarshark 17

    Thanx joe 90 Good reading for me and i will pass it on as he invites.

    I wonder how many policy direction spotlights like this one would be necessary to set us on the good path to modernism and sustainability of enterprise and income? Twenty>?

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

  • Government moves to quickly ratify the NZ-EU FTA
    "The Government is moving quickly to realise an additional $46 million in tariff savings in the EU market this season for Kiwi exporters,” Minister for Trade and Agriculture, Todd McClay says. Parliament is set, this week, to complete the final legislative processes required to bring the New Zealand – European ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 hours ago
  • Positive progress for social worker workforce
    New Zealand’s social workers are qualified, experienced, and more representative of the communities they serve, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “I want to acknowledge and applaud New Zealand’s social workers for the hard work they do, providing invaluable support for our most vulnerable. “To coincide with World ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    9 hours ago
  • Minister confirms reduced RUC rate for PHEVs
    Cabinet has agreed to a reduced road user charge (RUC) rate for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. Owners of PHEVs will be eligible for a reduced rate of $38 per 1,000km once all light electric vehicles (EVs) move into the RUC system from 1 April.  ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    11 hours ago
  • Trade access to overseas markets creates jobs
    Minister of Agriculture and Trade, Todd McClay, says that today’s opening of Riverland Foods manufacturing plant in Christchurch is a great example of how trade access to overseas markets creates jobs in New Zealand.  Speaking at the official opening of this state-of-the-art pet food factory the Minister noted that exports ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    11 hours ago
  • NZ and Chinese Foreign Ministers hold official talks
    Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Wellington today. “It was a pleasure to host Foreign Minister Wang Yi during his first official visit to New Zealand since 2017. Our discussions were wide-ranging and enabled engagement on many facets of New Zealand’s relationship with China, including trade, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Kāinga Ora instructed to end Sustaining Tenancies
    Kāinga Ora – Homes & Communities has been instructed to end the Sustaining Tenancies Framework and take stronger measures against persistent antisocial behaviour by tenants, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Earlier today Finance Minister Nicola Willis and I sent an interim Letter of Expectations to the Board of Kāinga Ora. ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Speech to Auckland Business Chamber: Growth is the answer
    Tēna koutou katoa. Greetings everyone. Thank you to the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and the Honourable Simon Bridges for hosting this address today. I acknowledge the business leaders in this room, the leaders and governors, the employers, the entrepreneurs, the investors, and the wealth creators. The coalition Government shares your ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 days ago
  • Singapore rounds out regional trip
    Minister Winston Peters completed the final leg of his visit to South and South East Asia in Singapore today, where he focused on enhancing one of New Zealand’s indispensable strategic partnerships.      “Singapore is our most important defence partner in South East Asia, our fourth-largest trading partner and a ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Minister van Velden represents New Zealand at International Democracy Summit
    Minister of Internal Affairs and Workplace Relations and Safety, Hon. Brooke van Velden, will travel to the Republic of Korea to represent New Zealand at the Third Summit for Democracy on 18 March. The summit, hosted by the Republic of Korea, was first convened by the United States in 2021, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Insurance Council of NZ Speech, 7 March 2024, Auckland
    ICNZ Speech 7 March 2024, Auckland  Acknowledgements and opening  Mōrena, ngā mihi nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho.  Good morning, it’s a privilege to be here to open the ICNZ annual conference, thank you to Mark for the Mihi Whakatau  My thanks to Tim Grafton for inviting me ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Five-year anniversary of Christchurch terror attacks
    Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Lead Coordination Minister Judith Collins have expressed their deepest sympathy on the five-year anniversary of the Christchurch terror attacks. “March 15, 2019, was a day when families, communities and the country came together both in sorrow and solidarity,” Mr Luxon says.  “Today we pay our respects to the 51 shuhada ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024
    Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024  Acknowledgements and opening  Morena, Nga Mihi Nui.  Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Thanks Nate for your Mihi Whakatau  Good morning. It’s a pleasure to formally open your conference this morning. What a lovely day in Wellington, What a great ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Early visit to Indonesia strengthens ties
    Foreign Minister Winston Peters held discussions in Jakarta today about the future of relations between New Zealand and South East Asia’s most populous country.   “We are in Jakarta so early in our new government’s term to reflect the huge importance we place on our relationship with Indonesia and South ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • China Foreign Minister to visit
    Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters has announced that the Foreign Minister of China, Wang Yi, will visit New Zealand next week.  “We look forward to re-engaging with Foreign Minister Wang Yi and discussing the full breadth of the bilateral relationship, which is one of New Zealand’s ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Minister opens new Auckland Rail Operations Centre
    Transport Minister Simeon Brown has today opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre, which will bring together KiwiRail, Auckland Transport, and Auckland One Rail to improve service reliability for Aucklanders. “The recent train disruptions in Auckland have highlighted how important it is KiwiRail and Auckland’s rail agencies work together to ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Celebrating 10 years of Crankworx Rotorua
    The Government is proud to support the 10th edition of Crankworx Rotorua as the Crankworx World Tour returns to Rotorua from 16-24 March 2024, says Minister for Economic Development Melissa Lee.  “Over the past 10 years as Crankworx Rotorua has grown, so too have the economic and social benefits that ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Government delivering on tax commitments
    Legislation implementing coalition Government tax commitments and addressing long-standing tax anomalies will be progressed in Parliament next week, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The legislation is contained in an Amendment Paper to the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill issued today.  “The Amendment Paper represents ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Significant Natural Areas requirement to be suspended
    Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard has today announced that the Government has agreed to suspend the requirement for councils to comply with the Significant Natural Areas (SNA) provisions of the National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity for three years, while it replaces the Resource Management Act (RMA).“As it stands, SNAs ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Government classifies drought conditions in Top of the South as medium-scale adverse event
    Agriculture Minister Todd McClay has classified the drought conditions in the Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts as a medium-scale adverse event, acknowledging the challenging conditions facing farmers and growers in the district. “Parts of Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts are in the grip of an intense dry spell. I know ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Government partnership to tackle $332m facial eczema problem
    The Government is helping farmers eradicate the significant impact of facial eczema (FE) in pastoral animals, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced.  “A $20 million partnership jointly funded by Beef + Lamb NZ, the Government, and the primary sector will save farmers an estimated NZD$332 million per year, and aims to ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • NZ, India chart path to enhanced relationship
    Foreign Minister Winston Peters has completed a successful visit to India, saying it was an important step in taking the relationship between the two countries to the next level.   “We have laid a strong foundation for the Coalition Government’s priority of enhancing New Zealand-India relations to generate significant future benefit for both countries,” says Mr Peters, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Ruapehu Alpine Lifts bailout the last, say Ministers
    Cabinet has agreed to provide $7 million to ensure the 2024 ski season can go ahead on the Whakapapa ski field in the central North Island but has told the operator Ruapehu Alpine Lifts it is the last financial support it will receive from taxpayers. Cabinet also agreed to provide ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Govt takes action to drive better cancer services
    Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Govt takes action to drive better cancer services
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  • Statement to the 68th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women
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