“It’s always an honor to be asked to come and pay tribute to someone with a career as long and distinguished as Bruce’s…. integrity beyond reproach…. It’s a great tragedy and an irony that a man of such great character should have been subject to those accusations.”
Humbug Corner is dedicated to gathering, and highlighting, the most striking examples of faux solicitude, insincere apologies, and particularly stupid recycling of official canards. It is produced by the Insincerity Project®, a division of Daisycutter Sports Inc.
More appalling humbug….
No. 3 Dean Lonergan: “Y’ know what? The only people who will mock them are people who are dwarfists.”
No. 2 Peter Dunne: “What a load of drivel and sanctimonious humbug…” http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-09062013/#comment-645811
No.1 Dominic Bowden: “It’s okay to be speechless.” http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-02062013/#comment-642288
See also….
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.” http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-27052013/#comment-638881
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.”
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-15052013/#comment-633295
No. 6 NZ Herald PR dept: “Congratulations—you’re reading New Zealand’s best newspaper.”
No. 5 Rawdon Christie: “…a FORMIDABLE replacement, it seems, is Claudette Hauiti.” http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-13052013/#comment-632594
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.”
Amnesty’s skewed priorities
by zemblan and Joe Emersberger, Media Lens, 17.6.13
A revealing snippet from the Guardian‘s ‘Politics Live Blog’ on the G8 Summit:
3.15pm: ‘Amnesty International are being allowed through the gates of the summit to deliver a letter to Vladimir Putin. As Henry McDonald reports, they will tell the Russian President to release the punk protest band Pussy Riot, two of whom are still in jail. A number of Amnesty activists will wear balaclavas similar to the ones the band don when they go on stage.’
They apparently didn’t have the mental wherewithal to write a letter condemning the US government’s persecution of whistleblowers like Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden. Nor did they have the initiative to condemn the British government’s treatment of Julian Assange.
Amnesty gave jailed Pussy Riot members Prisoner of Conscience designation within about two months of their incarceration.
Manning has been jailed and tortued in broad daylight for years and Amnesty has said it has been “investigating” all these years if he really qualifies as a Prisoner of Conscience.
“With each generation, it becomes harder to imagine a future that resembles the present…”.
Teaser:
…These inventions were not created to be improvements upon face-to-face communication, but a declension of acceptable, if diminished, substitutes for it. I’m almost sure that’s right: a computer is just a more complex telephone. Also, the word ‘declension’: yeah.
But then a funny thing happened: we began to prefer the diminished substitutes. It’s easier to make a phone call than to schlep to see someone in person. Leaving a message on someone’s machine is easier than having a phone conversation. So we began calling when we knew no one would pick up. Especially our brother-in-law, Frank. How we all hate talking to Frank.
Shooting off an e-mail is easier, still, because one can hide behind the absence of vocal inflection, and of course there’s no chance of accidentally catching Frank. And texting is even easier, as the expectation for articulateness is further reduced, and another shell is offered to hide in. Each step “forward” has made it easier, just a little, to avoid the emotional work of being present, to convey information rather than humanity…
Bradley, Assange, and Snowden are accused of revealing crimes committed by the world’s deadliest terrorist organization: the US military.
“The phrase “war on terrorism” should always be used in quotes, because there can’t possibly be a war on terrorism. It’s impossible. The reason is it’s led by one of the worst terrorist states in the world, in fact, it’s led by the only state in the world which has been condemned by the highest international authorities for international terrorism, namely the World Court and Security Council, except that the US vetoed the resolution.” Noam Chomsky
RIP Anti-racism dog @anti_racicm_dog.. nevermore will we hear your barking.
The account @Anti_Racism_Dog didn’t last long. Twitter suspended it quickly, a fate reserved only for the most aggressive, abusive and hateful users. What could a dog – an anti-racist one, at that – do to deserve it? @Anti_Racism_Dog had one real function: to bark at racist speech on Twitter. The account responded to tweets it deemed racist with the simple response ‘bark bark bark!’ Sometimes it would send wags to supporters but that was pretty much it.
For the short time it lasted, it was amazing to watch how people reacted to @Anti_Racism_Dog.
snip
Colour-blind racists feed on good-faith debate, and engaging with them, especially online, is almost always futile. But when they’re barked at by a dog, one whose only quality is anti-racism, they flip the fuck out. They demand to be engaged in debate (‘Tell me how what I said was racist!’) or appeal to objective definitions (‘The dictionary says racist means X, therefore nothing I said was racist’), but @Anti_Racism_Dog just barks.
A true troll doesn’t have a position to protect because to establish one would leave it vulnerable to attack, and playing defence takes time. @Anti_Racism_Dog, by fully assuming the persona of an animal, was invulnerable to counter-attack. You can’t explain yourself to a dog and you look like an idiot trying. The only way to win is not to play but this is the colour-blind racist’s Achilles Heel: they’re compelled to defend themselves against accusations of racism. It’s the anti-racist argument that gives them content; theirs is an ideology that’s in large part a list of counter-arguments. After all, white-supremacists are already winning – their task now is to keep the same racist structures in place while making plausibly colour-blind arguments against dismantling them. @Anti_Racism_Dog was empty of anything other than accusation and so left its targets sputtering.
The account served a second purpose: as a sort of anti-racist hunting dog. @Anti_Racism_Dog quickly attracted a lot of like-minded followers who understood the dynamics at play. Whenever it would start barking at another user, this was a cue to the dog’s followers to troll the offender as well. There’s only so much one dog can do alone. Colour-blind racism is particularly dangerous because it isn’t immediately visible as such. It provokes good-faith discussion from liberals about what counts as racism, muddying the water. But @Anti_Racism_Dog’s strategy draws new lines about what constitutes acceptable discourse on race, placing colour-blind racists on the other side by speaking to them like an animal. What would be taken as totally insane in flesh space can be infuriatingly clever online.
How much longer is the public going to continue to prop up Mediaworks? They consider themselves so independent but with this and NZOA funding they’re sucking on the taxpayer teat like a newborn rat.
How can the IRD be left out I though the IRD were first in line?
If the sale price is only for the amount owing to the banks and the purchaser then voluntarily agrees to pay all creditors except for IRD then it can happen.
There also are the issues of employment contracts, bonuses leave entitlements and howthese fall in the ranking of payments and the ability to transfers these to another entity.
then there are existing Nzoa grants to programms that are currently under production,( and I understand that many production coys are independent of the tv station that airs them ) there are many avenues that the greater “govt ” can withhold existing funding to media works,ability to transfer the broadcasting license.
There could also be potential of fraud as there under your scenario a scripted plan to defraud a or some creditors. I am sure that media works have some gifted lawyers that will protect the parent coy yet close investigation could find an t uncrossed or an I that is not doted. The govt has to be seen doing all it can against such a corporate that has displayed such contempt towards this country.
These are just a few random thoughts 😉
‘Jobcentre advisors will have unprecedented powers to compel claimants to carry out whatever old bollocks they can come up with to waste unemployed people’s time looking for jobs which aren’t there. Those who do not meet their Claimant Commitment could face having benefits stopped for up to three years. For those with children this could be devastating, for those severely unwell or disabled it could mean death.’
This is the UK model that Paula is following. I have severe rheumatoid arthritis and am on the invalid benefit, soon to become the ‘supported living payment’. I have so far managed to stymie attempts to move me to the sickness benefit, soon to be the jobseekers allowance. But I expect further harassment. I did not choose to have this disease which has cost me two careers, I can cope with living on less than $300 per week but I find it difficult to cope with the harassment from MSD and the ‘bludging beneficiary’ label. Since the Natz, a lot of Invalid beneficiaries have been dumped onto the Sickness Benefit ( a process started by Labour). Many of these people have psychiatric disabilities and stress is the last thing they need. But Johnny reckons he’ll have the welfare bill down regardless and Labour refuse to say different. Meanwhile we wait in fear…..
I am so sorry that you have to face this harassment beatie – it is a blight on our society that those who need help get treated the way you are – kia kaha. I can appreciate the fear you feel and the additional stress this is giving you and your family – what a terrible situation to be in for you – all the best.
Hi beatie and marty mars “I am so sorry that you have to face this harassment beatie”
Yes it is harassment re John Minto the government want to remove 100,000 off the benefit in the next 10 years:
“Government’s plan to push 100,000 off welfare with no job plan in place is shameful
“It’s shameful that the government is pressing ahead with this latest round of welfare changes”, says John Minto, Vice-President of the MANA Movement. “When the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Bill comes up in the House for its second reading later today there’s only one place it belongs – in the rubbish, because that’s how it treats people impacted by it –as rubbish.”
The bill marks the second big step in the wave of reforms initiated by Paula Bennett and Paula Rebstock back in 2010, all aimed at getting up to 100,000 beneficiaries off welfare in the next ten years.”
This government intends to fit beneficiaries onto a procrustian bed of shame and harassment and distress to save themselves money to give the rich more tax cuts and pay private organisations to do the dirty work like ATOS in the U$K. Shame on them. It’s to be an exercise in sadism to satisfy the propaganda they’ve been spewing for over a decade: People like Michael Laws. Atos in the U$K is a criminal harassment organisation funded by a criminal government that has caused the deaths of many people.
“In Greek mythology, Procrustes (Προκρούστης) or “the stretcher [who hammers out the metal]”, also known as Prokoptas or Damastes (Δαμαστής) “subduer”, was a rogue smith and bandit from Attica who physically attacked people by stretching them or cutting off their legs, so as to force them to fit the size of an iron bed. In general, when something is Procrustean, different lengths or sizes or properties are fitted to an arbitrary standard.”
beatie – Sorry to hear your distress and concerns.
Yes, I and a fair few others are equally worried, about what Bennett and her ‘Work and Insult” department will present to us from next month on. I have information that MSD (the Ministry) is already actively seeking requests for proposals for having mentally ill on benefits referred to outsourced service providers, who are supposed to get them into some kind of work.
It is all still in the process and kept from the public eye and ear, but they are wanting to commission agencies, who may be NGOs or employment agencies, to try placing mentally ill youth in Auckland at least into jobs, for which the providers will be offered “rewarding” fees.
WINZ will refer clients that are considered “fit” to do certain work to those providers, and naturally they will have expectations.
Nothing has been published about future assessments in detail, but looking at some policy documents that were released to the media a few months back, there are going to be various “tools” they will use, from self assessments, to targeted interviews with certain WINZ staff, up to the supposed “independent” examinations and assessments that may be done by medical staff, rehab staff or others they will select to do this.
It is scandalous that the government passed the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Act without informing the opposition parties and MPs, nor the public, about how they will decide who will be capable to do some work, and who not.
This is again a secret agenda, and I am sure, they will in future be much less transparent in anything they will do, as they got quite a scare when some took them on about unfair, unreasonable and not fact based recommendations by certain designated doctors and their health and disability advisors.
Yet from what I also hear, it seems they are going to tread more carefully than DWP have in the UK, because having people commit suicide, or harm themselves in other ways, that will not be the headlines Paula Bennett and John Key want here.
So be mindful, alert and prepared, but do not freak yourself out too much. In any case, prepare by already connecting with advocates, support networks and others, friends and family included, so when they come to challenge you, take witnesses to assessments and else.
At some stage there will likely be legal challenges on all what they will try, and I expect WINZ and MSD to breach natural justice in many cases. If people get together, pull resources and efforts together, and perhaps find a good lawyer, who may be prepared to take WINZ on, then something will be achieved.
Apart from all this: I am still furious that WINZ and MSD also always tell clients to use their websites, but it is hard to get to some of their offices, their kiosks and computers are often booked out, and the same applies to public libraries. Internet cafes cost money, so do home connections.
When do MSD and WINZ live up to the 21st century standards of communication and not only cover phone line costs for sick and disabled, but also internet access, I ask???!
Two-faced Bridges – tells Parliament one thing and does another.
Last week he told Parliament that he would be meeting with ILO officials in Geneva to discuss his employment law changes – but now he is in Geneva he is refusing to meet with them.
Ugh! The vomit inducing Bridges! He’s a lying sneaky rat, no different to his peers and should not be in the position he is in.
Perhaps he just can’t face the possibility of being scrutinised and held to account by the ILO. If he has a change a heart and does meet with the ILO maybe they can take up the issue of the 90 day bill while they’re at it. I had thought that the denial of access to legal representation in the case of a workplace personal grievance was against one of the ILO conventions. Not sure which number though. Does anyone know?
I also have rheumatoid arthritis. It is an incurable disease so how can you be taken off an invalid benefit onto sickness benefit. My understanding of invalids is that there is no chance of cure within 2 years and sickness benefit 6 months. Has this criteria changed? RA is a brutal, painful disease and the added stress of worrying about this must be terrible. Do you have an understanding doctor/rheumatologist. I feel for you. Good luck.
I went to my GP for a Winz medical cert and he gave me one for 3 months, he said if ‘I could drive, I could work’ and ‘I needed to consider paying back to society the cost of a recent joint replacement’ I’m not kidding! I asked my rheumatologist and he gave me one for 5 years. Now, I think you have to use a Winz ‘designated doctor’ who follows the ‘arbeit mact frei’ Winz line. The idea that the Invalid Benefit is for long-term/incurable illnesses was dismantled by the last Labour govt. I have a friend who has schizophrenia who is on the sickness/jobseeker allowance and will be harassed to find a job and sanctioned if they fail to comply. I think that most NZ’ers don’t have the faintest idea of how these ‘reforms’ will impact on those with a disability.
I have a friend who has schizophrenia who is on the sickness/jobseeker allowance and will be harassed to find a job and sanctioned if they fail to comply. I think that most NZ’ers don’t have the faintest idea of how these ‘reforms’ will impact on those with a disability.
Harrassment and denigration. It seems that a great number of NZs always middle-class plus those who have moved up the income ladder with social aspirations, never accepted the idea of a social contract and concern for all. See David Bennett Mp comment elsewhere on TS today.
The stats may very well be that 10% of beneficiaries may be fraudulent, not doing their bit to help themselves and put into society, 10% find jobs which they can manage and live on and are probably helped into at the beginning. The rest are going to have this gang of harpies and witch-hunters after them. What a soul destroying job to have to work for WINZ. It’s likely to produce a resentment that as they have to suffer so they will pass it on.
Yep. Sounds like the story behind yesterday’s armed man in wheelchair incident in Auckland, as somebody speculated here might be the case before the perp was taken into custody.
beatie, I would suggest getting a different GP. Unless you are in a really small town, you should have a choice. You don’t have to put up with ideological bullying.
(I do live in a very small town with a doctor shortage, so changing is difficult. However I refuse to see him and see a locum if I need to. He instructed his office staff not to accept beneficiaries onto his books. Unfortunately this attitude underlies Winz welfare ‘reforms’. The chief medical advisor to Winz, Dr David Bratt, (appointed under Labour) believes that being on a benefit is worse than heroin addiction. Those who choose to believe that beneficiaries are rorting the system have no idea and are a huge part of the problem. Try getting on, staying on and surviving on a benefit before uttering such smug fallacies.
“He instructed his office staff not to accept beneficiaries onto his books.”
This is a breach of the Human Rights Act, for sure!!!
A doctor has no right and breaches also the Code of Ethics of the NZ medical profession, if he does this. I see the problem you may have to prove this, as his staff will not say what they have been told by him.
Document everything he does and says to you and perhaps others, and consider making a complaint to the Health and Disability Commissioner, even though that office is also rather useless in many ways.
A sad state of affairs there is, in especially the more rural areas of N.Z..
He is a wealthy South African immigrant and he owns his practice. His office worker came to our advocacy organisation with an employment complaint and she told us about the ‘no beneficiaries’ rule. He’s pissed off a lot of local people but so far got away with it. It’s difficult to prove these matters. Incidentally at least one of the local real-estate agents also has a ‘no beneficiaries’ policy. It’s difficult to keep these things quiet in a small town.
The devil made guns to give Americans the opportunity to obtain them to protect themselves from other Americans who obtain them and make everybody safer. I am reliably informed by sources in Iran that the devil is actually an American.
How far to the nearest other town with a GP beatie? I think you definitely have a case for claiming transport costs from WINZ to see someone else.
I would keep notes, with times, dates etc of what is said. You can also ask to have a practice nurse sit in on any consult, or even a Health and Disability advocate. It’s amazing the things some people won’t say when there is a witness. And if he does say them, you have proof.
“I went to my GP for a Winz medical cert and he gave me one for 3 months, he said if ‘I could drive, I could work’ and ‘I needed to consider paying back to society the cost of a recent joint replacement’ I’m not kidding!”
How disgusting a GP that is! Sadly the same people that have been known for pushing the whole agenda, who include ones like Dr David Beaumont (formerly from ATOS) – as advisor for MSD (and others), like Dr Des Gorman, Chief of Health Workforce NZ (in charge of recruitment and involved also in working on training programs for staff in the medical field), who also is now on the board of ACC, who gave some appalling advice on past ACC cases, and possibly still is the top man on the National Health Board, same as of course Dr David Bratt, Principal Health Advisor for MSD (comparing benefit dependence to drug dependence), plus of course Prof. Mansel Aylward (one of the key propagators of “work being the best treatment to get well”, advisor to Paula Bennett, also due to speak to a leading GP conference in Rotorua in a week or so) and “Dame Black” (like Aylward also from the UK), they have all been involved in sending the same “messages” to medical practitioners.
Doctors are also being lobbied, trained and influenced, to work along the new philosophy, following the perverted interpretation of the “bio-psycho social model” for illness and disability issues, as DWP in the UK and now WINZ in New Zealand are pushing for.
It goes beyond WINZ’s designated doctors and health and disability advisors now, and some doctors are concerned.
That GP of yours needs a good reminder of his Code of Ethics, which ensures that the well-being of the patient comes before all else!
I am glad a more competent, properly qualified professional gave you a better, more sympathetic treatment.
That is what I tell all affected. Do not just rely on your GP, go and consult a specialist in the very health areas you suffer from, be this a rheumatoligist, an orthopaedic specialist, a psychologist, a psychiatrist, counsellor, or whatever!
GPs often lack sufficient in depth knowledge, but of course they would never admit it. They like to call themselves “specialist generalists”, what a contradiction in terms, really!
I dunno. It’s a mixed bag with GPs. Mine had no problem completing medical certificates for IBs for people who really were not able to work. She had a problem with being abused for not completing them for a small fraction of patients who were fit for work, after WINZ had reportedly told them no problem getting your benefit extended, just get your GP to sign the certificate. Mind you, that discussion took place about 5 years ago. Things are a lot different now, but my GP will still be batting & even battling for genuine cases.
Unfortunately yes things are a lot different now. My latest letter from Winz warned me not to jet off overseas without informing them first (so they could cut my benefit). Reality check….today I treated myself to a 3 month car reg (no public transport here).
Well to be fair it is pretty important for the thousands of beneficiaries who regularly embark on overseas shopping trips to let WINZ know they’ll be offshore visiting overseas thrift & pawn shops for a few days.
‘it’s a mixed bag with GPs. Mine had no problem completing medical certificates for IBs for people who really were not able to work.’ Hmmm. I can work, I’d love to work and I think I have a lot to offer, but I would need lots of days off when I’m unwell and I can’t type very fast because my hands are crippled. So whether you can do paid work or not is not the issue. I can work but no-one will employ me, especially when I’m competing withe the able-bodied..I believe the whole point of these reforms is to drive down wages and conditions for those who have paid work.
That GP of yours needs a good reminder of his Code of Ethics, which ensures that the well-being of the patient comes before all else!
I am glad a more competent, properly qualified professional gave you a better, more sympathetic treatment.
That is what I tell all affected. Do not just rely on your GP, go and consult a specialist in the very health areas you suffer from, be this a rheumatoligist, an orthopaedic specialist, a psychologist, a psychiatrist, counsellor, or whatever!
GPs often lack sufficient in depth knowledge, but of course they would never admit it. They like to call themselves “specialist generalists”, what a contradiction in terms, really!
Plenty of specialists who are arseholes too unfortunately. I’ve come across some excellent GPs too. It really comes down to the individual person. And for the beneficiary, what kind of disability/illness they have is critical to who they should see. Some are going to be better off with a compassionate GP rather than an unsympathetic specialist.
weka – as for medical professionals, any of us, whether affected and needing reports on conditions and illnesses from GPs or others, we should never be forced to do something like “doctor shopping”, for those that do their job, or as you describe as being sympathetic.
All of them have to abide by Codes of Ethics, and if they do not abide by them, they should be exposed, criticised and attacked for it. They may be in the wrong job, if they do not take their code serious.
Abuse by some “patients” may be attempted and may happen, but I see also that some medical staff are trying to not follow the codes and just do not want to bother with beneficiaries. That is unacceptable.
It is totally unacceptable to explain bias and prejudice away with “individual persons” acting differently.
Then you may as well tolerate the application of the Sharia in New Zealand, by those who think that is necessary to keep “order”!
In your previous comment you seemed to be saying that people on medical benefits should see a specialist because GPs are fairly useless. I was pointing out that the qualification or area of specialisation of the doctor is irrelevant, it’s the compassion and politics of the practitioner that counts when it comes to support with WINZ shit. Just because someone is a specialist, it doesn’t mean they will be competent at dealing with WINZ.
I agree with you that bias and lack of professional ethics is unacceptable. That’s an issue for NZ and medical practitioners to sort out. Advice to beneficiaries… I stand by making the suggestion that they choose a practitioner who isn’t an arsehole and go to some length to do that even if it does mean shopping around. Many people still believe they have to take shit from their doctor because their doctor is their doctor and can’t be changed. That’s just bullshit. I also acknowledge that for some people it is very difficult to be assertive enough to change doctors, esp where there is not much choice.
Ok, I suggested seeing a specialist, because MSD and WINZ can also turn around and say themselves (that is their case managers, or the more secretive Regional Health Advisors or Disability Advisors), well, that is what her or his GP says. We think though, the GP may not be the best medical “expert” to listen to, so hey, send the client to a designated doctor, who may have some extra “specialised skills” that appear to be more appropriate.
Then the client gets sent there and gets assessed by a WINZ trained and picked doctor, who will be less sympathetic.
In view of such possibilities I think it would make sense to go and see a specialist, who is also perhaps sympathetic at the same time, to cover oneself in case WINZ try to question reports. MSD and WINZ have many tricks up their sleeves, and so getting ones own specialist before they may come with their own doctors for a second opinion, seems advisable from my point of view.
It would certainly make sense to try and consult a specialist, if the own GP is not very sympathetic. But of course then I would try and also find a new GP.
I accept your point that some are scared to change doctors. Yes, it is understandable, as it involves looking around and approaching other doctors, whom one does not know. Then there are very private informations involved also. Changing a doctor is not done easily, as any person doing so wants to know that the new doctor can be trusted. Also those living in small towns and rural regions, they will have a very limited choice amongst doctors. I have heard enough feedback from some, who would have to travel large distances to see another doctor. When you are on a benefit such travel may be impossible or prohibitively expensive.
And challenging a doctor in such scenarios is not easy either, as the doctor may be well respected with others in such more “conservative” places. The media in such places will also not want to write critical reports on a local doctor, who could go and sue them for alleged defamation. Staff working for the doctor will not want to risk their jobs and say what they know.
I feel for people in such remote areas, as they live under conditions allowing little choice and making it very difficult to challenge unreasonableness, discrimination and what else there may be. So it pays to establish contacts to outsiders, who may be able to raise matters via channels like this forum, to at least raise awareness.
“My understanding of invalids is that there is no chance of cure within 2 years and sickness benefit 6 months. Has this criteria changed? ”
IB has become Supported Living Payment. Within that, some people will be assessed to see if they are work ready (either full or part time).
Sickness benefit has become part of the Job-seeker benefit ie they are in the same general category as unemployed people, but will have different assessment processes, depending on their illness.
From WINZ, SLP
Assessing your ability to work
We may ask some people on Supported Living Payment to do a self-assessment to tell us about the sort of work they think they might be able to do, and how we could help them to achieve that.
In some cases, we may also ask people to meet with an independent health professional as part of our assessment process.
These aren’t things we’ll ask everyone to do, as it will depend on people’s circumstances.
I take that to mean that not much has changed technically (still using designated doctors etc), but they are formalising processes so that it’s easier for them to target IBs for work. But as it says, it won’t be everyone, so anyone on IB should be making sure their GP is competent at supporting them for when the time comes.
Re SB
People receiving the following benefits on 15 July 2013 will transfer to Jobseeker Support:
Unemployment Benefit
Sickness Benefit
Domestic Purposes Benefit (Sole Parents with youngest child aged 14 or over, and Women Alone)
Widow’s Benefit (without children, or with youngest child aged 14 or over).
…
New obligations and other changes that apply to you
To receive Jobseeker Support, there are some new things you must do. These are listed below. At any time, if you can’t meet these requirements, please talk to us. Unless you have a good reason for not meeting them, your benefit could reduce or stop.
Accepting offers of suitable employment
If you’re required to look for work, and from 15 July 2013 you turn down a suitable job without a good reason, your benefit will reduce by up to half (if you have dependent children) or stop (if you don’t have dependent children) for a 13-week period.
If you’ve given us a medical certificate
There’s no change to what your current medical certificate means for your obligations, or what you need to do when it expires. We may ask you to do a self-assessment. This is an opportunity for you to tell us about the sort of work you think you can do now or in future, and how we could help you back into work.
Plus some stuff about drug testing.
I take that to mean that the UB rules will apply to SB, once the SB person has been assessed for work.
The self-assessment thing should be treated with the utmost caution, because they will be able to use that against people later. eg “I’d really like to be able to do some voluntary work at some point” becomes “they’re capable of working and should be looking for a part time job”.
As per usual, the people that have good skills at dealing with abusive systems will do ok-ish, the people that don’t will get hammered. Fuck Key, Bennet, bigots, and all the liberal middle classes who are letting this happen on their watch.
Xtasy’s advice is excellent So be mindful, alert and prepared, but do not freak yourself out too much. In any case, prepare by already connecting with advocates, support networks and others, friends and family included, so when they come to challenge you, take witnesses to assessments and else. I would add, get everything in writing.
Good advice! I don’t trust Winz and avoid them if at all possible. A lot of people on IB are former ACC clients who were dumped onto a benefit. Meanwhile there is a deafening silence from mainstream disability organisations about this. Hoping to pick up future contracts I guess.
Beatie – We have an almost undeclared ‘strategic war’ by Minister Bennett and MSD against advocacy groups.
Those that have been working in advocacy for years know this, and they are confronted by this. Funding is stopped, or limited, or re-arranged, so some, like here in Auckland long running Mangere Budgeting Service had to dismiss staff, others are facing closure.
They are all over-burdened but get insufficient funds to do their jobs.
Budgeting services do now have to follow very restrictive operational rules, limiting them to just do what MSD want the to do, to tell beneficiaries to learn to live off the benefit – no matter what, as they will not get more. True advocacy is only possible by doing extra time and putting in extra effort, it is not paid for anymore.
And the disability advocates do (like many of the advocacy and budgeting services) also largely depend from direct or indirect state funding.
So they are kept in dependence, which means they do not dare to bite the hand that feeds them. Bennett and her Ministry have the upper hand, they know it, and they lay down the law as they please.
As there will be much out-sourcing of services, yes, some will be keen to look at what they can sign up for, to “assist” some sick and disabled into open employment, for nice fees that MSD is going to pay for them.
No surprise there, as that allows Bennett to go around and behave so “cocky” as she often comes across. She earns 5000 or more dollars a week, and she has long forgotten, where she once came from!
Until recently I was part of an advocacy organisation in my town. we were volunteers and we assisted people with Winz, Acc, employment and tenancy issues etc. There is a huge need out there for this sort of service.We got a trickle of funding because there is no CAB here. However that dried up and when we queried it we were accused of ‘biting the hand that feeds us’. Meanwhile organisations that say they do advocacy, but don’t got $1000’s. Also those of us on benefits were targeted by Winz because, if we could do voluntary work we could do paid work, couldn’t we? One of us (head injury, ex nurse) and particularly good at advocacy was moved from IB to SB because she pissed our local Winz workers off. There’s some nasty bastards out there.
I’m disclosing a lot of personal info here but I think that a lot of people are in real trouble out there and others don’t know/care/give a fuck.
Thanks beatie, it sounds like you have been through a lot, and you have certainly done the right thing by doing some advocacy for others.
Yes, I know, there are some mean jerks within WINZ, but then again some are also ok. In the end they are all public servants, and that means, they get instructions, and must follow them, or they will themselves get trouble for not doing so.
It is the chain of command, and the system keeps us all in some forms of chains of dominance and command.
That was also what enabled Hitler and the Nazis to do what they did, to exploit the fear of people to step out of line and not co-operate.
What WINZ do cannot be compared to that, but it is highly worrisome and increasingly inhumane, in some cases criminal. So at some stage civil disobedience should become the duty of those pushed too far to do things that just are not right.
Raising awareness here and elsewhere is a start to spread the truth about what is going on. Ideally more will wake up and raise their voice of disagreement and protest. That is what we must work for. We need people to ask themselves whether this is right, and come to the right conclusion, and then join us and take action.
“If you’re required to look for work, and from 15 July 2013 you turn down a suitable job without a good reason, your benefit will reduce by up to half (if you have dependent children) or stop (if you don’t have dependent children) for a 13-week period.”
An awful lot hangs on that phrase “without a good reason“.
Back in 1991 I was unemployed – perfectly timed to coincide with the benefit cuts and introduction of draconian rules just like this one. At the time there was a rule that if you turned down work (not just ‘a permanent job’) you had a strike against you. You had two strikes and then, next time, you had your benefit stopped (I think that was how it worked).
Well, I lined up for my weekly scouring of the jobs board and chat with the person processing us on the other side of the counter and was told that there were two days shallot picking/digging somewhere beyond the outskirts of Christchurch. It happened that I had been told a few days earlier that I had managed to get an interview for a professional job on the morning of the first day of shallot picking. I said this to the woman behind the counter. She said, deadpan, ‘So, you’re refusing work?’.
I tried to explain that I thought it was a good reason and it seemed crazy to insist I go for two days shallot picking and miss out on an interview for a very skilled job when there were plenty of others in the line who’d be keen to take the two days work. She wasn’t having any of it and seemed more intent on getting through the day in front of an endless line of unemployed people.
‘That’s one strike’ she said (or words to that effect). I left the office feeling like dirt and worried as hell at what they might do to me if something like that happened again. At that very moment I had written away and had in process over 40 applications for positions both in New Zealand and overseas. Part of me wanted to go back in, take the shallot picking and flag the interview – I didn’t want to risk losing what was a pretty meagre benefit because it was the only guaranteed income I had.
I was gobsmacked but stuck to my guns and went to the job interview. About a week later I ended up hearing that I got the job. In the meantime, I’d taken another ‘job’ picking apples and took the job offer call in the apple orchard office.
I’ve never forgotten that experience.
Who knows, maybe the woman I spoke to was applying the rules incorrectly and just thought I was a lazy, con-artist or something who was spinning her a line. Part of me still wants to believe that it couldn’t possibly be what was intended – counted as ‘refusing work’ because you had to go to a job interview.
Maybe just that the form said – agreed to do work offered – Yes … No and had no other option.
Government bureaucracies work like that, especially when they’ve just been gutted or restructured by bean counters and been told to find ways to work smarter to get through the same amount of work. Basic checklists soon abound on front desks to slash the time previously “wasted” applying rational thinking when the situation is even slightly more complex than the simple interactions the academically qualified policy designers or the contracted trainers envisaged.
This outwardly attractive person’s inability to form a coherent answer reminds me of David Shearer.
What is the difference between David Shearer and Miss Utah?
One is young, inexperienced and has plenty of time to develop skills.
The other is old, experienced and is incapable of developing skills now.
Unfortunately Stuff often self-promotes using images of young attractive women in that photo slot – sometimes it has more serious news items there, and sometimes images of young celebrity males, but young women are most often seen in that slot.
Now it is all coming out bit by bit. There are new revelations by the week now, if not by the day.
Edward Snowden, NSA intelligence staff member turned “whistle-blower”, in hiding in Hong Kong, has answered questions via the website of ‘The Guardian’:
AP have come out with a story, revealing that apparently PRISM is just the tip of the iceberg, when it comes to wide-scale internet and communications surveillance by US agencies:
“Deep in the oceans, hundreds of cables carry much of the world’s phone and Internet traffic. Since at least the early 1970s, the NSA has been tapping foreign cables. It doesn’t need permission. That’s its job.
But Internet data doesn’t care about borders. Send an email from Pakistan to Afghanistan and it might pass through a mail server in the United States, the same computer that handles messages to and from Americans. The NSA is prohibited from spying on Americans or anyone inside the United States. That’s the FBI’s job and it requires a warrant.
Despite that prohibition, shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, President George W. Bush secretly authorized the NSA to plug into the fiber optic cables that enter and leave the United States, knowing it would give the government unprecedented, warrantless access to Americans’ private conversations.”
Edward Snowden
They gave some of his comments on Radionz this morning. Sounds a cool guy. Hope you keep cool Edward. Don’t want you to be the Count of Monte Christo.
Yes, I would have thought that this failure would make important news on the msm yet TV3 news never has MRP share price on its half dozen listed prices it shows…I wonder why?
oooh Government books WILL NOT return to surplus in 2015; wait patiently till 2016 instead now.oooh.- RNZ
she’ll be coming round the mountain, she’ll be coming round the mountain, she’ll be coming round the mountain when she bombs. (I knew an old lady who swallowed a fly). 😀
Would be kind of good for us all to know what exactly is being surrendered in the TPPA negotiations, too. You know, the 1-2% doing on-the-quiet-selling-your-sovereignty-deals with the other 1-2% in the US.
Well no, I’m still interested in finding out who the leaker was in MFAT, but just not that interested. People needed to see what a thick prick McCully is. Public servants have endured years of bashing from the arsoles they have to work for. Its inevitable some will defend themselves and retaliate by whatever means available.
Public servants have endured years of bashing from the arsoles they have to work for. Its inevitable some will defend themselves and retaliate by whatever means available.
Can attest to that. I worked for a government agency that tried to rip off another government agency in the late 1980s and early 1990s. I had to put up with bullying and intimidation because they knew I had a few senior political contacts at that time and they were afraid I might spill the beans. In the end I did exactly that, and they had no-one but themselves to blame. A contract they were dead keen on getting signed ended up being scrapped. It served them right. Not surprisingly, that management didn’t last much longer…
But the details of the case were swiftly covered up and never the light of day.
Aye! Not to mention covering up financial mismanagement, lying, leaking cabinet papers, troughing, and generally thinking that quaint old code of conduct doesn’t apply to them.
Thankfully (as you suggest Anne), some of them eventually come a cropper
“The Auckland Council is talking up another one million residents in the city by 2041, but it is taking a prudent line when it comes to providing transport, water and other services.
The council has adopted a Statistics New Zealand’s high-growth scenario of a million more residents by 2041, but its water body is using a medium-growth scenario of 700,000 more residents.
The mismatch has raised questions, but council chief planning officer Dr Roger Blakeley says it is prudent to provide for the highest likely population growth and to be cautious to avoid over-investment.
………………..
Councillor Cameron Brewer has called for an independent review of the most likely population growth, saying the council’s projections are out of kilter with the Government’s national infrastructure unit’s mid-range projections. …..”
______________________________________________________________________________
STATEMENT BY 2013 AUCKLAND MAYORAL CANDIDATE PENNY BRIGHT:
Did YOU know that the following Petition 2011/64 has already been presented to the House?
Requesting that Parliament declines to proceed with the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill until the lawfulness of the reliance of Auckland Council on the New Zealand Department of Statistics’ “high”population growth projections, instead of their “medium” population growth projections for the Auckland Spatial Plan, has been properly and independently investigated, taking into consideration that both Auckland Transport and Watercare Services Ltd, have relied upon “medium” population growth projections for their infrastructural asset management plans.
Petition number: 2011/64
Presented by: Holly Walker
Date presented: 30 May 2013
Referred to: Social Services Committee
______________________________________________________________________________
MAIL TO THE CLERK OF THE SOCIAL SERVICES SELECT COMMITTEE : Tracey Rayner
Private Bag 18041, Parliament Buildings, Wellington 6061 (No stamp required).
______________________________________________________________________________
To Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, Chair of the Social Services Select Committee.
RE: Petition 2011/64
Requesting that Parliament declines to proceed with the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill until the lawfulness of the reliance of Auckland Council on the New Zealand Department of Statistics’ “high” population growth projections, instead of their “medium” population growth projections for the Auckland Spatial Plan, has been properly and independently investigated, taking into consideration that both Auckland Transport and Watercare Services Ltd, have relied upon “medium” population growth projections for their infrastructural asset management plans.
I, the undersigned, request that you and ALL members of the Social Services Select Committee please support the investigation requested by this petition.
I am particularly concerned, that the LAW which covers the Auckland (Spatial) Plan, which the Auckland Draft Unitary Plan is supposed to help implement, appears to have not been followed:
(1)The Auckland Council must prepare and adopt a spatial plan for Auckland.
(4)The spatial plan must—
(c) provide an evidential base to support decision making for Auckland, including evidence of
trends,opportunities, and constraints within Auckland;
____________________________________________________________________________
The recommendation from the Department of Statistics, in their ‘customised’ advice to Auckland Council on 28 March 2011 – stated:
“Population Projections for the Auckland Spatial Plan
Development of the Auckland Spatial Plan requires that an evidential base is provided to support decision making for Auckland. Furthermore, it requires the identification of the existing and future location of residential activities within specific geographic areas within Auckland.
Population estimates and projections clearly form a good source of information for these purposes.
Statistics New Zealand were asked to produce customised population projections for a new growth model for Auckland. Under the medium series, this resulted in a projected population of 2,160,700 for 2041
(the low series projected 1,832,100 people and the high series projected 2,467,500 people).
Statistics New Zealand has been asked by the Auckland Council
“is a projected population for the Auckland region of approximately 2.1 million people a reasonable basis for planning?” While there is no certainty that the births, deaths and migration assumptions in the population projection will be realised, Statistics New Zealand agrees that a projected population of approximately 2.1 million at 2041 is a reasonable basis for planning at this point in time. We would reiterate that it is important to consider the range of projections, including the low and high scenarios. ..”
Why was this arguably ‘expert’ advice from the Department of Statistics apparently then ignored?
I look forward to your exercising ‘due diligence’ as a Members of Parliament for New Zealand, the ‘Highest Court in the Land’, and doing your part to ensure that ‘justice is done and been seen to be done’, and the ‘Rule of Law’ prevails.
NAME ADDRESS SIGNED
______________________________________________________________________________
If YOU want to sign something which ‘has teeth’ and can help make a difference to stop this Auckland ‘democracy for developers’ / ‘market madness’ – this, in my considered opinion – is IT.
Isn’t the agenda to get those up to a million extra “Aucklanders” into the city first, to get them sweating – while working hard, and to have them earn some money in a future, more “sweat-shop” like NZ economy, and pay taxes from that, and with that pay for the additional infrastructure?
That is what it seems to me.
It has been the agenda for decades, well probably from the day the first settlers came here, to bring in more, to create growth in a “primitive” way, by simply “growing the market” and labour pool by immigration, to justify all the great nice new projects the “leaders” of cities and central government like to talk about.
Once those additional people are here, oh my, ah well, we never expected that, we need yet more, to pay for the additional costs that “unexpectedly” arose in the meantime.
The ‘Hairdo’ makes a stand for His rehabilitation announcing today that He will not support the private members bill that would allow ‘scab labour’ to be used by employers to break strikes…
Addendum : the same google search gave this article in the Southland Times by Peter Cullen, Employment lawyer, on the Dunne situation vis a vis ownership of emails sent from employer’s sites.
Who me speculate!!! shame on me, heard it on the news on the car radio twelve oclock-ish, don’t ask me what the station was coz as far as the sounds in the car go i wouldn’t have a clue,(leaving myself wide open here),
Dunne was quoted as saying that He wouldn’t vote for it as such legislation was wide open to abuse from employers,
Who would have thunk it, Saint Peter seeks redemption in the court of public opinion and only scores a brownie point,
i wonder what the Maori Party(s) view is on this issue,(besides Pita worrying about the mortgage and Te Ureroa worrying about being leader that is)…
“And the cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon
Little boy blue and the man on the moon…” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tZmN7eHYFU
“But there were planes to catch and bills to pay.”
My ‘Open Letter /OIA request to Professor Sir Peter Gluckman :”Upon what ‘science’ are you relying to support fluoride in water?” should get a reply before 5pm, Wednesday 10 July 2013.
______________________________________________________________________________
Dear Penny
Thank you for your request under the Official Information Act 1982 dated 12 June 2013, which has been forwarded to me.
We will respond to your query as soon as is reasonably practicable within the 20 working days allowed,
(before 5pm 10 July 2013).
Yours sincerely
……………………………….
Communications Officer
Office of the Prime Minister’s Science Advisory Committee
PO Box 108-117, Symonds Street
Auckland 1150, New Zealand
_______________________________________________________
12 June 2013
‘Open Letter’ / OIA to Professor Sir Peter Gluckman from Auckland Mayoral candidate Penny Bright:
“Upon what ‘science’ are you relying to support fluoride in water?”
OFFICE OF THE PRIME MINISTER’S SCIENCE ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, KNZM FRSNZ FMedSci FRS
Chief Science Advisor
Dear Professor,
I read with interest your following ‘Media Release’:
“The science of fluoride in water is effectively settled. It has been one of the most thoroughly worked questions in public health science over many decades,” says Sir Peter Gluckman, the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor.
In a statement released today on the issue of fluoride in public water supplies, Sir Peter reiterates the scientific facts, saying “it is absolutely clear that at doses used in New Zealand to adjust the natural level to one that is consistent with beneficial effects (0.7-1.0mg/litre), there is no health risk from fluoride in the water.”
So why is there any issue at all?
Sir Peter points to the importance of the values debate around fluoridation, but warns that this should not be misrepresented as a scientific debate. …”
“..chronic effects of fluoride involve alterations in the chemical activity of calcium by the fluoride ion. Natural calcium fluoride with low solubility and toxicity from ingestion is distinct from fully soluble toxic industrial fluorides …”
“Industrial fluoride ingested from treated water enters saliva at levels too low to affect dental caries. Blood levels during lifelong consumption can harm heart, bone, brain, and even developing teeth enamel.
The widespread policy known as water fluoridation is discussed in light of these findings. ….”
FYI – I have spent some hundreds of hours researching the decisions of the Ministry of Health and Watercare Services to use Waikato river water as a ‘raw’ source of drinking water supplies for the Auckland region.
I respectfully suggest that you read the following document which I prepared for a meeting of the Auckland City Council Finance and Business Committee back in October 2002, so that you can understand why a number of persons, such as myself, do NOT trust either the Ministry of Health, or Watercare Services Ltd, when it comes to safeguarding public health and drinking water supplies.
Dr. W.L. Hutton was the head medical officer of health in the first Canadian city to fluoridate their water supply. Dr. W.L. Hutton was the president of the eugenics society of Canada from 1930 – 1938 [he became Brantford’s head medical officer in 1937].
“Using the fluoride in the water supplies in their gulags (concentration camps), to make the prisoners stupid, docile, and subservient.”
Ref : The Crime and Punishment of I. G. Farben by Joseph Borkin
“At the end of the Second World War, the United States Government sent Charles Eliot Perkins, a research worker in chemistry, biochemistry, physiology and pathology, to take charge of the vast Farben chemical plants in Germany. While there he was told of a scheme which had been worked out by them during the war and adopted by the German General Staff. This was to control the population in any given area through mass medication of drinking water. In this scheme sodium fluoride occupied a prominent place. Repeated doses of infinitesimal amounts of fluoride will in time reduce an individual’s power to resist domination by slowly poisoning and narcotisizing a certain area of the brain and will thus make him submissive to the will of those who wish to govern him. Both the Germans and the Russians added sodium fluoride to the drinking water of prisoners-of-war to make them stupid and docile.” (Reference: Victorian Hansard of 12th August 1987).
… as the fluoridation campaign gained steam, the Public Health Service was headed by another top Alcoa official, Oscar R. Ewing, who in turn was aided by Edward L. Bernays, the father of modern public relations and author of the book “Propaganda,” who sought to portray fluoride’s opponents as wackos.
In contrast to the anticipated increase in dental caries following the cessation of water fluoridation in the cities Chemnitz (formerly Karl-Marx-Stadt) and Plauen, a significant fall in caries prevalence was observed. This trend corresponded to the national caries decline and appeared to be a new population-wide phenomenon.
Our results show that biologically relevant concentrations of fluoride are capable of increasing cell migration in tumour cells, suggesting that exposure to fluoride could stimulate tumour invasion.
Note that the investigators noted altered cell migration behaviour at a level of just 2.4 micromol/L of human serum fluoride concentration.
This was a level several times less than what the investigators considered typical for persons “chronically exposed” to fluoridated water.
Every single chemical on the planet is dangerous at some level, from hydrogen to uranium. The entire point is that there is a dose-response relationship for good effects as well as bad. Were they talking about NZ fluoride levels creating actual harm? Experimental science dovetails with epidemiological evidence – just show the relevance of the article you provided to the discussion of fluoridation in NZ.
Science is a methodology. Scripture is unquestioned assertion. Basically, you’re now in the realm of creationists who say “the Theory of Evolution is just a theory”.
Edit: And I read your links more carefully than you did.
Nice how like any fundamentalist you like to judge and denigrate other peoples belief systems by your own specific orthodoxy’s unassailable criteria for truth and validity.
Yes you did read the links more carefully, good you have full access to those papers thanks for the extra info
EDIT
Science is a methodology.
It is far more than that, and sometimes it is not that at all.
Damned dirty trick I played, asking you to show how your randomly-selected article (butbutbut it contained the word “fluoride”) was at all relevant to the fluoridation levels used in NZ. /sarc
It’s actually really easy to understand: if fluoridation had negative effects at NZ levels, your tinfoil support sites would point to the studies that show it. Not some dime-doctor who says that’s what the studies say, they would link to the actual studies that show detectable harm from the 0.7-0.8ppm levels. We have seen detectable benefits linked to before in this debate, and the study you presented to say that maybe those benefits no longer apply was indeterminate and difficult to translate directly to NZ conditions (the entire “Berlin Wall and lifestyles” thing).
You want to call it mass-medication? Okay, then let’s go to “first, do no harm”. Where’s the harm?
EDIT
Science is a methodology.
It is far more than that, and sometimes it is not that at all.
well, that looked profound while saying fuck all.
I mean, you have the balls to accuse me of judging by unassailable criteria, but at least I don’t come up with pseudo-profundities like that.
You want to call it mass-medication? Okay, then let’s go to “first, do no harm”. Where’s the harm?
Where’s the harm? Nah fuck that mate. Instead, for starters, let’s go with consent to treat.
You don’t have it. The harm is in you taking away my ability to consent to take a medication or not take a medication. And I do not consent.
Where’s your medical bioethics now, hotshot? You gonna say that you know best and the patient should just follow doctors orders?
Except, Christchurch has just decided to turn down fluoridation yet again, and roughly half of NZers do not receive fluoridated water supply, Taranaki and Hamilton ditched it pretty recently, so whatever.
I mean, you have the balls to accuse me of judging by unassailable criteria, but at least I don’t come up with pseudo-profundities like that.
yeah, that’s what I already figured about the ethics of your compulsory mass medication programme.
awwww, you thought you’d learned how to support a scientific argument with actual evidence and now you’re just flailing about back in the familiar territory of making bioethical mountains out of trace-element molehills with a few semi-godwins thrown in.
Much as you like to call science a religious doctrine, the fact is that without at least a little bit of science you’d be singing the praises of “invisible good-teeth water magic”.
Anyway, I’m off to bed now. Remember to check under the bed for boogeymen and NSA bugs before you go sleepytime. And try to figure out the difference between “as low as” and “greatly increased from”.
oh that’s sweet, CV’s learning how to provide evidence.
If you’d looked beyond the abstract and read the article, you’d have read the confounding factors in East Germmany at the time:
O A greater utilisation of dental services. A large
number of subjects visited the dentist once per
year (90.7%) or at least once per half-year (50%);
a high FT-component (90%); a high proportion
of children with orthodontic treatment (47.9%);
387
O The adoption of a preventive approach by dental
practitioners. Fissure sealants were placed in
40.3% of subjects with 3.6 molars/person, combined
with F-topical and oral health instruction/
motivation;
O An increased use of F-toothpastes from 10–15%
(up to 1990) to 88% in 1993. Toothpaste consumption
in 1993–95: 4 to 5 tubes containing 75
mL/pCY½270–330 g/subject;
O Fluoridated salt became available after 1992;
market share in 1993–1995 ,15%;
O Ninety percent of all children receive vitamin D3
combined with NaF (0.25 mg F/die)½222 Mio
DDD (½Defined Daily Dose) for rickets prevention
during their first year of life;
O There was no longer any positive correlation between
annual sugar consumption and the caries
levels. The sugar consumption of 1993 was as
low as 1980–89 (35.1 to 40 kg/per capita/year)
and the availability of products with sugar substitutes
was increased (1993: 7795 tons);
O The pattern of food consumption changed due
to the introduction of Fast Food chains and possibly
increases in the presence of food preservatives
should also be considered;
O The provision of antibiotics for medical treatment
(463 Mio DDD) was twice as high as in
1985. Annual consumption of antibiotics in Germany
1995½2.160.601 dt½0.027 kg/per capita/
year.
And you might have even bothered to read the last line of the article, after the general discussion of the results and other studies (some with similar results):
From our point of view, water fluoridation would still seem to be reasonable in all heavily-populated industrial areas with high or increasing caries prevalence.
Didja see the bit about feeding babies sodium fluoride in their first year of life? And the massive increases in antibiotic use? Of course you did, because you didn’t just rely on the abstract, did you…
The German government massively resourced their people to improve dental care, made sure fluoridated toothpastes and salt were available, but as part of the dental health programme saw it fit to REMOVE mass water fluoridation.
Cheers mate.
you’d have read the confounding factors in East Germmany
Yeah I think you’re the one “confounded”.
EDIT you might want to explain to me how Vit D for rickets and antibiotics for all reasons plus greatly increased fast food and sugar intake is supposed to help with the incidence of dental caries across the entire population?
Further, greater use of dental care and surveillance should mean an increase in caries found, not a decrease.
btw I am for the availability of fluoridated salt, milk and topical toothpastes in retail stores.
From our point of view, water fluoridation would still seem to be reasonable in all heavily-populated industrial areas with high or increasing caries prevalence.
Hey I could agree with that mate. But the researchers conclude fluoridation is NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence.
oh, but you’re the scientific researcher, even if you might not know what a confounding factor is. You’d know all about things like oral antibiotics interacting with oral bacteria (maybe even the ones that cause tooth decay).
plus greatly increased […] sugar intake
awwww, you mixed up “The sugar consumption of 1993 was as
low as 1980–89″ with “The sugar consumption of 1993 was greatly increased from 1980–89″. You gotta start reading what’s written, rather than what you agree with.
Further, greater use of dental care and surveillance should mean an increase in caries found, not a decrease.
Because all a dentist does is put fillings in and count caries, nothing else at all /sarc
Oh McFlock, look how much effort the new German government put into improving dental care yet they yanked water fluoridation preferring to use fluoridated toothpaste and salt instead.
This is a policy that they continue to this day, 20 years on.
And once again thank you for the researchers’ conclusion from the paper:
From our point of view, water fluoridation would still seem to be reasonable in all heavily-populated industrial areas with high or increasing caries prevalence.
But, as I said before, the researchers conclude fluoridation is NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence.
“reasonable for areas with high or increasing caries prevalence”
does not equal
“NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence”,
but it does equal
“NO COMMENT ON areas with lower AND decreasing caries prevalence”.
As for “the germans did it so we can” argument, well – that’s pretty stupid.
“EDIT you might want to explain to me how Vit D for rickets and antibiotics for all reasons plus greatly increased fast food and sugar intake is supposed to help with the incidence of dental caries across the entire population?”
Vitamin D affects calcium metabolism (amongst many other things), and is necessary for bone health (and probably dental health). I would expect that increases in antibiotic use would have a negative effect on dental health due to poorer absorption of nutrients.
Anyways, the list of confounding factors just points to we probably have no idea what is really going on (which was the point at the end of the abstract, for those of us not lucky enough to access to the full article).
If this F stuff was simply added to some brands of toothpaste and salt and milk, and I could choose to have it or not, fine. Put it out there.
But since people insist that you need to mass medicate everyone with it in all areas of the country all the time in all their food and drink, I think that a far higher standard is needed. (By the way, I’m about to go brush my teeth with a tube of Colgate Total, so I’m not a fundamentalist about this stuff)
And what I do know is that Germany yanked water fluoridation after unification, despite taking great pains to ensure that dental care in East Germany was improved, and has kept it that way for the last 20+ years.
Well I get enough F from toothpaste (and there the action is mostly topical anyways); I don’t also compulsarily need it in all the food that I buy, all the meals I make and all the drink I consume.
one can empathise, regrettably, with the position of the NRA sometimes; the only thing these Authoritarian pricks seem to understand is the barrel of gun.Seen any good movies lately? like Death Race?.
Nope, haven’t seen Death Race. America has arrived at the robocop corporate government & policing style though. I see no prospect of Americans giving up their guns. They really should be concerned. I read somewhere recently there are 14 separate state security organisations there now, not including the countless military and security contractors. Eisenhower would be incredulous.
Yes, about time, that this gets raised again, and looked at closely again! It all kind of went under the radar again, after Minister Collins took over the files and promised to have her staff look into things, when the scandal broke and become public last year.
John Campbell did invite other ACC claimants that had similar experiences to contact them. So more is likely to come.
How bloody disgusting, them putting pressure on a man who lost one arm, to go and look for work, even in a car-yard. And also expecting a woman with serious back pain, due to serious damage, to work full-time, when she cannot and is not ready for that.
Nothing has changed, really!
I wish Campbell and his team would also open their eyes and ears and examine WINZ designated doctor recommendations, decisions by WINZ and their appallingly biased Principal Health Advisor Dr David Bratt, comparing benefit dependence to drug dependence.
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
Photo by Alvan Nee on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
Buzz from the Beehive One minister is talking tough while a colleague – whose ministry had acted tough and drawn a barrage of flak – has shown an official softening. Some ministers are doing what Labour was good at, which is distributing public funds to causes regarded as worthy or ...
A ballot for 4 Member's Bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn: Insurance Contracts Bill (Duncan Webb) Income Tax (Clean Transport FBT Exclusion) Amendment Bill (Julie Anne Genter) Crimes (Increased Penalties for Slavery Offences) Amendment Bill (Greg Fleming) Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) ...
One of the strongest narratives about "our" spy agencies is that they are basically institutional traitors, working for foreign powers (or just themselves), without any control or oversight by the elected government. And today, we have yet another report from the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security which explicitly confirms this. ...
“It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April to meet the Prime Minister’s ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Hesp, Professor, Flinders University Patrick Hesp In some parts of Australia, coastal dunes are retreating from the ocean at an alarming rate, as waves carve up the beach and wind blows the sand inland. But coastal communities are largely ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Heemsbergen, Senior Lecturer, Digital, Political, Media, Deakin University With an impressive 60% of the US smartphone market, Apple is undeniably big, but not a clear monopoly. Yet, years of innovation by Apple have effectively given the company its own exclusive ...
Whether you’re facing layoffs or are just an emotional junior staffer, it’s always a good idea to scout out a good crying place before you need it. It’s an incredibly hard time for Wellington. Across the city, thousands of public servants are hearing tough news about redundancies and layoffs. Government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Miller-Jones, Professor, Curtin University Nuclear explosions on a neutron star feed its jets. Danielle Futselaar and Nathalie Degenaar, Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, CC BY-SA How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daryl Adair, Associate Professor of Sport Management, University of Technology Sydney Earlier this week, independent MP Andrew Wilkie accused the AFL of conducting “off the books” illicit drug testing to identify players using substances of abuse, then inappropriately withdrawing them from matches ...
The Government’s announcement that it will scrap plans for a vast marine sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands is ‘shameful’ and will make it impossible for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its international commitments, says the World Wide Fund for Nature ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Shutterstock The federal government has bowed to pressure from the car industry, announcing it will relax proposed emissions rules for utes and vans and delay enforcement of the new standards ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Rutland, Professor Emerita, University of Sydney In his latest book, Jewish Life in Medieval Spain, Jonathan Ray focuses on the tumult of the 14th century in Spain – a time of the plague, civil strife and war between the two largest ...
While creating a slate of world-class shows, Whakaata Māori also developed a generation of world-class creatives. Television is an odd word. It mixes the Ancient Greek and Latin languages, and its most literal meaning is “far-off sight”. In the contemporary and living language of te reo Māori, “whakaata” as a ...
Yesterday the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. This significant step and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza prompted an urgent debate in the New Zealand Parliament. Leader ...
The Government’s decision to reduce access to continuous glucose monitors (CGM) not only threatens the lives of children with type 1 diabetes and increases the potential for ‘Dead in Bed’ syndrome, but also threatens the health of their parents an ...
Apples are available year-round, but the wide variety on offer involves intensive scientific research – and large-scale commercialisation. What’s beautiful, red, sweet and crunchy? Tony Martin’s favourite kind of apple: Sassy. The CEO of apple and pear breeding organisation Prevar, Martin’s fondness for Sassy represents professional success as well as ...
Family violence specialist service Shine is calling on employers to stop asking for proof of domestic violence in order for employees to access domestic violence leave. The call comes five years after the introduction of the Domestic Violence ...
The Deputy Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is calling for public submissions on the Budget Policy Statement 2024. The Budget Policy Statement 2024 (BPS) sets out the Government's priorities for the 2024 Budget. It explains the approach ...
Brutal government spending cuts that will see the size of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples slashed by 40% will hit Pasifika communities hard, the PSA says. The Ministry has told staff that it is seeking voluntary redundancies, and to redeploy and reassign ...
I live with five people I mostly love, but our different ideas about generosity are starting to really irk me.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,This is a bit of a random one but here goes. I’m 22 and work an OK job (OK meaning I get paid ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maria Nicholas, Senior Lecturer in Language and Literacy Education, Deakin University Earlier this month, the New South Wales government announced it would roll out programs for gifted students in every public school in the state. This comes amid concerns gifted school ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Rudge, Law lecturer, University of Sydney Massachusetts General Hospital In a world first, we heard last week that US surgeons had transplanted a kidney from a gene-edited pig into a living human. News reports said the procedure was a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tombs, Howard Paterson Chair of Theology and Public Issues, University of Otago The 5th-century Maskell panel showing Jesus in a loincloth.British Museum, CC BY-NC-SA When Jesus is shown on the cross, he is almost always depicted wearing a loincloth around ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University Shutterstock When you think about a red object, you might picture a red carpet, or the massive ruby in the Queen’s crown. Indeed, Western monarchies and marketing from brands such ...
COMMENTARY:Jewish Voice for Peace The UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza on Monday — and for the first time since the beginning of the Israeli military’s genocide of Palestinians, the United States abstained rather than vetoing it. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, ...
Asia Pacific Report A New Zealand investigative journalist and author says the US spy system hosted by the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) appears to be a controversial intelligence system used in global capture-kill operations. Writing a commentary for RNZ News today, Nicky Hager, author of Secret Power, a 1996 ...
While Nicola Willis wouldn’t give any details on its size, she said a package of tax cuts is definitely still coming in this year’s budget, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the investigation into the Department of Internal Affairs after it was revealed that the Department’s Chief Executive personally reached out to expedite a DJs passport application. Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns ...
Finance minister Nicola Willis delivers her first budget statement, and unwittingly helps Joel MacManus save his relationship. Nicola Willis strode into the Beehive Theatrette. Around me, on the green foldout seats, were the country’s top business and political journalists. They were all here to see her announce the Budget Policy ...
Twenty years ago today, Māori Television launched after much controversy. Jamie Tahana looks back on its survival and impact across two decades. Chad Chambers stepped onto the stage, the brim of his cap casting a shadow across his face. His smile beamed as bright as his white freezing works gumboots, ...
Tauranga, Rotorua, Wellsford, Onehunga, Westhaven marina – Gavin Strawhan walks the meanish streets of New Zealand in his entertaining debut novel The Call, almost sure to roar into the number 1 position on the Nielsen bestseller chart, its front cover bearing a rave from somebody: “A really good and genuinely ...
On a Thursday in February, at Wellington’s Conservation House, the Conservation Authority, a statutory body advising the eponymous department and minister, Tama Potaka, opened its 195th meeting. Under consideration that afternoon was an agenda item written by Tim Bamford, chief advisor in the Department of Conservation’s biodiversity, heritage and visitors ...
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A lengthy response to the recently released draft Government policy statement on transport will soon be delivered from Auckland Council to Minister of Transport Simeon Brown. A submission raising concerns about funding distribution and the plan’s treatment of Auckland passed through the council’s transport committee on Wednesday, despite some councillors ...
The unidentified foreign intelligence operation discussed in a scathing report by New Zealand’s Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) last week appears to be a controversial United States intelligence system. The IGIS report said the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) decision to host a foreign system from 2012-2020 was “improper” ...
As a young gymnast, Aimee Didierjean was always conscious of making sure her underwear wasn’t showing on the competition floor. A peek of a bra strap, or briefs if a leotard rode up, would cost a gymnast points in her routines. “When I was growing and going through puberty, it ...
Jubi/West Papua Daily Repeated cases of Indonesian military (TNI) soldiers torturing civilians in Papua have been evident, as seen in the viral video depicting the torture of civilians in the Puncak Regency allegedly done by soldiers of Raider 300/Brajawijaya Infantry Battalion. There is a pressing need for stringent law enforcement ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra In 2023, Anthony Albanese was shooting for the moon, his eyes on the Voice referendum. On one view, he looked like the idealist reflecting his left-wing roots. In 2024, we’re seeing a pragmatic, determined, ...
The House - The principle that all MPs are honourable and that they should be taken at their word has been tested multiple times this week in Parliament. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Helen Dickinson, Professor, Public Service Research, UNSW Sydney Drazen Zigic/Shutterstock Since the review of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) released its recommendations in December, there has been a series of Town Hall events to discuss them around the country ...
Asia Pacific Report Two of the global Freedom Flotilla ships are being prepared in Turkey and almost ready for the upcoming humanitarian mission to Gaza. It is expected that the flotilla will include a New Zealand medical team. Kia Ora Gaza is a member of the international Freedom Flotilla Coalition ...
Humbug Corner
No. 4: MIKE BUSH
“It’s always an honor to be asked to come and pay tribute to someone with a career as long and distinguished as Bruce’s…. integrity beyond reproach…. It’s a great tragedy and an irony that a man of such great character should have been subject to those accusations.”
—-Deputy Police Commissioner Mike Bush, speaking at funeral of notorious bent cop Bruce Hutton, April 10, 2013.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/national/news/video.cfm?c_id=1503075&gal_cid=1503075&gallery_id=132106
Humbug Corner is dedicated to gathering, and highlighting, the most striking examples of faux solicitude, insincere apologies, and particularly stupid recycling of official canards. It is produced by the Insincerity Project®, a division of Daisycutter Sports Inc.
More appalling humbug….
No. 3 Dean Lonergan: “Y’ know what? The only people who will mock them are people who are dwarfists.”
No. 2 Peter Dunne: “What a load of drivel and sanctimonious humbug…”
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-09062013/#comment-645811
No.1 Dominic Bowden: “It’s okay to be speechless.” http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-02062013/#comment-642288
LIARS OF OUR TIME
No. 22: Mike Bush
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
“…integrity beyond reproach….”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Deputy Police Commissioner Mike Bush, eulogizing corrupt cop Bruce Hutton, found by a Royal Commission of Inquiry to have planted false evidence to frame an innocent man for a double murder.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/national/news/video.cfm?c_id=1503075&gal_cid=1503075&gallery_id=132106
See also….
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.”
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-27052013/#comment-638881
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.”
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-15052013/#comment-633295
No. 6 NZ Herald PR dept: “Congratulations—you’re reading New Zealand’s best newspaper.”
No. 5 Rawdon Christie: “…a FORMIDABLE replacement, it seems, is Claudette Hauiti.” http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-13052013/#comment-632594
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.”
Amnesty’s skewed priorities
by zemblan and Joe Emersberger, Media Lens, 17.6.13
A revealing snippet from the Guardian‘s ‘Politics Live Blog’ on the G8 Summit:
3.15pm: ‘Amnesty International are being allowed through the gates of the summit to deliver a letter to Vladimir Putin. As Henry McDonald reports, they will tell the Russian President to release the punk protest band Pussy Riot, two of whom are still in jail. A number of Amnesty activists will wear balaclavas similar to the ones the band don when they go on stage.’
They apparently didn’t have the mental wherewithal to write a letter condemning the US government’s persecution of whistleblowers like Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden. Nor did they have the initiative to condemn the British government’s treatment of Julian Assange.
Amnesty gave jailed Pussy Riot members Prisoner of Conscience designation within about two months of their incarceration.
Manning has been jailed and tortued in broad daylight for years and Amnesty has said it has been “investigating” all these years if he really qualifies as a Prisoner of Conscience.
http://members5.boardhost.com/medialens/msg/1371483719.html
Sounds like more of the, staged *theatre news*, Mozza.
Amnesty Intl, simply part of the aparati, designed to subvert, and divert any chance of genuine movements, by creating a faux notion of *caring*.
Phooey!
so cynical muzza
http://bat-bean-beam.blogspot.co.nz/2013/06/the-jonathan-safran-foer-fallacy.html
Giovani Tiso’s latest.
It is political:
“With each generation, it becomes harder to imagine a future that resembles the present…”.
Teaser:
Not sure about texting being easier. It would be if I could convert speech to text but then I’d have to go to all the effort of searching for an app.
It is a crime to conceal a crime.
Can it also be a crime to reveal a crime?
Bradley, Assange, and Snowden are accused of revealing crimes committed by the world’s deadliest terrorist organization: the US military.
“The phrase “war on terrorism” should always be used in quotes, because there can’t possibly be a war on terrorism. It’s impossible. The reason is it’s led by one of the worst terrorist states in the world, in fact, it’s led by the only state in the world which has been condemned by the highest international authorities for international terrorism, namely the World Court and Security Council, except that the US vetoed the resolution.” Noam Chomsky
RIP Anti-racism dog @anti_racicm_dog.. nevermore will we hear your barking.
The account @Anti_Racism_Dog didn’t last long. Twitter suspended it quickly, a fate reserved only for the most aggressive, abusive and hateful users. What could a dog – an anti-racist one, at that – do to deserve it? @Anti_Racism_Dog had one real function: to bark at racist speech on Twitter. The account responded to tweets it deemed racist with the simple response ‘bark bark bark!’ Sometimes it would send wags to supporters but that was pretty much it.
For the short time it lasted, it was amazing to watch how people reacted to @Anti_Racism_Dog.
snip
Colour-blind racists feed on good-faith debate, and engaging with them, especially online, is almost always futile. But when they’re barked at by a dog, one whose only quality is anti-racism, they flip the fuck out. They demand to be engaged in debate (‘Tell me how what I said was racist!’) or appeal to objective definitions (‘The dictionary says racist means X, therefore nothing I said was racist’), but @Anti_Racism_Dog just barks.
#BringBackTheDog
http://redefiningbodyimage.tumblr.com/post/52750516768/writeswrongs-girljanitor-ghostdaddotcx
A true troll doesn’t have a position to protect because to establish one would leave it vulnerable to attack, and playing defence takes time. @Anti_Racism_Dog, by fully assuming the persona of an animal, was invulnerable to counter-attack. You can’t explain yourself to a dog and you look like an idiot trying. The only way to win is not to play but this is the colour-blind racist’s Achilles Heel: they’re compelled to defend themselves against accusations of racism. It’s the anti-racist argument that gives them content; theirs is an ideology that’s in large part a list of counter-arguments. After all, white-supremacists are already winning – their task now is to keep the same racist structures in place while making plausibly colour-blind arguments against dismantling them. @Anti_Racism_Dog was empty of anything other than accusation and so left its targets sputtering.
The account served a second purpose: as a sort of anti-racist hunting dog. @Anti_Racism_Dog quickly attracted a lot of like-minded followers who understood the dynamics at play. Whenever it would start barking at another user, this was a cue to the dog’s followers to troll the offender as well. There’s only so much one dog can do alone. Colour-blind racism is particularly dangerous because it isn’t immediately visible as such. It provokes good-faith discussion from liberals about what counts as racism, muddying the water. But @Anti_Racism_Dog’s strategy draws new lines about what constitutes acceptable discourse on race, placing colour-blind racists on the other side by speaking to them like an animal. What would be taken as totally insane in flesh space can be infuriatingly clever online.
Thanks Asleep – that dog deserves a pat.
Pity the Anti-Racism Dog wasn’t operating when “Sir” Paul Holmes (RIP) was churning out his racist filth in the Herald.
GRRRRRR….GRRRRRRRRRRUFF! RUFFF!! GRRRR…….RUFF!!RUFF!!RUFF!!GRRRRRR……
Too late now, felix—but impressive watchdogging, nonetheless.
Whatever happened to WOOF, the dog who used to comment here all the time?
Debarked – destination unknown.
Re the Media works receivership
How can the IRD be left out I though the IRD were first in line?
AND its westpac who put them into receivership and effectively screwing our IRD out of 22 million
Oh the IRD aren’t going to be taking this passively mate, don’t worry.
after that tip of a neopolitan iceberg for supper, interesting there is no article about those 4000 Troopers in todays Herald.
😈
Key’s reckons that tax debt is highly secured, but journos on twitter are suggesting he doesn’t know what he’s talking about:
https://mobile.twitter.com/MattNippert/status/346733463069675522?p=v
It’s the same thing Macleans IT did in auckland.
How much longer is the public going to continue to prop up Mediaworks? They consider themselves so independent but with this and NZOA funding they’re sucking on the taxpayer teat like a newborn rat.
Funny ain’t it? The same Nats who seem happy for the state to fund this private network also want to sell Radio NZ.
‘Cos, y’know, the state has no business owning a radio network etc etc.
Fucking joke is what it is.
How can the IRD be left out I though the IRD were first in line?
If the sale price is only for the amount owing to the banks and the purchaser then voluntarily agrees to pay all creditors except for IRD then it can happen.
There also are the issues of employment contracts, bonuses leave entitlements and howthese fall in the ranking of payments and the ability to transfers these to another entity.
then there are existing Nzoa grants to programms that are currently under production,( and I understand that many production coys are independent of the tv station that airs them ) there are many avenues that the greater “govt ” can withhold existing funding to media works,ability to transfer the broadcasting license.
There could also be potential of fraud as there under your scenario a scripted plan to defraud a or some creditors. I am sure that media works have some gifted lawyers that will protect the parent coy yet close investigation could find an t uncrossed or an I that is not doted. The govt has to be seen doing all it can against such a corporate that has displayed such contempt towards this country.
These are just a few random thoughts 😉
Brighter Future™, right this way please.
Seems normal to western society – try to sweep the problem under the carpet.
EDIT:
http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2013/06/17/details-of-claimants-commitments-emerge/
‘Jobcentre advisors will have unprecedented powers to compel claimants to carry out whatever old bollocks they can come up with to waste unemployed people’s time looking for jobs which aren’t there. Those who do not meet their Claimant Commitment could face having benefits stopped for up to three years. For those with children this could be devastating, for those severely unwell or disabled it could mean death.’
This is the UK model that Paula is following. I have severe rheumatoid arthritis and am on the invalid benefit, soon to become the ‘supported living payment’. I have so far managed to stymie attempts to move me to the sickness benefit, soon to be the jobseekers allowance. But I expect further harassment. I did not choose to have this disease which has cost me two careers, I can cope with living on less than $300 per week but I find it difficult to cope with the harassment from MSD and the ‘bludging beneficiary’ label. Since the Natz, a lot of Invalid beneficiaries have been dumped onto the Sickness Benefit ( a process started by Labour). Many of these people have psychiatric disabilities and stress is the last thing they need. But Johnny reckons he’ll have the welfare bill down regardless and Labour refuse to say different. Meanwhile we wait in fear…..
…one day at a time.
I am so sorry that you have to face this harassment beatie – it is a blight on our society that those who need help get treated the way you are – kia kaha. I can appreciate the fear you feel and the additional stress this is giving you and your family – what a terrible situation to be in for you – all the best.
Hi beatie and marty mars “I am so sorry that you have to face this harassment beatie”
Yes it is harassment re John Minto the government want to remove 100,000 off the benefit in the next 10 years:
“Government’s plan to push 100,000 off welfare with no job plan in place is shameful
“It’s shameful that the government is pressing ahead with this latest round of welfare changes”, says John Minto, Vice-President of the MANA Movement. “When the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Bill comes up in the House for its second reading later today there’s only one place it belongs – in the rubbish, because that’s how it treats people impacted by it –as rubbish.”
The bill marks the second big step in the wave of reforms initiated by Paula Bennett and Paula Rebstock back in 2010, all aimed at getting up to 100,000 beneficiaries off welfare in the next ten years.”
http://mana.net.nz/2013/03/governments-plan-to-push-100000-off-welfare-with-no-job-plan-in-place-is-shameful/
This government intends to fit beneficiaries onto a procrustian bed of shame and harassment and distress to save themselves money to give the rich more tax cuts and pay private organisations to do the dirty work like ATOS in the U$K. Shame on them. It’s to be an exercise in sadism to satisfy the propaganda they’ve been spewing for over a decade: People like Michael Laws. Atos in the U$K is a criminal harassment organisation funded by a criminal government that has caused the deaths of many people.
“In Greek mythology, Procrustes (Προκρούστης) or “the stretcher [who hammers out the metal]”, also known as Prokoptas or Damastes (Δαμαστής) “subduer”, was a rogue smith and bandit from Attica who physically attacked people by stretching them or cutting off their legs, so as to force them to fit the size of an iron bed. In general, when something is Procrustean, different lengths or sizes or properties are fitted to an arbitrary standard.”
beatie – Sorry to hear your distress and concerns.
Yes, I and a fair few others are equally worried, about what Bennett and her ‘Work and Insult” department will present to us from next month on. I have information that MSD (the Ministry) is already actively seeking requests for proposals for having mentally ill on benefits referred to outsourced service providers, who are supposed to get them into some kind of work.
It is all still in the process and kept from the public eye and ear, but they are wanting to commission agencies, who may be NGOs or employment agencies, to try placing mentally ill youth in Auckland at least into jobs, for which the providers will be offered “rewarding” fees.
WINZ will refer clients that are considered “fit” to do certain work to those providers, and naturally they will have expectations.
Nothing has been published about future assessments in detail, but looking at some policy documents that were released to the media a few months back, there are going to be various “tools” they will use, from self assessments, to targeted interviews with certain WINZ staff, up to the supposed “independent” examinations and assessments that may be done by medical staff, rehab staff or others they will select to do this.
It is scandalous that the government passed the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Act without informing the opposition parties and MPs, nor the public, about how they will decide who will be capable to do some work, and who not.
This is again a secret agenda, and I am sure, they will in future be much less transparent in anything they will do, as they got quite a scare when some took them on about unfair, unreasonable and not fact based recommendations by certain designated doctors and their health and disability advisors.
Yet from what I also hear, it seems they are going to tread more carefully than DWP have in the UK, because having people commit suicide, or harm themselves in other ways, that will not be the headlines Paula Bennett and John Key want here.
So be mindful, alert and prepared, but do not freak yourself out too much. In any case, prepare by already connecting with advocates, support networks and others, friends and family included, so when they come to challenge you, take witnesses to assessments and else.
At some stage there will likely be legal challenges on all what they will try, and I expect WINZ and MSD to breach natural justice in many cases. If people get together, pull resources and efforts together, and perhaps find a good lawyer, who may be prepared to take WINZ on, then something will be achieved.
Apart from all this: I am still furious that WINZ and MSD also always tell clients to use their websites, but it is hard to get to some of their offices, their kiosks and computers are often booked out, and the same applies to public libraries. Internet cafes cost money, so do home connections.
When do MSD and WINZ live up to the 21st century standards of communication and not only cover phone line costs for sick and disabled, but also internet access, I ask???!
Two-faced Bridges – tells Parliament one thing and does another.
Last week he told Parliament that he would be meeting with ILO officials in Geneva to discuss his employment law changes – but now he is in Geneva he is refusing to meet with them.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1306/S00299/simon-bridges-misleads-parliament.htm
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1306/S00216/minister-refuses-ilo-advice.htm
Ugh! The vomit inducing Bridges! He’s a lying sneaky rat, no different to his peers and should not be in the position he is in.
Perhaps he just can’t face the possibility of being scrutinised and held to account by the ILO. If he has a change a heart and does meet with the ILO maybe they can take up the issue of the 90 day bill while they’re at it. I had thought that the denial of access to legal representation in the case of a workplace personal grievance was against one of the ILO conventions. Not sure which number though. Does anyone know?
I also have rheumatoid arthritis. It is an incurable disease so how can you be taken off an invalid benefit onto sickness benefit. My understanding of invalids is that there is no chance of cure within 2 years and sickness benefit 6 months. Has this criteria changed? RA is a brutal, painful disease and the added stress of worrying about this must be terrible. Do you have an understanding doctor/rheumatologist. I feel for you. Good luck.
I went to my GP for a Winz medical cert and he gave me one for 3 months, he said if ‘I could drive, I could work’ and ‘I needed to consider paying back to society the cost of a recent joint replacement’ I’m not kidding! I asked my rheumatologist and he gave me one for 5 years. Now, I think you have to use a Winz ‘designated doctor’ who follows the ‘arbeit mact frei’ Winz line. The idea that the Invalid Benefit is for long-term/incurable illnesses was dismantled by the last Labour govt. I have a friend who has schizophrenia who is on the sickness/jobseeker allowance and will be harassed to find a job and sanctioned if they fail to comply. I think that most NZ’ers don’t have the faintest idea of how these ‘reforms’ will impact on those with a disability.
this is a really revealing account beatie.
I have a friend who has schizophrenia who is on the sickness/jobseeker allowance and will be harassed to find a job and sanctioned if they fail to comply. I think that most NZ’ers don’t have the faintest idea of how these ‘reforms’ will impact on those with a disability.
Harrassment and denigration. It seems that a great number of NZs always middle-class plus those who have moved up the income ladder with social aspirations, never accepted the idea of a social contract and concern for all. See David Bennett Mp comment elsewhere on TS today.
The stats may very well be that 10% of beneficiaries may be fraudulent, not doing their bit to help themselves and put into society, 10% find jobs which they can manage and live on and are probably helped into at the beginning. The rest are going to have this gang of harpies and witch-hunters after them. What a soul destroying job to have to work for WINZ. It’s likely to produce a resentment that as they have to suffer so they will pass it on.
Yep. Sounds like the story behind yesterday’s armed man in wheelchair incident in Auckland, as somebody speculated here might be the case before the perp was taken into custody.
beatie, I would suggest getting a different GP. Unless you are in a really small town, you should have a choice. You don’t have to put up with ideological bullying.
(I do live in a very small town with a doctor shortage, so changing is difficult. However I refuse to see him and see a locum if I need to. He instructed his office staff not to accept beneficiaries onto his books. Unfortunately this attitude underlies Winz welfare ‘reforms’. The chief medical advisor to Winz, Dr David Bratt, (appointed under Labour) believes that being on a benefit is worse than heroin addiction. Those who choose to believe that beneficiaries are rorting the system have no idea and are a huge part of the problem. Try getting on, staying on and surviving on a benefit before uttering such smug fallacies.
“He instructed his office staff not to accept beneficiaries onto his books.”
This is a breach of the Human Rights Act, for sure!!!
A doctor has no right and breaches also the Code of Ethics of the NZ medical profession, if he does this. I see the problem you may have to prove this, as his staff will not say what they have been told by him.
Document everything he does and says to you and perhaps others, and consider making a complaint to the Health and Disability Commissioner, even though that office is also rather useless in many ways.
A sad state of affairs there is, in especially the more rural areas of N.Z..
He is a wealthy South African immigrant and he owns his practice. His office worker came to our advocacy organisation with an employment complaint and she told us about the ‘no beneficiaries’ rule. He’s pissed off a lot of local people but so far got away with it. It’s difficult to prove these matters. Incidentally at least one of the local real-estate agents also has a ‘no beneficiaries’ policy. It’s difficult to keep these things quiet in a small town.
That is why the Devil made guns.
The devil made guns to give Americans the opportunity to obtain them to protect themselves from other Americans who obtain them and make everybody safer. I am reliably informed by sources in Iran that the devil is actually an American.
How far to the nearest other town with a GP beatie? I think you definitely have a case for claiming transport costs from WINZ to see someone else.
I would keep notes, with times, dates etc of what is said. You can also ask to have a practice nurse sit in on any consult, or even a Health and Disability advocate. It’s amazing the things some people won’t say when there is a witness. And if he does say them, you have proof.
“I went to my GP for a Winz medical cert and he gave me one for 3 months, he said if ‘I could drive, I could work’ and ‘I needed to consider paying back to society the cost of a recent joint replacement’ I’m not kidding!”
How disgusting a GP that is! Sadly the same people that have been known for pushing the whole agenda, who include ones like Dr David Beaumont (formerly from ATOS) – as advisor for MSD (and others), like Dr Des Gorman, Chief of Health Workforce NZ (in charge of recruitment and involved also in working on training programs for staff in the medical field), who also is now on the board of ACC, who gave some appalling advice on past ACC cases, and possibly still is the top man on the National Health Board, same as of course Dr David Bratt, Principal Health Advisor for MSD (comparing benefit dependence to drug dependence), plus of course Prof. Mansel Aylward (one of the key propagators of “work being the best treatment to get well”, advisor to Paula Bennett, also due to speak to a leading GP conference in Rotorua in a week or so) and “Dame Black” (like Aylward also from the UK), they have all been involved in sending the same “messages” to medical practitioners.
Doctors are also being lobbied, trained and influenced, to work along the new philosophy, following the perverted interpretation of the “bio-psycho social model” for illness and disability issues, as DWP in the UK and now WINZ in New Zealand are pushing for.
It goes beyond WINZ’s designated doctors and health and disability advisors now, and some doctors are concerned.
That GP of yours needs a good reminder of his Code of Ethics, which ensures that the well-being of the patient comes before all else!
I am glad a more competent, properly qualified professional gave you a better, more sympathetic treatment.
That is what I tell all affected. Do not just rely on your GP, go and consult a specialist in the very health areas you suffer from, be this a rheumatoligist, an orthopaedic specialist, a psychologist, a psychiatrist, counsellor, or whatever!
GPs often lack sufficient in depth knowledge, but of course they would never admit it. They like to call themselves “specialist generalists”, what a contradiction in terms, really!
I dunno. It’s a mixed bag with GPs. Mine had no problem completing medical certificates for IBs for people who really were not able to work. She had a problem with being abused for not completing them for a small fraction of patients who were fit for work, after WINZ had reportedly told them no problem getting your benefit extended, just get your GP to sign the certificate. Mind you, that discussion took place about 5 years ago. Things are a lot different now, but my GP will still be batting & even battling for genuine cases.
Unfortunately yes things are a lot different now. My latest letter from Winz warned me not to jet off overseas without informing them first (so they could cut my benefit). Reality check….today I treated myself to a 3 month car reg (no public transport here).
Well to be fair it is pretty important for the thousands of beneficiaries who regularly embark on overseas shopping trips to let WINZ know they’ll be offshore visiting overseas thrift & pawn shops for a few days.
‘it’s a mixed bag with GPs. Mine had no problem completing medical certificates for IBs for people who really were not able to work.’ Hmmm. I can work, I’d love to work and I think I have a lot to offer, but I would need lots of days off when I’m unwell and I can’t type very fast because my hands are crippled. So whether you can do paid work or not is not the issue. I can work but no-one will employ me, especially when I’m competing withe the able-bodied..I believe the whole point of these reforms is to drive down wages and conditions for those who have paid work.
That GP of yours needs a good reminder of his Code of Ethics, which ensures that the well-being of the patient comes before all else!
I am glad a more competent, properly qualified professional gave you a better, more sympathetic treatment.
That is what I tell all affected. Do not just rely on your GP, go and consult a specialist in the very health areas you suffer from, be this a rheumatoligist, an orthopaedic specialist, a psychologist, a psychiatrist, counsellor, or whatever!
GPs often lack sufficient in depth knowledge, but of course they would never admit it. They like to call themselves “specialist generalists”, what a contradiction in terms, really!
Plenty of specialists who are arseholes too unfortunately. I’ve come across some excellent GPs too. It really comes down to the individual person. And for the beneficiary, what kind of disability/illness they have is critical to who they should see. Some are going to be better off with a compassionate GP rather than an unsympathetic specialist.
weka – as for medical professionals, any of us, whether affected and needing reports on conditions and illnesses from GPs or others, we should never be forced to do something like “doctor shopping”, for those that do their job, or as you describe as being sympathetic.
All of them have to abide by Codes of Ethics, and if they do not abide by them, they should be exposed, criticised and attacked for it. They may be in the wrong job, if they do not take their code serious.
Abuse by some “patients” may be attempted and may happen, but I see also that some medical staff are trying to not follow the codes and just do not want to bother with beneficiaries. That is unacceptable.
It is totally unacceptable to explain bias and prejudice away with “individual persons” acting differently.
Then you may as well tolerate the application of the Sharia in New Zealand, by those who think that is necessary to keep “order”!
In your previous comment you seemed to be saying that people on medical benefits should see a specialist because GPs are fairly useless. I was pointing out that the qualification or area of specialisation of the doctor is irrelevant, it’s the compassion and politics of the practitioner that counts when it comes to support with WINZ shit. Just because someone is a specialist, it doesn’t mean they will be competent at dealing with WINZ.
I agree with you that bias and lack of professional ethics is unacceptable. That’s an issue for NZ and medical practitioners to sort out. Advice to beneficiaries… I stand by making the suggestion that they choose a practitioner who isn’t an arsehole and go to some length to do that even if it does mean shopping around. Many people still believe they have to take shit from their doctor because their doctor is their doctor and can’t be changed. That’s just bullshit. I also acknowledge that for some people it is very difficult to be assertive enough to change doctors, esp where there is not much choice.
Ok, I suggested seeing a specialist, because MSD and WINZ can also turn around and say themselves (that is their case managers, or the more secretive Regional Health Advisors or Disability Advisors), well, that is what her or his GP says. We think though, the GP may not be the best medical “expert” to listen to, so hey, send the client to a designated doctor, who may have some extra “specialised skills” that appear to be more appropriate.
Then the client gets sent there and gets assessed by a WINZ trained and picked doctor, who will be less sympathetic.
In view of such possibilities I think it would make sense to go and see a specialist, who is also perhaps sympathetic at the same time, to cover oneself in case WINZ try to question reports. MSD and WINZ have many tricks up their sleeves, and so getting ones own specialist before they may come with their own doctors for a second opinion, seems advisable from my point of view.
It would certainly make sense to try and consult a specialist, if the own GP is not very sympathetic. But of course then I would try and also find a new GP.
I accept your point that some are scared to change doctors. Yes, it is understandable, as it involves looking around and approaching other doctors, whom one does not know. Then there are very private informations involved also. Changing a doctor is not done easily, as any person doing so wants to know that the new doctor can be trusted. Also those living in small towns and rural regions, they will have a very limited choice amongst doctors. I have heard enough feedback from some, who would have to travel large distances to see another doctor. When you are on a benefit such travel may be impossible or prohibitively expensive.
And challenging a doctor in such scenarios is not easy either, as the doctor may be well respected with others in such more “conservative” places. The media in such places will also not want to write critical reports on a local doctor, who could go and sue them for alleged defamation. Staff working for the doctor will not want to risk their jobs and say what they know.
I feel for people in such remote areas, as they live under conditions allowing little choice and making it very difficult to challenge unreasonableness, discrimination and what else there may be. So it pays to establish contacts to outsiders, who may be able to raise matters via channels like this forum, to at least raise awareness.
“My understanding of invalids is that there is no chance of cure within 2 years and sickness benefit 6 months. Has this criteria changed? ”
IB has become Supported Living Payment. Within that, some people will be assessed to see if they are work ready (either full or part time).
Sickness benefit has become part of the Job-seeker benefit ie they are in the same general category as unemployed people, but will have different assessment processes, depending on their illness.
From WINZ, SLP
Assessing your ability to work
We may ask some people on Supported Living Payment to do a self-assessment to tell us about the sort of work they think they might be able to do, and how we could help them to achieve that.
In some cases, we may also ask people to meet with an independent health professional as part of our assessment process.
These aren’t things we’ll ask everyone to do, as it will depend on people’s circumstances.
I take that to mean that not much has changed technically (still using designated doctors etc), but they are formalising processes so that it’s easier for them to target IBs for work. But as it says, it won’t be everyone, so anyone on IB should be making sure their GP is competent at supporting them for when the time comes.
Re SB
People receiving the following benefits on 15 July 2013 will transfer to Jobseeker Support:
Unemployment Benefit
Sickness Benefit
Domestic Purposes Benefit (Sole Parents with youngest child aged 14 or over, and Women Alone)
Widow’s Benefit (without children, or with youngest child aged 14 or over).
…
New obligations and other changes that apply to you
To receive Jobseeker Support, there are some new things you must do. These are listed below. At any time, if you can’t meet these requirements, please talk to us. Unless you have a good reason for not meeting them, your benefit could reduce or stop.
Accepting offers of suitable employment
If you’re required to look for work, and from 15 July 2013 you turn down a suitable job without a good reason, your benefit will reduce by up to half (if you have dependent children) or stop (if you don’t have dependent children) for a 13-week period.
If you’ve given us a medical certificate
There’s no change to what your current medical certificate means for your obligations, or what you need to do when it expires. We may ask you to do a self-assessment. This is an opportunity for you to tell us about the sort of work you think you can do now or in future, and how we could help you back into work.
Plus some stuff about drug testing.
I take that to mean that the UB rules will apply to SB, once the SB person has been assessed for work.
The self-assessment thing should be treated with the utmost caution, because they will be able to use that against people later. eg “I’d really like to be able to do some voluntary work at some point” becomes “they’re capable of working and should be looking for a part time job”.
As per usual, the people that have good skills at dealing with abusive systems will do ok-ish, the people that don’t will get hammered. Fuck Key, Bennet, bigots, and all the liberal middle classes who are letting this happen on their watch.
Xtasy’s advice is excellent So be mindful, alert and prepared, but do not freak yourself out too much. In any case, prepare by already connecting with advocates, support networks and others, friends and family included, so when they come to challenge you, take witnesses to assessments and else. I would add, get everything in writing.
Good advice! I don’t trust Winz and avoid them if at all possible. A lot of people on IB are former ACC clients who were dumped onto a benefit. Meanwhile there is a deafening silence from mainstream disability organisations about this. Hoping to pick up future contracts I guess.
Beatie – We have an almost undeclared ‘strategic war’ by Minister Bennett and MSD against advocacy groups.
Those that have been working in advocacy for years know this, and they are confronted by this. Funding is stopped, or limited, or re-arranged, so some, like here in Auckland long running Mangere Budgeting Service had to dismiss staff, others are facing closure.
They are all over-burdened but get insufficient funds to do their jobs.
Budgeting services do now have to follow very restrictive operational rules, limiting them to just do what MSD want the to do, to tell beneficiaries to learn to live off the benefit – no matter what, as they will not get more. True advocacy is only possible by doing extra time and putting in extra effort, it is not paid for anymore.
And the disability advocates do (like many of the advocacy and budgeting services) also largely depend from direct or indirect state funding.
So they are kept in dependence, which means they do not dare to bite the hand that feeds them. Bennett and her Ministry have the upper hand, they know it, and they lay down the law as they please.
As there will be much out-sourcing of services, yes, some will be keen to look at what they can sign up for, to “assist” some sick and disabled into open employment, for nice fees that MSD is going to pay for them.
No surprise there, as that allows Bennett to go around and behave so “cocky” as she often comes across. She earns 5000 or more dollars a week, and she has long forgotten, where she once came from!
Until recently I was part of an advocacy organisation in my town. we were volunteers and we assisted people with Winz, Acc, employment and tenancy issues etc. There is a huge need out there for this sort of service.We got a trickle of funding because there is no CAB here. However that dried up and when we queried it we were accused of ‘biting the hand that feeds us’. Meanwhile organisations that say they do advocacy, but don’t got $1000’s. Also those of us on benefits were targeted by Winz because, if we could do voluntary work we could do paid work, couldn’t we? One of us (head injury, ex nurse) and particularly good at advocacy was moved from IB to SB because she pissed our local Winz workers off. There’s some nasty bastards out there.
I’m disclosing a lot of personal info here but I think that a lot of people are in real trouble out there and others don’t know/care/give a fuck.
Thanks beatie, it sounds like you have been through a lot, and you have certainly done the right thing by doing some advocacy for others.
Yes, I know, there are some mean jerks within WINZ, but then again some are also ok. In the end they are all public servants, and that means, they get instructions, and must follow them, or they will themselves get trouble for not doing so.
It is the chain of command, and the system keeps us all in some forms of chains of dominance and command.
That was also what enabled Hitler and the Nazis to do what they did, to exploit the fear of people to step out of line and not co-operate.
What WINZ do cannot be compared to that, but it is highly worrisome and increasingly inhumane, in some cases criminal. So at some stage civil disobedience should become the duty of those pushed too far to do things that just are not right.
Raising awareness here and elsewhere is a start to spread the truth about what is going on. Ideally more will wake up and raise their voice of disagreement and protest. That is what we must work for. We need people to ask themselves whether this is right, and come to the right conclusion, and then join us and take action.
“If you’re required to look for work, and from 15 July 2013 you turn down a suitable job without a good reason, your benefit will reduce by up to half (if you have dependent children) or stop (if you don’t have dependent children) for a 13-week period.”
An awful lot hangs on that phrase “without a good reason“.
Back in 1991 I was unemployed – perfectly timed to coincide with the benefit cuts and introduction of draconian rules just like this one. At the time there was a rule that if you turned down work (not just ‘a permanent job’) you had a strike against you. You had two strikes and then, next time, you had your benefit stopped (I think that was how it worked).
Well, I lined up for my weekly scouring of the jobs board and chat with the person processing us on the other side of the counter and was told that there were two days shallot picking/digging somewhere beyond the outskirts of Christchurch. It happened that I had been told a few days earlier that I had managed to get an interview for a professional job on the morning of the first day of shallot picking. I said this to the woman behind the counter. She said, deadpan, ‘So, you’re refusing work?’.
I tried to explain that I thought it was a good reason and it seemed crazy to insist I go for two days shallot picking and miss out on an interview for a very skilled job when there were plenty of others in the line who’d be keen to take the two days work. She wasn’t having any of it and seemed more intent on getting through the day in front of an endless line of unemployed people.
‘That’s one strike’ she said (or words to that effect). I left the office feeling like dirt and worried as hell at what they might do to me if something like that happened again. At that very moment I had written away and had in process over 40 applications for positions both in New Zealand and overseas. Part of me wanted to go back in, take the shallot picking and flag the interview – I didn’t want to risk losing what was a pretty meagre benefit because it was the only guaranteed income I had.
I was gobsmacked but stuck to my guns and went to the job interview. About a week later I ended up hearing that I got the job. In the meantime, I’d taken another ‘job’ picking apples and took the job offer call in the apple orchard office.
I’ve never forgotten that experience.
Who knows, maybe the woman I spoke to was applying the rules incorrectly and just thought I was a lazy, con-artist or something who was spinning her a line. Part of me still wants to believe that it couldn’t possibly be what was intended – counted as ‘refusing work’ because you had to go to a job interview.
But it happened, intended or not.
Maybe just that the form said – agreed to do work offered – Yes … No and had no other option.
Government bureaucracies work like that, especially when they’ve just been gutted or restructured by bean counters and been told to find ways to work smarter to get through the same amount of work. Basic checklists soon abound on front desks to slash the time previously “wasted” applying rational thinking when the situation is even slightly more complex than the simple interactions the academically qualified policy designers or the contracted trainers envisaged.
FFS. No wonder people despair the msm. This is stuff.co’s headline front page photo item.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/beauty/8808621/Miss-Utahs-words-fail-her-and-everyone-else
This outwardly attractive person’s inability to form a coherent answer reminds me of David Shearer.
What is the difference between David Shearer and Miss Utah?
One is young, inexperienced and has plenty of time to develop skills.
The other is old, experienced and is incapable of developing skills now.
Unfortunately Stuff often self-promotes using images of young attractive women in that photo slot – sometimes it has more serious news items there, and sometimes images of young celebrity males, but young women are most often seen in that slot.
karol
Are pretty women used as tokens to be put into the paywall slot?
Perhaps they will get a special rate for their citizen images of themselves, as is offered in some bars because of their magnetic abilities.
“Pretty woman, I don’t believe you
You’re not the truth
No one could look as good as you
Mercy”
(Oh Noze, they air-brushed my face). 😎
Deprivation and Double the density around the Tamaki estuary.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10891194
only one Tamaki resident on the board, chaired by a former property developer, Merchant Banker.
PLA responds to PRISM
http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/international/17-Jun-2013/china-army-paper-hits-out-at-us-prism-programme
Americans oppose arming Syrian rebels
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/17/americans-are-reluctant-to-aid-syrian-rebels-polls-show/ but many are not even aware of what’s going on.
“Washington is Insane”
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Washington-Is-Insane-by-Paul-Craig-Roberts-130617-780.html
Now it is all coming out bit by bit. There are new revelations by the week now, if not by the day.
Edward Snowden, NSA intelligence staff member turned “whistle-blower”, in hiding in Hong Kong, has answered questions via the website of ‘The Guardian’:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-nsa-files-whistleblower
AP have come out with a story, revealing that apparently PRISM is just the tip of the iceberg, when it comes to wide-scale internet and communications surveillance by US agencies:
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/secret-prism-success-even-bigger-data-seizure
Have a read of this for “enlightenment”:
“Deep in the oceans, hundreds of cables carry much of the world’s phone and Internet traffic. Since at least the early 1970s, the NSA has been tapping foreign cables. It doesn’t need permission. That’s its job.
But Internet data doesn’t care about borders. Send an email from Pakistan to Afghanistan and it might pass through a mail server in the United States, the same computer that handles messages to and from Americans. The NSA is prohibited from spying on Americans or anyone inside the United States. That’s the FBI’s job and it requires a warrant.
Despite that prohibition, shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, President George W. Bush secretly authorized the NSA to plug into the fiber optic cables that enter and leave the United States, knowing it would give the government unprecedented, warrantless access to Americans’ private conversations.”
Also:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-surveillance-architecture-includes-collection-of-revealing-internet-phone-metadata/2013/06/15/e9bf004a-d511-11e2-b05f-3ea3f0e7bb5a_story.html
So George Orwell’s 1984 ominous future visions have in some ways already materialised!
Does anybody trust GCSB, the SIS and Key’s assurances that New Zealanders have nothing to fear?
Protests spread throughout Brazil
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-22946736
Nuts spending all this money on sports facilities.
Edward Snowden
They gave some of his comments on Radionz this morning. Sounds a cool guy. Hope you keep cool Edward. Don’t want you to be the Count of Monte Christo.
Queensland power prices rise 20%
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/17/australia-electricity-prices-queensland
more free-market fu$k-ups.
The ghost of Edward carpenter
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jun/17/millthorpe-derbyshire-edward-carpenter
gay rights activist and socialist.
Mighty river down to $2.30!!!
It was lower than that last week. IIRC it ended last week at $2.28.
What a bluff hand. Not a royal flush…
Yes, I would have thought that this failure would make important news on the msm yet TV3 news never has MRP share price on its half dozen listed prices it shows…I wonder why?
WHO IS LEADING THE ARMS RACE?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/datablog/picture/2013/jun/16/infographic-who-leading-the-arms-race
(infographic)
China- 2.2M active troops
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/16/world-military-power-infographic
and then there’s all that gear.
oooh Government books WILL NOT return to surplus in 2015; wait patiently till 2016 instead now.oooh.- RNZ
she’ll be coming round the mountain, she’ll be coming round the mountain, she’ll be coming round the mountain when she bombs. (I knew an old lady who swallowed a fly). 😀
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/8809801/Job-revealed-in-Rebstock-appeal
Well, well, well wouldn’t it be interesting to know who person A is…
Yep. But no worries if I never find out. I’m more interested in knowing who GCSB spied on, and why.
Yeah I kinda figured it’d be like that…
Would be kind of good for us all to know what exactly is being surrendered in the TPPA negotiations, too. You know, the 1-2% doing on-the-quiet-selling-your-sovereignty-deals with the other 1-2% in the US.
Look forward to learning more about what the NSA’s been up to from Snowden as well. A lot of guts, that bloke. Seems to doubt people can trust Corporate-led – or maybe any – Governments with private information:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10891334
He might be on to something there.
yup pretend its not happening or point to something else thats the ticket
Well no, I’m still interested in finding out who the leaker was in MFAT, but just not that interested. People needed to see what a thick prick McCully is. Public servants have endured years of bashing from the arsoles they have to work for. Its inevitable some will defend themselves and retaliate by whatever means available.
Can attest to that. I worked for a government agency that tried to rip off another government agency in the late 1980s and early 1990s. I had to put up with bullying and intimidation because they knew I had a few senior political contacts at that time and they were afraid I might spill the beans. In the end I did exactly that, and they had no-one but themselves to blame. A contract they were dead keen on getting signed ended up being scrapped. It served them right. Not surprisingly, that management didn’t last much longer…
But the details of the case were swiftly covered up and never the light of day.
Yep. Similar experience. Legal Services assisted in the cover up so we were stuffed trying to do anything about it.
Aye! Not to mention covering up financial mismanagement, lying, leaking cabinet papers, troughing, and generally thinking that quaint old code of conduct doesn’t apply to them.
Thankfully (as you suggest Anne), some of them eventually come a cropper
FYI
(Information you won’t find on the ‘Truth’ or the ‘Daily Blog’ 🙂
“How to get ACTION taken to help stop this Auckland DAFT Unitary Plan!”
BACKGROUND:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10891017
NZ Herald Monday 17 June 2013 Bernard Orsman
“The Auckland Council is talking up another one million residents in the city by 2041, but it is taking a prudent line when it comes to providing transport, water and other services.
The council has adopted a Statistics New Zealand’s high-growth scenario of a million more residents by 2041, but its water body is using a medium-growth scenario of 700,000 more residents.
The mismatch has raised questions, but council chief planning officer Dr Roger Blakeley says it is prudent to provide for the highest likely population growth and to be cautious to avoid over-investment.
………………..
Councillor Cameron Brewer has called for an independent review of the most likely population growth, saying the council’s projections are out of kilter with the Government’s national infrastructure unit’s mid-range projections. …..”
______________________________________________________________________________
STATEMENT BY 2013 AUCKLAND MAYORAL CANDIDATE PENNY BRIGHT:
Did YOU know that the following Petition 2011/64 has already been presented to the House?
http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Presented/Petitions/5/0/5/50DBHOH_PET3157_1-Petition-of-Penelope-Mary-Bright-requesting-that.htm
Petition of Penelope Mary Bright
Requesting that Parliament declines to proceed with the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill until the lawfulness of the reliance of Auckland Council on the New Zealand Department of Statistics’ “high”population growth projections, instead of their “medium” population growth projections for the Auckland Spatial Plan, has been properly and independently investigated, taking into consideration that both Auckland Transport and Watercare Services Ltd, have relied upon “medium” population growth projections for their infrastructural asset management plans.
Petition number: 2011/64
Presented by: Holly Walker
Date presented: 30 May 2013
Referred to: Social Services Committee
______________________________________________________________________________
– with the following ‘Supplementary Evidence’ ?
http://www.occupyaucklandvsaucklandcouncilappeal.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Housing-Accord-and-Special-Housing-Areas-Bil-Supplementary-Evidence-13-Juna-2013.pdf
This is an ‘Item of Business’ before the Social Services Select Committee.
The next meeting of the Social Services Select Committee, is scheduled for Wednesday 26 June 2013.
If YOU support this Petition, you can send an email / letter to this Select Committee, in the following way, using this as a guide:
(EMAIL TO THE CLERK OF THE SOCIAL SERVICES SELECT COMMITTEE : tracey.rayner@parliament.govt.nz
MAIL TO THE CLERK OF THE SOCIAL SERVICES SELECT COMMITTEE : Tracey Rayner
Private Bag 18041, Parliament Buildings, Wellington 6061 (No stamp required).
______________________________________________________________________________
To Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, Chair of the Social Services Select Committee.
RE: Petition 2011/64
Requesting that Parliament declines to proceed with the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill until the lawfulness of the reliance of Auckland Council on the New Zealand Department of Statistics’ “high” population growth projections, instead of their “medium” population growth projections for the Auckland Spatial Plan, has been properly and independently investigated, taking into consideration that both Auckland Transport and Watercare Services Ltd, have relied upon “medium” population growth projections for their infrastructural asset management plans.
I, the undersigned, request that you and ALL members of the Social Services Select Committee please support the investigation requested by this petition.
I am particularly concerned, that the LAW which covers the Auckland (Spatial) Plan, which the Auckland Draft Unitary Plan is supposed to help implement, appears to have not been followed:
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2009/0032/latest/DLM3338660.html
79 Spatial plan for Auckland
(1)The Auckland Council must prepare and adopt a spatial plan for Auckland.
(4)The spatial plan must—
(c) provide an evidential base to support decision making for Auckland, including evidence of
trends,opportunities, and constraints within Auckland;
____________________________________________________________________________
The recommendation from the Department of Statistics, in their ‘customised’ advice to Auckland Council on 28 March 2011 – stated:
http://www.occupyaucklandvsaucklandcouncilappeal.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/AUCKLAND-GROWTH-PROJECTIONS-FOR-SPATIAL-PL-AN-DEPT-OF-STATISTICS-SNZ-letter-2.pdf
“Population Projections for the Auckland Spatial Plan
Development of the Auckland Spatial Plan requires that an evidential base is provided to support decision making for Auckland. Furthermore, it requires the identification of the existing and future location of residential activities within specific geographic areas within Auckland.
Population estimates and projections clearly form a good source of information for these purposes.
Statistics New Zealand were asked to produce customised population projections for a new growth model for Auckland. Under the medium series, this resulted in a projected population of 2,160,700 for 2041
(the low series projected 1,832,100 people and the high series projected 2,467,500 people).
Statistics New Zealand has been asked by the Auckland Council
“is a projected population for the Auckland region of approximately 2.1 million people a reasonable basis for planning?” While there is no certainty that the births, deaths and migration assumptions in the population projection will be realised, Statistics New Zealand agrees that a projected population of approximately 2.1 million at 2041 is a reasonable basis for planning at this point in time. We would reiterate that it is important to consider the range of projections, including the low and high scenarios. ..”
Why was this arguably ‘expert’ advice from the Department of Statistics apparently then ignored?
I look forward to your exercising ‘due diligence’ as a Members of Parliament for New Zealand, the ‘Highest Court in the Land’, and doing your part to ensure that ‘justice is done and been seen to be done’, and the ‘Rule of Law’ prevails.
NAME ADDRESS SIGNED
______________________________________________________________________________
A copy of this ‘sample’ letter can be found here:
http://www.occupyaucklandvsaucklandcouncilappeal.org.nz/?p=171
If YOU want to sign something which ‘has teeth’ and can help make a difference to stop this Auckland ‘democracy for developers’ / ‘market madness’ – this, in my considered opinion – is IT.
Yours sincerely,
Penny Bright
‘Anti-corruption / anti-privatisation’ campaigner
2013 Auckland Mayoral candidate
Penny,
Isn’t the agenda to get those up to a million extra “Aucklanders” into the city first, to get them sweating – while working hard, and to have them earn some money in a future, more “sweat-shop” like NZ economy, and pay taxes from that, and with that pay for the additional infrastructure?
That is what it seems to me.
It has been the agenda for decades, well probably from the day the first settlers came here, to bring in more, to create growth in a “primitive” way, by simply “growing the market” and labour pool by immigration, to justify all the great nice new projects the “leaders” of cities and central government like to talk about.
Once those additional people are here, oh my, ah well, we never expected that, we need yet more, to pay for the additional costs that “unexpectedly” arose in the meantime.
The ‘Hairdo’ makes a stand for His rehabilitation announcing today that He will not support the private members bill that would allow ‘scab labour’ to be used by employers to break strikes…
Are you speculating, bad, or is there a public announcement to that effect?
Perhaps this, Karol.
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/Auckland/news/nbpol/1159820385-Dunne-not-backing-crack-down-on-strikes
Newstalk also has this item
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/Auckland/news/nbpol/1820192995-Peter-Dunne-breaks-political-hiatus
Addendum : the same google search gave this article in the Southland Times by Peter Cullen, Employment lawyer, on the Dunne situation vis a vis ownership of emails sent from employer’s sites.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/southland-times/business/8808508/All-emails-from-work-belong-to-the-employer
Now I am late for an appointment – must rush!
Thanks, Veuto. I did a search on google news earlier and it didn’t throw that article up.
Who me speculate!!! shame on me, heard it on the news on the car radio twelve oclock-ish, don’t ask me what the station was coz as far as the sounds in the car go i wouldn’t have a clue,(leaving myself wide open here),
Dunne was quoted as saying that He wouldn’t vote for it as such legislation was wide open to abuse from employers,
Who would have thunk it, Saint Peter seeks redemption in the court of public opinion and only scores a brownie point,
i wonder what the Maori Party(s) view is on this issue,(besides Pita worrying about the mortgage and Te Ureroa worrying about being leader that is)…
Twittering from Dunne
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10891371
“And the cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon
Little boy blue and the man on the moon…”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tZmN7eHYFU
“But there were planes to catch and bills to pay.”
https://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/06/17-3
😉
-Stone
now, here is a ‘parent’ that could do with ‘the bash’
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10891298
…john patiently waits…
What a great roundup
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10891362
Race, Religion and politics.
Hats off to Bryce Edwards.(and Roy Harper).
FYI
My ‘Open Letter /OIA request to Professor Sir Peter Gluckman :”Upon what ‘science’ are you relying to support fluoride in water?” should get a reply before 5pm, Wednesday 10 July 2013.
______________________________________________________________________________
Dear Penny
Thank you for your request under the Official Information Act 1982 dated 12 June 2013, which has been forwarded to me.
We will respond to your query as soon as is reasonably practicable within the 20 working days allowed,
(before 5pm 10 July 2013).
Yours sincerely
……………………………….
Communications Officer
Office of the Prime Minister’s Science Advisory Committee
PO Box 108-117, Symonds Street
Auckland 1150, New Zealand
_______________________________________________________
12 June 2013
‘Open Letter’ / OIA to Professor Sir Peter Gluckman from Auckland Mayoral candidate Penny Bright:
“Upon what ‘science’ are you relying to support fluoride in water?”
OFFICE OF THE PRIME MINISTER’S SCIENCE ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, KNZM FRSNZ FMedSci FRS
Chief Science Advisor
Dear Professor,
I read with interest your following ‘Media Release’:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/GE1306/S00035/sir-peter-gluckman-statement-of-flouride.htm
“Media release
12 June 2013
“The science of fluoride in water is effectively settled. It has been one of the most thoroughly worked questions in public health science over many decades,” says Sir Peter Gluckman, the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor.
In a statement released today on the issue of fluoride in public water supplies, Sir Peter reiterates the scientific facts, saying “it is absolutely clear that at doses used in New Zealand to adjust the natural level to one that is consistent with beneficial effects (0.7-1.0mg/litre), there is no health risk from fluoride in the water.”
So why is there any issue at all?
Sir Peter points to the importance of the values debate around fluoridation, but warns that this should not be misrepresented as a scientific debate. …”
______________________________________________________________________________
Can you please provide the information which confirms you have read the following research:
1) http://www.hindawi.com/journals/jeph/2013/439490/
“..chronic effects of fluoride involve alterations in the chemical activity of calcium by the fluoride ion. Natural calcium fluoride with low solubility and toxicity from ingestion is distinct from fully soluble toxic industrial fluorides …”
“Industrial fluoride ingested from treated water enters saliva at levels too low to affect dental caries. Blood levels during lifelong consumption can harm heart, bone, brain, and even developing teeth enamel.
The widespread policy known as water fluoridation is discussed in light of these findings. ….”
2) http://www.slweb.org/50reasons.html
50 Reasons to Oppose Fluoridation
Dr. Paul Connett
Professor of Chemistry
St. Lawrence University, NY 13617
______________________________________________________________________________
FYI – I have spent some hundreds of hours researching the decisions of the Ministry of Health and Watercare Services to use Waikato river water as a ‘raw’ source of drinking water supplies for the Auckland region.
I respectfully suggest that you read the following document which I prepared for a meeting of the Auckland City Council Finance and Business Committee back in October 2002, so that you can understand why a number of persons, such as myself, do NOT trust either the Ministry of Health, or Watercare Services Ltd, when it comes to safeguarding public health and drinking water supplies.
http://www.occupyaucklandvsaucklandcouncilappeal.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Waikato-Amended-ACC-Presentation-18-10-02.pdf
FYI – as a 2013 Auckland Mayoral candidate, I do NOT support the fluoridation of public drinking water supplies.
Penny Bright
‘Anti-corruption / anti-privatisation’ campaigner.
…………………………………………………..
http://www.occupyaucklandvsaucklandcouncilappeal.org.nz/?page_id=152
James Corbett on Margaret Sanger’s Planned Parenthood & Eugenics.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=UU7TvL4GlQyMBLlUsTrN_C4Q&feature=player_embedded&v=QOmRk26jrNo
Dr. W.L. Hutton was the head medical officer of health in the first Canadian city to fluoridate their water supply. Dr. W.L. Hutton was the president of the eugenics society of Canada from 1930 – 1938 [he became Brantford’s head medical officer in 1937].
“Using the fluoride in the water supplies in their gulags (concentration camps), to make the prisoners stupid, docile, and subservient.”
Ref : The Crime and Punishment of I. G. Farben by Joseph Borkin
http://canadianawareness.org/2012/03/water-fluoridation-directly-linked-to-eugenics/
“At the end of the Second World War, the United States Government sent Charles Eliot Perkins, a research worker in chemistry, biochemistry, physiology and pathology, to take charge of the vast Farben chemical plants in Germany. While there he was told of a scheme which had been worked out by them during the war and adopted by the German General Staff. This was to control the population in any given area through mass medication of drinking water. In this scheme sodium fluoride occupied a prominent place. Repeated doses of infinitesimal amounts of fluoride will in time reduce an individual’s power to resist domination by slowly poisoning and narcotisizing a certain area of the brain and will thus make him submissive to the will of those who wish to govern him. Both the Germans and the Russians added sodium fluoride to the drinking water of prisoners-of-war to make them stupid and docile.” (Reference: Victorian Hansard of 12th August 1987).
http://fluoridationfacts.com/education/propaganda/870000_perkins.htm
Are you sure your tin-foil headgear is wound tightly enough?
… as the fluoridation campaign gained steam, the Public Health Service was headed by another top Alcoa official, Oscar R. Ewing, who in turn was aided by Edward L. Bernays, the father of modern public relations and author of the book “Propaganda,” who sought to portray fluoride’s opponents as wackos.
http://www.dkosopedia.com/wiki/Mellon_family
obviously didn’t have to try to hard, though
West Germany ditched mass water fluoridation after a brief trial in the 1950’s. Probably the idiot Americans pushing them to try it.
After West Germany unified with East Germany, they ordered the East Germans to ditch water fluoridation too.
Did that prove to be the predictable dental disaster for East German children??? Nope.
Oh and just for the pedantic amongst us McFlock
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11014515
Very interesting abstract. Thanks.
You’re welcome. How about this one:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Mendoza-Schulz%20A%5BAuthor%5D&cauthor=true&cauthor_uid=19619626
Note that the investigators noted altered cell migration behaviour at a level of just 2.4 micromol/L of human serum fluoride concentration.
This was a level several times less than what the investigators considered typical for persons “chronically exposed” to fluoridated water.
and how did they define “chronic exposure” in relation to, say, the <0.7-0.8ppm levels used in artificial fluoridation in NZ?
Dunno…but they regard (0.23 and 1.2 micromol/L) as below normal human serum concentrations.
And just 2 micromol/L above that, evidence was found suggesting increased migration activity in malignant brain cell behaviour.
Come on Mr Scientist, open your eyes and consider a few facts from outside your doctrinal orthodoxy
ffs.
Every single chemical on the planet is dangerous at some level, from hydrogen to uranium. The entire point is that there is a dose-response relationship for good effects as well as bad. Were they talking about NZ fluoride levels creating actual harm? Experimental science dovetails with epidemiological evidence – just show the relevance of the article you provided to the discussion of fluoridation in NZ.
hey mate keep sucking it up
I’m sure your serum F is ok
eeep! I am suddenly scared for no reason, and will therefore completely reverse my position!
Oh, wait, that’s not how science works. Phew, you almost had me there for a moment.
You’re a follower of the doctrine mate, science is merely your scripture. And you don’t like looking at the verses which don’t suit you.
Wait a sec I have to go brush my teeth with Colgate Total now, got that yucky furry feeling from enamel destroying plaque
Science is a methodology. Scripture is unquestioned assertion. Basically, you’re now in the realm of creationists who say “the Theory of Evolution is just a theory”.
Edit: And I read your links more carefully than you did.
Nice how like any fundamentalist you like to judge and denigrate other peoples belief systems by your own specific orthodoxy’s unassailable criteria for truth and validity.
Yes you did read the links more carefully, good you have full access to those papers thanks for the extra info
EDIT
It is far more than that, and sometimes it is not that at all.
Damned dirty trick I played, asking you to show how your randomly-selected article (butbutbut it contained the word “fluoride”) was at all relevant to the fluoridation levels used in NZ. /sarc
It’s actually really easy to understand: if fluoridation had negative effects at NZ levels, your tinfoil support sites would point to the studies that show it. Not some dime-doctor who says that’s what the studies say, they would link to the actual studies that show detectable harm from the 0.7-0.8ppm levels. We have seen detectable benefits linked to before in this debate, and the study you presented to say that maybe those benefits no longer apply was indeterminate and difficult to translate directly to NZ conditions (the entire “Berlin Wall and lifestyles” thing).
You want to call it mass-medication? Okay, then let’s go to “first, do no harm”. Where’s the harm?
EDIT
well, that looked profound while saying fuck all.
I mean, you have the balls to accuse me of judging by unassailable criteria, but at least I don’t come up with pseudo-profundities like that.
Where’s the harm? Nah fuck that mate. Instead, for starters, let’s go with consent to treat.
You don’t have it. The harm is in you taking away my ability to consent to take a medication or not take a medication. And I do not consent.
Where’s your medical bioethics now, hotshot? You gonna say that you know best and the patient should just follow doctors orders?
Except, Christchurch has just decided to turn down fluoridation yet again, and roughly half of NZers do not receive fluoridated water supply, Taranaki and Hamilton ditched it pretty recently, so whatever.
Oh look thee to thy scriptures for revelations
It’s called a “water filter”. And has a friend called “find an alternative source”.
Nobody forces you to drink tap water.
yeah, that’s what I already figured about the ethics of your compulsory mass medication programme.
awwww, you thought you’d learned how to support a scientific argument with actual evidence and now you’re just flailing about back in the familiar territory of making bioethical mountains out of trace-element molehills with a few semi-godwins thrown in.
Much as you like to call science a religious doctrine, the fact is that without at least a little bit of science you’d be singing the praises of “invisible good-teeth water magic”.
Anyway, I’m off to bed now. Remember to check under the bed for boogeymen and NSA bugs before you go sleepytime. And try to figure out the difference between “as low as” and “greatly increased from”.
oh that’s sweet, CV’s learning how to provide evidence.
If you’d looked beyond the abstract and read the article, you’d have read the confounding factors in East Germmany at the time:
And you might have even bothered to read the last line of the article, after the general discussion of the results and other studies (some with similar results):
Didja see the bit about feeding babies sodium fluoride in their first year of life? And the massive increases in antibiotic use? Of course you did, because you didn’t just rely on the abstract, did you…
Wow, that’s really impressive. Thank you.
The German government massively resourced their people to improve dental care, made sure fluoridated toothpastes and salt were available, but as part of the dental health programme saw it fit to REMOVE mass water fluoridation.
Cheers mate.
Yeah I think you’re the one “confounded”.
EDIT you might want to explain to me how Vit D for rickets and antibiotics for all reasons plus greatly increased fast food and sugar intake is supposed to help with the incidence of dental caries across the entire population?
Further, greater use of dental care and surveillance should mean an increase in caries found, not a decrease.
btw I am for the availability of fluoridated salt, milk and topical toothpastes in retail stores.
Hey I could agree with that mate. But the researchers conclude fluoridation is NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence.
oh, but you’re the scientific researcher, even if you might not know what a confounding factor is. You’d know all about things like oral antibiotics interacting with oral bacteria (maybe even the ones that cause tooth decay).
awwww, you mixed up “The sugar consumption of 1993 was as
low as 1980–89″ with “The sugar consumption of 1993 was greatly increased from 1980–89″. You gotta start reading what’s written, rather than what you agree with.
Because all a dentist does is put fillings in and count caries, nothing else at all /sarc
Oh McFlock, look how much effort the new German government put into improving dental care yet they yanked water fluoridation preferring to use fluoridated toothpaste and salt instead.
This is a policy that they continue to this day, 20 years on.
And once again thank you for the researchers’ conclusion from the paper:
But, as I said before, the researchers conclude fluoridation is NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence.
Basic logic, boyo:
“reasonable for areas with high or increasing caries prevalence”
does not equal
“NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence”,
but it does equal
“NO COMMENT ON areas with lower AND decreasing caries prevalence”.
As for “the germans did it so we can” argument, well – that’s pretty stupid.
Do you hear that sound McFlock? It’s the sound of scientific schism.
“But, as I said before, the researchers conclude fluoridation is NOT REASONABLE for areas with lower or decreasing caries prevalence.”
Do we know why? Could it be financial? How much does it cost to fluoridate water (including monitoring)?
lol
keep using big words you don’t understand. It’s funny.
not sure but the article wasn’t an economics cost/benefit analysis, it focussed on factors affecting dental effectiveness.
“EDIT you might want to explain to me how Vit D for rickets and antibiotics for all reasons plus greatly increased fast food and sugar intake is supposed to help with the incidence of dental caries across the entire population?”
Vitamin D affects calcium metabolism (amongst many other things), and is necessary for bone health (and probably dental health). I would expect that increases in antibiotic use would have a negative effect on dental health due to poorer absorption of nutrients.
Anyways, the list of confounding factors just points to we probably have no idea what is really going on (which was the point at the end of the abstract, for those of us not lucky enough to access to the full article).
If this F stuff was simply added to some brands of toothpaste and salt and milk, and I could choose to have it or not, fine. Put it out there.
But since people insist that you need to mass medicate everyone with it in all areas of the country all the time in all their food and drink, I think that a far higher standard is needed. (By the way, I’m about to go brush my teeth with a tube of Colgate Total, so I’m not a fundamentalist about this stuff)
And what I do know is that Germany yanked water fluoridation after unification, despite taking great pains to ensure that dental care in East Germany was improved, and has kept it that way for the last 20+ years.
If you think that ingestion of fluoride might be a problem, why do you use fluoridated toothpaste?
Well I get enough F from toothpaste (and there the action is mostly topical anyways); I don’t also compulsarily need it in all the food that I buy, all the meals I make and all the drink I consume.
one can empathise, regrettably, with the position of the NRA sometimes; the only thing these Authoritarian pricks seem to understand is the barrel of gun.Seen any good movies lately? like Death Race?.
Nope, haven’t seen Death Race. America has arrived at the robocop corporate government & policing style though. I see no prospect of Americans giving up their guns. They really should be concerned. I read somewhere recently there are 14 separate state security organisations there now, not including the countless military and security contractors. Eisenhower would be incredulous.
ACC story on Campbell Live no link up yet
Yes, Paul –
Campbell Live is kicking off investigations into ACC’s off-loading of complex claimants – to shift them onto welfare benefits.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Is-ACC-cutting-off-people-too-early/tabid/367/articleID/301917/Default.aspx
Yes, about time, that this gets raised again, and looked at closely again! It all kind of went under the radar again, after Minister Collins took over the files and promised to have her staff look into things, when the scandal broke and become public last year.
John Campbell did invite other ACC claimants that had similar experiences to contact them. So more is likely to come.
How bloody disgusting, them putting pressure on a man who lost one arm, to go and look for work, even in a car-yard. And also expecting a woman with serious back pain, due to serious damage, to work full-time, when she cannot and is not ready for that.
Nothing has changed, really!
I wish Campbell and his team would also open their eyes and ears and examine WINZ designated doctor recommendations, decisions by WINZ and their appallingly biased Principal Health Advisor Dr David Bratt, comparing benefit dependence to drug dependence.
The UK might be concerned about tax havens (not really) but they are connected to many of them
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2013/06/201361613599895885.html