John Campbell does such a fine job bringing the realities of this tragedy into the living rooms of everyone who has eyes to see and ears to hear. Those who live on the benefits of escalating house prices however will have neither.
Look saying shit like that is simply not credible. It is ridiculous. What is neoliberal about this government? It is a Centre left government and it has the policies to match. You come across as totally mental.
Don’t be obtuse – stealing and privatising public anything is neo-liberal. Serco. Charter schools. State house sell-offs.
This is a failed, corrupt, extreme right government – if it were working it’d’ve used market mechanisms to address the housing crisis instead of pretending it didn’t exist.
It’d’ve rebuilt Christchurch to prove the validity of its economic preferences – the rubble proves the converse. The market simply does not work under lame-assed regulation like this.
Brian Rudman: Blaming others won’t build homes, Mr Key
If April 1 hadn’t been long gone, I’d have said Prime Minister John Key and his housing Sancho Panza Nick Smith were taking the mickey when responding to reports of dozens of families reduced to living in cars alongside a South Auckland sports ground.
Dr Smith chose to appear on television before a huge roaring fire, like the Queen delivering her annual Christmas message, first tut-tutting gravely, before launching into yet another attack on local councillors and anyone other than himself.
The next day, Mr Key was on radio blaming the dumb victims. He suggested they be good folk and pop along to the local Work and Income office and all, it seemed, would be sorted out. “People often don’t understand what’s available to them.” He said the bureaucrats would “do their very best to support people in those situations, especially when children are involved”.
Emergency houses are only available to them for a couple of weeks – and only if they are prepared to pay WINZ back the $2000 odd it cost them to live in some overpriced room.
“Electricity consumption in the country was fully covered by solar, wind and hydro power in an extraordinary 107-hour run that lasted from 6.45am on Saturday 7 May until 5.45pm the following Wednesday”
+1 Steve. Not only does the government need to address homelessness and low wages/high rents/house price ratio as a major issue, but also the price of running a home these days with the cost of power.
If most new builds were all designed to be on solar and there were a lot more incentives for conversions to solar then the again people have more money in their pockets to enjoy their lives, not spend every cent of food and utilities and every other essential cost in this country that is out of line with the average wage.
Also the same for new build businesses. Westgate mall, Auckland for example was built and opened this year, no sustainability in design for water or power – so no savings for businesses operating in this mall… It doesn’t look too bad inside, but in NZ developers are only focused on the appearance, not what is happening underneath.
Also had corporate welfare given to it by Auckland council, of course not bothered to make it easier for ratepayers for water and power, public transport etc….
It is also not doing too well, the businesses have no clients and are going broke.
Could have been another IronBank but no, so short sighted.
but also the price of running a home these days with the cost of power.
Oh, I’m pretty sure you’ll find that the government is quite concerned about the price of power and is doing all it can to ensure that the new owners keep getting massive profits.
Thanks Steve. Because NZ is mostly run on renewable Hydro, the urgency is not upon us. Sadly, the Mum and Dad shareholders must get a dividend from our companies like Genesis so up go our costs. Pity our Government treats Solar with contempt.
An interesting discussion on Pundit re Solar started by Mike Williams.
Alfie West Wrote a rebuttal for another commentator:
“I invite you to consider solar in a slightly different way… as an energy saving appliance.
Say you fitted a couple of low energy appliances, or added better insulation and maybe changed your lighting to LED throughout your home. Would you consider it fair if your power company said, “Your usage has dropped. You were using $x of electricity per month but now it’s only $x, our profits have dropped therefore we’re going to tax you the difference.” Would you happily pay that extra tax? Of course you wouldn’t. What you are advocating is a little like anyone buying a Prius being “taxed” by petrol companies because they’re using less of their product. ”
“I was astounded to learnt the Hawke’s Bay power lines company, a monopoly called Unison, has announced increased line charges for households generating their own electricity. This “solar tax” runs counter to New Zealand’s attempts to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and is one of the most stupid business decisions I’ve heard of in a very long time.”
Fascism is upon us.
But no mention of the Nanny State from the media…. installing low energy bulbs is nanny state, but companies putting up power for individuals based on their usage is fine….
You can also beat the power companies by going totally off grid – but maybe not so easy in urban areas as you need fire to heat generally and you get caught up in planning regs.
+100…obviously those outside corporates and businesses who have bought formerly NZ State- owned NZ electricity are desperate to hold on to their profits…
jonkey Nact needs to be held to account for this rorting of New Zealanders
…there needs to be some analysis and sunshine on the facts here and who is making profits out of New Zealanders
…Yes mainstream media is generally pathetic on this..i think Kathryn Ryan may have covered some debate on this issue though ( unfortunately I wasnt listening properly)
In the past year, at least nine of my close friends have been without their own home – “homeless”. They happen to all be Māori women with children. They have lived in garages, have been taken in by other families to overcrowd their homes or have endured spirit-breaking emergency accommodation.
They are some of the thousands of families without stable housing in this country. They are not just Māori and they aren’t just in Auckland. This problem is impacting disproportionately on Māori and Pacific families but also on lower income people including those in paid employment, from all backgrounds and across the entire country.
Real political leadership would put families first. Real leadership would discourage the buying up of houses as a speculative business; homes are for people to live in, not for profit at the expense of all else. Real leadership would actually invest in building more state homes. Real leadership would be to go and see for yourself what exactly is going on with our families, our children, and our elderly – our New Zealanders.
Real leadership would acknowledge the absolutely vital role of government in implementing a whole of system approach to end homelessness; ensuring that government agencies, local government and the community sector are offering a coordinated response to the complex structural issue that is homelessness.
Key doesnt see this as failure just the market doing what it does and those ‘choices’ folk make.
The fact that he created the market conditions with immigration, tax havens and no cgt needs to be pinned on the likes of nick smith who is an accident waiting to happen.
Yep – now that Labour has skinned Nationals’ red herring we can deal to the real causes of the housing crisis.
Excessive immigration, foreign buyers, out of control speculation and Nationals’ failed social housing policy.
[You appear to have misunderstood the meaning of either the comment, the word xenophobia or both. Instead of failed one liners, how about trying to contribute to the discussion meaningfully? TRP]
OK – some one should be able to answer this – how many homes need to hit the market at the same time to have a big enough effect on demand that slows prices down?
or are we talking forcing the savings through to the purchaser?
opening land will mean more houses – sure, but there is nothing in that that means any kind of impact on prices – all that will happen is a drip feed with each house being priced to the max the market will bear – and in AK we have ever growing demand
Well think of it like this, its still a long way to go but since there seems to be agreement over one of the causes and that cause is looking like may be on its way out then its a step towards where Auckland needs to be going
Of course I also tend to be somewhat of an optimist
that ignores pretty much all the far greater causes and ignores new issues created by sprawl
anyone pushing the “free up land” argument should be able to show how it leads to better house prices, better value for ratepayers (infrastructure costs etc) and an affordable life style for those that purchase that far out (transport and de-centralisation) – so far not one person actually has
” looking like may be on its way ”
its already gone anyway – both nat and lab are talking about a boundry that has already been done away with in the upcoming plan (according to RNZ interview this morning)
the whole thing is really weird and has more of an aspect of voter PR than anything actually meaningfull
That’s not the solution. In fact, IMO, that seems to be a large of the problem. We need large, dense cities to develop high tech and better education. What we don’t need is massive amounts of sprawl that damages the environment and causes cost of living to skyrocket.
In other words, we’d all be better off if we developed our regional cities to do the high tech and education as well as Auckland.
And next year you’ll say the same thing and the year after that. End result is that the correct thing to do, the thing that needs to be done, will never be done.
Listening to stupidity like yours is what’s caused so much poverty and heartache in our society.
True, but that doesn’t mean that he’s wrong about everything.
And his preferred political system is, I suspect, only tangetially (at best) related to his ideas on urban architecture.
It seems to me that the idea of vertical expansion, which you seemed to regard as a reasonable long term solution, would lose its investment appeal if urban sprawl were allowed to expand. So your short term solution inhibits, if not outright stalls, developing reasonable long term solutions.
I’m thinking that the short term solution, that might stall the long term solution, will offer quicker easing of the housing market then the longer term idea mooted
Yeah its not ideal but sometimes you have to work with what you have not what you want.
If National and Labour both agree on this then this is whats going to happen
But the longer term idea might create more sustained and extensive easing of the housing market than the shorter term idea. See how that works?
It might or it might not so I’d rather have short term relief followed by the long term solution taking longer then no short term relief and the long term relief (which may or may not work)
And just dropping the discussion to holler “commie!” is about as interesting as your fatalistic attitude to policy development
About as interesting as believing communism is the cure for the worlds ills
But the discussion wasn’t about all the world’s ills, or communism.
The discussion was about vertical versus horizontal sprawl in Auckland, and short term patches versus longer term solutions, and you just randomly started on about communism.
Did the fear of being asked to show some intellectual depth make you leap for the derail? Or was it just tory-tourettes?
Nothing quite like that, its more like certain posters because of what they’ve posted before bring out a certain response in me.
So like when I post something on here posters immediate reactions are it must be tory-speak or something (quite understandable) and rather then look at what was posted its immediately put into the tory trash bin
So with Draco my immediate thought is that sooner or later hes just going to come out with something about communisim
Although I do note my original post was positive and complimentary towards Labour
It might or it might not so I’d rather have short term relief followed by the long term solution taking longer then no short term relief and the long term relief (which may or may not work)
The big problem is that your short term solution isn’t a solution at all but a kicking the can down the road action.
The long term solution, higher density urban areas, can be implemented just as fast and probably better and cheaper than your short term solution that isn’t.
Although I do note my original post was positive and complimentary towards Labour
Because they were supporting stupid Tory policies.
Except we don’t know your idea will work any better
Well, what are the advantages or disadvantages?
Sprawl requires more infrastructure development like streets, sewers, drains, power, comms, high volume public transport.
Blocks require larger capital outlay initially, higher value property/public works purchases, and small design or construction failures can have repercussions on social and structural safety for hundreds or thousands of people.
Sprawl simply delays the inevitable and increases pollution and energy inefficiency. Blocks can extend the solution by acting as testbeds for even larger blocks, and can be much more resource efficent than distributed housing.
However, sprawl is harder to fuck up catastrophically. This is a major factor because, sooner or later, tories will be involved in the process.
I’d rather have cross-party consensus in trying to deal with this issue
Why? You’re always one for saying shit like “oh, but X have the votes, it’s a done deal”. Now you want consensus within the confederacy of dunces (of greater and lesser degree)? Given that the discussion here is unlikely to change government or opposition policy, why not actually talk about what you think is the best option, not the option you think is politically most likely?
Except we don’t know your idea will work any better…
Except for the fact that we, you know, do. All we have to do is look to the higher density cities in Europe, the US and other nations across the world.
Well you know PR, the DTB comes across way more caring and compassionate than you. Which means he sees common weal. Seems you don’t. Seems common weal is like unintelligible to the articulate PR. Which is a shame of course.
You are a barometer. Whatever you say, the Government should do the opposite. i.e you seem to be wrong on everything.
The future of the world is in the suburbs. The current urban limit in Auckland has pushed up housing policies and hurt the poor. There are two big factors that have caused child poverty. 1. Housing costs. 2 Tobacco costs.
I suggest you read this excellent essay on the future of cities.
Suburban households drive about three times more than households close to the city centre. All that extra driving has a big impact on household budgets, family stress, and personal health. Extra car ownership and fuel cancel out much of the household budget savings from lower home prices, bringing the real cost of a suburban house closer to the sticker price of an urban residence.
An abundance of credible research indicates that sprawl significantly increases per capita land development, and by dispersing activities, increases vehicle travel. These physical changes impose various economic costs including reduced agricultural and ecological productivity, increased public infrastructure and service costs, plus increased transport costs including consumer costs, traffic congestion, accidents, pollution emissions, reduced accessibility for non-drivers, and reduced public fitness and health. Sprawl provides various benefits, but these are mostly direct benefits to sprawled community residents, while many costs are external, imposed on non-residents. This analysis indicates that sprawl imposes more than $400 billion dollars in external costs and $625 billion in internal costs annually in the U.S.
PLANS to build thousands of homes on Melbourne’s fringes will cost Victorians around $40 billion more than if they were built in existing suburbs, a new State Government report shows.
In an embarrassment for the Government on the day that submissions close on its plans to further expand Melbourne’s urban growth boundary, the report released on Wednesday shows the total cost of building homes in new outer suburbs is more than double that of building in existing areas.
The added costs include extra infrastructure such as power, water and transport, as well as higher health costs and greenhouse gas emissions.
The report, commissioned by the state Department of Planning, cites research that found “for every 1000 dwellings, the cost for infill development (in existing suburbs) is $309 million and the cost of fringe developments is $653 million”.
The Economist, like you, wouldn’t know what an economy was they fell over one.
I get the trifector here today, srylands slow learner son. Mcflock and DTB, you wipe the floor with Puckish rogue, he smears half thought out ideas so few see.
Agree. Affordable housing needs to mean affordable to live in and run, not just affordable to buy or rent.
If people have to use their car to travel to work, services and activities then the cost of living in those houses is higher, and is prone to increases in travel costs. Not only that, it takes time to travel – more time away from already time poor households.
The social costs of commuter households is also high. There is very little opportunity for connection when residents are always going somewhere else to shop, work etc. The financial benefits of good social cohesion can be found in reduced crime, better quality of life etc.
IMO, only allow greenfields development if that development is created with these features:
Access to public transport within 5 minutes
Roads/lots developed with passive solar orientation in mind,
All stormwater processed on site,
All new homes installed with alternative energy source – either individually or as a collective,
Also, plan community spaces and linkages with buildings that can be adapted for use as small commmercial or retail spaces.
Public transit would still be more viable than private cars and you’re wrong anyway:
Myth: Viable public transport requires high population densities
Fact: Public transport runs successfully in many cities with similar or lower population densities than Melbourne. Any city with sufficient population density to cause traffic congestion has sufficient population to support a first-rate public transport alternative.
It’s not the average density of a city that’s the issue – only particular areas like sprawling fringe suburbs. Ever seen a bus route try to service all of Massey or Flatbush? Gee, I wonder why so many of their inhabitants drive ..
Part of the explanation could be contained in a recent YouGov Poll (conducted Late-April) which found that …
(2) Clinton’s lead over Sanders as preferred nominee (specifically among Democratic Primary voters) had shrunk from double digits earlier this year (as high as a 58%/33% split in Clinton’s favour in January) to just 4 points at the end of April (47%/43%). (Among all voters, Sanders is preferred over Clinton by 41%/30%)
Importantly, the opinions that Sanders Voters have of Clinton have changed dramatically. More than 60% held a Favourable view of her late last year, now just 44% do (with 56% holding an Unfavourable view).
Just over half (54%) of Sanders supporters say they’ll vote for Clinton in November (although that rises to 63% when Trump is specified as the GOP candidate). That still leaves 37% of Sanders voters unprepared to go Clinton.
The YouGov highlights an interesting split between Democrat-identifiers and Independents who have voted (or intend to vote) in the Democratic Primaries. It’s a split that’s been evident in the Primaries conducted so far and in a number of recent Polls. Clinton’s been winning the majority of Registered Democrats / Sanders has been taking the lion’s share of Independents (a long with the relatively small % of GOP identifiers).
And it’s these Independent Sanders voters who are most dissatisfied with Clinton – a large majority hold an Unfavourable view of her, 61% agree they will be “Upset” if she wins the nomination (compared to only a quarter of Sanders’ Registered Democrat supporters), and while 74% of Sanders’ Democrat supporters are prepared to vote for Hillary in November, less than half (just 45%) of his Independent voters say they will.
(Independents in general – regardless of whether or not they’ve voted in the Democratic Primaries – prefer Bernie over Hillary by 49% to 20% and 60% hold an unfavourable view of Clinton)
(3)YouGov (which is, of course, a UK-based Pollster) has also been polling UK Labour Party members on their attitudes towards Corbyn and finds support for his leadership has solidified and grown, with 64% now saying they’d vote for him in another Leadership ballot / against 33% who wouldn’t. Party members are now also more likely than not to believe he’ll become PM – a reversal of the findings in the previous (November 2015) Poll.
His overall Approval ratings are also up among Party members – in Nov 2015 66% though he was doing well / 32% thought his performance was poor. Now the split is 72% / 27%. (Corbyn appears to have won over large minorities of those members who supported Yvette Cooper and Andy Burnham in the leadership contest – 43% in both cases now believe Corbyn is doing well, whereas only 17% of the staunch Blairites who supported Liz Kendall approve of his performance).
All of which is bad news for his Blairite/Brownite adversaries.
The “Anti-Semitism” Witch-Hunt (which leading operatives in Labour’s new and old Right factions played a central role in fuelling (eg Labour First leader and Israel lobbyist, Luke Akehurst) was supposed to bring Corbyn and McDonnell down – both directly through a manufactured “crisis” and unbearable MSM pressure and indirectly by ruining what they already hoped would be a particularly dismal Local Election result for Labour – there was a lot of talk of the Party losing a few hundred council seats, thus creating a Leadership crisis in which they envisaged Party members turning to a more “Centrist” leader . In the event, Labour did a lot better than expected.
Which makes the following YouGov result important …
(4) Labour Party Members Anti-Semitism is:
A bigger problem in Labour than in Other Parties 5%
A problem in Labour but no worse than in Other Parties 47%
Not a problem in Labour but is a problem in Other Parties 16%
Not a problem in any Party 22%
And The Labour Party:
Has a problem with Anti-Semitism and it is right that the Media report it 10%
Has a problem but is being used by the Press and Corbyn’s opponents to attack him 35%
Does not have a problem and it has been created by the Press and Corbyn’s opponents to attack him 49%
Leading journo with The Independent, John Rentoul, thinks these figures show Labour Party members are “out of touch” with the rest of UK society (his tone suggests woefully so). That’s not entirely surprising – Rentoul has been one of Corbyn’s most vehement critics in the MSM since that June 2015 YouGov revealed the veteran MP for Islington was the frontrunner in the Leadership contest.
But if you look at a YouGov carried out in the immediate wake of the witch-hunt, you’ll find that the UK public in general hold very similar views to Labour Party members on the “scandal”. 45% of voters in general believed Labour had either “No” or only a “Very Small” Anti-Semitism problem, with just 22% agreeing it has either a “Fairly Big” or “Very Big” problem. This despite the fact that the MSM have consistently and uncritically portrayed the crisis as symbolising a Very Serious problem of Anti-Semitism.
Suggesting that, for Rentoul, it’s all about being “in touch” with the views of the tiny UK Establishment and its various enablers and bottom-feeders, rather than with the outlook of British voters in general.
If you ran a ‘find replace’ of Clinton->Obama and then Sanders->Clinton, you’d have the exact same story at this stage in the ’08 democratic primary.
There’s, understandably, a lot of passion in the Sanders camp, but I really struggle to see many of those people moving over to Trump in the general election.
But you forget, Phil, that crucial attitudinal divide I highlighted between Sanders’
(1) Registered Democrat supporters and (2) Independent supporters. The former are already suggesting they’re prepared to vote Clinton in November in overwhelming numbers (74%), but most of the latter (who comprise a clear majority of Sanders’ voters) say they won’t (only 45% will vote for her).
Back in 2008, Obama was the one who was winning the Independents in the Democratic Primaries, not Clinton (the ratio was more than 2 to 1 in Obama’s favour – quite similar to Sanders’ advantage among Independents today).
in other words, Clinton’s 08 supporters were overwhelmingly Registered Democrats (as they are today) – so it was entirely predictable that they’d ultimately get in behind Obama in November 2008. Sanders supporters today are largely Independents and they’re a whole different kettle of fish. Far less certain to back a candidate that many (quite correctly) see as running to the ideological Right of Trump on certain key policy areas.
Independent voters in general are as Unfavourable towards Clinton as they are to Trump (in terms of Very Unfavourable ratings – both candidates are on 49% among all Independents).
“There’s, understandably, a lot of passion in the Sanders camp, but I really struggle to see many of those people moving over to Trump in the general election.”
You are working on the assumption that voters decide based on reason instead of feelings (passion). If you assume they vote based on feelings, it becomes easy to imagine many angry voters shifting from angry Sanders to angry Trump.
Dude if you are going to shit on the Fox Poll then you better ignore the other result it came out with which was that Bernie Sanders would win the Presidency ahead of Trump and Clinton, easy as.
Sanders has an historic capacity to defeat Trump if he directs his supporters to do so at Dem Convention to align with Hillary.
Otherwise Sanders risks being a graceless spoiler who -unlike Cruz – knew when to enable just one candidate to command the media field.
His movement must also evolve to become a Superpac that focuses on Sente, Congress and Governorships – where Republicans have made massive gains for three decades straight. Feel The Bern can’t be wasted into another defeated and directionless Occupy.
See Paul Buchanan: He feels Sanders is “playing his cards correctly” by following a moderate-militant strategy – playing hardball in order to force significant concessions from the Clinton camp.
Buchanan rightly argues that: “Given her own negatives, she can no longer rely on loathing of Trump as a guarantee of a defensive vote turnout against him.* She needs Bernie more than he needs her, and his playing tough all the way to the convention is a way of underscoring that point … The worst thing that Sanders can do is concede or pull out of the race before the convention. Were he to do so he would lose any bargaining position he might have had …”
What the Clinton camp must understand most “is that the chances of a Clinton victory in November rest as much on gaining his support as they do on her own qualifications and experience.”
* Phil rightly highlights Trumps Sky High Unfavourability ratings but ignores the fact that Clinton isn’t too far behind him in this regard. She is strongly disliked by the all-important Independents.
Personally, if I was American there’s no way I’d vote for an Establishment/Status Quo Uber-Hawk like Clinton. But I’d be unable to bring myself to go for Trump either. Head, instead, I think in the direction of the Green candidate Jill Stein (which seems to be what a significant swathe of Sanders’ Independent supporters are thinking of doing).
At this point in proceedings it’s not the Clinton camp that need to understand what to do next. His legacy relies a whole bunch more on persuading her, then her persuading him. And he’s got just over a month to figure it out.
I can understand the desire for staying clean of it all by voting Green. Kind of.
From New Zealand, with the campaign attack ads and accusations to come, it’s filthy.
Your last sentence at 6.2 says it Ad. The Bern is actually part of the notableness of this run up to the US election. Incongruously Sanders and Trump occupy a very limited common ground.
Came across this on can Clinton loose?
“Hillary dislikes the media. Her impulse is to keep the press away, to only give the appearance of access and to focus her attention on friendly outlets that will engage in puffery.”
Sound familiar? Surely not the same for Key? http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=11640967
so a distressed Lady comes to the shop, asks me if she could use my phone to call the cops.
Why not i says, and hand her the phone.
She finally ends up speaking to a copper, and at some stage just lost it : Listen, please send a cop car up that house and arrest these guys as they are cooking Meth, and i think they have given some to my partner and hie is out of it, and i ran away from home feeling not safe. ……A minute or two later she says : Look, if you don’t go, I will go up there with a shot gun and just shoot the fuckers? Would that be enough for one or two of you to show up and do your shop?
she hangs up and hands the phone to me, shaking in her barefeet. Close to tears very distraught. I hand her a cuppa and tell her to wait.
Coppers call the shop and ask me if this is for real!!!!! So i says, why yes, she is here, she is in tears, and obviously something is up and why don’t you come and check it out? i had to repeat that at least three times.
Coppers speaks with the Lady again, and finally agrees that someone will come.
End of story, some people got arrested for cooking meth, and distribution.
The two growth sectors in NZ during the National Party Years, houses and Meth.
the dairy next to me has been robbed several times.
i have had some bloke beating the living day light out of his missus while the baby was screaming its head of.
road rage with people pulling others out of their cars and such is daily occurrence and we used to be such a lovely neighborhood, until empty houses, high unemployment and unaffordable housing came near us.
Oh and drug deals after 5 pm on our shared carpark. Sometimes you kinda just want to ask whats the quality and how much.
and fact is, the coppers are not here for us, they are here to protect the nice hoods, and give us tickets.
and fact is, the coppers are not here for us, they are here to protect the nice hoods, and give us tickets.
As proven by their raids when FJK complained about The Teapot Tapes, the raid on Nicky Hager after Dirty Politics proved how corrupt National is and Slater getting off on diversion when he wasn’t eligible.
Sabine (9) … Police quite complacent. But then they must be at the ready to jump to anything FJK demands eg harassing Nicky Hager and other whistleblowers!
“The two growth sectors in NZ during the National Party Years, houses and Meth.”
True. Now add poverty to that list and you have three major growth sectors.
an interesting read on the ‘real economy’ and the parasite economy – or the ‘free’ market economy that can not sustain itself without government handouts and subsidies.
“here are two types of businesses in America today: those that pay their workers a living wage—the real economy—and those that don’t—the parasite economy. And all of us who live and work in the real economy should be royally pissed at the way the parasite economy is sucking us dry.
Here in the real economy, we solve the problems, build the things, and pay the wages that make America great. When politicians of both parties promise to attract “good jobs” to their districts or states, they’re talking about the kind of real-economy jobs that pay a decent middle-class wage—jobs that provide the income, benefits, and security necessary to participate robustly in the economy as a consumer and taxpayer. It is the real economy that drives both production and demand, and that fills our tax coffers with the money needed to educate our children, maintain our infrastructure, invest in research and development, fund our social safety net, and provide for the national defense.
But in the parasite economy—where companies large and small cling to low-wage business models out of ignorance or habit or simple greed—“good jobs,” and the economic dynamism they produce, are in short supply. This is the economy in which tens of millions of Americans work for poverty wages with few if any benefits, often in the face of abusive scheduling practices that make it impossible to plan their life from day to day, let alone month to month.”
This gem in the comments “We have also noted that the ones interviewed about living in cars on the news were all living in nice looking vehicles. No clapped out run about for them. “
one thing that i have heard a few times, and i guess it is gallows humor
I got myself i nice van, used, but relatively new, not to expensive to run and when i loose my flat or house i can live in it for a while.
So in a sense, if one is part of the precariat, it makes sense to invest in a vehicle such as a peoples mover or a van as it will provide shelter for the days where they have no home and the Winz drone is not helping.
Yeah I’ve made this comment before: 40 years ago May 1977 transiting at Manila on the way to China our plane taxied to the end of runway. Visible 150 metres away, shacks with TV aerials, amongst the banana palms. All the jet blast and the noise. Jeezuz !
“Ooh, look, they’re meant to be poor but they can afford TV !” rang out the voice of one of the ’20 Young Workers from New Zealand’ of which I was one. There was a bit of raruraru broke out as we taxied to the terminal. Everyone shut up at the sight of armed soldiers at the bottom of the stairs.
Same thing. “What wastrels ! They’ve got a $9,000 people mover.” On which they owe 7 grand, arseholes who think like that. Really inviting the pitchfork aren’t you ?
Two-Party Preferred ALP leads in 9 Coalition leads in 1 Tie in 8
(ALP leads in 4 of the last 5 – and by 5 points in the latest)
Main concern: Significant number of key Marginals in NSW – just about the only State in Australia where the Coalition remains popular (at least at the State level). Means ALP probably need 51%+ in practice to win.
NZ Context
Coalition behind in Polls despite Turnbull remaining considerably more popular as Preferred PM than Labor’s Shorten and clearly more popular than John Key is here.
Unlike here oz have independant media who get watched in election campaigns so banksta turnbull gets doesnt get an armchair ride like shonky does here.
Murdochs papers are doing their best for malcolm but with compulsory voting he has to fool a majority not a third like here.
Unbelievable. Housing NZ has been selling its properties in Queenstown and Wanaka despite there being a serious housing shortage and a local Community housing trust offering to manage them. Source today’s ODT, not sure if it’s online.
Differing eligibility requirements between HNZ and Housing Trust, and $$$$ to be made by HNZ playing the market. I gather it’s really hard to meet HNZ requirements here as nearly all people with housing problems are from somewhere else, so it’s like go back where you came from. The local trust is a bit more realistic, just starved of capital and not getting a lot of assistance from government, yet.
The New Zealand Herald reports – Stats NZ has offered a voluntary redundancy scheme to all of its workers as a way to give staff some control over their “future” amidst widespread job losses in the public sector. In an update to staff this morning, seen by the Herald, Statistics New Zealand ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: TVNZ says it is dealing with about 50 formal complaints over its coverage of the latest 1News-Verian political poll, with some viewers – as well as the Prime Minister and a former senior Labour MP – critical of the tone of the 6pm report. ...
Muriel Newman writes – When Meridian Energy was seeking resource consents for a West Coast hydro dam proposal in 2010, local Maori “strenuously” objected, claiming their mana was inextricably linked to ‘their’ river and could be damaged. After receiving a financial payment from the company, however, the Ngai Tahu ...
Alwyn Poole writes – “An SEP,’ he said, ‘is something that we can’t see, or don’t see, or our brain doesn’t let us see, because we think that it’s somebody else’s problem. That’s what SEP means. Somebody Else’s Problem. The brain just edits it out, it’s like a ...
Our trust in our political institutions is fast eroding, according to a Maxim Institute discussion paper, Shaky Foundations: Why our democracy needs trust. The paper – released today – raises concerns about declining trust in New Zealand’s political institutions and democratic processes, and the role that the overuse of Parliamentary urgency ...
This article was prepared for publication yesterday. More ministerial announcements have been posted on the government’s official website since it was written. We will report on these later today …. Buzz from the BeehiveThere we were, thinking the environment is in trouble, when along came Jones. Shane Jones. ...
New Zealand now has the fourth most depressed construction sector in the world behind China, Qatar and Hong Kong. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 8:46am on Thursday, May 2:The Lead: ...
Hi,I am just going to state something very obvious: American police are fucking crazy.That was a photo gracing the New York Times this morning, showing New York City police “entering Columbia University last night after receiving a request from the school.”Apparently in America, protesting the deaths of tens of thousands ...
Winston Peters’ much anticipated foreign policy speech last night was a work of two halves. Much of it was a standard “boilerplate” Foreign Ministry overview of the state of the world. There was some hardening up of rhetoric with talk of “benign” becoming “malign” and old truths giving way to ...
Graham Adams assesses the fallout of the Cass Review — The press release last Thursday from the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls didn’t make the mainstream news in New Zealand but it really should have. The startling title of Reem Alsalem’s statement — “Implementation of ‘Cass ...
This open-for-business, under-new-management cliché-pockmarked government of Christopher Luxon is not the thing of beauty he imagines it to be. It is not the powerful expression of the will of the people that he asserts it to be. It is not a soaring eagle, it is a malodorous vulture. This newest poll should make ...
The latest labour market statistics, showing a rise in unemployment. There are now 134,000 unemployed - 14,000 more than when the National government took office. Which is I guess what happens when the Reserve Bank causes a recession in an effort to Keep Wages Low. The previous government saw a ...
Three opinion polls have been released in the last two days, all showing that the new government is failing to hold their popular support. The usual honeymoon experienced during the first year of a first term government is entirely absent. The political mood is still gloomy and discontented, mainly due ...
National's Finance Minister once met a poor person.A scornful interview with National's finance guru who knows next to nothing about economics or people.There might have been something a bit familiar if that was the headline I’d gone with today. It would of course have been in tribute to the article ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – Throughout the pandemic, the new Vice-Chancellor-of-Otago-University-on-$629,000 per annum-Can-you-believe-it-and-Former-Finance-Minister Grant Robertson repeated the mantra over and over that he saved “lives and livelihoods”.As we update how this claim is faring over the course of time, the facts are increasingly speaking differently. NZ ...
Chris Trotter writes – IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in acknowledgement of electoral victory: “We’ll govern for all New Zealanders.” On the face of it, the pledge is a strange one. Why would any political leader govern in ways that advantaged the huge ...
Bryce Edwards writes – The list of former National Party Ministers being given plum and important roles got longer this week with the appointment of former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett as the chair of Pharmac. The Christopher Luxon-led Government has now made key appointments to Bill ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 10:06am on Wednesday, May 1:The Lead: Business confidence fell across the board in April, falling in some areas to levels last seen during the lockdowns because of a collapse in ...
Over the past 36 hours, Christopher Luxon has been dong his best to portray the centre-right’s plummeting poll numbers as a mark of virtue. Allegedly, the negative verdicts are the result of hard economic times, and of a government bravely set out on a perilous rescue mission from which not ...
Auckland Transport have started rolling out new HOP card readers around the network and over the next three months, all of them on buses, at train stations and ferry wharves will be replaced. The change itself is not that remarkable, with the new readers looking similar to what is already ...
Completed reads for April: The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling Carnival of Saints, by George Herman The Snow Spider, by Jenny Nimmo Emlyn’s Moon, by Jenny Nimmo The Chestnut Soldier, by Jenny Nimmo Death Comes As the End, by Agatha Christie Lord of the Flies, by ...
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 ...
Have a story to share about St Paul’s, but today just picturesPopular novels written at this desk by a young man who managed to bootstrap himself out of father’s imprisonment and his own young life in a workhouse Read more ...
The list of former National Party Ministers being given plum and important roles got longer this week with the appointment of former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett as the chair of Pharmac. The Christopher Luxon-led Government has now made key appointments to Bill English, Simon Bridges, Steven Joyce, Roger Sowry, ...
Newsroom has a story today about National's (fortunately failed) effort to disestablish the newly-created Inspector-General of Defence. The creation of this agency was the key recommendation of the Inquiry into Operation Burnham, and a vital means of restoring credibility and social licence to an agency which had been caught lying ...
Holding On To The Present:The moment a political movement arises that attacks the whole idea of social progress, and announces its intention to wind back the hands of History’s clock, then democracy, along with its unwritten rules, is in mortal danger.IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in ...
Stuck In The Middle With You:As Christopher Luxon feels the hot breath of Act’s and NZ First’s extremists on the back of his neck and, as he reckons with the damage their policies are already inflicting upon a country he’s described as “fragile”, is there not some merit in reaching out ...
The unpopular coalition government is currently rushing to repeal section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act. The clause is Oranga Tamariki's Treaty clause, and was inserted after its systematic stealing of Māori children became a public scandal and resulted in physical resistance to further abductions. The clause created clear obligations ...
Buzz from the Beehive The government’s official website – which Point of Order monitors daily – not for the first time has nothing much to say today about political happenings that are grabbing media headlines. It makes no mention of the latest 1News-Verian poll, for example. This shows National down ...
It Takes A Train To Cry:Surely, there is nothing lonelier in all this world than the long wail of a distant steam locomotive on a cold Winter’s night.AS A CHILD, I would lie awake in my grandfather’s house and listen to the traffic. The big wooden house was only a ...
Packing A Punch: The election of the present government, including in its ranks politicians dedicated to reasserting the rights of the legislature in shaping and determining the future of Māori and Pakeha in New Zealand, should have alerted the judiciary – including its anomalous appendage, the Waitangi Tribunal – that its ...
Dead Woman Walking: New Zealand’s media industry had been moving steadily towards disaster for all the years Melissa Lee had been National’s media and communications policy spokesperson, and yet, when the crisis finally broke, on her watch, she had nothing intelligent to offer. Christopher Luxon is a patient man - but he’s not ...
Chris Trotter writes – New Zealand politics is remarkably easy-going: dangerously so, one might even say. With the notable exception of John Key’s flat ruling-out of the NZ First Party in 2008, all parties capable of clearing MMP’s five-percent threshold, or winning one or more electorate seats, tend ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is ...
Luxon will no doubt put a brave face on it, but there is no escaping the pressure this latest poll will put on him and the government. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political ...
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler In the wake of any unusual weather event, someone inevitably asks, “Did climate change cause this?” In the most literal sense, that answer is almost always no. Climate change is never the sole cause of hurricanes, heat waves, droughts, or ...
Something odd happened yesterday, and I’d love to know if there’s more to it. If there was something which preempted what happened, or if it was simply a throwaway line in response to a journalist.Yesterday David Seymour was asked at a press conference what the process would be if the ...
Hi,From time to time, I want to bring Webworm into the real world. We did it last year with the Jurassic Park event in New Zealand — which was a lot of fun!And so on Saturday May 11th, in Los Angeles, I am hosting a lil’ Webworm pop-up! I’ve been ...
Education Minister Erica Standford yesterday unveiled a fundamental reform of the way our school pupils are taught. She would not exactly say so, but she is all but dismantling the so-called “inquiry” “feel good” method of teaching, which has ruled in our classrooms since a major review of the New ...
Exactly where are we seriously going with this government and its policies? That is, apart from following what may as well be a Truss-Lite approach on the purported economic “plan“, and Victorian-era regression when it comes to social policy.Oh it’ll work this time of course, we’re basically assured, “the ...
Hey Uncle Dave, When the Poms joined the EEC, I wasn't one of those defeatists who said, Well, that’s it for the dairy job. And I was right, eh? The Chinese can’t get enough of our milk powder and eventually, the Poms came to their senses and backed up the ute ...
Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is higher than for any other mayor ...
Buzz from the Beehive Pharmac has been given a financial transfusion and a new chair to oversee its spending in the pharmaceutical business. Associate Health Minister David Seymour described the funding for Pharmac as “its largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff”. ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its ...
TL;DR: Here’s my top 10 ‘pick ‘n’ mix of links to news, analysis and opinion articles as of 10:10am on Monday, April 29:Scoop: The children's ward at Rotorua Hospital will be missing a third of its beds as winter hits because Te Whatu Ora halted an upgrade partway through to ...
span class=”dropcap”>As hideous as David Seymour can be, it is worth keeping in mind occasionally that there are even worse political figures (and regimes) out there. Iran for instance, is about to execute the country’s leading hip hop musician Toomaj Salehi, for writing and performing raps that “corrupt” the nation’s ...
Yesterday marked 10 years since the first electric train carried passengers in Auckland so it’s a good time to look back at it and the impact it has had. A brief history The first proposals for rail electrification in Auckland came in the 1920’s alongside the plans for earlier ...
Right now, in Aotearoa-NZ, our ‘animal spirits’ are darkening towards a winter of discontent, thanks at least partly to a chorus of negative comments and actions from the Government Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on ...
You make people evil to punish the paststuck inside a sequel with a rotating castThe following photos haven’t been generated with AI, or modified in any way. They are flesh and blood, human beings. On the left is Galatea Young, a young mum, and her daughter Fiadh who has Angelman ...
April has been a quiet month at A Phuulish Fellow. I have had an exceptionally good reading month, and a decently productive writing month – for original fiction, anyway – but not much has caught my eye that suggested a blog article. It has been vaguely frustrating, to be honest. ...
A listing of 31 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 21, 2024 thru Sat, April 27, 2024. Story of the week Anthropogenic climate change may be the ultimate shaggy dog story— but with a twist, because here ...
Hi,I spent about a year on Webworm reporting on an abusive megachurch called Arise, and it made me want to stab my eyes out with a fork.I don’t regret that reporting in 2022 and 2023 — I am proud of it — but it made me angry.Over three main stories ...
The new Victoria University Vice-Chancellor decided to have a forum at the university about free speech and academic freedom as it is obviously a topical issue, and the Government is looking at legislating some carrots or sticks for universities to uphold their obligations under the Education and Training Act. They ...
Do you remember when Melania Trump got caught out using a speech that sounded awfully like one Michelle Obama had given? Uncannily so.Well it turns out that Abraham Lincoln is to Winston Peters as Michelle was to Melania. With the ANZAC speech Uncle Winston gave at Gallipoli having much in ...
She was born 25 years ago today in North Shore hospital. Her eyes were closed tightly shut, her mouth was silently moving. The whole theatre was all quiet intensity as they marked her a 2 on the APGAR test. A one-minute eternity later, she was an 8. The universe was ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park in collaboration with members from our Skeptical Science team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is Antarctica gaining land ice? ...
Images of US students (and others) protesting and setting up tent cities on US university campuses have been broadcast world wide and clearly demonstrate the growing rifts in US society caused by US policy toward Israel and Israel’s prosecution of … Continue reading → ...
Barrie Saunders writes – Dear Paul As the new Minister of Media and Communications, you will be inundated with heaps of free advice and special pleading, all in the national interest of course. For what it’s worth here is my assessment: Traditional broadcasting free to air content through ...
Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its arguments for such a bold reform. ...
Peter Dunne writes – The great nineteenth British Prime Minister, William Gladstone, once observed that “the first essential for a Prime Minister is to be a good butcher.” When a later British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, sacked a third of his Cabinet in July 1962, in what became ...
Ele Ludemann writes – New Zealanders had the OECD’s second highest tax increase last year: New Zealanders faced the second-biggest tax raises in the developed world last year, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) says. The intergovernmental agency said the average change in personal income tax ...
We all know something’s not right with our elections. The spread of misinformation, people being targeted with soundbites and emotional triggers that ignore the facts, even the truth, and influence their votes.The use of technology to produce deep fakes. How can you tell if something is real or not? Can ...
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Simon Clark. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). This year you will be lied to! Simon Clark helps prebunk some misleading statements you'll hear about climate. The video includes ...
It is all very well cutting the backrooms of public agencies but it may compromise the frontlines. One of the frustrations of the Productivity Commission’s 2017 review of universities is that while it observed that their non-academic staff were increasing faster than their academic staff, it did not bother to ...
Buzz from the Beehive Two speeches delivered by Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters at Anzac Day ceremonies in Turkey are the only new posts on the government’s official website since the PM announced his Cabinet shake-up. In one of the speeches, Peters stated the obvious: we live in a troubled ...
1. Which of these would you not expect to read in The Waikato Invader?a. Luxon is here to do business, don’t you worry about thatb. Mr KPI expects results, and you better believe itc. This decisive man of action is getting me all hot and excitedd. Melissa Lee is how ...
…it has a restricted jurisdiction which must not be abused: it is not an inquisitionNOTE – this article was published before the High Court ruled that Karen Chhour does not have to appear before the Waitangi Tribunal Gary Judd writes – The High Court ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – One of reasons Oranga Tamariki exists is to prevent child neglect. But could the organisation itself be guilty of the same?Oranga Tamariki’s statistics show a decrease in the number and age of children in care. “There are less children ...
David Farrar writes: Graeme Edgeler wrote in 2017: In the first five years after three strikes came into effect 5248 offenders received a ‘first strike’ (that is, a “stage-1 conviction” under the three strikes sentencing regime), and 68 offenders received a ‘second strike’. In the five years prior to ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in politics. That’s refreshing and will be extremely ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the two days to 6:06am on Thursday, April 25:Politics: PM Christopher Luxon has set up a dual standard for ministerial competence by demoting two National Cabinet ministers while leaving also-struggling ...
The Labour Party is saddened to learn of the death of Sir Robert Martin, a globally renowned disability advocate who led the way for disability rights both in New Zealand and internationally. ...
Labour is calling for the Government to urgently rethink its coalition commitment to restart live animal exports, Labour animal welfare spokesperson Rachel Boyack said. ...
Today’s Financial Stability Report has once again highlighted that poverty and deep inequality are political choices - and this Government is choosing to make them worse. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to do more for our households in most need as unemployment rises and the cost of living crisis endures. ...
Unemployment is on the rise and it’s only going to get worse under this Government, Labour finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds said. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate grew to 4.3 percent in the March quarter from 4 percent in the December quarter. “This is the second rise in unemployment ...
The New Zealand Labour Party welcomes the entering into force of the European Union and New Zealand free trade agreement. This agreement opens the door for a huge increase in trade opportunities with a market of 450 million people who are high value discerning consumers of New Zealand goods and ...
The National-led Government continues its fiscal jiggery pokery with its Pharmac announcement today, Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall says. “The government has increased Pharmac funding but conceded it will only make minimal increases in access to medicine”, said Ayesha Verrall “This is far from the bold promises made to fund ...
This afternoon’s interim Waitangi Tribunal report must be taken seriously as it affects our most vulnerable children, Labour children’s spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime. ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay says Canada’s refusal to comply in full with a CPTPP trade dispute ruling in our favour over dairy trade is cynical and New Zealand has no intention of backing down. Mr McClay said he has asked for urgent legal advice in respect of our ‘next move’ ...
The rights of our children and young people will be enhanced by changes the coalition Government will make to strengthen oversight of the Oranga Tamariki system, including restoring a single Children’s Commissioner. “The Government is committed to delivering better public services that care for our most at-risk young people and ...
The Government is making it easier for minor changes to be made to a building consent so building a home is easier and more affordable, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on making it easier and cheaper to build homes so we can ...
New Zealand lost a true legend when internationally renowned disability advocate Sir Robert Martin (KNZM) passed away at his home in Whanganui last night, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. “Our Government’s thoughts are with his wife Lynda, family and community, those he has worked with, the disability community in ...
Good evening – Before discussing the challenges and opportunities facing New Zealand’s foreign policy, we’d like to first acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. You have contributed to debates about New Zealand foreign policy over a long period of time, and we thank you for hosting us. ...
From today, passengers travelling internationally from Auckland Airport will be able to keep laptops and liquids in their carry-on bags for security screening thanks to new technology, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Creating a more efficient and seamless travel experience is important for holidaymakers and businesses, enabling faster movement through ...
People with an interest in the health of Northland’s marine ecosystems are invited to a public meeting to discuss how to deal with kina barrens, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones will lead the discussion, which will take place on Friday, 10 May, at Awanui Hotel in ...
Kiwi exporters are $100 million better off today with the NZ EU FTA entering into force says Trade Minister Todd McClay. “This is all part of our plan to grow the economy. New Zealand's prosperity depends on international trade, making up 60 per cent of the country’s total economic activity. ...
There are heartening signs that the extractive sector is once again becoming an attractive prospect for investors and a source of economic prosperity for New Zealand, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The beginnings of a resurgence in extractive industries are apparent in media reports of the sector in the past ...
The return of the historic Ō-Rākau battle site to the descendants of those who fought there moved one step closer today with the first reading of Te Pire mō Ō-Rākau, Te Pae o Maumahara / The Ō-Rākau Remembrance Bill. The Bill will entrust the 9.7-hectare battle site, five kilometres west ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has announced 25 new high-speed EV charging hubs along key routes between major urban centres and outlined the Government’s plan to supercharge New Zealand’s EV infrastructure. The hubs will each have several chargers and be capable of charging at least four – and up to 10 ...
The coalition Government will not proceed with the previous Government’s plans to regulate residential property managers, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “I have written to the Chairperson of the Social Services and Community Committee to inform him that the Government does not intend to support the Residential Property Managers Bill ...
The Government has announced an independent review into the disability support system funded by the Ministry of Disabled People – Whaikaha. Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston says the review will look at what can be done to strengthen the long-term sustainability of Disability Support Services to provide disabled people and ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has attended the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva and outlined the Government’s plan to restore law and order. “Speaking to the United Nations Human Rights Council provided us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while responding to issues and ...
The Government and Rotorua Lakes Council are committed to working closely together to end the use of contracted emergency housing motels in Rotorua. Associate Minister of Housing (Social Housing) Tama Potaka says the Government remains committed to ending the long-term use of contracted emergency housing motels in Rotorua by the ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay heads overseas today for high-level trade talks in the Gulf region, and a key OECD meeting in Paris. Mr McClay will travel to Riyadh to meet with counterparts from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). “New Zealand’s goods and services exports to the Gulf region ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford has outlined six education priorities to deliver a world-leading education system that sets Kiwi kids up for future success. “I’m putting ambition, achievement and outcomes at the heart of our education system. I want every child to be inspired and engaged in their learning so they ...
The new NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) App is a secure ‘one stop shop’ to provide the services drivers need, Transport Minister Simeon Brown and Digitising Government Minister Judith Collins say. “The NZTA App will enable an easier way for Kiwis to pay for Vehicle Registration and Road User Charges (RUC). ...
Whānau with tamariki growing up in emergency housing motels will be prioritised for social housing starting this week, says Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka. “Giving these whānau a better opportunity to build healthy stable lives for themselves and future generations is an essential part of the Government’s goal of reducing ...
Racing Minister Winston Peters has paid tribute to an icon of the industry with the recent passing of Dave O’Sullivan (OBE). “Our sympathies are with the O’Sullivan family with the sad news of Dave O’Sullivan’s recent passing,” Mr Peters says. “His contribution to racing, initially as a jockey and then ...
Assalaamu alaikum, greetings to you all. Eid Mubarak, everyone! I want to extend my warmest wishes to you and everyone celebrating this joyous occasion. It is a pleasure to be here. I have enjoyed Eid celebrations at Parliament before, but this is my first time joining you as the Minister ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced Pharmac’s largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff. “Access to medicines is a crucial part of many Kiwis’ lives. We’ve committed to a budget allocation of $1.774 billion over four years so Kiwis are ...
Hon Paula Bennett has been appointed as member and chair of the Pharmac board, Associate Health Minister David Seymour announced today. "Pharmac is a critical part of New Zealand's health system and plays a significant role in ensuring that Kiwis have the best possible access to medicines,” says Mr Seymour. ...
Hundreds of New Zealand families affected by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) will benefit from a new Government focus on prevention and treatment, says Health Minister Dr Shane Reti. “We know FASD is a leading cause of preventable intellectual and neurodevelopmental disability in New Zealand,” Dr Reti says. “Every day, ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones today attended the official opening of Kaikohe’s new $14.7 million sports complex. “The completion of the Kaikohe Multi Sports Complex is a fantastic achievement for the Far North,” Mr Jones says. “This facility not only fulfils a long-held dream for local athletes, but also creates ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
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Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
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Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
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The Labour Party is demanding Peters be stood down, saying "he's embarrassed the country" with a "totally unacceptable" attack on a prominent AUKUS critic. ...
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The PSA is concerned that the voluntary redundancies being offered to staff by Stats NZ will impact on the agency’s ability to deliver on its core functions. ...
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The campaign will engage the community and encourage submissions on the bill to the New Zealand government by the closing submission deadline of Friday 31st of May 2024 4pm. ...
The paper raises concerns about declining trust in New Zealand's political institutions and democratic processes, and the role that the overuse of Parliamentary urgency plays in that. ...
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Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, ugly and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
John Campbell does such a fine job bringing the realities of this tragedy into the living rooms of everyone who has eyes to see and ears to hear. Those who live on the benefits of escalating house prices however will have neither.
+100 Paul and Macro
Look saying shit like that is simply not credible. It is ridiculous. What is neoliberal about this government? It is a Centre left government and it has the policies to match. You come across as totally mental.
Don’t be obtuse – stealing and privatising public anything is neo-liberal. Serco. Charter schools. State house sell-offs.
This is a failed, corrupt, extreme right government – if it were working it’d’ve used market mechanisms to address the housing crisis instead of pretending it didn’t exist.
It’d’ve rebuilt Christchurch to prove the validity of its economic preferences – the rubble proves the converse. The market simply does not work under lame-assed regulation like this.
Stop talking nonsense.
If you find it acceptable to defend the government’s cruel treatment of the homeless, then you are part of the problem.
Brian Rudman: Blaming others won’t build homes, Mr Key
If April 1 hadn’t been long gone, I’d have said Prime Minister John Key and his housing Sancho Panza Nick Smith were taking the mickey when responding to reports of dozens of families reduced to living in cars alongside a South Auckland sports ground.
Dr Smith chose to appear on television before a huge roaring fire, like the Queen delivering her annual Christmas message, first tut-tutting gravely, before launching into yet another attack on local councillors and anyone other than himself.
The next day, Mr Key was on radio blaming the dumb victims. He suggested they be good folk and pop along to the local Work and Income office and all, it seemed, would be sorted out. “People often don’t understand what’s available to them.” He said the bureaucrats would “do their very best to support people in those situations, especially when children are involved”.
If you want to read more it’s here….
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11640202
People often don’t understand what’s available to them
WINZ didn’t get where it is today by telling people what’s available to them.
Emergency houses are only available to them for a couple of weeks – and only if they are prepared to pay WINZ back the $2000 odd it cost them to live in some overpriced room.
Online petition at Action Stations requesting the Minister (Anne Tolley) forgive the debt for this so-called “entitlement”
please sign
Amazing achievement…sadly not NZ though 🙁
“Electricity consumption in the country was fully covered by solar, wind and hydro power in an extraordinary 107-hour run that lasted from 6.45am on Saturday 7 May until 5.45pm the following Wednesday”
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/18/portugal-runs-for-four-days-straight-on-renewable-energy-alone
+1 Steve. Not only does the government need to address homelessness and low wages/high rents/house price ratio as a major issue, but also the price of running a home these days with the cost of power.
If most new builds were all designed to be on solar and there were a lot more incentives for conversions to solar then the again people have more money in their pockets to enjoy their lives, not spend every cent of food and utilities and every other essential cost in this country that is out of line with the average wage.
Also the same for new build businesses. Westgate mall, Auckland for example was built and opened this year, no sustainability in design for water or power – so no savings for businesses operating in this mall… It doesn’t look too bad inside, but in NZ developers are only focused on the appearance, not what is happening underneath.
Also had corporate welfare given to it by Auckland council, of course not bothered to make it easier for ratepayers for water and power, public transport etc….
It is also not doing too well, the businesses have no clients and are going broke.
Could have been another IronBank but no, so short sighted.
It appears in NZ that developers and councils are still focussed on what worked in the 19th century and not looking at what’s needed today.
Oh, I’m pretty sure you’ll find that the government is quite concerned about the price of power and is doing all it can to ensure that the new owners keep getting massive profits.
Thanks Steve. Because NZ is mostly run on renewable Hydro, the urgency is not upon us. Sadly, the Mum and Dad shareholders must get a dividend from our companies like Genesis so up go our costs. Pity our Government treats Solar with contempt.
An interesting discussion on Pundit re Solar started by Mike Williams.
Alfie West Wrote a rebuttal for another commentator:
“I invite you to consider solar in a slightly different way… as an energy saving appliance.
Say you fitted a couple of low energy appliances, or added better insulation and maybe changed your lighting to LED throughout your home. Would you consider it fair if your power company said, “Your usage has dropped. You were using $x of electricity per month but now it’s only $x, our profits have dropped therefore we’re going to tax you the difference.” Would you happily pay that extra tax? Of course you wouldn’t. What you are advocating is a little like anyone buying a Prius being “taxed” by petrol companies because they’re using less of their product. ”
http://www.pundit.co.nz/content/solar-tax-makes-its-harder-to-be-green-for-now
@imac – good link… extract
“I was astounded to learnt the Hawke’s Bay power lines company, a monopoly called Unison, has announced increased line charges for households generating their own electricity. This “solar tax” runs counter to New Zealand’s attempts to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and is one of the most stupid business decisions I’ve heard of in a very long time.”
Fascism is upon us.
But no mention of the Nanny State from the media…. installing low energy bulbs is nanny state, but companies putting up power for individuals based on their usage is fine….
You can also beat the power companies by going totally off grid – but maybe not so easy in urban areas as you need fire to heat generally and you get caught up in planning regs.
+100…obviously those outside corporates and businesses who have bought formerly NZ State- owned NZ electricity are desperate to hold on to their profits…
jonkey Nact needs to be held to account for this rorting of New Zealanders
…there needs to be some analysis and sunshine on the facts here and who is making profits out of New Zealanders
…Yes mainstream media is generally pathetic on this..i think Kathryn Ryan may have covered some debate on this issue though ( unfortunately I wasnt listening properly)
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/201777147/solar-energy-'biggest-challenge'-to-electricity-pricing-says-ea
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/20151103
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/20150928
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/201751454/new-energy-and-money-saving-technologies
Marama Davidson on the housing issue,
https://blog.greens.org.nz/2016/05/17/homelessness-national-has-failed-all-of-us/
How about some focus on the puppet party enabling the state housing flogging, the Maori party.
About time they were run out of the trough along with shonkys wrecking crew.
Of course Key has failed.
It is his biggest failure
The chief is unable to look after his villagers.
That is the epitome of failure
John Key is a wretched prick for this
Key doesnt see this as failure just the market doing what it does and those ‘choices’ folk make.
The fact that he created the market conditions with immigration, tax havens and no cgt needs to be pinned on the likes of nick smith who is an accident waiting to happen.
Well done to Labour for recognizing the problem and offering a solution, this is the type of thing voters are looking for.
Good job.
Yep – now that Labour has skinned Nationals’ red herring we can deal to the real causes of the housing crisis.
Excessive immigration, foreign buyers, out of control speculation and Nationals’ failed social housing policy.
The Xenophobia is strong with this one.
[You appear to have misunderstood the meaning of either the comment, the word xenophobia or both. Instead of failed one liners, how about trying to contribute to the discussion meaningfully? TRP]
No, xenophobia would be banning tourism.
Stopping immigration, foreign ownership and speculation is addressing the problems that those bring about.
+100 DTB
Ref: Opening up land for housing
OK – some one should be able to answer this – how many homes need to hit the market at the same time to have a big enough effect on demand that slows prices down?
or are we talking forcing the savings through to the purchaser?
opening land will mean more houses – sure, but there is nothing in that that means any kind of impact on prices – all that will happen is a drip feed with each house being priced to the max the market will bear – and in AK we have ever growing demand
That’s true, I guess it comes down getting as many houses onto the market (as soon as possible (safely of course)
But its a good step in the right direction at least
kinda points to it not working doesnt it
Well think of it like this, its still a long way to go but since there seems to be agreement over one of the causes and that cause is looking like may be on its way out then its a step towards where Auckland needs to be going
Of course I also tend to be somewhat of an optimist
Only by the fuckwits.
“agreement over one of the causes”
that ignores pretty much all the far greater causes and ignores new issues created by sprawl
anyone pushing the “free up land” argument should be able to show how it leads to better house prices, better value for ratepayers (infrastructure costs etc) and an affordable life style for those that purchase that far out (transport and de-centralisation) – so far not one person actually has
” looking like may be on its way ”
its already gone anyway – both nat and lab are talking about a boundry that has already been done away with in the upcoming plan (according to RNZ interview this morning)
the whole thing is really weird and has more of an aspect of voter PR than anything actually meaningfull
the whole thing is really weird and has more of an aspect of voter PR than anything actually meaningfull
– If so then Labours done good, turned a corner perhaps?
only if you are soothed by PR (he he) 🙂
That’s not the solution. In fact, IMO, that seems to be a large of the problem. We need large, dense cities to develop high tech and better education. What we don’t need is massive amounts of sprawl that damages the environment and causes cost of living to skyrocket.
In other words, we’d all be better off if we developed our regional cities to do the high tech and education as well as Auckland.
Well that is certainly one way of looking at it especially for the longer term but in the short term I think this is a better option
And next year you’ll say the same thing and the year after that. End result is that the correct thing to do, the thing that needs to be done, will never be done.
Listening to stupidity like yours is what’s caused so much poverty and heartache in our society.
Let me guess, your idea would be for NZ to elect a communist government, because that’s worked so well in the past
Thanks but no thanks
wow. From short-sighted deregulation to communism in one easy step.
Oh c’mon get serious, its Draco so you know that what he really wants is communism
True, but that doesn’t mean that he’s wrong about everything.
And his preferred political system is, I suspect, only tangetially (at best) related to his ideas on urban architecture.
It seems to me that the idea of vertical expansion, which you seemed to regard as a reasonable long term solution, would lose its investment appeal if urban sprawl were allowed to expand. So your short term solution inhibits, if not outright stalls, developing reasonable long term solutions.
I’m thinking that the short term solution, that might stall the long term solution, will offer quicker easing of the housing market then the longer term idea mooted
Yeah its not ideal but sometimes you have to work with what you have not what you want.
If National and Labour both agree on this then this is whats going to happen
But the longer term idea might create more sustained and extensive easing of the housing market than the shorter term idea. See how that works?
And just dropping the discussion to holler “commie!” is about as interesting as your fatalistic attitude to policy development.
But the longer term idea might create more sustained and extensive easing of the housing market than the shorter term idea. See how that works?
It might or it might not so I’d rather have short term relief followed by the long term solution taking longer then no short term relief and the long term relief (which may or may not work)
And just dropping the discussion to holler “commie!” is about as interesting as your fatalistic attitude to policy development
About as interesting as believing communism is the cure for the worlds ills
But the discussion wasn’t about all the world’s ills, or communism.
The discussion was about vertical versus horizontal sprawl in Auckland, and short term patches versus longer term solutions, and you just randomly started on about communism.
Did the fear of being asked to show some intellectual depth make you leap for the derail? Or was it just tory-tourettes?
Nothing quite like that, its more like certain posters because of what they’ve posted before bring out a certain response in me.
So like when I post something on here posters immediate reactions are it must be tory-speak or something (quite understandable) and rather then look at what was posted its immediately put into the tory trash bin
So with Draco my immediate thought is that sooner or later hes just going to come out with something about communisim
Although I do note my original post was positive and complimentary towards Labour
The big problem is that your short term solution isn’t a solution at all but a kicking the can down the road action.
The long term solution, higher density urban areas, can be implemented just as fast and probably better and cheaper than your short term solution that isn’t.
Because they were supporting stupid Tory policies.
Except we don’t know your idea will work any better and I’d rather have cross-party consensus in trying to deal with this issue
Well, what are the advantages or disadvantages?
Sprawl requires more infrastructure development like streets, sewers, drains, power, comms, high volume public transport.
Blocks require larger capital outlay initially, higher value property/public works purchases, and small design or construction failures can have repercussions on social and structural safety for hundreds or thousands of people.
Sprawl simply delays the inevitable and increases pollution and energy inefficiency. Blocks can extend the solution by acting as testbeds for even larger blocks, and can be much more resource efficent than distributed housing.
However, sprawl is harder to fuck up catastrophically. This is a major factor because, sooner or later, tories will be involved in the process.
Why? You’re always one for saying shit like “oh, but X have the votes, it’s a done deal”. Now you want consensus within the confederacy of dunces (of greater and lesser degree)? Given that the discussion here is unlikely to change government or opposition policy, why not actually talk about what you think is the best option, not the option you think is politically most likely?
Except for the fact that we, you know, do. All we have to do is look to the higher density cities in Europe, the US and other nations across the world.
Well you know PR, the DTB comes across way more caring and compassionate than you. Which means he sees common weal. Seems you don’t. Seems common weal is like unintelligible to the articulate PR. Which is a shame of course.
You are a barometer. Whatever you say, the Government should do the opposite. i.e you seem to be wrong on everything.
The future of the world is in the suburbs. The current urban limit in Auckland has pushed up housing policies and hurt the poor. There are two big factors that have caused child poverty. 1. Housing costs. 2 Tobacco costs.
I suggest you read this excellent essay on the future of cities.
http://www.economist.com/suburbs
New studies measure the true cost of sprawl, and it’s more than you think
Suburban sprawl costs billions more
The Economist, like you, wouldn’t know what an economy was they fell over one.
Yup, melb has become very choked over the last 15 years with sprawl/apartments and not matching it with public transport.
Been watching a mature conversation going on over there in contrast to the stupidity of key, smith, blinglush etc here.
They will probably end up allowing multistorey blocks within x of a train stop. Something akl needs but the landed akl gentry killed in its tracks.
I get the trifector here today, srylands slow learner son. Mcflock and DTB, you wipe the floor with Puckish rogue, he smears half thought out ideas so few see.
Agree. Affordable housing needs to mean affordable to live in and run, not just affordable to buy or rent.
If people have to use their car to travel to work, services and activities then the cost of living in those houses is higher, and is prone to increases in travel costs. Not only that, it takes time to travel – more time away from already time poor households.
The social costs of commuter households is also high. There is very little opportunity for connection when residents are always going somewhere else to shop, work etc. The financial benefits of good social cohesion can be found in reduced crime, better quality of life etc.
IMO, only allow greenfields development if that development is created with these features:
Access to public transport within 5 minutes
Roads/lots developed with passive solar orientation in mind,
All stormwater processed on site,
All new homes installed with alternative energy source – either individually or as a collective,
Also, plan community spaces and linkages with buildings that can be adapted for use as small commmercial or retail spaces.
Sprawling suburbs do not contain enough people to make public transit viable.
Public transit would still be more viable than private cars and you’re wrong anyway:
It’s not the average density of a city that’s the issue – only particular areas like sprawling fringe suburbs. Ever seen a bus route try to service all of Massey or Flatbush? Gee, I wonder why so many of their inhabitants drive ..
And that’s BS as well. One bus route won’t work, multiple will.
We’re still talking suburbia here and not rural and even rural could be well served by buses.
Some recent US / UK Poll findings
(1) Clinton’s lead over Trump narrows
Nationwide polling average shows gap down to just 3 points
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CiqzcruWgAAP2mC.jpg:large
New NBC Poll suggests Overwhelming majority of Democrats and Republicans fall into line behind their Party’s prospective nominee, but Independents split 44/36 in favour of Trump
https://politicalwire.com/2016/05/17/clinton-holds-narrow-lead-nationally-over-trump/
Part of the explanation could be contained in a recent YouGov Poll (conducted Late-April) which found that …
(2) Clinton’s lead over Sanders as preferred nominee (specifically among Democratic Primary voters) had shrunk from double digits earlier this year (as high as a 58%/33% split in Clinton’s favour in January) to just 4 points at the end of April (47%/43%). (Among all voters, Sanders is preferred over Clinton by 41%/30%)
Importantly, the opinions that Sanders Voters have of Clinton have changed dramatically. More than 60% held a Favourable view of her late last year, now just 44% do (with 56% holding an Unfavourable view).
Just over half (54%) of Sanders supporters say they’ll vote for Clinton in November (although that rises to 63% when Trump is specified as the GOP candidate). That still leaves 37% of Sanders voters unprepared to go Clinton.
The YouGov highlights an interesting split between Democrat-identifiers and Independents who have voted (or intend to vote) in the Democratic Primaries. It’s a split that’s been evident in the Primaries conducted so far and in a number of recent Polls. Clinton’s been winning the majority of Registered Democrats / Sanders has been taking the lion’s share of Independents (a long with the relatively small % of GOP identifiers).
And it’s these Independent Sanders voters who are most dissatisfied with Clinton – a large majority hold an Unfavourable view of her, 61% agree they will be “Upset” if she wins the nomination (compared to only a quarter of Sanders’ Registered Democrat supporters), and while 74% of Sanders’ Democrat supporters are prepared to vote for Hillary in November, less than half (just 45%) of his Independent voters say they will.
(Independents in general – regardless of whether or not they’ve voted in the Democratic Primaries – prefer Bernie over Hillary by 49% to 20% and 60% hold an unfavourable view of Clinton)
https://yougov.co.uk/news/2016/04/28/clinton-seen-likely-nominee-sanders-voters-arent-b/
(3) YouGov (which is, of course, a UK-based Pollster) has also been polling UK Labour Party members on their attitudes towards Corbyn and finds support for his leadership has solidified and grown, with 64% now saying they’d vote for him in another Leadership ballot / against 33% who wouldn’t. Party members are now also more likely than not to believe he’ll become PM – a reversal of the findings in the previous (November 2015) Poll.
His overall Approval ratings are also up among Party members – in Nov 2015 66% though he was doing well / 32% thought his performance was poor. Now the split is 72% / 27%. (Corbyn appears to have won over large minorities of those members who supported Yvette Cooper and Andy Burnham in the leadership contest – 43% in both cases now believe Corbyn is doing well, whereas only 17% of the staunch Blairites who supported Liz Kendall approve of his performance).
https://yougov.co.uk/news/2016/05/17/labour-members-increasingly-bullish-on-corbyn/
All of which is bad news for his Blairite/Brownite adversaries.
The “Anti-Semitism” Witch-Hunt (which leading operatives in Labour’s new and old Right factions played a central role in fuelling (eg Labour First leader and Israel lobbyist, Luke Akehurst) was supposed to bring Corbyn and McDonnell down – both directly through a manufactured “crisis” and unbearable MSM pressure and indirectly by ruining what they already hoped would be a particularly dismal Local Election result for Labour – there was a lot of talk of the Party losing a few hundred council seats, thus creating a Leadership crisis in which they envisaged Party members turning to a more “Centrist” leader . In the event, Labour did a lot better than expected.
Which makes the following YouGov result important …
(4) Labour Party Members
Anti-Semitism is:
A bigger problem in Labour than in Other Parties 5%
A problem in Labour but no worse than in Other Parties 47%
Not a problem in Labour but is a problem in Other Parties 16%
Not a problem in any Party 22%
And
The Labour Party:
Has a problem with Anti-Semitism and it is right that the Media report it 10%
Has a problem but is being used by the Press and Corbyn’s opponents to attack him 35%
Does not have a problem and it has been created by the Press and Corbyn’s opponents to attack him 49%
Leading journo with The Independent, John Rentoul, thinks these figures show Labour Party members are “out of touch” with the rest of UK society (his tone suggests woefully so). That’s not entirely surprising – Rentoul has been one of Corbyn’s most vehement critics in the MSM since that June 2015 YouGov revealed the veteran MP for Islington was the frontrunner in the Leadership contest.
But if you look at a YouGov carried out in the immediate wake of the witch-hunt, you’ll find that the UK public in general hold very similar views to Labour Party members on the “scandal”. 45% of voters in general believed Labour had either “No” or only a “Very Small” Anti-Semitism problem, with just 22% agreeing it has either a “Fairly Big” or “Very Big” problem. This despite the fact that the MSM have consistently and uncritically portrayed the crisis as symbolising a Very Serious problem of Anti-Semitism.
Suggesting that, for Rentoul, it’s all about being “in touch” with the views of the tiny UK Establishment and its various enablers and bottom-feeders, rather than with the outlook of British voters in general.
Re: #2.
If you ran a ‘find replace’ of Clinton->Obama and then Sanders->Clinton, you’d have the exact same story at this stage in the ’08 democratic primary.
There’s, understandably, a lot of passion in the Sanders camp, but I really struggle to see many of those people moving over to Trump in the general election.
But you forget, Phil, that crucial attitudinal divide I highlighted between Sanders’
(1) Registered Democrat supporters and (2) Independent supporters. The former are already suggesting they’re prepared to vote Clinton in November in overwhelming numbers (74%), but most of the latter (who comprise a clear majority of Sanders’ voters) say they won’t (only 45% will vote for her).
Back in 2008, Obama was the one who was winning the Independents in the Democratic Primaries, not Clinton (the ratio was more than 2 to 1 in Obama’s favour – quite similar to Sanders’ advantage among Independents today).
in other words, Clinton’s 08 supporters were overwhelmingly Registered Democrats (as they are today) – so it was entirely predictable that they’d ultimately get in behind Obama in November 2008. Sanders supporters today are largely Independents and they’re a whole different kettle of fish. Far less certain to back a candidate that many (quite correctly) see as running to the ideological Right of Trump on certain key policy areas.
Independent voters in general are as Unfavourable towards Clinton as they are to Trump (in terms of Very Unfavourable ratings – both candidates are on 49% among all Independents).
Phil
“There’s, understandably, a lot of passion in the Sanders camp, but I really struggle to see many of those people moving over to Trump in the general election.”
You are working on the assumption that voters decide based on reason instead of feelings (passion). If you assume they vote based on feelings, it becomes easy to imagine many angry voters shifting from angry Sanders to angry Trump.
Phil. Didn’t you see the latest poll giving Trump a 3% lead over Clinton?
Who did the poll? Oh wait..it was Fox News. (fair-balanced and sh*t scared)
Dude if you are going to shit on the Fox Poll then you better ignore the other result it came out with which was that Bernie Sanders would win the Presidency ahead of Trump and Clinton, easy as.
Sanders has an historic capacity to defeat Trump if he directs his supporters to do so at Dem Convention to align with Hillary.
Otherwise Sanders risks being a graceless spoiler who -unlike Cruz – knew when to enable just one candidate to command the media field.
His movement must also evolve to become a Superpac that focuses on Sente, Congress and Governorships – where Republicans have made massive gains for three decades straight. Feel The Bern can’t be wasted into another defeated and directionless Occupy.
See Paul Buchanan: He feels Sanders is “playing his cards correctly” by following a moderate-militant strategy – playing hardball in order to force significant concessions from the Clinton camp.
Buchanan rightly argues that: “Given her own negatives, she can no longer rely on loathing of Trump as a guarantee of a defensive vote turnout against him.* She needs Bernie more than he needs her, and his playing tough all the way to the convention is a way of underscoring that point … The worst thing that Sanders can do is concede or pull out of the race before the convention. Were he to do so he would lose any bargaining position he might have had …”
What the Clinton camp must understand most “is that the chances of a Clinton victory in November rest as much on gaining his support as they do on her own qualifications and experience.”
* Phil rightly highlights Trumps Sky High Unfavourability ratings but ignores the fact that Clinton isn’t too far behind him in this regard. She is strongly disliked by the all-important Independents.
http://www.kiwipolitico.com/2016/05/bernie-the-spoiler/
Personally, if I was American there’s no way I’d vote for an Establishment/Status Quo Uber-Hawk like Clinton. But I’d be unable to bring myself to go for Trump either. Head, instead, I think in the direction of the Green candidate Jill Stein (which seems to be what a significant swathe of Sanders’ Independent supporters are thinking of doing).
At this point in proceedings it’s not the Clinton camp that need to understand what to do next. His legacy relies a whole bunch more on persuading her, then her persuading him. And he’s got just over a month to figure it out.
I can understand the desire for staying clean of it all by voting Green. Kind of.
From New Zealand, with the campaign attack ads and accusations to come, it’s filthy.
Your last sentence at 6.2 says it Ad. The Bern is actually part of the notableness of this run up to the US election. Incongruously Sanders and Trump occupy a very limited common ground.
Some Snowden Papers to read.
The more people are informed the better.
https://theintercept.com/snowden-sidtoday/
Came across this on can Clinton loose?
“Hillary dislikes the media. Her impulse is to keep the press away, to only give the appearance of access and to focus her attention on friendly outlets that will engage in puffery.”
Sound familiar? Surely not the same for Key?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=11640967
so a distressed Lady comes to the shop, asks me if she could use my phone to call the cops.
Why not i says, and hand her the phone.
She finally ends up speaking to a copper, and at some stage just lost it : Listen, please send a cop car up that house and arrest these guys as they are cooking Meth, and i think they have given some to my partner and hie is out of it, and i ran away from home feeling not safe. ……A minute or two later she says : Look, if you don’t go, I will go up there with a shot gun and just shoot the fuckers? Would that be enough for one or two of you to show up and do your shop?
she hangs up and hands the phone to me, shaking in her barefeet. Close to tears very distraught. I hand her a cuppa and tell her to wait.
Coppers call the shop and ask me if this is for real!!!!! So i says, why yes, she is here, she is in tears, and obviously something is up and why don’t you come and check it out? i had to repeat that at least three times.
Coppers speaks with the Lady again, and finally agrees that someone will come.
End of story, some people got arrested for cooking meth, and distribution.
The two growth sectors in NZ during the National Party Years, houses and Meth.
That’s a big morning. Very well done Sabine. But what the hell is up with the business as usual attitude police?
the dairy next to me has been robbed several times.
i have had some bloke beating the living day light out of his missus while the baby was screaming its head of.
road rage with people pulling others out of their cars and such is daily occurrence and we used to be such a lovely neighborhood, until empty houses, high unemployment and unaffordable housing came near us.
Oh and drug deals after 5 pm on our shared carpark. Sometimes you kinda just want to ask whats the quality and how much.
and fact is, the coppers are not here for us, they are here to protect the nice hoods, and give us tickets.
So, frankly this business as usual.
As proven by their raids when FJK complained about The Teapot Tapes, the raid on Nicky Hager after Dirty Politics proved how corrupt National is and Slater getting off on diversion when he wasn’t eligible.
Sabine (9) … Police quite complacent. But then they must be at the ready to jump to anything FJK demands eg harassing Nicky Hager and other whistleblowers!
“The two growth sectors in NZ during the National Party Years, houses and Meth.”
True. Now add poverty to that list and you have three major growth sectors.
Good citizen Sabine, their are plenty of us out there, I hope that women will be all right.
A city is built of brick, Pharoah. The strong make many, the starving make few. The dead make none.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049833/quotes?item=qt0469445for accusations.
an interesting read on the ‘real economy’ and the parasite economy – or the ‘free’ market economy that can not sustain itself without government handouts and subsidies.
http://prospect.org/article/confronting-parasite-economy
“here are two types of businesses in America today: those that pay their workers a living wage—the real economy—and those that don’t—the parasite economy. And all of us who live and work in the real economy should be royally pissed at the way the parasite economy is sucking us dry.
Here in the real economy, we solve the problems, build the things, and pay the wages that make America great. When politicians of both parties promise to attract “good jobs” to their districts or states, they’re talking about the kind of real-economy jobs that pay a decent middle-class wage—jobs that provide the income, benefits, and security necessary to participate robustly in the economy as a consumer and taxpayer. It is the real economy that drives both production and demand, and that fills our tax coffers with the money needed to educate our children, maintain our infrastructure, invest in research and development, fund our social safety net, and provide for the national defense.
But in the parasite economy—where companies large and small cling to low-wage business models out of ignorance or habit or simple greed—“good jobs,” and the economic dynamism they produce, are in short supply. This is the economy in which tens of millions of Americans work for poverty wages with few if any benefits, often in the face of abusive scheduling practices that make it impossible to plan their life from day to day, let alone month to month.”
Headline of the day!
Helping Out Lends a Hand to CV
(Sadly, it’s not actually about disaffected Labour Party members in the deep south, just some advice on sharpening up your resume)
You did that all by yourself, are you sure your alright, i mean to say theirs not even an apostrophe in sight, get your shit sorted fella. 👿
“Housing crisis, what housing crisis? It depends on what you mean by crisis, says the Government. And of course, what you mean by housing.”
“These are the public agencies that make Serco look good.” Raybon Kan
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11640706
This gem in the comments “We have also noted that the ones interviewed about living in cars on the news were all living in nice looking vehicles. No clapped out run about for them. “
one thing that i have heard a few times, and i guess it is gallows humor
I got myself i nice van, used, but relatively new, not to expensive to run and when i loose my flat or house i can live in it for a while.
So in a sense, if one is part of the precariat, it makes sense to invest in a vehicle such as a peoples mover or a van as it will provide shelter for the days where they have no home and the Winz drone is not helping.
Yeah I’ve made this comment before: 40 years ago May 1977 transiting at Manila on the way to China our plane taxied to the end of runway. Visible 150 metres away, shacks with TV aerials, amongst the banana palms. All the jet blast and the noise. Jeezuz !
“Ooh, look, they’re meant to be poor but they can afford TV !” rang out the voice of one of the ’20 Young Workers from New Zealand’ of which I was one. There was a bit of raruraru broke out as we taxied to the terminal. Everyone shut up at the sight of armed soldiers at the bottom of the stairs.
Same thing. “What wastrels ! They’ve got a $9,000 people mover.” On which they owe 7 grand, arseholes who think like that. Really inviting the pitchfork aren’t you ?
Also with refugees & cell phones, which I once saw a pithy commenter write – “They are escaping a war torn country, not the freakin’ 18th century!”
Momentum with ALP in Aussie Election
18 polls since the beginning of April
Two-Party Preferred
ALP leads in 9
Coalition leads in 1
Tie in 8
(ALP leads in 4 of the last 5 – and by 5 points in the latest)
Main concern: Significant number of key Marginals in NSW – just about the only State in Australia where the Coalition remains popular (at least at the State level). Means ALP probably need 51%+ in practice to win.
NZ Context
Coalition behind in Polls despite Turnbull remaining considerably more popular as Preferred PM than Labor’s Shorten and clearly more popular than John Key is here.
Unlike here oz have independant media who get watched in election campaigns so banksta turnbull gets doesnt get an armchair ride like shonky does here.
Murdochs papers are doing their best for malcolm but with compulsory voting he has to fool a majority not a third like here.
Letter from Britain:
‘Leave EU or face greater terror threat, Brexiteers warn’
https://www.rt.com/uk/343424-libya-brexit-interpol-migrants/
‘Tories will use Counter-Extremism Bill to silence their opponents – campaigners’
https://www.rt.com/uk/343461-queens-speech-extremism-bill/
‘Tony Blair lied on Iraq and will be exposed by Chilcot report’ – Corbyn’
https://www.rt.com/uk/343403-corbyn-chilcot-blair-iraq/
‘Trump blasts Tony Blair for Iraq War ‘disaster,’ says Britain should stand up to US presidents’
https://www.rt.com/uk/343295-trump-blair-iraq-khan/
‘ ‘Crime of aggression’: Alex Salmond’s quest to put Tony Blair on trial over Iraq hits legal snag’
https://www.rt.com/uk/343151-salmond-blair-iraq-impeachment/
For Lprent, no more court for you – well over this one.
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2016/05/19/breaking-blogwatch-cameron-slater-halts-appeal-in-long-running-defamation-case/
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-36315952
Good article on the need for Farmers to control emissions. From the BBC science site.
Unbelievable. Housing NZ has been selling its properties in Queenstown and Wanaka despite there being a serious housing shortage and a local Community housing trust offering to manage them. Source today’s ODT, not sure if it’s online.
Shocking!
Link to odity article on this http://www.odt.co.nz/news/queenstown-lakes/383719/state-house-be-offered-auction
Differing eligibility requirements between HNZ and Housing Trust, and $$$$ to be made by HNZ playing the market. I gather it’s really hard to meet HNZ requirements here as nearly all people with housing problems are from somewhere else, so it’s like go back where you came from. The local trust is a bit more realistic, just starved of capital and not getting a lot of assistance from government, yet.