A strong Labour Victory will overturn the economic orthodoxy of the past 30 years and drive export and innovation led strategies that will lift Kiwi incomes and prospects up substantially.
Professional advisors like Mike Williams and Matthew Hooton are promoting middle-of-the-road strategies to Trevor, Annette and Grant. These strategies assume the Nats will loose as “part of the cycle”! It will result in 40% Green & NZ First around the Cabinet Table. Frankly the public won’t buy it, IMO.
No junior ministerial positions for Labour MPs!
Fewer senior positions for Labour MPs!
More Labour MPs on the back benches!
The “conventional wisdom” of the past 30 years will continue to be economic policy, while the unstable Cabinet argues over Green Party agendas and populist scams Winston will demand.
Do you want to trudge the streets of Dunedin South, North Shore, Hamilton East or wherever for that outcome? Or do you want Labour to cut through the mist with conviction politics, catch the imagination of the voters and the 800,000 disaffected and win strongly?
Tell your MP which you want.
Winston was ‘in Government’ with Labour for 9 years, which ‘populist scams’ did the NZFirst leader demand???,
Are you still intellectually mired in First Past the Post politics, Labour will have to come to terms with Green policies if it wants to form the next Government,
On social policy that should be relatively easy for Labour to come to grips with, Labour only need dig out any of it’s past election manifesto from years prior to 1984 to fully understand the Green’s social policy…
A strong Labour Victory will overturn the economic orthodoxy of the past 30 years and drive export and innovation led strategies that will lift Kiwi incomes and prospects up substantially.
That sentence is a contradiction – drive export and innovation led strategies is exactly the orthodoxy of the last 30+ years.
Or do you want Labour to cut through the mist…
I suspect that if Labour returned to its roots then things would be better but I just can’t see that happening as they’re far too caught up in the economic orthodoxy.
A strong Labour Victory will overturn the economic orthodoxy of the past 30 years
Cite, pls.
Labour being able to govern with greens and mana, on the other hand…
And if Winston can take the above from 56 to 61%, so much the better. And it still wouldn’t be so bad if he was an interchangeable wheel where lab needs either the greens or (mana + NZ1).
It was telling, when Mike Williams was describing us here at TS as “nutters” and “extemists” that he also jeeringly said that many said crazies were former Alliance members.
I thought at the Labour conference a remit was passed that denounced the actions of the Lange/Douglas government. Which was pretty much everything the Alliance was about.
So surely, rather than thinking of those Labour faithful who fought against the neoliberal revolution in the 80s as “nutters”, this was an endorsement that the Alliance was correct. A unanimous endorsement in fact.
Maybe the power block running the Labour Party were insincere in voting for this remit. That it was just more lip service from remorseless marketeers, trying to appease the dissatisfied, so they can get on with the job.
Also, the irony of Williams denouncing our fight against the powerful and wealthy within Labour for refusing to abide by the principles of the party as “hate speech”. Last time I looked I was a person. And I found his words hateful in the extreme. I guess only the rich and powerful matter.
It was telling, when Mike Williams was describing us here at TS as “nutters” and “extemists” that he also jeeringly said that many said crazies were former Alliance members.
Yes, I thought the associations of the Alliance with “nutters” and “extremists” was curious. So MW associates Jim Anderton (strong ally with the Clark government) and Laila Harre (ex RNZ, 9-to-Noon “from the left” person), with nutters and extremists. And then he dismissed all TS authors and commenters with these labels. And MW threw in the “anonymous” smear along with it, plus various comments and innuendos that we are all Cunliffe supporters, or, as I recall, implied we were being instructed/manipulated by Clunliffe,
“Nutters’ and “extremists” implies irrationality. But where is the evidence and reasoned arguments to support MW’s comments. It all seemed pretty irrational, and lacking in supporting evidence to me.
That you guys and girls are commented on in such terms should be taken as a positive. It means you are getting under the skins, having an impact, getting the “names” worried.
Keep at it. Ignore the term nutters. If you were true nutters it wouldn’t even make the radar. By Mike Williams commenting proves the opposite of what he said, and he knows it.
“That you guys and girls are commented on in such terms should be taken as a positive. It means you are getting under the skins, having an impact, getting the “names” worried.
Keep at it. Ignore the term nutters. If you were true nutters it wouldn’t even make the radar.”
Indeed, less outrage that current Labour would even consider attacking it’s own voter base in such a way, more focus, steady hands and steady nerves.
Now who doesn’t just love revolution? 😆
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell 2.1.1.1.1
In fact, a cynic like me could easily surmise from his tone a clear signal that the top table are not only aware, but actively seeking to undermine.
That doesn’t sound very nice, but like I say, I’m just an old cynic.
There are many on this site, who use terms such as “nutters, nut jobs”, and other insults – Perhaps when those people desist, then there could be cause for complaint.
Well, the difference is between people who allude to vague police conspiracies about tragic (but local) events, versus people who basically support what was pretty much sound, conventional and stable economic management until the rich decided to get richer off the work of the nation.
The problem isn’t the epithet, the problem is the fact that well within MW’s lifetime Alliance policies were pretty orthodox and the best solution for most citizens – and nothing has happened to change that (indeed, our twenty or thirty years of “brighter future” serves only to reinforce it).
Yep. I am not Karol. Personally I have called a few people nuts over the last 5 years. But it is a small fraction of the people I have described as wankers, fools, gormless or idiots. I prefer the more precise expressions… 🙂
But Karol is almost too perfect – so perfect that you almost have to ask “what is she hiding?”…. (cue the music) 😈
But Karol is almost too perfect – so perfect that you almost have to ask “what is she hiding?”…. (cue the music)
Huh?! Well, personal failings by the flat load. Abba, not so much, McF. But I can be into all kinds of trash popular culture.
But nothing to hide in terms of political affiliations.
And I was schooled in online forums and political debates in female-centred places where personal abuse was strongly frowned on. Also, as far as I can see, it could too easily draw me into flame wars.
And I was schooled in online forums and political debates in female-centred places where personal abuse was strongly frowned on. Also, as far as I can see, it could too easily draw me into flame wars.
I spent quite a lot of time embroiled in flamewars in 80’s; unfortunately (mostly) young males seem to love the damn things. Eventually I found several ways of making them dissipate. They usually involve being a bigger arsehole than the flamers and discouraging them from wanting to start a war again because they could never be sure about how close the snippers would get to their testicles.
Hi Karol – sorry the reply made it look that way, it was not intended. Your *form*, is beyond question here.
The premise is that if people don’t want to be smeared, labelled, etc, then they first need to ensure that they are not guilty of it themselves, and that includes myself.
Perhaps an analogy will help you:
Let’s say I am in a bank and someone runs in, grabs money out of the teller’s draw and runs out again. That is all the information I know about the situation. I call them a “thief”.
Mike Williams is in a bank, and sees someone approach the teller and withdraw money from their account apparently using the normal protocols, and then leave. That is all MW knows about the situation. Mike Williams calls them a “thief”.
Surely, I can call MW a doofus for that (without you whining like a spoilt child)?
He was simply making the point that most people who comment here are way further left than the parliamentary wing of the Labour Party. That is hardly contentious.
FIFY A fair few here are part of the Labour Party.
What (That Fat Wanker) said was that those commenting on the Standard while claiming to be Labour Party activists were unlikely to be active in the Party at all,
I agree with TRP on this. Using someone’s body shape/size as a term of abuse is abuse. It’s not relevant and it feeds/supports prejudice against people who have bodies that defy the attempts of the dominating parts of society to say what is normal and acceptable.
It never ceases to amaze me that this has to be be spelled out on the left. If you can understand the analysis of something like capitalism or homophobia and how that damages people, why not fatphobia?
Cheers, CW, nicely put. I got pulled up myself a couple of years ago for using similar language and I had to acknowledge that it was inconsistent for me to oppose prejudice regarding gender, race and class while also using body image stereotyping. Kudos to QoT for that valuable lesson.
Muzza: Can’t help you there, as there is no such a thing as “hypocracy”. Wait! Perhaps your misspelling is deliberate; just a part of Project Onan too brilliant for us mere mortals to understand? I guess we’ll never know.
now, now TRP: poor spelling is not always a sign of low intelligence.
Lack of any degree of self-evaluation, failure to discriminate between “plausible” and “implausible” theories, and a dose of cognitive dissonance, on the other hand…
Voice, indeed, the spelling was poor. I do agree with your contention, but not believe that you’re in a position to be requesting others raise their standards.
McFlock – Amazing how you’ve figured out so little, that you’re nakedly projecting, so wildly. Lack of self evaluation, congnitive dissonance /snort!
I’m sure your lifes experiences (obviously limited, as illustrated by your comments on here), have created such a juvenile mindset, perhaps you have learnt/experienced life, from books or behind screens only?
This would be the point where I talk about how much blood and piss and puke I’ve walked through to help keep idiotic little know-it-alls like you safe, and in some cases alive.
But really, the fact that you are so willing to exploit other people’s pain and grief on the basis that your fanta-cyst mind sees a minute possibility of unnamed conspiracies means that you either:
have never been close to someone with such grief, so have lived the “sheltered life” of which you accuse others; or
are as callous and unfeeling as you are stupid.
So rather than “out” my pseudonym by giving too much detail, I think I’ll leave it at that.
As to the bit where I suggested that your pointless little jibe was supposed to provoke me into talking about myself, rather than your dickishness, it could not so much be interpreted as “don’t you know you know who I am”, rather more “you don’t know what shoes I’ve worn and where I’ve walked”. Whereas the fact you take others’ grief so cheaply indicates you have no idea about the effect your idle speculation has on others.
The point of the entire comment was that the callous monomania you display, coupled with your accusations of sheltered life, is indicative of the dissonance to which I referred.
Jesus don’t be so precious will you, for your info i am fat, well my gut is, such fat having failed to immigrate to places like my legs and butte give me an uneven distribution of fat,
Nonetheless FAT my gut is and i see nothing abusive in the use of such a descriptive upon myself (or other’s like those Fat Wanker’s),
As far as being ‘abusive’ toward the 2 individiuals who are being discussed here, no f**king problem whatsoever,
i like to think i at least try and keep such within the bounds of ‘the rules’ BUT those 2 in terms of what they generally and consistently expound upon is simply abuse of the lower paid and recipients of beneficiaries in New Zealand on the basis of their personal political (and financial???) gain,
i have no problem with calling a shower of s**t such as those two represent exactly that, a shower of s**t…
Well, call them a shower of shit, then, bad. Abuse based on body size is still abuse. You’re not the kind of person to call someone a (black/paki/gay/etc.) wanker, are you? So have a think about the nature, and consequences, of our capitalist society, which is currently based on a culture of endless consumption.
Look, I think you’re a good person, so that’s why I raised it in a non-confrontational way. You are capable of understanding the argument and I really hope you (and others reading this) will have a bit of a think on it.
Te Reo bigotry (in your eyes) it may be but thoughtless, never!!! and you would be surprised at what we call each other down here at gutter level,
My Samoan nieghbour is wont to point out who in particular among His cuzzies is a FOB much to the hilarity of us both,
I won’t repeat the exchange that took place as a greeting between my Maori nieghbours and some visitors this arvo, needless to say it wasn’t Kia Ora Bro, and did include the words black and a certain word beginning with C, (and yes they were female),
So, while not knowing at what level of society you live i do find that your finding of the word FAT to be one of abuse while amusing is also rather effete, but, just for you i will attempt to find another expletive of a descriptive nature that best suits the 2 wankers you are inadvertently mounting a defence for…
Cheers, bad. I’m not defending anyone, all I know is that how much Hooten and Williams weigh is completely irrelevant to the point you were trying to make. Re: your neighbours; you know them, they know you. Try using that language out of your neighbourly, friendly context and, well, you know how that’d end.
The point is really straightforward. It’s abuse. Don’t do it. If you want to educate yourself, google ‘fat’ and ‘politics’.
Actually no. He is wrong, and so are you. Most people of the NZLP who comment here are more interested in competence of the whole party than the parliamentary wing of the Labour Party is. That is what is contentious.
The majority of authors on this site are NZLP members. The majority of the authors who complain about the NZLP’s performance are members. So for that matter are most of the most cogent of the commentators pointing out flaws in the NZLP, and it is pretty clear to people who are members and who is and are not.
Most of those members would be from the centre of the parties ideological wing like Mickey and others. Or even from the centre-right like myself or maybe Anne.. Those on the “left” of the party members pretty much gave up arguing about strategy and direction long ago. The long lack of a forum for dialogue means that they’re more interesting in expressing ideas here than looking at the well-known flaws in the party. They reluctantly support (if at all) the party because of a simple lack of viable alternatives (and I’m sure that I’ll hear chapter and verse about that sentence at the Mana meeting tomorrow).
The important change that has been happening is that the centrist members who have been supporting the party through the last few decades are getting irritated at how incompetently the party is operating. Part of that is that the party structure has been gutted with arcane rules and lack of resources. Most of it is because the beltway hack culture that has been arising in Wellington seems to assume that we’re here merely to rubber-stamp idiots making foolish decisions. It was less of an issue when the people in Wellington were competent.
We’re less worried about the ideological views that we are about the incompetence that the parliamentary wing appears to be fostering. For every person who actually comments here, there are heaps of members (and I tend to know a *lot* of them) who will talk the same in private – and usually a damn sight more extreme than anyone does here. These are all long time NZLP members.
That is the reason why the votes at LEC’s, regionals, and conference are going through without problems. Sure the “left” are voting for them. But they’re passing because the “centre”, “centre right”, and virtual every affliated union are voting for them as well. Right now it is a case of trying to make the old party survive into it’s second century with a viable structure rather than floundering under a structure that was designed pre-TV
That you guys and girls are commented on in such terms should be taken as a positive. It means you are getting under the skins, having an impact, getting the “names” worried.
Precisely.
Don’t forget it was a tandem effort. Hooton claimed the Cunliffe supporters manipulated the vote, and are continuing to fuel the fire of disunity within the Labour Party. According to him, one of our most respected contributers at The Standard has been leading the charge. 🙄
I can honestly say that I have never been scathing of Shearer.
Indeed you havn’t… Neither have a lot of Standard contributors – including me. Our beef is with the unprincipled behaviour of certain members of the ABC club. But of course Hooton would never understand. He seem a little devoid of principles himself…
Anne is part of a group that murders small children and blows goats.
Of course I never have been, nor never will be, scathing of Anne.
[lprent: Instead you act like a complete fucktard critic. You have no ideas. Have no intelligence. So basically you sit on the sidelines jerking off and laughing at your own pathetic jokes. Would that be an accurate assessment?
Somehow I think that it would be the common opinion of your arsehole behaviour. ]
“Instead you act like a complete fucktard critic. You have no ideas. Have no intelligence. So basically you sit on the sidelines jerking off and laughing at your own pathetic jokes. Would that be an accurate assessment?”
Apart from the jerking off and the fact that I don’t think my jokes are pathetic, you have pretty much nailed it.
But not to fear, I have decided to do an MBA and pretend I am a computer genius. Apparantly this will make me an authority on everything.
[lprent: “computer genius” ha… I (don’t) wish. Computer geniuses, in my experience, usually burn out early from actually programming. They drop out of the industry into something like management, sales, contract analysts, or tech support. But I like programming and it is really hard to pry me away to become another deadhead ex-programmer. I mostly code in c++ on one multi-year project at a time and have been doing for several glorious decades.
The “computer genius” was a myth fostered by burt, barnsley and some other tech dickheads. I never said it and I notice that most of the people who repeat it usually seem to be rather bored with their lives. I tend to treat it more as being an expression of envy since few of the people saying it appear to be active programmers.
But seriously, a degree would probably do you good. It might help lift your conversation out of the dry old hole that your life appears to be from your comments. The level of frustrated bilious crap you push out in your comments tends to indicate someone who is doing fuck all of any use in their life. And it is always irritating to see people wasting their abilities. ]
Come on Lprent, you’ve searched my IP address (or whatever it is you nerds do). You know who I am and how awesome I am.It is a bit naughty trying to bait me into outing myself.
[lprent: You had a go at one of the authors for no apparent reason and I suspect simply because you’d be fairly sure that she won’t do anything nasty.
However I have some time today for similar petty behaviour, so I reserved your comments so I could return the favour and to demonstrate what a complete fuckwit behaviour that is. I’d just embellish all of your comments with my own observations on you.
Looking at the workload I may be able to keep this up for the rest of the week. And if I can’t then I can just ban….
It is petty I know. But it seems like it is more likely to penetrate your blockhead that you don’t attack authors personally than a banning. 😈 ]
[lprent: Not Anne (very good – the monkey can search for where he crapped). It was a while ago when I was somewhat short of time. Your comments about a “potato muncher” reminded me to do something about your manners. ]
“But seriously, a degree would probably do you good. It might help lift your conversation out of the dry old hole that your life appears to be from your comments. The level of frustrated bilious crap you push out in your comments tends to indicate someone who is doing fuck all of any use in their life. And it is always irritating to see people wasting their abilities. ]”
…what a pity, I thought you were referring to our PM when you wrote that…would have pretty appropriate; I would have +1ed it….
Hooton has only got one principle. And that’s the one he is PAID to have. Which makes him a very shallow, and poor, specimen of an intelligent human being. He may spout all sorts of shit, and that’s his right, but to me the biggest sign of intelligence in that scenario, is knowing when to shut up, and he doesn’t know when.
Williams has had his day as has the rest of the Mallarfia. They’ll cling onto the power by any means regardless of the impact on the long term health of Labour and any positive change giving it up to new generation could have made.
Much like companies who keep toxic and out of touch management/boards too long, bye bye market share and position in the industry, enjoy the slide like the children you all are.
I don’t think so, according to (That Fat Wanker), He only goes to conferences to listen to the Leaders speech and then does a bunk,
It’s obvious that ‘the Standard’ is being taken notice of in certain quarters of Labour and the likes of (Those Fat Wankers), are feeling a little marginalized hence the diatribe spilled like an open sewer into the airwaves yesterday,
I also have the sneaking suspicion that (The Fat Wankers) did a little rehearsing prior to going on air on RadioNZ National yesterday, (One Fat Wanker) who regularly posts the occasional comment on the Standard recently got ‘it’s’ tail twisted severely in a departure from what is the usual ‘friendly banter’ ‘it’ is accustomed to here,
Me thinks part of the attack from (One of the Fat Wankers) was of a retributive nature on behalf of (The Other Fat Wanker) so as that one would not be accused of ‘attacking the Standard or its authors…
Equally telling was Catherine Ryan’s response, who pushed back on them both saying that if The Standard are just a fringe group of lefties that have recently re-entered the Party to undermine it from within, why was there such a majority in the November 2012 Conference who so clearly voted their dissatisfaction and forced major constitutional changes through over the heads fo tehleadership?
That is, The Standard represents the mainstream of leftie opinion, not the fringe.
Good to see the MSM itself pushing back against the spin from the Old Guard.
+1. Maybe she’s beginning to ‘get it’ too – (finally).
Amusing isn’t it how it’s “……….from the Left [insert Pagani or Williams], and from the Right [insert Hooten]. The LEFT??? – hardly!!!!
Still more amusing is that RNZ gets accused of being a bunch of lefties sometimes – what! – with Ryan in the morning and Mora in the afternoon 5 days a week – HARDLY!
The likes of Williams/Pagani et al should realise that just because a number of us have held on to a few basic principles (not necessarily ideology) that seeks to ensure everyone gets a fair suck of the sav over the past 3 decades, whilst the political pendulum has swung right….DOESN’T make us extremeists.
Yea ……but……..yea…..but
Not all clowns though. At least there’s the weekdays between 5pm and 9am, AND weekends. And of course Concert FM. All we need now is a 3rd network, as I believe Tim Finn or someone once proposed
fair call. I suppose I was meaning Hootten, Williams, and Kathryn Ryan’s producers. Mind you, I could email Ryan and her producers and politely point these things out.
I’m quite happy to be an extremist. The situation is so desperate that anyone who thinks the standard policies of the neolib choir can do anything but make things worse is a nutter. I am not a nutter.
A remit followed by business as usual will not get rid of the stench of Rogernomics. Only a cleaning out of caucus and some new policy directed at the needs of the needy rather than the greed of the greedy can do that. Why do 90% of the present lot even have the gall to even stay in Parliament? NAct under Key have to be the worst and most incompetent bunch of bungling fools I can remember and her majesty’s loyal opposition can’t make a dent. Worse, it actually does seem to be for lack of trying.
Williams is just trying to stay relevant and on-side with the power brokers in Labour. Williams has ended up like so many within Labour, they need Labour more than Labour needs them. Move on Mike…Labour needs to make some BIG changes if it is to have a future then some of the “has beens” need to get out of the way.
Williams knows that most Labour members browse or maybe comment on the Standard. People who have the energy and motivation to join a political party are inherently interested in Labour Party politics and The Standard is the go to destination for Labour politics.
Clearly Williams is just sucking up to Goff, Mallard, King and co.
Amy Adams gets primary industries and food safety, and keeps environment
Chris Finlayson gets local government and conservation
Nick Smith returns and gets Labour
There seems to be a sort of symetery to that arrangement.
Last thing I want is Smith in local government after what he said about our libraries.
The Wellington ‘rumor’ puts Smith firmly in the Enviroment portfolio, a position where Nick can rave on endlessly with passion while doing nothing and more importantly do very little damage to the National voter base,
There’s trouble brewing for Nick in the form of Winston Peters (who would have thunk it), this goes back to pre-2008 when Smith was Nationals spokesperson on Building and Housing,
In a speech in Nelson Smith shot His mouth off to such an extent that a local timber supply company sued the idiot for defamation,
Upon Nationals election to Government in 2008 the matter was settled out of court via a 200,000 grand lump of largesse from the taxpayer, Slippery the Prime Minister claiming at the time that Smith’s legal costs should be paid by the taxpayer as Smith was defaming the building supply company on their behalf, (not your’s or mine obviously),
Winston is apparently alleging that Smith (or His supporters) set up some form of fund to collect monies for (a) Smith’s legal defence and (b) presumably to pay any cost of the defamation should the court have ruled against Smith,
The allegation from Winston is that Smith has a ‘financial interest’ in this fund and that Smith failed to disclose this in the register of MP’s pecuniary interests as required,
There’s a further question begging here and that is if the taxpayer paid the 200 odd thousand to settle the Smith defamation out of court in 2008 what then became of this fund or more importantly the monies in it after the taxpayer coughed to bail Smith out of the s**t,
Did Smith say thank you very much Slippery for the paying of the cost of the defamation and then pocket the proceeds from the fund Winston Peters alleges was set up specifically to do just that…
I heard the news-piece on Nick Smith’s possible return to Cabinet on last night’s “PM”. Followed by criticism of Smith’s demonstrated unfitness to be a Minister from both the Greens and Winston Peters – the Green’s coupling an attack on John Key’s totally discredited “demand a high standard from Ministers” promise.
Add the ‘demand a high standard from Ministers’ promise from Slippery to the ever elongating list of lies told by that one,
Of course Slippery has the defence that such ‘high standards’ are measured by Him on the basis of Slippery’s own moral code of ethics which have yet to become a physical manifestation that can be measured in any way that us mere mortals can understand…
Try opening both f**king eyes when you get up in the morning for a change wont you, among the supposed unethical behavior of Winston Peters was a fish and chip meal supposedly provided free by the Vella Brothers the details of which were splashed all over our TV’s for weeks,
Who would have thunk it tho, Slippery the Prime Minister not long after the 2008 election accepted a free ride from Hamilton to Auckland aboard a helicopter owned by those very same Vella Brothers,
Now perhaps you can see why YOU are ridiculed here at the Standard, IF Peter’s actions were in any way unethical then the actions of Slippery the Prime Minister when viewed through the lens of ‘the gifts cost’ must be considered to be 1000 times more unethical than the actions of Peter’s…
PS, that is of course assuming that the fish’n’chip meal was actually a ‘gift’.
Yet another ‘study’ is released to show how un-affordable New Zealand housing is especially in Auckland and Christchurch, telling us all what we all already know,
Bill, yeah that one that masquerades occasionally as the Minister of Finance says that the problem is becoming urgent but they (National) have no mandate from the people in cities like Auckland, Wellington, and, Christchurch to push local councils to free up more land for development,
Yeah right Bill, when the farming lobby want to get at the water you and your’s will happily trash whole elected councils, when people need affordable housing its time to sit on the hands again and do nothing,
Bill tho did make one interesting observation, apparently according to the bean counters it takes on average 8 years after a new immigrant has arrived here for ‘the market’ to produce a new house to keep pace with the flow of arrivals,
Bill of course, as part of (admittedly a pathetic failure) National Government has part of the answer at His finger tips,
The dullard could simply restrict the immigrant flow which would obviously slow the rise in demand for housing and exert downward pressure on the market,
Obviously Labour have as policy ‘part’ of the solution with it’s Kiwibuild scheme to build 100,000 houses over 10 years,
What is also needed is a State House build of the same size to make home rental affordable and kill off the demand for ‘rental investment’ properties…
It’s bloody depressing. Just had a look at “To let” accommodation in the local papers. I’m feeling down about it, and I’m not one of the people worst off re-housing. I have a rental place near work – it’s just that it’s less than adequate, and not great for someone approaching retirement age.
But there’s really not a lot going, and what there is, is bigger and costs more than I’m willing to pay. And I imagine there’ll be a long queue of people wanting to rent each place that’s available. Seriously thinking of moving to a more rural area and doing a longer commute to my part time job.
How helpful would it be to put a cap on the amount landlords can charge for rents?
My answer to your question vis a vis ‘capping rents’ is HUGELY helpful, in theory the Accommodation Supplement was supposed to do just that,
Obviously that Accommodation Supplement has simply become a taxpayer payment to various banking institutions which amounts to nearly a 5th of the profits those banks take off-shore yearly with the ‘rental investor’ simply acting as an ‘agent’ of the banks via the mortgages held by those banks,
Capping rents hasn’t been tried in New Zealand before and the first problem i see is that the ‘rental investors’ might have a problem paying their mortgages if caps were placed upon private rentals,
It has been done before in the US and i will have a look later at how that worked (or works), i can’t tho get passed the mortgage V capped rent equation without seeing how such has worked in other countries…
” the first problem i see is that the ‘rental investors’ might have a problem paying their mortgages if caps were placed upon private rentals,”
you mean those selfish short-sighted shysters who over decades drove over inflated house prices ever-upward to satisfy the greed of Bankers and the parasites they support, who if faced with a rental cap would have never had the opportunity to corrupt the NZ housing market and thus make their contribution to the quagmire of inequality NZ is sinking into.
Yes exactly, i do mean those short sighted shysters who have en masse piled into ‘rental investments’ thus driving the price of property out of the bounds that even their own children can afford, along with driving the cost of rent for the low waged from 25-30% of income to 50-80% of income,
I would happily see ‘rent caps’ introduced tomorrow, but then, i would happily see all private property abolished and rented back to the occupants at 25% of income including farms factories, and office blocks,
Fortunately or unfortunately we live in one of those democracy things so that aint going to occur,
Labour simply have to be pushed to include in their housing policy the building of the same amount of State rentals as they plan to build for the KiwiBuild scheme (100,000) in the same time-frame as what the KiwiBuild proposal envisages, (10 years),
Along with such a policy Labour need alter it’s immigration policy to restrict the flow of new immigrants and only allow builders, plumbers, electricians and those with building design planning skills residence,
Add to that the Kiwi labour component either as simple labour or apprentices and there would be a workforce of sufficient robustness to accomplish a affordable housing build of the needed quantity and quality…
Christchurch first for building, as there are not enough skilled Builders in the country to take on 10,000 low priced houses, and new state housing of 10,000, per annum.
Bulls**t, Norm Kirk’s Labour Government managed to build 30,000 houses a year with a far smaller workforce than is currently available in New Zealand, and, most houses back then were constructed ‘on site’ as opposed to being pre-formed in a gang-nail framing factory,
There is no need to have 2 or 3 qualified builders working upon one house construction, 2 or 3 builders could easily provide the supervision for a dozen labourers and apprentices…
Hi Karol. It IS depressing and good luck to you for finding the right place. Its very unfair when accomodation is a purely market driven commodity and only regulated to a certain degree in regard to the landlord’s repsonsibility to their tennant and to the wider community.
We’re in our early 40’s now and we’ve only got into our first house. Because of my unemployment we are really struggling and are prisoners in our own home! In some way because of the cost of housing being so over valued (Am I correct in recalling that Gareth Morgan estimates it may be as high as 25%?) its feels like we have jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. In saying that I don’t forget what its like to feel you have to compete desparately with other prospective tennants to get a place that is just acceptable and nothing more. Its sort of degrading and people shouldn’t be put into a situation where they are at the whim of the market.
In the meantime while the average NZer really sweats trying to make ends meet week after week the banks are making huge profits. Kiwibank who we have our mortgage with made record profits last year. Its just that whole win-lose dicotomy keeping renters and homeowners on the treadmill.
Er, no, Fortran, that would be fraud, wouldn’t it? Inflating paper profits by cash injections, I mean.
Post established KB, and continues to bankroll Kiwibank’s expansion, but KB’s profits (and excellent customer loyalty) are all its own work. Remind me again, who’s idea was Kiwibank? Some socialist from down south wasn’t it?
Yep, its great that a govt owned bank is doing well but you have to question the ethics of a bank (question the ethics of a bank! What next?!) that has reduced its access to branches whilst penalising its customers for not using its online banking services. Having talked with KB’s elderly customers while waiting in epic out the door queues because they closed the local branch down, you get to understand how inconvenient it is for them to be told to use online services rather than use a branch. To further push you into doing what they want you to they have introduced charges for phone banking. I made a formal complaint to the bank on behalf of the elders I talked to, who can’t stand for too long in queues. The response was along the lines of “Suck it up, online banking is where we’re going”. Thats not helpful for those who don’t have a computer and have to visit the library to use one. Its not helpful if you have more faith in the smarts of hackers than the smarts of the banks’ online security.
So the issue is ordinary NZers are genuinely struggling. Housing inaffordability in NZ is very high as per Bad12’s comment and link above, and the banks are raking it in, including KB. How is that reasonable?
Capital investments by the banks owner cannot be added to profits,so Fortran is incorrect. What every bank needs is sufficient capital to continue to operate, and a growing bank needs proportionately more than a shrinking bank (it also depends on the business mix of course). The amount of capital that NZ Post can subscribe must be reducing as post continues to decline; it is up to government to decide if it wants Kiwibank to grow as fast as it could to provide effective competition to the Aussie banks – the Nat/ACTs would rather that didn’t happen, so Kiwibank is not growing market share as fast as many of us would like. National know that New Zealand voters would see closing or selling off the bank as too great a betrayal – they will just quietly let it shrivel .
How helpful would it be to put a cap on the amount landlords can charge for rents?
..and after that, let’s adopt carless days and build a synthetic-petrol plant at Motunui and have a rugby tour from a country where black people are treated as second class citizens. Good times, good times.
You don’t have to be a Muldoon fan to remember a lot of good things that were part of Kiwi society and have disappeared since 1984, when the first ACT government destroyed the basis of our way of life. You do, however, need to be an idiot to think that there was no alternative.
Indeed.
The longer Muldoon remains dead, the more Nationalites and (at the time) young nacts stood up to him. Frankly, it’s amazing he ever gained the party leadership, the way all those tories opposed him so much.
But you confuse “knowing which evil was worse” with “fan”. Easy mistake for you to make, what with “fan” being monosyllabic and all that.
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell …
I reckon a lot of Muldoon’s acumen was innate – and he was effective. Some of his economic policies weren’t even too bad, until 81. Even the Tour was a good political decision, if a shite ethical and moral one. But after a while chickens came home to roost, he grew tired, drank more, and became a caricature. Francis Urquhart without the bullet.
At least he was an oppressor one could respect, though. Not like the current crop of blue mush.
Yeah Rob was viewed with a grudging respect here as well, had He pulled off ‘think-big’ we may have been for a few decades at least nearly self sufficient in terms of fuel,
Wages and price freezes of course require the ‘will’ to effectively police both sides of that equation which escaped Rob at the cost of voter disapproval,
And yeah the decision by Norm Kirk to withdraw visas for a racially selected Springbok team probably resulted in Bill Rowling’s later defeat and Muldoon assured Himself another term of Government in later allowing them to tour,
Ah the Springbok tour, the point when the seeds of actual hatred for the National Party were planted in my psyche,
I was on Molesworth Street the night 16 year old girls and 60 year old grandmothers had their heads split open by the batons of recruits from the Porirua Police College for the simple ‘crime’ of exercising their democratic right to protest,
Up on the upstairs balcony of the Parliament Building watching all of this, i assume sipping their G and T”s were a number of Muldoon’s Cabinet applauding the imposition of ‘Law’n’Order upon the peasants…
Seriously? Did you not hear Mickey on Morning Report last year whining about his best mate getting dealt with like the treacherous scum that he is. He made David Shearer sound like Sir Ian McKellan and gave the unnerving impression that he was about to burst into tears at any second.
Good media communicators for the left are a bit thin on the ground. Probably doesn’t help that you get that bog trotting, potato muncher to do all your training.
Probably doesn’t help that you get that bog trotting, potato muncher to do all your training.
I wish they were – it’d help a lot. Based on past experience the “potato muncher” does an effective job at making politicians presentable. Usually the hard bit is getting the egotist charm merchants to realize that they need the work…. Look at how much better Phil Goff got after a little work in 2011.
Good example of what not to do over the last decade are English, Brash, and Shearer, all of whom suck at the performance art part of their profession – and mostly for the same reason.
BTW: You are bigoted sleazeball with the approximate social skills of a female hyena in heat. And since I have the time, I’m going to reserve your comments for the next few weeks for some social training.
It is harder than you think when you have other things you actually enjoy doing. Every time I get an invite, I think about the many hours that I’d have to cut away from programming and the projects to devote to a low bandwidth (ie data over time) performance art. Not to mention that I’d have to pretend to be “nice”… urrggh
LOLZ, the evil baby lookalike is still stinging from the last visit, hence ‘big brother Mike’ having a go at the Standard via RadioNZ National yesterday…
I’d love it if the “sane and reasonable”, Hooton, who as we know never ever, nosiree makes any extremist remarks were to make an appearance. I’d remind him of his history of shilling for work at the “Marlborough Sounds Symposia” with racists and Anders Brevik fanboys.
Bryce Edwards, who actually studies and analyses media an politics, shows he has a very high regard for The Standard. His regular NZ Politics Daily in on the NRB today.
I am a little amazed that the only major leftie group making the news is The Standard!
So far this year the MSM media have profiled:
– John Key on holiday
– John Key dishing out knighthoods
– John Key fainting
– John Key in Antarctica
– Jonh Key confirming that he will accelerate asset sales depending on the Supreme Court ruling, and today
– John Key promoting or demoting MPs
and on the weekend it will be John Key opening stuff in Auckland
…which gives him plenty of momentum for setting out Parliament and policy precisely the way he wants it.
Does David Shearer exist? The political year was his to take… and hasn’t.
Not sure what the leadership team around David Shearer is thinking, but it sure isn’t amounting to anything other than a complete gift to the government. Hey Trevor, hey Mike, complain about The Standard all you like, but it’s getting better political cut-through than Labour’s own leader!
Bring back Slippery dancing like a autistic spastic is what i say, it’s all so straight to have what was a budding ‘Crusty the Clown’ routine which turned the Office of New Zealand Prime Minister into a laughing stock curtailed in its infancy,
Looks like we will have the other guise of Office of the Prime minister back again, nothing more than the salesman’s shack found on any used car sales lot back until the little shyster is let out of the closet once more…
Unbelievable! And when I read the blurb on the front page of Stuff predicting/foretelling a comeback to the front bench for a Labour Party MP, I was thinking DC. But Jones! 🙄
Ach! Stuff changed the article while I was typing. Now all mention of a Shane Jones comeback has been removed. It’s totally Smith comeback affirmed.
Reshuffles for Key, Shearer
DEIDRE MUSSEN, TRACY WATKINS AND THE NELSON MAIL
Last updated 10:57 22/01/2013
“Two senior politicians could be back from the wilderness when Prime Minister John Key and Labour leader David Shearer reshuffle their leadership teams.”
Thanks, KV. Yes, that’s it. If Shearer is only “considering” reinstating Jones, then I’d suggest to him he doesn’t. That’d be a really backward step for Labour.
being a total cynic, I just assume that “they” are fecking stupid 🙂
Sometimes a phrase search of Stuff brings up the lost article, now with a heading that actually reflects the contents and the random segue simply cut into a different story altogether.
Drat.,,,,I had money on our own Trevor getting the nod. I think he would be an excellent Speaker and Parliamentry Ambssdador.
Lockwood (what were his parents thinking?) Smith has done a very good job. However I think Trevor would help make parliament relevant to that great mass who are cynical about it.
If Labour wins with a stong majority maybe he will get it. That is if he is in parliament next term. Is Shearer gonna announce the resignations this week?
Great to see Nikki Kaye elevated into cabinet, wonderful to see such young, gifted talent having been groomed to rule, finally in their rightful positions!
It just focuses mainly on the Labour an National policies, with a little bit from deputy Auckland mayor, Penny Hulse. It leaves out a lot of the most crucial and urgent issues: eg the need for more state housing.
Medium density housing is a good thing to consider as well.
well, you’ll probably find that English’s ideas run along the lines of removing pesky building codes, resource consents and population density constraints. Short words: help slumlords build slums.
Absolute bulls**t, i suggest that dan1 read the frigging article properly, in one breath Bill says the Government could legislate to make building land available and in the next Bill says they aint going to do that as they have no mandate,
“leave it to the market’ Bill is simply making noises in the hope that next week the tiny little minds that run the New Zealand main-stream media will have moved on to a knitting competition or something…
Settle down Bad12! Take another ritalin! It was not so long ago that the right wing ravers would demolish any suggestiion of government interference with the cry “Nanny State”. Whether English follows up or nor not is irrelevant. The hypocrisy is startling.
Your over-reaction will give credence to Mike Williams who has a very poor opinion of the contributors to this blog.
Williams will get credibility exactly where, Williams was an idiot when He flew off to Australia during an election campaign to dig up the dirt on the Slippery little Shyster we currently have as Prime Minister,and, was an even bigger one when He flew back here armed with nothing except His snide stupidity,
The total silence after that little bit of self inflation of the ego by Williams was deafening and i can only assume that He spent the time in Oz getting pissed over His inability to sway the electorate,
Squealing Nanny State might be the level of political discourse that supporters of the present Slippery lead National Government might rise to but i fear that such debate here on the pages of the Standard is of a more robust nature,
Ritalin??? not my drug of choice, these days i am more a cup of tea type along with a good puff on some home grown tobacco, although in the 80’s most of which i have little memory of i was partial to the odd tab of acid and not the battery type either,
dan1 scores a rather large ‘F’ for failure to carry a lucid argument in His first comment and then compounding upon the mistake by attempting to muster a scarecrow in the form of the dickless ex Labour Prez as a branch with which to score some form of brownie point only relevant in His own mind…
Chris Trotter’s latest post is a response to Eddie’s post on the Standard, in which he mentions a possibility that Shearer will put his leadership up for a party wide vote in February:
Trotter argues that it is too soon for Cunliffe to benefit from a full leadership contest, and that Robertson would be the likely winner. He also speculates on Eddie’s role in stimulating leadership rumours in a way that seems highly contestable to me:
Mr Shearer, too, should think very carefully before confirming “Eddie’s” rumour. It was, after all, the same pseudonymous writer who kicked off all the discussion about Mr Shearer’s leadership deficiencies immediately prior to last year’s Conference. That discussion, which suddenly (and without justification) morphed into the media-driven accusation that Mr Cunliffe was mounting a leadership challenge led, in turn, to his savage relegation to the back-benches.
I have learned that at about the same time as “Eddie” was mounting his first assault against Mr Shearer, a representative of at least one of the trade union affiliates was sounding-out fellow unionists’ opinions of a Robertson candidacy. (It is important to note here that Mr Robertson emphatically denies any involvement in, or knowledge of, such soundings.)
Now “Eddie” is at it again. Were Mr Shearer to allow himself to be goaded into an early vote in the Electoral College it is possible – indeed it is quite likely – that both he and his most serious rival, Mr Cunliffe, could find themselves manoeuvred out of contention.
Frankly, assuming the election period lasts as much as 3-6 months, even if everybody piles on, the leader at the end of it would have demonstrated grit and probably some communication skills, too. Good for labour, well timed for the election.
Frankly, assuming the election period lasts as much as 3-6 months
Organising and doing the school hall meetings and community debates up and down the country as part of a serious Primaries Process would require this much time.
Labour Party members and affiliate members all through NZ should have the chance to see the leadership candidates debate live, and to hear them answer tough questions from the audience.
If labour is like other parties I’ve been part of, lec meetings are monthly. They’d need a couple of months so every lec has an opportunity to meet the candidates/discuss material and the issues. Not to mention then mailing out voting forms for those who can’t do the net.
No way the candidates would go to every LEC in the country. It’d be halls in the bigger cities, maybe an online debate or two. A couple of weeks of campaigning, a week or two for the LEC’s to meet and one more week for the ballot to be held.
That would in my opinion be a sad waste of a good opportunity to generate some much needed publicity for the Labour Party,
A 3 month road trip by the candidates around all the cities and bigger towns while carting along for the ride on the bus selected journo’s and maybe a Campbell Live reporter would invigorate the Party and add new members,
Your continual assertion that Shearer’s leadership will not be tested by the Party-wide vote is also sad as in my view the only possible means of Him gaining full support of those who will stuff the letterboxes with election material and such would be the endorsement of the whole Party…
indeed – there’s no reason to rush it, and actually more debate means more exposure of labour’s policies, particularly if everyone can avoid acting like dicks. Worth a try, anyway.
The interesting thing about this is that Mumblefuck is now backed into a corner. If he doesn’t open his leadership up to a vote, then his weakness will be hanging over his head forever.
His “decisiveness” has now blown up in his face. Let’s see him put that on a barbeque and sizzle it!
Robertson… Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear oh dear. He’s Labour’s Brezhnev – a vain, supercilious apparatchik who will prove supreme at securing his position – and supreme outside that in driving the party into an ever-diminishing spiral of mediocrity.
Labour needs its Gorbachev – someone who may have arisen within the system, but nonetheless someone with inflexible core principles that my cost him his job, but save the nation.
Whilst I acknowledge Mr Robertson has done some good speaking in the house, I understand that he has been part of the strategy team over recent years and therefore my view of his credibility and capability has plummeted. Need someone who has some credentials to bring to the table, more than a failed opposition approach.
@ Karol
Yeah, I put my 2 cents worth in on that article and was going to post a link here except its already been posted!
I enjoyed some of Trotters recent articles, on reading them, I thought that he must have had a new wave of inspiration, and then this [mentioned] article came along. What’s with the conspiracy style implications of “Eddie”? Not very impressive.
I just watched Mr Shearer making a comment on Nats reshuffle this evening on Prime News and really, at the risk of receiving rabid “anti-criticism” responses, I really do wonder how it could be that the whole of NZ can’t cough up someone with a bit more presence and credibility than Mr Shearer for the leader of one of the main political parties in NZ.
Speaking isn’t everything, yet this state of affairs is laughable. What is with it??
A ‘cult,’ according to Merriam-Webster, can be defined as “Great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work..(and)..a usually small group of people characterized by such devotion.”
Re the return of Smith, bourgeoisie of Forest & Bird, get f….d !
Easy to be mouthy with your f….d ideas when you’re sitting on 40 mill’ or whatever it is handsome “kitty” Gareth.
Have a little think you arseholes about the penniless pensioner who finds life tolerable only ‘cos of their little cat.
Not that it’s ever gonna’ happen but entitled to talk shit rich guys not that many years away from licking Tory arse, and the oh so proper bourgeoisie piss me off !
Had a wee laugh at Gareth’s latest ‘idea’ and the after-thought was that He was in for one hell of a cat-scratching from the lovers of that particular furry friend,
While i happen to like the furry little critters Gareth does have a good point vis a vis the damage they can and do inflict upon the natural species that also occupy the space,
That cute little kitty when kicked out the door at night for the crime of constantly hogging the best spot on or in the bed has the propensity to roam across a range of 3 square kilometers knocking off anything of such size as said cat is able to dispatch with ease and in most cases of the family moggy simply for the sport involved in the act of teasing and killing various species,
The neighbours cat, a friend of mine,(the cat not the neighbour), has a constant bowl of food on the front porch and at times the cat can be seen reclining upon a chair above the food bowl while birds of different variety eat the left overs,
A strange cat this one, He is often found perched on the fence between my and the neighbour on the other side’s place, that neighbour keeps pigeon’s and the cat falls asleep on the fence to the sound of the massed pigeon choir purring His little face off and drooling like a loon,
The neighbour’s keeping of such bird life was an eye opener for me as He doesn’t race them and i received a scornful look when i impolitely inquired if He ate them, a slave to the rythem He spends an inordinate amount of each day scraping pigeon poo from the confines of the sheds the poor wee things spend their lives occupying,
But i digress, while Gareth’s idea of knocking off the entire cat population might be a little over the top i can see nothing wrong with the critters when kept as pets being suitably caged or confined to the inner realms of their various residencies…
I congratulate The Standard on the practice of picking up important articles from other blogs and providing a means of discussion. In particular I enjoy the issues picked up from I/S at NRT – many of those posts break stories may not become ‘mainstream’ news until days or weeks later, or worryingly just disappear. Well done
I guess in a way I was thanking I/S – in a public forum rather than writing privately through his website. I do believe it is to the credit of The Standard though to pick up a range of posts for discussion. As a country we would be better off with more open discussion, instead National are cutting back on public reporting (hat-tip NRT again) – one of the few good news items about guns in America was hearing that resources are going to be put into study of the effect of guns in the USA – after years of suppression instigated by the gun lobby. Through being prepared to encourage and allow reasonable debate on a wide range of issues, The Standard has changed political debate in NZ – mainstream media appear to be starting to realise that.
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Me, Myself, and II am webmaster for Sensible Sentencing Trust http://www.safenz.org.nz. and live in an apartment in Newmarket. I do housework once a year whether I need to or not. My partner is the love of my life and he is the best thing that has happened to me.
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For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
Analysis - Nicola Willis is holding firm on tax cuts despite the economic outlook being worse than forecast and critics urging her to wait, writes Peter Wilson for The Week In Politics. ...
Opposition MPs and unions are criticising a proposal by New Zealand’s Ministry of Pacific Peoples to cut staff by 40 percent. The country’s largest trade union — The Public Service Association — says the ministry has informed staff that it is looking to shed 63 of 156 positions. Opposition MPs ...
A poem by Poetry Aotearoa Yearbook 2024 featured poet Carin Smeaton. Daughtr of the 90s when she gets promoted to usherette a baby blu eel carries her all the way up to mothership she’s hovering high she lets the underaged in to see keanu reeves she lets the only lonely ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Keith Rankin, trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand. My earlier article – Can ‘Good’ be the Greater Evil? – looked at the issue of how wars should end, and how Good versus Evil ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 AMMA by Saraid de Silva (Moa Press, $38)A stunning debut novel reviewed by Brannavan ...
From Steve Martin to Ricky Stanicky, a pick’n’mix of things worth watching and listening to this long weekend. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. If you’re at a loss for something to occupy yourself with this Easter, don’t panic: The Spinoff’s got ...
Jesus had dinner with his 12 disciples right before he died. Noted historian Madeleine Chapman finds out who really deserved to be there.First published in 2018 but let’s be honest, the subject is timeless. As you sit on your couch this Easter Sunday, eating a chocolate egg you know ...
The newly-promoted Northern League club is on a mission to return to the National League for the first time in two decades. Plenty about domestic football in New Zealand has changed in that time – but the sense that this amateur competition is not an entirely level playing field remains. ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
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Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
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A strong Labour Victory will overturn the economic orthodoxy of the past 30 years and drive export and innovation led strategies that will lift Kiwi incomes and prospects up substantially.
Professional advisors like Mike Williams and Matthew Hooton are promoting middle-of-the-road strategies to Trevor, Annette and Grant. These strategies assume the Nats will loose as “part of the cycle”! It will result in 40% Green & NZ First around the Cabinet Table. Frankly the public won’t buy it, IMO.
No junior ministerial positions for Labour MPs!
Fewer senior positions for Labour MPs!
More Labour MPs on the back benches!
The “conventional wisdom” of the past 30 years will continue to be economic policy, while the unstable Cabinet argues over Green Party agendas and populist scams Winston will demand.
Do you want to trudge the streets of Dunedin South, North Shore, Hamilton East or wherever for that outcome? Or do you want Labour to cut through the mist with conviction politics, catch the imagination of the voters and the 800,000 disaffected and win strongly?
Tell your MP which you want.
‘Professional advisors like Mike Williams and Matthew Hooton ….’
I think you’ve highlighted the issue right there, in terms of NZ owning it’s own future KV.
Winston was ‘in Government’ with Labour for 9 years, which ‘populist scams’ did the NZFirst leader demand???,
Are you still intellectually mired in First Past the Post politics, Labour will have to come to terms with Green policies if it wants to form the next Government,
On social policy that should be relatively easy for Labour to come to grips with, Labour only need dig out any of it’s past election manifesto from years prior to 1984 to fully understand the Green’s social policy…
That sentence is a contradiction – drive export and innovation led strategies is exactly the orthodoxy of the last 30+ years.
I suspect that if Labour returned to its roots then things would be better but I just can’t see that happening as they’re far too caught up in the economic orthodoxy.
Cite, pls.
Labour being able to govern with greens and mana, on the other hand…
And if Winston can take the above from 56 to 61%, so much the better. And it still wouldn’t be so bad if he was an interchangeable wheel where lab needs either the greens or (mana + NZ1).
Why are you replying to me? That sentence was from KhandallaViper @ comment 1.
aye, true enough. sorry for the confusion.
It was telling, when Mike Williams was describing us here at TS as “nutters” and “extemists” that he also jeeringly said that many said crazies were former Alliance members.
I thought at the Labour conference a remit was passed that denounced the actions of the Lange/Douglas government. Which was pretty much everything the Alliance was about.
So surely, rather than thinking of those Labour faithful who fought against the neoliberal revolution in the 80s as “nutters”, this was an endorsement that the Alliance was correct. A unanimous endorsement in fact.
Maybe the power block running the Labour Party were insincere in voting for this remit. That it was just more lip service from remorseless marketeers, trying to appease the dissatisfied, so they can get on with the job.
Also, the irony of Williams denouncing our fight against the powerful and wealthy within Labour for refusing to abide by the principles of the party as “hate speech”. Last time I looked I was a person. And I found his words hateful in the extreme. I guess only the rich and powerful matter.
It was telling, when Mike Williams was describing us here at TS as “nutters” and “extemists” that he also jeeringly said that many said crazies were former Alliance members.
Yes, I thought the associations of the Alliance with “nutters” and “extremists” was curious. So MW associates Jim Anderton (strong ally with the Clark government) and Laila Harre (ex RNZ, 9-to-Noon “from the left” person), with nutters and extremists. And then he dismissed all TS authors and commenters with these labels. And MW threw in the “anonymous” smear along with it, plus various comments and innuendos that we are all Cunliffe supporters, or, as I recall, implied we were being instructed/manipulated by Clunliffe,
“Nutters’ and “extremists” implies irrationality. But where is the evidence and reasoned arguments to support MW’s comments. It all seemed pretty irrational, and lacking in supporting evidence to me.
That you guys and girls are commented on in such terms should be taken as a positive. It means you are getting under the skins, having an impact, getting the “names” worried.
Keep at it. Ignore the term nutters. If you were true nutters it wouldn’t even make the radar. By Mike Williams commenting proves the opposite of what he said, and he knows it.
Kia kaha.
“That you guys and girls are commented on in such terms should be taken as a positive. It means you are getting under the skins, having an impact, getting the “names” worried.
Keep at it. Ignore the term nutters. If you were true nutters it wouldn’t even make the radar.”
Indeed, less outrage that current Labour would even consider attacking it’s own voter base in such a way, more focus, steady hands and steady nerves.
Now who doesn’t just love revolution? 😆
He was simply making the point that most people who comment here are way further left than the Labour Party. That is hardly contentious.
If he said it like you wrote it, maybe not.
But he didn’t, so it very much is.
In fact, a cynic like me could easily surmise from his tone a clear signal that the top table are not only aware, but actively seeking to undermine.
That doesn’t sound very nice, but like I say, I’m just an old cynic.
If MW was”simply making” that point, he wouldn’t have used smear terms like “extremist”, “nutters”, etc.
There are many on this site, who use terms such as “nutters, nut jobs”, and other insults – Perhaps when those people desist, then there could be cause for complaint.
As it stands there isn’t!
Well, the difference is between people who allude to vague police conspiracies about tragic (but local) events, versus people who basically support what was pretty much sound, conventional and stable economic management until the rich decided to get richer off the work of the nation.
The problem isn’t the epithet, the problem is the fact that well within MW’s lifetime Alliance policies were pretty orthodox and the best solution for most citizens – and nothing has happened to change that (indeed, our twenty or thirty years of “brighter future” serves only to reinforce it).
muzza, show me an example of when I have ever used the term “nutters” or even “RWNJ” on this blog.
Yep. I am not Karol. Personally I have called a few people nuts over the last 5 years. But it is a small fraction of the people I have described as wankers, fools, gormless or idiots. I prefer the more precise expressions… 🙂
But Karol is almost too perfect – so perfect that you almost have to ask “what is she hiding?”…. (cue the music) 😈
BTW: Karol – nice to finally meet you….
My guess: a love for polka remixes of Abba hits.
Yes, it was great to meet you and Lynn, too.
But Karol is almost too perfect – so perfect that you almost have to ask “what is she hiding?”…. (cue the music)
Huh?! Well, personal failings by the flat load. Abba, not so much, McF. But I can be into all kinds of trash popular culture.
But nothing to hide in terms of political affiliations.
And I was schooled in online forums and political debates in female-centred places where personal abuse was strongly frowned on. Also, as far as I can see, it could too easily draw me into flame wars.
Actually, bearing in mind that it is muzza, I was thinking more like theme music for a Hitchcock film as the terrible secret was slowly unveiled.
For some reason I feel like stirring today..
And I was schooled in online forums and political debates in female-centred places where personal abuse was strongly frowned on. Also, as far as I can see, it could too easily draw me into flame wars.
I spent quite a lot of time embroiled in flamewars in 80’s; unfortunately (mostly) young males seem to love the damn things. Eventually I found several ways of making them dissipate. They usually involve being a bigger arsehole than the flamers and discouraging them from wanting to start a war again because they could never be sure about how close the snippers would get to their testicles.
Hi Karol – sorry the reply made it look that way, it was not intended. Your *form*, is beyond question here.
The premise is that if people don’t want to be smeared, labelled, etc, then they first need to ensure that they are not guilty of it themselves, and that includes myself.
Unsurprising to read McFlock making excuses!
Excuses?
Perhaps an analogy will help you:
Let’s say I am in a bank and someone runs in, grabs money out of the teller’s draw and runs out again. That is all the information I know about the situation. I call them a “thief”.
Mike Williams is in a bank, and sees someone approach the teller and withdraw money from their account apparently using the normal protocols, and then leave. That is all MW knows about the situation. Mike Williams calls them a “thief”.
Surely, I can call MW a doofus for that (without you whining like a spoilt child)?
Silly McFlock, acting like context matters. Context isn’t in the terms of reference for muzza’s “personal research project”.
He was simply making the point that most people who comment here are way further left than the parliamentary wing of the Labour Party. That is hardly contentious.
FIFY A fair few here are part of the Labour Party.
What (That Fat Wanker) said was that those commenting on the Standard while claiming to be Labour Party activists were unlikely to be active in the Party at all,
Bordering upon the slanderous in my opinion…
Hey, Bad, just an aside really, but can you drop the ‘fat’? It’s not relevant. Cheers.
What’s up, did you look in the mirror or something, how bout Fat-headed, Obese wanker perhaps???…
It’s the thoughtless bigotry that’s the problem, Bad. But, if you’re cool with being an abuser, carry on …
Surely you realise the hypocracy of your comment, Voice!
I agree with TRP on this. Using someone’s body shape/size as a term of abuse is abuse. It’s not relevant and it feeds/supports prejudice against people who have bodies that defy the attempts of the dominating parts of society to say what is normal and acceptable.
It never ceases to amaze me that this has to be be spelled out on the left. If you can understand the analysis of something like capitalism or homophobia and how that damages people, why not fatphobia?
Cheers, CW, nicely put. I got pulled up myself a couple of years ago for using similar language and I had to acknowledge that it was inconsistent for me to oppose prejudice regarding gender, race and class while also using body image stereotyping. Kudos to QoT for that valuable lesson.
Muzza: Can’t help you there, as there is no such a thing as “hypocracy”. Wait! Perhaps your misspelling is deliberate; just a part of Project Onan too brilliant for us mere mortals to understand? I guess we’ll never know.
now, now TRP: poor spelling is not always a sign of low intelligence.
Lack of any degree of self-evaluation, failure to discriminate between “plausible” and “implausible” theories, and a dose of cognitive dissonance, on the other hand…
Voice, indeed, the spelling was poor. I do agree with your contention, but not believe that you’re in a position to be requesting others raise their standards.
McFlock – Amazing how you’ve figured out so little, that you’re nakedly projecting, so wildly. Lack of self evaluation, congnitive dissonance /snort!
I’m sure your lifes experiences (obviously limited, as illustrated by your comments on here), have created such a juvenile mindset, perhaps you have learnt/experienced life, from books or behind screens only?
This would be the point where I talk about how much blood and piss and puke I’ve walked through to help keep idiotic little know-it-alls like you safe, and in some cases alive.
But really, the fact that you are so willing to exploit other people’s pain and grief on the basis that your fanta-cyst mind sees a minute possibility of unnamed conspiracies means that you either:
have never been close to someone with such grief, so have lived the “sheltered life” of which you accuse others; or
are as callous and unfeeling as you are stupid.
So rather than “out” my pseudonym by giving too much detail, I think I’ll leave it at that.
McFlock – If you’re going to post a comment like that, then finish it by using what amounts to, *don’t you know who I am*…
Following through, even at risk of outing yourself, would be the appropriate next step!
Amazing what you want to read into things, muz.
As to the bit where I suggested that your pointless little jibe was supposed to provoke me into talking about myself, rather than your dickishness, it could not so much be interpreted as “don’t you know you know who I am”, rather more “you don’t know what shoes I’ve worn and where I’ve walked”. Whereas the fact you take others’ grief so cheaply indicates you have no idea about the effect your idle speculation has on others.
The point of the entire comment was that the callous monomania you display, coupled with your accusations of sheltered life, is indicative of the dissonance to which I referred.
Jesus don’t be so precious will you, for your info i am fat, well my gut is, such fat having failed to immigrate to places like my legs and butte give me an uneven distribution of fat,
Nonetheless FAT my gut is and i see nothing abusive in the use of such a descriptive upon myself (or other’s like those Fat Wanker’s),
As far as being ‘abusive’ toward the 2 individiuals who are being discussed here, no f**king problem whatsoever,
i like to think i at least try and keep such within the bounds of ‘the rules’ BUT those 2 in terms of what they generally and consistently expound upon is simply abuse of the lower paid and recipients of beneficiaries in New Zealand on the basis of their personal political (and financial???) gain,
i have no problem with calling a shower of s**t such as those two represent exactly that, a shower of s**t…
Well, call them a shower of shit, then, bad. Abuse based on body size is still abuse. You’re not the kind of person to call someone a (black/paki/gay/etc.) wanker, are you? So have a think about the nature, and consequences, of our capitalist society, which is currently based on a culture of endless consumption.
Look, I think you’re a good person, so that’s why I raised it in a non-confrontational way. You are capable of understanding the argument and I really hope you (and others reading this) will have a bit of a think on it.
Cheers.
Te Reo bigotry (in your eyes) it may be but thoughtless, never!!! and you would be surprised at what we call each other down here at gutter level,
My Samoan nieghbour is wont to point out who in particular among His cuzzies is a FOB much to the hilarity of us both,
I won’t repeat the exchange that took place as a greeting between my Maori nieghbours and some visitors this arvo, needless to say it wasn’t Kia Ora Bro, and did include the words black and a certain word beginning with C, (and yes they were female),
So, while not knowing at what level of society you live i do find that your finding of the word FAT to be one of abuse while amusing is also rather effete, but, just for you i will attempt to find another expletive of a descriptive nature that best suits the 2 wankers you are inadvertently mounting a defence for…
Cheers, bad. I’m not defending anyone, all I know is that how much Hooten and Williams weigh is completely irrelevant to the point you were trying to make. Re: your neighbours; you know them, they know you. Try using that language out of your neighbourly, friendly context and, well, you know how that’d end.
The point is really straightforward. It’s abuse. Don’t do it. If you want to educate yourself, google ‘fat’ and ‘politics’.
Let’s keep wordsmithing niceties, it’s what the Left is reknowned for.
Actually no. He is wrong, and so are you. Most people of the NZLP who comment here are more interested in competence of the whole party than the parliamentary wing of the Labour Party is. That is what is contentious.
The majority of authors on this site are NZLP members. The majority of the authors who complain about the NZLP’s performance are members. So for that matter are most of the most cogent of the commentators pointing out flaws in the NZLP, and it is pretty clear to people who are members and who is and are not.
Most of those members would be from the centre of the parties ideological wing like Mickey and others. Or even from the centre-right like myself or maybe Anne.. Those on the “left” of the party members pretty much gave up arguing about strategy and direction long ago. The long lack of a forum for dialogue means that they’re more interesting in expressing ideas here than looking at the well-known flaws in the party. They reluctantly support (if at all) the party because of a simple lack of viable alternatives (and I’m sure that I’ll hear chapter and verse about that sentence at the Mana meeting tomorrow).
The important change that has been happening is that the centrist members who have been supporting the party through the last few decades are getting irritated at how incompetently the party is operating. Part of that is that the party structure has been gutted with arcane rules and lack of resources. Most of it is because the beltway hack culture that has been arising in Wellington seems to assume that we’re here merely to rubber-stamp idiots making foolish decisions. It was less of an issue when the people in Wellington were competent.
We’re less worried about the ideological views that we are about the incompetence that the parliamentary wing appears to be fostering. For every person who actually comments here, there are heaps of members (and I tend to know a *lot* of them) who will talk the same in private – and usually a damn sight more extreme than anyone does here. These are all long time NZLP members.
That is the reason why the votes at LEC’s, regionals, and conference are going through without problems. Sure the “left” are voting for them. But they’re passing because the “centre”, “centre right”, and virtual every affliated union are voting for them as well. Right now it is a case of trying to make the old party survive into it’s second century with a viable structure rather than floundering under a structure that was designed pre-TV
Precisely.
Don’t forget it was a tandem effort. Hooton claimed the Cunliffe supporters manipulated the vote, and are continuing to fuel the fire of disunity within the Labour Party. According to him, one of our most respected contributers at The Standard has been leading the charge. 🙄
Matthew Hooton is a pathological liar.
Thanks Anne.
I reread my stuff and I can honestly say that I have never been scathing of Shearer. Of ABC yes, but that is an entirely different matter …
I can honestly say that I have never been scathing of Shearer.
Indeed you havn’t… Neither have a lot of Standard contributors – including me. Our beef is with the unprincipled behaviour of certain members of the ABC club. But of course Hooton would never understand. He seem a little devoid of principles himself…
Anne is part of a group that murders small children and blows goats.
Of course I never have been, nor never will be, scathing of Anne.
[lprent: Instead you act like a complete fucktard critic. You have no ideas. Have no intelligence. So basically you sit on the sidelines jerking off and laughing at your own pathetic jokes. Would that be an accurate assessment?
Somehow I think that it would be the common opinion of your arsehole behaviour. ]
“Instead you act like a complete fucktard critic. You have no ideas. Have no intelligence. So basically you sit on the sidelines jerking off and laughing at your own pathetic jokes. Would that be an accurate assessment?”
Apart from the jerking off and the fact that I don’t think my jokes are pathetic, you have pretty much nailed it.
But not to fear, I have decided to do an MBA and pretend I am a computer genius. Apparantly this will make me an authority on everything.
[lprent: “computer genius” ha… I (don’t) wish. Computer geniuses, in my experience, usually burn out early from actually programming. They drop out of the industry into something like management, sales, contract analysts, or tech support. But I like programming and it is really hard to pry me away to become another deadhead ex-programmer. I mostly code in c++ on one multi-year project at a time and have been doing for several glorious decades.
The “computer genius” was a myth fostered by burt, barnsley and some other tech dickheads. I never said it and I notice that most of the people who repeat it usually seem to be rather bored with their lives. I tend to treat it more as being an expression of envy since few of the people saying it appear to be active programmers.
But seriously, a degree would probably do you good. It might help lift your conversation out of the dry old hole that your life appears to be from your comments. The level of frustrated bilious crap you push out in your comments tends to indicate someone who is doing fuck all of any use in their life. And it is always irritating to see people wasting their abilities. ]
Come on Lprent, you’ve searched my IP address (or whatever it is you nerds do). You know who I am and how awesome I am.It is a bit naughty trying to bait me into outing myself.
[lprent: Why would I bother? The reasons for using that information are in the policy – http://thestandard.org.nz/policy/#privacy and you don’t fit any of them. ]
Whats all this moderation nonsense?
[lprent: You had a go at one of the authors for no apparent reason and I suspect simply because you’d be fairly sure that she won’t do anything nasty.
However I have some time today for similar petty behaviour, so I reserved your comments so I could return the favour and to demonstrate what a complete fuckwit behaviour that is. I’d just embellish all of your comments with my own observations on you.
Looking at the workload I may be able to keep this up for the rest of the week. And if I can’t then I can just ban….
It is petty I know. But it seems like it is more likely to penetrate your blockhead that you don’t attack authors personally than a banning. 😈 ]
Never knew Anne was an author.
[lprent: Not Anne (very good – the monkey can search for where he crapped). It was a while ago when I was somewhat short of time. Your comments about a “potato muncher” reminded me to do something about your manners. ]
@lprent
…what a pity, I thought you were referring to our PM when you wrote that…would have pretty appropriate; I would have +1ed it….
For authoritarians an attack on the club would be seen as an attack on the leader and thus inexcusable.
Hooton has only got one principle. And that’s the one he is PAID to have. Which makes him a very shallow, and poor, specimen of an intelligent human being. He may spout all sorts of shit, and that’s his right, but to me the biggest sign of intelligence in that scenario, is knowing when to shut up, and he doesn’t know when.
Williams has had his day as has the rest of the Mallarfia. They’ll cling onto the power by any means regardless of the impact on the long term health of Labour and any positive change giving it up to new generation could have made.
Much like companies who keep toxic and out of touch management/boards too long, bye bye market share and position in the industry, enjoy the slide like the children you all are.
Is Mike Williams on a “media advisor” or similar retainer from the Labour parliamentary budget, like Mike Smith?
I don’t think so, according to (That Fat Wanker), He only goes to conferences to listen to the Leaders speech and then does a bunk,
It’s obvious that ‘the Standard’ is being taken notice of in certain quarters of Labour and the likes of (Those Fat Wankers), are feeling a little marginalized hence the diatribe spilled like an open sewer into the airwaves yesterday,
I also have the sneaking suspicion that (The Fat Wankers) did a little rehearsing prior to going on air on RadioNZ National yesterday, (One Fat Wanker) who regularly posts the occasional comment on the Standard recently got ‘it’s’ tail twisted severely in a departure from what is the usual ‘friendly banter’ ‘it’ is accustomed to here,
Me thinks part of the attack from (One of the Fat Wankers) was of a retributive nature on behalf of (The Other Fat Wanker) so as that one would not be accused of ‘attacking the Standard or its authors…
Equally telling was Catherine Ryan’s response, who pushed back on them both saying that if The Standard are just a fringe group of lefties that have recently re-entered the Party to undermine it from within, why was there such a majority in the November 2012 Conference who so clearly voted their dissatisfaction and forced major constitutional changes through over the heads fo tehleadership?
That is, The Standard represents the mainstream of leftie opinion, not the fringe.
Good to see the MSM itself pushing back against the spin from the Old Guard.
+1. Maybe she’s beginning to ‘get it’ too – (finally).
Amusing isn’t it how it’s “……….from the Left [insert Pagani or Williams], and from the Right [insert Hooten]. The LEFT??? – hardly!!!!
Still more amusing is that RNZ gets accused of being a bunch of lefties sometimes – what! – with Ryan in the morning and Mora in the afternoon 5 days a week – HARDLY!
The likes of Williams/Pagani et al should realise that just because a number of us have held on to a few basic principles (not necessarily ideology) that seeks to ensure everyone gets a fair suck of the sav over the past 3 decades, whilst the political pendulum has swung right….DOESN’T make us extremeists.
Hey, the blogosphere is new (according to Williams), and Greg Presland blogs here! (funny, I thought he was a commenter).
What a bunch of clowns on RNZ. I notice that the RNZ website doesn’t use the title ‘Political Comment from the Left and from the Right’.
Yea ……but……..yea…..but
Not all clowns though. At least there’s the weekdays between 5pm and 9am, AND weekends. And of course Concert FM. All we need now is a 3rd network, as I believe Tim Finn or someone once proposed
fair call. I suppose I was meaning Hootten, Williams, and Kathryn Ryan’s producers. Mind you, I could email Ryan and her producers and politely point these things out.
I’m quite happy to be an extremist. The situation is so desperate that anyone who thinks the standard policies of the neolib choir can do anything but make things worse is a nutter. I am not a nutter.
A remit followed by business as usual will not get rid of the stench of Rogernomics. Only a cleaning out of caucus and some new policy directed at the needs of the needy rather than the greed of the greedy can do that. Why do 90% of the present lot even have the gall to even stay in Parliament? NAct under Key have to be the worst and most incompetent bunch of bungling fools I can remember and her majesty’s loyal opposition can’t make a dent. Worse, it actually does seem to be for lack of trying.
“Nutters”?
Hooton and Williams 69-ing each other in public on Nine to Noon? That’s “normal”?
Ha!
Try this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI-9WH4Z4gY
The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band’s “My Pink Half of the Drainpipe.”
My favourite line(s)?
“If you’re normal, then I resolve to be a freak for the rest of my life… So theeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrreeeeeeee…”
Williams is just trying to stay relevant and on-side with the power brokers in Labour. Williams has ended up like so many within Labour, they need Labour more than Labour needs them. Move on Mike…Labour needs to make some BIG changes if it is to have a future then some of the “has beens” need to get out of the way.
Williams knows that most Labour members browse or maybe comment on the Standard. People who have the energy and motivation to join a political party are inherently interested in Labour Party politics and The Standard is the go to destination for Labour politics.
Clearly Williams is just sucking up to Goff, Mallard, King and co.
My picks for the cabinet reshuffle today:
Amy Adams gets primary industries and food safety, and keeps environment
Chris Finlayson gets local government and conservation
Nick Smith returns and gets Labour
There seems to be a sort of symetery to that arrangement.
Last thing I want is Smith in local government after what he said about our libraries.
The Wellington ‘rumor’ puts Smith firmly in the Enviroment portfolio, a position where Nick can rave on endlessly with passion while doing nothing and more importantly do very little damage to the National voter base,
There’s trouble brewing for Nick in the form of Winston Peters (who would have thunk it), this goes back to pre-2008 when Smith was Nationals spokesperson on Building and Housing,
In a speech in Nelson Smith shot His mouth off to such an extent that a local timber supply company sued the idiot for defamation,
Upon Nationals election to Government in 2008 the matter was settled out of court via a 200,000 grand lump of largesse from the taxpayer, Slippery the Prime Minister claiming at the time that Smith’s legal costs should be paid by the taxpayer as Smith was defaming the building supply company on their behalf, (not your’s or mine obviously),
Winston is apparently alleging that Smith (or His supporters) set up some form of fund to collect monies for (a) Smith’s legal defence and (b) presumably to pay any cost of the defamation should the court have ruled against Smith,
The allegation from Winston is that Smith has a ‘financial interest’ in this fund and that Smith failed to disclose this in the register of MP’s pecuniary interests as required,
There’s a further question begging here and that is if the taxpayer paid the 200 odd thousand to settle the Smith defamation out of court in 2008 what then became of this fund or more importantly the monies in it after the taxpayer coughed to bail Smith out of the s**t,
Did Smith say thank you very much Slippery for the paying of the cost of the defamation and then pocket the proceeds from the fund Winston Peters alleges was set up specifically to do just that…
I heard the news-piece on Nick Smith’s possible return to Cabinet on last night’s “PM”. Followed by criticism of Smith’s demonstrated unfitness to be a Minister from both the Greens and Winston Peters – the Green’s coupling an attack on John Key’s totally discredited “demand a high standard from Ministers” promise.
And from Labour/Shearer? (Crickets.)
Add the ‘demand a high standard from Ministers’ promise from Slippery to the ever elongating list of lies told by that one,
Of course Slippery has the defence that such ‘high standards’ are measured by Him on the basis of Slippery’s own moral code of ethics which have yet to become a physical manifestation that can be measured in any way that us mere mortals can understand…
Winston called such a Smith move as “unethical”.
From Winston that’s a new one “unethical”. Wow.
Try opening both f**king eyes when you get up in the morning for a change wont you, among the supposed unethical behavior of Winston Peters was a fish and chip meal supposedly provided free by the Vella Brothers the details of which were splashed all over our TV’s for weeks,
Who would have thunk it tho, Slippery the Prime Minister not long after the 2008 election accepted a free ride from Hamilton to Auckland aboard a helicopter owned by those very same Vella Brothers,
Now perhaps you can see why YOU are ridiculed here at the Standard, IF Peter’s actions were in any way unethical then the actions of Slippery the Prime Minister when viewed through the lens of ‘the gifts cost’ must be considered to be 1000 times more unethical than the actions of Peter’s…
PS, that is of course assuming that the fish’n’chip meal was actually a ‘gift’.
Our friends in the UK have produced some solid work on the left inclusiveness within labour.
http://www.labourleft.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/74185392-The-Red-Book.pdf
Yet another ‘study’ is released to show how un-affordable New Zealand housing is especially in Auckland and Christchurch, telling us all what we all already know,
http://www.demographia.com/dhi.pdf
It’s a PDF but does have a ‘quickview’,
Bill, yeah that one that masquerades occasionally as the Minister of Finance says that the problem is becoming urgent but they (National) have no mandate from the people in cities like Auckland, Wellington, and, Christchurch to push local councils to free up more land for development,
Yeah right Bill, when the farming lobby want to get at the water you and your’s will happily trash whole elected councils, when people need affordable housing its time to sit on the hands again and do nothing,
Bill tho did make one interesting observation, apparently according to the bean counters it takes on average 8 years after a new immigrant has arrived here for ‘the market’ to produce a new house to keep pace with the flow of arrivals,
Bill of course, as part of (admittedly a pathetic failure) National Government has part of the answer at His finger tips,
The dullard could simply restrict the immigrant flow which would obviously slow the rise in demand for housing and exert downward pressure on the market,
Obviously Labour have as policy ‘part’ of the solution with it’s Kiwibuild scheme to build 100,000 houses over 10 years,
What is also needed is a State House build of the same size to make home rental affordable and kill off the demand for ‘rental investment’ properties…
It’s bloody depressing. Just had a look at “To let” accommodation in the local papers. I’m feeling down about it, and I’m not one of the people worst off re-housing. I have a rental place near work – it’s just that it’s less than adequate, and not great for someone approaching retirement age.
But there’s really not a lot going, and what there is, is bigger and costs more than I’m willing to pay. And I imagine there’ll be a long queue of people wanting to rent each place that’s available. Seriously thinking of moving to a more rural area and doing a longer commute to my part time job.
How helpful would it be to put a cap on the amount landlords can charge for rents?
My answer to your question vis a vis ‘capping rents’ is HUGELY helpful, in theory the Accommodation Supplement was supposed to do just that,
Obviously that Accommodation Supplement has simply become a taxpayer payment to various banking institutions which amounts to nearly a 5th of the profits those banks take off-shore yearly with the ‘rental investor’ simply acting as an ‘agent’ of the banks via the mortgages held by those banks,
Capping rents hasn’t been tried in New Zealand before and the first problem i see is that the ‘rental investors’ might have a problem paying their mortgages if caps were placed upon private rentals,
It has been done before in the US and i will have a look later at how that worked (or works), i can’t tho get passed the mortgage V capped rent equation without seeing how such has worked in other countries…
” the first problem i see is that the ‘rental investors’ might have a problem paying their mortgages if caps were placed upon private rentals,”
you mean those selfish short-sighted shysters who over decades drove over inflated house prices ever-upward to satisfy the greed of Bankers and the parasites they support, who if faced with a rental cap would have never had the opportunity to corrupt the NZ housing market and thus make their contribution to the quagmire of inequality NZ is sinking into.
Yes exactly, i do mean those short sighted shysters who have en masse piled into ‘rental investments’ thus driving the price of property out of the bounds that even their own children can afford, along with driving the cost of rent for the low waged from 25-30% of income to 50-80% of income,
I would happily see ‘rent caps’ introduced tomorrow, but then, i would happily see all private property abolished and rented back to the occupants at 25% of income including farms factories, and office blocks,
Fortunately or unfortunately we live in one of those democracy things so that aint going to occur,
Labour simply have to be pushed to include in their housing policy the building of the same amount of State rentals as they plan to build for the KiwiBuild scheme (100,000) in the same time-frame as what the KiwiBuild proposal envisages, (10 years),
Along with such a policy Labour need alter it’s immigration policy to restrict the flow of new immigrants and only allow builders, plumbers, electricians and those with building design planning skills residence,
Add to that the Kiwi labour component either as simple labour or apprentices and there would be a workforce of sufficient robustness to accomplish a affordable housing build of the needed quantity and quality…
Christchurch first for building, as there are not enough skilled Builders in the country to take on 10,000 low priced houses, and new state housing of 10,000, per annum.
Bulls**t, Norm Kirk’s Labour Government managed to build 30,000 houses a year with a far smaller workforce than is currently available in New Zealand, and, most houses back then were constructed ‘on site’ as opposed to being pre-formed in a gang-nail framing factory,
There is no need to have 2 or 3 qualified builders working upon one house construction, 2 or 3 builders could easily provide the supervision for a dozen labourers and apprentices…
Hi Karol. It IS depressing and good luck to you for finding the right place. Its very unfair when accomodation is a purely market driven commodity and only regulated to a certain degree in regard to the landlord’s repsonsibility to their tennant and to the wider community.
We’re in our early 40’s now and we’ve only got into our first house. Because of my unemployment we are really struggling and are prisoners in our own home! In some way because of the cost of housing being so over valued (Am I correct in recalling that Gareth Morgan estimates it may be as high as 25%?) its feels like we have jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. In saying that I don’t forget what its like to feel you have to compete desparately with other prospective tennants to get a place that is just acceptable and nothing more. Its sort of degrading and people shouldn’t be put into a situation where they are at the whim of the market.
In the meantime while the average NZer really sweats trying to make ends meet week after week the banks are making huge profits. Kiwibank who we have our mortgage with made record profits last year. Its just that whole win-lose dicotomy keeping renters and homeowners on the treadmill.
Kiwibank’s profits were propped up by regular cash inflow from NZ Post, and have been every year since formed.
Er, no, Fortran, that would be fraud, wouldn’t it? Inflating paper profits by cash injections, I mean.
Post established KB, and continues to bankroll Kiwibank’s expansion, but KB’s profits (and excellent customer loyalty) are all its own work. Remind me again, who’s idea was Kiwibank? Some socialist from down south wasn’t it?
That may be so Fortran but their lending has increased 8% which is one contributing factor to their increasing profits
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/kiwibank-triples-profit-gb-126368
Yep, its great that a govt owned bank is doing well but you have to question the ethics of a bank (question the ethics of a bank! What next?!) that has reduced its access to branches whilst penalising its customers for not using its online banking services. Having talked with KB’s elderly customers while waiting in epic out the door queues because they closed the local branch down, you get to understand how inconvenient it is for them to be told to use online services rather than use a branch. To further push you into doing what they want you to they have introduced charges for phone banking. I made a formal complaint to the bank on behalf of the elders I talked to, who can’t stand for too long in queues. The response was along the lines of “Suck it up, online banking is where we’re going”. Thats not helpful for those who don’t have a computer and have to visit the library to use one. Its not helpful if you have more faith in the smarts of hackers than the smarts of the banks’ online security.
So the issue is ordinary NZers are genuinely struggling. Housing inaffordability in NZ is very high as per Bad12’s comment and link above, and the banks are raking it in, including KB. How is that reasonable?
Capital investments by the banks owner cannot be added to profits,so Fortran is incorrect. What every bank needs is sufficient capital to continue to operate, and a growing bank needs proportionately more than a shrinking bank (it also depends on the business mix of course). The amount of capital that NZ Post can subscribe must be reducing as post continues to decline; it is up to government to decide if it wants Kiwibank to grow as fast as it could to provide effective competition to the Aussie banks – the Nat/ACTs would rather that didn’t happen, so Kiwibank is not growing market share as fast as many of us would like. National know that New Zealand voters would see closing or selling off the bank as too great a betrayal – they will just quietly let it shrivel .
Not very
How helpful would it be to put a cap on the amount landlords can charge for rents?
..and after that, let’s adopt carless days and build a synthetic-petrol plant at Motunui and have a rugby tour from a country where black people are treated as second class citizens. Good times, good times.
apart from the rugby tour, better times than the nineties and the last 4 years or so.
So rare to meet a Muldoon fan these days.
You don’t have to be a Muldoon fan to remember a lot of good things that were part of Kiwi society and have disappeared since 1984, when the first ACT government destroyed the basis of our way of life. You do, however, need to be an idiot to think that there was no alternative.
Indeed.
The longer Muldoon remains dead, the more Nationalites and (at the time) young nacts stood up to him. Frankly, it’s amazing he ever gained the party leadership, the way all those tories opposed him so much.
But you confuse “knowing which evil was worse” with “fan”. Easy mistake for you to make, what with “fan” being monosyllabic and all that.
Oh, for your command of the language, McFlock. If only I could express myself with half as much magniloquence and mellifluousness as you possess.
But, alas, I am just a simple person. Lucky, you know what is best. Guide me in your ways, oh wise one.
How???, Rob Muldoon was Jack Marshall’s batman during WW2, laying out the suits and pouring the champers one would assume,
Did Rob learn a little about Jack that provided Him with the necessary ‘leverage’ to rise to the leadership of the National Party…
Heh – didn’t know that.
I reckon a lot of Muldoon’s acumen was innate – and he was effective. Some of his economic policies weren’t even too bad, until 81. Even the Tour was a good political decision, if a shite ethical and moral one. But after a while chickens came home to roost, he grew tired, drank more, and became a caricature. Francis Urquhart without the bullet.
At least he was an oppressor one could respect, though. Not like the current crop of blue mush.
Yeah Rob was viewed with a grudging respect here as well, had He pulled off ‘think-big’ we may have been for a few decades at least nearly self sufficient in terms of fuel,
Wages and price freezes of course require the ‘will’ to effectively police both sides of that equation which escaped Rob at the cost of voter disapproval,
And yeah the decision by Norm Kirk to withdraw visas for a racially selected Springbok team probably resulted in Bill Rowling’s later defeat and Muldoon assured Himself another term of Government in later allowing them to tour,
Ah the Springbok tour, the point when the seeds of actual hatred for the National Party were planted in my psyche,
I was on Molesworth Street the night 16 year old girls and 60 year old grandmothers had their heads split open by the batons of recruits from the Porirua Police College for the simple ‘crime’ of exercising their democratic right to protest,
Up on the upstairs balcony of the Parliament Building watching all of this, i assume sipping their G and T”s were a number of Muldoon’s Cabinet applauding the imposition of ‘Law’n’Order upon the peasants…
I wonder if Hooton will make a guest appearance to the Standard today? I would really like to discuss a couple of matters with him.
What the righteous cause could do with is someone like you to get on the MSM and become a media commentator in their own right.
Seriously? Did you not hear Mickey on Morning Report last year whining about his best mate getting dealt with like the treacherous scum that he is. He made David Shearer sound like Sir Ian McKellan and gave the unnerving impression that he was about to burst into tears at any second.
Good media communicators for the left are a bit thin on the ground. Probably doesn’t help that you get that bog trotting, potato muncher to do all your training.
I wish they were – it’d help a lot. Based on past experience the “potato muncher” does an effective job at making politicians presentable. Usually the hard bit is getting the egotist charm merchants to realize that they need the work…. Look at how much better Phil Goff got after a little work in 2011.
Good example of what not to do over the last decade are English, Brash, and Shearer, all of whom suck at the performance art part of their profession – and mostly for the same reason.
BTW: You are bigoted sleazeball with the approximate social skills of a female hyena in heat. And since I have the time, I’m going to reserve your comments for the next few weeks for some social training.
KK
Which particular dimension are you currently living in?
It is harder than you think when you have other things you actually enjoy doing. Every time I get an invite, I think about the many hours that I’d have to cut away from programming and the projects to devote to a low bandwidth (ie data over time) performance art. Not to mention that I’d have to pretend to be “nice”… urrggh
LOLZ, the evil baby lookalike is still stinging from the last visit, hence ‘big brother Mike’ having a go at the Standard via RadioNZ National yesterday…
He will….once he’s practiced his spiel in front of a mirror. Then it’ll be pomposity personified
I’d love it if the “sane and reasonable”, Hooton, who as we know never ever, nosiree makes any extremist remarks were to make an appearance. I’d remind him of his history of shilling for work at the “Marlborough Sounds Symposia” with racists and Anders Brevik fanboys.
Bryce Edwards, who actually studies and analyses media an politics, shows he has a very high regard for The Standard. His regular NZ Politics Daily in on the NRB today.
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/nz-politics-daily-new-year-revolution-ck-134731
It s an excellent review of all the media outlets , whether modern or old-fashioned!
I am a little amazed that the only major leftie group making the news is The Standard!
So far this year the MSM media have profiled:
– John Key on holiday
– John Key dishing out knighthoods
– John Key fainting
– John Key in Antarctica
– Jonh Key confirming that he will accelerate asset sales depending on the Supreme Court ruling, and today
– John Key promoting or demoting MPs
and on the weekend it will be John Key opening stuff in Auckland
…which gives him plenty of momentum for setting out Parliament and policy precisely the way he wants it.
Does David Shearer exist? The political year was his to take… and hasn’t.
Not sure what the leadership team around David Shearer is thinking, but it sure isn’t amounting to anything other than a complete gift to the government. Hey Trevor, hey Mike, complain about The Standard all you like, but it’s getting better political cut-through than Labour’s own leader!
Bring back Slippery dancing like a autistic spastic is what i say, it’s all so straight to have what was a budding ‘Crusty the Clown’ routine which turned the Office of New Zealand Prime Minister into a laughing stock curtailed in its infancy,
Looks like we will have the other guise of Office of the Prime minister back again, nothing more than the salesman’s shack found on any used car sales lot back until the little shyster is let out of the closet once more…
The labour press lot are on their umpteenth re-re-rehearsal of the speech for the Summer School gig.
ahhh yep – now I get it. The problem with Labour is that they have a propensity to stutter.
Let’s make allowances then shall we?
Just as well they don’t lithp, or they’d have Garth McVicar on their backs
Or just preparing for a come back of Shane Jones to the front bench?
Unbelievable! And when I read the blurb on the front page of Stuff predicting/foretelling a comeback to the front bench for a Labour Party MP, I was thinking DC. But Jones! 🙄
Ach! Stuff changed the article while I was typing. Now all mention of a Shane Jones comeback has been removed. It’s totally Smith comeback affirmed.
LOLZ, they messin with your head karol…
Maybe the Jones reference was all in my head?
No, Robert Winter saw it as well. http://robertwinter.blogspot.co.nz/2013/01/a-joke.html
Here is the link
Reshuffles for Key, Shearer
DEIDRE MUSSEN, TRACY WATKINS AND THE NELSON MAIL
Last updated 10:57 22/01/2013
“Two senior politicians could be back from the wilderness when Prime Minister John Key and Labour leader David Shearer reshuffle their leadership teams.”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/politics/8207314/Reshuffles-for-Key-Shearer
Thanks, KV. Yes, that’s it. If Shearer is only “considering” reinstating Jones, then I’d suggest to him he doesn’t. That’d be a really backward step for Labour.
Nah just the Stuff site moving stuff around just as your writing about it, Google has a bad habit of doing the same to me,
Occasionally i am embarrassed enough by one comment i have made or another as to have to provide the proof to the assertion so made,
I have found that at times the web page i have linked to in an endeavor to do just that on second attempts at a visit have disappeared,
Being a total paranoid i have to assume that ‘they’ are watching…
being a total cynic, I just assume that “they” are fecking stupid 🙂
Sometimes a phrase search of Stuff brings up the lost article, now with a heading that actually reflects the contents and the random segue simply cut into a different story altogether.
Drat.,,,,I had money on our own Trevor getting the nod. I think he would be an excellent Speaker and Parliamentry Ambssdador.
Lockwood (what were his parents thinking?) Smith has done a very good job. However I think Trevor would help make parliament relevant to that great mass who are cynical about it.
If Labour wins with a stong majority maybe he will get it. That is if he is in parliament next term. Is Shearer gonna announce the resignations this week?
Simon Bridges: Minister of Energy and Resources, Minister of Labour, Associate Minister for Climate Change Issues.
Minister for onanism 😆
He should try and get Jamie Lee a job as his right hand man.
Great to see Nikki Kaye elevated into cabinet, wonderful to see such young, gifted talent having been groomed to rule, finally in their rightful positions!
A “flash” mix that would be. “Si” and “wee Jamie” Ha Ha Ha. Both snotty narcissists. They’d scratch one anothers eyes out. Ho Ho Ho.
This looks article worthy.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/8208317/Govt-could-run-housing-land-supply-English
National copying Labour (pushing housing policy) and ignoring the sensible option of higher density accomodation.
I was just reading that article, and thinking how it fits with my argument about MSM “impartiality”.
It just focuses mainly on the Labour an National policies, with a little bit from deputy Auckland mayor, Penny Hulse. It leaves out a lot of the most crucial and urgent issues: eg the need for more state housing.
Medium density housing is a good thing to consider as well.
Headline: “Govt could run housing land supply – English” Nanny state? Where are the ravers?
well, you’ll probably find that English’s ideas run along the lines of removing pesky building codes, resource consents and population density constraints. Short words: help slumlords build slums.
Absolute bulls**t, i suggest that dan1 read the frigging article properly, in one breath Bill says the Government could legislate to make building land available and in the next Bill says they aint going to do that as they have no mandate,
“leave it to the market’ Bill is simply making noises in the hope that next week the tiny little minds that run the New Zealand main-stream media will have moved on to a knitting competition or something…
Settle down Bad12! Take another ritalin! It was not so long ago that the right wing ravers would demolish any suggestiion of government interference with the cry “Nanny State”. Whether English follows up or nor not is irrelevant. The hypocrisy is startling.
Your over-reaction will give credence to Mike Williams who has a very poor opinion of the contributors to this blog.
Seriously though, who gives a fuck about that? Let the talking heads spin as much as they like.
CV, I disagree with Williams, but with Bad12 so off track, Williams will get credibility.
Williams will get credibility exactly where, Williams was an idiot when He flew off to Australia during an election campaign to dig up the dirt on the Slippery little Shyster we currently have as Prime Minister,and, was an even bigger one when He flew back here armed with nothing except His snide stupidity,
The total silence after that little bit of self inflation of the ego by Williams was deafening and i can only assume that He spent the time in Oz getting pissed over His inability to sway the electorate,
Squealing Nanny State might be the level of political discourse that supporters of the present Slippery lead National Government might rise to but i fear that such debate here on the pages of the Standard is of a more robust nature,
Ritalin??? not my drug of choice, these days i am more a cup of tea type along with a good puff on some home grown tobacco, although in the 80’s most of which i have little memory of i was partial to the odd tab of acid and not the battery type either,
dan1 scores a rather large ‘F’ for failure to carry a lucid argument in His first comment and then compounding upon the mistake by attempting to muster a scarecrow in the form of the dickless ex Labour Prez as a branch with which to score some form of brownie point only relevant in His own mind…
Chris Trotter’s latest post is a response to Eddie’s post on the Standard, in which he mentions a possibility that Shearer will put his leadership up for a party wide vote in February:
Trotter argues that it is too soon for Cunliffe to benefit from a full leadership contest, and that Robertson would be the likely winner. He also speculates on Eddie’s role in stimulating leadership rumours in a way that seems highly contestable to me:
Frankly, assuming the election period lasts as much as 3-6 months, even if everybody piles on, the leader at the end of it would have demonstrated grit and probably some communication skills, too. Good for labour, well timed for the election.
Organising and doing the school hall meetings and community debates up and down the country as part of a serious Primaries Process would require this much time.
Labour Party members and affiliate members all through NZ should have the chance to see the leadership candidates debate live, and to hear them answer tough questions from the audience.
A month, tops. Not that its going to happen.
If labour is like other parties I’ve been part of, lec meetings are monthly. They’d need a couple of months so every lec has an opportunity to meet the candidates/discuss material and the issues. Not to mention then mailing out voting forms for those who can’t do the net.
No way the candidates would go to every LEC in the country. It’d be halls in the bigger cities, maybe an online debate or two. A couple of weeks of campaigning, a week or two for the LEC’s to meet and one more week for the ballot to be held.
That would in my opinion be a sad waste of a good opportunity to generate some much needed publicity for the Labour Party,
A 3 month road trip by the candidates around all the cities and bigger towns while carting along for the ride on the bus selected journo’s and maybe a Campbell Live reporter would invigorate the Party and add new members,
Your continual assertion that Shearer’s leadership will not be tested by the Party-wide vote is also sad as in my view the only possible means of Him gaining full support of those who will stuff the letterboxes with election material and such would be the endorsement of the whole Party…
indeed – there’s no reason to rush it, and actually more debate means more exposure of labour’s policies, particularly if everyone can avoid acting like dicks. Worth a try, anyway.
TRP is keen for the whole process to kick off and be all over within 3-4 weeks.
The interesting thing about this is that Mumblefuck is now backed into a corner. If he doesn’t open his leadership up to a vote, then his weakness will be hanging over his head forever.
His “decisiveness” has now blown up in his face. Let’s see him put that on a barbeque and sizzle it!
Robertson… Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear oh dear. He’s Labour’s Brezhnev – a vain, supercilious apparatchik who will prove supreme at securing his position – and supreme outside that in driving the party into an ever-diminishing spiral of mediocrity.
Labour needs its Gorbachev – someone who may have arisen within the system, but nonetheless someone with inflexible core principles that my cost him his job, but save the nation.
Whilst I acknowledge Mr Robertson has done some good speaking in the house, I understand that he has been part of the strategy team over recent years and therefore my view of his credibility and capability has plummeted. Need someone who has some credentials to bring to the table, more than a failed opposition approach.
@ Karol
Yeah, I put my 2 cents worth in on that article and was going to post a link here except its already been posted!
I enjoyed some of Trotters recent articles, on reading them, I thought that he must have had a new wave of inspiration, and then this [mentioned] article came along. What’s with the conspiracy style implications of “Eddie”? Not very impressive.
I just watched Mr Shearer making a comment on Nats reshuffle this evening on Prime News and really, at the risk of receiving rabid “anti-criticism” responses, I really do wonder how it could be that the whole of NZ can’t cough up someone with a bit more presence and credibility than Mr Shearer for the leader of one of the main political parties in NZ.
Speaking isn’t everything, yet this state of affairs is laughable. What is with it??
Nailed!.
A ‘cult,’ according to Merriam-Webster, can be defined as “Great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work..(and)..a usually small group of people characterized by such devotion.”
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/01/21
Straight talk follows:
Re the cats, Gareth Morgan, get f….d !
Re the return of Smith, bourgeoisie of Forest & Bird, get f….d !
Easy to be mouthy with your f….d ideas when you’re sitting on 40 mill’ or whatever it is handsome “kitty” Gareth.
Have a little think you arseholes about the penniless pensioner who finds life tolerable only ‘cos of their little cat.
Not that it’s ever gonna’ happen but entitled to talk shit rich guys not that many years away from licking Tory arse, and the oh so proper bourgeoisie piss me off !
Had a wee laugh at Gareth’s latest ‘idea’ and the after-thought was that He was in for one hell of a cat-scratching from the lovers of that particular furry friend,
While i happen to like the furry little critters Gareth does have a good point vis a vis the damage they can and do inflict upon the natural species that also occupy the space,
That cute little kitty when kicked out the door at night for the crime of constantly hogging the best spot on or in the bed has the propensity to roam across a range of 3 square kilometers knocking off anything of such size as said cat is able to dispatch with ease and in most cases of the family moggy simply for the sport involved in the act of teasing and killing various species,
The neighbours cat, a friend of mine,(the cat not the neighbour), has a constant bowl of food on the front porch and at times the cat can be seen reclining upon a chair above the food bowl while birds of different variety eat the left overs,
A strange cat this one, He is often found perched on the fence between my and the neighbour on the other side’s place, that neighbour keeps pigeon’s and the cat falls asleep on the fence to the sound of the massed pigeon choir purring His little face off and drooling like a loon,
The neighbour’s keeping of such bird life was an eye opener for me as He doesn’t race them and i received a scornful look when i impolitely inquired if He ate them, a slave to the rythem He spends an inordinate amount of each day scraping pigeon poo from the confines of the sheds the poor wee things spend their lives occupying,
But i digress, while Gareth’s idea of knocking off the entire cat population might be a little over the top i can see nothing wrong with the critters when kept as pets being suitably caged or confined to the inner realms of their various residencies…
Just seen Campbell telling us about 3’s poll on cats.
Choices “Yes” or “No”.
How do I vote “Get F….d” ?
Does it cost extra ?
Answers before 7.30 please.
I congratulate The Standard on the practice of picking up important articles from other blogs and providing a means of discussion. In particular I enjoy the issues picked up from I/S at NRT – many of those posts break stories may not become ‘mainstream’ news until days or weeks later, or worryingly just disappear. Well done
Congratulate I/S. He writes them and allows us to reproduce them….
I guess in a way I was thanking I/S – in a public forum rather than writing privately through his website. I do believe it is to the credit of The Standard though to pick up a range of posts for discussion. As a country we would be better off with more open discussion, instead National are cutting back on public reporting (hat-tip NRT again) – one of the few good news items about guns in America was hearing that resources are going to be put into study of the effect of guns in the USA – after years of suppression instigated by the gun lobby. Through being prepared to encourage and allow reasonable debate on a wide range of issues, The Standard has changed political debate in NZ – mainstream media appear to be starting to realise that.
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Me, Myself, and II am webmaster for Sensible Sentencing Trust http://www.safenz.org.nz. and live in an apartment in Newmarket. I do housework once a year whether I need to or not. My partner is the love of my life and he is the best thing that has happened to me. I also collect 1:18 scale model American cars, and work in my paid job as a Telco Network Engineer supporting Wide Area Networks over ATM, fibre, ADSL and G.SHDSL plus some old ISDN legacy technology
MusicJJ Cale, Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, George Jones, Dale Watson, Kenny Rogers, Tony Joe White, plus some blues eg John Lee Hooker, Solomon Burke etc (my partner hates all of them)Films2001 A Space Odyssey, Coal Miner’s Daughter, (partner hates these as well)SportsNo (partner likes sport)Happiest WhenCuddled up with my partner (probably not listening to music though!)
This is Peter Jenkins Garth Mcvicars kick talking about his gay partner
http://www.bebo.com/Profile.jsp?MemberId=12262143
Me, Myself, and II am webmaster for Sensible Sentencing Trust http://www.safenz.org.nz. and live in an apartment in Newmarket. I do housework once a year whether I need to or not. My partner is the love of my life and he is the best thing that has happened to me.
Bebo? You still stuck in 2007? I thought the only people who used bebo were 19 years old Black Power prospects and their 17 year old groupies?