Are all police allowed to lie under oath in any hearing?
And are they allowed indemnity from investigation and prosecution if they are caught out?
Or is the power to lie under oath with indemnity only permitted for senior police in exceptional, or politically charged cases?
In a thinly veiled threat, the Police Association have backed Chief Inspector Grant Wormald, demanding that he must not be investigated for committing perjury in the Kim Dotcom hearing.
With this sort of open (and secret) support, it is little wonder that Chief Inspector Grant Wormald has now been proven to be no stranger to giving false testimony under oath in another hearing.
For allowing senior police to exercise this new power to gain convictions in court against those the state have already determined must be found guilty, I would like to grant the new title of Detective Inspector Wormtongue, in honour of Detective Inspector Grant Wormald for openly and boldy pioneering this new police policy.
Police have always felt free to lie under oath, with a compliant judiciary accepting almost anything they say. What’s new about the Red Devils case is that they have made deceiving the courts central to the operation. If this makes a few judges treat their evidence with the cynicism it deserves, that will be a step forward.
And the police spokesperson shows that Key’s “in charge but oblivious” leadership style is trickling down: “Detective Inspector Wormald was the officer in charge of the investigation but was not a decision-maker in regard to the arrest and prosecution of Mr Wilson”.
Happened under his watch, he might have even known about it, but it wasn’t his decision… [spit]
And it is bullshit that politicians do not influence police decisions or have a quiet word on the side which is called interference. e.g. Banks statement being blacked out.
What gets me is when Key says the police are independent.
Ropata … thanks for the Steven Keen lecture. Some of the material is New Zealand specific and you won’t get these details laid out like this elsewhere.
Highly recommended for anyone here who is even remotely interested in economics. Warning he talks pretty fast and it’s likely a dense download.
The crucial point to grasp is that Keen is a real mathematician, and that much of what he is saying here is backed by the kind of language, tools and thinking that engineers understand works in the real world. This might not be clear from the lecture.
welcome.. keen has a fair bit of ego but he’s a very smart dude.. and shows how NZ’s property bubble (private debt vs GDP) is around the worst in the OECD. (although the UK and USA current account deficits are insanely worse than anyone’s)
OK … just finished listening to the whole thing. In some ways better than the Wgtn lecture I was at, especially the Q+A session at the end. Really worthwhile even though it’s close to a couple of hours long.
You’ve got to remember that being a heterodox economist, Keen was considered an outsider, a lone ranger by the wider (Chicago school/Washingon consensus) economics profession. And he still is by in large, but the GFC greatly changed that and he has also found other audiences now.
Frankly you need a bit of inner fortitude and ego when your neoclassical colleagues are used to dumping on your work from a great height.
I’ve watched the first half hour so far. It’s interesting and useful, though I think I’ll only remember a couple of main points. It’ll probably take me a while to get through the whole 1.5 hours. I will remember the quote(or a version of it) from a delusional mainstream economist that went something like this: he descrbed an increase in uneployment as “an increase in American’s leisure time”.
One key point: the level of economic activity in our modern economies is based on the acceleration of debt. When people get into more debt faster, employment improves and economic activity increases.
When the rate of increase in debt slows down, or shock horror, goes negative, both employment and the economy tanks.
The banks and financiers can tell ahead of time when the housing market is going to go up or down, based on how much mortgage debt they can observe themselves issuing.
And by observing the rate of general debt they are issuing, banks can predict ahead of time whether an entire economy is going to improve or decline.
AND of course the banks aren’t just neutral bystanders. By actively choosing to tighten or loosen the flow of credit into an economy, the banks and financiers can deliberately push an entire economy into a boom or a bust.
Yet, for the population getting their news from MSM and the evening “news”, it would appear all’s well this Labour Weekend, notwithstanding the inevitable road carnage. (police reviewing their vehicle fleet; fuel related? respond to assault with a Volt)
Sustento: Raf Manji’s econ blog:
– how the high dollar is hollowing out the real economy
– why nz needs not QE but ‘monetary dialysis’
– selling your soul: the unintended consequences of asset sales
“To be, or not to be, that is the question,
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them.” Hamlet, Act III, Scene 1.
It seems, after nearly 30 years of deregulated markets, that we face a sea of troubles ourselves. An extreme global debt deleveraging is upon us, the numbers too outrageous to even consider. Not only have we consumed beyond our means, we have mortgaged our future. Whereas once credit was difficult to come by and banks conservative in their lending (can you pay this back?), the brave new world brought us access to unlimited treasures, all paid for on a credit system, which had limited restraint.
As financial models became more complex and debt could be packaged, securitised and sold off, all sense of restraint was lost. Who owed whom was lost in a parallel universe of metaphor: swap, hedge, collateral, obligation, repurchase. Repaying principal and interest, in the old fashioned sense was put to one side. Can you afford the interest? Don’t worry about the principal, that will pay itself off as the price rises! Can’t afford the interest? Don’t worry, we’ll lend that to you as well, or have a holiday (from interest that is….keeps charging but pay it some other time). Tick, tock, tick, tock.
Exactly. And the point of the Hamlet quote is that we need politicians with the balls to act, and protect the people of NZ from the global pillagers of currency/resources/labour.
On our behalf, Hamlet ponders the road ahead:
“The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er, with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pitch and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action..…”
Save the Ross Sea. Avaaz have enlisted Leonardo di Caprio to spearhead a petition to support the creation of an Antarctic Marine Sanctuary. Russia, South Korea ‘and a few other countries’ want to keep on fishing in those waters. NZ thanks to Gerry Brownlee, Steven Joyce and Whatsit Carter have decided we don’t need to sign that treaty, that it’s ok to ruin that pristine environment.
From reading this I get the impression that Labour are in agreement of the lack of importance in this issue. Why don’t we just mix and match the Lab and Nat MP’s just like we use to do at school into 2 teams. With the captains alternating who was to be picked into each team. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10842069
“Our consistent policy has been to make sure we always use the best science,” Ruth Dyson said, as it had done to support the net bans to protect Maui dolphins.
Ruth Dyson said that while Mr Jones was not the party spokesman on the Ross Sea issue, “he also didn’t say anything that any of us would have gone ‘holy moly – he said what?”‘
Indeed, and sadly the masses believe their thoughts to be originals.
Even the few who are capable of understand the mirage, are still somewhat left to shape thoughts, opinions, behaviours, understandings etc, based on this temporal world.
I’m sure TPTB are sharing all the knowledge with us, for the betterment of humanity /sarc
You have got to wonder why they don’t have a user changeable pin.
My guess the infrastructure is too expensive.
They would nee pin terminals in all the offices and secure computer software to run it.
If PINs are too difficult for the IT whizzes in MSD [lol – probably the same team that ok’d the kiosks] what about the other option you get for credit cards: signatures? Not perfect, or accessible to all, but better than writing it on the card.
Oh but wait, it’s on the back of the card, it’s okay. Damn, couldn’t find the scary movie clip with the photos “they’re all blank!” – “turn them over”
Nah, its another card, another number, another link in the chain a servitude for everyone..
The oldest game plan in the book, is start at the bottom and work your way up while the masses are not paying attention, thinking they are “safe” in theor comfort zones, or too busy to pay attention, possibly both.
Proof from red alert today, as if we needed it, that Labour politicians don’t read left-wing blogs.
The sad thing is, Ms Fenton could have celebrated the hard work and valuable contributions, workers in the paid workforce make, without slapping anyone in the face, not stay-at-home parents, not beneficiaries, not the army of volunteers without whom much of our civilised society would come to a grinding halt, not those caring for a sick or disabled relative, nor the sick, injured or disabled, not the tireless activists who give up a good deal to try and fight injustice and inequality, no-one.
I’m certainly glad to read that Labour is aware of the erosions of the rights, working conditions and wages of paid workers and that it intends to make things better when next in government, even though exactly what they intend to do is always left unsaid.
But to use the headline “Thank You to NZs Workers”, and then write that piece in today, in 2012 is to demonstrate culpably negligent ignorance. And a very dangerous attitude.
I kind of predicted that you’d be the first to say bollocks. The difference is, because you read left-wing blogs you immediately knew what I was talking about, whether you think it is rubbish or not. So you’re ahead of Ms Fenton.
I’m hoping the union movement is evolving in its, in some cases, draconian attitudes on this issue too. Just being aware that there is alternative viewpoint to default assumptions is an important first step, and you’ve already made it whether you wanted to or not, TRP.
I read it, and I agree with js – Fenton, like Shearer, clearly thinks that paid work is the be-all and end-all of human existence.
You can see it right there where she says: They are often the forgotten part of the economic equation, but without workers, no business and no public service could get ahead.
And without unpaid stay-at-home parents, our economy would be fucked. Without an available pool of unemployed people, our economy would be fucked. Without volunteers going unpaid providing the kinds of social support which any government with a soul would be backing, our economy and society would be fucked.
I’m pretty sure it’s possible for Darien Fenton and David Shearer to say “yeah, go workers!” without shitting all over people whose unpaid labour is far more frequently ignored and demeaned.
But that might involve a little backpedalling on Labour’s “deserving poor” rhetoric.
It’s a post about labour day, ffs. Fenton does not “shit on” anyone, nor does she “slap” anyone. Is Fenton supposed to telepathically guess what js and you think needs mentioning in a short blog post about the annual celebration of working NZers? Or is this the start of a campaign to change the name of the day to Labour (and anyone else js and QoT think is worth mentioning) Day?
Yes, you’ve definitely spotted out cunning plan there, TRP.
Or it could be that we think experienced politicians could exercise a modicum of thought when making broad sweeping statements which alienate vast swathes of the population who Labour then expects will vote for them.
Disclaimer: the above statement is in no way intended to be any criticism or derogation, implied or explicit, of any person or persons unable for any reason at all to contribute in any way to the thread referred to, with or without interesting comments under any definition of “interesting” defined as “reasonable” under existing case law, inclusive of but not excluding other groups and expecially not stay-at-home parents, not beneficiaries, not the army of volunteers without whom much of our civilised society would come to a grinding halt, not those caring for a sick or disabled relative, nor the sick, injured or disabled, not the tireless activists who give up a good deal to try and fight injustice and inequality, nor unpaid stay-at-home parents, without whom our economy would be fucked, nor an available pool of unemployed people without whom our economy would be fucked, nor volunteers going unpaid providing the kinds of social support which any government with a soul would be backing, without whom our economy and society would be fucked.
TRP, I’m pretty sure I mentioned paid and unpaid work, beneficiaries etc, in my short-ish blog post on Labour Weekend, “Backwards to the future”. It’s not hard. I’m sure Fenton would also have been up to it, maybe in a different way – there are probably many ways it can be done.
In focusing on the things to celebrate about what was achieved when Labour Day was introduced, it’s quite relevant to update the issues for current conditions. If you look at that link in my post, to the Dunedin 1894 Labour Day Parade image, you will find it says this:
…you can see one of the floats has a banner reading ‘Otago Central Railway We Must Have It’. From the beginning Labour Day parades were often used to draw attention to other political or economic issues – in this case urging the government to complete a controversial regional transport project.
Yep, Karol and I’m sure other commentators made the same link, just as I’m sure many didn’t. Your excellent post was longer and more wide ranging than Fenton’s. Yours was written to bring out the wider implications of work, unemployment, underemployment, non paid work and to bring those strands together. Fenton just wrote a short blog on Labour day for those to whom the day is dedicated. There isn’t a damn thing wrong with either blog post and it’s going to be a sad day if people are condemned for what they didn’t write rather than what they did. Bring back the thought police, I say!
Again, what is your point, QoT? Fenton also completely failed to mention meerkats, the late Elvis Presley and the comedic music hall stylings of the even later Arthur Askey. And she outrageously refused to acknowlege the real significance of today’s date. Yes, it’s Kim Kardashian’s birthday, as we all know. Damn her eyes! Damn her, I say!
A brief Labour Day blogbost from Bowalley Road. In which Chris doesn’t insult those who work outside the paid workforce because from the start he’s completely clear about who he’s talking about. And he doesn’t even mention any other category of worker . It’s really not that hard TRP.
It wasn’t long ago that workers were routinely referred to as ‘men’ and many would have screamed (and some still would, but I don’t think you’d be among them) Political-Correctness-gone-Mad!! if a politician who used such a term was called on it.
Fenton doesn’t insult those ‘outside the paid workforce’, js. You are making shit up. She does actually mention workers who have been laid off, so the whole point of your wankery dissolves right there.
… which still reinforces the idea that paid work = only source of “dignity”, per Shearer.
But given your pathetic little “meerkats” comments above I’m just going to assume from this point that you have no actual interest in debating the actual points js and I have been making.
Ah, that explains it. You’ve got some kind of plug-in installed which replaces all of my and js’ comments with “LALALALALALALA I CAN’T HEAR YOU.”
Let’s be honest, TRP. You think unpaid workers are like meerkats, and as such you see no problem in the Labour Party ignoring their existence and shafting a good proportion of the people who, come election day, Labour will be outraged don’t dutifully show up to vote for them.
TRP, seems like there’s very little faith left to go around.
What happens to a church when the people lose faith in it? Congregations and donations go down. The church becomes less relevant to the every day life of the community.
I wonder what happens when people lose faith in Labour?
Nope, QoT, I was taking the piss, exaggerating for effect. If you want to expound further on why you think the unemployed resemble meerkats, but not Arthur Askey or Elvis, fire away.
Debating ‘what people should have said’ is equally mindless. That’s my complaint about js’s comment, way back up there. Mountain, meet molehill.
Also, gosh, you weren’t literally serious about the meerkats comment? I truly had NO IDEA. I thought you were totally advocating that meerkats’ roles in our economy were equal to unpaid workers’.
You are so right, TRP. In future we can only ever discuss the words people said, and can never, ever infer their meaning, or consider the things they left unsaid, and we can definitely never put their comments into existing context.
So that’s every single post on every single statement ever made by John Key banned by your edict, I suppose. Every suggestion of alternative policies tossed in the bin. Every criticism of every weasel-worded government policy out of line. Wait, no, that’s fucking ridiculous.
Just be honest, TRP – all you really want is for no one to criticise Labour/Darien Fenton, for whatever reason, and you’ll make up blatantly stupid principles of discussion to justify yourself.
I know you aren’t listening TRP, but for anyone else reading this debate please try and imagine this. I could have used any of a wide variety of kinds of examples, but this one is close to my heart.
You are the elderly sole parent and carer of a now adult child with severe disabilities and high needs. You’ve just finished the morning toileting, washing, dressing, and breakfast tasks. It’s taken you just over 3 and a half hours, and you’re already tired though the day has barely begun. Your child is now set for a wee while so you get on the computer with a well-earned cup of tea for a flick around the ‘sphere.
You may not even know it’s Labour day because you don’t get any holidays, your toil is 24/7 and you’re never ever going to have a retirement. You go to Red Alert. God know’s why, it’s not like the Labour Party represents your interests in any way. But hope springs eternal for some.
And the headline says “Thank You to NZ’s Workers”
It’s not like you get much acknowlegment let alone thanks for your valuable contribution to your community so you read on. And what do you find? The morning slog that has worn you out and set your arthritic body throbbing, along with the last forty years of similar toil has not been work. You had thought you would literally work until the moment you drop dead. You’ve probably saved the country millions in the cost of institutional care, but more importantly, you always done your very best for your beloved child. But in fact this is not work because there is no pay cheque (or holidays, sick days, minimum conditions or labour regualtions) it’s actually something else that will drain all your resources until you die :leisure.
A point well made js. I see where you’re coming from now, but I’m sure the labour blog didn’t deliberately exclude carers and volunteers. Love isn’t measured in dollar terms but without it our society has no soul.
ropata, the problem isn’t just Darien Fenton’s blog making unpaid workers invisible. It’s that it comes right after Shearer did a speech which quite clearly spelled out that if you’re not in paid work, you have no dignity and make no contribution to your community.
That’s the context Fenton’s blog post sits in, which is why her however-accidental erasing of people’s unpaid work is seriously problematic to me.
Well yes I’ve read both and I can take something I like from both. And yes if I had to choose I’d pick Chris Trotter’s post for two reasons:
1. Unlike some around here I’ve long admired Chris for the steadfastness of his moral compass. Sure there are some themes and topics he’s definitely not PC on, but I’m prepared to set them aside. And even on a bad day he still writes the arse off anyone else on the left in this country.
2. Chris goes somewhat deeper into the root of the issue; the madness that is the neo-liberal experiment; an experiment that was perhaps implemented more ruthlessly in this country than any other.
But then Darien is a Labour Party MP, the party of union workers, not the ‘non-workers’. And after 30 years of neo-liberalism the interests of unionised workers cannot be decoupled from the interests of the state and business owners. After all no business = no jobs. This equation has always been an achilles heel for labour, creating an incipient fault-line for the right to drive wedges down.
There are far too many low-paid working families, working 80hrs or more a week, broken shifts and a broken family life who look across the back fence to a DPB family who don’t seem to be all that much worse off. Frankly it just does not feel fair and fuels resentment.
Of course the root cause is the miserable wages the working family is getting, yet a National govt will re-frame this unfairness with the welfare family cast as bludgers, whose miserable existence should be made even more dire in order to make things right in the world again.
Let’s try and be a little clearer who the real opponent is here.
Pitting the working class against the underclass would have to be one of the stupidest things we could do at this point in time.
Of course Fenton technically didn’t do anything other than render non-employed workers invisible. If on the rest of the year those workers were acknowledged and respected then it wouldn’t matter that on Labour Day only the paid workers were (and the historical context honoured). But they aren’t, so I have to agree with QoT, it’s a very significant omission.
Other than that, the blogpost is a pretty poor showing from a political party that is meant to be based on workers.
Unite is a union for low paid workers unemployed and beneficiaries. The Waitemata Branch of Unite includes students, mothers, carers, those with illnesses or disabilities, unemployed, full time and casual workers. We are all members of the working class and united we will win!
I’m certainly glad to read that Labour is aware of the erosions of the rights, working conditions and wages of paid workers and that it intends to make things better when next in government, even though exactly what they intend to do is always left unsaid.
That, IMO, is because they don’t actually intend to do anything.
A relaxing change from dealing with topics of great importance to us and the world!! Attendees even doze off during the day’s sessions. The Boring Lectures. Sounded intriguing on Radionz this morning. Blurb:
Labour Day 22/10 – 10:25 James Ward
James Ward is a boredom enthusiast who blogs at I Like Boring Things. He is the founder and organiser of the annual Boring Conference in London. Boring 2012 takes place in November.
On Labour Day the NZ Herald takes the oppurtunity to rip into David Shearer simply for saying that NZ workers should have first dibs on earthquake recovery jobs.
God forbid we should start training up our own workforce, instead of just importing it, as what has been happening for the past 20 years, resulting in mass unemployment and low wages.
Turn the immigration taps off, and youth unemployment will vanish overnight.
A Film 🙂
How Far Is Heaven: a film by Christopher Pryor & Miriam Smith
Official Selection New Zealand International Film Festival 2012
It is about Hiruharama on the Whanganui River.
Did you know, that the Turkish Government attempted to prosecute citizen publishers of Chomsky’s
“Manufacturing Consent” under laws concerning Destabilisation of Society? I wonder how long before freedom of speech becomes circumscribed here; not to say, I do not think Hate Speech is helping the cohesion of our society at all, in fact, I am perpetually perplexed how TPTB allow it to proliferate the way that it has, and is continuing to. As Ellul challenges, “What price freedom?”
Mark Solomon presented the position of Iwi well on the MSM current affairs I thought; he is correct, that individual dividends to all whanau would not stretch very far, and that like the Police, members are as varied in outlook as the people that make up our Nation
And, I think the political labelling “maori mafia” is not very helpful; Do the MSM label the Business Round Tables the “capitalist cartels” ?
I have not heard Darien Fenton utter anything useful in my observations, and Jacinda comes across as “whiny”
I saw an attitude written on a postcard recently; “Oh well, What shall I complain about today?”;
Made me stop and reflect, as I do everytime I read personality labels, narcissist, psychopath, sociopath, etc; I revised on this this morning and the presence of these traits in our society reflect the change in Values we have witnessed in our lifetimes, particularly pertaining to the significance of children, as children remain children for increasingly short time-spans these days..and Personality is a construct that varies within people across contexts and time (thankfully)
Now, having been to the Supermarket, and being the observant chappie that I am, there does appear to be a developing trend for consumers to select more primary whole foods for their trolleys than the sugar and fat laden processed cardboard…round the outside..round the outside
there are different types of flesh, yet, all flesh is grass.
if you will, you can become all flame
-sayings of the desert fathers 103 (that’s where I’m headed, that’s where I belong; sure I do more harm than help occasionally)
same. Only costs $40 to feed me for a week (not counting fish and chips)
protein-beef, lamb or salmon
green and coloured vegetables
1 loaf of wholegrain bread
avocados
butter.cheese
vegemite
changing diet and habits after decades of “modern socialised living” is unsettling though
I read today that prescriptions for anti-depressants are up 40% in our province over last six years, and my previous GP is an apologist for them; I understand his position, yet, much dis-ease is socio-genic in etiology, and it is just so corrupt that investors are profiting off peoples social misery; that is why I started commenting on this blog, as in Hamlet above; Interestingly, despite their detractors, the socially oriented Christian Churches, amongst other faiths, are labouring at the coal face in very real terms to alleviate the suffering brought about by this government in particular.
many Christians are not motivated by “increasing” their congregations size or contribution; It is just the power of the gospels; Imagine the Industrial Revolution, Fordism, Modern War and Modern Economic and Political Ideologies without the handbrakes of Judeo-Christian based Values?
Critics always refer to the “evils” carried out in the name of God; Humans carried out those actions.
Most people I read or hear who are scathing of faith have no depth of background in philosophy, history, theology or science holistically; The proverbs that guide Christian conduct begin with Wisdom is to Fear God. (that’s why I never debate my faith)
and the mystery just increases in a comforting way every day.
God Bless
Sample of the actual religion of our society … “Kraft International, especially in developing markets, should continue to realize solid growth as it leverages the Cadbury acquisition and benefits from continued Cadbury cost synergies. The company is likely to realize $300 million of revenue synergies in 2012 by distributing Kraft’s biscuit products in Cadbury outlets in Mexico (approximately 380,000 outlets), distributing Oreo and Tang products in Cadbury outlets (approximately 380,000 outlets) in India and doubling its distribution in Brazil with this acquisition (from 300,000 to 600,000 outlets).”
– Ashish Sharma, “Kraft Foods: Safe Stock with Upside Potential”, The Motley Fool Blog Network, 13 August 2012
When Kraft bought Cadbury (weep for the Quaker brothers, for they had a vision of a socially just society – eg they championed the emerging working class, and boycotted beans from African slavery plantations),
Kraft was less interested in Cadbury chocolates, but more greedily wanted to grab and control the distribution networks.
Mana’s solution to abolishing GST is to bring in a financial transaction tax – first mooted by a bunch of Social Credit weirdos driving Skodas and now openly advocated by crazies like the president of France. If you want to know how this much-maligned tax, also known as a “Hone Heke tax”, would work, go to an automatic banking machine. Every time you make a transaction you pay a small fee. If you travel overseas and change money, you also pay a financial transaction tax, except that foreign exchange dealers call it commission. When a bank taxes you on a transaction it’s called responsible financial management. When Hone Harawira suggests that the government do the same, it’s crazy Maori radical activism.
A bank ATM has no problem charging you $1 to withdraw $60 in cash. A 1.7% tax by the bank.
Most proposed FTT’s are around 1/20 or 1/50 this sum. And of course, that’s because FTT’s are designed to penalise financial speculators who conduct high frequency financial markets trading.
Yep. Yet the banks will scream at a 0.1% FTT while they are more than happy to charge you and me a 3% difference when changing NZD into Australian dollars.
To be honest I’m a little frustrated that we keep on re-inventing the wheel here. Gareth Morgan has pretty much nailed it … all the essential components of a thorough reform of the tax system are there and he’s done a credible job of crunching the numbers. Why not take it more seriously?
Is it just because Morgan isn’t perceived as a proper leftie?
Damn, now I’m trying to remember if Morgan had an FTT in with his CCT.
The thing about our tax system is that it’s had centuries of build up of little fixes. It really needs to be taken back to basics and redesigned completely then give about a years notice that the old rules and precedents are going out and an entirely new system coming in.
And it’s not just “Hone and Hollande” but that well known Skoda driver and social anarchist Angela Merkel – as well as finance ministers from 11 Euro zone countries: Eleven euro states back ftt
On Tuesday 23 October 2012 – the Government is planning to consider and approve an Order in Council for Cabinet and the Executive Council to remove Mighty river Power from the State Owned Enterprises Act.
Voting machine and results scrutiny in the USA for the 2004 election and others by
blackboxvoting.org definitely show skullduggery. The attitude of all officials involved seems shamelessly casual to me.
Blackbox have a video recording all that they do. One move was to search for records themselves that had been requested under their information act. The dockets they had been supplied had been recently prepared and they had asked for copies of the signed originals.. So a search at the electoral processing facility brought to light rubbish bags with voting figure dockets signed by the clerks at the time of finalising, and these were being thrown out although by law they should have been held for 22 months I think. At least one docket differed by more than 100 votes from the recently issued one presented to them.
Let’s not have electronic voting by anyone. And allowing private companies to run this essential government procedure is criminal. Up against the wall and firing squad criminal. That excuse that required information is commercially sensitive is just one of the reasons for not having a bar of private involvement, even contractor help.
If the idea ever comes up in NZ it needs to be sunk once and for all.
It’s a change that’s going to happen and you can’t stop it. The best idea would be to ensure that we don’t use the same system as the US – in other words, engage with the process.
Make it done by government department rather than private business. Make it OpenSource so that people can actually see it and test it. Make it so that people can check how their vote was recorded and be able to change it if it was recorded incorrectly. Make it a three part entry system using either a security token or the same system that Kiwibank uses. Both systems are nearly impossible to break.
Online voting paves the way for even more democracy and less corruption. Leaving it as is leaves all the power in the hands of the politicians and their owners.
Online voting paves the way for even more democracy and less corruption. Leaving it as is leaves all the power in the hands of the politicians and their owners.
I think you are far too optimistic about the use of technology, all these pins and barriers to make the information safe, don’t make it easier and it would become more burdensome for some people than travelling or walking to what should be a nearby polling booth for most.
And there is the means for computer programmers and companies employing them to make small secret changes that negatively affect the probity of the system and large numbers of voters, and their ability to make decisions as to who is going to assist or constrain their lives. I say again you are too positive. I know programmers who are good people for sure but everybody doesn’t hold to sacred ethics of the highest behaviour. Especially when there is money in it and its hard to uncover.
It's hard times try to make a livingYou wake up every morning in the unforgivingOut there somewhere in the cityThere's people living lives without mercy or pityI feel good, yeah I'm feeling fineI feel better then I have for the longest timeI think these pills have been good for meI ...
In 1974, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Nixon, finding that the President was not a King, but was subject to the law and was required to turn over the evidence of his wrongdoing to the courts. It was a landmark decision for the rule ...
Every day now just seems to bring in more fresh meat for the grinder.In their relentlessly ideological drive to cut back on the “excessive bloat” (as they see it) of the previous Labour-led government, on the mountains of evidence accumulated in such a short period of time do not ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Megan Valére SosouMarket gardening site of the Itchèléré de Itagui agricultural cooperative in Dassa-Zoumè (Image credit: Megan Valère Sossou) For the residents of Dassa-Zoumè, a city in the West African country of Benin, choosing between drinking water and having enough ...
Buzz from the Beehive Melissa Lee – as may be discerned from the screenshot above – has not been demoted for doing something seriously wrong as Minister of ...
Morning in London Mother hugs beloved daughter outside the converted shoe factory in which she is living.Afternoon in London Travelling writer takes himself and his wrist down to A&E, just to be sure. Read more ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – The recent announcement of the University Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Peter Gluckman, makes very clear where the Government’s focus and priorities lie. The remit of the Advisory Group is that Group members will consider challenges and opportunities for improvement in the university sector including: ...
Eric Crampton writes – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand desperately wants to find reasons to have workstreams in climate change. It makes little sense. They’ve run another stress test on the banks looking to see if they could find a prudential regulation case. They couldn’t. They ...
Rob MacCullough writes – Pundits from the left and the right are arguing that National’s Fast Track Bill that is designed to speed up infrastructure decisions could end up becoming mired in a cesspool of corruption. Political commentator ...
Looking at the headlines this morning it’s hard to feel anything other than pessimistic about the future of humanity.Note that I’m not speaking about the future of mankind, but the survival of our humanity. The values that we believe in seem to be ebbing away, by the day.Perhaps every generation ...
Swabbing mixed breed baby chicks to test for avian influenzaUh oh. Bird flu – often deadly to humans – is not only being transmitted from infected birds to dairy cows, but is now travelling between dairy cows. As of last Friday, Bloomberg News reports, there were 32 American dairy herds ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
Photo # 1 I am a huge fan of Singapore’s approach to housing, as described here two years ago by copying and pasting from The ConversationWhat Singapore has that Australia does not is a public housing developer, the Housing Development Board, which puts new dwellings on public and reclaimed land, ...
Buzz from the Beehive Reactions to news of the government’s readiness to make urgent changes to “the resource management system” through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes don’t go far enough. Greenpeace says ...
I’m starting to wonder if Anna Burns-Francis might be the best political interviewer we’ve got. That might sound unlikely to you, it came as a bit of a surprise to me.Jack Tame can be excellent, but has some pretty average days. I like Rebecca Wright on Newshub, she asks good ...
Chris Trotter writes – Willie Jackson is said to be planning a “media summit” to discuss “the state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalism”. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes – This morning [April 21], the Wellington High Court is hearing a judicial review brought by Hon. Karen Chhour, the Minister for Children, against a decision of the Waitangi Tribunal. This is unusual, judicial reviews are much more likely to brought against ministers, rather than ...
Both of Parliament’s watchdogs have now ripped into the Government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s political economy and beyond on the morning of Tuesday, April 23 are:The Lead: The Auditor General,John Ryan, has joined the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Sarah SpengemanPeople wait to board an electric bus in Pune, India. (Image credit: courtesy of ITDP) Public transportation riders in Pune, India, love the city’s new electric buses so much they will actually skip an older diesel bus that ...
The infrastructure industry yesterday issued a “hurry up” message to the Government, telling it to get cracking on developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects.The hiatus around the change of Government has seen some major projects cancelled and others delayed, and there is uncertainty about what will happen with the new ...
Hi,Over the weekend I revisited a podcast I really adore, Dead Eyes. It’s about a guy who got fired from Band of Brothers over two decades ago because Tom Hanks said he had “dead eyes”.If you don’t recall — 2001’s Band of Brothers was part of the emerging trend of ...
Buzz from the Beehive The 180 or so recipients of letters from the Government telling them how to submit infrastructure projects for “fast track” consideration includes some whose project applications previously have been rejected by the courts. News media were quick to feature these in their reports after RMA Reform Minister Chris ...
It would not be a desirable way to start your holiday by breaking your back, your head, or your wrist, but on our first hour in Singapore I gave it a try.We were chatting, last week, before we started a meeting of Hazel’s Enviro Trust, about the things that can ...
Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure that the new Fast-Track Approvals Bill – currently being pushed through by the ...
Feel worried. Shane Jones and a couple of his Cabinet colleagues are about to be granted the power to override any and all objections to projects like dams, mines, roads etc even if: said projects will harm biodiversity, increase global warming and cause other environmental harms, and even if ...
Bryce Edwards writes- The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. ...
Michael Bassett writes – If you think there is a move afoot by the radical Maori fringe of New Zealand society to create a parallel system of government to the one that we elect at our triennial elections, you aren’t wrong. Over the last few days we have ...
Without a corresponding drop in interest rates, it’s doubtful any changes to the CCCFA will unleash a massive rush of home buyers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, April 22 included:The Government making a ...
Sunday was a lazy day. I started watching Jack Tame on Q&A, the interviews are usually good for something to write about. Saying the things that the politicians won’t, but are quite possibly thinking. Things that are true and need to be extracted from between the lines.As you might know ...
In our Weekly Roundup last week we covered news from Auckland Transport that the WX1 Western Express is going to get an upgrade next year with double decker electric buses. As part of the announcement, AT also said “Since we introduced the WX1 Western Express last November we have seen ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 29 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Stats NZ releases its statutory report on Census 2023 tomorrow.Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivers a pre-Budget speech at ...
A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 14, 2024 thru Sat, April 20, 2024. Story of the week Our story of the week hinges on these words from the abstract of a fresh academic ...
The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. The Government says this will ...
This is a column to say thank you. So many of have been in touch since Mum died to say so many kind and thoughtful things. You’re wonderful, all of you. You’ve asked how we’re doing, how Dad’s doing. A little more realisation each day, of the irretrievable finality of ...
Identifying the engine type in your car is crucial for various reasons, including maintenance, repairs, and performance upgrades. Knowing the specific engine model allows you to access detailed technical information, locate compatible parts, and make informed decisions about modifications. This comprehensive guide will provide you with a step-by-step approach to ...
Introduction: The allure of racing is undeniable. The thrill of speed, the roar of engines, and the exhilaration of competition all contribute to the allure of this adrenaline-driven sport. For those who yearn to experience the pinnacle of racing, becoming a race car driver is the ultimate dream. However, the ...
Introduction Automobiles have become ubiquitous in modern society, serving as a primary mode of transportation and a symbol of economic growth and personal mobility. With countless vehicles traversing roads and highways worldwide, it begs the question: how many cars are there in the world? Determining the precise number is a ...
Maintaining a safe and reliable vehicle requires regular inspections. Whether it’s a routine maintenance checkup or a safety inspection, knowing how long the process will take can help you plan your day accordingly. This article delves into the factors that influence the duration of a car inspection and provides an ...
Mazda Motor Corporation, commonly known as Mazda, is a Japanese multinational automaker headquartered in Fuchu, Aki District, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan. The company was founded in 1920 as the Toyo Cork Kogyo Co., Ltd., and began producing vehicles in 1931. Mazda is primarily known for its production of passenger cars, but ...
Your car battery is an essential component that provides power to start your engine, operate your electrical systems, and store energy. Over time, batteries can weaken and lose their ability to hold a charge, which can lead to starting problems, power failures, and other issues. Replacing your battery before it ...
In most states, you cannot register a car without a valid driver’s license. However, there are a few exceptions to this rule. Exceptions to the RuleIf you are under 18 years old: In some states, you can register a car in your name even if you do not ...
Mazda, a Japanese automotive manufacturer with a rich history of innovation and engineering excellence, has emerged as a formidable player in the global car market. Known for its reputation of producing high-quality, fuel-efficient, and driver-oriented vehicles, Mazda has consistently garnered praise from industry experts and consumers alike. In this article, ...
Struts are an essential part of a car’s suspension system. They are responsible for supporting the weight of the car and damping the oscillations of the springs. Struts are typically made of steel or aluminum and are filled with hydraulic fluid. How Do Struts Work? Struts work by transferring the ...
Car registration is a mandatory process that all vehicle owners must complete annually. This process involves registering your car with the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and paying an associated fee. The registration process ensures that your vehicle is properly licensed and insured, and helps law enforcement and other authorities ...
Zoom is a video conferencing service that allows you to share your screen, webcam, and audio with other participants. In addition to sharing your own audio, you can also share the audio from your computer with other participants. This can be useful for playing music, sharing presentations with audio, or ...
Building your own computer can be a rewarding and cost-effective way to get a high-performance machine tailored to your specific needs. However, it also requires careful planning and execution, and one of the most important factors to consider is the time it will take. The exact time it takes to ...
Sleep mode is a power-saving state that allows your computer to quickly resume operation without having to boot up from scratch. This can be useful if you need to step away from your computer for a short period of time but don’t want to shut it down completely. There are ...
Introduction Computer-Assisted Translation (CAT) has revolutionized the field of translation by harnessing the power of technology to assist human translators in their work. This innovative approach combines specialized software with human expertise to improve the efficiency, accuracy, and consistency of translations. In this comprehensive article, we will delve into the ...
In today’s digital age, mobile devices have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. Among the vast array of portable computing options available, iPads and tablet computers stand out as two prominent contenders. While both offer similar functionalities, there are subtle yet significant differences between these two devices. This ...
A computer is an electronic device that can be programmed to carry out a set of instructions. The basic components of a computer are the processor, memory, storage, input devices, and output devices. The Processor The processor, also known as the central processing unit (CPU), is the brain of the ...
Voice Memos is a convenient app on your iPhone that allows you to quickly record and store audio snippets. These recordings can be useful for a variety of purposes, such as taking notes, capturing ideas, or recording interviews. While you can listen to your voice memos on your iPhone, you ...
Laptop screens are essential for interacting with our devices and accessing information. However, when lines appear on the screen, it can be frustrating and disrupt productivity. Understanding the underlying causes of these lines is crucial for finding effective solutions. Types of Screen Lines Horizontal lines: Also known as scan ...
Right-clicking is a common and essential computer operation that allows users to access additional options and settings. While most desktop computers have dedicated right-click buttons on their mice, laptops often do not have these buttons due to space limitations. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on how to right-click ...
Powering up and shutting down your ASUS laptop is an essential task for any laptop user. Locating the power button can sometimes be a hassle, especially if you’re new to ASUS laptops. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on where to find the power button on different ASUS laptop ...
Dell laptops are renowned for their reliability, performance, and versatility. Whether you’re a student, a professional, or just someone who needs a reliable computing device, a Dell laptop can meet your needs. However, if you’re new to Dell laptops, you may be wondering how to get started. In this comprehensive ...
Two-thirds of the country think that “New Zealand’s economy is rigged to advantage the rich and powerful”. They also believe that “New Zealand needs a strong leader to take the country back from the rich and powerful”. These are just two of a handful of stunning new survey results released ...
In today’s digital world, screenshots have become an indispensable tool for communication and documentation. Whether you need to capture an important email, preserve a website page, or share an error message, screenshots allow you to quickly and easily preserve digital information. If you’re an Asus laptop user, there are several ...
A factory reset restores your Gateway laptop to its original factory settings, erasing all data, apps, and personalizations. This can be necessary to resolve software issues, remove viruses, or prepare your laptop for sale or transfer. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to factory reset your Gateway laptop: Method 1: ...
“You talking about me?”The neoliberal denigration of the past was nowhere more unrelenting than in its depiction of the public service. The Post Office and the Railways were held up as being both irremediably inefficient and scandalously over-manned. Playwright Roger Hall’s “Glide Time” caricatures were presented as accurate depictions of ...
Roger Partridge writes – When the Coalition Government took office last October, it inherited a country on a precipice. With persistent inflation, decades of insipid productivity growth and crises in healthcare, education, housing and law and order, it is no exaggeration to suggest New Zealand’s first-world status was ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – In 2022, the Curriculum Centre at the Ministry of Education employed 308 staff, according to an Official Information Request. Earlier this week it was announced 202 of those staff were being cut. When you look up “The New Zealand Curriculum” on the Ministry of ...
Chris Bishop’s bill has stirred up a hornets nest of opposition. Photo: Lynn Grieveson for The KākāTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate from the last day included:A crescendo of opposition to the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill is ...
Monday left me brokenTuesday, I was through with hopingWednesday, my empty arms were openThursday, waiting for love, waiting for loveThe end of another week that left many of us asking WTF? What on earth has NZ gotten itself into and how on earth could people have voluntarily signed up for ...
Hello! Here comes the Saturday edition of More Than A Feilding, catching you up on the past week’s editions.State of humanity, 20242024, it feels, keeps presenting us with ever more challenges, ever more dismay.Do you give up yet? It seems to ask.No? How about this? Or this?How about this?Full story Share ...
Determining the hardest sport in the world is a subjective matter, as the difficulty level can vary depending on individual abilities, physical attributes, and experience. However, based on various factors including physical demands, technical skills, mental fortitude, and overall accomplishment, here is an exploration of some of the most challenging ...
The allure of sport transcends age, culture, and geographical boundaries. It captivates hearts, ignites passions, and provides unparalleled entertainment. Behind the spectacle, however, lies a fascinating world of financial investment and expenditure. Among the vast array of competitive pursuits, one question looms large: which sport carries the hefty title of ...
Introduction Pickleball, a rapidly growing paddle sport, has captured the hearts and imaginations of millions around the world. Its blend of tennis, badminton, and table tennis elements has made it a favorite among players of all ages and skill levels. As the sport’s popularity continues to surge, the question on ...
Abstract: Soccer, the global phenomenon captivating millions worldwide, has a rich history that spans centuries. Its origins trace back to ancient civilizations, but the modern version we know and love emerged through a complex interplay of cultural influences and innovations. This article delves into the fascinating journey of soccer’s evolution, ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Government’s newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealand’s urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
I’m on the wrong side of 40, I never pursued creative work and now my job is killing my soul. Help! Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,May I start with the least original conversation opener you’re likely to hear around the motu at the moment, particularly in Wellington: ...
“Never again - No AUKUS” was the message of the wreath laid at this morning’s national ANZAC Day commemorative service at Pukeahu National War Memorial Park this morning by the Stop AUKUS group. ...
Until this month, Auckland swimmer Hazel Ouwehand had never met a qualifying time in an Olympic event for a New Zealand team, even as a junior. Now she’s very likely off to the Paris Olympics after swimming well under the qualifying standard in the 100m butterfly twice – both in ...
While Anzac Day has experienced a resurgence in recent years, our other day of remembrance has slowly faded from view.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand. Original illustrations by Hope McConnell.First published in 2022.The high school’s head girl and ...
Australian and New Zealand volunteers fought together in the Waikato War, yet still its place in the Anzac tradition is unacknowledged by our defence forces or Returned Services Association.First published in 2018.When I was a boy cub I attended Anzac Day services in the South Auckland suburb of ...
A poem by Wellington writer Tayi Tibble.Hoki Mai She kisses him goodbye with her eyes still wet and alight from their last swim in the Awatere river. At the train station celebration, she leads the Kapa Haka but her voice keeps breaking under and over itself like waves. ...
A poem from Bill Manhire’s 2017 book of verse Some Things to Place in a Coffin.My World War I Poem Inside each trench, the sound of prayer. Inside each prayer, the sound of digging. Image courtesy of Auckland War Memorial Museum. ...
There are three books I have wolfed down in one sitting over the last two years. Colleen Maria Lenihan’s gorgeous and sad debut Kōhine, Noelle McCarthy’s memoir Grand about becoming her mother and then unbecoming her, and now Hine Toa, a staunch yet gentle self-portrait by living legend Ngāhuia te ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Thursday 25 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Asia Pacific Report Students and activist staff at Australia’s University of Sydney (USyd) have set up a Gaza solidarity encampment in support of Palestinians and similar student-led protests in the United States. The camp was pitched as mass graves, crippled hospitals, thousands of civilian deaths and the near-total destruction of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James B. Dorey, Lecturer in Biological Sciences, University of Wollongong Australian teddy bear bees are cute and fluffy, but get a look at that massive (unbarbed) stinger! James Dorey Photography Most of us have been stung by a bee and we ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jen Roberts, Senior Lecturer, School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, University of Wollongong Aussie~mobs/FlickrVictor Farr, a private in the 1st Infantry Battalion, was among the first to land at Anzac Cove just before dawn on April 25 1915. Victor Farr ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Gregory Moore I had the good fortune to care for the sugar gum at The University of Melbourne’s Burnley Gardens in Victoria where I worked for ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Senior Lecturer, Canberra School of Politics, Economics and Society, University of Canberra BagzhanSadvakassov/Upsplash, CC BY-SA Australia’s inflation rate has fallen for the fifth successive quarter, and it’s now less than half of what it was back in late 2022. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachel Ong ViforJ, ARC Future Fellow & Professor of Economics, Curtin University Just when we think the price of rentals could not get any worse, this week’s Rental Affordability Snapshot by Anglicare has revealed low-income Australians are facing a housing crisis like ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Meighen McCrae, Associate Professor of Strategic & Defence Studies, Australian National University American and Australian stretcher bearers working together near the front line during the Battle of Hamel in 1918.Australian War Memorial While the AUKUS alliance is new, the Australian-American partnership ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tracey Holmes, Professorial Fellow in Sport, University of Canberra When the news broke last weekend that 23 Chinese swimmers had tested positive to a banned drug in early 2021 and were allowed to compete at the Tokyo Olympic Games six months later ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cally Jetta, Senior Lecturer and Academic Lead; College for First Nations, University of Southern Queensland Australian War MemorialAboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people, as well as sensitive historical information ...
RNZ News Melissa Lee has been ousted from New Zealand’s coalition cabinet and stripped of the Media portfolio, and Penny Simmonds has lost the Disability Issues portfolio in a reshuffle. Climate Change and Revenue Minister Simon Watts will take Lee’s spot in cabinet. Simmonds was a minister outside of cabinet. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Lindenmayer, Professor, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University laurello/Shutterstock Some reports and popular books, such as Bill Gammage’s Biggest Estate on Earth, have argued that extensive areas of Australia’s forests were kept open through frequent burning by ...
Analysis - Christopher Luxon framing the demotion of two ministers as the portfolios getting "too complex" is a charitable way of saying they weren't up to the job. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra With Jim Chalmers’s third budget on May 14, Australians will be looking for some more cost-of-living relief – beyond the tax cuts – although they have been warned extra measures will be modest. As ...
Analysis: Melissa Lee has lost the media portfolio and her spot in Cabinet after multiple failed attempts to find solutions for a media industry in crisis. On Wednesday, the Prime Minister announced Lee would be losing her spot in Cabinet along with her media and communications ministerial portfolio. The job ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Simon Wilmot, Senior Lecturer, Film, Deakin University Among the many Australian who served during the second world war, there is a small group of people whose stories remain largely untold. These are the Muslim men and women who, while small in number, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kelly Saunders, PhD Candidate, University of Canberra There has been much analysis and praise of Justice Michael Lee’s recent judgement in Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation case against Channel Ten. Many people were openly relieved to read Lee’s “forensic” and “nuanced” application of law ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kathy Gibbs, Program Director for the Bachelor of Education, Griffith University zEdward_Indy/Shutterstock Around one in 20 people has attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). It’s one of the most common neurodevelopmental disorders in childhood and often continues into adulthood. ADHD is diagnosed ...
The Fairer Future coalition of anti-poverty groups say Whaikaha must be properly funded going forward, and that to argue that poor financial management of the new Ministry is a red herring by the Prime Minister. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is today congratulating Hon. Paul Goldsmith on his appointment as Minister for Media and Communications and urges him to rule out state intervention in the private media sector. ...
Asia Pacific Report The West Papuan resistance OPM leader has condemned Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and US President Joe Biden, accusing their countries of “six decades of treachery” over Papuan independence. The open letter was released today by OPM chairman Jeffrey P Bomanak on the eve of ANZAC Day ...
Welcome to The Spinoff Books Confessional, in which we get to know the reading habits and quirks of New Zealanders at large. This week: writer and one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people of 2024, Lauren Groff.The book I wish I’d writtenIf I wish I’d written a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Fechner, Research Fellow, Social Marketing, Griffith University mavo/Shutterstock Imagine having dinner at a restaurant. The menu offers plant-based meat alternatives made mostly from vegetables, mushrooms, legumes and wheat that mimic meat in taste, texture and smell. Despite being given that ...
“Three Strikes is a dead-end policy proposed by a dead-end government. The Three Strikes law ignores the causes of crime, instead just brutalising people already crushed by the cost of living.” ...
By Don Wiseman, RNZ Pacific senior journalist An Australian-born judge in Kiribati could well face deportation later this week after a tribunal ruling that he should be removed from his post. The tribunal’s report has just been tabled in the Kiribati Parliament and is due to be debated by MPs ...
With its clear mandate for police use, political nuances, and nuanced public trust, Denmark's insights provide valuable considerations for Australia and New Zealand. ...
Books editor Claire Mabey reviews poet Louise Wallace’s debut novel. A famous poet once said to me that he’s always suspicious when a poet publishes a novel. I never really understood why but maybe it’s something to do with cheating on your first form. Louise Wallace is a poet. She’s ...
For a few months at the turn of the millennium, TrueBliss burned bright as the biggest pop stars in the country. Alex Casey chats to two superfans who still hold the flame. During a humble backyard wedding in Nelson, 1999, one of the cordially invited guests had to excuse themselves ...
How will the recent wave of job cuts impact ethnic diversity in the media? In November last year, I was working a very busy day in the newsroom of a large online news site, interviewing whānau about their concerns over the imminent closure of one of the few puna reo ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ruth Knight, Researcher, Queensland University of Technology Have you ever felt sick at work? Perhaps you had food poisoning or the flu. Your belly hurt, or you felt tired, making it hard to concentrate and be productive. How likely would you be ...
Despite heavy criticism and an ongoing select committee process, the Police Minister says the Government will forge ahead with a ban on gang patches. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sam Whiting, Lecturer – Creative Industries, University of South Australia Shutterstock Everyone has a favourite band, or a favourite composer, or a favourite song. There is some music which speaks to you, deeply; and other music which might be the current ...
A new survey says ‘outlook not great’ for those charged with building infrastructure, while RMA changes delight farmers and depress environmentalists, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. First RMA changes announced ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Olli Hellmann, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Waikato Getty Images When New Zealanders commemorate Anzac Day on April 25, it’s not only to honour the soldiers who lost their lives in World War I and subsequent conflicts, but also ...
A leaked document shows the Canterbury/Waitaha arm of health agency Te Whatu Ora is scurrying to save $13.3 million by July. The “financial sustainability target”, which was “allocated” to Waitaha, is consistent with what’s happening in other districts, says Sarah Dalton, executive director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists. ...
A look at the state of the previous government’s affordable housing scheme, and what could come next.Remind me: What’s KiwiBuild again?First announced in 2012, KiwiBuild was a flagship policy of the Labour Party heading into both its 2014 and 2017 election campaigns. With Jacinda Ardern as prime minister, ...
Labour in opposition will be shocked to learn which party had six years in power but squandered any chance to make real change. Grant Robertson’s valedictory speech was a predictably entertaining trip down memory lane. The acid-tongued incoming Otago University chancellor administered a sick burn to the coalition government. He ...
Taiwan’s semiconductor industry is seen some as its ‘silicon shield’ against invasion – but how will overseas expansion affect that protection? The post The state of Taiwan’s silicon shield appeared first on Newsroom. ...
There’s relief for building owners bending under the weight of earthquake strengthening rules – and costs – that came into force seven years ago. Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk has announced a scheduled 2027 review of the earthquake-prone building regulations will now start this year. Owners will also get ...
Opinion: It has been announced that nine percent of roles at Oranga Tamariki will be disestablished, presumably to help fund the tax cuts promised by the coalition Government. I am reminded of the graphics used to illustrate pandemic events, where five thousand people are standing in a field and then ...
After more than two sleepless days, running through savage terrain, Greig Hamilton didn’t know if he was going to finish one of the most gruelling psychological assaults in sport. He was metres away from the finish line, a yellow gate made famous in a Netflix documentary; a race he’d dreamed ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Wednesday 24 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
The following interview with former Green Party MP Sue Kedgley came about because she features in the new memoir Hine Toa by activist Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku; the two knew each other at the University of Auckland in the early 70s, when they were both took on leadership roles in the ...
COMMENTARY:By Murray Horton New Zealand needs to get tough with Israel. It’s not as if we haven’t done so before. When NZ authorities busted a Mossad operation in Auckland 20 years ago, the government didn’t say: “Oh well, Israel has the right to defend itself.” No, it arrested, prosecuted, ...
NEWSMAKERS:By Vijay Narayan, news director of FijiVillage Blessed to be part of the University of Fiji (UniFiji) faculty to continue to teach and mentor those who want to join our noble profession, and to stand for truth and justice for the people of the country. I was privileged to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Three weeks from now, some of us will be presented with a mountain of budget papers, and just about all of us will get to hear about them on radio, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Lowry, Ice Sheet & Climate Modeller, GNS Science Hugh Chittock/Antarctica New Zealand, CC BY-SA As the climate warms and Antarctica’s glaciers and ice sheets melt, the resulting rise in sea level has the potential to displace hundreds of millions of ...
Are all police allowed to lie under oath in any hearing?
And are they allowed indemnity from investigation and prosecution if they are caught out?
Or is the power to lie under oath with indemnity only permitted for senior police in exceptional, or politically charged cases?
In a thinly veiled threat, the Police Association have backed Chief Inspector Grant Wormald, demanding that he must not be investigated for committing perjury in the Kim Dotcom hearing.
With this sort of open (and secret) support, it is little wonder that Chief Inspector Grant Wormald has now been proven to be no stranger to giving false testimony under oath in another hearing.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/7845990/Dotcom-raid-officer-headed-bike-gang-probe
For allowing senior police to exercise this new power to gain convictions in court against those the state have already determined must be found guilty, I would like to grant the new title of Detective Inspector Wormtongue, in honour of Detective Inspector Grant Wormald for openly and boldy pioneering this new police policy.
What does this all mean for civil liberties?
Will judges continue to give greater weight to police testimony against conflicting testimony from those who find themselves in the dock?
Will the fact that police are now allowed to lie under oath and not face any indemnity see defence witness testimony given equal weight in court?
Apart from the macro questions of police indemnity from prosecution for perjury…..
Will Officer Wormtongue ever again personally lead an investigation where he will be required to give evidence in court?
What would it mean for the police case if he did?
Would all evidence of previous inconsistent testimony from Officer Wormtongue be disallowed and ruled out of order?
Could this be called justice?
Police have always felt free to lie under oath, with a compliant judiciary accepting almost anything they say. What’s new about the Red Devils case is that they have made deceiving the courts central to the operation. If this makes a few judges treat their evidence with the cynicism it deserves, that will be a step forward.
Police lie in the courts, at an inquiry, to the IPCA and to their employer (when an individual tries to expose them).
Hells Angel fights to get drug charge thrown out
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/gangs/news/article.cfm?c_id=217&objectid=10812623
Police do not up hold the law by breaking it.
Damned straight.
And the police spokesperson shows that Key’s “in charge but oblivious” leadership style is trickling down: “Detective Inspector Wormald was the officer in charge of the investigation but was not a decision-maker in regard to the arrest and prosecution of Mr Wilson”.
Happened under his watch, he might have even known about it, but it wasn’t his decision… [spit]
And it is bullshit that politicians do not influence police decisions or have a quiet word on the side which is called interference. e.g. Banks statement being blacked out.
What gets me is when Key says the police are independent.
Memo to Shearer:
Hire Lynton Crosby ?
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/thetorydiary/2012/10/pay-whatever-it-takes-hire-lynton-crosby-and-hire-him-now.html
How to survive a political campaign and not lose your integrity, soul .. whatever
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/how-to-survive-a-campaign-and-not-sell-your-soul-20120608-2015d.html
bsprout : hugh fletcher slates laissez faire economics
outlines the worst failures of the past 3 decades of econ policy. CAFCA was right!
canty uni: steve keen public talk in christchurch
shows how the current GFC is twice as bad as the great depression… possibly worse
ropata
Thanks for great links.
Ropata … thanks for the Steven Keen lecture. Some of the material is New Zealand specific and you won’t get these details laid out like this elsewhere.
Highly recommended for anyone here who is even remotely interested in economics. Warning he talks pretty fast and it’s likely a dense download.
The crucial point to grasp is that Keen is a real mathematician, and that much of what he is saying here is backed by the kind of language, tools and thinking that engineers understand works in the real world. This might not be clear from the lecture.
welcome.. keen has a fair bit of ego but he’s a very smart dude.. and shows how NZ’s property bubble (private debt vs GDP) is around the worst in the OECD. (although the UK and USA current account deficits are insanely worse than anyone’s)
keen has a fair bit of ego
Yes that was pretty much my own impression until I met him in person … once he stops ‘lecturing’ he’s quite different.
And even then I admire his drive and commitment to his ideas.
OK … just finished listening to the whole thing. In some ways better than the Wgtn lecture I was at, especially the Q+A session at the end. Really worthwhile even though it’s close to a couple of hours long.
Keen’s intellectual ambit is quite remarkable.
You’ve got to remember that being a heterodox economist, Keen was considered an outsider, a lone ranger by the wider (Chicago school/Washingon consensus) economics profession. And he still is by in large, but the GFC greatly changed that and he has also found other audiences now.
Frankly you need a bit of inner fortitude and ego when your neoclassical colleagues are used to dumping on your work from a great height.
I’ve watched the first half hour so far. It’s interesting and useful, though I think I’ll only remember a couple of main points. It’ll probably take me a while to get through the whole 1.5 hours. I will remember the quote(or a version of it) from a delusional mainstream economist that went something like this: he descrbed an increase in uneployment as “an increase in American’s leisure time”.
This is a slightly more approachable presentation by Steve Keen (its a BBC interview). If you start here you’ll pick the rest up more easily.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01j5h51/Analysis_Steve_Keen_Why_Economics_Is_Bunk/
One key point: the level of economic activity in our modern economies is based on the acceleration of debt. When people get into more debt faster, employment improves and economic activity increases.
When the rate of increase in debt slows down, or shock horror, goes negative, both employment and the economy tanks.
Thanks, CV. Actually, I’ll look at the BBC link later. It might help sme things stick in my mind. I already grasped your “One key point”.
🙂
I’ll follow up with a second order tidbit then:
The banks and financiers can tell ahead of time when the housing market is going to go up or down, based on how much mortgage debt they can observe themselves issuing.
And by observing the rate of general debt they are issuing, banks can predict ahead of time whether an entire economy is going to improve or decline.
AND of course the banks aren’t just neutral bystanders. By actively choosing to tighten or loosen the flow of credit into an economy, the banks and financiers can deliberately push an entire economy into a boom or a bust.
Don’t ya just love the adjective “tanks” TankGirl?
Yet, for the population getting their news from MSM and the evening “news”, it would appear all’s well this Labour Weekend, notwithstanding the inevitable road carnage. (police reviewing their vehicle fleet; fuel related? respond to assault with a Volt)
nobody questions the beer barons or Nat tax policy after another holiday marred by alcohol abuse
Sustento: Raf Manji’s econ blog:
– how the high dollar is hollowing out the real economy
– why nz needs not QE but ‘monetary dialysis’
– selling your soul: the unintended consequences of asset sales
Did Hamlet sound crazy? Other would consider him one of the sane in a crazy society.
Exactly. And the point of the Hamlet quote is that we need politicians with the balls to act, and protect the people of NZ from the global pillagers of currency/resources/labour.
On our behalf, Hamlet ponders the road ahead:
Save the Ross Sea. Avaaz have enlisted Leonardo di Caprio to spearhead a petition to support the creation of an Antarctic Marine Sanctuary. Russia, South Korea ‘and a few other countries’ want to keep on fishing in those waters. NZ thanks to Gerry Brownlee, Steven Joyce and Whatsit Carter have decided we don’t need to sign that treaty, that it’s ok to ruin that pristine environment.
http://www.avaaz.org/en/save_the_southern_ocean_5/?cgkRPab
From reading this I get the impression that Labour are in agreement of the lack of importance in this issue. Why don’t we just mix and match the Lab and Nat MP’s just like we use to do at school into 2 teams. With the captains alternating who was to be picked into each team.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10842069
“Our consistent policy has been to make sure we always use the best science,” Ruth Dyson said, as it had done to support the net bans to protect Maui dolphins.
Ruth Dyson said that while Mr Jones was not the party spokesman on the Ross Sea issue, “he also didn’t say anything that any of us would have gone ‘holy moly – he said what?”‘
Yet again, this is one of the very many signs revealing poor Labour leadership and that the Labour Party is not ready to win the government benches.
Reinforcement:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a8/Propaganda_Jacques_Ellul_1973.jpg
Indeed, and sadly the masses believe their thoughts to be originals.
Even the few who are capable of understand the mirage, are still somewhat left to shape thoughts, opinions, behaviours, understandings etc, based on this temporal world.
I’m sure TPTB are sharing all the knowledge with us, for the betterment of humanity /sarc
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/7846531/Insecure-benefit-cards-slammed
The Pin for the benefit cards in printed on the back of the card!!!!!
DUH DUH
Sloppy, no Jacinda, that is yet another deliberate “privacy cockup’!
You have got to wonder why they don’t have a user changeable pin.
My guess the infrastructure is too expensive.
They would nee pin terminals in all the offices and secure computer software to run it.
AND isn’t the card supposed to be helping the clients with financial management.
One of the FIRST rule of PIN nos financial management is Don’t share them!!!
If PINs are too difficult for the IT whizzes in MSD [lol – probably the same team that ok’d the kiosks] what about the other option you get for credit cards: signatures? Not perfect, or accessible to all, but better than writing it on the card.
Oh but wait, it’s on the back of the card, it’s okay. Damn, couldn’t find the scary movie clip with the photos “they’re all blank!” – “turn them over”
The privacy and security of poor kids isn’t important.
Nah, its another card, another number, another link in the chain a servitude for everyone..
The oldest game plan in the book, is start at the bottom and work your way up while the masses are not paying attention, thinking they are “safe” in theor comfort zones, or too busy to pay attention, possibly both.
The experiment ploughs on, with little resistence
http://blog.labour.org.nz/2012/10/22/thank-you-to-nzs-workers/
Proof from red alert today, as if we needed it, that Labour politicians don’t read left-wing blogs.
The sad thing is, Ms Fenton could have celebrated the hard work and valuable contributions, workers in the paid workforce make, without slapping anyone in the face, not stay-at-home parents, not beneficiaries, not the army of volunteers without whom much of our civilised society would come to a grinding halt, not those caring for a sick or disabled relative, nor the sick, injured or disabled, not the tireless activists who give up a good deal to try and fight injustice and inequality, no-one.
I’m certainly glad to read that Labour is aware of the erosions of the rights, working conditions and wages of paid workers and that it intends to make things better when next in government, even though exactly what they intend to do is always left unsaid.
But to use the headline “Thank You to NZs Workers”, and then write that piece in today, in 2012 is to demonstrate culpably negligent ignorance. And a very dangerous attitude.
Oh, bollocks. Did you actually read the post, js? Can you point out the bit where the author “slaps” anyone in your list?
Yes I did TRP. Did you?
I kind of predicted that you’d be the first to say bollocks. The difference is, because you read left-wing blogs you immediately knew what I was talking about, whether you think it is rubbish or not. So you’re ahead of Ms Fenton.
I’m hoping the union movement is evolving in its, in some cases, draconian attitudes on this issue too. Just being aware that there is alternative viewpoint to default assumptions is an important first step, and you’ve already made it whether you wanted to or not, TRP.
Top prediction js. Let me guess your thought process:
js: If I write some complete bollocks, I bet TRP will call me on it.
js, 2 minutes later: ‘wow, that complete bollocks strategy really works!’
I read it, and I agree with js – Fenton, like Shearer, clearly thinks that paid work is the be-all and end-all of human existence.
You can see it right there where she says: They are often the forgotten part of the economic equation, but without workers, no business and no public service could get ahead.
And without unpaid stay-at-home parents, our economy would be fucked. Without an available pool of unemployed people, our economy would be fucked. Without volunteers going unpaid providing the kinds of social support which any government with a soul would be backing, our economy and society would be fucked.
I’m pretty sure it’s possible for Darien Fenton and David Shearer to say “yeah, go workers!” without shitting all over people whose unpaid labour is far more frequently ignored and demeaned.
But that might involve a little backpedalling on Labour’s “deserving poor” rhetoric.
It’s a post about labour day, ffs. Fenton does not “shit on” anyone, nor does she “slap” anyone. Is Fenton supposed to telepathically guess what js and you think needs mentioning in a short blog post about the annual celebration of working NZers? Or is this the start of a campaign to change the name of the day to Labour (and anyone else js and QoT think is worth mentioning) Day?
Yes, you’ve definitely spotted out cunning plan there, TRP.
Or it could be that we think experienced politicians could exercise a modicum of thought when making broad sweeping statements which alienate vast swathes of the population who Labour then expects will vote for them.
Or they could write a short blog on Labour Day celebrating NZ workers.
What an interesting thread.
Disclaimer: the above statement is in no way intended to be any criticism or derogation, implied or explicit, of any person or persons unable for any reason at all to contribute in any way to the thread referred to, with or without interesting comments under any definition of “interesting” defined as “reasonable” under existing case law, inclusive of but not excluding other groups and expecially not stay-at-home parents, not beneficiaries, not the army of volunteers without whom much of our civilised society would come to a grinding halt, not those caring for a sick or disabled relative, nor the sick, injured or disabled, not the tireless activists who give up a good deal to try and fight injustice and inequality, nor unpaid stay-at-home parents, without whom our economy would be fucked, nor an available pool of unemployed people without whom our economy would be fucked, nor volunteers going unpaid providing the kinds of social support which any government with a soul would be backing, without whom our economy and society would be fucked.
+1m internets!!
without taxpayers nz would be truly fucked so a big THANK YOU is in order to the nz labour party for remembering their roots on LABOUR day.
how foolish and ungracious are some people …
No-one has denied that paid workers deserve a big thank you. They most certainly do.
Are you being disingenuous, or are you just not paying attention?
just a little bemused by this heinous crime perpetrated by the Red Alert blog …
TRP, I’m pretty sure I mentioned paid and unpaid work, beneficiaries etc, in my short-ish blog post on Labour Weekend, “Backwards to the future”. It’s not hard. I’m sure Fenton would also have been up to it, maybe in a different way – there are probably many ways it can be done.
In focusing on the things to celebrate about what was achieved when Labour Day was introduced, it’s quite relevant to update the issues for current conditions. If you look at that link in my post, to the Dunedin 1894 Labour Day Parade image, you will find it says this:
How ironic given that Central Otago rail is now a bike track.
Yep, Karol and I’m sure other commentators made the same link, just as I’m sure many didn’t. Your excellent post was longer and more wide ranging than Fenton’s. Yours was written to bring out the wider implications of work, unemployment, underemployment, non paid work and to bring those strands together. Fenton just wrote a short blog on Labour day for those to whom the day is dedicated. There isn’t a damn thing wrong with either blog post and it’s going to be a sad day if people are condemned for what they didn’t write rather than what they did. Bring back the thought police, I say!
Darien Fenton is a full-time politician and the Labour Party’s spokesperson on Labour.
Somehow I feel sure she’s capable of doing just a teensy bit more than “a short blog post” on Labour Day.
Again, what is your point, QoT? Fenton also completely failed to mention meerkats, the late Elvis Presley and the comedic music hall stylings of the even later Arthur Askey. And she outrageously refused to acknowlege the real significance of today’s date. Yes, it’s Kim Kardashian’s birthday, as we all know. Damn her eyes! Damn her, I say!
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.co.nz/
Spot the difference
A brief Labour Day blogbost from Bowalley Road. In which Chris doesn’t insult those who work outside the paid workforce because from the start he’s completely clear about who he’s talking about. And he doesn’t even mention any other category of worker . It’s really not that hard TRP.
It wasn’t long ago that workers were routinely referred to as ‘men’ and many would have screamed (and some still would, but I don’t think you’d be among them) Political-Correctness-gone-Mad!! if a politician who used such a term was called on it.
Fenton doesn’t insult those ‘outside the paid workforce’, js. You are making shit up. She does actually mention workers who have been laid off, so the whole point of your wankery dissolves right there.
… which still reinforces the idea that paid work = only source of “dignity”, per Shearer.
But given your pathetic little “meerkats” comments above I’m just going to assume from this point that you have no actual interest in debating the actual points js and I have been making.
It’s hard to debate what doesn’t exist, QoT. Ask a Christian.
Ah, that explains it. You’ve got some kind of plug-in installed which replaces all of my and js’ comments with “LALALALALALALA I CAN’T HEAR YOU.”
Let’s be honest, TRP. You think unpaid workers are like meerkats, and as such you see no problem in the Labour Party ignoring their existence and shafting a good proportion of the people who, come election day, Labour will be outraged don’t dutifully show up to vote for them.
TRP, seems like there’s very little faith left to go around.
What happens to a church when the people lose faith in it? Congregations and donations go down. The church becomes less relevant to the every day life of the community.
I wonder what happens when people lose faith in Labour?
Nope, QoT, I was taking the piss, exaggerating for effect. If you want to expound further on why you think the unemployed resemble meerkats, but not Arthur Askey or Elvis, fire away.
Debating ‘what people should have said’ is equally mindless. That’s my complaint about js’s comment, way back up there. Mountain, meet molehill.
Debating ‘what people should have said’ is equally mindless.
Good to know you dismiss a large proportion of the posts on this site and in the blogosphere in general, then.
Also, gosh, you weren’t literally serious about the meerkats comment? I truly had NO IDEA. I thought you were totally advocating that meerkats’ roles in our economy were equal to unpaid workers’.
Yep, I have high standards and debating made up shit doesn’t meet the mark. Why not discuss what Fenton actually said?
You are so right, TRP. In future we can only ever discuss the words people said, and can never, ever infer their meaning, or consider the things they left unsaid, and we can definitely never put their comments into existing context.
So that’s every single post on every single statement ever made by John Key banned by your edict, I suppose. Every suggestion of alternative policies tossed in the bin. Every criticism of every weasel-worded government policy out of line. Wait, no, that’s fucking ridiculous.
Just be honest, TRP – all you really want is for no one to criticise Labour/Darien Fenton, for whatever reason, and you’ll make up blatantly stupid principles of discussion to justify yourself.
I know you aren’t listening TRP, but for anyone else reading this debate please try and imagine this. I could have used any of a wide variety of kinds of examples, but this one is close to my heart.
You are the elderly sole parent and carer of a now adult child with severe disabilities and high needs. You’ve just finished the morning toileting, washing, dressing, and breakfast tasks. It’s taken you just over 3 and a half hours, and you’re already tired though the day has barely begun. Your child is now set for a wee while so you get on the computer with a well-earned cup of tea for a flick around the ‘sphere.
You may not even know it’s Labour day because you don’t get any holidays, your toil is 24/7 and you’re never ever going to have a retirement. You go to Red Alert. God know’s why, it’s not like the Labour Party represents your interests in any way. But hope springs eternal for some.
And the headline says “Thank You to NZ’s Workers”
It’s not like you get much acknowlegment let alone thanks for your valuable contribution to your community so you read on. And what do you find? The morning slog that has worn you out and set your arthritic body throbbing, along with the last forty years of similar toil has not been work. You had thought you would literally work until the moment you drop dead. You’ve probably saved the country millions in the cost of institutional care, but more importantly, you always done your very best for your beloved child. But in fact this is not work because there is no pay cheque (or holidays, sick days, minimum conditions or labour regualtions) it’s actually something else that will drain all your resources until you die :leisure.
A point well made js. I see where you’re coming from now, but I’m sure the labour blog didn’t deliberately exclude carers and volunteers. Love isn’t measured in dollar terms but without it our society has no soul.
ropata, the problem isn’t just Darien Fenton’s blog making unpaid workers invisible. It’s that it comes right after Shearer did a speech which quite clearly spelled out that if you’re not in paid work, you have no dignity and make no contribution to your community.
That’s the context Fenton’s blog post sits in, which is why her however-accidental erasing of people’s unpaid work is seriously problematic to me.
Well yes I’ve read both and I can take something I like from both. And yes if I had to choose I’d pick Chris Trotter’s post for two reasons:
1. Unlike some around here I’ve long admired Chris for the steadfastness of his moral compass. Sure there are some themes and topics he’s definitely not PC on, but I’m prepared to set them aside. And even on a bad day he still writes the arse off anyone else on the left in this country.
2. Chris goes somewhat deeper into the root of the issue; the madness that is the neo-liberal experiment; an experiment that was perhaps implemented more ruthlessly in this country than any other.
But then Darien is a Labour Party MP, the party of union workers, not the ‘non-workers’. And after 30 years of neo-liberalism the interests of unionised workers cannot be decoupled from the interests of the state and business owners. After all no business = no jobs. This equation has always been an achilles heel for labour, creating an incipient fault-line for the right to drive wedges down.
There are far too many low-paid working families, working 80hrs or more a week, broken shifts and a broken family life who look across the back fence to a DPB family who don’t seem to be all that much worse off. Frankly it just does not feel fair and fuels resentment.
Of course the root cause is the miserable wages the working family is getting, yet a National govt will re-frame this unfairness with the welfare family cast as bludgers, whose miserable existence should be made even more dire in order to make things right in the world again.
Let’s try and be a little clearer who the real opponent is here.
+1
I have become highly sensitized to the negation of wirk. Labour should take care that it doesn’t sound more like RedNational on this issue.
I take it you mean this post.
Trotter’s pointed clarity > Fenton’s slightly fluffier piece, but they generally make the same point.
Pitting the working class against the underclass would have to be one of the stupidest things we could do at this point in time.
Of course Fenton technically didn’t do anything other than render non-employed workers invisible. If on the rest of the year those workers were acknowledged and respected then it wouldn’t matter that on Labour Day only the paid workers were (and the historical context honoured). But they aren’t, so I have to agree with QoT, it’s a very significant omission.
Other than that, the blogpost is a pretty poor showing from a political party that is meant to be based on workers.
Pitting the working class against the underclass would have to be one of the stupidest things we could do at this point in time.
But so easy to do because our current tax and redistribution system is so broken. Which is exactly WHY National will keep it broken.
Last union I was a member of had this under its objects : ‘recruit and organise workers (waged or uneaged, free or incarcerated.)’
So, y’know..if a union can recognise all workers, why can’t a bloody politician.
Indeed. eg Waitemata Unite
http://waitemataunite.blogspot.co.nz/
At least there was this admission. Finally.
That, IMO, is because they don’t actually intend to do anything.
This seems to have slipped past the news cycle.
http://news.discovery.com/earth/largest-iron-fertilization-test-blooms-criticism-120719.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/oct/15/pacific-iron-fertilisation-geoengineering
That wasn’t the only one going on.
A relaxing change from dealing with topics of great importance to us and the world!! Attendees even doze off during the day’s sessions. The Boring Lectures. Sounded intriguing on Radionz this morning. Blurb:
Labour Day 22/10 – 10:25 James Ward
James Ward is a boredom enthusiast who blogs at I Like Boring Things. He is the founder and organiser of the annual Boring Conference in London. Boring 2012 takes place in November.
Clearly the US is in no position to lecture Russia about Pussy Riot. Free the Grand Jury Resistors!
http://www.salon.com/2012/10/11/third_northwest_activist_jailed_for_staying_silent/
(For reasons currently unknown Leah-Lynn Plante has since been freed; Matt Duran and Katherine “Kteeo” Olejnik remain in prison).
On Labour Day the NZ Herald takes the oppurtunity to rip into David Shearer simply for saying that NZ workers should have first dibs on earthquake recovery jobs.
God forbid we should start training up our own workforce, instead of just importing it, as what has been happening for the past 20 years, resulting in mass unemployment and low wages.
Turn the immigration taps off, and youth unemployment will vanish overnight.
A Film 🙂
How Far Is Heaven: a film by Christopher Pryor & Miriam Smith
Official Selection New Zealand International Film Festival 2012
It is about Hiruharama on the Whanganui River.
Did you know, that the Turkish Government attempted to prosecute citizen publishers of Chomsky’s
“Manufacturing Consent” under laws concerning Destabilisation of Society? I wonder how long before freedom of speech becomes circumscribed here; not to say, I do not think Hate Speech is helping the cohesion of our society at all, in fact, I am perpetually perplexed how TPTB allow it to proliferate the way that it has, and is continuing to. As Ellul challenges, “What price freedom?”
Mark Solomon presented the position of Iwi well on the MSM current affairs I thought; he is correct, that individual dividends to all whanau would not stretch very far, and that like the Police, members are as varied in outlook as the people that make up our Nation
And, I think the political labelling “maori mafia” is not very helpful; Do the MSM label the Business Round Tables the “capitalist cartels” ?
I have not heard Darien Fenton utter anything useful in my observations, and Jacinda comes across as “whiny”
I saw an attitude written on a postcard recently; “Oh well, What shall I complain about today?”;
Made me stop and reflect, as I do everytime I read personality labels, narcissist, psychopath, sociopath, etc; I revised on this this morning and the presence of these traits in our society reflect the change in Values we have witnessed in our lifetimes, particularly pertaining to the significance of children, as children remain children for increasingly short time-spans these days..and Personality is a construct that varies within people across contexts and time (thankfully)
Now, having been to the Supermarket, and being the observant chappie that I am, there does appear to be a developing trend for consumers to select more primary whole foods for their trolleys than the sugar and fat laden processed cardboard…round the outside..round the outside
there are different types of flesh, yet, all flesh is grass.
if you will, you can become all flame
-sayings of the desert fathers 103 (that’s where I’m headed, that’s where I belong; sure I do more harm than help occasionally)
-James Morrison
there does appear to be a developing trend for consumers to select more primary whole foods for their trolleys
Word is quietly getting around.
Whole rows I never go down anymore.
same. Only costs $40 to feed me for a week (not counting fish and chips)
protein-beef, lamb or salmon
green and coloured vegetables
1 loaf of wholegrain bread
avocados
butter.cheese
vegemite
changing diet and habits after decades of “modern socialised living” is unsettling though
I read today that prescriptions for anti-depressants are up 40% in our province over last six years, and my previous GP is an apologist for them; I understand his position, yet, much dis-ease is socio-genic in etiology, and it is just so corrupt that investors are profiting off peoples social misery; that is why I started commenting on this blog, as in Hamlet above; Interestingly, despite their detractors, the socially oriented Christian Churches, amongst other faiths, are labouring at the coal face in very real terms to alleviate the suffering brought about by this government in particular.
many Christians are not motivated by “increasing” their congregations size or contribution; It is just the power of the gospels; Imagine the Industrial Revolution, Fordism, Modern War and Modern Economic and Political Ideologies without the handbrakes of Judeo-Christian based Values?
Critics always refer to the “evils” carried out in the name of God; Humans carried out those actions.
Most people I read or hear who are scathing of faith have no depth of background in philosophy, history, theology or science holistically; The proverbs that guide Christian conduct begin with Wisdom is to Fear God. (that’s why I never debate my faith)
and the mystery just increases in a comforting way every day.
God Bless
🙂
Sample of the actual religion of our society …
“Kraft International, especially in developing markets, should continue to realize solid growth as it leverages the Cadbury acquisition and benefits from continued Cadbury cost synergies. The company is likely to realize $300 million of revenue synergies in 2012 by distributing Kraft’s biscuit products in Cadbury outlets in Mexico (approximately 380,000 outlets), distributing Oreo and Tang products in Cadbury outlets (approximately 380,000 outlets) in India and doubling its distribution in Brazil with this acquisition (from 300,000 to 600,000 outlets).”
– Ashish Sharma, “Kraft Foods: Safe Stock with Upside Potential”, The Motley Fool Blog Network, 13 August 2012
The High Priests have spoken. Hallelujah.
When Kraft bought Cadbury (weep for the Quaker brothers, for they had a vision of a socially just society – eg they championed the emerging working class, and boycotted beans from African slavery plantations),
Kraft was less interested in Cadbury chocolates, but more greedily wanted to grab and control the distribution networks.
an interesting opinion piece on Stuff:
Exactly.
A bank ATM has no problem charging you $1 to withdraw $60 in cash. A 1.7% tax by the bank.
Most proposed FTT’s are around 1/20 or 1/50 this sum. And of course, that’s because FTT’s are designed to penalise financial speculators who conduct high frequency financial markets trading.
The forgien curreny trade in nz in 2010 averaged 9 billion per day!!
A tax of 0.1% would raise 90m per day or 36 billion per year
Yep. Yet the banks will scream at a 0.1% FTT while they are more than happy to charge you and me a 3% difference when changing NZD into Australian dollars.
Took me a while , but the TOTAL NZ tax take is expected to be in the order of 55 billion
So the FTT raising 36billion on foreign currency transactions would get pretty close to removing GST.
AND if the FTT was applied to all bank transactions, I suspect you MAY be able to remove all direct Tax.
And you woul not need an ird!!
Remember that that is at present levels of transactions which an FTT is likely to decrease.
To be honest I’m a little frustrated that we keep on re-inventing the wheel here. Gareth Morgan has pretty much nailed it … all the essential components of a thorough reform of the tax system are there and he’s done a credible job of crunching the numbers. Why not take it more seriously?
Is it just because Morgan isn’t perceived as a proper leftie?
Damn, now I’m trying to remember if Morgan had an FTT in with his CCT.
The thing about our tax system is that it’s had centuries of build up of little fixes. It really needs to be taken back to basics and redesigned completely then give about a years notice that the old rules and precedents are going out and an entirely new system coming in.
Flash back to Aug 2011
http://thestandard.org.nz/gareth-morgans-big-kahuna/
Although it doesnt really say if Morgan proposed an FTT, the comments were certainly full of the idea.
The currency trade transaction would decrease, but ot the internal transactions.
Does any one know the value of the turnover of money through the banks?
Oops 3.6 Billion
Nice link DTB
And it’s not just “Hone and Hollande” but that well known Skoda driver and social anarchist Angela Merkel – as well as finance ministers from 11 Euro zone countries: Eleven euro states back ftt
Well, she’s a nuclear chemist…
KIWIS! DON’T BUY INTO THE SELLOFF OF OUR PRECIOUS ELECTRICITY ASSETS!
PROTEST OUTSIDE MIGHTY RIVER POWER OFFICE!
ANZ Building 23 -29 Albert St Auckland City
https://maps.google.co.nz/maps?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=mighty+river+power+auckland&fb=1&gl=nz&hq=mighty+river+power&hnear=0x6d0d47fb5a9ce6fb%3A0x500ef6143a29917%2CAuckland&cid=0%2C0%2C14661661492653781907&ei=Iu-EUM-0La6higfJyoG4Dg&ved=0CGYQ_BIwAQ
TUESDAY 23 OCTOBER 2012
12 noon – 2pm
On Tuesday 23 October 2012 – the Government is planning to consider and approve an Order in Council for Cabinet and the Executive Council to remove Mighty river Power from the State Owned Enterprises Act.
http://www.johnkey.co.nz/archives/1537-PM-announces-next-steps-for-Mighty-River-sale.html
UNITE AND FIGHT THE PRIVATISATION OF MIGHTY RIVER POWER BY SWITCHING OFF MERCURY ENERGY!
http://switchoffmercuryenergy.org/how-to-switch-off-merucry-energy/
Protest called by Penny Bright, Jax Taylor and James Heremaia from the SWITCH OFF MERCURY ENERGY community group.
Voting machine and results scrutiny in the USA for the 2004 election and others by
blackboxvoting.org definitely show skullduggery. The attitude of all officials involved seems shamelessly casual to me.
Blackbox have a video recording all that they do. One move was to search for records themselves that had been requested under their information act. The dockets they had been supplied had been recently prepared and they had asked for copies of the signed originals.. So a search at the electoral processing facility brought to light rubbish bags with voting figure dockets signed by the clerks at the time of finalising, and these were being thrown out although by law they should have been held for 22 months I think. At least one docket differed by more than 100 votes from the recently issued one presented to them.
Let’s not have electronic voting by anyone. And allowing private companies to run this essential government procedure is criminal. Up against the wall and firing squad criminal. That excuse that required information is commercially sensitive is just one of the reasons for not having a bar of private involvement, even contractor help.
No electronic voting, no internet voting. If the idea ever comes up in NZ it needs to be sunk once and for all.
Seriously, these systems are designed to be shit and easy to compromise. You might as well design ATMs to accept random pin numbers.
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/09/new_diebold_vul.html
It’s a change that’s going to happen and you can’t stop it. The best idea would be to ensure that we don’t use the same system as the US – in other words, engage with the process.
Make it done by government department rather than private business. Make it OpenSource so that people can actually see it and test it. Make it so that people can check how their vote was recorded and be able to change it if it was recorded incorrectly. Make it a three part entry system using either a security token or the same system that Kiwibank uses. Both systems are nearly impossible to break.
Online voting paves the way for even more democracy and less corruption. Leaving it as is leaves all the power in the hands of the politicians and their owners.
DTB
I think you are far too optimistic about the use of technology, all these pins and barriers to make the information safe, don’t make it easier and it would become more burdensome for some people than travelling or walking to what should be a nearby polling booth for most.
And there is the means for computer programmers and companies employing them to make small secret changes that negatively affect the probity of the system and large numbers of voters, and their ability to make decisions as to who is going to assist or constrain their lives. I say again you are too positive. I know programmers who are good people for sure but everybody doesn’t hold to sacred ethics of the highest behaviour. Especially when there is money in it and its hard to uncover.