Written By: - Date published: 7:22 am, September 7th, 2011 - 69 comments
National is the party of middle aged white guys, but according to their chief spinster we shouldn’t care…
Written By: - Date published: 10:40 am, July 16th, 2011 - 47 comments
DPF thinks that comparing Lockwood Smith to a KKK member is “a pretty disgusting smear”. Could this be the same DPF who ran a billboard campaign comparing Labour government politicians to brutal dictators?
Written By: - Date published: 12:59 pm, June 3rd, 2011 - 28 comments
Just after we discover that National ministers and staffers have been accepting gifts from a bank wanting the government’s business and John Key says ministers shouldn’t take ‘too many’ Rugby World Cup freebies, we learn that civil servants are sternly banned from accepting any gifts. Do as I say, not as I do, eh?
Written By: - Date published: 11:45 am, May 9th, 2011 - 27 comments
Patrick Gower has more on the helicopter flight that John Key took in 2009 after opening a walkway that Key says was necessary because of mystery meetings that were supposedly arranged that afternoon. The flight cost us $2,000 when Key learned the helicopter was owned by the Velas.
Written By: - Date published: 2:30 pm, April 11th, 2011 - 19 comments
The Crown BMWs are back in the news. One will have a $1000 underseat heater to keep a worthy’s arse toasty. Based in Dunedin. For “long-distance and long-duration movements”. Hmm. Who flies to Dunedin for a 3 hour drive to Dipton occasionally? Guess you need that heater against the Southern cold when you’re used to balmy Karori.
Written By: - Date published: 10:21 am, April 7th, 2011 - 25 comments
The PSA is the frontline in our fight against National’s plans to savagely cut our public services. Much in the same vein as the sticker campaign that Eddie posted on yesterday, the PSA has used humour to get across an incisive message: what the rich elitists in National consider ‘nice to have’ is very different from what we value.
Written By: - Date published: 10:14 am, March 12th, 2011 - 39 comments
Faced with the choice between short-term stability offered by a military strong-man or the long-term stability that would emerge from a democratic revolution, the West has long backed dictators in key resource supplying third-world nations. As the West backs away from saving the Libyan rebellion, it appears that little has changed.
Written By: - Date published: 9:34 pm, March 2nd, 2011 - 76 comments
English on Working for Families cuts: “around 1,000 families earning over $100,000 receive WFF, and payments to those families total only $1.1 million … Taking higher-income families out of WFF saves very little money …
In this uncertain economic climate, we want to give all families certainty about their incomes”
Written By: - Date published: 8:27 pm, February 16th, 2011 - 36 comments
Key says he didn’t know about the BMW purchase. Funny cause on Tuesday, English was taking responsibility: “we could go out and buy second-hand cars but one way or another cars need to be maintained”. The Nats try to blame Labour but the contract Labour signed says replacing the cars was optional without penalty.
Written By: - Date published: 11:22 pm, February 15th, 2011 - 135 comments
Last week, Key says Kiwis “have to tighten their belts, we have to do the same”. More job cuts for public servants. This week, buying 34 $200,000 limos for him and his mates to replace 3 year old ones. How many teachers would that employ?Not the cars that need replacing after 3 years. It’s this government. Good on Goff for giving up the limos.
Written By: - Date published: 12:38 pm, January 31st, 2011 - 12 comments
At his ‘Blue-Green’ conference Nick Smith talked up the Nats’ environmental credentials. Proclaimed a marine reserve … where commercial fishing will still be allowed. And pushed new air quality standards from 2013 to 2020. That will cost 635 lives and a million sick days. Smith says it will save $506m. Guess the ‘Green’ in ‘Blue-Green’ is money after all.
Written By: - Date published: 6:06 pm, January 27th, 2011 - 20 comments
John Key 2008: Follow me and we’ll be like Ireland.
John Key 2011: Follow me or we’ll be like Ireland.
Written By: - Date published: 10:31 am, December 14th, 2010 - 14 comments
Key has been very busy defending sacked Minister Pansy Wong. He has been desperately ignoring the calls for an Auditor General’s investigation as the cracks in the whitewash report on her illegal spending continue to grow. But Key is very quick to call for the Auditor General to investigate a single solitary billboard.
Written By: - Date published: 11:02 am, December 10th, 2010 - 35 comments
The usual suspects are accusing Labour of “flip flopping” on its position on the foreshore and seabed. You have to admire their bare-faced gall eh?
Written By: - Date published: 7:03 pm, October 1st, 2010 - 19 comments
Rodney Hide has taken a complaint to Parliamentary Services over Phil Twyford EA sending a message from his work email calling on people to vote for Len Brown. Wow, free emails. What a huge abuse of taxpayer cash. Not exactly on the scale of a trip to Disneyland. You’ve got to love Hide’s total lack of self-awareness.
Written By: - Date published: 11:45 am, October 1st, 2010 - 40 comments
Why does our Minister of Tourism always take his holidays overseas?
Written By: - Date published: 3:13 pm, June 14th, 2010 - 22 comments
Labour holds it’s MPs to higher standards than National. This post from the archives looks at some examples. If Key doesn’t act on his profligate MPs it will be time to add another chapter.
Written By: - Date published: 8:02 am, April 28th, 2010 - 36 comments
How does the government decide which are good drugs and which are bad?
And how much does it have to do with big money?
Written By: - Date published: 3:53 pm, February 26th, 2010 - 26 comments
The Human Rights Commission has come out swinging at the anti-democratic nature of the Super City consultation.
Will the Free Speech Coalition leap into action as it did last time? Probably not.
Written By: - Date published: 3:02 pm, December 18th, 2009 - 16 comments
Words: Prime Minister John Key has urged the world’s major economies to listen to the voices of vulnerable nations facing climate change. .. The current system of limited participation under the Kyoto Protocol had to be moved to one of “comprehensive global coverage”, he said. “For this to be achieved we need international commitments from …
Written By: - Date published: 7:24 am, November 7th, 2009 - 8 comments
Hypocrisy is such a difficult tag to shake in NZ politics. After blowing $50,000 of tax payer money on a trip with his girlfriend to visit her brother and wander around Disneyland, it seems like Rodney Hide has been caught yet again pilfering public funds to help with his romantic chances, this time another $10,000 …
Written By: - Date published: 2:43 pm, November 6th, 2009 - 31 comments
Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, October 27th, 2009 - 4 comments
Bill English knows a thing or two about screwing every possible cent out of the system. He gets his generous $276,000 salary. For years he received his unjustified Wellington accommodation allowance. The rules were changed so he could get an even bigger Wellington allowance as a Minister, but he got caught out and grudgingly paid …
Written By: - Date published: 10:05 am, October 9th, 2009 - 20 comments
Stabbing a kid to death is OK because it’s: “expressing frustration over [tagging]” Taking away people’s access to the most effective ‘flu and cold treatment because it’s a minor source for an ingredient(less than a third of pseudoephedrine comes from pharmacies according to Key), for a drug the use of which is already in decline: “a …
Written By: - Date published: 9:01 am, September 29th, 2009 - 28 comments
If DPF doesn’t practice Yoga already I think he should take it up. He’d be a natural. He’s so damn flexible! I’ve had occasion to comment on this once before. But for the EFA we see DPF lowering the bar of consistency to unbelievable depths, and limboing right on down. The Electoral Finance Act (EFA). …
Written By: - Date published: 7:27 am, September 21st, 2009 - 13 comments
I’ve posted before on “mainstream” media editorials, their variable quality and the paradox (in this world of blogging) of their anonymity. Every now and then it means that even The Herald can come up with a scorcher. And the Saturday Editorial on Bill English is certainly that. Usually I would try to “add value” (don’t …
Written By: - Date published: 2:30 pm, September 20th, 2009 - 39 comments
One of these things is not the other, One of these things is not quite the same… Can you guess which one is not like the other, Can you tell me before I finish the game?
Written By: - Date published: 9:08 am, September 15th, 2009 - 5 comments
A few important passages from the special select committee report on the Emissions Trading Scheme: In the long term, price caps stand in the way of market development and shield business from the real price of carbon to the economy…[National and United Future] recommend to the Government that if a short-term price cap is introduced, …
Written By: - Date published: 6:05 am, September 10th, 2009 - 11 comments
There was an odd little piece in The Herald on Tuesday: Uprising would force Super City changes: PM Prime Minister John Key says the Government will back down on the new Super City boundaries for Rodney and Franklin if there is enough of a community uprising. Mr Key said he would be happy to overrule …
Written By: - Date published: 9:32 am, September 3rd, 2009 - 22 comments
This 2007 quote from John Key is doing the rounds among angry “No” voters: Labour shows contempt for New Zealanders The Labour Government has shown utter contempt for New Zealanders and the democratic process with its plan to railroad the anti-smacking bill through Parliament, says National Party Leader John Key. “The Labour-led Government knows the …
Written By: - Date published: 7:05 am, August 5th, 2009 - 35 comments
What would you call it when you collect $900 a week by false pretenses? What would you call it when you tell the Electoral Commission and Ministerial Services that you live somewhere other than where you, your partner and your children actually live and work? And if you did those things while holding an office presumably subject …
Comments