I was wondering why Key’s team weren’t trying to milk his upcoming hardtalk interview for PR like they have with his other international media appearances.
Finally, an interview where some truly difficult points were forced. Made John Key look like a complete amateur and, despite some notable occasions, Stephen Sackeur is a wonderful interviewer who does his research.
The only question left to ask is this: wtf was John Key thinking accepting an interview from the one place that was going to truly sock it to him?
Stephen regularly makes the world’s most powerful people cringe in their chairs and only a few have truly stood their ground and fought with him – he always has an army of facts for any interview he does and isn’t afraid to follow up the 1st punch with a 2nd and 3rd…
Sorry just spilt coffee over my Keyboard
where was I ?
>Finally, an interview where some truly difficult points were forced.<
Not really passing judgement on Hardtalk verses Campbell Live, but Key refuses to front on CL or any program where he might be asked similar questions, this interview could be look at as entrapment, maybe not only should we feel embarrassed, but sorry for our dear leader.
The wanker
Front on New Zealand TV you slack prick
What an embarrassment! Opposition parties could have a field day with this performance. “100% pure relative to other countries” Better than a Tui ad. So ‘unemployment is really good compared to …!”
There is an episode of hardtalk on BBC World at 3:30am tonight (which presumably will also be shown on TV1), but I’m not sure if it is this interview. Some commentators on open mike yesterday mentioned watching this episode, not sure where they are located.
Hard Talk is scheduled to show on TV One overnight at 3.30am Wednesday. However, it was also on the scheduled early this morning at the same time, so I’m not sure if it will be the Key interview tomorrow am.
After doing some digging, I found that proxies from hidemyass.com seem to work (click on IP: Port Proxies in the centre of the menu, in the box on the left scroll down until you get United Kingdom and hit Search).
The 2nd one on the list is let me download the Windows Media Player version, which is 242mb. And it also appears that I can watch it! There’s DRM that forces it to expire 30 days after you’ve downloaded it, and no-doubt it’s also doing geo-location checks on my IP address, so need to use the proxy to watch it.
If no better source turns up, I might see if I can screen-scrape this, encode it and upload it somewhere on the net. Youtube probably won’t work though as BBC will probably automatically send them a take down notice.
“Conserving our native animals and plants is the core thing New Zealanders expect the government to do in conservation. The cuts to the budget the government has already made have reduced the department’s capacity to actually do that. With all of the rhetoric around the need to cut further, the public is being softened up for further cuts in areas like conservation.”
The department had a $1.6 billion budget for the 2010 financial year. In 2009, the government signalled it would be slashed by $54 million over a four-year period.
It woud be neglect if MSM do not pick up on this. Any bets on this happening? Has there ever been a more cringe worthy international performance by a NZ PM?
Oh the stupid it hurts.(PR folk that is not slippery sideshow)…..after years of laughing at the Ozzies having Howard as PM the worms turned big time with sideshow up front hamming it up on the world stage….am I coping it big time now from across the ditch.
I couldn’t believe the ridiculous smirk he has on his face at the start of the interview. I can’t imagine any other leader that would go into an interview with an expression like that.
He looked from the start as if he was going to be asked about corgis and the LotRings, like back home. Quite fun when he does his assassin eyes when hes reeling off numbers – steely trader squint, probably works on a monitor.
It must have been a real surprise for Shonkey to get a real journalist asking some real questions instead of the patsy arse kissing questions we get from NZ journalists, who are bribed to be Nationals mouth piece. Didn’t he completely fail in the real world where people respect the truth and lies are confronted.
Key’s answers were very telling taking on two flavours. The first was a typical denialist attack – discredit the source by saying it was that scientist’s ‘opinion’ and that he could find other opinions to refute it. His second type of reply was that there wasn’t an issue just ‘look out the window’ at the natural beauty.
The first is disingenuous, the second is quite scary if that is his yardstick for conservation. It implies that so long as the green veneer is there then he is happy to sell the 100% NZ brand regardless of any environmental crises going on behind.
I agree Key should have said something along the lines of:’ “Yes quitre correct – New Zealand isn’t 100% pure, it hasn’t been since colonisation. Sorry about the last ten years of duping tourists into coming here. But well you gotta love the marketing particulalry by politicans like Helen Clark and their officials as they toured around the world suckering it out of money. Again apologies from New Zealand to the world… come down and we’ll make it up to you with some fush n chups & an L&P.”
It was a horrendous show of pass the buck in parliament today, with Shonkey doing just that on a number of difficult questions. Next National will be blaming Labour for their drinking.
What was that shit about “two way trade on its way to 12 billion…y’ know, 20 billion”
So the total of import/export trade with China is…what exactly? I mean, fuck. 12 billion is a long way from 20 billion. What is two way trade heading towards and when will it be at the 12 cough 20 billion mark? And how much of that 12 cough 20 billion will be earned by NZ and how much by China?
That aside, I was waiting for him to blame the Christchurch earthquake for…..stuff. And then follow that up by claiming to be 110% committed to…stuff.
Anyway. The Nats publicly dumped the ‘Clean and Green’ sales pitch. So why didn’t he just say that his government recognised the ‘Clean and Green’ image as a bit of a have and move on?
Meanwhile. What are those tougher environmental measures for dairy farming he was referring to? Anyone?
I watched the interview yesterday on BBC World. Couldd be the same interview if it is on again tonight
If you have MySky, record it. This interview is a much watch.
Seriously, if this ‘100% Pure’ thing is all anyone has picked up on yet from the internet clip, then WOW. There is a whole lot more insight into Key’s mind and character in this interview.
You’re right. Key’s comments re immigration in the interview were also cringe-worthy. All his talk about encouraging worthwhile people to NZ; of them investing in our economy; bringing their skills and money, etc. Has he not been briefed by Kate Wilkinson on the great job she’s done dodging Campbell Live’s attempts to interview her about Martyn Payne? Overall, Key’s HARDtalk interview performance reinforced my view that the guy’s a lightweight.
And just to highlight how the MSM helps Mr – can’t answer questions by himself – Key cover up his mistakes…
MikeMs comment pretty much sums it up:
I’m very impressed at how Stuff’s summary of the interview managed to twist a boring environmental topic into something that was 90% about Key’s thoughts on the Monarchy.
Comment by MikeM on Dim post — May 10, 2011 @ 7:28 pm
Dim Post is also giving this an airing. Most are displeased or more, with our Prime Ministers foolish performance, just as there is an absence of support for Key here. Do Burt and Pete et al only get paid 9-5? Dim Post
Damn. Doesn’t go quite to the right page. [Fixed — r0b]
The HardTalk interview has probably done more to boost Goff & Labour’s chances in the November election than any other media event in the past 2 & half years. My friends , scattered across the world wherever HardTalk screened, have all expressed a collective cringe at seeing such a pitiful performance from a NZ PM.
Key’s performance was one that demonstrated what quality interviewing is all about… the interviewer allowing the interviewee to put his own foot in his mouth and then gently probing so that the foot goes even deeper into the speaker’s throat.
There was no excuse for Key being so uninformed, so ignorant and so shallow apart from his own arrogant belief in his PR creation.
It just shows how pathetic the media are here , they let that flimsy , pathetic excuse for a PM get away with SMILE and try the deflection routine . What is it ? do the media get stars in their eyes ?
Sackur refers to New Zealand being “vulnerable” to world economic events, and Key says that any small country that is effected by a large event is vulnerable but New Zealand is in a “economically quite a strong position”!
Sackur then says that one thing New Zealand does not have is strong growth. John Key says that “we don’t accept that position”. ‘Not only dairy… but forestry, land, beef, seafood prices are at record highs.’
Sackur then hits him on NZ having 30% lower wages than Australia, and 25% of NZ Graduates leaving NZ as opposed to 2.5% leaving Australia. Key defends NZ, says that nobody else in the OECD has had as big a population increase as NZ.
It goes on.. but here is the best quote from Sackur:
“You spent many years working in London making a lot of money. And I wonder if you’re the right person to be telling New Zealanders, “You know what, you should stay at home, invest in your own country, and you can make it in your own country” because you had to come here to make it”
Very internationalist perspective from Sackur. Very big picture. No wonder he is so sceptical of Key.
Ref the Helen Clark interview on Hardtalk…That woman made us proud to be NZ’ers. She handled those questions with such skill. That’s the difference between someone who is briefed, goes out of her way to be informed and lives by her principles. That line from her is so true “I say in private what I say in public”. I heard her say that so often. And some of the prescient comments left by viewers are being fulfilled right now.
Too true, the difference in the two interviews is marked.
I didn’t always agree with Helen but she is clearly intelligent, principled, well-informed, and very much her own person. None of which can be said about the present Head Bozo.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we had another HC-like person in Labour?
Please can the NZ MSM get some similar interviewers. So refreshing to have someone that actually did some research, asked real questions and expected real responses in place of the usual one-liner PR spin we get in NZ.
I managed to use a proxy to download the WMP version (see 3.2.4 above). Spent the last 50 minutes trying to transcribe it all, and only got through about 8 minutes of it! It’s 30 minutes long, so this doesn’t seem like a go-er.
Here’s what I have so far. Apologies for any typoes and lack of grammer and punctuation. I’ve tried to get the wording almost as exact as I can, although I might miss a few ‘ums’ and other sounds out, as well as word stresses and Key’s slack-jawed gabbing.
Hard talk today is in central london. my guest is new zealand’s visiting prime minister john key. his first term in office has been a baptism of fire. he’s had to cope with a prolonged economic slowdown, and a string of disasters including a major mining accident and the devastating christchurch earthquake. geographically isolated and small in population, just how resilient is new zealand when put to the test?
HT: prime minister john key, welcome to hard talk
JK: thanks very much, great to be here
HT: is it proving harder than you expected to be new zealand’s prime minister?
JK: well we’ve certainly had more challenges than one might either want or expect, if you think about the time i’ve been in office, nearly three years, we’ve had the global financial crisis, two earthquake in christchurch, ah pike river mine disaster, we’ve ended up having to uh buy and ah bailout a number of finance companies and in recent times provide support for an insurance company which has a large exposure to christchurch so it hasn’t been an easy time for us
HT: those are massive tests, and we’ll go through them in some detail, but they’re tests that you’ve had to face, as, I think the most inexperienced prime minister in the last 100 years of NZ’s history. i mean you-you-you came in to office, I think just 6 years as an MP, 2 years as party leader, you weren’t really terribly well-equipped as a political leader were you?
JK: well it depends on what you think um are the skills that you need to be a good prime minister. it’s certainly true I got there in the fastest time, prior to me was david lange who I think took 7 years, but i think in modern day politcs you are seeing the emergeance of young leaders. um we’re seeing that in the case of president obama now in the US, obviously with david cameron here in the united kingdom, and I think the experience that i had working in a number of international markets here in the uk, singapore, australia and the likes, that banking experience where you have, very much, the economy at the front and centre stage of the issues new zaealand faces. i think actually the mixture of skills I’ve had would be about the right ones.
HT: well, you were a successful banker, you made lots of money, but you’d never, for example, run a city, let alone a ministerial department. and then to go to some of those challenges you’ve already alluded to, here you are, faced, for example, in christchurch, with what you I think described as possibly, maybe, NZ’s darkest day ever, with the christchurch earthquake.
JK: I think the answer to that is that you need to have a plan. I mean ultimately, one of the things the commercial sector teaches you is that you have to have a sense of where you’re going, a sense of how you’re going to achieve that, and to be able to frame up the challenges that ya face. in the case of christchurch, if one puts to one side the human tragedy, which has been enormous – I mean we lost 181 people there – um then th-the process of funding the rebuilding, of what is actually required to make that happen, allow that to happen in a timeframe which is sensible both for new zealand and for the people of christchurch, i think is rather the self-explanatory. now, we have taken some hard calls, we’ve passed legislation which gives us ah very wide and encompassing powers to enable us to rebuild christchurch quickly, we’ve essentially assumed that responsibility at a central government level
HT: does it make sense to rebuild christchurch, quickly? i mean th-the city is still getting serious tremors, it’s had around the area of the city, it’s had 2 major earthquakes in the last 8 or so months. is it wise, to rebuild christchurch?
JK: we believe so – the second earthquake we think is an aftershock of the first one, and that’s been supported by our scientists in new zealand. now it’s true, there’s been 5000 aftershocks in christchurch measuring above, i think 3 or 4 on the richter scale since the first earthquake on the 4th of september.
HT: ah-a-and because of that you have a lot of people in christchurch who are saying ‘i want out of this city, i see no future for myself and my children in this place’
JK: yeah-it’s-been-interesting-actually-the-response wh- look there are about 400,000 people that live in christchurch, and there is no perfect way of measuring how many people have or will leave, but if you put your finger in the air and say what’s that number likely to look like and I’d say it’s 20 to 30 thousand people.
HT: you’re sounding determinedly upbeat, but here’s where it gets very difficult for a very small country – populations not much more than 4 million – we’re talking about your second city, economists reckon that in the short-run, the next year or two, it could mean that rather than expecting growth of over 3%, it might be down to 2%, so it’s a real drag on new zealand’s economic prospects. and that’s, in a way, illustrating how vulnerable your small country is, would you accept that?
JK: well by definition, any small country where it’s affected by a very large event um has less room to move than say a larger country – that’s-that’s a statement of fact. having said that, new zealand finds itself in economically quite a strong position, so gross debt to gdp is under 20% currently, and we are going into our budget process on may the 19th with a zero budget, so instead of spending a billion dollars more, we will spend zero. and that money will be used over time, um to pay for the earthquake. so we are addressing that through essentially trimming government expenditure.
HT: but what you do not have in nz right now is-is strong growth, in fact you have virtually no growth at all, and that’s really not something you can blame on the earthquake. I just wonder whether you, with all of your financial background, over-estimated your ability, and the country’s ability to deliver, ahh, sustainable growth, because it isn’t happening, is it?
JK: well we wouldn’t accept that position. i mean for a start off, the global financial crisis had quite an impact, so when we came in to office at the end of 2008, the country had experienced 3 quarters of negative growth, and that continued into the back-end of 2008 and into early 2009. but if you strip the earthquake out and say ‘ok how does nz really look’ we have a very strong commodity sector, so it’s not just diary prices – forestry, lamb, beef, seafood, all of those are at record highs, and not withstanding that we’re combatting very high exchange rate, actually that part of our economy is very strong, we have the rugby world cup in new zealand, the christchurch rebuild will add probably a percent to the gdp every year for the next, 5 to 7 years. so, look i, the picture that we see, is one that we see is one of growth, above 4%
HT: (interjecting)well y-y-y-you’re painting a rosy picture, which I think a lot of new zealanders might-might question. I mean they heard you, for example, in-in, ahh, the last couple of years, consistently saying, ‘we are going to close the prosperity gap, the wages gap’ in particular ‘with Australia’, and people compare yourselves with australia. it hasn’t happened, in fact the wages gap is wider than ever.
JK: (smiling) actually we also reject that proposition. but let me take you through that, so. (chuckles)
HT: well, the-the opposition leader just the other day, Phil Goff he said “the best this government can do is now trumpet that new zealand wages are 30% below australia’s giving us a supposed competitive advantage. he used to talk about the fact we were going to close the gap’
JK: I won’t get into a political debate about the robustness of his numbers. but let me-let me take this step back for you. new zealand has had a widening wage gap with australia [why? why?] over the course of the last 40 years. primarily mineral resources base in australia. so australia’s very minerally wealthy, and china’s having a huge impact on their market. so to give you some idea of that, the capital investment going into the mining sector in australia, for the last decade, has averaged about 5 to 10 billion dollars a year. in the last 3 years alone in australia it’s been 55 billion dollars a year.
HT: i’m sure you don’t want to spend the whole interview comparing yourselves to australia, but, here is one important fact. more than a quarter of new zealand’s graduates, that is the brightest and the best that your country’s producing, are now living outside of your own country. that’s 10 times the rate for australia-born graduates, and that suggests to me that you have got a fundamental, a structual problem.
That’s fantastic! the interviewer doesn’t rate Key’s credentials at all, does he? and don’t accept/reject the proposition huh – only because he can’t deny them.
Haven’t updated this for a while but since National Ltd™ came to power:
has been caught out repeatedly lying in the run up to and during the election campaign about its real intentions in relation to the environment
celebrated the opening of the foreign-owned Pike River Coal Ltd mine on DOC land adjacent to the Paparoa National Park from which 1 megatonne of coal will be extracted per year for the next 20 years – Pike River Coal Ltd has announced that it has found additional coal in the national park
removed a proposed efficiency standard (MEPS) on incandescent lightbulbs
reversed a moratorium on building new gas/oil/coal power stations
removed the bio fuel subsidy
scrapped the scheme that would have penalised imported vehicles producing high emissions
removed regulations for water efficient new housing
renewed leases on sensitive high country farms which were meant to return to DOC
reversed restrictions on the freeholding of vast swathes of land on the edge of the Southern Lakes
arbitrarily excised 400 hectares from the brand new Oteake Conservation Park, including the most important and, ecologically, the rarest part of the new Park, the tussock and shrubland that went right down to the banks of the Manuherikia River, to enable future access to lignite
said nothing to say in regard to the World Commission on Protected areas of IUCN’s severe criticism of its intention to investigate mineral resources and mining opportunities in protected conservation areas including our three UNESCO World Heritage Sites of Te Wahi Pounamu-South West New Zealand, Tongariro National Park and the Sub Antarctic Islands
approved two prospecting permit applications lodged by Australian iron-ore giant Fortescue Metals Group subsidiary FMG Pacific lodged in June – areas covered by the two-year permits include an 8204-square-kilometre area of seabed adjoining the west coast from Cape Reinga to the Manukau Harbour and a 3798-square-kilometre prospecting area of land from Cape Reinga to the Kaipara Harbour including Ninety Mile Beach, the west side of the Aupouri Peninsula, Kaitaia and the Hokianga.
approved an additional prospecting permit for Fortesque Metals in relation to 3568sq km right next door to the Kahurangi National Park where the Heaphy Track is
was forced to release its Ministry of Economic Development (MED) report under the Official Information Act that proclaims “significant mineral potential” in the Fiordland, Kahurangi and Paparoa national parks – the report said the Waitutu area of the Fiordland National Park had sufficient petroleum reserves to be “worthy” of inclusion in a review of conservation land protected from mining
secretly granted the minerals industry the right to veto proposed National Park boundaries and permission for any such vetoes to be kept confidential – in spite of recommendations from its own officials against any such a veto
Minster of Conservation Tim Grosser, on 29 August 2009, called for caring New Zealanders to halt their “emotional hysteria” and recognise that conservation land should be mined for minerals and went on to say “Mining in a modern, technological way can have a negligible effect”
Associate Minister of Conservation Kate Wilkinson, in an interview in “Canterbury Farming” rubished her own department, DOC, suggesting it was incapable of looking after the high country reserves and parks under its control
gutted the home insulation scheme
pulled $300 million out of public transport, walking and cycling schemes and added it to a pot of $2 billion to ‘upgrade’ state highways
changed the law to provide billions of dollar in subsidies for polluters via the ETS casino which is now a target for scamming by international criminals
begun a process of gutting the Resource Management Act to make it difficult/impossible for the public to lodge appeals against developers
removed the ability of Auckland to introduce a fuel levy to fund planned public transport upgrades
left electrification of the national rail network up in the air without promised funding commitments
removed the Ministry for the Environment’s programme to make Government Departments ‘carbon neutral’
removed funding for public tv advertising on sustainability and energy efficiency
pulled funding for small-town public litter bin recycling schemes
cabinet ministers expressing public support the bulldozing of Fiordland
reduced Department of Conservation funding by about $50 million over three years
canceled funding for the internationally acclaimed ‘Enviroschools’ programme
usurped the democratic role of local Councils of determining policies for their citizens by requiring the abandonment of the efficient and well-established tree protection rules for urban areas
set about revamping Auckland governance in a way that is likely to greatly reduce the ‘Environmental Watchdog’ role of the the current Regional Council
removed Auckland’s metropolitan limits and opened the gateway for unfettered urban sprawl
defended internationally the importation of rain-forest-wrecking palm kernel and stood silent while Federated Farmers called Greenpeace “terrorists”
stood silent while Godfrey Bloom, a Member of the European Parliament and infamous Climate Change Denialist, publicly rejoiced in the 1985 bombing of the Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior – who was doing so while standing on a dock next to the replacement vessel
took a 0% emissions reduction target to Copenhagen. Yes, seriously, that isn’t a misprint – that was the lower bound of their negotiation platform – then missed the 01/02/10 deadline for commitment to action it had agreed to – meanwhile 55 of the 80 countries which attended did make the deadline
secretly cancelled the internationally recognised scheme for the mandatory labelling of exotic woods to ensure the timber has not been taken from rain forests in direct contradiction of its own statements made at the 13th World Forestry Congress in Argentina
supported the Department of Conservation’s decision to open up the pristine Cathedral Cove to an ice-cream franchise
given the Department of Conservsation $1.7 million to further develop commercial activities on DOC land and started an “off set” plan allowing company’s to damage the conservation estate if they agree to improve land elsewhere – no monitoring regime has been suggested on put in place
left DOC director-general Al Morrison to announce that DOC is to charge for services that had been free and, to soften the public up to the idea that there will be more “energy generation schemes” operating on DOC land
taken no action to reduce existing pollution pouring into the Manawatu River and is “leaving it up to industry” to come up with solutions to heal the river which was described by the Cawthorn Institute as “one of the worst polluted in the Western world”
announced a $1.1 million industry subsidy to kick start marine farming without identifying no-go areas nor putting in place a consultation process for individiuals, communities, and other general coastal users
blamed New Zealanders after a Japanese whaling ship deliberately smashed into a smaller, more vulnerable craft in the open sea
was forced to release documents under the Official Information Act which confirm that DOC has “giving up” on ecologically valuable high-country land in the Mackenzie Basin because of funding cuts. The released documents cite “statements made by ministers”, “diminishing funding” and the Government’s new high-country policies as reasons for the changed stance – the comments from DOC were made after Land Information New Zealand (Linz), which manages the tenure review process, ignored DOC’s previous conservation recommendations for the farms
used former National Party minister and current director of Open Country Cheese – a company convicted of filthy farming practices – Wyatt Creech to head up an enquiry into Environment Canterbury which had been standing up the dairy farmers’ demands for more and more water resources and less and less regulation. The Creech report recommended the Environmental Canterbury be sacked and replaced with government appointments and the voters of Canterbury do without democracy until the water situation had been resolved. The Canterbury area holds 50 percent of New Zealand’s fresh water reserves and 50 percent of the water required for hyrdo energy. The Creech report said Environmental Centerbury put too much focus on the environment.
Despite international condemnation for knowing next to nothing about the parlous state of the New Zealand fisheries, National Ltd™ bucks international trends, pours more acid on the 100% Pure brand and increases the bluefin tuna quota.
New Zealand is subject to international criticism for its backing of commericial whaling which National Ltd supports
Government-owned company Solid Energy runs an essay competition entitled “The role of coal in sustainable energy solutions for New Zealand” for school children. First prize is a trip to New Zealand’s largest coal customer, China.
Supported access fees for entrance onto DOC walkways – fee introduced following cuts to DOC’s budget.
New Zealand’s environment would profit from mining national parks, Conservation Minister Kate Wilkinson says.
Department of Conservation director-general Al Morrison said the conservation estate created “opportunities to do a whole lot for a lot of different people. We’ve got to get away from this idea that somehow we have to protect one-third of New Zealand for a certain constituency and put it in a jar of formaldehyde and leave it.”
State coal miner Solid Energy could get an extra slice of the action if highly sensitive conservation land is opened to gold, silver and other prospecting. Energy and Resources Minister Gerry Brownlee said Solid Energy’s work could be widened to include other minerals and resources, or it could form part of a new state-owned enterprise to maximise government returns from any mining. He did not rule out the company, which produces 80 per cent of New Zealand’s coal, having a role in mining gold and other minerals on Great Barrier Island and other conservation areas being eyed by the Government http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/3519703/Golden-possibility-for-state-coal-miner
>removed a proposed efficiency standard (MEPS) on incandescent lightbulbs <
I posted a lot of mercury bombs into parliament, spreading mercury vapour throughout the postal system and parliament buildings, and it was legal, the bulbs tended to break as they went into the post box.
But it got the idiot law stopped 😉 … maybe?
@BLiP! – excellent stuff, i’ve been trying to pull together a summary like that for some time. Request permission to shamelessly borrow/promulgate.
Despite the almost non-exhaustive nature of that list, it’s pretty much a lot worse than that.
try: Sacked ECAN councillors claiming ‘dysfunctional’, but OIA documents reveal Carter, Brownlee and Key up to their eyeballs in pushing officials to get rid of ‘hurdles’ to ‘accelerating large scale water storage and irrigation in Canterbury’. Guess what the two hurdles were identified as? Water Conservation Orders and Council Processes.
What do we see come out of the toothless NPS on freshwater this week? a fund entitled “Irrigation acceleration fund”. Subtle? not very.
For those of you not up with the play, while the media spotlight played out on the sacking of ECAN councillors, the true fatal thrust to water in Canterbury was the amending of Water Conservation Orders (essentially National Park like status given to rivers that met the required tests under the RMA) so that there is no longer a right of appeal.
The comments here have spurred me into tidying the list up and adding more to it. I’ve been busy with mahi – the evil, foreign-owned multi-national I work for has decided the best way to increase productivity is to not replace staff who leave. That means the rest of us have to pick up the slack. Do you think our salaries have gone up to reflect the extra work? Like fuck.
SOMEONE needs to put this up on Youtube and pass it on to the New Zealand media or else no-one will see or hear about it except for us geeky lefties that will not vote for the brat anyway.
There is a lot more to this interview than the freely available highlights online.
I followed someone’s instructions here and downloaded it via a hidemyass proxy but i don’t know how to convert it to youtube friendly …
Made total mincemeat of him. Makes you realise how pathetic NZ current affairs TV is. Can’t we get Stephen Sackur to come to NZ for the election campaign?
richard you are right. current afairs in NZ is pathetic and that is the way these people want it. they know they can stand up to the hair and teeth jobs shoulder tapped by TVNZ and the others so to save themselves the bother they just dont have any current affairs at all! very convenient and then they say that the public isnt interested. well they would be if there was some blood on the floor every now and again instead of the saccharine hucksterism that passes for investigative journalism these days.
You know that there’s something wrong with the MSM when, confronted with scientific research, they go and get a businessman to cast doubt on the scientists research.
HA! Whilst I was listening to the interview in the above clip my 14 year old daughter was sitting on the sofa behind me mucking about on facebook or whatever and she suddenly piped up and said, ‘Why can’t he just answer the question!’
Re: the question whether NZ will let Crafar being bought – I can mostly hear that slurring guy trying to buy interview time while figuring out how to answer, nay, avoid the question.
This one that NZ elected as PM in 2008 shows himself to be very mediocre, nay, an embarrassment at coming up with responses when he is interviewed.
Cut out the explanation of the research- cut out the journalist saying you aren’t answering the questions and end with the journalist patting Key down…
John Key should be immortalised ” Compared to other countries we are 100%” compared to sum I achieved 100% in School cert English 🙂 !!!
I only wished that JK was min of education when I was at school !!!!!
This is pure magic and should be aired many times. The unfortunate thing is that this will be lost on many. Still even so late in the day nice to have a chuckle. Pure magic
Anyone know when the full interview will be on again and where. There maybe some more gems that were missed on the 3 minute clip
Another classic part is near the end, where Key goes on about NZers supporting the monarchy based on a poll that said 85% of people here supported bringing back knighthoods. Shortly afterwards, Sarkur points out that a poll he has seen says around 40% of NZers want a republic. Key responds by saying “There’s always some random poll that you can draw from but…”
Everytime i watch Key’s answers my face meets the palms of my hands at regular intervals. I know NZ does have some decent journo’s but could you imagine Key getting that type of grilling with more regulararity. His tenure as PM would’ve been finished long ago. Since Muldoon’s over the top treatment of any journo’s not giving the Nats favourable treatment back in the early 80’s there seems to be an utter lack of consistent probing invesitgative journalism in NZ putting chancers like Key under real public scrutiny. That coupled with the severe scaling back in NZ based newsrooms.
Sackur is not known as one the BBC’s hardest interviewers. But he was doing what any investigative political journo does well. Puts his subject under pressure and see’s how they react. In Key’s case not very well. Sackur having dealt with the seasoned Westminster politico’s for years was always going to have done his research on Key and most of it was not going to be favourable. As oppossed to the Herald who have just gone to their default position of being the Nat’s propoganda leaflet. The Herald article almost seems to hint that the big old nasty BBC had no right to harrass NZ’s glorious leader. Plus going to a NZ business bloke to refute the claims of a respected scientist must surely be the Herald’s idea of a piss take.
Key must be asking himself “why can’t all international TV invites be as intellectually challenging as Letterman”?
Having watched the full interview, I actually think that your average viewer would think that Key does OK. Don’t get me wrong imho Key is evading questions, contradicting himself (most notably with the whole “academics and lawyers” and republic v monarchy statistics) etc
But he is very good at doing it while smiling without ever getting aggressive and taking the bait. Most people, when proven wrong like he is, a few times just in this interview (!), or when caught out lying, e.g. the whole Kiwirail shares thing before the 08 election, would go on the attack or get really flustered. He just sticks to some semi-evasive waffle, might even partially concede a point to conceal the fact that he is getting caught red-handed, and remains mild-mannered.
How does he get away with it? Well, in NZ, the casual mild-mannered approach is king. It’s a cultural thing. Politicians like Clark and Goff who are too serious, too intellectual, or too earnest invoke suspicion – they must be full of themselves if they aren’t constantly in self-deprecating humour mode or if they use technical vocabulary (tall poppy syndrome) – and are called “robots” “hapless ideologues” “ivory tower types” and so on. They are not “one of Us”. Key on the other hand is your “average white businessman familyman golfplaying aucklander” type who speaks the language of low-level corporate office. He ticks all the boxes for the Herald, most journalists, tv, etc. as being “one of Us” so he has significantly greater leeway on any subject anyway. He fits into what the Nats would see as the “mainstream NZer” mould quite nicely. Add to that his casual, friendly mild manners and our journos hesitate to attack him because they would be attacking a friendly one-of-us type bloke – they will be the ones seen as unreasonable aggressors. Even Sackur when he nailed him couldn’t bring himself to go all the way.
Invoking “pragmatism” also gets him off the hook. This is an anglo-saxon misnomer to conceal a dominant ideology in this case a watered down neo-liberal approach. Neoliberals can afford to be conservatives in NZ, in the literal sense of the term, because we are not that far off a neoliberal paradise anyway. And Key like many other politicians will avoid rocking the boat by any means possible. This “conservative” line is seen as both “moderate” and “reasonable”.
So the nicknames “teflon” “slippery” are all well-founded. Unless a respected journo nails him with an unrelenting line of questioning on prime time telly – and the PR boys will avoid that at all costs – he will remain our friendly PM whose policies go unnoticed and unchallenged behind the artificial veil that is his Image. If only they would show a few more vids on the news of him sneering and jeering nastily in the house, that could go a long way to undermining his “nice-guy-not-a-politician” persona. His honeymoon with a befuddled media is not even over yet and it’s almost election time so there is little hope of that happening…
It takes the BBC – a leading overseas media organisation – to show the true face of our useless “leader”. Again this proves the uselessness of most NZ media. Apart from a few exceptions the NZ media has become so useless and pre-occupied with “image” and “presentation” that no matters of substance are reported on in-depth. Like with our supermarkets we have something like a duopoly owning the newspapers, magazines and some TV and radio stations. Public broadcasting gets treated worse year by year.
So many in NZ are so brain-washed, they do not get a chance to see “real” questions being asked to our leading politicians. Many do not even bother informing themselves, because they have grown up in a society where commercials on radio and television take up a per centage of broadcasting times, so that any program gets fragmented and listeners and viewers constantly distracted and otherwise brainwashed to simply be “consumers”.
This interview should be a revelation of how useless John Key really is. He dodges questions all the time, contradicts himself, denies facts and make a total fool of himself. Sadly hardly anyone in NZ bothers watching or listening to Hard Talk!
So no wonder we get election results that make critical and informed people wonder how that came about.
At least one tv program showed a 45second extract of this – Media7 on TVNZ7
TVNZ7 the best news in the country at 8pm where they take time to interview people and get to the bottom of issues unlike the tabloid headlines prevalent on TV1 TV3 Prime.
TVNZ7 the channel discarded by our beloved national govt
no surprises there – Key and Coleman are conducting their own Glorious Cultural Revolution
with the motto “Kill Public Service Broadcasting”.
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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 ...
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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 ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
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 ...
The government's plan to reintroduce a three strikes regime is being strongly opposed by lawyers, who argue there is no evidence it reduces crime or helps people rehabilitate. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Jerker B. Svantesson, Professor specialising in Internet law, Bond University Do Australian courts have the right to decide what foreign citizens, located overseas, view online on a foreign-owned platform? Anyone inclined to answer “yes” to this question should perhaps also ask ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Giovanni E Ferreira, NHMRC Emerging Leader Research Fellow, Institute of Musculoskeletal Health, University of Sydney Last week in a post on X, owner of the platform Elon Musk recommended people look into disc replacement if they’re experiencing severe neck or back pain. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Hayward, Emeritus Professor of Public Policy, RMIT University anek.soowannaphoom/Shutterstock NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey caught the headlines yesterday, courtesy of a blistering speech condemning the latest GST carve-up. New South Wales, he claimed, would be A$11.9 billion worse off over the ...
While police are "broadly in favour", the government's proposed anti-gang laws are facing pushback from lawyers, rights groups and former gang members. ...
While police are "broadly in favour", the government's proposed anti-gang laws are facing pushback from lawyers, rights groups and former gang members. ...
By Miriam Zarriga in Port Moresby Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has arrived at Kokoda Station, Northern province, at the start of his state visit to Papua New Guinea. Both Albanese and Prime Minister James Marape will meet with the locals and the Northern Provincial government before they begin their ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Wallace, Professor, School of Politics Economics & Society, Faculty of Business Government & Law, University of Canberra Shutterstock An important principle was invoked by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week in defence of the government’s Future Made in Australia industry ...
By Patrick Decloitre, RNZ Pacific correspondent French Pacific desk Security forces reinforcements were sent from France ahead of two rival marches in the capital Nouméa today, at the same time and only two streets away one from the other. One march, called by Union Calédonienne party (a component of the ...
A poll last August found that just 16% of New Zealanders oppose bringing back the ‘Three Strikes’ law. The nationwide poll of 1,000 New Zealanders was commissioned by Family First NZ and carried out by Curia Market Research. ...
The solo show from Ana Scotney is both sprawling and intimate, and a must-see, writes Mad Chapman. In the opening moments of Scattergun: After the Death of Rūaumoko, writer and performer Ana Scotney lays out the groundwork, literally. Silently moving around the square stage, Scotney is not so much dancing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Burridge, Professor of Linguistics, Monash University Who makes the words? Why are trees called trees and why are shoes called shoes and who makes the names? – Elliot, age 5, Eltham, Victoria Good question Elliot! Let’s start with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Duckett, Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne at amRawpixel.com/Shutterstock Roles of health professionals are still unfortunately often stuck in the past. That is, before the ...
COMMENTARY:By Malcolm Evans Last week’s leaked New York Times staff directive, as to what words can and cannot be used to describe the carnage Israel is raining on Palestinians, is proof positive, since those reports are published verbatim here in New Zealand, that our understanding of the conflict is ...
In the case of New Zealand, the results confirm that there is no popular support for the vicious austerity program being imposed by the National Party-led government, which is backed in all fundamental respects by the opposition Labour Party. ...
The ‘Vampire’ singer has never visited our part of the world, but that might all be about to change. We assess the evidence.Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts World Tour is pulling in massive crowds as it whips around the US and Europe, even helping to catapult regular supporting act Chappell Roan ...
Testing of drinking water in rural Canterbury over the weekend by Greenpeace revealed that several public town supplies were reaching levels of nitrate above 5 mg/L - the threshold which a growing body of scientific evidence has linked to increased ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rohan Fisher, Information Technology for Development Researcher, Charles Darwin University It may come as a surprise to hear 2023 was Australia’s biggest bushfire season in more than a decade. Fires burned across an area eight times as big as the 2019–20 Black ...
Responding to the Government’s announcement of changes to resource management laws, Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, said: “These changes are a step in the right direction in terms of removing ideological and unworkable ...
More than two years after the Human Rights Council called for the establishment of a national human rights commission, such a body has yet to be formed. ...
Comment:An emergency management system with wide variations in performance, significant capability gaps, funding shortfalls and above all a setup that is not meeting the needs of New Zealanders at times of crisis. The Government’s inquiry into the response to Cyclone Gabrielle and other severe weather events in the North ...
Welcome to the whirring wonders of one brain trying to align its actions with its beliefs within a system it thinks is evil. My brain has been spiralling in a woke conundrum ever since I found out a bookshop I’ve never been to was shutting down. Good Books, a bookshop ...
We repeat our call for criminal justice policy to be based on evidence, something the three strikes regime neglects to recognise – with no evidence that it either reduces crime or assists with rehabilitation. ...
By Koroi Hawkins, RNZ Pacific editor in Honiara With only four more seats in the 50-member Parliament yet to be officially declared, there is no outright winner in the Solomon Islands elections. As of Monday, the two largest blocs in the winner’s circle, independents and the incumbent Prime Minister Manasseh ...
Two/fiftyseven is a multi-purpose space hidden in the heart of Wellington that is paving a way for sustainable building and responsible landlording in Aotearoa and beyond.By 2060 the world is predicted to double its entire building stock, which equates to building an entire New York City every 34 days, ...
Popstars wasn’t just a reality television revolution, it was also a huge moment for Y2K fashion.It’s 25 years since girl group TrueBliss was formed on New Zealand national television, breaking new ground for both the reality television industry and the shiny clothing industry. With the first episode on NZ ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Pepping, Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology, Griffith University Marvin / Shutterstock Are all single people insecure? When we think about people who have been single for a long time, we may assume it’s because single people have insecurities that make ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By William Geary, Lecturer in Quantitative Ecology & Biodiversity Conservation, The University of Melbourne Trismegist san, Shutterstock Landscapes that have escaped fire for decades or centuries tend to harbour vital structures for wildlife, such as tree hollows and large logs. But these ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Gladstone-Gallagher, Lecturer in Marine Science, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Shutterstock/S Curtis Why are we crossing ecological boundaries that affect Earth’s fundamental life-supporting capacity? Is it because we don’t have enough information about how ecosystems respond to change? Or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew Crocker, PhD Student in Economics, Deakin University Here’s something for the board of the Reserve Bank of Australia to ponder as it meets next month to set interest rates. It has pushed up rates on 13 occasions since it began its ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a charity director outlines how she’s saving for retirement and buying secondhand. Want to be part of The Cost of Being? Fill out the questionnaire here.Gender: Female Age: 45 Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: Charity director, mum of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sophie Yates, Research Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Many Australians with disability feel on the edge of a precipice right now. Recommendations from the disability royal commission and the NDIS review were released late last year. Now a ...
It’s been called a failed experiment and a judicial straightjacket but the government says the revised three strikes law will be a more workable regime, 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. Three ...
New Zealand’s Palestinian community and Palestinian Youth Aotearoa are voicing alarm and disappointment with the lack of factual rigour present during the Israeli Ambassador’s appearance as a guest on TVNZ’s Q+A With Jack Tame Sunday (21/04). ...
Both ACT leader David Seymour, who played a key role in drawing up the assisted dying law, and hospice leaders say it's time the legislation was changed. ...
Public submissions on proposed gang control laws are being heard today. Rising gang membership has been cited as rationale for a crackdown – but what do we actually know about how many people belong to gangs in New Zealand?What’s all this then?A rise in the number of gang ...
Climate activists are setting their sights on an unpopular target, and hoping to bring lots of the public with them. It’s hard to miss the Majestic Princess: the enormous cruise ship, docked at Auckland’s Prince’s Wharf, looms over the nearby buildings. The ship, which can fit nearly 6,000 people, ...
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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, Tuesday 23 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
The following korero between Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku, author of the newly published memoir Hine Toa, one of the year’s most important books, and Dale Husband from e-tangata, was first published in October. It traverses her involvement with the activist group Ngā Tamatoa at Auckland University in the early 1970s, her ...
In the 16 years since it was bought by the government for $690 million, KiwiRail has had several overhauls and turnaround plans worth billions of dollars. Its ambitions as a successful, profitable operator of tourism, freight and ferries have often been derailed by disasters from earthquakes to cyclones, mine explosions ...
By Russell Palmer, RNZ News digital political journalist New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters is putting off recognition of Palestine as a state, despite opposition Labour’s formal request that he make the move. Peters said diplomatic recognition of Palestine was a matter of “when not if”, but doing so now ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Nicholls, Senior research associate, University of Sydney Australia’s eSafety Commissioner has ordered social media platform “X” (formerly known as Twitter) to remove graphic videos of the stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel in Sydney last week from the site. The incident ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Turnbull, Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Sydney John Turnbull, CC BY-NC-ND In past bleaching events on the Great Barrier Reef, the southern region has sometimes been spared worst of the bleaching. Not this time. This year’s intense underwater heat has ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Austin, Lecturer in Theatre, The University of Melbourne Darren Gill/Mackey, Darling & Collaborators The relationship between witchcraft and teenage girls has been the subject of many books, films and television shows. Over time, the traditional image of witch as crone ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. 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 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Becky Freeman, Associate Professor, School of Public Health, University of Sydney Andres Siimon/Unsplash There are no silver bullets, magic tricks or secret hacks to solving complex public health problems. Taking on the global tobacco industry and reducing the devastating consequences of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adam B. Watts, Research Associate in galaxy evolution, The University of Western Australia ESO/A. Watts et al., CC BY We breathe oxygen and nitrogen gas in our atmosphere every day, but did you know that these gases also float through space, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Nielsen, Professor and Deputy Director, Monash Addiction Research Centre, Monash University Maxime Bhm/Unsplash A new group of drugs called nitazenes has been detected in Australia. They have been sold as heroin as well as other drugs like ketamine. Concerns ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anne Twomey, Professor emerita, University of Sydney Image from Bradlow + Bock campaign Can the job of being a federal member of parliament be shared by two or more persons? Two prospective candidates for the inner-Melbourne federal seat of Higgins, Lucy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Zoe Rathus, Senior Lecturer in Law, Griffith University Shutterstock In October 2023, the federal parliament passed major changes to how children’s cases are decided under the Family Law Act, which kick in next month. Among other things, they repeal a ...
Minister of Tourism .. touring for himself, not the tourism sector
Yes, Stephen Sackur dear, yes you are right, yes, John Key is 100% pure bullshit
In any case, some folks I know say tourism has been cursed since he took the portfolio
Finally, an interview where some truly difficult points were forced. Made John Key look like a complete amateur and, despite some notable occasions, Stephen Sackeur is a wonderful interviewer who does his research.
The only question left to ask is this: wtf was John Key thinking accepting an interview from the one place that was going to truly sock it to him?
Stephen regularly makes the world’s most powerful people cringe in their chairs and only a few have truly stood their ground and fought with him – he always has an army of facts for any interview he does and isn’t afraid to follow up the 1st punch with a 2nd and 3rd…
I was going to edit and saw your reference … indeed the interview shows up John Key as Minister of Amateurism
*facepalm*
Finally, an interview where some truly difficult points were forced.
Sorry just spilt coffee over my Keyboard
where was I ?
>Finally, an interview where some truly difficult points were forced.<
Not really passing judgement on Hardtalk verses Campbell Live, but Key refuses to front on CL or any program where he might be asked similar questions, this interview could be look at as entrapment, maybe not only should we feel embarrassed, but sorry for our dear leader.
The wanker
Front on New Zealand TV you slack prick
god, he gets tetchy after a couple of questions… and then it gets worse.
“we’re 100% pure, relative to other countries”
and when he asks Key if he’s happy to have china owning Kiwi farmland
“well, we’re happy to have them as a major trading partner”
“that’s not what I asked you, is it?”
is there a link to the full interview?
What an embarrassment! Opposition parties could have a field day with this performance. “100% pure relative to other countries” Better than a Tui ad. So ‘unemployment is really good compared to …!”
Spain where unemployment hit 21% – depression level (not that that is mentioned in the NZH article).
BBC iplayer can only be accessed in the UK. I’m wondering if it will show up on sky here?
There is an episode of hardtalk on BBC World at 3:30am tonight (which presumably will also be shown on TV1), but I’m not sure if it is this interview. Some commentators on open mike yesterday mentioned watching this episode, not sure where they are located.
Hard Talk is scheduled to show on TV One overnight at 3.30am Wednesday. However, it was also on the scheduled early this morning at the same time, so I’m not sure if it will be the Key interview tomorrow am.
Watched the whole thing last evening on skys 93BBC. Painful, embarrassing and cringe worthy.
After doing some digging, I found that proxies from hidemyass.com seem to work (click on IP: Port Proxies in the centre of the menu, in the box on the left scroll down until you get United Kingdom and hit Search).
The 2nd one on the list is let me download the Windows Media Player version, which is 242mb. And it also appears that I can watch it! There’s DRM that forces it to expire 30 days after you’ve downloaded it, and no-doubt it’s also doing geo-location checks on my IP address, so need to use the proxy to watch it.
If no better source turns up, I might see if I can screen-scrape this, encode it and upload it somewhere on the net. Youtube probably won’t work though as BBC will probably automatically send them a take down notice.
Species extinction.. ‘what are you going to do about it?’
Make funding endangered, of course!
Hope TVNZ picks up that interview.
It woud be neglect if MSM do not pick up on this. Any bets on this happening? Has there ever been a more cringe worthy international performance by a NZ PM?
Oh the stupid it hurts.(PR folk that is not slippery sideshow)…..after years of laughing at the Ozzies having Howard as PM the worms turned big time with sideshow up front hamming it up on the world stage….am I coping it big time now from across the ditch.
Aye
Key said that NZ will inevitably become a republic but not under his watch.
He has previously said that the age of retirement will not go up under his watch.
Another inevitability that he should address now if he wanted to do the best for the country.
He is a coward.
I couldn’t believe the ridiculous smirk he has on his face at the start of the interview. I can’t imagine any other leader that would go into an interview with an expression like that.
Nah, don’t worry, the stupid smirk was lost faster than the Kiwi dollar has lost a cent on the currency market on a bad trading day.
In fairness to John Key, he’s probably the only leader who’s never watched Hard Talk and doesn’t know who Stephen Sackur is.
Well he knows who he is nowfor farkin sure. Oh that cheered me up after a bad day.
Irish, I’m still getting my head around them making him MP for Helensville.
Can’t I just call this guy a hack or not actually go on his programme like I would in NZ?
Quick get Dick Griffin to head the BBC!
He looked from the start as if he was going to be asked about corgis and the LotRings, like back home. Quite fun when he does his assassin eyes when hes reeling off numbers – steely trader squint, probably works on a monitor.
It must have been a real surprise for Shonkey to get a real journalist asking some real questions instead of the patsy arse kissing questions we get from NZ journalists, who are bribed to be Nationals mouth piece. Didn’t he completely fail in the real world where people respect the truth and lies are confronted.
Key’s answers were very telling taking on two flavours. The first was a typical denialist attack – discredit the source by saying it was that scientist’s ‘opinion’ and that he could find other opinions to refute it. His second type of reply was that there wasn’t an issue just ‘look out the window’ at the natural beauty.
The first is disingenuous, the second is quite scary if that is his yardstick for conservation. It implies that so long as the green veneer is there then he is happy to sell the 100% NZ brand regardless of any environmental crises going on behind.
Wish I could watch this, but still waiting for my Brighter future and my ultra fast broad band, is there a transcript anywhere?
If you still can’t get it here is an alternative, just about as funny. “John Key has gone missing” http://www.bryangould.net/
Ah, a journo with a brain who has done the research!
IrishBill: you will want to change your handle. We don’t allow identity theft here.
I agree Key should have said something along the lines of:’ “Yes quitre correct – New Zealand isn’t 100% pure, it hasn’t been since colonisation. Sorry about the last ten years of duping tourists into coming here. But well you gotta love the marketing particulalry by politicans like Helen Clark and their officials as they toured around the world suckering it out of money. Again apologies from New Zealand to the world… come down and we’ll make it up to you with some fush n chups & an L&P.”
That’s actually not far off what he did say.
Wow, 2 1/2 years into his term, all Key supporters can say is – it’s all somehow Labour’s fault
LOL
It was a horrendous show of pass the buck in parliament today, with Shonkey doing just that on a number of difficult questions. Next National will be blaming Labour for their drinking.
Can’t blame that on Labour. No Way. No How!!
Accomplices all share blame. Check your history.
http://10yearsyoung.tourismnewzealand.com/
According to John Key “we are masters of our own destiny” LOL
Who is HIS master, that is what I want to know.
he may have meant to say that he was “master of his own domain” – which he isn’t.
Or ‘Captain of my destiny’ a quote attributed to Nelson Mandela according to the movie Invictus
Ha Ha Ha – looks like Shonkey is desperately hoping for some RWC magic to help him win the election too….
Well I have news for you, John the destroyer – you’re not Nelson Mandela, this is not South Africa, and the All Blacks are not the Spring Boks
And do you think that the E-Mails are going to be running thick and fast between his kitten bearing masters, and him?
A friend in the UK sent me this link http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/hardtalk/9480610.stm
What was that shit about “two way trade on its way to 12 billion…y’ know, 20 billion”
So the total of import/export trade with China is…what exactly? I mean, fuck. 12 billion is a long way from 20 billion. What is two way trade heading towards and when will it be at the 12 cough 20 billion mark? And how much of that 12 cough 20 billion will be earned by NZ and how much by China?
That aside, I was waiting for him to blame the Christchurch earthquake for…..stuff. And then follow that up by claiming to be 110% committed to…stuff.
Anyway. The Nats publicly dumped the ‘Clean and Green’ sales pitch. So why didn’t he just say that his government recognised the ‘Clean and Green’ image as a bit of a have and move on?
Meanwhile. What are those tougher environmental measures for dairy farming he was referring to? Anyone?
So much GOLD in 3 minutes
For the Greens – “Jump into any river or stream in NZ” Would love to see him being presented a list of rivers or streams to jump into.
I’m thinking of printing T Shirts “Mostly 100% pure”
Do you think he shook off his minders and went over thier heads for the interview?
I’m thinking of printing T Shirts “Mostly 100% pure”
“Was 100% pure” ?
I was wondering the same thing, he’s not usually allowed to do serious interviews.
Maybe he made a new friend at the wedding.
How about “Conditionally 100% New Zealand Pure”
@Billy Fish, I’d suggest Key jump into the Manawatu or Tarawera rivers, and be sure to put his head underwater after doing so.
I watched the interview yesterday on BBC World. Couldd be the same interview if it is on again tonight
If you have MySky, record it. This interview is a much watch.
Seriously, if this ‘100% Pure’ thing is all anyone has picked up on yet from the internet clip, then WOW. There is a whole lot more insight into Key’s mind and character in this interview.
You’re right. Key’s comments re immigration in the interview were also cringe-worthy. All his talk about encouraging worthwhile people to NZ; of them investing in our economy; bringing their skills and money, etc. Has he not been briefed by Kate Wilkinson on the great job she’s done dodging Campbell Live’s attempts to interview her about Martyn Payne? Overall, Key’s HARDtalk interview performance reinforced my view that the guy’s a lightweight.
And just to highlight how the MSM helps Mr – can’t answer questions by himself – Key cover up his mistakes…
MikeMs comment pretty much sums it up:
I’m very impressed at how Stuff’s summary of the interview managed to twist a boring environmental topic into something that was 90% about Key’s thoughts on the Monarchy.
Comment by MikeM on Dim post — May 10, 2011 @ 7:28 pm
Dim Post is also giving this an airing. Most are displeased or more, with our Prime Ministers foolish performance, just as there is an absence of support for Key here. Do Burt and Pete et al only get paid 9-5?
Dim Post
Damn. Doesn’t go quite to the right page.
[Fixed — r0b]
The HardTalk interview has probably done more to boost Goff & Labour’s chances in the November election than any other media event in the past 2 & half years. My friends , scattered across the world wherever HardTalk screened, have all expressed a collective cringe at seeing such a pitiful performance from a NZ PM.
Key’s performance was one that demonstrated what quality interviewing is all about… the interviewer allowing the interviewee to put his own foot in his mouth and then gently probing so that the foot goes even deeper into the speaker’s throat.
There was no excuse for Key being so uninformed, so ignorant and so shallow apart from his own arrogant belief in his PR creation.
It just shows how pathetic the media are here , they let that flimsy , pathetic excuse for a PM get away with SMILE and try the deflection routine . What is it ? do the media get stars in their eyes ?
I just watched the interview on Mysky again.
Sackur refers to New Zealand being “vulnerable” to world economic events, and Key says that any small country that is effected by a large event is vulnerable but New Zealand is in a “economically quite a strong position”!
Sackur then says that one thing New Zealand does not have is strong growth. John Key says that “we don’t accept that position”. ‘Not only dairy… but forestry, land, beef, seafood prices are at record highs.’
Sackur then hits him on NZ having 30% lower wages than Australia, and 25% of NZ Graduates leaving NZ as opposed to 2.5% leaving Australia. Key defends NZ, says that nobody else in the OECD has had as big a population increase as NZ.
It goes on.. but here is the best quote from Sackur:
“You spent many years working in London making a lot of money. And I wonder if you’re the right person to be telling New Zealanders, “You know what, you should stay at home, invest in your own country, and you can make it in your own country” because you had to come here to make it”
Very internationalist perspective from Sackur. Very big picture. No wonder he is so sceptical of Key.
I’ll just put this here…
Helen Clark on HardTalk re: China free trade.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjmEW1QjPZA
LOL, the comments for that video are priceless, considering the current govt and Key’s performance.
Ref the Helen Clark interview on Hardtalk…That woman made us proud to be NZ’ers. She handled those questions with such skill. That’s the difference between someone who is briefed, goes out of her way to be informed and lives by her principles. That line from her is so true “I say in private what I say in public”. I heard her say that so often. And some of the prescient comments left by viewers are being fulfilled right now.
Too true, the difference in the two interviews is marked.
I didn’t always agree with Helen but she is clearly intelligent, principled, well-informed, and very much her own person. None of which can be said about the present Head Bozo.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we had another HC-like person in Labour?
Epic fail from Key.
Wonder if Metiria or others will be on Hard Talk anytime soon.
Real empty interview from Key. Was he hungover from the wedding?
I may be wrong but I think it was conducted here.
It was definitely in London
Please can the NZ MSM get some similar interviewers. So refreshing to have someone that actually did some research, asked real questions and expected real responses in place of the usual one-liner PR spin we get in NZ.
keys had to protect china.. he is ordered to.
it is what peopleabove himtell him ..he has to be careful..hes f**ked up alot though heh
I managed to use a proxy to download the WMP version (see 3.2.4 above). Spent the last 50 minutes trying to transcribe it all, and only got through about 8 minutes of it! It’s 30 minutes long, so this doesn’t seem like a go-er.
Here’s what I have so far. Apologies for any typoes and lack of grammer and punctuation. I’ve tried to get the wording almost as exact as I can, although I might miss a few ‘ums’ and other sounds out, as well as word stresses and Key’s slack-jawed gabbing.
Hard talk today is in central london. my guest is new zealand’s visiting prime minister john key. his first term in office has been a baptism of fire. he’s had to cope with a prolonged economic slowdown, and a string of disasters including a major mining accident and the devastating christchurch earthquake. geographically isolated and small in population, just how resilient is new zealand when put to the test?
HT: prime minister john key, welcome to hard talk
JK: thanks very much, great to be here
HT: is it proving harder than you expected to be new zealand’s prime minister?
JK: well we’ve certainly had more challenges than one might either want or expect, if you think about the time i’ve been in office, nearly three years, we’ve had the global financial crisis, two earthquake in christchurch, ah pike river mine disaster, we’ve ended up having to uh buy and ah bailout a number of finance companies and in recent times provide support for an insurance company which has a large exposure to christchurch so it hasn’t been an easy time for us
HT: those are massive tests, and we’ll go through them in some detail, but they’re tests that you’ve had to face, as, I think the most inexperienced prime minister in the last 100 years of NZ’s history. i mean you-you-you came in to office, I think just 6 years as an MP, 2 years as party leader, you weren’t really terribly well-equipped as a political leader were you?
JK: well it depends on what you think um are the skills that you need to be a good prime minister. it’s certainly true I got there in the fastest time, prior to me was david lange who I think took 7 years, but i think in modern day politcs you are seeing the emergeance of young leaders. um we’re seeing that in the case of president obama now in the US, obviously with david cameron here in the united kingdom, and I think the experience that i had working in a number of international markets here in the uk, singapore, australia and the likes, that banking experience where you have, very much, the economy at the front and centre stage of the issues new zaealand faces. i think actually the mixture of skills I’ve had would be about the right ones.
HT: well, you were a successful banker, you made lots of money, but you’d never, for example, run a city, let alone a ministerial department. and then to go to some of those challenges you’ve already alluded to, here you are, faced, for example, in christchurch, with what you I think described as possibly, maybe, NZ’s darkest day ever, with the christchurch earthquake.
JK: I think the answer to that is that you need to have a plan. I mean ultimately, one of the things the commercial sector teaches you is that you have to have a sense of where you’re going, a sense of how you’re going to achieve that, and to be able to frame up the challenges that ya face. in the case of christchurch, if one puts to one side the human tragedy, which has been enormous – I mean we lost 181 people there – um then th-the process of funding the rebuilding, of what is actually required to make that happen, allow that to happen in a timeframe which is sensible both for new zealand and for the people of christchurch, i think is rather the self-explanatory. now, we have taken some hard calls, we’ve passed legislation which gives us ah very wide and encompassing powers to enable us to rebuild christchurch quickly, we’ve essentially assumed that responsibility at a central government level
HT: does it make sense to rebuild christchurch, quickly? i mean th-the city is still getting serious tremors, it’s had around the area of the city, it’s had 2 major earthquakes in the last 8 or so months. is it wise, to rebuild christchurch?
JK: we believe so – the second earthquake we think is an aftershock of the first one, and that’s been supported by our scientists in new zealand. now it’s true, there’s been 5000 aftershocks in christchurch measuring above, i think 3 or 4 on the richter scale since the first earthquake on the 4th of september.
HT: ah-a-and because of that you have a lot of people in christchurch who are saying ‘i want out of this city, i see no future for myself and my children in this place’
JK: yeah-it’s-been-interesting-actually-the-response wh- look there are about 400,000 people that live in christchurch, and there is no perfect way of measuring how many people have or will leave, but if you put your finger in the air and say what’s that number likely to look like and I’d say it’s 20 to 30 thousand people.
HT: you’re sounding determinedly upbeat, but here’s where it gets very difficult for a very small country – populations not much more than 4 million – we’re talking about your second city, economists reckon that in the short-run, the next year or two, it could mean that rather than expecting growth of over 3%, it might be down to 2%, so it’s a real drag on new zealand’s economic prospects. and that’s, in a way, illustrating how vulnerable your small country is, would you accept that?
JK: well by definition, any small country where it’s affected by a very large event um has less room to move than say a larger country – that’s-that’s a statement of fact. having said that, new zealand finds itself in economically quite a strong position, so gross debt to gdp is under 20% currently, and we are going into our budget process on may the 19th with a zero budget, so instead of spending a billion dollars more, we will spend zero. and that money will be used over time, um to pay for the earthquake. so we are addressing that through essentially trimming government expenditure.
HT: but what you do not have in nz right now is-is strong growth, in fact you have virtually no growth at all, and that’s really not something you can blame on the earthquake. I just wonder whether you, with all of your financial background, over-estimated your ability, and the country’s ability to deliver, ahh, sustainable growth, because it isn’t happening, is it?
JK: well we wouldn’t accept that position. i mean for a start off, the global financial crisis had quite an impact, so when we came in to office at the end of 2008, the country had experienced 3 quarters of negative growth, and that continued into the back-end of 2008 and into early 2009. but if you strip the earthquake out and say ‘ok how does nz really look’ we have a very strong commodity sector, so it’s not just diary prices – forestry, lamb, beef, seafood, all of those are at record highs, and not withstanding that we’re combatting very high exchange rate, actually that part of our economy is very strong, we have the rugby world cup in new zealand, the christchurch rebuild will add probably a percent to the gdp every year for the next, 5 to 7 years. so, look i, the picture that we see, is one that we see is one of growth, above 4%
HT: (interjecting)well y-y-y-you’re painting a rosy picture, which I think a lot of new zealanders might-might question. I mean they heard you, for example, in-in, ahh, the last couple of years, consistently saying, ‘we are going to close the prosperity gap, the wages gap’ in particular ‘with Australia’, and people compare yourselves with australia. it hasn’t happened, in fact the wages gap is wider than ever.
JK: (smiling) actually we also reject that proposition. but let me take you through that, so. (chuckles)
HT: well, the-the opposition leader just the other day, Phil Goff he said “the best this government can do is now trumpet that new zealand wages are 30% below australia’s giving us a supposed competitive advantage. he used to talk about the fact we were going to close the gap’
JK: I won’t get into a political debate about the robustness of his numbers. but let me-let me take this step back for you. new zealand has had a widening wage gap with australia [why? why?] over the course of the last 40 years. primarily mineral resources base in australia. so australia’s very minerally wealthy, and china’s having a huge impact on their market. so to give you some idea of that, the capital investment going into the mining sector in australia, for the last decade, has averaged about 5 to 10 billion dollars a year. in the last 3 years alone in australia it’s been 55 billion dollars a year.
HT: i’m sure you don’t want to spend the whole interview comparing yourselves to australia, but, here is one important fact. more than a quarter of new zealand’s graduates, that is the brightest and the best that your country’s producing, are now living outside of your own country. that’s 10 times the rate for australia-born graduates, and that suggests to me that you have got a fundamental, a structual problem.
Great work. I hope you’re able to complete that process at some point! I for one would be fascinated to read the whole transcript.
Alternatively, some of the HardTalk interviews seem to be on You Tube. It’s possible that this one will make it there eventually too I guess.
Thanks Lanthanide!
I couldnt even find the full WMP, proxy or no – just the 3-minute clip. Pray tell, where does yon full WMP reside?
regards, Terry
Thanks for that, if you or someone posts the transcript somewhere, please let me know.
Nice one L, Stephen Sackur is like a terrier with a bone – he rocks
That’s fantastic! the interviewer doesn’t rate Key’s credentials at all, does he? and don’t accept/reject the proposition huh – only because he can’t deny them.
Haven’t updated this for a while but since National Ltd™ came to power:
has been caught out repeatedly lying in the run up to and during the election campaign about its real intentions in relation to the environment
celebrated the opening of the foreign-owned Pike River Coal Ltd mine on DOC land adjacent to the Paparoa National Park from which 1 megatonne of coal will be extracted per year for the next 20 years – Pike River Coal Ltd has announced that it has found additional coal in the national park
removed a proposed efficiency standard (MEPS) on incandescent lightbulbs
reversed a moratorium on building new gas/oil/coal power stations
removed the bio fuel subsidy
scrapped the scheme that would have penalised imported vehicles producing high emissions
removed regulations for water efficient new housing
renewed leases on sensitive high country farms which were meant to return to DOC
reversed restrictions on the freeholding of vast swathes of land on the edge of the Southern Lakes
arbitrarily excised 400 hectares from the brand new Oteake Conservation Park, including the most important and, ecologically, the rarest part of the new Park, the tussock and shrubland that went right down to the banks of the Manuherikia River, to enable future access to lignite
said nothing to say in regard to the World Commission on Protected areas of IUCN’s severe criticism of its intention to investigate mineral resources and mining opportunities in protected conservation areas including our three UNESCO World Heritage Sites of Te Wahi Pounamu-South West New Zealand, Tongariro National Park and the Sub Antarctic Islands
approved two prospecting permit applications lodged by Australian iron-ore giant Fortescue Metals Group subsidiary FMG Pacific lodged in June – areas covered by the two-year permits include an 8204-square-kilometre area of seabed adjoining the west coast from Cape Reinga to the Manukau Harbour and a 3798-square-kilometre prospecting area of land from Cape Reinga to the Kaipara Harbour including Ninety Mile Beach, the west side of the Aupouri Peninsula, Kaitaia and the Hokianga.
approved an additional prospecting permit for Fortesque Metals in relation to 3568sq km right next door to the Kahurangi National Park where the Heaphy Track is
was forced to release its Ministry of Economic Development (MED) report under the Official Information Act that proclaims “significant mineral potential” in the Fiordland, Kahurangi and Paparoa national parks – the report said the Waitutu area of the Fiordland National Park had sufficient petroleum reserves to be “worthy” of inclusion in a review of conservation land protected from mining
secretly granted the minerals industry the right to veto proposed National Park boundaries and permission for any such vetoes to be kept confidential – in spite of recommendations from its own officials against any such a veto
Minster of Conservation Tim Grosser, on 29 August 2009, called for caring New Zealanders to halt their “emotional hysteria” and recognise that conservation land should be mined for minerals and went on to say “Mining in a modern, technological way can have a negligible effect”
Associate Minister of Conservation Kate Wilkinson, in an interview in “Canterbury Farming” rubished her own department, DOC, suggesting it was incapable of looking after the high country reserves and parks under its control
gutted the home insulation scheme
pulled $300 million out of public transport, walking and cycling schemes and added it to a pot of $2 billion to ‘upgrade’ state highways
changed the law to provide billions of dollar in subsidies for polluters via the ETS casino which is now a target for scamming by international criminals
begun a process of gutting the Resource Management Act to make it difficult/impossible for the public to lodge appeals against developers
removed the ability of Auckland to introduce a fuel levy to fund planned public transport upgrades
left electrification of the national rail network up in the air without promised funding commitments
removed the Ministry for the Environment’s programme to make Government Departments ‘carbon neutral’
removed funding for public tv advertising on sustainability and energy efficiency
pulled funding for small-town public litter bin recycling schemes
cabinet ministers expressing public support the bulldozing of Fiordland
reduced Department of Conservation funding by about $50 million over three years
canceled funding for the internationally acclaimed ‘Enviroschools’ programme
usurped the democratic role of local Councils of determining policies for their citizens by requiring the abandonment of the efficient and well-established tree protection rules for urban areas
set about revamping Auckland governance in a way that is likely to greatly reduce the ‘Environmental Watchdog’ role of the the current Regional Council
removed Auckland’s metropolitan limits and opened the gateway for unfettered urban sprawl
defended internationally the importation of rain-forest-wrecking palm kernel and stood silent while Federated Farmers called Greenpeace “terrorists”
stood silent while Godfrey Bloom, a Member of the European Parliament and infamous Climate Change Denialist, publicly rejoiced in the 1985 bombing of the Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior – who was doing so while standing on a dock next to the replacement vessel
took a 0% emissions reduction target to Copenhagen. Yes, seriously, that isn’t a misprint – that was the lower bound of their negotiation platform – then missed the 01/02/10 deadline for commitment to action it had agreed to – meanwhile 55 of the 80 countries which attended did make the deadline
secretly cancelled the internationally recognised scheme for the mandatory labelling of exotic woods to ensure the timber has not been taken from rain forests in direct contradiction of its own statements made at the 13th World Forestry Congress in Argentina
supported the Department of Conservation’s decision to open up the pristine Cathedral Cove to an ice-cream franchise
given the Department of Conservsation $1.7 million to further develop commercial activities on DOC land and started an “off set” plan allowing company’s to damage the conservation estate if they agree to improve land elsewhere – no monitoring regime has been suggested on put in place
left DOC director-general Al Morrison to announce that DOC is to charge for services that had been free and, to soften the public up to the idea that there will be more “energy generation schemes” operating on DOC land
taken no action to reduce existing pollution pouring into the Manawatu River and is “leaving it up to industry” to come up with solutions to heal the river which was described by the Cawthorn Institute as “one of the worst polluted in the Western world”
announced a $1.1 million industry subsidy to kick start marine farming without identifying no-go areas nor putting in place a consultation process for individiuals, communities, and other general coastal users
blamed New Zealanders after a Japanese whaling ship deliberately smashed into a smaller, more vulnerable craft in the open sea
was forced to release documents under the Official Information Act which confirm that DOC has “giving up” on ecologically valuable high-country land in the Mackenzie Basin because of funding cuts. The released documents cite “statements made by ministers”, “diminishing funding” and the Government’s new high-country policies as reasons for the changed stance – the comments from DOC were made after Land Information New Zealand (Linz), which manages the tenure review process, ignored DOC’s previous conservation recommendations for the farms
used former National Party minister and current director of Open Country Cheese – a company convicted of filthy farming practices – Wyatt Creech to head up an enquiry into Environment Canterbury which had been standing up the dairy farmers’ demands for more and more water resources and less and less regulation. The Creech report recommended the Environmental Canterbury be sacked and replaced with government appointments and the voters of Canterbury do without democracy until the water situation had been resolved. The Canterbury area holds 50 percent of New Zealand’s fresh water reserves and 50 percent of the water required for hyrdo energy. The Creech report said Environmental Centerbury put too much focus on the environment.
Despite international condemnation for knowing next to nothing about the parlous state of the New Zealand fisheries, National Ltd™ bucks international trends, pours more acid on the 100% Pure brand and increases the bluefin tuna quota.
New Zealand is subject to international criticism for its backing of commericial whaling which National Ltd supports
Government-owned company Solid Energy runs an essay competition entitled “The role of coal in sustainable energy solutions for New Zealand” for school children. First prize is a trip to New Zealand’s largest coal customer, China.
Supported access fees for entrance onto DOC walkways – fee introduced following cuts to DOC’s budget.
New Zealand’s environment would profit from mining national parks, Conservation Minister Kate Wilkinson says.
Department of Conservation director-general Al Morrison said the conservation estate created “opportunities to do a whole lot for a lot of different people. We’ve got to get away from this idea that somehow we have to protect one-third of New Zealand for a certain constituency and put it in a jar of formaldehyde and leave it.”
State coal miner Solid Energy could get an extra slice of the action if highly sensitive conservation land is opened to gold, silver and other prospecting. Energy and Resources Minister Gerry Brownlee said Solid Energy’s work could be widened to include other minerals and resources, or it could form part of a new state-owned enterprise to maximise government returns from any mining. He did not rule out the company, which produces 80 per cent of New Zealand’s coal, having a role in mining gold and other minerals on Great Barrier Island and other conservation areas being eyed by the Government http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/3519703/Golden-possibility-for-state-coal-miner
. . . there’s plenty more I need to add.
Nice work BLiP, where you been?
What felix said. And the more you can fill in your list with links to sources, the better it gets. You should send it to us as a guest post some time…
. . . there’s plenty more I need to add.
Please do and I’ll put it up as a page. In fact I really need to make it a database generating a page.
>removed a proposed efficiency standard (MEPS) on incandescent lightbulbs <
I posted a lot of mercury bombs into parliament, spreading mercury vapour throughout the postal system and parliament buildings, and it was legal, the bulbs tended to break as they went into the post box.
But it got the idiot law stopped 😉 … maybe?
Norman gave it a go
10.5.11 – Question 6: Dr Russel Norman to the Prime Minister – Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRXn0sMKlZQ
But alas forgot to mention that Kiwi Saver is dependent on destroying the environment, via every means possible, as long as it makes MONEY.
@BLiP! – excellent stuff, i’ve been trying to pull together a summary like that for some time. Request permission to shamelessly borrow/promulgate.
Despite the almost non-exhaustive nature of that list, it’s pretty much a lot worse than that.
try: Sacked ECAN councillors claiming ‘dysfunctional’, but OIA documents reveal Carter, Brownlee and Key up to their eyeballs in pushing officials to get rid of ‘hurdles’ to ‘accelerating large scale water storage and irrigation in Canterbury’. Guess what the two hurdles were identified as? Water Conservation Orders and Council Processes.
What do we see come out of the toothless NPS on freshwater this week? a fund entitled “Irrigation acceleration fund”. Subtle? not very.
For those of you not up with the play, while the media spotlight played out on the sacking of ECAN councillors, the true fatal thrust to water in Canterbury was the amending of Water Conservation Orders (essentially National Park like status given to rivers that met the required tests under the RMA) so that there is no longer a right of appeal.
and NOBODY in the MSM whispered a word… sigh.
Of course, permission granted.
The comments here have spurred me into tidying the list up and adding more to it. I’ve been busy with mahi – the evil, foreign-owned multi-national I work for has decided the best way to increase productivity is to not replace staff who leave. That means the rest of us have to pick up the slack. Do you think our salaries have gone up to reflect the extra work? Like fuck.
SOMEONE needs to put this up on Youtube and pass it on to the New Zealand media or else no-one will see or hear about it except for us geeky lefties that will not vote for the brat anyway.
There is a lot more to this interview than the freely available highlights online.
I followed someone’s instructions here and downloaded it via a hidemyass proxy but i don’t know how to convert it to youtube friendly …
Try one of these http://download.cnet.com/windows/video-converters/
Also if that doesn’t work, if you don’t mind would you be able to upload it to http://www.sendspace.com and post the URL for us
http://www.sendspace.com/file/nyun3h
there’s the link for the beeb’s file. good luck trying to remove DRM.
you might be better off with a UK ip address from hidemyass.com and a screen ripper as suggested above. unless you already have a good DRM remover.
Please post the youtube/othervideosite link if you manage to! cheers.
Made total mincemeat of him. Makes you realise how pathetic NZ current affairs TV is. Can’t we get Stephen Sackur to come to NZ for the election campaign?
richard you are right. current afairs in NZ is pathetic and that is the way these people want it. they know they can stand up to the hair and teeth jobs shoulder tapped by TVNZ and the others so to save themselves the bother they just dont have any current affairs at all! very convenient and then they say that the public isnt interested. well they would be if there was some blood on the floor every now and again instead of the saccharine hucksterism that passes for investigative journalism these days.
You know that there’s something wrong with the MSM when, confronted with scientific research, they go and get a businessman to cast doubt on the scientists research.
That’s disgusting! Phil O’Reilly, one of the Hollow Men is he not?
Thats because in the early 21st century businessperson somehow makes you an oracle on any subject…
HA! Whilst I was listening to the interview in the above clip my 14 year old daughter was sitting on the sofa behind me mucking about on facebook or whatever and she suddenly piped up and said, ‘Why can’t he just answer the question!’
Yeah, he’s got an excellent mind and intelligent speaking abilities for photo-ops.
It is now on You Tube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfUozKMgA-Y&feature=player_embedded
Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/user/aidanleenz#p/a/u/0/_0canC4MM9I
Robert, you the man!
Re: the question whether NZ will let Crafar being bought – I can mostly hear that slurring guy trying to buy interview time while figuring out how to answer, nay, avoid the question.
This one that NZ elected as PM in 2008 shows himself to be very mediocre, nay, an embarrassment at coming up with responses when he is interviewed.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/video.cfm?c_id=1&gal_cid=1&gallery_id=118540
wow at the Herald cuts…
are they the ministry for propaganda?
Cut out the explanation of the research- cut out the journalist saying you aren’t answering the questions and end with the journalist patting Key down…
ffs
John Key should be immortalised ” Compared to other countries we are 100%” compared to sum I achieved 100% in School cert English 🙂 !!!
I only wished that JK was min of education when I was at school !!!!!
This is pure magic and should be aired many times. The unfortunate thing is that this will be lost on many. Still even so late in the day nice to have a chuckle. Pure magic
Anyone know when the full interview will be on again and where. There maybe some more gems that were missed on the 3 minute clip
The BBC site now has the audio which you can listen to worldwide:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00ggyh3/Hardtalk_11_05_2011/
Another classic part is near the end, where Key goes on about NZers supporting the monarchy based on a poll that said 85% of people here supported bringing back knighthoods. Shortly afterwards, Sarkur points out that a poll he has seen says around 40% of NZers want a republic. Key responds by saying “There’s always some random poll that you can draw from but…”
OOOHHH I get it now! That is why they’ve been keeping him to photo ops!
Doh!
Everytime i watch Key’s answers my face meets the palms of my hands at regular intervals. I know NZ does have some decent journo’s but could you imagine Key getting that type of grilling with more regulararity. His tenure as PM would’ve been finished long ago. Since Muldoon’s over the top treatment of any journo’s not giving the Nats favourable treatment back in the early 80’s there seems to be an utter lack of consistent probing invesitgative journalism in NZ putting chancers like Key under real public scrutiny. That coupled with the severe scaling back in NZ based newsrooms.
Sackur is not known as one the BBC’s hardest interviewers. But he was doing what any investigative political journo does well. Puts his subject under pressure and see’s how they react. In Key’s case not very well. Sackur having dealt with the seasoned Westminster politico’s for years was always going to have done his research on Key and most of it was not going to be favourable. As oppossed to the Herald who have just gone to their default position of being the Nat’s propoganda leaflet. The Herald article almost seems to hint that the big old nasty BBC had no right to harrass NZ’s glorious leader. Plus going to a NZ business bloke to refute the claims of a respected scientist must surely be the Herald’s idea of a piss take.
Key must be asking himself “why can’t all international TV invites be as intellectually challenging as Letterman”?
Having watched the full interview, I actually think that your average viewer would think that Key does OK. Don’t get me wrong imho Key is evading questions, contradicting himself (most notably with the whole “academics and lawyers” and republic v monarchy statistics) etc
But he is very good at doing it while smiling without ever getting aggressive and taking the bait. Most people, when proven wrong like he is, a few times just in this interview (!), or when caught out lying, e.g. the whole Kiwirail shares thing before the 08 election, would go on the attack or get really flustered. He just sticks to some semi-evasive waffle, might even partially concede a point to conceal the fact that he is getting caught red-handed, and remains mild-mannered.
How does he get away with it? Well, in NZ, the casual mild-mannered approach is king. It’s a cultural thing. Politicians like Clark and Goff who are too serious, too intellectual, or too earnest invoke suspicion – they must be full of themselves if they aren’t constantly in self-deprecating humour mode or if they use technical vocabulary (tall poppy syndrome) – and are called “robots” “hapless ideologues” “ivory tower types” and so on. They are not “one of Us”. Key on the other hand is your “average white businessman familyman golfplaying aucklander” type who speaks the language of low-level corporate office. He ticks all the boxes for the Herald, most journalists, tv, etc. as being “one of Us” so he has significantly greater leeway on any subject anyway. He fits into what the Nats would see as the “mainstream NZer” mould quite nicely. Add to that his casual, friendly mild manners and our journos hesitate to attack him because they would be attacking a friendly one-of-us type bloke – they will be the ones seen as unreasonable aggressors. Even Sackur when he nailed him couldn’t bring himself to go all the way.
Invoking “pragmatism” also gets him off the hook. This is an anglo-saxon misnomer to conceal a dominant ideology in this case a watered down neo-liberal approach. Neoliberals can afford to be conservatives in NZ, in the literal sense of the term, because we are not that far off a neoliberal paradise anyway. And Key like many other politicians will avoid rocking the boat by any means possible. This “conservative” line is seen as both “moderate” and “reasonable”.
So the nicknames “teflon” “slippery” are all well-founded. Unless a respected journo nails him with an unrelenting line of questioning on prime time telly – and the PR boys will avoid that at all costs – he will remain our friendly PM whose policies go unnoticed and unchallenged behind the artificial veil that is his Image. If only they would show a few more vids on the news of him sneering and jeering nastily in the house, that could go a long way to undermining his “nice-guy-not-a-politician” persona. His honeymoon with a befuddled media is not even over yet and it’s almost election time so there is little hope of that happening…
It takes the BBC – a leading overseas media organisation – to show the true face of our useless “leader”. Again this proves the uselessness of most NZ media. Apart from a few exceptions the NZ media has become so useless and pre-occupied with “image” and “presentation” that no matters of substance are reported on in-depth. Like with our supermarkets we have something like a duopoly owning the newspapers, magazines and some TV and radio stations. Public broadcasting gets treated worse year by year.
So many in NZ are so brain-washed, they do not get a chance to see “real” questions being asked to our leading politicians. Many do not even bother informing themselves, because they have grown up in a society where commercials on radio and television take up a per centage of broadcasting times, so that any program gets fragmented and listeners and viewers constantly distracted and otherwise brainwashed to simply be “consumers”.
This interview should be a revelation of how useless John Key really is. He dodges questions all the time, contradicts himself, denies facts and make a total fool of himself. Sadly hardly anyone in NZ bothers watching or listening to Hard Talk!
So no wonder we get election results that make critical and informed people wonder how that came about.
At least one tv program showed a 45second extract of this – Media7 on TVNZ7
TVNZ7 the best news in the country at 8pm where they take time to interview people and get to the bottom of issues unlike the tabloid headlines prevalent on TV1 TV3 Prime.
TVNZ7 the channel discarded by our beloved national govt
no surprises there – Key and Coleman are conducting their own Glorious Cultural Revolution
with the motto “Kill Public Service Broadcasting”.