Archive for March, 2012

Earth Hour

Written By: - Date published: 8:24 pm, March 31st, 2012 - 31 comments

OK – so we’re a bit late with this – but it’s Earth Hour, 8:30 – 9:30pm NZ time.

Confused? A guide to the letters & leaks in the Nats’ Civil War

Written By: - Date published: 4:03 pm, March 31st, 2012 - 77 comments

The ever-growing list of letters, emails, and leaks in the National Party Civil War, that started off as an apparently apolitical privacy breach by ACC, is getting hard to follow. Here’s a summary of the various documents and their ramifications – so far.

Punching above our weight

Written By: - Date published: 10:50 am, March 31st, 2012 - 16 comments

Punching above our weight will never be the same again …

It’s safe to get off the fence now, Len

Written By: - Date published: 9:54 am, March 31st, 2012 - 50 comments

The PoAL management looks as incompetent and divided as the Nats after their ‘bullet-proof’ contracting out plans were shot down by the Employment Court and a director resigned publicly admonishment management’s strategy. Time to use that bully pulpit, Len. Say you have no confidence in Pearson and Gibson, demand they drop their plans, and get the port back to work.

Open mike 31/03/2012

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 31st, 2012 - 44 comments

Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike…

POAL falling apart

Written By: - Date published: 2:29 pm, March 30th, 2012 - 47 comments

Things are not going so well for Ports of Auckland. “Ports of Auckland lifts lock-out amid board rift” sums it up…

Weekend social 30/03/2012

Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, March 30th, 2012 - 40 comments

Weekend social is for non political chat. What’s on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no aggro, why can’t we all just get along?

We need “operation 9” to suppress the bookies

Written By: - Date published: 12:37 pm, March 30th, 2012 - 22 comments

Evidently the people at iPredict don’t like being called “bookies” or being described as “opening a contract” on someone. We are now being targeted by this shadowy organisation.

Perhaps it is time that the police exerted themselves as the entertainment for the media and started operation 9 against this subversive organisation

Beached as bro

Written By: - Date published: 11:59 am, March 30th, 2012 - 57 comments

Within minutes of Simon Lusk’s name being linked to the leaking of the Boag email, a message came through on the tip line – Slater is going feral over Lusk’s name being mentioned. And well he might, Lusk is Cameron Slater’s meal ticket. After a stunned silence on Whaleoil for a few hours – Slater/Lusk were back with all the dirt they could sling.

Participate: Stop Asset Sales and Welfare Reform

Written By: - Date published: 11:02 am, March 30th, 2012 - 54 comments

Friday 13th (April) – a scary day as submissions close on 2 major government bills. Make sure you get your submissions in on the Mixed Ownership Model Bill and the Social Security (Youth Support and Work Focus) Amendment Bill.

Collins’ dilemma & lameduck Key

Written By: - Date published: 9:06 am, March 30th, 2012 - 36 comments

Judith Collins’ behaviour might strike some as strangely aggressive. Some might even suppose she wouldn’t behave like this unless she was in the right. But let’s put ourselves in her shoes. She wants to be leader. She is now embroiled in a scandal that could end her career. If she could put an end to it without resigning, she would nip it in the bud. Clearly, she can’t.

Suing the taxpayer

Written By: - Date published: 8:06 am, March 30th, 2012 - 42 comments

Judith Collins is suing Radio NZ for airing 2 Labour MPs defamation. The taxpayer will be paying her costs, Radio NZ’s costs and the court costs. Oh, and should Collins win? The taxpayer will pay any settlement…

Open mike 30/03/2012

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 30th, 2012 - 69 comments

Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike…

Key people

Written By: - Date published: 10:02 pm, March 29th, 2012 - 50 comments

The people named as Bronwyn Pullar’s support team seem to be the same people that helped John Key into the National Party and then into the leadership.

Like they say – it’s not what you know…

Key linked to Pullar claim

Written By: - Date published: 7:22 pm, March 29th, 2012 - 153 comments

Close Up tonight led with the allegation, based on a leaked document, that John Key (and other prominent Nats) were listed as supporting a $14 million dollar insurance claim by Bronwyn Pullar.

Blinglish’s Treasury not so hot

Written By: - Date published: 4:16 pm, March 29th, 2012 - 12 comments

Bill English and Treasury adopted a “see no evil, hear no evil” approach to the Retail Deposit Guarantee Scheme. And it’s cost us $2 billion. The Deputy Auditor General has delivered a damning report on a ministry used to judging others, not suffering any oversight itself…

Caption Competition

Written By: - Date published: 3:13 pm, March 29th, 2012 - 71 comments

Your life, your choice

Written By: - Date published: 1:29 pm, March 29th, 2012 - 29 comments

The right to choose to end our lives is back on the political agenda with Maryan Street’s private member’s bill on euthanasia going into the ballot. If it’s drawn, it will be the third time in 17 years such a Bill has come up. The first one was voted down 2 to 1, the next lost by 3 votes. This time, success seems highly likely.

NRT – Unqualified crony Isaac gets charter schools job

Written By: - Date published: 11:55 am, March 29th, 2012 - 20 comments

ACT-crony Catherine Isaac will head the implementation of the government’s unmandated charter schools programme. Isaac has no relevant expertise to justify this appointment. She has been given the position (and a generous public salary) solely on the basis of ideology and party affiliation. That is not how our public service is supposed to work.

Cost of the Ports of Auckland fiasco

Written By: - Date published: 11:03 am, March 29th, 2012 - 9 comments

Apparently the Auckland Council doesn’t know how much the POAL fiasco is costing. Rough estimates suggest that the cost is at least $400,000 a day, probably significantly more.  No wonder the Council doesn’t want to know.

You know you’re in trouble when: The bookies open a contract on you

Written By: - Date published: 10:28 am, March 29th, 2012 - 163 comments

You know that bookies sense when there is blood in the water and they’ll create contracts. I don’t gamble but the interesting contracts today in my mind are “Judith Collins to cease being a Minister before 1 June 2012”, “An ACC official ….to be found to have leaked Boag email”, “Beehive staffer to be found to have leaked Boag email”, etc. And a politician is definitely in trouble in NZ when they start talking about defamation 🙂

Unanswered questions

Written By: - Date published: 8:45 am, March 29th, 2012 - 96 comments

Why did Collins print a copy of the Boag email? Who else saw it or was informed of its contents? If she didn’t give the information to Lusk or Slater, how did it get to the Herald? If they weren’t involved, why did they run hard on the Pullar issue with an anti-Boag angle from Day 1? Does Collins want us to believe ACC leaked to the Herald? How long does Collins thinks she can hold out?

Mfat’s cuts cost $9.2m

Written By: - Date published: 7:50 am, March 29th, 2012 - 20 comments

Mfat is spending $9.2m a year on 30 strong razor gang cut diplomat jobs. It’s a ludicrous waste of money. As Goff notes – McCully’s splurging on ‘back office’ contractors in the razor gang to cut the ‘frontline’. 49 of 53 heads of mission have written to McCully say this process is destructive and dangerous. All McCully can do is blame the ‘star’ private sector head of Mfat he appointed.

Open mike 29/03/2012

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 29th, 2012 - 76 comments

Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike…

They eat their own

Written By: - Date published: 2:18 pm, March 28th, 2012 - 96 comments

ACC denies leaking Bronwyn Pullar’s name. It’s not credible that they would act so high risk and so politically. Boag and Pullar clearly didn’t leak it. So, that leaves Collins and her office. Collins denied leaking the email to the media … but leaves a fair bit of wiggle room, doesn’t it? The tipline is, as they say, running hot – and the name on everyone’s lips is Lusk. More soon.

Come back, we were just measuring GDP wrong!

Written By: - Date published: 12:34 pm, March 28th, 2012 - 10 comments

100 jobs a day were lost in January and 1000 people a week left New Zealand for Australia last year but it turns out it was all a mistake! David Farrar has discovered that we measure GDP slightly differently from Australia and if we use their measure then the purchasing power parity-adjusted difference in GDP per capita is close to zero. Hooray!

Joyce for National leader?

Written By: - Date published: 10:23 am, March 28th, 2012 - 36 comments

Ipredict reckons there’s 60% odds Key won’t be National leader in 3 years. Whether you think that’s too low or high, it brings an important fact into resolution – the next National leader is in Parliament, probably a minister right now. People talk about Parata but she’s a lightweight. Collins and Joyce are the options. Mike’s just had a look at Collins’ style, let’s examine Joyce’s.

Workers’ victory over incompetent PoAL management

Written By: - Date published: 8:32 am, March 28th, 2012 - 43 comments

Ports of Auckland must pay the permanent workers among the union members it had illegally locked out. It’s only a partial victory for workers who want to work and have long-term job security, not just get paid for two weeks. But it’s yet another costly defeat for management. How long will they keep burning ratepayers’ money like this before the council acts?

Blood sport

Written By: - Date published: 8:23 am, March 28th, 2012 - 48 comments

Judith Collins has twice told the Prime Minister that she didn’t leak Bronwyn Pullar’s information. But who else could have? The internecine fighting within National is heating up with Michelle Boag saying “When you can’t send a communication to a Government minister without fearing that the privacy of that communication is going to be breached, that’s very, very dangerous.” This is going to end badly for someone.

Open mike 28/03/2012

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 28th, 2012 - 91 comments

Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike…

Hubris in pink

Written By: - Date published: 9:35 pm, March 27th, 2012 - 23 comments

“Crusher Collins up close”  headlines a two-page article by Andrea Vance in the Saturday March 10 DomPost. It’s not on the Stuff website but deserves a wider audience. John Key might have been unwise to have stayed away on holiday this week – he should remember what happened to Jim Bolger.