Author Archive

The DL Debates – Rangitikei

Written By: - Date published: 10:36 am, October 30th, 2008 - 7 comments

The good fellas and fellaresses of Drinking Liberally Palmerston North have organised three debates for the Rangatikei electorate. These will be the only candidate debates in the electorate, so really great to see DL making it happen. The debates are: 2 November, 7pm Feilding – Senior citizens hall, Bowen street 3 November, 7pm Marton – […]

No smoking gun

Written By: - Date published: 10:09 am, October 30th, 2008 - 152 comments

It turns out the Herald’s story about John Key’s H-fee involvement is a bust. Aside from Key not being straight with the dates he worked at Elders there isn’t anything firm to tie him to the actual fraud. That’s not the story I expected given the Herald had decided to lead with this story on […]

The H-fee explained

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 pm, October 29th, 2008 - 161 comments

A little more detail to flesh out Tane’s post. The core of the H-fee story is this: In 1987, head of Equiticorp Allan Hawkins illegally helped Elders Merchant Finance in New Zealand with the takeover of another company. In return, Elders paid Hawkins $66m through a series of sham foreign exchange transactions. There were two so-called […]

Vote Smart: Wellington

Written By: - Date published: 2:16 pm, October 29th, 2008 - 40 comments

In Wellington Central and Ohariu-Belmont, left-wing voters have the opportunity to use their candidate votes wisely to help good left-wing candidates to victory, and keep out two conservative dinosaurs. Wellington Central is a two-horse race between Labour’s Grant Robertson and National’s homophobic former ACT MP Stephen Franks. Wellington Central was a firmly Labour seat last […]

Gone Flippin’

Written By: - Date published: 11:58 am, October 29th, 2008 - 21 comments

Slippery John’s flip-flops keep on coming. Here he is just three weeks ago in the Listener: “you either have a conflict of interest or you don’t; it doesn’t matter whether you hold one share or a million” and, today, on Breakfast: ‘it’s a very small number, no-one thinks a Member of Parliament with 500 Contact […]

A clear choice on ACC

Written By: - Date published: 9:59 am, October 29th, 2008 - 48 comments

If you vote National, United Future, or ACT, you will be voting for the ACC system to be privatised. Consequences of this include: – $200 million in profits flowing offshore, according to John Key’s former employers Merril Lynch – higher levies on most workers, as private insurers cherry-pick the most profitable for themselves, leaving the […]

Update on Brownlee

Written By: - Date published: 5:20 pm, October 28th, 2008 - 37 comments

There are substantive policy issues such as National’s privatisation plans for the prisons that need to be covered but, first, an update on Gerry Brownlee’s conflict of interest. According to the NZPA: Brownlee said his shareholding (496 shares, worth around $4,000 during 2002-2003) was too small to amount to a pecuniary interest. – Pecuniary interest is […]

A pattern of (mis)behaviour

Written By: - Date published: 1:41 pm, October 28th, 2008 - 87 comments

Over this year, we’ve seen John Key caught out lying on a number of occasions – the excuses for his “we would love to see wages drop” quote, his shares, numerous instances in the debate and other interviews. He has said things like ‘I’ve aways believed in climate change‘ when he had previously claimed to […]

Standard scoop: Another senior Nat failed to disclose conflicts

Written By: - Date published: 10:39 am, October 28th, 2008 - 34 comments

Last month, Key lied when he was asked whether he had more Tranzrail shares, over which he had failed to declare his conflict of interest. On Sunday, it was revealed on The Standard that Key had also held shares in Fletcher Challenge Forests, which was campaigning for the Government to buy the rails off Tranzrail, […]

You’re too kind

Written By: - Date published: 7:51 am, October 28th, 2008 - 16 comments

Audrey Young is now acknowledging Key’s reflexive tendency to lie, but she is incredibly soft on it: I was intrigued at Key’s suggestion that cutting Kiwisaver to fund tax cuts had been part of National’s response to the economic downturn because that has been the plan all along. I was also intrigued by his reasoning […]

Horse racing

Written By: - Date published: 10:26 pm, October 27th, 2008 - 70 comments

Here are the results of the last four polls, released over the past four days. I’ve presented them in number of seats won and grouped the parties into Left and Right based on these facts: ACT is locked with National as the Progressives are with Labour, the Greens won’t go with National, UF won’t go […]

Labour’s labour policy good for labourers

Written By: - Date published: 7:50 pm, October 27th, 2008 - 19 comments

Labour has unveiled its work rights policy, and it’s a good one: – minimum wage increases at least at the rate of inflation or the average wage increase, whichever is higher. That would bring it to nearly $15 a year by 2011. Why they didn’t just commit to $15 like the rest of the Left, […]

Key – Undisclosed conflict of interest

Written By: - Date published: 1:40 pm, October 27th, 2008 - 31 comments

National’s response to my revelation on The Standard that John Key owned shares had undisclosed conflicts of interest with Fletcher Challenge Forests is to deny the conflict. Let me restate the core conflict suscinctly: John Key owned shares in Fletcher Challenge Forests. Fletcher Challenge Forests was a major user of Tranzrail, it depended on Tranzrail […]

Standard Scoop: Key exposed again on secret shares and Tranzrail

Written By: - Date published: 9:00 pm, October 26th, 2008 - 145 comments

When the Tranzrail shares came to light, Key was asked whether he had any other undisclosed shares entailing a conflict of interest. He said he didn’t. That was not true. National Party Leader John Key failed to disclose his conflict of interest arising from his share holding in Fletcher Challenge Forests while using his privileges […]

On moral mandates

Written By: - Date published: 7:01 am, October 26th, 2008 - 69 comments

So, let me get this straight. The Right says that the minor parties have to support a National-led government if National gets more votes than Labour. Even if a National government would go against everything a party stands for, even if it is a complete betrayal of the people who voted for them, minor parties […]

Here be dragons

Written By: - Date published: 10:02 pm, October 25th, 2008 - 20 comments

So, we can all make up dumb pictures and say ‘beware of many-headed monsters’. Let’s, instead, ask if National’s attack makes sense. First, any new government is going to need support from a number of parties. A Labour-led government is likely to be dependent on Labour, the Progressives, Greens, and the Maori Party (four parties). […]

The Standard Week: 17-24 October

Written By: - Date published: 2:01 pm, October 24th, 2008 - 13 comments

National’s MPs might be considering spending the next two weeks in bed, dreaming of victory. Because it seems every day they go out, one of them accidentally speaks their mind, which is costing votes. They’ve managed to alienate an impressive range of demographics in the last month: 830,000 Kiwisavers, a half a million low income […]

The Standard line: Kiwisaver

Written By: - Date published: 11:37 am, October 24th, 2008 - 26 comments

So, you’re talking with someone about politics and they say something really dumb and wrong and you know it’s wrong but you don’t have the arguments and facts at your fingertips to make a decisive point. That’s where our election series, The Standard line, comes in. The info you need in bite-size form. Today: Kiwisaver Points […]

The Standard line: Photoshop

Written By: - Date published: 10:03 am, October 24th, 2008 - 132 comments

So, you’re talking with someone about politics and they say something really dumb and wrong and you know it’s wrong but you don’t have the arguments and facts at your fingertips to make a decisive point. That’s where our election series, The Standard line, comes in. The info you need in bite-size form. Today: photoshop Points: […]

Don’t dream, it’s over

Written By: - Date published: 3:58 pm, October 23rd, 2008 - 76 comments

I’ve always regarded the possibility of a National-Maori Party governing arrangement as absurd, even grotesque. The interests of the Maori people, who are predominantly working-class, are clearly best represented by the Left. Under National in the 1990s, Maori unemployment reached 25% and incomes plummeted. Today it is 7.7%, and Maori incomes are rising as fast […]

Reserve Bank drops OCR 1%

Written By: - Date published: 9:02 am, October 23rd, 2008 - 30 comments

The OCR is down from 7.5% to 6.5%. That’s an unprecendented cut in one go and further confirmation that we are entering tough economic times. Inflation has been high but the Reserve Bank thinks the increasingly likely global recession will remove inflationary pressure. Keeping the economy going will be the challenge.

Green laffs

Written By: - Date published: 8:46 am, October 23rd, 2008 - 7 comments

Russel Norman at Drinking Liberally – Auckland last night on Lockwood Smith: Lockwood may think all Asians have small hands but what we really learned today is that Lockwood’s feet are so small he can fit them in his mouth Classic.

Wait, what’s the RSE?

Written By: - Date published: 3:46 pm, October 22nd, 2008 - 38 comments

OK, we’ve reported on, given historical context to, and mocked Lockwood Smith’s racist comments about seasonal migrant workers. Now, to the substance of what Smith as saying, ie that fewer permits issued under the Recognised Seasonal Employer Scheme (RSE) should be allocated to people from the Pacific Islands (because, he says, other people are smaller […]

Nats: instilling the work ethic early

Written By: - Date published: 1:51 pm, October 22nd, 2008 - 34 comments

Lockwood Smith has unveiled more National workforce innovations. In addition to favouring Asian seasonal migrants over Polynesians because their hands are smaller, Smith has announced that National’s plans to have new schools built and owned by private companies will include “co-location of educational and industrial facilities” to “further leverage our most precious asset: our children, […]

Drinking Liberally – Palmerston North

Written By: - Date published: 10:29 am, October 22nd, 2008 - 1 comment

When: 24th of Oct, 7:30pm Where: Zoe’s Bar – Bottom floor of the Kingsgate hotel, Fitzherbert ave Who: guest speaker Green MP Keith Locke, and a great group of jokers and jokesses Also: join the mailing list dlpalmerstonnorth@gmail.com .

Scratch a Tory…

Written By: - Date published: 9:27 am, October 22nd, 2008 - 40 comments

…and you still reveal a bigot, it seems. Here is National’s Immigration spokesperson, Lockwood Smith, (he who likes to swallow dead fish) on taking more Asian seasonal worker migrants instead of Polynesians: “There are some skills in the vineyard that some people are perhaps better at, for example some of the pruning … some of […]

Vote smart: Epsom

Written By: - Date published: 1:40 pm, October 21st, 2008 - 58 comments

I’ve come in for a bit of flak for this ‘Vote Smart‘ series of posts on how people can make the most of their vote but I don’t resile from it. It seems to me the criticism is based on a quaint notion that there is an optimal party and candidate for everyone and they […]

Inflation up but already on way down

Written By: - Date published: 1:18 pm, October 21st, 2008 - 21 comments

Inflation hit 5.1% for the year to September driven by the mammoth spike in oil, food, and other commodity which has abated since then, for now. There is nothing that could be done to avoid this impact on New Zealand from international markets. The economy is already in recession, and now would be the worst […]

Highly principled statements

Written By: - Date published: 12:29 pm, October 21st, 2008 - 16 comments

Yesterday, Bill ‘do whatever it takes to win’ English was out trying to assuage Kiwis fears of National’s secret agenda (which his recorded remarks helped ignite). He praised Labour’s achievements but said it was time for more positive leadership. In other words, ‘don’t worry, we’re just like Labour but John smiles a lot, oh and […]

New posters/leaflets

Written By: - Date published: 6:19 pm, October 20th, 2008 - 66 comments

I have to say, these are my favourite so far. There are some talented people out there. There’s eight versions of this new one on the Campaign Hub, each with an example of Key flipping-flopping Keep getting them out there guys. The people deserve to know.

It’s your choice

Written By: - Date published: 1:35 pm, October 20th, 2008 - 109 comments

Now that both Labour and National have all their major spending promises out, we can compare the options. Remember, whatever happens one of these two parties will lead the next government, so these are the basic choices we face: Labour: -Keep existing policies including important polices growing next term: -retaining Kiwibank -retaining Kiwisaver -tax cuts […]