infrastructure

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National badly wants Kiwibuild to crash

Written By: - Date published: 8:34 am, October 30th, 2018 - 339 comments

National is complaining that Labour is not solving the National imposed housing crisis quickly enough.

The Mariana Trench Fix.

Written By: - Date published: 1:53 pm, October 21st, 2018 - 59 comments

The Mariana Trench is pretty huge. And deep. And if the idea is to fill a hole in the ground with ‘stuff’, then it’s a fair sized hole to be filling, right?

Light rail in Auckland

Written By: - Date published: 9:56 am, October 14th, 2018 - 96 comments

There has been some push back against the Government’s light rail proposal for Dominion Road from some unlikely sources.  But they are concentrating on what is best for airport users, not what is best for the city as a whole.

No Waimea dam

Written By: - Date published: 2:35 pm, August 17th, 2018 - 26 comments

With the change in Government and ever increasing costs of construction it appears that the Waimea dam project in Tasman District is going to be scuppered.

Building Nations

Written By: - Date published: 8:15 am, August 16th, 2018 - 72 comments

This Government has probably one term to show progress in dealing with the country’s infrastructure deficit.

Corporatism.

Written By: - Date published: 12:35 pm, August 1st, 2018 - 44 comments

Hand in hand with “compassionate liberalism”.

Nurses.

Written By: - Date published: 12:31 pm, July 27th, 2018 - 76 comments

There’s a sickness affecting our health system.

Government with a plan

Written By: - Date published: 8:00 am, July 22nd, 2018 - 46 comments

Labour and New Zealand First Ministers under the first term of the sixth Labour government sitting in the Cabinet office.

The polls are great. Top work. But I’m getting worried about the entropy of this government already. Matthew Hooten and Karl Marx agree with me.

Liberalism Uber Alles

Written By: - Date published: 11:29 am, June 13th, 2018 - 32 comments

If the political class think liberalism has failed, then why is it that the process of killing off NZ Post is approaching completion?

Labour aims to make transport system more sustainable

Written By: - Date published: 1:03 pm, April 4th, 2018 - 89 comments

The Government has released a draft Government Policy Statement on Transport for consultation.  A radical shake up of the Transport system is being proposed.

Tripling down on financial illiteracy with Amy Adams (and MMT)

Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, March 8th, 2018 - 128 comments

A 500-million Mark bank note from pre-war Germany

Amy Adams won’t commit to $11.7b, but she too has now become the third person to fall down the imaginary fiscal hole. How can National claim to have any soundness on finance if they won’t admit their criticisms on the economy are unreasonable and unfounded? And besides, aren’t National actually worse fiscal managers if ordinary people tend to get paid less under their regimes? We dive into some theory to thoroughly dispute even Steven Joyce’s/Amy Adam’s secondary criticism of “fiscal tightness,” although concede that two of the Budget Responsibility rules are probably stupid in order to do it.

Bio-fuels.

Written By: - Date published: 2:15 pm, February 11th, 2018 - 35 comments

Biofuels and fossil. The difference?

Is it time to Nationalise Auckland?

Written By: - Date published: 8:51 am, January 13th, 2018 - 52 comments

It has been a decade now since Minister of Local Government Rodney Hide proposed amalgamating all of Auckland’s city councils into one enormous entity by dumping much of the Royal Commission’s proposals. Well it’s time to hold its results to account.

Home Sweet Home

Written By: - Date published: 11:52 am, November 4th, 2017 - 23 comments

The changing face of New Zealand.

Ten Reasons for National to do another term

Written By: - Date published: 7:30 am, October 5th, 2017 - 28 comments

A tongue in cheek list of reasons why it may be best for National to form the next Government.

A “Culture of Entitlement”?

Written By: - Date published: 3:39 pm, August 17th, 2017 - 48 comments

With the current dialog about welfare, It is time to look at the people who are the real  beneficiaries, of the welfare system.

Who use the educated and healthy  workforce our system provides

The people who say “everyone should stand on their own two feet”, “you don’t work you don’t eat”,  and “take personal responsibility”,

The business sector.

Generous donation – why was it necessary to get a hospital built?

Written By: - Date published: 12:58 pm, July 11th, 2017 - 28 comments

Thank you Mark Dunajtschik. But why did it take a generous private donation to get a badly needed public hospital off the drawing-board?

Little on immigration

Written By: - Date published: 2:09 pm, May 8th, 2017 - 34 comments

A good piece by Andrew Little in The Herald, setting out Labour’s position on immigration (with policy to come).

Billions of lies

Written By: - Date published: 7:49 am, April 29th, 2017 - 41 comments

The Nats are settling in to election mode – smoke and mirrors. Steven Joyce feeds us billions of dollars worth of lies.

Good ideas in Gisborne

Written By: - Date published: 1:28 pm, February 17th, 2017 - 97 comments

Andrew Little’s announcement yesterday in Gisborne of Labour’s pledge of up to $20million to build a prefabricated timber plant there is a much-needed boost to the area and a sign that Labour’s 100,000 new house pledge first made by David Shearer in 2012 has legs.

National tries to have it both ways

Written By: - Date published: 8:31 am, November 19th, 2016 - 51 comments

Despite the Kaikoura earthquakes, the damage to the Capital and the fact the EQC fund is now in deficit, the Government is still holding out the possibility of tax cuts in election year.

Labour’s Auckland light rail announcement

Written By: - Date published: 8:38 am, October 31st, 2016 - 87 comments

National is criticising Labour for releasing policy during an election campaign.

Charles Hugh Smith – The Ultimate Long Game: Autarky and Resilience

Written By: - Date published: 6:17 pm, August 18th, 2016 - 28 comments

Today, electronic numbers in electronic bank accounts are the most important things to the people who lead NZ. That’s going to have to seriously change. The country’s capacity and resources in terms of food, energy, water and cultural/social resiliency is what actually counts.

Free Petrol Pt IV

Written By: - Date published: 6:25 am, August 5th, 2016 - 92 comments

Part IV of IV

Free Petrol Pt III

Written By: - Date published: 11:20 am, August 4th, 2016 - 25 comments

Part III of IV – a focus on road transport.

The New Silk Road

Written By: - Date published: 9:48 am, August 4th, 2016 - 45 comments

The New Silk Road is a massive economic transport system being built at rapid speed with Chinese money, Chinese politicking, Chinese engineering, and yes, Chinese steel.

National’s Rodeo.

Written By: - Date published: 12:21 pm, July 15th, 2016 - 23 comments

The fiction that National is doing a competent job of managing the economy is entirely due, now that the boom from Dairy and Christchurch rebuilding is ending, to immigration and rising house prices.

They are now riding a bolting horse that they cannot dismount, caused by their own inaction.

When is a toll road not a toll road?

Written By: - Date published: 9:36 am, June 22nd, 2016 - 37 comments

When it is a variable network pricing mechanism …

The Mother Budget

Written By: - Date published: 6:21 pm, May 26th, 2016 - 89 comments

There are budgets and there are budgets. And for all the presence or absence of bright ideas, there’s a budget that threatens to subsume all others…

We’re going to burn it all, until we burn it down.

Written By: - Date published: 12:11 am, May 20th, 2016 - 173 comments

What does it really mean to reduce NZ’s total fossil fuel use by 50% by 2030: a warm up discussion for an upcoming thought experiment.

The solar surcharge

Written By: - Date published: 2:39 pm, April 15th, 2016 - 98 comments

Profit gouging or genuine need?

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