Written By: - Date published: 10:54 am, March 7th, 2013 - 53 comments
Nick Smith, of the forked tongue, is challenging Auckland council’s plan for affordable compact housing. It will do nothing for housing affordability, transport, the environment. It is undemocratic, over-rides the council, and will enrich developers.
Written By: - Date published: 11:00 am, February 26th, 2013 - 41 comments
A wheelchair got caught in the rail tracks, resulting in critical injuries. Pedestrians are low priority, and people with disabilities even lower, making them/us vulnerable: poor pavements, hazardous road crossings, some inaccessible public transport… and more.
Written By: - Date published: 12:28 pm, February 11th, 2013 - 90 comments
There’s a lot of talk about the benefits of moving to a green, sustainable economy but details on what that looks like in practice in New Zealand are often frustratingly thin. Greenpeace is releasing a report – The Future is Here – that puts meat on the bones. The main thing is getting us off expensive, polluting, imported oil and on to clean, local energy.
Written By: - Date published: 11:55 pm, January 9th, 2013 - 24 comments
Looks like people are heading back to work. I’m always surprised at how predictable the end of year pattern is on this site. In fact I can (and do) bet server maintenance on it. This year we moved fully into the cloud but did it offshore. That way we don’t pay excessive variable costs to the Southern Cross cable monopoly to pay for searchbots.
Written By: - Date published: 8:04 am, January 9th, 2013 - 54 comments
The wildfires in Australia are an immediate cause for concern. Such events will be more common as average temperatures rise. Joseph Stigliz warns of an urgent need for structural change to respond to economic decline, climate change, poverty and inequality.
Written By: - Date published: 10:33 am, November 4th, 2012 - 138 comments
Kim Dotcom is promising ultra-cheap broadband for NZ. If he pulls it off, he is going to put our local entrepreneurs to shame – not to mention our government.
Written By: - Date published: 2:32 pm, October 23rd, 2012 - 28 comments
As expected, the High Court advised today that the government should hold off sale of Mighty River Power. The government is complying.
Written By: - Date published: 8:41 am, September 1st, 2012 - 156 comments
Planning permission has been sought to construct the world’s largest windfarm off the Scottish coast. Estimated to cost around 4.5 billion pounds and cover some 300 square km of ocean, if the project receives the green light, it will produce up to 40% of Scotland household power use. When compared to other forms of energy […]
Written By: - Date published: 7:03 am, July 30th, 2012 - 37 comments
In April, Christchurch Council revealed its plan for the CBD rebuild following an extensive period of public consultation. The chance to rebuild the CBD of our second-largest city was a once-in-generations opportunity to fit the city for our future challenges. The Council plan had its faults but one of the good aspects was it addressed smart transport. King Gerry ripped it up immediately.
Written By: - Date published: 5:17 pm, June 26th, 2012 - 239 comments
They’re quite literally selling our country down the river.
Written By: - Date published: 3:54 pm, June 15th, 2012 - 11 comments
Iain Lees-Galloway has been leading an admirable campaign to keep Palmy North’s Capital Connection.
His latest effort is to have petition (online & offline versions) to present to Parliament at the end of the month. It has to be then, because it’s expected that the government (through NZTA) will cut the service in July or August.
Written By: - Date published: 1:11 pm, May 21st, 2012 - 68 comments
The Greens launched their Budget alternative this morning. Titled “Smart Green Economics” it lived up to the billing. Extra heft was provided by BERL economist Dr Ganesh Nana paper arguing that the Government’s asset sales programme leaves the government accounts permanently worse off. It was also good to hear about opportunities and their alternatives. We’ve had enough of TINA.
Written By: - Date published: 8:08 am, May 10th, 2012 - 21 comments
You know how the government’s short of cash, eh? Well, the guy spending $14 billion on highways that don’t make sense on the government’s rosy numbers, isn’t even going to consider whether they’re still a good idea now the IMF says petrol is heading to $5 a litre. Nor is he concerned about the $6 billion shortfall because that’s in ‘the future’ – because he’ll be out of office by then (seriously)
Written By: - Date published: 10:54 am, May 7th, 2012 - 11 comments
Over the past few months, we’ve seen Auckland City’s wholly-owned port, Ports of Auckland, waging war against its own workforce, costing the city millions of dollars in lost dividends. Now, the Auckland Council has acted, requiring its intermediate Auckland Council Investments Limited to impose “good employer” provisions on its subsidiaries.
Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, May 3rd, 2012 - 94 comments
Last week, the IMF warned that oil prices will double over and above inflation in the next decade. The Greens crunched the numbers and say that means we’ll be paying $5 a litre for petrol in 2022. If it wasn’t clear before, it is now. A handful of white elephant highways is a poor use of $14 billion, especially when petrol is only getting more expensive.
Written By: - Date published: 8:50 pm, April 19th, 2012 - 25 comments
When it comes to doing dirty deals with a casino, selling our law so that it gets a convention centre and more profits from gambling addicts, National’s willing to die in a ditch. But when there was an opportunity to save and expand our high-tech, high-skill manufacturing at Hillside simply by requiring government bodies to consider the costs and benefits of their actions on the whole country, not their narrow corporate interests, National did nothing.
Written By: - Date published: 12:15 pm, April 3rd, 2012 - 10 comments
Something to do in Auckland tonight: What: Special screening of The Muppets Where: Hoyts Sylvia Park, Mt Wellington When: Tonight, April 3rd, 6.10pm to 8.30pm Don’t let those muppets at the Ports of Auckland get you down, come laugh at the real Muppets instead! Some door sales will be available, or you can email julie.fairey@gmail.com […]
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?
Written By: - Date published: 12:24 pm, March 27th, 2012 - 48 comments
The Nats selected Chinese company Huawei to build theparts of the UFB network after Joyce and English visited them in China. Now, the company’s been banned from Australia’s UFB project because of links to Chinese espionage. Key’s shrugged it off. Maybe there’s a risk, maybe not. But our government should give a damn and investigate. Its indifference makes it look compromised.
Written By: - Date published: 10:14 am, March 27th, 2012 - 6 comments
Mediation broke down in the Port dispute again yesterday with the PoAL management still refusing to make any concessions. So it’s back to court for a ruling on PoAL’s lockout without notice. Hopefully, the Court will side with reason, force the Port to allow the workers back and impose compensation for lost wages along with hefty fines.
Written By: - Date published: 2:18 pm, March 8th, 2012 - 28 comments
Ports of Auckland wants to increase profits by slashing pay-packets by 20% – $6m. So far, the process has cost them at least $28m. Add $9m for redundancies. Add the cost of continuing interruption as the contractors are established. Add the cost of blacklisting. Add the cost of customers that have shifted ports. Len Brown should sack the POAL management for incompetence.
Written By: - Date published: 9:50 am, March 2nd, 2012 - 136 comments
So, National wants to re-assure us that, when they sell our assets against our will, they’ll keep 51% and control. But, um, minority shareholders have rights and private boards have to maximise profits ahead of the national interest. If they decide to sell off the dams later they can, and the Nats won’t stop them.
Written By: - Date published: 3:34 pm, March 1st, 2012 - 22 comments
There never was a good business case for holiday highways. Now it’s even worse.
Written By: - Date published: 9:47 am, February 22nd, 2012 - 64 comments
Steven Fry’s outburst on broadband in NZ, however confused, did at least succeed in putting the state of our broadband access back in the headlines for a bit. It’s an issue that the Nats would rather we forgot.
Written By: - Date published: 12:15 am, February 9th, 2012 - 186 comments
It’s slipped down the news agenda but is about to come back up it: The Ports of Auckland Dispute. Tony Gibson is wasting our money on his union-busting campaign that will result in reduced profits for ratepayers. Sign up to make him see sense.
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