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Latest Comar Brunton poll result

Written By: - Date published: 1:08 pm, December 10th, 2017 - 88 comments

The latest Colmar Brunton results just released suggests that support for the Government parties is stable and support for Jacinda Ardern is surging.

Shane Jones and work for the dole

Written By: - Date published: 11:24 am, December 4th, 2017 - 94 comments

Shane Jones has muddied a perfectly good job creation policy by talking about work for the dole.

Once again: National lost the election

Written By: - Date published: 9:17 pm, November 26th, 2017 - 154 comments

A rebuttal of Nick Smith’s claim to have “won the 2017 election, but lost the coalition negotiations.”

Latest Roy Morgan Poll – Labour and Greens surge as National flounders

Written By: - Date published: 7:03 am, November 23rd, 2017 - 156 comments

The first post election Roy Morgan poll result has been released. Labour and the Greens have surged and National has gone backwards.

Can Ben Mack please make his mind up

Written By: - Date published: 7:35 am, November 12th, 2017 - 84 comments

Herald lifestyle columnist has published two recent opinion pieces, the first wondering if Jacinda Ardern will be able to address the many and varied problems the country faces and the second suggesting that the Government is under the control of the extreme right.  Can he please make up his mind.

This TPP…

Written By: - Date published: 11:19 am, November 8th, 2017 - 68 comments

Some aspects of the TPP no-one’s mentioning.

Suck it up political sleazers.

Written By: - Date published: 8:22 am, November 8th, 2017 - 113 comments

Winston Peters has launched a legal fishing expedition to identify who exactly breached privacy on his superannuation over payments. A problem that he shares with about 50 thousand other pensioners. Unlike them, his problem wasn’t trying to find money to repay it. It was that the breach was deliberately timed to be a classic dirty politics ploy, almost certainly by National, in the leadup to the  recent election. I wish him good fishing.

 

Let’s do this

Written By: - Date published: 2:42 pm, November 3rd, 2017 - 11 comments

With a change of Government it is a time for a change in the public entities that run New Zealand.

The new cabinet

Written By: - Date published: 12:07 pm, October 25th, 2017 - 41 comments

Details of the new cabinet have been announced.

Say goodbye to roads of national significance

Written By: - Date published: 7:29 am, October 25th, 2017 - 55 comments

National’s roads of national significance programme looks to be no more with an early casualty being the East West Link in Auckland, which per kilometre was destined to be the most expensive transport project the world has ever seen.

Labour – NZFirst deal details announced

Written By: - Date published: 3:54 pm, October 24th, 2017 - 60 comments

Details of the Labour – NZ First coalition agreement have just been announced.

The new cabinet

Written By: - Date published: 8:03 am, October 24th, 2017 - 78 comments

Details about how the next Cabinet may be made up are emerging. Winston Peters may regain the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs as well as being Deputy Prime Minister.

NZ First: We could and should be doing better

Written By: - Date published: 8:58 am, October 20th, 2017 - 15 comments

NZ First chose to be inside Cabinet in a full coalition. I’d rather expected that they would choose to be in a confidence and supply agreement as they did with Labour back in 2005. That they decided to take the risk despite their previous experience with National is a stunning level of trust. But they work well with Labour.

Jacinda Ardern’s speech

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, October 20th, 2017 - 25 comments

If you missed it last night – Jacinda Ardern’s first speech as PM elect is everything that we could want and expect. But the take-home line of the drama belongs to Winston Peters.

We have a Government

Written By: - Date published: 9:37 pm, October 19th, 2017 - 26 comments

NZ First have chosen to support Labour to form the next government of NZ and have secured a coalition deal. The Greens are in the process of making a decision about a Confidence and Supply deal before they make an announcement. Matthew Whitehead writes about what the options are and how Confidence and Supply agreements can work.

Today is a win-win with Winston

Written By: - Date published: 8:48 am, October 19th, 2017 - 103 comments

It appears that Winston is about to announce the decision of the NZ First party about their coalition partner today. For those who seem to think that coalitions should be formed with rapidity, they simply shouldn’t. That is the path to making stupid decisions, and I am yet to hear a single good reason to do it.

Another day

Written By: - Date published: 5:03 pm, October 17th, 2017 - 34 comments

Just watched the “waiting for Winston Peters”  live feed from Stuff. It sounds like the NZ First board know what they want and now there will be a bit more negotiation with both major parties to get closer to what the NZF board were after. They are heading back home leaving the politicians to finish up.
Updated: Winston in one-on-one talks with Bill and Jacinda last night. Looks like it is getting serious.

This is the day *

Written By: - Date published: 8:15 am, October 16th, 2017 - 120 comments

* but delays are possible.

Every body wants to rule the world

Written By: - Date published: 9:19 am, October 12th, 2017 - 195 comments

D day approaches. What will happen? Will we have a decaying toothless National Government moderated by coalition with New Zealand First or will we have something more exciting?

Last day of talks

Written By: - Date published: 7:40 am, October 12th, 2017 - 26 comments

It’s the last day of coalition talks (probably). Peters has certainly created big expectations of “change”, but what they will mean in practice is still anyone’s guess.

Green options

Written By: - Date published: 7:17 am, October 12th, 2017 - 12 comments

If the Greens prioritise change over power, then the whole ‘they have no leverage’ rhetoric becomes less important than the fact that the Greens are necessary to form government but still have choices in how they participate in that.

Politics or Policy?

Written By: - Date published: 5:46 pm, October 9th, 2017 - 56 comments

Policy is everything, Winston Peters said today. This should not be a surprise. Before every election, he has refused to give any hint of Party support preference until after the vote. But he will have thought a lot about what he might want, as it has long been clear that his Party would decide the outcome. So what are his policies?

Why Labour may form the next Government

Written By: - Date published: 8:39 am, October 8th, 2017 - 173 comments

The prospects of a Labour led Government have improved dramatically following the release of the final election results.

And the final result is …

Written By: - Date published: 2:10 pm, October 7th, 2017 - 206 comments

The final election results have been announced with Labour and the Greens each picking up an extra seat.

Coalition of liars

Written By: - Date published: 6:34 am, October 7th, 2017 - 35 comments

The right wing clobbering machine is already calling a possible Labour Green NZF a “coalition of losers”. Well under MMP a coalition of losers can be the winners. But however you cut it a coalition of liars will always be liars.

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.

ETS is useless, scrap it

Written By: - Date published: 9:11 am, October 4th, 2017 - 25 comments

I suspect that ETS has become a political football in the next parliament, but probably not part of a coalition agreement with either National or Labour. My guess is that both NZ First and the Greens will want it off the table unless it is agreed that it will go. That leaves them able to vote against further stupid patches being added to it.

Good call from Ardern

Written By: - Date published: 9:46 am, October 3rd, 2017 - 86 comments

I have very mixed feelings about a Labour Green NZF government. I certainly don’t think that Labour should “pay any price”. So I’m pleased to see Jacinda Ardern acknowledging the Greens.

The Herald doesn’t want Winston to go with Labour

Written By: - Date published: 11:58 am, October 1st, 2017 - 132 comments

The Herald has offered a number of opinions this weekend saying that Labour forming a coalition with New Zealand First would be a very bad thing.

On that stupid coalition deal…

Written By: - Date published: 7:07 am, September 30th, 2017 - 101 comments

A possible National/Green coalition deal? Matthew Whitehead discusses why and why not from a Green perspective.

The political strategy of Winston Peters

Written By: - Date published: 7:21 am, September 29th, 2017 - 13 comments

The Winston Peters interregnum provides New Zealand with the opportunity to work out what are core values and what can be the subject of compromise.

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