political parties

HDPA on the rot that goes to the top

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 10:04 am, June 25th, 2017 - 30 comments

Heather du Plessis-Allan asks why Barclay is taking the fall alone, when – just as with dirty politics – the rot goes to the top of the National Party.

New Zealand First

Written By: advantage - Date published: 9:30 am, June 24th, 2017 - 61 comments

New Zealand First could have a pivotal role in the next Government. What are their principles and what are they committed to?

Over egging the scandal soufflee

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 9:09 am, June 24th, 2017 - 97 comments

Team Nat were desperate to try and divert some attention from their floundering leader, and to a certain extent they succeeded. But compare and contrast Labour and National’s handling of the issues, front up and fix vs lie harder.

English still digging

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 8:03 am, June 24th, 2017 - 44 comments

Burying the last shred of his credibility in a deep hole forever, Bill claims that nobody realised Todd Barclay recording of secretary might be a crime. It’s like the events of 2008 and 2011 never happened.

Greens to contest Nick Smith’s seat in Nelson

Written By: weka - Date published: 7:00 am, June 24th, 2017 - 41 comments

Nelson city councillor Matt Lawrey is to run a two tick campaign with the full backing of the party.

Creative uses for Brash’s “Hobson’s pledge” pamphlets

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 12:20 pm, June 23rd, 2017 - 48 comments

Ex Nat leader Don Brash, of racist Orewa speech and Iwi/Kiwi fame, is still out there fanning the flames of division in NZ.

So English lied to Parliament too

Written By: Natwatch - Date published: 6:40 am, June 23rd, 2017 - 23 comments

Labour and Peters have both made complaints over English’s lie to Parliament. Peters is calling on English to step down. That’s going to make any post-election NZF/Nat coalition a bit tricky.

Follow the money

Written By: Mike Smith - Date published: 10:39 pm, June 22nd, 2017 - 49 comments

Bill English’s texted electorate chair Stuart Davie on 21st February 2016 saying Glenys Dickson was given an extra payout from the Leader’s fund “to avoid potential legal action.” It was the only source available for an extra payout for confidentiality. English said today no-one in February knew there was any issue of illegality. Then what legal action and why an extra payment?

Labour to invest in public transport for Greater Christchurch

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 11:17 am, June 22nd, 2017 - 9 comments

A 21st century city simply has to have integrated, multi-modal public transport at its heart.

Bill English is no John Key

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 9:00 am, June 22nd, 2017 - 37 comments

During Dirty Politics John Key was able to stand in front of a group of reporters and with complete confidence make a series of statements the veracity of which was dubious. Bill English has shown this week that he does not have that ability.

Barclay/English cartooned

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 6:06 am, June 22nd, 2017 - 8 comments

Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.

Barclay debacle recap

Written By: weka - Date published: 6:05 am, June 21st, 2017 - 73 comments

From twitter, Holy shit, someone in NZ did some journalism and all hell breaks loose.

National’s Todd Barclay problem

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:24 am, June 20th, 2017 - 113 comments

Newsroom has released details about how National handled the police investigation into Todd Barclay’s alleged illegal wiretapping suggesting that Bill English thought it had occurred and that the complaint was dealt with in part by a payment from John Key’s Prime Minister’s fund.

Party donations analysis

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 7:02 am, June 20th, 2017 - 101 comments

Max Rasbrooke has done an analysis of donations to political parties, and raises the concern that donations buy influence. There is a solution to this problem.

Lies, damn lies, and National’s housing affordability statistics

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 9:19 am, June 19th, 2017 - 39 comments

RNZ: The Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment ignored advice from the Reserve Bank over its new housing affordability measure, and made houses appear to be more affordable than they actually were.

National release their Social Media Policy

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 6:30 am, June 19th, 2017 - 14 comments

How not to be a twit.

National’s view of disability

Written By: weka - Date published: 11:19 am, June 18th, 2017 - 51 comments

The Minister for Disability Issues would rather be sailing.

The Nation on housing

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 7:03 am, June 18th, 2017 - 57 comments

The Nation did good work on the housing crisis yesterday. This is the Brighter Future that Bill English warned of in 2010.

Bridges and flouting the OIA

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 7:03 am, June 17th, 2017 - 18 comments

Simon Bridges tried to block the release of a report on a Kiwirail proposal. The Ombudsman warns against flouting the Official Information Act. But it’s a well established pattern of behaviour with this government.

Health budget stuff up – incompetent

Written By: Natwatch - Date published: 2:56 pm, June 16th, 2017 - 9 comments

I guess English can’t be too angry at Coleman – just last year he stuffed up his own numbers to the tune of $160m per year when “explaining” why he was vetoing an extension to paid parental leave.

Our brilliant economy

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 10:49 am, June 16th, 2017 - 51 comments

We need new thinking on the economy – zero emissions, sustainable, a big redistribution from rich to poor. But the list of current economic woe shows that even on their own old conventional terms the Nats are useless economic managers.

UNICEF on our appalling child welfare record – but apparently we don’t care

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 8:22 am, June 16th, 2017 - 199 comments

UNICEF has another major report ranking the wellbeing of NZ kids 34th out of 41 developed countries. This is not new news, and apparently a lot of voters just don’t give a damn.

Debt to Income Loan Limits

Written By: advantage - Date published: 7:56 am, June 15th, 2017 - 116 comments

this is not the hope you were looking for

The possible introduction of debt to income lending ratios will potentially have an enormous effect on New Zealand’s housing market.

New Zealand folds and apologises to Israel

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 10:34 am, June 14th, 2017 - 81 comments

New Zealand has completely backed down from its original position of opposing the illegal occupation by Israel of Palestinian land and apologised to Israel for damaging the relationship.

Immigration and economic growth

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 8:16 am, June 14th, 2017 - 54 comments

English’s scaremongering about Labour’s immigration policy does nothing but highlight the fundamental weakness of our economy. Just how anemic are we after 9 long years?

Green perspectives on the Point England land appropriation

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 11:59 am, June 13th, 2017 - 64 comments

Modern Day Land Grab or Treaty Settlement?

Labour oppose visa scams – Nats would rather have the quick bucks

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 7:02 am, June 13th, 2017 - 35 comments

Labour is right to stress the many advantages that immigration brings to NZ, and right to address the major way in which it is being abused – student visa scams. Bill English has made National’s position clear, they would rather have the quick bucks.

Labour’s immigration policy

Written By: Anthony R0bins - Date published: 3:46 pm, June 12th, 2017 - 95 comments

On first impressions Labour has done a good job of trying to balance the needs: to acknowledge the positive role of immigration in NZ, slow down immigration while infrastructure catches up, and target immigration effectively.

Act’s Euthanasia Bill

Written By: advantage - Date published: 10:05 am, June 12th, 2017 - 83 comments

Following the selection of David Seymour’s private member’s bill euthanasia will be debated this year in Parliament.

How to make medicinal cannabis laws based on the needs of ill and disabled people

Written By: weka - Date published: 9:48 am, June 12th, 2017 - 124 comments

The Greens’ bill would make medicinal cannabis easily accessible to those in need without hoop jumping or financial barriers.

Brownlee lying to the UN over Operation Burnham

Written By: Natwatch - Date published: 6:36 am, June 12th, 2017 - 18 comments

The UN called for an investigation into Operation Burnham. Very inconvenient for the Nats who would rather sweep any dead civilians under the carpet and forget them. So naturally Gerry Brownlee responds with a lie.