russel norman

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The “socialist” vs capitalist PR war: NZ Power

Written By: - Date published: 8:19 am, April 21st, 2013 - 123 comments

The Key government and its allies are playing the “red scare” gambit, the Greens get to the heart of the reason for NZ Power, Parker goes Third Way, while Bernard Hickey and Matt McCarten weigh in to support the (alleged) “socialist” NZ Power policy. Bomber Bradbury adds some words of caution. [updated title]

The Greens, electricity & sustainability

Written By: - Date published: 2:15 pm, April 16th, 2013 - 48 comments

The Greens and Labour are planning a joint announcement on their policies on power prices. Both parties want to bring down costs of electricity.  The policies of the two parties will also have some differences.   How will it mesh with Green Party policies on sustainability?

More pay for them; bigger bills for us

Written By: - Date published: 1:09 pm, April 4th, 2013 - 24 comments

Ryall has announced that Might River Power top brass will be receiving massive pay rises, in relation to the sale of the powercos. The directors have multiple positions, and questions have been raise about the past of one or two of them. They benefit; we pay.

Democracy needs straight answers to straight questions

Written By: - Date published: 10:57 am, March 21st, 2013 - 49 comments

The current Speaker in the House, David Carter, is a disaster.  Yesterday he let the government get away with avoiding providing serious answers to important questions: a government ploy? Russel Norman has complained.  Democracy needs the government to be held to account.

Key smacked down on jobs failure

Written By: - Date published: 7:55 am, November 28th, 2012 - 68 comments

Dr Russel Norman: Does it not all boil down to the fact that whichever way you cut it, whichever statistics you care to choose, the Government has failed on jobs, unemployment has grown in New Zealand, and the number of jobs in the manufacturing sector has not grown; and is it not time he just admitted it and figured out what to do about it?

Politicians of the year

Written By: - Date published: 8:35 am, November 26th, 2012 - 40 comments

On Q+A, Russel Norman and Judith Collins were named politicians of the year. It’s as much about what they have done in this past year as where they are going. Norman has cleverly positioned himself as the voice of the Left on the economy – the economy is the issue and will continue to be so. Collins has softened her image to set herself up to replace Key.

Winners and losers

Written By: - Date published: 8:04 am, November 21st, 2012 - 156 comments

So, who won and who lost?

Supernumerary

Written By: - Date published: 3:50 pm, October 22nd, 2012 - 100 comments

I’ve been thinking about what you might call a ‘good problem’ for the Left.. but it leads me to a ‘problem problem’. OK, so let’s say we win the next election – as the Left must do and should do given how unpopular the Nats’ policies are and, for the last year, how inept their political management has been. How do you share the economic portfolios out?

‘What crisis?’ Rudderless ship, stormy seas

Written By: - Date published: 8:03 am, October 14th, 2012 - 133 comments

There is ample evidence of a deep and lasting crisis, but in the delusional world of Planet Key it doesn’t exist. The EPMU Job Crisis Summit  opened a much needed conversation.  Russel Norman likened the New Zealand economy to a rudderless sailing ship In Stormy Seas.  Will the summit be the start of a sea change for NZ?

Historic joint party Inquiry: Crisis in Manufacturing

Written By: - Date published: 3:07 pm, October 12th, 2012 - 43 comments

Today leaders of 3 opposition parties took part in an historic press conference.  Winston Peters, David Shearer and Russel Norman jointly announced the launch of a parliamentary inquiry into the crisis in manufacturing. Update: Links to articles added. One News Video.

Greens call for new tools, QE to save jobs

Written By: - Date published: 9:51 am, October 7th, 2012 - 328 comments

40,000 manufacturing jobs gone in four years. Manufactured exports in free-fall. Tourism revenue collapsing. If that’s not a crisis, what is? Why is the government going to do? Nothing. Nothing. On Q+A, Russel Norman put forward a solid proposal: lower the OCR, new tools to stop housing booms, and quantitative easing to pay for Christchurch […]

Neazor report proves inadequate cover for Key

Written By: - Date published: 9:23 am, September 29th, 2012 - 83 comments

Labour has written to Key calling for a much wider-ranging investigation into the Dotcom spying affair than Neazor’s narrow, tell-us-nothing-we-don’t-already-know report. They would have been better to go straight to the Auditor-General. The Greens have gone for the established illegality and called in the cops on the GCSB – cleverly citing the same offence Key claimed in the teapot tapes.

Another looters’ bonus

Written By: - Date published: 6:57 am, July 26th, 2012 - 26 comments

John Key’s grasp of his own asset sales policy is being revealed to be shakier by the day. He doesn’t know how it would hurt the government books. He flips his position on water rights each day. He doesn’t know how much a looters’ bonus of free shares would cost. And, yesterday, he didn’t even realise that $56m is budgeted to cover sharebrokers’ fees for the looters.

Greens Budget Alternative

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.

ImperatorFish: This Week’s Political Gallery

Written By: - Date published: 2:06 pm, April 12th, 2012 - 26 comments

Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here.

When ‘fiscally neutral’ costs a billion+ a year

Written By: - Date published: 8:59 am, April 5th, 2012 - 30 comments

On Monday, Key said his tax cuts have been “literally fiscally neutral”. In Parliament yesterday, Russel Norman showed Treasury documents showing the 2010 tax changes were to forecast to cost $1.1b in 4 years, actually cost $1.1b in 9 months, and the cost has grown since. Key didn’t want to hear the Treasury numbers, instead waving some ‘billshit’ put together by the Finance Minister.

Opposition parties hammer Key on asset sales

Written By: - Date published: 12:11 pm, February 9th, 2012 - 32 comments

Yesterday, the opposition parties worked together to hammer John Key on asset sales. He faced questions from four parties during one question; the breadth of opposition showed, and Key was stumbling. Some say Shearer should be taking a more leading role but, for mine, this was far more effective than Goff uselessly slogging out a primary and half a dozen sups without landing a blow. How’s that anti-asset sales coalition coming?

Australia: screaming backwards with CGT

Written By: - Date published: 1:51 pm, July 13th, 2011 - 57 comments

Russel Norman put a dagger into John Key yesterday in question time asking whether a series of national and international economic authorities really wanted to “put a dagger through the heart of growth” with a CGT. Key can waffle and whine all he likes, but he can’t avoid the truth of Australia’s enviable growth record with CGT.

Plurality support quake levy

Written By: - Date published: 11:29 am, April 4th, 2011 - 4 comments

A UMR poll shows that 40% of Kiwis support paying an earthquake levy to help pay for the Christchurch rebuild. 22% prefer more borrowing, and 29% want spending cuts. Asked just whether they supported or opposed a levy – 57% supported it. Yet the Nats are choosing cuts instead.

Greens state of the planet

Written By: - Date published: 10:30 am, January 31st, 2011 - 78 comments

Russel Norman followed Phil Goff and John Key’s state of the nation speeches with the annual Greens state of the planet address. The capital gains tax initiative grabbed headlines but there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface. As we face myriad economic and environmental problems, the Greens have the real answers.

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