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Government’s cruelty on Christchurch’s mental health

Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, July 5th, 2017 - 16 comments

Christchurch’s mental health services are overwhelmed and verging on collapse. Canterbury has the most suicides in NZ. And yet the government has just declined a request for further funding. National – delivering misery for Canterbury.

Same Old, Same Old.

Written By: - Date published: 1:03 pm, July 2nd, 2017 - 148 comments

This time last year, there was a smattering of posts put up about average global ocean and land surface temperatures. They didn’t make for comfortable reading.

About that pay equity deal

Written By: - Date published: 10:26 am, July 1st, 2017 - 15 comments

More excellent reporting from Newsroom: “Long overdue pay rate increases affecting 55,000 New Zealand care and support workers kick in on July 1. But the Government’s failure to fully fund the changes is threatening to derail service providers”

The view from Southland

Written By: - Date published: 9:23 am, June 29th, 2017 - 41 comments

A Southland Times editorial has a pretty blunt assessment of the PM: English wasn’t there for us. “In what he has done and in what he has failed to do, English has himself become a party to the deception of the public.”

National’s conference – no policy – drowns in Billshit

Written By: - Date published: 12:47 am, June 26th, 2017 - 21 comments

National’s conference was supposed to be a tour de force, setting them up for the home stretch to the election. Instead it was empty of policy or vision, and coverage was drowned in a rising tide of Billshit.

Bill English is a liar not a leader

Written By: - Date published: 7:38 am, June 21st, 2017 - 160 comments

Bill English lied and he tried to coverup what may well be a crime. He has blown his brand big-time.

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

Written By: - 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.

The Nation on housing

Written By: - 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.

Health budget stuff up – incompetent

Written By: - 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: - 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: - 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.

Arise Sir John

Written By: - Date published: 7:24 am, June 5th, 2017 - 261 comments

John Key has been awarded a knighthood. Want to know why?

Once upon a time

Written By: - Date published: 7:44 am, June 4th, 2017 - 44 comments

Once upon a time this country stood up to American and said no to nuclear weapons. Now we dare not say yes to saving the planet.

Postcards from the brighter future

Written By: - Date published: 10:58 am, June 1st, 2017 - 3 comments

Part of an occasional series. It all seems to be going according to plan.

National promise to “monitor the rental market” – so where do tenants send reports of rent gouging?

Written By: - Date published: 7:21 am, May 30th, 2017 - 35 comments

In the wake of the accommodation supplement fiasco Joyce has promised that the government will monitor the rental market.
Questions that the media may wish to ask Mr J – Where do tenants send reports of rent gouging? – Exactly what action will the government take when they receive these reports?

Family package that punishes families

Written By: - Date published: 7:42 am, May 29th, 2017 - 6 comments

Apparently the Nats can’t even run a lolly scramble.

NRT: A constitutional change

Written By: - Date published: 3:01 pm, May 26th, 2017 - 8 comments

I/S at No Right Turn writes: “The Court has ruled that the High Court was right to declare that National’s 2010 prisoner voting restrictions (the ones which were so shabby and shoddily passed that they brought Parliament into disrepute) were inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act

$14 billion to meet Paris Agreement targets

Written By: - Date published: 7:01 am, May 23rd, 2017 - 16 comments

Why isn’t National taking active steps to curb our emissions? We committed to reduce to 30 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030, instead we are expected to increase. This is a massive failure of vision, commitment, and competence.

Pre budget positioning for a government that says it is “doing all it can”

Written By: - Date published: 1:37 pm, May 22nd, 2017 - 10 comments

National does the bare minimum that it thinks it can get away with for those in need. This positioning is just preparing the ground for a budget that does more the same not enough.

Armstrong demolishes Nats on housing

Written By: - Date published: 10:13 am, May 18th, 2017 - 28 comments

John Armstrong is not impressed: Government’s handling of housing crisis lurches from chaotic to shambolic

The other conference

Written By: - Date published: 7:05 am, May 18th, 2017 - 26 comments

Richard Harman on the Politik blog: “Overall, to use a favourite Government saying, it was an ‘untidy’ weekend capped by a flat speech from English which saw delegates ignore placards they’d been given to wave when he finished speaking.” The B-team is missing John Key.

There is no housing problem!

Written By: - Date published: 10:25 am, May 11th, 2017 - 19 comments

But only in Nick Smith’s head. See the finally released government Housing Affordability Measure (HAM).

Seymour on Nat properties and policy

Written By: - Date published: 10:07 am, May 10th, 2017 - 28 comments

The right in court

Written By: - Date published: 9:16 am, May 10th, 2017 - 44 comments

The political right wing has been kicking itself in the head all over the courts recently. For those of you keeping score at home we have…

Fuck the homeless

Written By: - Date published: 7:11 am, May 6th, 2017 - 187 comments

Those compassionate conservatives of the National Party have a message for the increasing number of homeless who occupy our Brighter Future.

Brownlee as Foreign Minister as successful as you’d expect

Written By: - Date published: 12:16 pm, May 5th, 2017 - 77 comments

Brownlee’s run as Foreign Minister is already a mess. Such is the depth of National’s talent pool.

Bill English doesn’t get it – literally doesn’t get it – how messed up the “Brighter Future” is

Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, May 4th, 2017 - 55 comments

“There are approximately 92,700 Kiwis aged between 15 and 24 who aren’t working, in education or training. That’s up 19 percent during National’s time in power, and Prime Minister Bill English admits he’s not sure why.” Could it be because…

A legacy of poisoned water

Written By: - Date published: 7:01 am, April 28th, 2017 - 66 comments

We won’t be able to say that we didn’t have ample warning, with a another detailed and damning report on water quality out yesterday. Does National really want to be remembered for allowing the poisoning of our water?

Nick knifed

Written By: - Date published: 9:51 am, April 26th, 2017 - 15 comments

Parata fleeing education mess

Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, April 24th, 2017 - 37 comments

Parata can believe whatever brings her comfort of course, but the fact is that this National government has made, as usual, a mess of education.

Housing affordability data suppressed?

Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, April 22nd, 2017 - 83 comments

Bill English would have you believe that there is no housing crisis. He desperately needs you to believe it until after the next election. Is Nick Smith deliberately suppressing housing data?

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