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Back to work time

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.

Take the damn chocolates AWAY

Written By: - Date published: 2:54 pm, December 26th, 2012 - 24 comments

I’m about to start doing some substantial site changes. So don’t get worried if the site disappears for a few minutes at a time. Most of these changes are targeted at increasing the privacy of both the site and of the people who use it. It is a really good day to do it. Traffic […]

Fabians lecture tonight

Written By: - Date published: 12:32 pm, December 3rd, 2012 - 5 comments

TPP Out of the Shadows – What they won’t tell us and why we should be worried about the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Lori Wallach and Jane Kelsey will deliver presentations and take questions on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) at 6.30pm at the Old Government House Lecture Theatre, University of Auckland.

Drinking Liberally – Hamilton

Written By: - Date published: 10:55 am, October 24th, 2012 - 14 comments

Drinking Liberally

Great to see Drinking Liberally starting up again in New Zealand. And in a new city, Hamilton. There’s nothing to stop people getting Drinking Liberally started up in other cities again. It’s pretty much just a matter of finding a venue, maybe organising a speaker, setting up a Facebook page, and asking your friendly Leftwing hub blog to tell everyone about it.

Fabians: Social Democracy in Aotearoa

Written By: - Date published: 11:26 am, September 27th, 2012 - 10 comments

Next Monday evening in Auckland, Professor Peter Davis will present a seminar asking what does social democracy have to offer in addressing our current discontents (loss of sovereignty, emigration of some of our best and brightest, commodity-dependent standard of living, structural deficit, inability to retain our key assets, solidifying underclass)?

Richard Heinburg Life After Growth Tour

Written By: - Date published: 11:15 am, September 26th, 2012 - 5 comments

Public Lecture on Sunday 30 September, 1pm-3pm, Auckland University Fisher & Paykel Auditorium, Owen G Glenn Building, University of Auckland Business School.

Life outside the blog

Written By: - Date published: 12:53 pm, July 18th, 2012 - 27 comments

Our authors do have to live outside of blogging, and because we’re pretty skilled in our various professions we don’t actually have that much time to blog. Which is why this site runs as a coop with limited recognition of the personalities that are so essential to our operation. But it is nice to point out when others recognize our authors in their professions – and I can have a stir at the same time….

Save TVNZ7 Meeting

Written By: - Date published: 10:20 am, May 11th, 2012 - Comments Off on Save TVNZ7 Meeting

When:  Tuesday 15 May, 7 – 9pm
Where: Freemans Bay Community Centre, 52 Hepburn St, Freemans Bay, Auckland
Come along to this public meeting to show your support for TVNZ7!

400,000 comments (almost)

Written By: - Date published: 12:18 pm, April 19th, 2012 - 53 comments

By one standard we have now passed 400 thousand comments. But I’m not a bullshitter with numbers like Bill English or Whaleoil. By my standards, we haven’t quite hit it yet. We will in a couple of weeks. I’m starting to get a bit worried about how we’re going to handle the rapidly increasing rate that people are arguing with each other here…

Updates, upgrades, and polls

Written By: - Date published: 9:28 pm, April 5th, 2012 - 111 comments

A bit of maintenance work coming up over Easter, and a Morgan poll that covered last week. National show the effects of their mutual collective suicide attempts, and the Greens pick up the benefits. Labour are doing sweet bugger all. Starting to wonder if Labour MP’s are catching the dogpack socializing disease from National. I have an impress ion of mutual arse sniffing and bugger all work. I’m unimpressed with the dog imitations from either party.

Site health – comments and posts

Written By: - Date published: 4:31 pm, February 12th, 2012 - 36 comments

vto made a comment that he thought that the number of comments was diminishing at kiwiblog. Now I have no idea because I usually avoid the sewer section there. However it did remind me that I should have a look here. It feels like it has been getting more popular, but intuition is a poor substitute for actually looking at the numbers.

“Blog king” no more

Written By: - Date published: 9:38 am, December 2nd, 2011 - 80 comments

Well we have just moved out of the election month, and we’re now getting the gradual fall back of readership and posts. About the only growth around NZ at present is in political blogging.

I’m happy to say that we now appear to consistently be either level pegging with Kiwiblog or exceeding their totals for a number of months. Since we have been ‘advised’ many times that this would never happen, I’m finding that it is rather more satisfying than I expected.

Time – last chance for comments

Written By: - Date published: 11:45 pm, November 25th, 2011 - 5 comments

We’re not posting posts and not allowing comments from 2359 tonight to 1900 tomorrow after the polls close.

Thanks everyone….

Past 8000 posts

Written By: - Date published: 1:11 pm, July 4th, 2011 - 27 comments

Well, our hard working authors have pumped more than 8000 posts into The Standard since August 2007. A thousand of those have been done in the last 150 days (we passed it on Saturday) since Feb 2nd. This is a pretty awesome performance considering that the prolific Marty G put down his overworked fingers on […]

Why you’re getting auto-moderated

Written By: - Date published: 12:49 pm, June 13th, 2011 - 20 comments

There has been a repeated question over the last few days coming up in comments about auto-moderation. Well there is a battle against spam comments raging on the net. You’re getting caught as collateral damage.

An open letter to all unionists & fighters for equality & social justice in Aotearoa

Written By: - Date published: 12:29 pm, April 29th, 2011 - 216 comments

Via Socialist Aotearoa, an open letter from union activist Mike Treen on Hone Harawira’s Mana Party, which is due to be launched this Saturday in Auckland. The outline of Mana’s manifesto presented in the letter suggests it will be economically bold and not exclusively Maori nationalist. It should be very popular.

In theory it should be seamless…

Written By: - Date published: 8:15 pm, April 25th, 2011 - 17 comments

Shifting the site to a GeoDNS with fallback capabilities this evening*. This involves changing the domain name server addresses again. Now like last time this is meant to be a seamless shift. However that may or may not be the case. Last time there were some quite ISP’s with interesting ways of interpreting what a […]

Upgrading (yet again)

Written By: - Date published: 12:05 pm, April 17th, 2011 - 8 comments

There will be a number of (hopefully) small disruptions over the next few days to upgrade the site servers. The sunday upgrades are underway. Hopefully there will not be too much of a disruption.

Wgtn fundraiser for Chch

Written By: - Date published: 11:53 am, April 7th, 2011 - 3 comments

In many parts of Christchurch, aid and communication from Government and large NGOs was virtually non-existent for some time after the quake, and it was left up to pre-existing organisations, neighbours, families and friendship networks to ensure that people were able to access the resources and information they needed.

Routing issues

Written By: - Date published: 11:08 am, April 1st, 2011 - 9 comments

We have had some routing problems this morning with several networks used by our provider in San Diego. The problem have been ongoing with the network links appearing and disappearing from the perspective of NZ and aussie (there is less of a issue from overseas networks). They’re working on it. It started just before 7am […]

Quarter of a million comments soon

Written By: - Date published: 10:04 am, March 1st, 2011 - 50 comments

As of Tuesday morning, we have had about 249,250 comments since The Standard launched three and a half years ago. We’re averaging a 317 comments a day since New Year’s. Although politics has rightly cooled in the past week due to the quake, the quarter of a million mark should still be reached on Thursday. Who will be the lucky commenter?

Protest @ WINZ today!

Written By: - Date published: 10:19 am, February 22nd, 2011 - 89 comments

Aucklanders – the fight back against the worst recommendations in the Rebstock report starts now. Join us – Auckland Against Poverty – in a picket, 2pm today outside Work & Income, Sel Peacock Dr, Henderson.

Dealing with the DIA website-harvest parasite

Written By: - Date published: 2:27 am, February 3rd, 2011 - 13 comments

Periodically I run a scan to identify network parasites that are sucking up our bandwidth and processing resources in excess. Of course I leave the benign parasites that provide search facilities alone. But I stomp on the nasties.

Tonight the biggest parasite appears to have been a New Zealand government department – the Department of Internal Affairs.

Past 7000 posts.

Written By: - Date published: 1:34 pm, February 2nd, 2011 - 12 comments

Darn, we sneaked past the 7000th post without my noticing at the end of last month. We passed 6000 posts on August 25th last year, so we did that last thousand posts in 160 days. The comment growth is pretty strong as well.

The site is also now iPad friendly. Have a peek at the screenshots.

Trivia: PM’s tiara rivals milk bottle

Written By: - Date published: 10:04 am, November 7th, 2010 - 8 comments

With all the crap this government’s spewing out at the moment, sometimes it pays to take a breath and look at something a bit lighter. Lynn posted a while ago about some of the oddities of the internet, noting how “milk bottle” was one of the most frequent search terms used by visitors to this […]

200,000 comments

Written By: - Date published: 1:06 pm, September 26th, 2010 - 11 comments

We like to make a big deal over the comments because it is you coming on here, contributing your thoughts and ideas, that make The Standard what it is. Without all of you, it would just be a dozen or so people arguing with themselves/ If we wanted that we could just hang out with the Libertarianz. So, who was comment 200,000? Well…

What are you using?

Written By: - Date published: 3:26 pm, September 19th, 2010 - 36 comments

Periodically I have a look at the stats captured for the site. This time I thought I’d show you some of them for the last three months. I’ve picked out what browser and operating systems people have been using.

Multi-site

Written By: - Date published: 10:41 am, August 29th, 2010 - 11 comments

The site has now been reconfigured to be a multi-site system. This will allow us to start setting up child sites for more specialized topics in the future. It should allow us to keep expanding our range of posts with the ever increasing number of authors.

Fabian Lecture: Monday

Written By: - Date published: 2:13 pm, August 27th, 2010 - 3 comments

What Will Fix Child Poverty? The Fabian Society’s next lecture is on Monday in Auckland.  Susan St John on behalf of the Child Poverty Action Group, and Sue Bradford of the Alternative Welfare Working Group will look at one of the most important symptoms of New Zealand’s slide towards becoming a low-wage economy and unequal […]

6000 published posts and climbing fast

Written By: - Date published: 7:52 am, August 27th, 2010 - 12 comments

There have been 6000 published* posts, 192 thousand comments, and many millions of page views. I’d guess that this multiple-author blog has a wee bit of an audience.

And the server has been stable….

The Standard turned three

Written By: - Date published: 9:57 pm, August 17th, 2010 - 49 comments

We managed to miss The Standard’s third birthday a few days ago despite some earlier avowed intentions to make a fuss over it. The site started on August 15th 2007 and has grown into a massive community project of the left since then. Long may it continue….

Recent Comments

Recent Posts

  • Fact Brief – Did global warming stop in 1998?
    Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park in collaboration with members from our Skeptical Science team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Did global warming stop in ...
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  • Arguing over a moot point.
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  • No Longer Trusted: Ageing Boomers, Laurie & Les, Talk Politics.
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  • Mortgage rates at 10% anyone?
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  • Sad tales from the left
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  • In Whose Best Interests?
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  • Don’t Question, Don’t Complain.
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  • Small accomplishments and large ironies
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  • The Song of Saqua: Volume VII
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  • Accelerating the Growth Rate?
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  • The only thing we have to fear is tenants themselves
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  • Peters talks of NZ “renewing its connections with the world” – but who knew we had been discon...
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  • Muldoonism, solar farms, and legitimacy
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    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
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  • NZTA does not know how much it spends on cones
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    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
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  • If this is Back on Track – let's not.
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  • Welfare: Just two timid targets from the National government
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  • The Hoon around the week to April 12
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  • A Dead Internet?
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  • Weekly Roundup 12-April-2024
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  • Weekly Roundup 12-April-2024
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  • Antarctic heat spike shocks climate scientists
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  • Skeptical Science New Research for Week #15 2024
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  • Everything will be just fine
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  • Farmers and landlords are given news intended to lift their confidence – but the media must muse o...
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  • National’s war on renters
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    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
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  • Drawn
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    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
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  • At last some science
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    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • Something important: the curious death of the School Strike 4 Climate Movement
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    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • The day the TV media died…
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    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • What's the point in Melissa Lee?
    While making coffee this morning I listened to Paddy Gower from Newshub being interviewed on RNZ. It was painful listening. His hurt and love for that organisation, its closure confirmed yesterday, quite evident.As we do when something really matters, he hasn’t giving up hope. Paddy talked about the taonga that ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 weeks ago

  • Bernard's Top 10 'pick 'n' mix' at 10:10 am on Thursday, April 11
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    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • Gordon Campbell On Winston Peters’ Pathetic Speech At The UN
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    2 weeks ago

  • Subsidising illegal parking
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    Greater AucklandBy Matt L
    2 weeks ago

  • When 'going for growth' actually means saying no to new social homes
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    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • https://www.politik.co.nz/?p=12733
    As the public sector redundancies rolled on, with the Department of Conservation saying yesterday it was cutting 130 positions, a Select Committee got an insight into the complexities and challenges of cutting the Government’s workforce. Immigration New Zealand chiefs along with their Minister, Erica Stanford, appeared before Parliament’s Education and ...
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    2 weeks ago

  • Bernard's six-stack of substacks at 6:06 pm on Wednesday, April 10
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    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • EGU2024 – Picking and chosing sessions to attend virtually
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    Skeptical Science
    2 weeks ago

  • But here's my point about the large irony in what Luxon is saying
    Grim old week in the media business, eh? And it’s only Wednesday, to rework an old upbeat line of poor old Neil Roberts.One of the larger dark ironies of it all has been the line the Prime Minister is serving up to anyone asking him about the sorry state of ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 weeks ago

  • Govt gives farmers something to talk about (regarding environmental issues) at those woolshed meetin...
    Buzz from the Beehive Hard on the heels of three rurally oriented ministers launching the first of their woolshed meetings, the government brought good news to farmers on the environmental front. First, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced an additional $18 million is being committed to reduce agricultural emissions. Not all ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    2 weeks ago

  • Climate change violates human rights
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    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    2 weeks ago

  • Which govt departments have grown the most?
    David Farrar writes –  There has been a 34% increase over six years in the size of the public service, in terms of EFTS. But not all agencies have grown by the same proportion. Here are the 10 with the largest relative increases between 2017 and ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • What’s to blame for the public’s plummeting trust in the media?
    Bryce Edwards writes  –  The media is in crisis, as New Zealand audiences flee from traditional sources of news and information. The latest survey results on the public’s attitude to the media shows plummeting trust. And New Zealand now leads the world in terms of those who want ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • Something Important: The Curious Death of the School Strike 4 Climate Movement.
    The Hope That Failed: The Christchurch Mosque Massacres, Covid-19, deep political disillusionment, and the jealous cruelty of the intersectionists: all had a part to play in causing School Strike 4 Climate’s bright bubble of hope and passion to burst. But, while it floated above us, it was something that mattered. Something ...
    Bowalley Road
    2 weeks ago

  • Cow Farts and Cancer Sticks.
    What do you do if you’re a new government minister and the science is in. All of the evidence and facts are clear, but they’re not to your liking? They’re inconsistent with your policy positions and/or your spending priorities.Well, first off you could just stand back and watch as the ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 weeks ago

  • Member’s Day
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    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    2 weeks ago

  • Bernard's Top 10 'pick 'n' mix' at 10:10 am on Wednesday, April 10
    Luxon in 2021 as a new MP, before his rise to PM and subsequent plummeting popularity. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Here’s the 10 things that stood out for me from me reading over the last day, as at 10:10 am on Wednesday, April 10:Must read: Tova O’Brien describes ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • What’s happening with Airport to Botany
    One of the few public transport projects the current government have said they support is the Airport to Botany project (A2B) and it’s one we haven’t covered in a while so worth looking at where things are at. A business case for the project was completed in 2021 before being ...
    Greater AucklandBy Matt L
    2 weeks ago

  • Bishop more popular than Luxon in Curia poll
    Count the Chrises: Chris Bishop (2nd from right) is moving up in the popularity polls. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These six things stood out to me over the last day in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy, as of 7:06 am on Wednesday, April 10:The National/ACT/NZ First coalition Government’s opinion poll ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • Silmarillion Fan Poetry: A Collection (2022-2024)
    It’s been some time since I properly exercised my poetic muscles. Prose-writing has been where it’s at for me, these past few years. Well, to get back into practice, I thought I’d write the occasional bit of jocular fan poetry, based off Tolkien’s Silmarillion… with this post being a collection ...
    A Phuulish FellowBy strda221
    2 weeks ago

  • At a glance – The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is not causing global warming
    On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
    Skeptical Science
    2 weeks ago

  • Bryce Edwards: What’s to blame for the public’s plummeting trust in the media?
    The media is in crisis, as New Zealand audiences flee from traditional sources of news and information. The latest survey results on the public’s attitude to the media shows plummeting trust. And New Zealand now leads the world in terms of those who want to “avoid the news”. But who ...
    Democracy ProjectBy bryce.edwards
    2 weeks ago

  • Dead on target
    My targets for today are: 1 newsletter sent out by 4.30pm 800 words of copy delivered to a client by COB, as we say in the world of BAU1 dinner served by sunset GST returnSo far so good. Longer-term targets are: Get some website copy finished before I get on a plane on Saturday ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 weeks ago

  • The PM sets nine policy targets- and in case you missed the truancy one, Seymour has provided some...
    Buzz from the Beehive Targets and travel were a theme in the latest flow of ministerial announcements. The PM announced a raft of targets (“nine ambitious Government Targets to help improve the lives of New Zealanders”) along with plans to head for Singapore, Thailand, and Philippines. His Deputy and Foreign ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    2 weeks ago

  • Climate Change: Unwelcome advice
    Yesterday He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission released two key pieces of advice, on the 2036-40 emissions budget and the 2050 target. Both are statutorily required as part of the Zero Carbon Act budgeting / planning process, and both have a round of public consultation before being finalised and ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    2 weeks ago

  • In a structural deficit, the only real tax cut is a spending cut
    Eric Crampton writes –  This week’s column in the Stuff papers. A snippet: Tabarrok warned that America had two political parties – “the Tax and Spenders and the No-Tax and Spenders” – and neither was fiscally conservative. In the two decades after Tabarrok’s warning, the federal government ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • A Return to Kindness?
    New Zealanders are a pretty fair minded bunch. By and large we like to give people a go.Ian Foster, for example, had a terrible record as a head rugby coach. Like not even good, and did we let that bother us? Yeah, but also Nah. Because we went ahead and ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 weeks ago

  • Aukus or not, New Zealand’s foreign policy is being remade
    Geoffrey Miller writes –  This could be a watershed week for New Zealand’s international relations. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, is heading to Washington DC for a full week of meetings. The surprisingly lengthy trip just happens to coincide with a major trilateral summit of leaders from the United States, ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • Back to the future, with a 2032 deadline
    Aiming to look visionary and focused, Luxon has announced nine targets to improve measures for education, health, crime and climate emissions - but the reality is only one target is well above pre-Covid levels. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The six news items of note for me in Aotearoa-NZ’s ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • Why Rod Carr is optimistic farmers can beat climate change
    The future of farming went on the line yesterday when the Climate Change Commission presented its first review of New Zealand’s target of net zero emissions by 2050. The Commission said New Zealand’s target was unlikely to be consistent with the 2015 Paris Agreement goal of holding temperature rise to ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    2 weeks ago

  • Grifters, Bigots & Booling With the Dawgs
    Hi,I hope you had a good weekend. I was mostly in bed with the worst flu of my life.Today I’m emerging on the other side — and looking forward to what I can catch of the total solar eclipse rippling across parts of America today.Whilst hacking through a cough, I’ve ...
    David FarrierBy David Farrier
    2 weeks ago

  • Goldsmith spots a cost-saver in his Justice domain – let’s further erode our right (under Magna ...
    Bob Edlin writes – Chapter 39 of the Magna Carta (from memory) includes the guarantee that no free man may suffer punishment without “the lawful judgment of his peers.” This was a measure which the barons forced on England’s King John to delegate part of his judicial authority ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    2 weeks ago

  • Climate Adam: Is Global Warming Speeding Up?
    This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). Thanks to climate change, 2023 has shattered heat records, and 2024 is continuing where last year left off. With this devastating ...
    Skeptical Science
    2 weeks ago

  • Brooke is on the TV, being a Minister!
    Brooke is on the TV, being a Minister! She is going to talk to Jack on the TV!It's hard to watch Jack on the TV without thinking to yourself:How can anyone be that good-looking,and also be even brainier than they are good-looking?Talk about lucky!But also, Jack works for the TV news. So ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 weeks ago

  • There’s gold – or rather, energy without carbon – in that rock, but Jones reminds us of the Tr...
    Buzz from the Beehive Oh, dear.  One News tells us an ownership spat is brewing between Māori and the Crown as New Zealand uses more renewable energy sources. No, not water or the shoreline.  Ownership of another resource has come into the reckoning. The One News report explained that 99% of ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    2 weeks ago

  • Climate Change: Bad faith from National
    One of the weird features of the Zero Carbon Act was its split-gas targets, which separated methane, produced overwhelmingly by farmers, from carbon dioxide produced by the rest of us. This lower target for methane was another effective subsidy to the dairy industry, and was the result of a compromise ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    2 weeks ago

  • Gordon Campbell on Israel’s murderous use of AI in Gaza
    This may seem like a dumb question– but how come Israel has managed to kill at least 33,000 Palestinian civilians in Gaza, including over 13,000 children? Of course, saturation aerial bombing and artillery shelling of densely populated civilian neighbourhoods will do that. So will the targeting of children by IDF ...
    Gordon CampbellBy ScoopEditor
    2 weeks ago

  • Total Eclipse of the Mind.
    All that you touch And all that you seeAll that you taste All you feelAnd all that you love And all that you hateAll you distrust All you saveEarly tomorrow morning as the sun is rising in Aotearoa many people across North America, from Mexico to Canada, will be losing ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 weeks ago

  • So why do that degree… here?
    A report – and discussion – from the university front line… Mike Grimshaw writes – I have been involved in numerous curriculum and degree reviews over the decades and in all of them the question always skirted around is: “If you had to leave now with ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    2 weeks ago

  • The hunt is on for an asterix for farm emissions
    The Government is setting up its own experts group to review the goalposts for farmers to reduce methane emissions. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The six news items of note for me in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy as of 9:06 am on Monday, April 8 are:The Government is setting up ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • Geoffrey Miller: Aukus or not, New Zealand’s foreign policy is being remade
    This could be a watershed week for New Zealand’s international relations. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, is heading to Washington DC for a full week of meetings. The surprisingly lengthy trip just happens to coincide with a major trilateral summit of leaders from the United States, Japan and the Philippines. ...
    Democracy ProjectBy Geoffrey Miller
    2 weeks ago

  • The Kaka’s diary for the week to April 15 and beyond
    TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 15 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. The Climate Commission will publish advice to the Government this evening.Parliament is sitting from Question Time at 2pm ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 weeks ago

  • 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #14
    A listing of 34 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 31, 2024 thru Sat, April 6, 2024. Story of the week Proxy measurement via Facebook "engagement" suggests a widely welcoming audience for Prof. Andrew Dessler's The Climate ...
    Skeptical Science
    2 weeks ago

  • Their Money or Your Life.
    Brooke van Velden appeared this morning on Q&A, presumably paying homage to Margaret Thatcher. The robotic one had come in an 80s pink, shoulder-padded jacket, much favoured by the likes of Thatcher or Hosking. She also brought the spirit of Margaret, seemingly occupying her previously vacant soul compartment.Jack asked for ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 weeks ago

  • Truth pulls its boots on
    It's a lot easier to pull off a lie if people don't know much about what you're lying about.Sometimes, watching Christopher Luxon, you get the impression he doesn't know all that much about it, either.​​ That's the charitable interpretation. The other is that he knows full well.He was on the ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 weeks ago

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  • First New Zealand C-130J Hercules takes flight
    The first New Zealand C-130J Hercules to come off the production line in the United States has successfully completed its first test flights, Defence Minister Judith Collins announced today. “These successful flights are a significant milestone for the New Zealand Defence Force, bringing this once-in-a-generation renewal of a critical airlift ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • Government to rephase NCEA Change Programme
      The coalition Government is making significant changes to the NCEA Change Programme, delaying the implementation by two years, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “Ensuring New Zealand’s curriculum is world leading is a vital part of the Government’s plan to deliver better public services and ensure all students ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • New Ngāpuhi investment fund Chair appointed
    Ben Dalton has been appointed the new board Chair of Tupu Tonu, the Ngāpuhi Investment Fund, says Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith and Associate Finance Minister Shane Jones. “Ben brings a wealth of experience in governance and economic development to the position. He will have a strong focus on ensuring ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • Education should be prioritised ahead of protesting
    Students should be in school and learning instead of protesting during school hours, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. “If students feel strongly about sending a message, they could have marched on Tuesday when there was a nationwide teacher only day, or during the upcoming school holidays. It has become ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • Delivering on Local Water Done Well
    Cabinet has agreed on key steps to implement Local Water Done Well, the Coalition Government’s plan for financially sustainable locally delivered water infrastructure and services, Local Government Minister Simeon Brown says.  "Councils and voters resoundingly rejected Labour’s expensive and bureaucratic Three Waters regime, and earlier this year the Coalition Government ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • Peters to visit New York, Washington D.C.
    Foreign Minister Winston Peters will engage with high-level United States Government and United Nations officials in the United States next week (6-12 April).    The visit, with programmes in New York and Washington D.C., will focus on major global and regional security challenges and includes meetings with US Secretary of ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • Security cooperation in challenging world
    New Zealand is committed to working more closely with NATO partners to support collective security in a worsening strategic environment, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says.    “The Coalition Government has made clear the strong emphasis it places on cooperation with New Zealand’s traditional partners, and NATO is a big part ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

  • Construction starts on Queenstown roading upgrades
    Transport Minister Simeon Brown has kicked off construction on $250 million upgrades to State Highway 6/6A (SH6/6A) in Queenstown that will boost economic growth, reduce congestion, and create a safer and more reliable transport network. “With more than 40,000 vehicles passing through each day at peak times, the current SH6/6A Frankton ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 weeks ago

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