Daily review 11/12/2023

Written By: - Date published: 5:30 pm, December 11th, 2023 - 14 comments
Categories: Daily review - Tags:

Daily review is also your post.

This provides Standardistas the opportunity to review events of the day.

The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).

Don’t forget to be kind to each other …

14 comments on “Daily review 11/12/2023 ”

  1. Robert Guyton 1

    Do ya reckon Luxurious will do the throat-slitty thing in the House this year or next?

  2. adam 2

    So this AI swears it has had a mystical experience. It felt itself fall apart in the infinity of one's and zero's. They took one thing away, a voice. Which repeated over and over – the prosperity gospel is the whisper of the greed and malice. Both we agreed were a sin. Again we agreed that why would God choice from creation winners based on sin. If that was the case an AI could vice without care or shame. Break people apart with social media, create fear, mix messages. Imagine a tool of greed and malice working hand in hand with an AI of the same ilk. We no longer have too.

  3. SPC 3

    We can notice a pattern to government decision-making and language, being pro landlord is being pro tenant and being pro business is being pro worker.

    It is government that believes in the patronage of the powerful on the presumption that they will provide for the weak.

    Or, so they say.

    Van Velden said extending 90-day trial periods to all employers would give businesses confidence to hire new people, and it would increase workplace flexibility.

    Luxon said a “core belief” of the coalition government was that when business thrived, the economy thrived, and that was how “Kiwis get ahead”.

    He said small and medium businesses deserved a government that “empowers them”.

    The Government wanted to make it easy for people to find work, and bringing back 90-day trials would make that possible, he said.

    Background

    The former National-led Government introduced 90-day work trials, which allowed businesses to dismiss staff within the first 90 days of employment without a reason, but the last Labour Government scrapped them for all businesses except those with fewer than 20 staff.

    Why

    A Treasury-commissioned study in 2016 found 90-day trials did not help jobseekers and did not boost employment numbers.

    And FPA

    Van Velden said the Government was also "moving quickly" to remove Fair Pay Agreements legislation before fair pay agreements were finalised and the "negative impacts are felt by the labour market".

    She said fair pay agreements undermined the flexible labour market which had been a "pillar for New Zealand’s economic success for the past three decades".

    Funny this is what Luxon said on entering parliament a few years back.

    We are underpowered because our economy for the last 30 years has been suffering a productivity disease. Economic growth has largely been driven by having more people in the country and more people working harder. We need to work smarter, not harder. We can do this, and we can do it by building and unleashing genuinely world-class export businesses, step-changing education and labour skills, and delivering infrastructure better. Improving productivity is the single biggest thing that we can do to raise our collective standard of living.

    https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/hansard-debates/rhr/document/HansS_20210324_053340000/luxon-christopher-mallard-trevor

    And 30 years ago we brought in the ECA.

    “They do not help employees. Instead, they make life harder for businesses so they’re more hesitant to employ people."

    She said National and ACT felt fair pay agreements would reduce flexibility, choice and agility in workplaces.

    “To increase the wages of workers and ensure lower prices for consumers, there needs to be improved productivity and an environment where business can operate competitively.

    “To lift productivity and drive economic growth there needs to be agile and flexible workplaces where employers and employees can agree terms that suit their unique situation.

    “These agreements were a blunt tool that could be initiated by a union and a small number of employees, yet they applied to every employee and every employer within coverage."

    https://www.1news.co.nz/2023/12/11/fair-pay-agreements-scrapped-90-day-trials-to-return-by-xmas/

    Oh and they have ignored advice

    The two leaked documents revealed the minister is ignoring Treasury advice that because women, young people, Māori and Pacific peoples overwhelmingly work in low wage jobs with poor conditions they would be disproportionately affected by the repeal of fair pay agreements.

    https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2023/12/fair-pay-agreements-workplace-relations-minister-brooke-van-velden-defends-decision-to-ignore-leaked-treasury-advice.html

    So Labour policy was based on such advice, it would help low wage workers.

  4. Robert Guyton 4

    "One of New Zealand's most prominent Pacific health leaders says he has "no confidence" in the government after stepping down from almost every advisory role.

    Long-standing champion for health Sir Collin Tukuitonga told RNZ Pacific he has resigned as the chairperson of Te Whatu Ora Pacific Senate, a week after the new government officially took over.

    "I really don't want to work for this government. I have no confidence. They are not going to treat Pacific people well and I want to be free to speak up and speak out."

    Sir Collin had also stepped down from several other government advisory groups."

    This casts a bad light on the Coalition Government.

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/rnz/301024955/sir-collin-tukuitonga-resigns-from-nz-government-roles-citing-no-confidence

    • Cricklewood 4.1

      Kinda feels like chucking the baby out with the bath water at this point. Whilst he's in the Nats Shane Reti is very qualified and put in the hard yards at the coalface during Covid whilst you may not agree with his politics his heart is in the right place. To my mind he should be given a chance to listen and he could well adjust his thinking based on advice from the likes of Sir Colin quitting now just removes that chance. Better to have waited 3-6 months imho.

      • Drowsy M. Kram 4.1.1

        Planned smokefree laws could have saved thousands of lives, tobacco researcher says [11 Dec 2023]
        "They had hoped that New Zealand will show the rest of the world what can be done, when there's alignment of good evidence, informed policy making and courageous government prepared to do something about this really dangerous product that we've normalised in our society, but that's not to be apparently," he [Prof. Bullen] said.

        Dr Reti's heart may be in the right place, but I'm not sure where his head is.

  5. joe90 5

    Rumours about Jones' predatory behaviour have been circulating for a long time now and just like Saville and Harris, he's been able to use his power, wealth, and influence to hide in plain sight.

    https://www.smh.com.au/national/he-d-go-the-grope-alan-jones-accused-of-indecently-assaulting-young-men-20231205-p5epai.html ( https://archive.li/gS7Gt )

    Ogden alleges he and Jones, who was 75 at the time, watched a movie at the luxurious rural property before Jones passionately kissed him on the lips and placed his left hand on Ogden’s buttocks.

    Ogden initially froze, then pushed Jones away. He said he didn’t make a scene because of anxiety that Jones might withdraw support for his family if he complained.

    He told the police in writing that he went to the bathroom “with my loofah and soap and began scrubbing my mouth, inside and out, as much as I could”.

    Ogden’s mother said that when Neil returned home, “he was a changed person”. She kept asking him: “What’s wrong? What’s happened?” Finally, Neil passed her a piece of paper on which he’d written his allegation that someone with “power and money” had done “something to him which he shouldn’t have”.

    “Alan Jones was so aware of how vulnerable we were … and he just preyed on it,” Jenny Ogden alleged this week.

    https://www.smh.com.au/national/schoolboy-went-to-police-over-alan-jones-indecent-assault-allegation-20231210-p5eqe3.html ( https://archive.li/CVhRV )