Dom protecting its favoured mayoral candidate

Written By: - Date published: 7:27 am, September 19th, 2013 - 58 comments
Categories: Media - Tags:

Did you know that Wellington mayoral candidate John Morrison told an audience at an arts awards ceremony that he would see a body-painted model in the shower later? Did you know he’s engaged in voter suppression of young voters? Did you know at a recent debate he told Celia Wade-Brown to be quiet, saying ‘the men are talking’? If you do, it’s not from reading the Dompost.

The Dom has decided that Morrison is going to win the mayoral election and they’re going to warp the coverage any way they need to to make it happen.

They barely mentioned it when Morrison was caught plagiarising speeches.

They credited him with getting a call centre moved from Australia to Wellington, when he didn’t.

They didn’t mention it when Morrison got voting points at the university banned – a classic voter suppression tactic.

And they didn’t bother to publish Morrison’s gross comments about the body-painted model. Why, because he denied making them to the Dom reporter (having already admitted making them to the Herald)… Remember that guys, if you’re ever in trouble for saying something, just tell the Dom you didn’t say it and they won’t cover the story! Well, they probably will, because that exemption only applies to favoured mayoral candidates.

As Michael Joseph Savage once mockingly said of the Dominion – ‘that’s the voice of democracy!’

58 comments on “Dom protecting its favoured mayoral candidate ”

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  1. infused 1
    19 September 2013 at 8:02 am

    I don’t care who gets in. She is useless.

    • Rich 1.1
      19 September 2013 at 12:57 pm

      He’d be worse – I’m putting him last and Wade-Brown above him, but not first.

      When will we get a decent mayoral candidate – maybe Grant Robertson will run.

      Or a future government will abolish the stupid mayoral beauty contests and have councillors elect a mayor with majority support – same system as used nationally.

      • Enough is Enough 1.1.1
        19 September 2013 at 1:48 pm

        Do we need a Mayor at all?

        Maybe a chair to run meetings but why is there any need for a Mayor?

  2. bad12 2
    19 September 2013 at 8:19 am

    Yes, i too am not the happiest with Wade-Brown’s performance as Mayor, one point of major concern is Her presiding while yet another over-seas manager of the council is employed,

    My second point is Celia also presiding over a Council that further gutted the council workforce by outsourcing more of it’s work,

    Having said all that i, along with plenty more will be voting for Wade-Brown and also attempting to gain a larger Green voice in council with our selections…

    • ghostwhowalksnz 2.1
      19 September 2013 at 10:11 am

      A Mayor only has the same vote as a Councillor in making decisions. Shes not a dictator

      • bad12 2.1.1
        19 September 2013 at 10:33 am

        Gosh thanks for informing me, reading the third little paragraph of my comment above would tend to suggest what…

  3. Outofbed 3
    19 September 2013 at 8:27 am

    whilst Celia hasn’t been a stellar performer
    Do we really want a misogynist as mayor?

    • Frank Macskasy 3.1
      19 September 2013 at 9:47 pm

      I wonder how Morrison would feel if someone said that about his wife or daughter?

      If Wellingtonians vote for this misogynistic dinosaur, they can have Michael Laws as a “package deal”.

  4. Rosie 4
    19 September 2013 at 9:17 am

    Thanks for highlighting Morrison’s bad behaviour. What an arse. I know little about him, except that he gives off a whiff of superiority and authoritarianism. What words I have heard, I felt at the time, belonged to another era. Thanks for confirming it.

    Has anyone noticed the weekly anti council rant in the editorial of the mini me fairfax paper, The Wellingtonian? It is relentless. The editor, Joseph Romanos doesn’t even pretend to be ‘balanced’. When we finally got rid of Prendergast he was heart broken and mourned for months but since then has put his energies into bad mouthing Wade Brown. Fairfax, like their promotion of the Nat govt, promote a right wing business as usual agenda at a local level too, it would seem

    Like bad, I am not too pleased with Celia’s appointment of Ken Lavery (I guess thats who you mean by over seas manager bad?) and was disappointed by the moves to outsource more of its work. Also displeased with the alternate giving campaign. So many kinds of wrong there.
    Oddly at the same time at the same they are introducing a living wage to council staff. A bit of inconsistency there? However I think Celia is good in the area of Green policy. Her talks at events I been to have been full of substance, intent, and good knowledge of the subject. This is my reason for voting for her.

    • bad12 4.1
      19 September 2013 at 9:49 am

      Yes Rosie, Him the one, since when have we not had the skill to run our own cities, our own country,

      While happy to point out the negatives i have seen from Celia’s leadership of Wellington City Council i will be voting for Her again as Mayor and hopefully my vote will also help install other Greens into the make-up of the next Council…

    • JT 4.2
      20 September 2013 at 8:42 am

      He didn’t say “quiet men are talking” – He said ‘pipe down’ which does not infer gender superiority and he was not the only one getting talked over.

      I imagine the Dominion Post didn’t cover the story until they had a quote from the two main leads John and Louise. They have since published a story having maintained quotes from both. That is journalism, not a report from someone in the crowd with a political agenda.

      Also Youth Voters are not suppressed, there is a post box at the university and one on Salamaca Road – if they are suppressed then so is the rest of Wellington.

      Go to journalism school and learn to get your facts correct before you start criticising other journalists.

  5. TheContrarian 5
    19 September 2013 at 9:35 am

    “Did you know at a recent debate he told Celia Wade-Brown to be quiet, saying ‘the men are talking’?”

    Which debate was this? I was at the one last week Thursday and I didn’t hear that.

  6. TheContrarian 6
    19 September 2013 at 9:42 am

    Not too mention the Dompost actually called Wade-Brown the debate winner:
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/9159687/Rhetoric-barbs-and-a-few-boos

    • TheContrarian 6.1
      19 September 2013 at 9:50 am

      “And they didn’t bother to publish Morrison’s gross comments about the body-painted model.”

      Ah yeah they did.

      http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/9174683/Morrison-apologises-for-shower-quip

      • richard 6.1.1
        19 September 2013 at 10:30 am

        I looked for an article about it on stuff after seeing the item on the herald’s homepage. Couldn’t find anything.

        Now there is an article but … I could only find the article from a search. It certainly isn’t linked from the dom’s news page – http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/politics/ or http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/politics/

        • TheContrarian 6.1.1.1
          19 September 2013 at 11:13 am

          It was headlined:
          http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/more_headlines

          Back a couple days. DomPost did publish it and headlined it. That is where I saw it a couple days ago.

          • Intrinsicvalue 6.1.1.1.1
            19 September 2013 at 11:30 am

            More sloppy work from the standard.

            [lprent: Banned one week to give you an opportunity to rectify your obvious deficiencies in reading our policy. The Standard is a program. It doesn’t think. Address your remarks to a person. ]

            • Ramsay 6.1.1.1.1.1
              19 September 2013 at 1:25 pm

              Hey – does the Dominion Post think? Fair is fair, seems to me. Don’t count me down as a fan of either Morrison or the Com-Post but it does seem the latter has been wrongly accused of not covering a story it did – and with no correction in sight.

              • Hayden …
                19 September 2013 at 2:05 pm

                It covered his apology, but not the incident itself, if I remember correctly.

                • Populuxe1 …
                  19 September 2013 at 2:19 pm

                  Well which is more likely to have a press release? The event is still a matter of public record.

                  • felix …
                    19 September 2013 at 2:26 pm

                    Eh? You mean they just print whatever Morrisson issues a press release on?

                    • Ramsay …
                      19 September 2013 at 4:23 pm

                      “The Dominion Post understands Mr Morrison made a comment in his speech in which he thanked the models and said he would be meeting up with one of them in the showers after the show.

                      Ms Cormack, a programme manager for Plunket, was reportedly upset by the remark.”

                      Isn’t that covering the incident? It’s not like they reported “Cr Morrison apologised for an unspecified comment the details of which we have chosen not to divulge.”

                      You don’t have to like Morrison to want a “higher standard” of commentary than this.

                    • Hayden …
                      19 September 2013 at 4:41 pm

                      I meant at the time, i.e., they didn’t report it until after the apology had been given whereas other outlets did; then, when they did report it, it was framed in a more positive light, leading with the words “Morrison apologises”.

                    • Colonial Viper …
                      19 September 2013 at 5:18 pm

                      Correct. There’s no journalism there, no attempt to speak to the people involved, no attempt to ascertain what might have actually happened. Just BS.

                    • felix …
                      19 September 2013 at 6:40 pm

                      Hi Ramsay, you should take that point up with Populuxe.

                      He/she claimed it was probably reported on because Morrisson sent them a press release.

          • Pascal's bookie 6.1.1.1.2
            19 September 2013 at 11:48 am

            Wasn’t in the print edition but.

      • Populuxe1 6.1.2
        19 September 2013 at 1:45 pm

        Shhhh. You’ll upset their confirmation bias

      • andyS 6.1.3
        19 September 2013 at 4:28 pm

        Wellington mayoral hopeful John Morrison has apologised for a bad taste quip about showering with a body-painted model that landed him in hot water.

        Why do newspaper articles have to read like Frankie Howerd gags?

      • Frank Macskasy 6.1.4
        19 September 2013 at 9:51 pm

        @ The Contrarian…

        Interesting…

        The Herald published the story on 15 September.

        The DomPost published theirs two days later.

        Were they embarressed at not presenting the news story?

        • TheContrarian 6.1.4.1
          20 September 2013 at 4:01 am

          Dunno but it was headlined nonetheless. And I was at the mayoral debate and can tell you Morisson never said “the men are speaking” to Wade-Brown or anyone else nor can I find any link to substantiate that claim on the off chance he did make the comment while I was in the bathroom or otherwise distracted.

          And interesting that “warping the coverage” means declaring Wade-Brown the debate winner, which the DomPost did. On the front page I believe.

          This post is sloppy, as mentioned above.

        • JT 6.1.4.2
          20 September 2013 at 8:45 am

          I think Frank, they were waiting for a comment from either Morrison or Louise to draft a substainal story it might help to get a quote from atleast one of the main subjects? Not from some bystander with a political agenda.

  7. Auto_Immune 7
    19 September 2013 at 9:42 am

    Thank goodness for STV. Celia is the lesser of evils compared to Morrison and will be ranked as such. Jack Yan is still getting my ‘1’ though.

  8. Crunchtime 8
    19 September 2013 at 10:05 am

    I’m not overly impressed with Wade-Brown either but she is not nearly as bad as the press likes to make out.

    …and there is not a single candidate running against her who is worth voting for.

    Nicola Young is an elitist who is just about as unpleasant as John Morrison.

    All of them are pretty right-wing compared to Celia…

  9. tracey 9
    19 September 2013 at 10:21 am

    at last, a topic infused has enormous experience… uselessness

    • fender 9.1
      19 September 2013 at 12:22 pm

      +1 tracey
      I don’t care how few words his comment limit is, he is boring.

      And why anyone would vote for Morrison is a ‘mystery’, he’s a horrible creep.

  10. js 10
    19 September 2013 at 11:44 am

    It was also his sporting colleague/friend in Australia who was implicated in and then laughed when the ‘little’ person team mascot was set on fire.

    • Greywarbler 10.1
      19 September 2013 at 12:22 pm

      js
      Is there a link you can give for this? Or some keyword?

      • Greywarbler 10.2.1
        21 September 2013 at 2:03 pm

        Thanks richard.
        This is a comment on stuff with background on John Morrison who has a sporting background, not one that is very concerned about other’s rights or concerns. He comments on the dwarf incident in richard’s link.
        As a former New Zealand cricketer, and commentator of some note, John Morrison has seen a few sports people do daft things. …..
        The Wellington City Council sport portfolio leader is the man responsible for signing AFL club St Kilda to a three-year playing deal at Westpac Stadium. So when he heard Saints player Clinton Jones had set dwarf entertainer Blake Johnston’s clothes alight during the team’s ‘Mad Monday’ celebrations, he was appalled.

        And the Herald Sun link gives some detail about the company where you can hire a dwarf to entertain you. But of course some hearty fellas don’t know the difference between innocent fun and dangerous attacks. (Remember the guy who set a hawaiian skirt on fire with sad results. Very haha. – Apr 24, 2001 CNN.com – Grass skirt fire prank proves fatal – A New Zealand man who set fire to his colleague’s fancy dress costume … synthetic grass skirt a company Hawaiian theme Christmas Party in …)

        Blake Johnston, who works for the entertainment firm Dwarf My Party, claimed he was set alight with a cigarette lighter while talking to a group of players at South Melbourne pub Bells Hotel yesterday.
        It’s understood his jumper and pants were significantly burnt in the alleged attack….
        Bells Hotel management said the incident was a “storm in a teacup”.

        A spokesman for the pub said that Johnston stayed at the event after his outfit caught fire.
        “He was fine with everything and shook my hand as he left,” the pub’s manager said.
        But Johnston has denied the claim through his unnamed friend.

  11. Brett Dale 11
    19 September 2013 at 11:46 am

    You men its being biased like Susan Pepperell is for the nzherald.

  12. expatriot 12
    19 September 2013 at 1:01 pm

    They have strong form in this regard – last election they never once hinted that Prendergast was anything but a shoo-in for re-election.

  13. Sable 13
    19 September 2013 at 1:03 pm

    No surprises really. Again the best move is don’t buy their shitty little rag (I wont read it on principle most of the time-save the occasional doctors office visit) and it will fail.

    Its already gone from being a twice daily newspaper to a once a day proposition. When I was doing some post grad study at VUW in 2009 it was free. Maybe the university loos were short of paper.

    They have even taken to trying to “hawk” the crappy thing by door knocking around my neighbourhood to drum up subscriptions and no doubt its the same elsewhere.

    As to the spat, well I have to say its comes as no surprise. This paper has a long history of supporting the right and no doubt Morrison is a right leaning candidate.

    As to Wade Brown, well I have to say no fan of hers either. She has hiked rates at a time when people are really suffering economically, wants to slug people with more charges for visiting the Wellingtons Botanical Gardens and waste money on ridiculous bicycle lanes (her personal hobby horse) to the tune of $1.8 million.Meantime she wont offer compensation for lost earnings to small business owners in Kilbernie after the Council stuffed up road works costing these people considerable lost revenue. Again in times of economic hardship.

    If she gets the boot I wont be shedding any tears.

  14. captain hook 14
    19 September 2013 at 2:10 pm

    Morison is one of those dweebs who always had his socks pulled up and his underpants too tight.
    A sneak and a bully.

  15. Michael mckee 15
    19 September 2013 at 4:27 pm

    I wrote to Celia wade Brown and Ken Lavery with regard to the Kilbirnie upgrade.
    I asked them why it wasn’t council policy to offer a rates holiday 25, 50, 75 or 100% during the time of the work planned providing they could show Turnover affected.
    Celia didn’t reply and Ken Lavery’s letter said “it wouldn’t be fair to other ratepayers”.

    They know they are going to affect businesses around the works but still ask for the same rates!
    Same thing for yellow and red stickered buildings.

    My letter in the Dompost posited that WCC and our officers were actually committing fraud as they were charging rates on the old value when the building wasn’t stickered and they were in charge of the whole process as they are the territorial authority.

    Iona Pannet and I had an email correspondence about it which prompted me to write the letter after Rex Nicols had a letter published about it.
    I do not know Rex Nicols but what he had to say about the stickered buidlings being less in value as a result made sense and I questioned the councillors. Only Iona and Celia replied.
    Iona Pannet and Celia Wade Brown do not see it that way, but “rich prick landlords” who are getting their just deserts because they have allowed their buildings to not meet the new standards.

    so glad to see some stuff about Morrison as I always thought he is in Kerry’s old guard and I gather Wade Brown has had a devil of a job with the Prendagast group at times.
    Michael

    • Dem Young Sconies 15.1
      20 September 2013 at 6:05 am

      Celia and Iona are quite correct with regards to earthquake prone buildings. Commercial landlords are in fact rich pricks, and have happily earned high income and ridiculous untaxed capital gains from these properties. Now they have to pay for a wee bit of strengthening, so their precious “investment” is no longer a death trap. Well boo hoo for them. If it was up to me, they would be either compelled to have all commercial buildings to 100% of the current building code, or face confiscation.

      As far as rates go. Commercial rate payers are largely subsidised by residential. And poorer residential in turn subsidise richer. Commercial rates should be doubled. The additional revenue should be used to reduce the residential rates burden, and to finally fund a world class light rail service from the railway station to the suburbs.

  16. peterlepaysan 16
    19 September 2013 at 9:23 pm

    Morrison is a dangerous loose cannon in the John Banks mode, all ego and no ethics.

    Winning is all! A la Denis Connor.

    Morrison is brown nosing business backers, he does not give a …. about the citizens of Wellington

    Actually he was a pretty crap cricketer as well.

    Morrison has an undoubted ability for making snide remarks but that is where his talents and abilities start and stop.

    He would make an excellent sledging coach for Australian Cricket teams.

  17. RedBaronCV 17
    19 September 2013 at 10:05 pm

    Yeah, I saw what you mean about Morrison – but his support group was worse. Rod Goulden’s style didn’t have much going for it either.

  18. Martin 18
    19 September 2013 at 10:36 pm

    Swallow the blue pill and vote National or its local variants
    – Fearfacts media

  19. JT 19
    20 September 2013 at 8:48 am

    University voters are not supressed. They have the same voting rights as everyone else.