Nats pay for booze for the elite, cut home insulation for families

Written By: - Date published: 11:15 am, May 30th, 2012 - 33 comments
Categories: class war - Tags: , , ,

National blew the VIP entertainment budget for the Rugby World Cup by $5 million, despite none of the promised big names actually turning up. They got the extra dosh out of Mfat’s budget. In unrelated news, the government is cutting the Greens’ Warm Up New Zealand programme, which has returned four times its costs in benefits. There’s no money, you see.

33 comments on “Nats pay for booze for the elite, cut home insulation for families ”

  • Comments are now closed

  1. ghostwhowalksnz 1
    30 May 2012 at 12:03 pm

    I have a feeling the VIP budget was a parking place for other expenses McCully doesnt want to fess up to – executive jets ?

    – could it be for the cost of the extra limos, so that Key didnt have to live with it in his budget.

    • Deano 1.1
      30 May 2012 at 12:15 pm

      [Pointless,stupid and potentially inflammatory comment deleted. If I see you commenting in a similar vein again you’ll be having some days off. – B.]

      • Zetetic 1.1.1
        30 May 2012 at 6:27 pm

        I must have missed the meeting where we changed the rules. Because deleting offences have always been limited to derogatory terms and extremely offensive behaviour, or burt-like stupidity.

        Just disagreeing with the point, thinking a point is stupid, or that a post is “potentially inflammatory” is not enough to justify deletion and banning threats.

        If it were, I would ban all those conspiracy morons for starters and everyone who has ever insulted Peter Dunne to PeteG would have to be banned too on the “potentially inflammatory” ground.

        I’m glad that we don’t run this blog like that because that wouldn’t be in the spirit of a broad community of discussion which we have committed to build, would it?

        • Bill 1.1.1.1
          30 May 2012 at 6:38 pm

          There was no point zet. It was a straight out provocative comment…an attempt to goad specifically named commentators who had made comments on other threads and was unrelated to previous comments in either this thread or the post. I’m not exactly given to deleting comments, but I’m fucked if i’m going to sit back and let deliberate attempts to ignite a flame war slip by.

          • Zetetic 1.1.1.1.1
            30 May 2012 at 7:33 pm

            let’s face it, you just didn’t like the point made.

            Sure, chuck in a ‘don’t carry debates cross posts’ or ‘let’s not have a flame war’ in bold at the bottom to cool people off if you’re worried but I think we risk driving away good commenters if we start censoring on minor stuff.

            • Bill 1.1.1.1.1.1
              30 May 2012 at 8:09 pm

              zet. I’m not going to say this again. There was no point made. None. It wasn’t ‘carrying a debate across threads’. Deliberately and gratuitously goading other named commentators…baiting might be a better term…when they haven’t even commented on this thread in the hope of eliciting a response from them that would inevitably have blown up isn’t ‘minor stuff’. And there was nothing apart from that in the comment. (If there had been, that portion would have been left in tact… ie the comment would have been redacted or edited accordingly)

              Like I said, I’m not in the habit of deleting comments. In fact I can’t think of another occasion I’ve done so… unless it was connected to the one, and so far only, ban I’ve brought down on a commentator (but even there I think I left the comments in place because I’m fucking loathe to delete stuff).

              Now, is this conversaation ended or would you like me to send you as close an approximation to the original comment as I can remember for you to pass judgement on?

  2. Chris 2
    30 May 2012 at 12:07 pm

    I posted this yesterday as well but according to the Herald only $3.5million of the $10million put aside was used for entertaining.

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10809172

    Not sure who is correct as I haven’t seen the budget papers and even if I had not sure I would want to trawl through them.

  3. bbfloyd 3
    30 May 2012 at 12:15 pm

    I suppose we can now reveal the results of a new worldwide poll that has new zealand taking over from the Irish as the “stupedest” race on the planet…we certainly seem to want people to sneer at us… look at the class of leaders we have produced to represent us…..

    At least the aussies are happy about it… their jokes about us have become funny at last…

    • fatty 3.1
      30 May 2012 at 2:16 pm

      “look at the class of leaders we have produced to represent us…”

      Our current choice is a smile and wave…or a guitar strumming hillbilly. Be nice if we had 2 politicians with differing views, rather than 2 inbreeds with the same ideology…both of which try their best to not have an opinion on life.
      I’d rather have Berlusconi…at least he has a personality to match personality poitics. Our two are dick-wads

      • Vicky32 3.1.1
        30 May 2012 at 6:05 pm

        I’d rather have Berlusconi…at least he has a personality to match personality poitics. Our two are dick-wads

        If you’d had the wonderful experience of living under his rule, you’d know better than to say something so stupid – and your sneer at Shearer is equally stupid. 

        or a guitar strumming hillbilly and ‘inbreed’

        Nasty! Completely unacceptably nasty.
         

  4. Frank Macskasy 4
    30 May 2012 at 2:19 pm

    There appears to be more hidden cuts in the Budget… http://fmacskasy.wordpress.com/2012/05/30/correction-minister/

    This is turning out to be a Budget filled with fish hooks.

    • Dr Terry 4.1
      30 May 2012 at 3:59 pm

      Oh dear! I thought the corrections “reforms” sounded too good to be true! Thanks for enlightening me.

      • seeker 4.1.1
        30 May 2012 at 7:34 pm

        Thanks for your work on this Frank.These “sleight of hand” antics really need to be revealed and the perpetrators held to account.The ministers need to be ‘corrected’.

        • vto 4.1.1.1
          30 May 2012 at 8:02 pm

          Sounds like they have been indulging in misleading and deceptive conduct. This is banned under the Fair Trading Act.

          It also sounds like they fall well short of the standards they impose on others when it comes to financial statements such as prospectuses and investment statements.

          The New Zealand government holds itself to the lowest standards in the country.

          • Frank Macskasy 4.1.1.1.1
            31 May 2012 at 9:48 am

            Thanks, everyone.

            I’ve emailed a “please explain” to Anne Tolley – no response yet. Also mentioned it to an opposition MP I met at “Backbenches” last night. She was quite interested in what I’d found and will be passing it on to their Correction-spokesperson.

            The media have been advised as well, so we’ll see what happens now…

  5. Treetop 5
    30 May 2012 at 3:12 pm

    This lot appear to be unable to cope without alcohol in their lives. I would like to see all alcohol removed from Parliament grounds because then I will not have to wonder who might be half pissed at work.

    • Frank Macskasy 5.1
      30 May 2012 at 3:45 pm

      *pulls back breath-tester*

      “I’m sorry, sir, but that’s a positive return. I’ll now have to ask you to accompany me back to the station for an evidential blood test.”

      “Is this serious, constable?”

      “Yes, Mr Key, I’m afraid it is. You may be charged with driving the country while under the influence of neo-liberal intoxicants.”

      “Dem it.”

      • Dr Terry 5.1.1
        30 May 2012 at 4:01 pm

        Spot on, Frank!!

        • mike e 5.1.1.1
          30 May 2012 at 6:02 pm

          Frank Now I can see why he mumbles all the time also that would explain the cat walk as well as crashing our economy. theal bee a briigghter fture.selling of all our assets to feed hjs addiction to ill gotten money!

          • felix 5.1.1.1.1
            30 May 2012 at 6:12 pm

            It explains he doesn’t often why he can’t seem to be know which way the words are going, or whatever it might be.

            • vto 5.1.1.1.1.1
              30 May 2012 at 8:08 pm

              He is the next Joh Bjeikle-Peterson, the greatest garbler and mangler of the english language known, and whose sentences never ever made sense.

              • Frank Macskasy …
                31 May 2012 at 9:43 am

                Indeed, guys.

                I wouldn’t mind so much… if he did it in the privacy of his own home, and with his own money, whilst hitting the neo-liberal bottle and ‘under the influence’.

      • Richard Christie 5.1.2
        31 May 2012 at 9:33 am

        *pulls back breath-tester*

        “I’m sorry, sir, but that’s a positive return. I’ll now have to ask you to accompany me back to the station for an evidential blood test.”

        “Ish this sherious, constable?”

        “Yes, Mr Key, I’m afraid it is. You may be charged with driving the country while under the influence of neo-liberal intoxicants.”

        “But I always talk like thish”

    • Vicky32 5.2
      30 May 2012 at 6:16 pm

      I would like to see all alcohol removed from Parliament grounds because then I will not have to wonder who might be half pissed at work.

      I am surprised it’s allowed now! It isn’t at any other workplace that I know of…

      • vto 5.2.1
        30 May 2012 at 8:06 pm

        Surely you are not surprised Vicky. It is a well established principle that those in government in New Zealand can apply one thing to them and a completely different thing to everyone else.

        Alcohol is one. Misleading and deceptive conduct is another. Pay rises each and every year is another. Superannuation schemes are another.Retrospective activity making something wrong right is another.

        The only requirement for becoming a politician in NZ is the ability to keep a straight face.

  6. Akldnut 6
    30 May 2012 at 9:19 pm

    Muldoon woould be rolling in his grave if you bannned alcohol.

    • Treetop 6.1
      31 May 2012 at 3:34 pm

      I still remember the June 1984 clip of Muldoon announcing a snap election. An example of the combination of a prime minister and alcohol.

  7. Ed 7
    31 May 2012 at 9:08 am

    This morning on Morning Report, McCully explained that the budget for a Pacific conference and something else were underspent, so the difference was transferred to the Rugby World Cup, and they also had some contingency funds ; taken together all that money was not used so spending was within budget . . .

    Given that a budget is about allocating funds to different areas, such a transfer of underspending from one area to another is at best “unusual”, but to then claim that not spending a contingency margin brings total spending within budget must be Spin of an extraordinary nature.

The server will be getting hardware changes this evening starting at 10pm NZDT.
The site will be off line for some hours.