Gotta say, trying to boost the NRA is a particularly fiendish way for the rooskies to try to fuck up American society.
Hopefully this all gets a lot more exposure and causes blowback on the NRA for acting as agents of a malicious foreign power. Maybe it will even open the eyes of some moonbat lefties that still seem to think Russian government are just misunderstood.
Yeah. That’s one of the reasons I find it a minor relief that America’s Prolapsed Rectum is so fkn incompetent.
If he really was the 37-dimensional chess grandmaster some have asserted he is, he could have put it all together as a quiet private army and kept the official agencies supportive as well. But as it is, he seems determined to completely piss off everyone except his deplorables.
It most be noted, not all NRA kooks are in the deplorables basket, I’m pretty sure there’s a significant subset that will be seriously peeved about the NRA apparently becoming a wing of the Kremlin.
Thanks for the link, Morrissey. The Real News Network do some pretty good stuff and their subscriber based business model allows them a degree of independence other net based media sites don’t have. I know Bomber and others have tried to do similar work, however the size of NZ’s population makes it near impossible to sustain without advertising income. So we may have to wait a little while longer for the Standard News Network 😉
That’s abit like the British radical wing equivalent of Alternative for Germany, have taken over Brexit.
The demographics of their public’s voting blocks, along with a logical stepped referendum process to those, would lead the most functionable way ahead but rather it looks like there is abit of a meltdown going on.
The USA come out right into the open and just say that their coup’ in Venezuela is all about oil, of course anyone with even a sliver of a functioning brain could already quite plainly see this obvious truth…makes you wonder what the fuck goes on the craniums of a few commenters here..plainly not all that much.
I would have thought that Green Party supporters, which I think you are Cinny, would be opposed to any more Venezuelan production. It is a very heavy crude and contains a lot of sulphur, as are the tar sands that make up an even greater proportion of their reserves.
As such it has more severe environmental effects than does the comparatively light crude from Saudi Arabia.
You’re right, alwyn: Venezuela should have diversified long ago, and left the oil where it belongs. In the ground.
But the voracious superpower to the north would never tolerate that.
Whatever should be done in regards to Venezuela’s conservation strategies in the future, it’s certainly not Trump, Pence, Pelosi, or Pomposeo who have any rights to speak on the matter. Don’t they have enough pollution to sort out in their own country?
Alwyn, I think you misunderstand Cinny and Adrian. They’re pointing out the reason for the attempted coup, which is greed.
Oil production has declined under Chavez and Maduro, which is good for the world. If there is a successful coup, oil production will rise, which is bad for the world.
The reason for the production decline isn’t a commitment to green ideology, as far as I can tell. More to do with sacking most of the workers 15 years ago (they were relatively well off and anti-Chavez) and chronic under funding of the industry since. As you note, it’s not the best crude and is expensive to refine.
However, there’s a lot of it and the US has a President who doesn’t believe in climate change but does believe in money. So it’s easy to see where this is heading.
Talking of Venezuela, I read that a shipment of gold about to be loaded onto a Russian plane was stopped. That wouldn’t be Nicky-boy trying but failing to loot the remnants of the stunningly successful socialist economy, which has made nearly all Venezuelans equally poor, would it? Dear oh dear.
Important point from Allan Nairn – it’s not control of the oil extraction itself that the US wants, it’s control of where the profit from its sale ends up.
It’s about making an example of Venezuela for daring to direct some of that money away from the pockets of the local elites and US shareholders into social programmes for the poor. It’s about making it clear that any alternative forms of economic management wont be permitted. The Maduro government being (possibly) incompetent and corrupt doesn’t alter this underlying dynamic.
The US establishment really hates state oil company/state businesses/state banking revenues being used by socialist governments as
1. nation state functioning independent of the global private ownership capitalist profit market system challenge the TINA regime.
2. priority of the money for public education and health and housing demonstrates another way of organising distribition of resources.
Climate change and bizarre weather patterns are effecting weather, land and housing.
But the Auckland (and other) councils, environmental lawyers growing rich and the bovine environment court (that is just a rubber stamp to development no matter what the future outcomes are,) are just blithely allowing more and more building and resource consents without any risk assessment of what the liability of those consents are going to be in the future from climate change when you can have 43mm of rain falling in one hour in summer… they can’t even work out what to do, now it has happened.
We don’t just need more houses in NZ, we need SAFE livable houses that are designed to be immune to climate change, designed not to need remedial work from bad building work and not building on sites which are going to be at risk in the future and be unliveable!
The red zone in Christchurch for example was declined by the council to be built on due to earthquake risks, then the developers took the council to environment court and won, and then they were developed and destroyed in the earthquake. Didn’t see the council or environment court recovering that money from the developers who are able to litigate to build on unsafe land, then take the money, leaving all the devastation to future owners and ultimately the tax payer paid out.
Note the below is in Summer!!
“Forty-three millimetres of rain fell in the Waitakere Ranges in one hour, between 5pm and 6pm on Saturday. Compare that to Auckland Airport, where just 15mm fell over 24 hours.”
“We don’t just need more houses in NZ, we need SAFE livable houses that are designed to be immune to climate change,”
Not sure if that is possible really.
The Piha flooding is highlighting very real issues. I’m so sorry for those people.
CC events will lead to no rebuild, and worse longer decision making processes as people protect their arse. insurance is gonna be hit and miss with a lot of misses.
There is plenty that can be done and much of the current gormless planning is making it worse especially in Auckland where planners allow properties to run over building to non permeable surfaces more often than not against the rules as a matter of course, (normally for additional parking), houses are getting bigger with more parking, more tarsal everywhere and trees and non permeable grass areas being removed constantly for more roads, and ash felt, (which is then dug up constantly every time someone runs a utility line or changes the pavements and roads which in Auckland is constantly dug up and modified and often for no real reason apart from someone got a lucrative contract to do it), destruction, etc…
There is absolutely zero point building badly designed houses that some poor home owner who has done nothing wrong is then forced to rent while paying a mortgage of a property that is unliveable while the developers and their ‘experts’ get rich on the process of NZ famous, overpriced and poorly designed and built buildings.
Even worse those same home owners are then expected to pay higher rates to pay for the developer/council/BRANZ messes like leaky building syndrome, all designed to increase inequality.
Then they decide to add that extra taxes for the ordinary person just in the last year in Auckland we have petrol taxes, new rates on the rates for new builds passed onto the owner which used to be paid by the devloper, fees if you rent our your house short term…. etc etc
That’s just last year new taxes in Auckland, what are they planning when the shit hits the fan with the next ‘leaky building’ lots with bad resource consents that they ‘relaxed’ while not building the affordable houses, and instead McMansions everywhere…
Absolutely. Design can go a long way to alleviating all sorts of concerns. Solar roofs to take pressure off the power grid and owners utility bills; rain gardens and roof collection to take pressure off storm water systems and water supplies; passive heating and cooling to take pressure off utilities and utility bills, and the health system; tree planting to lower the urban heat island effect, add aesthetic beauty, clean air, habitat, shelter, and food; aspect to utilise solar angles…
Instead we have a box aligned with the other boxes aligned with the road. A very expensive box. A box we need to plug into and pay for all our water, power and food on top of the exorbitant rents/mortgages. Many of these boxes are shoddy nonsense requiring large power inputs to be at all comfortable.
Many of these boxes are supermarket friendly, power company friendly, oil transport friendly, keeping you dependent friendly, and bank friendly.
The hopeless dosile ‘Environment Court’ is owned by the Corporate industry.
So it should be dismantled and the (PCE) ‘Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’ must be givem more poower to change Government poicy before we are all ‘sunk’ opps – sorry for the pun!!!
@Gabby, I agree but that is not what is being built in Auckland, the opposite is being built and what the planners are consenting based on the political and economic and market driven ‘third way’ (aka Rogernomics/Kiwibuild/Thatcherism) models of building big houses for profit and then making the state pay in weird deals a premium and then still not delivering any houses worthwhile while selling/swapping off land into private hands .
If you want weird weather patterns look at the flooding in Townsville right now. This time last we were up there and the place was exactly as per it’s usual name ‘Brownsville’. Dry and hot.
This year the monsoonal trough is way further south than normal, and the place is inundated. At one point they got 300mm of rain in 4 hours. And there’s forecast for the same conditions for another week:
Come on Red, it’s called “Clownsville, AJ Town” never heard of Brownsville. But mind you when I did the RAAF’s Combat Survival Cse, the Arid phase was cut short as we were barely making or producing a enough water let alone to survive on and Jungle solo phase was cut short for the lack of water as well. That was about 15yrs ago btw.
Yes it’s interesting that the Monsoon tough is a lot further Sth than usual and it arrived a mth and half late than usual as well. Darwin has recorded its direst Jan since records began. Parts of the Darwin rural area and out at my bush block, we are were just below the median level for rain in Jan and it’s even worst past Katherine and to the west towards WA.
Some Central and Nth Australia Cattle producers are already thinking of reducing their herds and other farmers are already thinking about reducing their crops and fruit because the lack of water from this years Wet season on current trends. If people down Sth and up here in Darwin are already complaining about the cost of meat, veggies and fruit? Then wait until after the Nth wet season, if fails to bring the rains and then it’s going to get interesting for a lot of people.
Its a well known thing that men seem to delay going to the doctor more that women do. The stark reality of the consequences of that became all to real yesterday when I was informed my best freind who isn’t even 40 yet has cancer. The mind numbing reality of that is the lymphoma growing on him was first noticed 8 months ago. He has other symptoms that suggests it’s spread that in themselves should have resulted in a doctors visit, but no. His partner even booked him in a month or so ago but he didnt turn up.
Why?
His childhood was crap, his father was absent, his mother was useless with kids to different dads and never worked a day in her life. He often comments about having to raise himself. He’s extremely paranoid about child abusers and wants to murder them all, so although he never says anything happened to him I’m suspicious. He failed completely in school, is illiterate. Witnessed his best freind standing next to him being shot dead by his brother as a teenager. A continuously drinking, sober alcoholic. Drug addict that like the alcoholism he has never been able to stop despite many attempts. Cigarettes and weed, that he can’t stop as well. His high is reckless driving, and motorcycle riding recently loosing his licence, again.
To me there’s just so many indicators of contempt for his own life, that the whole picture is just one of suicidle behavour.
That is such a painful tragic life story DJ (4). Very sad indeed.
Evidence children need to be lovingly nurtured from birth and made to feel worthy throughout their lives.
Let’s hope your friend is able to access the means to address both his mental and physical health issues ASAP, before both situations deteriorate even further.
DJ, I am really sorry to hear about your friend. Life can be so unfair at times and he certainly has been landed with a very short straw through no fault of his own. I can understand him not going to the doctor. Many people do the same and put off doing so when medical problems occur. I have no doubt that he will be hurting emotionally at present, as you obviously are. Hopefully he is now getting some support both physically and emotionally through people such as the Cancer Society, local hospice services etc; but I am sure that you will be there for him and his partner etc, as only a best friend can be. kia kaha to you all.
Much love and support to your friend, his good fortune is having you in his life, well done for being there for him and not giving up on him.
Re motorcycle riding, it’s a way for him to release steam so to speak.
Has he got a dirt bike and safety gear?
Hard to lose a license off road, and blasting up and down steep dirt tracks is a hell of a rush. Just a thought….and it’s a heap of fun building jumps out of dirt and stuff. No idea if it’s possible to do such for him, just a thought that’s all.
Being proud of something in ones life helps so much, positive encouragement, support and a bit of direction is massively helpful. Least it has been in my experience.
It’s scary going to the Dr, sometimes we know in our minds what’s happening, but as soon as a health professional verbalises it, sometimes that is what causes the pain. Support person at the Dr’s visit maybe?
Fingers crossed this well being budget will bring the help that so many need.
PS… important for all to know the signs of possible suicide, I really think more people could help each other then. Mental health as a subject should be just as important as PE at school.
You conveyed this story very well. I’ve encountered more than a few similar men in the same shitty place myself.
You nail it in your last para:
To me there’s just so many indicators of contempt for his own life,
And given this truth, why would it be surprising if at least some of these men then treat the lives of those around them with equal contempt?
I think a lot depends on personality as to how this contempt manifests; it can be inwardly directed as high risk or suicidal behaviour, or outwardly directed as abuse and violence toward others. The behaviour we can see is different, but the root cause is much the same.
The Dunedin Longitudinal Study said a lot about this; that depending on innate personality those children whom they term “poorly controlled”, who were also abused as children between the ages of 4 and 8, were the ones most likely to be in prison as adult offenders.
This response to a suggestion that dogs should be banned from beaches because they are harassing and killing vulnerable protected birds I think reflects the anomic,
uncaring, immature and irresponsible attitude of a majority of NZs, probably men particularly.
…. who was braving the inclement weather in Christchurch to take Reba for a walk along Waimairi beach, thought a ban would be a terrible idea.
“The dog catches rabbits but birds, we don’t really see a lot, seagulls stuff like that but I don’t think there’s a massive risk. The birds probably move somewhere else… let the dogs run.”
… – who was taking Izza for a stroll at South Brighton beach – was similarly unimpressed with the idea of a ban.
“Bollocks, pretty much. There’s very few birds nesting around this area. It’s a good call to try to save the birds and everything but as far as me walking my dog in the morning, yeh I’m not interested in anybody telling me I can’t.”
I’ve spent many long hours hunting possums with my now deceased dog Bud and in my youth with a duck hunting dog named Bear. If you think dogs can’t hunt out birds and do it by instinct you don’t know what your talking about. With Bear we could go into an area and off the dog would go. It would often return with a duck without us even having to fire our gun. Bud would naturally find Turkey nests, and flush pheasants.
What’s needed in these situations is a class where the dog is taught not to go near the Penguins. The same class as they do for Kiwi and dogs in the bush. So yes walk your dog on the beach. It’s good for the person and the dog but a simple solution exists. Do the class, get a tag on the collar, all good.
Or get together with Doc, dog experts and create a class.
“reflects the anomic, uncaring, immature and irresponsible attitude of a majority of NZs”.
Sure – and if you’re not like that you’ll be written off as ‘PC’.
The rot runs very deep now.
We perhaps need a new setting for being a decent, good NZer. I feel that I might look for the traits of the good tradesmen I have come across as I get my old car ‘up to speed’ for a wof. Some repairs needed and I know I am lucky to be talking to people who are honest, practical, helpful – good attitudes.
Then there are those working at the coalface helping people who are struggling to get above the poor conditions facing the low or no-waged who have limited opportunities. I put these at a higher setting of value to those with money who hand out little bits of charity when it suits. Or those who have jobs who stride around in the right clothes and a confident manner handing out advice and threats for non-compliance.
NZ is allowing 63 tonne laden weight trucks on our rural unsealed roads and all local roads an highways with no concrete under-bases setting us up for a financial disaster in future as we will go bankrupt paying for roads maintenance by pouring money down the back of Steven Joyce’s dream of a tar sealed NZ where trucks can roam everywhere.
US/Canada have reinforced concrete under-based roads to carry trucks up to 62.5 tonnes or 155 000 pounds weight.
The truth is out about our NZ substandard ‘soft roads’ that is unable to withstand the new heavier trucks now on our roads and the video shown demonstrates that when these 63 tonne trucks laden travel along our sub-standard roads such as all our regional and local roads the engineers capture the time that these roads just stretch and buckle and separate like a squashed orange on the road, causing the surface of the road to break into pieces that are then picked up by other truck tyres and removed from the road surface leaving the road with no tar seal so we are witnessing the wholesale wrecking of our roads by heavy laden trucks now causing us billions in costs to repair the road until inside three months the roads are wrecked again and needing new surfacing.
We must return to rail to use ‘train freight’ or go bankrupt.
The end game is to place reinforced concrete bases under the roads to carry the 63 tonne trucks and that is being done all over the world including US/Canada and Europe.
US/Canadian limits of truck weights on their roads with concrete under-bases are 33 tonnes to 62.5 tonnes or 80 000 lbs to 150 000lbs.
NZ is allowing 63 tonne laden weight trucks on our rural unsealed roads and all local roads and highways with no concrete under-bases setting us up for a financial disaster in future as we will go bankrupt paying for roads maintenance by pouring money down the back of Steven Joyce’s dream of a tar-sealed NZ where trucks can roam everywhere.
Single Axle, Tandem Axle and Gross Weight Limits
Fourteen States have a single axle limit greater than the Federal standard of 20,000 pounds on
the Interstate. Off the Interstate, 17 States have limits greater than the Federal limit and three
States are below the Federal limit.
Fifteen States have a tandem axle limit greater than the Federal limit of 34,000 pounds on the
Interstate. On the non-Interstate State system, 21 States have limits greater than 34,000 pounds and two states are below the Federal limit.
Four States have grandfather rights to exceed 80,000 pounds on the Interstate. On non-Interstate State highways,
18 States have a GVW limit higher than 80,000 pounds. Alternatively, five States have GVWs less than 80,000 pounds on some of their non-Interstate highways.
“Routine” Permit Limits for a 5-axle unit there are 28 different permitted maximum GVW limits ranging from 80,000 pounds to 155,000 pounds. The mode value (the value that occurs most frequently) is 100,000 pounds and occurs in seven States.
For any number of axles there are 25 different
maximum permitted GVW limits (the mode value is 120,000 pounds and occurs in ten States).
For single axles there are 16 different limits ranging from 13,000 pounds to 32,000 pounds.
For tandem axles there are 17 different limits ranging from 26,000 pounds to 64,000 pounds.
2.1.1 Heavy-Vehicle Impact on Pavement Damage Commonly identified pavement distress associated with heavy vehicles can be characterized as fatigue cracking and rutting. On rigid pavements damage includes transverse cracking, corner breaking, and cracking on the wheel paths. Flexible pavements and granular roads are most susceptible to rutting. In all cases, cracking and rutting increase pavement roughness and reduce pavement life.
+1 cleangreen, not only is the cost of other’s paying for the trucks wrecking the roads when the trucks should have to pay to fix their destruction, there is also the problem of the congestion and length of time it takes when the maintenance people somehow manage to take months to fix up the roads.
Whenever you talk to anybody they despair at how the same roads are dug up again and again for maintenance while other roads are pot holed and not sealed or barely repaired…
It is not so much money in NZ but a culture of corruption and incompetence in that area. Shown by how Fletchers were so incompetent they lost money during the building boom, but expected to make up for their incompetence through road maintenance contracts that are so over priced that incompetent companies can keep going through the rorting of this lucrative activity throughout NZ.
If i had time I might think up a good verse to cleangreen’s comment “where trucks can roam everywhere”.
The best i can do off the cuff.
Oh give me a home, where truck’s do not roam,
And the kids can play anywhere.
Where seldom is heard
A discouraging word,
And the politicians
Come here and stay.
Excellent article and food for thought in particular the winning strategy of China to go from a low supply chain to a high value supply chain and BUY UP the supply as part of their success.
You can see how successful this strategy is in NZ where Chinese interests are buying up the supply chains here in particular in agriculture and natural resources like farms and water, and how NZ might be increasing our exports but are getting poorer as a country under our pavlov type ‘free trade’ which in NZ seems to be more about ‘thick trade’ than ‘free trade’. Who trades to get poorer and gives away in real terms natural resources like water and sand for a song, only to buy it back at extreme profit to an overseas firm?
NZ has moved the opposite way to China and going from a high value supply chain to a low value supply chain through government and official stupidity and lack of long term strategy here…
“The next factor is that China’s role in this is changing fundamentally. There are some great studies on this. Not the least is one by Standard Chartered Bank some three years ago. China is moving incredibly fast, from being a source of low-cost components for other people’s value chains to being a relatively high cost country. For example, it’s far more expensive to manufacture something in Shanghai than it is in Michigan. So they are moving very fast to build up their own value and supply chains around the world, of which the high value part of the chain is in China. Surrounding countries like Vietnam become the low-cost suppliers. It is interesting to see the US starting to articulate how it’s trying to do bilaterals with the likes of Vietnam to try to disrupt that process. Clearly, this asymmetry of supply chains, whereby greater benefit flows to a few players and less to the rest, is becoming a more marked feature of international trade.”
To simplify things SNZ, it has been, & is, by and largely the buying up of private interests (mostly National networked ones) that have embedded themselves in the public sector areas.
That comes back to the lack of a systemic dynamic demand and supply NZ lobbying system. It’s probably a constituitional issue ultimately related to the integration of democracy.
The Chinese, while their internal demand and supply is extremely top down rigid, it is also very much a unified lobbying system when it comes to it’s external imperialism in contrast to say the corruption inherent in it’s internal communistic demand and supply against the dynamisms of it’s own markets.
I think the well being budget approach incorporates a good start to grappling with this issue’s systemics, in that it can organically start to remove the magic numbers of false wealth gains out of the system enabling a clearer picture to emerge of what is going on & which will create movement to co-operative solutions that are more democratic (see 2nd sentence) and thus having more relative strength about them.
We already pay much higher interest rates than China, and many of the other countries that we trade with are able to out bid Kiwis and have the advantage of lower interest rates. At one point they were taxing savings in Japan aka you had to pay to put money in the bank! Here in NZ, although historically low interest rates, it is still much higher in NZ than other countries have to pay for interest rates and probably easier to manipulate our currency being a small nation to maximise profits.
““An 82-year-old woman believes a trio of the unruly tourists scammed her out of almost $9000, claiming they would fix her roof but left a hole in her ceiling….
Leonard (the 82 year old woman) told Newshub that she recognised one of the three from the rowdy British tourist group when she saw photos……”
And now:
“Two British men are set to be charged with fraud by police investigating a series of alleged roofing scams in Auckland.”
Maybe just put up a sign, scammers come to NZ, they can join the already full troops of arrivals in the courts… of course in NZ we tend to just take the losses and be grateful for any cash dished out from fraudsters and dishonesty operating here, in this case the person is offering to settle LESS than the amount owed.
Wonder why with people being better off with committing crimes it is continuing to skyrocket… and why our justice system does not seek to penalise clearly so send a message to other fraudsters…
Bridges said it would involve $650M in the first year, so why both the Herald and the Dominion Post mislead with the figure of $1.7B for last year is inexplicable.
Absolutely right even taking the $0.7B on offer this is pure sophistry by Bridges and people are buying it because the media are selling it as a “really good and ‘obvious'” idea. About 650k-700k will get $15 and likely lose a bit of WFF, those under $50k get about a paltry $2 per week but I doubt they realise this and if National follows through with its 2017 intention to remove the Independent Earners rebate of $10 per week they are far worse off. Just as are those who just sucked it up in 2011 when National took $520 per year back in Kiwisaver contributions, The “paper boys and girls” that the National Party imposed taxes on will get nothing.
Thanks RedLogix. A Brilliant presentation. The technology which allows such precision is vast. And Titan might be inhabitable?
With such high level science what is missing from the human condition which doesn’t seem to fully engage with the needs of our own planet?
Jenny – How to get there? 18
30 January 2019 at 10:40 pm
Talleys a New Zealand synonym for greed, bullying and environmental abuse. Opening new coal mines in the Waikato. Victimising unionists in Afco and now plundering a marine reserve.
“The New Zealand Government was pushing hard to get the Talley’s vessel off the international IUU blacklist of disreputable fishing vessels, in spite of SPRFMO Compliance and Technical Committee finding that the Talley’s vessel was involved in IUU activities,” he says.
“Other countries at the meeting objected, and the result is that the Talleys boat will remain on the draft IUU list.
“Incidentally, Talley’s is the same company that donated heavily to the campaign of Shane Jones, who has emerged as the defacto Minister of Fisheries in the current Government.”
“Rather than trying to protect Talley’s from an international IUU listing, the Government should welcome the listing as a warning to other fishing companies that they must follow rules to protect the environment.
A gigantic cavity two-thirds the area of Manhattan and almost 1,000 feet (300 meters) tall has been found growing at the bottom of Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica.
About the size of Florida, Thwaites Glacier is currently responsible for approximately 4 percent of global sea level rise.
It holds enough ice to raise the world ocean a little over 2 feet (65 centimeters) and backstops neighboring glaciers that would raise sea levels an additional 8 feet (2.4 meters) if all the ice were lost……
The Amaltal Apollo, a vessel owned by a subsidiary of Talley’s, is facing 14 charges for fishing in protected waters in the Tasman Sea.
And Cabinet rules clearly state: “Ministers do not comment on or involve themselves in the investigation of offences or the decision as to whether a person should be prosecuted.”
“I think there’s no question that Jones has breached the Cabinet Manual, which is the rules that govern the behaviour of Ministers,” Mr Norman said.
Shane Jones: now pimping for Sealords
Written By: LPRENT – Date published: 11:34 am, October 3rd, 2012
……After all presumably he didn’t merely blow off because his ex-employer and current political donor asked him? Presumably he got approval from the shadow cabinet and Labour caucus to make the statement since he was making a statement on areas covered by someone else’s portfolio? It must be completely obvious to all of the people involved around politics exactly why this is far far more important a topic for Labour to be pursuing right now than the continuing disintergration of the Key government…..
……So Greenpeace are asserting that there is overfishing going on, that the populations of yellowfin tuna are decreasing, and that sealord are buying from sources using seine nets with the significiant bycatch issues. Certainly it isn’t hard to find support for that view from everyone from game fisherman to organisations the FAO.
But lets see how our self-appointed spokesman from Labour deals with these issues.
“Their concerns are about some obscure ecosystem …”
That is it. The rest of his reported statement is essentially a rant that would look good if he were the owner of Sealords, concerned mostly with the loss of short-term profits, and full of a faux concern about jobs. For if Greenpeace are right about the over fishing and the unsustainability of the fishery, then there are no long-term jobs and no long-term profits. Jones makes a big thing about Sealord being mostly owned by Maori. Who bloody cares? Not Greenpeace, not me as a consumer, in fact no-one apart from Shane Jones raising it. What we are interested in is the fish and how they are caught.
Make no mistake this is a fight for the soul of this government.
Who will blink first?
If Winston Peters decides to make a stand on behalf of Jones, will the Prime Minister call his bluff?
Will Jacinda Adern fight for her leadership?
And if necessary, in the face of Peters possible refusal to back down, threaten to put it to the country?
An election that in my opinion the Prime Minister would handily win, returning to the treasury benches with a weakened NZ First and a strengthened Green Party
All the cards are in the Prime Minister’s hands.
Will she play them, or quietly try to paper over the cracks only to have them blow apart at some later date when she is in a weaker position?
Will the Prime Minister concede, or make a stand?
Jones has to go, and Peters needs to accept it.
Even if Peters threatens to pull the house down, the Prime Minister must stand her ground, or be forever lost. Instead of the great leader she is otherwise destined to be.
Shane Jones. It doesn’t look good when looking at his work on fishing while in his new ministerial position. Cosseting fishing companies which are falling off their charts of legal fishing locations as Jenny has sat up late into the early morning documenting.
It doesn’t look good in Gisborne, when he organises more tree planting but the locals don’t see signs of better roads, and improved port facilities to handle present logs, much less those from the future of fast-growing radiata. (I put up comment about this.)
What a pity. All the practical men liked his no-nonsense manly style. An honest broker they thought. Someone who can see problems and bite them to size.
Looks like he is swallowing a rat instead.
Here you go Whanau when a group of White Collar Crim,s are caught with the hands in peoples pockets stealing off people they are ASKED TO BE NICE TO THERE customer,s When A poor person blue Collar gets caught they get thrown in jail there right taken away the media kicks the story around for weeks and our minor cultures mana gets eroded away. I have told you its a illusion that the so called( professionail upper classes have the 97. % well being at Heart ) YEA RIGHT . We have to be viglant and make them KNOW we expect them to use the power of rule to treat all kiwis respectfully and that means stop ripping US OFF And stop letting there M8 OFF THE HOOK
They got away with it again.
Executives and board members of New Zealand’s life insurers will be quietly breathing heavy sighs of relief this morning, just as their colleagues in the banking industry did last year.
Many work for the same companies or are in partnership. And many know exactly what being exposed in public for their wrongdoing and punished in the court of public opinion looks like.
They only need to read Australia’s daily newspapers and watch the litany of sackings and share price slumps and public condemnation they see convulsing through the Australian life insurance and banking industries every day because of the ongoing Hayne Royal Commission into banking, superannuation and financial advice industries.
One New Zealand-based life insurer has been selling a life product to foreign customers, even though cover was only available to New Zealand residents. Another insurer incorrectly recorded customers’ dates of birth, due to manual errors, resulting in 30 customers being overcharged. That insurer is now in the process of refunding those affected customers, the FMA and RBNZ said without naming the company.
Another incorrectly calculated the impact of a consumer price index-linked premium increase by up to 30 times. In all, 223 customers were over-charged. That problem was discovered in 2015 but the insurer didn’t contact those customers, instead relying on them to complain. Three years after the event, that insurer had failed to remediate 111 of the affected customers.
The review found examples of insurers failing to cancel old policies when a customer transferred to a new policy and continuing to charge premiums on both policies. It found insurers which failed to notify policyholders of premium increases.
The FMA took the same approach to a review it released in July when it said three of the 11 life insurance companies were responsible for behaviour so bad that it was considering taking regulatory action against them. It turns out that after follow-up inquiries, the FMA decided further action was unwarranted. Again, we’ll never know what went on.
We are expected to wait and trust the FMA and the Reserve Bank will look after consumers’ interests in the quiet time after the report. Their past record is not inspiring.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant
It’s clear from reading the report that the FMA and the Reserve Bank are most concerned about the reputation of the industry and its financial soundness, rather than the interests of consumers.
Repeatedly, and as identified in this chart below, the industry has over-charged premiums and got away with unacceptable behaviour because its products are complicated and they can rely on many to just set and forget their policies.
Simply asking them to be nice won’t work. They are beholden to their own shareholders and the employment agreements that incentivise them to go for the highest profits in the shortest term. Only the fear of career-ending exposure, fines and prison terms will change that. Ka kite ano links below
Kia ora Newshub ecoli in the Waiarapa water doesn’t look good that’s why I say our society needs to respect Wai much more than we do.
WAR IS FOR NEANDERTHAL.they cannot even account for %25 of their War budget spending ??????????.
Towns villa flooding condolences to all the people who have been hit by the flooding.
Alcohol causes big problem for OUR society I read a article that stated that alcohol sugar and prosessed food cause more damage to our society than drugs there you go the 00.1 %.
I quite admire Indian culture for the way they care about their Wild life what’s a couple of humans compared to the Havoc that we rage against our wild life Eco Maori say any were else the leopard would have been KILLED.
That’s shocking that mother in Britain FGM cutting her 3 year old daughter genital the reason is beyond me.
Tracey is doing a awesome job looking after all those abandoned chihuahua dogs but that’s not for Eco the Mokopunas tire me out in 3 days.
Tutankhamen is a awesome Egyptian that culture shows Eco Maori that we have forgotten more great technology than we know that’s why we should all ways respect and houner Ones Tipuna. I seen a story that Egypt was a matriarch society back in those days
Racism is shocking all around Papatuanukue. Ka kite ano
Kia R&R The neanderthal alt right shonky don’t want common people to be able to stay at home a care and education our children. They want to keep the common people that busy just trying to keep the Waka afloat we have no time to see the cheating moves they make against us. It also limits our participation in elections. We had one parent at home to care for our tamariki but that was when times were much easier than at the minute. I know of people working long hours and are treading water. That’s why I Back Jim Bolger, s new employment laws and what do you know ECO MAORI cannot find the story on the Internet today a controlled society is what we live in.
Ka kite ano P.S Well Come back to the Internet SAMOANS Ki kaha Eco Maori Tau Tokos the greatest contribution Wahine give to our society’s
Who said that one group of people can make there wages hundreds times higher than the group that makes the money the majority and make our wages a pittance.
We are the majority in a TRUE Democratic society the laws would be made to be good for the many that is not happening so who is cheating in everyway they can the 00.1% are ripping the many off thats a FACT . Back Jim Bolgers new employment laws with all you have got Tangata whenua and minority cultures if you want a better future for te mokopuna,s
Jim Bolger: New Zealand’s low productivity to blame for poor wages
The Government’s been handed a set of fair pay guidelines to set minimum standards across an industry or occupation.
The working group report was headed up by former National Prime Minister Jim Bolger.
It recommends workers be able to trigger a fair pay agreement if they can reach a threshold of 1000 workers, or 10 percent of workers in a specific sector or job.
Bolger told Larry Williams that this was devised to help the working poor who are struggling the most by increasing their pay packets.
“We have more and more families relying on welfare even if they are in full time employment. The system allows them to be on very low wages even if they work a 40 hour week.”
He says that it’s not much different to how the minimum wage is enshrined in law.
Bolger says they never looked at compulsory unionism, which he scrapped when he was Prime Minister.
“We shouldn’t scare people on this. What we’re saying is there are issues out there, there are problems out there, why don’t we sensibly look at how we resolve them?”
He says they looked at multiple other countries for innovative ideas, but none of their models worked in the New Zealand, forcing them to come up with their own interpretation. Ka kite ano Links below
Speaker Nancy Pelosi stands with House Democrats to re-introduce the Paycheck Fairness Act. Photograph: Yuri Gripas/Reuters
Equal pay requires honest discussions
The gender pay gap, as every right-thinking person knows, is a feminist myth. Those figures you’ve seen about white women earning around 80% of what white men make, and black women earning just 61%, are probably wrong. And if they’re not, then, as many conservatives have pointed out, there are rational explanations for the disparity. Such as the fact that, as Jordan Peterson has explained, women are just more agreeable than men, meaning they don’t ask for more money. Which is a very agreeable explanation if you don’t want to confront structural inequality.
Women swear sometimes – let’s get the hell over it
Arwa Mahdawi
While many on the right insist the gender pay gap doesn’t exist, they also appear keen to block legislation that would strengthen equal pay protection and make it easier for employees to share wage information. Which would appear to be a contradictory position. As congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted on Wednesday “If ‘the wage gap is a myth’ as some allege, then workplaces should have no problem with workers disclosing our salaries with one another.
Ocasio-Cortez’s tweet followed a news conference in which she, along with other Democrats, re-introduced the Paycheck Fairness Act, which strives to close the gender wage gap by giving women tools to challenge unequal pay. For example, it would stop employers retaliating against workers who discuss their salaries with each other. The bill was first introduced in 1997, but has been repeatedly blocked by Republicans.
While the pay gap has narrowed since 1980, not much progress has been made in the last 15 years. Arguably, one reason for this is the lack of transparency around pay. Most of us don’t know how much our colleagues make, which makes it easier for companies to ignore the issue. Indeed, Lean In’s 2018 Black Women’s Equal Pay Survey found that 50% of Americans aren’t aware of pay gap between black and white women, and hiring managers are also ignorant of the disparity.Ka kite ano Links below. P.S Wahine deserve to be respected and all payed the same as MAN
Kia ora R&R Waiata is a good tool that have many uses and one is to protest about injustices that have been dished out to Tangata Whenua O Aoteoroa for the last 250 years by the settlors .
The other use,s for maori is recording history boost ones mana and wairua mauri educate tangata unite tangata .
One could create a great tangata whenua waiata artist that,s is known all around Papatuanuku and one doesn’t have to invent the wheel to do this just be smart we have the tallent in Maori society .
The 00.1 % have made it so we are to busy to protest or to vote to busy rowing one own waka to servive and have know time to protest and they scrapped free education to stop that phenomenon.
Ka kite ano
Kia ora Newshub Townsville North Queens land has had extreme rain and flooding our scientists priditived that.
Ralph Northem should step DOWN from his Vigina governors office because of that old shocking photo of him in that racist yearbook. $100 million is cool for Maori business growth on Maori land but I still want to see Jim Bolgers new Employment laws that will deliver billions to the lower classes.
Nice one Stue Muir that’s a name of olden time in Aotearoa it’s cool you are regeneration the mangrove mash land that are the filters of the whenua on your farm land .
That’s a happy end to the story of bubbles the chihuahua being found an is safe and sound being returned to it owner in Hamilton hospital. Ka kite ano
A new study says that hydrogen fuel for vehicles and businesses is unlikely in the foreseeable future – in spite of Government financial support for private company research.
Simon Coates, director of Concept Consulting, said converting electricity or gas to power a fleet of hydrogen trucks would take more than three times more energy than using electricity and batteries.
His report was jointly funded by Contact Energy, the Energy Efficiency Conservation Authority, First Gas, Meridian Energy, Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment, and Powerco. “Most of the technologies involved in hydrogen production and use are mature and well understood, because they have been used at scale for many decades to support industrial processes such as synthetic fertiliser manufacture. Other hydrogen technologies, such as fuel cells, were discovered many decades ago but have not yet been applied at scale.”
The report said it may be possible to reduce hydrogen production costs during periods of low electricity prices, but this would require more renewable power stations to be built.
Almost three times more renewable energy was required to power a hydrogen vehicle than an electric vehicle, and approximately twice as much renewable energy was required to fuel a hydrogen boiler or heater, compared with an electric boiler or heat pump.
The report is available here Ka kite ano links below
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 27 were:1. The Minister for Ford Rangers strikes againTransport Minister Simeon Brown was again the busiest of the Cabinet ministers this week, announcing an ...
You got a fast carAnd I want a ticket to anywhereMaybe we make a dealMaybe together we can get somewhereAny place is betterYesterday’s newsletter, Trust In Me, on the report of abuse in state care, and by religious organisations, between 1950 and 2019, coupled with the hypocrisy of Christopher Luxon ...
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
Poneke Antifascist Coalition has invited Wellingtonians to stand in solidarity with the Kanak people at 12pm today outside the French Embassy in Wellington. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Slee, Associate Professor, Clinical Academic Neurologist, Flinders University Francisco Gonzelez/Unsplash Migraine is many things, but one thing it’s not is “just a headache”. “Migraine” comes from the Greek word “hemicrania”, referring to the common experience of migraine being predominantly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Heynen, Program Coordinator, Sustainable Energy, The University of Queensland A temporary stadium in the Champ-de-Mars, ParisEkaterina Pokrovsky/Shutterstock As Paris prepares to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the sustainability of the event is coming under scrutiny. The organisers have promoted ...
A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Wright, Professor in Marine Geology, University of Canterbury Louise Corcoran/Getty Images The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy. Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laurie Berg, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney defotoberg/Shutterstock Migrant worker exploitation is entrenched in workplaces across Australia. Tragically, a deep fear of immigration consequences means most unlawful employer conduct goes unreported. On Wednesday, however, the government officially launched a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vaughan Cruickshank, Senior Lecturer in Health and Physical Education, University of Tasmania Paris is about to host its third summer Olympics. While we don’t yet know what the legacy of this year’s games will be, let’s take the opportunity to reflect on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Deputy Director, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Griffith University In the wake of the assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, there were calls from bothsides of US politics, as well as internationally, to reduce the brutal, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Keith Rathbone, Senior Lecturer, Modern European History and Sports History, Macquarie University Two high-profile assaults on Australians in Paris have raised concerns about security ahead of the Olympic Games. On Saturday evening, a young woman was allegedly sexually assaulted by a ...
Dying is inevitable and, so it seems, is it costing a lot, writes Stewart Sowman-Lund in today’s extract from The Bulletin. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here.The cost of dying ...
The government took Joyce Harris's first baby and sent her off to a girls' home. Half a century on - and out of oceans of hurt - it asked her to be a mother figure. ...
It’s the deadliest fictional town in the country, but which death has been the most bonkers? Alex Casey looks back at 10 seasons of The Brokenwood Mysteries to find out. Warning: The following ranking story contains famous New Zealand actors appearing to be dead (not alive). The Spinoff has been ...
Water cremation is the biggest thing to happen to the death industry in the last 100 years. Alex Casey meets the people trying to bring it to Aotearoa. Through a set of mirrored doors down the industrial end of Christchurch’s St Asaph Street, death is getting a new lease on ...
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Gotta say, trying to boost the NRA is a particularly fiendish way for the rooskies to try to fuck up American society.
Hopefully this all gets a lot more exposure and causes blowback on the NRA for acting as agents of a malicious foreign power. Maybe it will even open the eyes of some moonbat lefties that still seem to think Russian government are just misunderstood.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/nra-heavyweight-wanted-access-to-putin-leaked-email?ref=home
Heavily armed agents of a foreign power.
That could play interestingly.
Yeah. That’s one of the reasons I find it a minor relief that America’s Prolapsed Rectum is so fkn incompetent.
If he really was the 37-dimensional chess grandmaster some have asserted he is, he could have put it all together as a quiet private army and kept the official agencies supportive as well. But as it is, he seems determined to completely piss off everyone except his deplorables.
It most be noted, not all NRA kooks are in the deplorables basket, I’m pretty sure there’s a significant subset that will be seriously peeved about the NRA apparently becoming a wing of the Kremlin.
Not every country in the world is terrified of crossing
the Trump, Bolton, Pompeo, Pence, Abrams gang.
“Democracy never needs to be imposed. It is tyranny that needs to be imposed.”
—Elliott Abrams
Thanks for the link, Morrissey. The Real News Network do some pretty good stuff and their subscriber based business model allows them a degree of independence other net based media sites don’t have. I know Bomber and others have tried to do similar work, however the size of NZ’s population makes it near impossible to sustain without advertising income. So we may have to wait a little while longer for the Standard News Network 😉
Just as an aside, a business opportunity for the Daisycutter media group may have opened up: https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/110300114/the-fire-the-forklift-and-the-fights-nightmare-company-goes-bust
Thanks for the heads-up, Te Reo! I’ll get Tiggy Ponsford and the acquisitions team to take a look at that.
Morrissey
A sixteen minute clip! If it was BBC or any other mainstream media site they could have given the key message in a two minute item.
Two minutes. That’s what you gave the “intelligence” briefers before you sent our troops to terrorize villagers in Afghanistan, Wayne?
well the BBC is good at signalling UK intentions to the Europeans (in under 20 sec)
That’s abit like the British radical wing equivalent of Alternative for Germany, have taken over Brexit.
The demographics of their public’s voting blocks, along with a logical stepped referendum process to those, would lead the most functionable way ahead but rather it looks like there is abit of a meltdown going on.
Brilliant critique, Nat boy – it was too long!
If that’s the depth of Nat thinking on international relations, no wonder we arse licked the USA under a Nat government.
The USA come out right into the open and just say that their coup’ in Venezuela is all about oil, of course anyone with even a sliver of a functioning brain could already quite plainly see this obvious truth…makes you wonder what the fuck goes on the craniums of a few commenters here..plainly not all that much.
Venezuela has the largest oil reserves on the planet.
Absolutely agree with your comment above.
Cheers for the link Adrian, following this with great interest, it’s very unsettling what is happening along with all the players in the game.
I would have thought that Green Party supporters, which I think you are Cinny, would be opposed to any more Venezuelan production. It is a very heavy crude and contains a lot of sulphur, as are the tar sands that make up an even greater proportion of their reserves.
As such it has more severe environmental effects than does the comparatively light crude from Saudi Arabia.
You’re right, alwyn: Venezuela should have diversified long ago, and left the oil where it belongs. In the ground.
But the voracious superpower to the north would never tolerate that.
Whatever should be done in regards to Venezuela’s conservation strategies in the future, it’s certainly not Trump, Pence, Pelosi, or Pomposeo who have any rights to speak on the matter. Don’t they have enough pollution to sort out in their own country?
Hey Alwyn, I’m a bit of a swing voter 🙂
I didn’t know re heavy crude v’s light crude thanks for that, I’ve learnt something today, that should always happen 🙂
Wonder if the severe environmental effects has prevented Venezuela pumping out their heavy crude… or is it the cost of extraction?
“prevented Venezuela pumping out their heavy crude”.
I think TRP, just below, is spot on with the reasons for the cut in production.
ps. Sorry if I have misinterpreted your political opinions.
Alwyn, I think you misunderstand Cinny and Adrian. They’re pointing out the reason for the attempted coup, which is greed.
Oil production has declined under Chavez and Maduro, which is good for the world. If there is a successful coup, oil production will rise, which is bad for the world.
The reason for the production decline isn’t a commitment to green ideology, as far as I can tell. More to do with sacking most of the workers 15 years ago (they were relatively well off and anti-Chavez) and chronic under funding of the industry since. As you note, it’s not the best crude and is expensive to refine.
However, there’s a lot of it and the US has a President who doesn’t believe in climate change but does believe in money. So it’s easy to see where this is heading.
Talking of Venezuela, I read that a shipment of gold about to be loaded onto a Russian plane was stopped. That wouldn’t be Nicky-boy trying but failing to loot the remnants of the stunningly successful socialist economy, which has made nearly all Venezuelans equally poor, would it? Dear oh dear.
Important point from Allan Nairn – it’s not control of the oil extraction itself that the US wants, it’s control of where the profit from its sale ends up.
It’s about making an example of Venezuela for daring to direct some of that money away from the pockets of the local elites and US shareholders into social programmes for the poor. It’s about making it clear that any alternative forms of economic management wont be permitted. The Maduro government being (possibly) incompetent and corrupt doesn’t alter this underlying dynamic.
The US establishment really hates state oil company/state businesses/state banking revenues being used by socialist governments as
1. nation state functioning independent of the global private ownership capitalist profit market system challenge the TINA regime.
2. priority of the money for public education and health and housing demonstrates another way of organising distribition of resources.
Climate change and bizarre weather patterns are effecting weather, land and housing.
But the Auckland (and other) councils, environmental lawyers growing rich and the bovine environment court (that is just a rubber stamp to development no matter what the future outcomes are,) are just blithely allowing more and more building and resource consents without any risk assessment of what the liability of those consents are going to be in the future from climate change when you can have 43mm of rain falling in one hour in summer… they can’t even work out what to do, now it has happened.
We don’t just need more houses in NZ, we need SAFE livable houses that are designed to be immune to climate change, designed not to need remedial work from bad building work and not building on sites which are going to be at risk in the future and be unliveable!
The red zone in Christchurch for example was declined by the council to be built on due to earthquake risks, then the developers took the council to environment court and won, and then they were developed and destroyed in the earthquake. Didn’t see the council or environment court recovering that money from the developers who are able to litigate to build on unsafe land, then take the money, leaving all the devastation to future owners and ultimately the tax payer paid out.
Note the below is in Summer!!
“Forty-three millimetres of rain fell in the Waitakere Ranges in one hour, between 5pm and 6pm on Saturday. Compare that to Auckland Airport, where just 15mm fell over 24 hours.”
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2018/02/piha-flooding-causes-evacuations-damage.html
Piha flooding: ‘If it’s raining you’re terrified in your own home’ – Residents frustrated at further report delays
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/381442/piha-flooding-if-it-s-raining-you-re-terrified-in-your-own-home-residents-frustrated-at-further-report-delays
“We don’t just need more houses in NZ, we need SAFE livable houses that are designed to be immune to climate change,”
Not sure if that is possible really.
The Piha flooding is highlighting very real issues. I’m so sorry for those people.
CC events will lead to no rebuild, and worse longer decision making processes as people protect their arse. insurance is gonna be hit and miss with a lot of misses.
There is plenty that can be done and much of the current gormless planning is making it worse especially in Auckland where planners allow properties to run over building to non permeable surfaces more often than not against the rules as a matter of course, (normally for additional parking), houses are getting bigger with more parking, more tarsal everywhere and trees and non permeable grass areas being removed constantly for more roads, and ash felt, (which is then dug up constantly every time someone runs a utility line or changes the pavements and roads which in Auckland is constantly dug up and modified and often for no real reason apart from someone got a lucrative contract to do it), destruction, etc…
There is absolutely zero point building badly designed houses that some poor home owner who has done nothing wrong is then forced to rent while paying a mortgage of a property that is unliveable while the developers and their ‘experts’ get rich on the process of NZ famous, overpriced and poorly designed and built buildings.
Even worse those same home owners are then expected to pay higher rates to pay for the developer/council/BRANZ messes like leaky building syndrome, all designed to increase inequality.
Then they decide to add that extra taxes for the ordinary person just in the last year in Auckland we have petrol taxes, new rates on the rates for new builds passed onto the owner which used to be paid by the devloper, fees if you rent our your house short term…. etc etc
That’s just last year new taxes in Auckland, what are they planning when the shit hits the fan with the next ‘leaky building’ lots with bad resource consents that they ‘relaxed’ while not building the affordable houses, and instead McMansions everywhere…
Absolutely. Design can go a long way to alleviating all sorts of concerns. Solar roofs to take pressure off the power grid and owners utility bills; rain gardens and roof collection to take pressure off storm water systems and water supplies; passive heating and cooling to take pressure off utilities and utility bills, and the health system; tree planting to lower the urban heat island effect, add aesthetic beauty, clean air, habitat, shelter, and food; aspect to utilise solar angles…
Instead we have a box aligned with the other boxes aligned with the road. A very expensive box. A box we need to plug into and pay for all our water, power and food on top of the exorbitant rents/mortgages. Many of these boxes are shoddy nonsense requiring large power inputs to be at all comfortable.
Many of these boxes are supermarket friendly, power company friendly, oil transport friendly, keeping you dependent friendly, and bank friendly.
People and environment friendly?
Wasn’t in the design.
100% support SAVENZ well honestly said.
The hopeless dosile ‘Environment Court’ is owned by the Corporate industry.
So it should be dismantled and the (PCE) ‘Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’ must be givem more poower to change Government poicy before we are all ‘sunk’ opps – sorry for the pun!!!
We need CHEAP houses that cost less to repair/replace/insure.
@Gabby, I agree but that is not what is being built in Auckland, the opposite is being built and what the planners are consenting based on the political and economic and market driven ‘third way’ (aka Rogernomics/Kiwibuild/Thatcherism) models of building big houses for profit and then making the state pay in weird deals a premium and then still not delivering any houses worthwhile while selling/swapping off land into private hands .
Well the council don’t want cheap houses built. They’re happy to squeeze the poor until the pips squeak.
If you want weird weather patterns look at the flooding in Townsville right now. This time last we were up there and the place was exactly as per it’s usual name ‘Brownsville’. Dry and hot.
This year the monsoonal trough is way further south than normal, and the place is inundated. At one point they got 300mm of rain in 4 hours. And there’s forecast for the same conditions for another week:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-01/townsville-as-flooding-emergency-continues-man-missing/10768656
And in addition … a new record:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-01/australian-weather-hottest-month-on-record-in-january/10769392
Come on Red, it’s called “Clownsville, AJ Town” never heard of Brownsville. But mind you when I did the RAAF’s Combat Survival Cse, the Arid phase was cut short as we were barely making or producing a enough water let alone to survive on and Jungle solo phase was cut short for the lack of water as well. That was about 15yrs ago btw.
Yes it’s interesting that the Monsoon tough is a lot further Sth than usual and it arrived a mth and half late than usual as well. Darwin has recorded its direst Jan since records began. Parts of the Darwin rural area and out at my bush block, we are were just below the median level for rain in Jan and it’s even worst past Katherine and to the west towards WA.
Some Central and Nth Australia Cattle producers are already thinking of reducing their herds and other farmers are already thinking about reducing their crops and fruit because the lack of water from this years Wet season on current trends. If people down Sth and up here in Darwin are already complaining about the cost of meat, veggies and fruit? Then wait until after the Nth wet season, if fails to bring the rains and then it’s going to get interesting for a lot of people.
Its a well known thing that men seem to delay going to the doctor more that women do. The stark reality of the consequences of that became all to real yesterday when I was informed my best freind who isn’t even 40 yet has cancer. The mind numbing reality of that is the lymphoma growing on him was first noticed 8 months ago. He has other symptoms that suggests it’s spread that in themselves should have resulted in a doctors visit, but no. His partner even booked him in a month or so ago but he didnt turn up.
Why?
His childhood was crap, his father was absent, his mother was useless with kids to different dads and never worked a day in her life. He often comments about having to raise himself. He’s extremely paranoid about child abusers and wants to murder them all, so although he never says anything happened to him I’m suspicious. He failed completely in school, is illiterate. Witnessed his best freind standing next to him being shot dead by his brother as a teenager. A continuously drinking, sober alcoholic. Drug addict that like the alcoholism he has never been able to stop despite many attempts. Cigarettes and weed, that he can’t stop as well. His high is reckless driving, and motorcycle riding recently loosing his licence, again.
To me there’s just so many indicators of contempt for his own life, that the whole picture is just one of suicidle behavour.
That’s sad. If we want to get better functioning and mentally well people in NZ it helps if they are cared for and protected as children.
That is such a painful tragic life story DJ (4). Very sad indeed.
Evidence children need to be lovingly nurtured from birth and made to feel worthy throughout their lives.
Let’s hope your friend is able to access the means to address both his mental and physical health issues ASAP, before both situations deteriorate even further.
DJ, I am really sorry to hear about your friend. Life can be so unfair at times and he certainly has been landed with a very short straw through no fault of his own. I can understand him not going to the doctor. Many people do the same and put off doing so when medical problems occur. I have no doubt that he will be hurting emotionally at present, as you obviously are. Hopefully he is now getting some support both physically and emotionally through people such as the Cancer Society, local hospice services etc; but I am sure that you will be there for him and his partner etc, as only a best friend can be. kia kaha to you all.
Much love and support to your friend, his good fortune is having you in his life, well done for being there for him and not giving up on him.
Re motorcycle riding, it’s a way for him to release steam so to speak.
Has he got a dirt bike and safety gear?
Hard to lose a license off road, and blasting up and down steep dirt tracks is a hell of a rush. Just a thought….and it’s a heap of fun building jumps out of dirt and stuff. No idea if it’s possible to do such for him, just a thought that’s all.
Being proud of something in ones life helps so much, positive encouragement, support and a bit of direction is massively helpful. Least it has been in my experience.
It’s scary going to the Dr, sometimes we know in our minds what’s happening, but as soon as a health professional verbalises it, sometimes that is what causes the pain. Support person at the Dr’s visit maybe?
Fingers crossed this well being budget will bring the help that so many need.
PS… important for all to know the signs of possible suicide, I really think more people could help each other then. Mental health as a subject should be just as important as PE at school.
https://www.health.govt.nz/your-health/conditions-and-treatments/mental-health/preventing-suicide
I truly feel for you DJ.
Watching a mate in pain is amongst the hardest things to endure.
FWIW, I can suggest being there to listen when (and if) he wants to talk.
Just listening, don’t feel burdened that you must solve anything.
Best of luck mate.
DJW
You conveyed this story very well. I’ve encountered more than a few similar men in the same shitty place myself.
You nail it in your last para:
To me there’s just so many indicators of contempt for his own life,
And given this truth, why would it be surprising if at least some of these men then treat the lives of those around them with equal contempt?
I think a lot depends on personality as to how this contempt manifests; it can be inwardly directed as high risk or suicidal behaviour, or outwardly directed as abuse and violence toward others. The behaviour we can see is different, but the root cause is much the same.
The Dunedin Longitudinal Study said a lot about this; that depending on innate personality those children whom they term “poorly controlled”, who were also abused as children between the ages of 4 and 8, were the ones most likely to be in prison as adult offenders.
This response to a suggestion that dogs should be banned from beaches because they are harassing and killing vulnerable protected birds I think reflects the anomic,
uncaring, immature and irresponsible attitude of a majority of NZs, probably men particularly.
…. who was braving the inclement weather in Christchurch to take Reba for a walk along Waimairi beach, thought a ban would be a terrible idea.
“The dog catches rabbits but birds, we don’t really see a lot, seagulls stuff like that but I don’t think there’s a massive risk. The birds probably move somewhere else… let the dogs run.”
… – who was taking Izza for a stroll at South Brighton beach – was similarly unimpressed with the idea of a ban.
“Bollocks, pretty much. There’s very few birds nesting around this area. It’s a good call to try to save the birds and everything but as far as me walking my dog in the morning, yeh I’m not interested in anybody telling me I can’t.”
Ōamaru now rakes in thousands of tourist dollars every year thanks to the Little Blue penguins that call its harbour home.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/378218/call-for-ban-on-dog-walkers-along-coastlines-with-little-penguins
Just a little sexism there but I’ll let it slide.
Some mansplianing.
I’ve spent many long hours hunting possums with my now deceased dog Bud and in my youth with a duck hunting dog named Bear. If you think dogs can’t hunt out birds and do it by instinct you don’t know what your talking about. With Bear we could go into an area and off the dog would go. It would often return with a duck without us even having to fire our gun. Bud would naturally find Turkey nests, and flush pheasants.
What’s needed in these situations is a class where the dog is taught not to go near the Penguins. The same class as they do for Kiwi and dogs in the bush. So yes walk your dog on the beach. It’s good for the person and the dog but a simple solution exists. Do the class, get a tag on the collar, all good.
Or get together with Doc, dog experts and create a class.
Or, keep your dog on a leash in public.
“reflects the anomic, uncaring, immature and irresponsible attitude of a majority of NZs”.
Sure – and if you’re not like that you’ll be written off as ‘PC’.
The rot runs very deep now.
We perhaps need a new setting for being a decent, good NZer. I feel that I might look for the traits of the good tradesmen I have come across as I get my old car ‘up to speed’ for a wof. Some repairs needed and I know I am lucky to be talking to people who are honest, practical, helpful – good attitudes.
Then there are those working at the coalface helping people who are struggling to get above the poor conditions facing the low or no-waged who have limited opportunities. I put these at a higher setting of value to those with money who hand out little bits of charity when it suits. Or those who have jobs who stride around in the right clothes and a confident manner handing out advice and threats for non-compliance.
https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/reports/tswstudy/v2chap2.pdf
NZ is allowing 63 tonne laden weight trucks on our rural unsealed roads and all local roads an highways with no concrete under-bases setting us up for a financial disaster in future as we will go bankrupt paying for roads maintenance by pouring money down the back of Steven Joyce’s dream of a tar sealed NZ where trucks can roam everywhere.
US/Canada have reinforced concrete under-based roads to carry trucks up to 62.5 tonnes or 155 000 pounds weight.
The truth is out about our NZ substandard ‘soft roads’ that is unable to withstand the new heavier trucks now on our roads and the video shown demonstrates that when these 63 tonne trucks laden travel along our sub-standard roads such as all our regional and local roads the engineers capture the time that these roads just stretch and buckle and separate like a squashed orange on the road, causing the surface of the road to break into pieces that are then picked up by other truck tyres and removed from the road surface leaving the road with no tar seal so we are witnessing the wholesale wrecking of our roads by heavy laden trucks now causing us billions in costs to repair the road until inside three months the roads are wrecked again and needing new surfacing.
We must return to rail to use ‘train freight’ or go bankrupt.
https://www.tmr.qld.gov.au/business-industry/Heavy-vehicles
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-some-roads-have-a-weight-limit
The end game is to place reinforced concrete bases under the roads to carry the 63 tonne trucks and that is being done all over the world including US/Canada and Europe.
US/Canadian limits of truck weights on their roads with concrete under-bases are 33 tonnes to 62.5 tonnes or 80 000 lbs to 150 000lbs.
NZ is allowing 63 tonne laden weight trucks on our rural unsealed roads and all local roads and highways with no concrete under-bases setting us up for a financial disaster in future as we will go bankrupt paying for roads maintenance by pouring money down the back of Steven Joyce’s dream of a tar-sealed NZ where trucks can roam everywhere.
Single Axle, Tandem Axle and Gross Weight Limits
Fourteen States have a single axle limit greater than the Federal standard of 20,000 pounds on
the Interstate. Off the Interstate, 17 States have limits greater than the Federal limit and three
States are below the Federal limit.
Fifteen States have a tandem axle limit greater than the Federal limit of 34,000 pounds on the
Interstate. On the non-Interstate State system, 21 States have limits greater than 34,000 pounds and two states are below the Federal limit.
Four States have grandfather rights to exceed 80,000 pounds on the Interstate. On non-Interstate State highways,
18 States have a GVW limit higher than 80,000 pounds. Alternatively, five States have GVWs less than 80,000 pounds on some of their non-Interstate highways.
“Routine” Permit Limits for a 5-axle unit there are 28 different permitted maximum GVW limits ranging from 80,000 pounds to 155,000 pounds. The mode value (the value that occurs most frequently) is 100,000 pounds and occurs in seven States.
For any number of axles there are 25 different
maximum permitted GVW limits (the mode value is 120,000 pounds and occurs in ten States).
For single axles there are 16 different limits ranging from 13,000 pounds to 32,000 pounds.
For tandem axles there are 17 different limits ranging from 26,000 pounds to 64,000 pounds.
http://www2.ku.edu/~iri/publications/HighwayDamageCosts.pdf
2.1.1 Heavy-Vehicle Impact on Pavement Damage Commonly identified pavement distress associated with heavy vehicles can be characterized as fatigue cracking and rutting. On rigid pavements damage includes transverse cracking, corner breaking, and cracking on the wheel paths. Flexible pavements and granular roads are most susceptible to rutting. In all cases, cracking and rutting increase pavement roughness and reduce pavement life.
+1 cleangreen, not only is the cost of other’s paying for the trucks wrecking the roads when the trucks should have to pay to fix their destruction, there is also the problem of the congestion and length of time it takes when the maintenance people somehow manage to take months to fix up the roads.
Whenever you talk to anybody they despair at how the same roads are dug up again and again for maintenance while other roads are pot holed and not sealed or barely repaired…
It is not so much money in NZ but a culture of corruption and incompetence in that area. Shown by how Fletchers were so incompetent they lost money during the building boom, but expected to make up for their incompetence through road maintenance contracts that are so over priced that incompetent companies can keep going through the rorting of this lucrative activity throughout NZ.
If i had time I might think up a good verse to cleangreen’s comment “where trucks can roam everywhere”.
The best i can do off the cuff.
Oh give me a home, where truck’s do not roam,
And the kids can play anywhere.
Where seldom is heard
A discouraging word,
And the politicians
Come here and stay.
+1000 cleangreen….and Labour is doing…wait for it….nothing.
Excellent article and food for thought in particular the winning strategy of China to go from a low supply chain to a high value supply chain and BUY UP the supply as part of their success.
You can see how successful this strategy is in NZ where Chinese interests are buying up the supply chains here in particular in agriculture and natural resources like farms and water, and how NZ might be increasing our exports but are getting poorer as a country under our pavlov type ‘free trade’ which in NZ seems to be more about ‘thick trade’ than ‘free trade’. Who trades to get poorer and gives away in real terms natural resources like water and sand for a song, only to buy it back at extreme profit to an overseas firm?
NZ has moved the opposite way to China and going from a high value supply chain to a low value supply chain through government and official stupidity and lack of long term strategy here…
https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2019/02/01/guest-blog-rod-oram-nz-in-internationalised-supply-chains/
“The next factor is that China’s role in this is changing fundamentally. There are some great studies on this. Not the least is one by Standard Chartered Bank some three years ago. China is moving incredibly fast, from being a source of low-cost components for other people’s value chains to being a relatively high cost country. For example, it’s far more expensive to manufacture something in Shanghai than it is in Michigan. So they are moving very fast to build up their own value and supply chains around the world, of which the high value part of the chain is in China. Surrounding countries like Vietnam become the low-cost suppliers. It is interesting to see the US starting to articulate how it’s trying to do bilaterals with the likes of Vietnam to try to disrupt that process. Clearly, this asymmetry of supply chains, whereby greater benefit flows to a few players and less to the rest, is becoming a more marked feature of international trade.”
To simplify things SNZ, it has been, & is, by and largely the buying up of private interests (mostly National networked ones) that have embedded themselves in the public sector areas.
That comes back to the lack of a systemic dynamic demand and supply NZ lobbying system. It’s probably a constituitional issue ultimately related to the integration of democracy.
The Chinese, while their internal demand and supply is extremely top down rigid, it is also very much a unified lobbying system when it comes to it’s external imperialism in contrast to say the corruption inherent in it’s internal communistic demand and supply against the dynamisms of it’s own markets.
I think the well being budget approach incorporates a good start to grappling with this issue’s systemics, in that it can organically start to remove the magic numbers of false wealth gains out of the system enabling a clearer picture to emerge of what is going on & which will create movement to co-operative solutions that are more democratic (see 2nd sentence) and thus having more relative strength about them.
We’ll be taxed for the Chinese loans borrowed to fix the roads ruined by raw materials bound for China. Win win win, for China.
We already pay much higher interest rates than China, and many of the other countries that we trade with are able to out bid Kiwis and have the advantage of lower interest rates. At one point they were taxing savings in Japan aka you had to pay to put money in the bank! Here in NZ, although historically low interest rates, it is still much higher in NZ than other countries have to pay for interest rates and probably easier to manipulate our currency being a small nation to maximise profits.
““An 82-year-old woman believes a trio of the unruly tourists scammed her out of almost $9000, claiming they would fix her roof but left a hole in her ceiling….
Leonard (the 82 year old woman) told Newshub that she recognised one of the three from the rowdy British tourist group when she saw photos……”
And now:
“Two British men are set to be charged with fraud by police investigating a series of alleged roofing scams in Auckland.”
Wonder if they were part of those pesky rowdy tourists?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12199950
Maybe just put up a sign, scammers come to NZ, they can join the already full troops of arrivals in the courts… of course in NZ we tend to just take the losses and be grateful for any cash dished out from fraudsters and dishonesty operating here, in this case the person is offering to settle LESS than the amount owed.
Wonder why with people being better off with committing crimes it is continuing to skyrocket… and why our justice system does not seek to penalise clearly so send a message to other fraudsters…
https://courtnews.co.nz/2019/01/30/tax-bill-ballooning-to-1-3m/
Wonder how many other restaurants went out of business while those that got the untaxed meat profited…
The Herald and Stuff are publishing that the cost of tax creep in 2017 was $1.7B .
I am not sure this can be credible given the total income tax take is $30B and this is over 5%.
Fake news from our MSM print media, surely not?
Tax on other income at your marginal tax rate, interest, shares etc
You are right with your surly not , paranoid maybe about msm ?
Bridges said it would involve $650M in the first year, so why both the Herald and the Dominion Post mislead with the figure of $1.7B for last year is inexplicable.
Absolutely right even taking the $0.7B on offer this is pure sophistry by Bridges and people are buying it because the media are selling it as a “really good and ‘obvious'” idea. About 650k-700k will get $15 and likely lose a bit of WFF, those under $50k get about a paltry $2 per week but I doubt they realise this and if National follows through with its 2017 intention to remove the Independent Earners rebate of $10 per week they are far worse off. Just as are those who just sucked it up in 2011 when National took $520 per year back in Kiwisaver contributions, The “paper boys and girls” that the National Party imposed taxes on will get nothing.
In among all the bad news, here is an inspiring one. And very, very cool …
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-01/sofia-flying-telescope-occultation-chasing-shadow-titan/10635802
Definitely cool, but the link looks like they’re using some special ceremony to invoke Cronus back into existence 🙂
LOL … it does too!
Thanks RedLogix. A Brilliant presentation. The technology which allows such precision is vast. And Titan might be inhabitable?
With such high level science what is missing from the human condition which doesn’t seem to fully engage with the needs of our own planet?
Being identical macca?
And now openly exposed by Greenpeace as a purchaser of an unprincipled, turncoat opportunist for sale to the highest bidder, posing as a politician.
While unprincipled politicians like Shane Jones still peddle their influence to dangerous oil corporations and exploitative fishing companies.
Fears rise ‘world’s most dangerous glacier’ could be on the verge of collapse as NASA study reveals gigantic cavity two-thirds the area of Manhattan and almost 1,000 feet tall at base of Thwaites Glacier in Antarctica
Male no mistake, this is a make or break moment for the Coalition Government
Will the Prime Minister act, as she clearly must, according to the Cabinet Manual?
Or will she bow to corporate pressure, to let their hireling continue to peddle his poisonous influence inside the government and cabinet?
Will Winston Peters back the Prime Minister’s decision to expel Shane Jones from the Cabinet?
Or will Peters use this opportunity as an excuse to break the government?
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2019/02/shane-jones-in-hot-water-over-support-for-talley-s-accused-of-illegal-fishing.html
A serial offender
Make no mistake this is a fight for the soul of this government.
Who will blink first?
If Winston Peters decides to make a stand on behalf of Jones, will the Prime Minister call his bluff?
Will Jacinda Adern fight for her leadership?
And if necessary, in the face of Peters possible refusal to back down, threaten to put it to the country?
An election that in my opinion the Prime Minister would handily win, returning to the treasury benches with a weakened NZ First and a strengthened Green Party
All the cards are in the Prime Minister’s hands.
Will she play them, or quietly try to paper over the cracks only to have them blow apart at some later date when she is in a weaker position?
Will the Prime Minister concede, or make a stand?
Jones has to go, and Peters needs to accept it.
Even if Peters threatens to pull the house down, the Prime Minister must stand her ground, or be forever lost. Instead of the great leader she is otherwise destined to be.
Shane Jones. It doesn’t look good when looking at his work on fishing while in his new ministerial position. Cosseting fishing companies which are falling off their charts of legal fishing locations as Jenny has sat up late into the early morning documenting.
It doesn’t look good in Gisborne, when he organises more tree planting but the locals don’t see signs of better roads, and improved port facilities to handle present logs, much less those from the future of fast-growing radiata. (I put up comment about this.)
What a pity. All the practical men liked his no-nonsense manly style. An honest broker they thought. Someone who can see problems and bite them to size.
Looks like he is swallowing a rat instead.
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
Thank you Eco Maori, one of my all time favourites!
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Here you go Whanau when a group of White Collar Crim,s are caught with the hands in peoples pockets stealing off people they are ASKED TO BE NICE TO THERE customer,s When A poor person blue Collar gets caught they get thrown in jail there right taken away the media kicks the story around for weeks and our minor cultures mana gets eroded away. I have told you its a illusion that the so called( professionail upper classes have the 97. % well being at Heart ) YEA RIGHT . We have to be viglant and make them KNOW we expect them to use the power of rule to treat all kiwis respectfully and that means stop ripping US OFF And stop letting there M8 OFF THE HOOK
They got away with it again.
Executives and board members of New Zealand’s life insurers will be quietly breathing heavy sighs of relief this morning, just as their colleagues in the banking industry did last year.
Many work for the same companies or are in partnership. And many know exactly what being exposed in public for their wrongdoing and punished in the court of public opinion looks like.
They only need to read Australia’s daily newspapers and watch the litany of sackings and share price slumps and public condemnation they see convulsing through the Australian life insurance and banking industries every day because of the ongoing Hayne Royal Commission into banking, superannuation and financial advice industries.
One New Zealand-based life insurer has been selling a life product to foreign customers, even though cover was only available to New Zealand residents. Another insurer incorrectly recorded customers’ dates of birth, due to manual errors, resulting in 30 customers being overcharged. That insurer is now in the process of refunding those affected customers, the FMA and RBNZ said without naming the company.
Another incorrectly calculated the impact of a consumer price index-linked premium increase by up to 30 times. In all, 223 customers were over-charged. That problem was discovered in 2015 but the insurer didn’t contact those customers, instead relying on them to complain. Three years after the event, that insurer had failed to remediate 111 of the affected customers.
The review found examples of insurers failing to cancel old policies when a customer transferred to a new policy and continuing to charge premiums on both policies. It found insurers which failed to notify policyholders of premium increases.
The FMA took the same approach to a review it released in July when it said three of the 11 life insurance companies were responsible for behaviour so bad that it was considering taking regulatory action against them. It turns out that after follow-up inquiries, the FMA decided further action was unwarranted. Again, we’ll never know what went on.
We are expected to wait and trust the FMA and the Reserve Bank will look after consumers’ interests in the quiet time after the report. Their past record is not inspiring.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant
It’s clear from reading the report that the FMA and the Reserve Bank are most concerned about the reputation of the industry and its financial soundness, rather than the interests of consumers.
Repeatedly, and as identified in this chart below, the industry has over-charged premiums and got away with unacceptable behaviour because its products are complicated and they can rely on many to just set and forget their policies.
Simply asking them to be nice won’t work. They are beholden to their own shareholders and the employment agreements that incentivise them to go for the highest profits in the shortest term. Only the fear of career-ending exposure, fines and prison terms will change that. Ka kite ano links below
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2019/01/29/420889/another-big-fat-and-wet-bus-ticket
Eco Maori Video for thee above post.
Kia ora Newshub ecoli in the Waiarapa water doesn’t look good that’s why I say our society needs to respect Wai much more than we do.
WAR IS FOR NEANDERTHAL.they cannot even account for %25 of their War budget spending ??????????.
Towns villa flooding condolences to all the people who have been hit by the flooding.
Alcohol causes big problem for OUR society I read a article that stated that alcohol sugar and prosessed food cause more damage to our society than drugs there you go the 00.1 %.
I quite admire Indian culture for the way they care about their Wild life what’s a couple of humans compared to the Havoc that we rage against our wild life Eco Maori say any were else the leopard would have been KILLED.
That’s shocking that mother in Britain FGM cutting her 3 year old daughter genital the reason is beyond me.
Tracey is doing a awesome job looking after all those abandoned chihuahua dogs but that’s not for Eco the Mokopunas tire me out in 3 days.
Tutankhamen is a awesome Egyptian that culture shows Eco Maori that we have forgotten more great technology than we know that’s why we should all ways respect and houner Ones Tipuna. I seen a story that Egypt was a matriarch society back in those days
Racism is shocking all around Papatuanukue. Ka kite ano
Kia R&R The neanderthal alt right shonky don’t want common people to be able to stay at home a care and education our children. They want to keep the common people that busy just trying to keep the Waka afloat we have no time to see the cheating moves they make against us. It also limits our participation in elections. We had one parent at home to care for our tamariki but that was when times were much easier than at the minute. I know of people working long hours and are treading water. That’s why I Back Jim Bolger, s new employment laws and what do you know ECO MAORI cannot find the story on the Internet today a controlled society is what we live in.
Ka kite ano P.S Well Come back to the Internet SAMOANS Ki kaha Eco Maori Tau Tokos the greatest contribution Wahine give to our society’s
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
We have to change from $ to counting good stars as $ gives the evil people to much power to CRAP on OUR Papatuanuku. We only have ONE PAPATUANUKU
Who said that one group of people can make there wages hundreds times higher than the group that makes the money the majority and make our wages a pittance.
We are the majority in a TRUE Democratic society the laws would be made to be good for the many that is not happening so who is cheating in everyway they can the 00.1% are ripping the many off thats a FACT . Back Jim Bolgers new employment laws with all you have got Tangata whenua and minority cultures if you want a better future for te mokopuna,s
Jim Bolger: New Zealand’s low productivity to blame for poor wages
The Government’s been handed a set of fair pay guidelines to set minimum standards across an industry or occupation.
The working group report was headed up by former National Prime Minister Jim Bolger.
It recommends workers be able to trigger a fair pay agreement if they can reach a threshold of 1000 workers, or 10 percent of workers in a specific sector or job.
Bolger told Larry Williams that this was devised to help the working poor who are struggling the most by increasing their pay packets.
“We have more and more families relying on welfare even if they are in full time employment. The system allows them to be on very low wages even if they work a 40 hour week.”
He says that it’s not much different to how the minimum wage is enshrined in law.
Bolger says they never looked at compulsory unionism, which he scrapped when he was Prime Minister.
“We shouldn’t scare people on this. What we’re saying is there are issues out there, there are problems out there, why don’t we sensibly look at how we resolve them?”
He says they looked at multiple other countries for innovative ideas, but none of their models worked in the New Zealand, forcing them to come up with their own interpretation. Ka kite ano Links below
https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/larry-williams-drive/audio/jim-bolger-new-zealands-low-productivity-to-blame-for-poor-wages/
Speaker Nancy Pelosi stands with House Democrats to re-introduce the Paycheck Fairness Act. Photograph: Yuri Gripas/Reuters
Equal pay requires honest discussions
The gender pay gap, as every right-thinking person knows, is a feminist myth. Those figures you’ve seen about white women earning around 80% of what white men make, and black women earning just 61%, are probably wrong. And if they’re not, then, as many conservatives have pointed out, there are rational explanations for the disparity. Such as the fact that, as Jordan Peterson has explained, women are just more agreeable than men, meaning they don’t ask for more money. Which is a very agreeable explanation if you don’t want to confront structural inequality.
Women swear sometimes – let’s get the hell over it
Arwa Mahdawi
While many on the right insist the gender pay gap doesn’t exist, they also appear keen to block legislation that would strengthen equal pay protection and make it easier for employees to share wage information. Which would appear to be a contradictory position. As congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted on Wednesday “If ‘the wage gap is a myth’ as some allege, then workplaces should have no problem with workers disclosing our salaries with one another.
Ocasio-Cortez’s tweet followed a news conference in which she, along with other Democrats, re-introduced the Paycheck Fairness Act, which strives to close the gender wage gap by giving women tools to challenge unequal pay. For example, it would stop employers retaliating against workers who discuss their salaries with each other. The bill was first introduced in 1997, but has been repeatedly blocked by Republicans.
While the pay gap has narrowed since 1980, not much progress has been made in the last 15 years. Arguably, one reason for this is the lack of transparency around pay. Most of us don’t know how much our colleagues make, which makes it easier for companies to ignore the issue. Indeed, Lean In’s 2018 Black Women’s Equal Pay Survey found that 50% of Americans aren’t aware of pay gap between black and white women, and hiring managers are also ignorant of the disparity.Ka kite ano Links below. P.S Wahine deserve to be respected and all payed the same as MAN
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/02/if-the-gender-pay-gap-is-a-feminist-myth-then-why-not-disclose-salaries
Kia ora R&R Waiata is a good tool that have many uses and one is to protest about injustices that have been dished out to Tangata Whenua O Aoteoroa for the last 250 years by the settlors .
The other use,s for maori is recording history boost ones mana and wairua mauri educate tangata unite tangata .
One could create a great tangata whenua waiata artist that,s is known all around Papatuanuku and one doesn’t have to invent the wheel to do this just be smart we have the tallent in Maori society .
The 00.1 % have made it so we are to busy to protest or to vote to busy rowing one own waka to servive and have know time to protest and they scrapped free education to stop that phenomenon.
Ka kite ano
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
Kia ora Newshub Townsville North Queens land has had extreme rain and flooding our scientists priditived that.
Ralph Northem should step DOWN from his Vigina governors office because of that old shocking photo of him in that racist yearbook. $100 million is cool for Maori business growth on Maori land but I still want to see Jim Bolgers new Employment laws that will deliver billions to the lower classes.
Nice one Stue Muir that’s a name of olden time in Aotearoa it’s cool you are regeneration the mangrove mash land that are the filters of the whenua on your farm land .
That’s a happy end to the story of bubbles the chihuahua being found an is safe and sound being returned to it owner in Hamilton hospital. Ka kite ano
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
Some Eco Maori music for the minute been studying history
A new study says that hydrogen fuel for vehicles and businesses is unlikely in the foreseeable future – in spite of Government financial support for private company research.
Simon Coates, director of Concept Consulting, said converting electricity or gas to power a fleet of hydrogen trucks would take more than three times more energy than using electricity and batteries.
His report was jointly funded by Contact Energy, the Energy Efficiency Conservation Authority, First Gas, Meridian Energy, Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment, and Powerco. “Most of the technologies involved in hydrogen production and use are mature and well understood, because they have been used at scale for many decades to support industrial processes such as synthetic fertiliser manufacture. Other hydrogen technologies, such as fuel cells, were discovered many decades ago but have not yet been applied at scale.”
The report said it may be possible to reduce hydrogen production costs during periods of low electricity prices, but this would require more renewable power stations to be built.
Almost three times more renewable energy was required to power a hydrogen vehicle than an electric vehicle, and approximately twice as much renewable energy was required to fuel a hydrogen boiler or heater, compared with an electric boiler or heat pump.
The report is available here Ka kite ano links below
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/110350993/cost-of-hydrogen-power-remains-biggest-hurdle-for-widespread-use-says-new-study