do what they did last year, hunt them, donate to foodbanks etc. I am sure the many many food insecure people in NZ would love to get a nice slab of meet for free.
Unfortunately the wild market has been buggered by covid, Germans aren't going out for dinner and China has prohibited the sale of wild meat. Both factors have also knocked the stuffing out of farmed venison prices as well. Currently the only market for wild game, apart from a few niche suppliers to restaurants, is for pet food and you've got to have everything going your way to make any money out of that.
Would be good if a protocol was developed to allow sale of game meat through butchers. If it's ok to give it away through food banks it should be able to be sold on the open market.
More than 18,000 families throughout New Zealand will be able to enjoy hearty meals thanks to a donation of free-range Fiordland venison.
The challenges created by the Covid-19 pandemic created the perfect opportunity for the foundation to trial an idea they’d been discussing for years, Sloan said.
The Fiordland Wapiti Foundation was the only recreational hunting group in New Zealand that managed deer on conservation land, he said, and it was important for the ecosystem.
“We understand that if you shoot a deer in Fiordland, the herd can replace it in four to five years, but if that deer damages the forest, it can take generations to recover,” Sloan said.
The foundation typically sends its carcasses to Canterbury for processing, before exporting the meat.
just call it free range. 🙂
Heck i would have it. Its better then what you can get in any supermarket.
Are you suggesting that Sabine @ 1.1 and others above are "incorrect" when suggesting that the distribution of wild venison to food banks etc last year did not happen?
Perhaps you should check your facts before hitting your keyboard.
Here is a generic Google search link to "wild venison food banks nz" providing a whole range of links to media reports on the distribution of 18000 kg of the wild deer meat last year to food banks and other charities here in NZ –
Pet food supply was in media recently, supply chain issues apparently. Turning pests into petfood is good ecological sense even if it doesn't get a gold standard for economics. It can't be that hard to at least supplement the money spent on conservation with income streams such as this.
I guarantee you that instead of government both local and national turning the exploding population of deer in this country into a job ,money,and environmental win they will just turn it into a tax burden that wastes a quality resource. By poisoning them and culling with out extraction.
That would be extremely sad, and in a country with lots of hungry people or people so poor tha they could not even afford a crap cut of meat it would be pure wastage. I hope they will do what they did last year, organise one big hunt, and donate the processed goods to marae and foodbanks. heck, train youngsters who to butcher some game. Skills for life. .
bwaghorn Very likely – the Semmelweis outcome. (He was a man with a good idea, which was tested as a success and saved lives, but the PTB were disturbed that he was changing the status quo without a complete dossier on why and how and ordered him not to proceed further.)
Up until about 10 years ago I or any other good old boy or girl could pot a deer and as long as the liver heart and head where attached trundle down to the local chiller and top their income up , jobs in out of the way places,pest control,and cash in the community, 1080 got picked up due in a carcase to a dick head jumping the wrong boundary,so instead of putting in place a way to stop that they just killed the trade dead.
It is interesting that a government that can live with the fouling of our drinking water from various gunk, is so concerned at one example of something going wrong and someone getting sick. With that sort of safety concern we shouldn't let men go out with rifles at all.
We shouldn't let people go tramping and have them call up our expensive helicopter service when they twist their ankle or get lost. The way that health and safety contracts are drawn up seems to indicate that prevention of any injury is a must for the employee/manager involved. I presume that is why the feral deer market was closed – safety?
In Germany you have a system where meat that was not meant to be butchered aka road kill etc, can be sold publicly at the Freibank. My family used to get their meat there, and was very unhappy when the last one in our town closed. Essentially it was mainly roadkill, animals that were not meant to be butchered but had to be killed, all sorts of meat horse, dear, boar, etc.
An interesting article here from 1911 outlines the rules.
For those interested in a bit of culinary history the above link is awesome to read. Who knew we ate dog in Germany in 1911. I did not.
But this system of a cheap meat butchery of meat that otherwise would not be used, and it could be pests, game etc, to be used solely by people of no means would not go amiss in certain towns where food insecurity and hunger is an issue.
As far as i know all Freibanks in Germany are closed as meat got plentyful and cheap.
I believe and this is anicdata that the traces of 1080 were picked up in wild venison after arriving in Germany, bit of a fuck up but surely an avoidable problem .
ome passengers on board three flights to New Zealand caught up in the Brisbane International Airport Covid-19 green zone breach have been told to immediately isolate.
The Ministry of Health was last night advised by the Queensland health authorities of an upgraded risk for some passengers on board three flights that left Brisbane airport on Thursday afternoon.
Brisbane International Airport was announced a "venue of concern" today after a passenger, who had travelled from Papua New Guinea and mingled with passengers bound for New Zealand, tested positive to Covid-19.
Almost 400 passengers who flew to New Zealand from Brisbane have potentially been exposed to the virus.
Surely there is a really innocent explanation, like Covid, emergency, blablablablah ……………..
The new features wanted by the ministry included a national booking system, with a website where people could "see their vaccination status, receive invitations and reminders to get immunised and have the ability to record adverse reactions".
Each vaccination would need to be easily recorded to assist with tracking and tracing of previous Pfizer doses.
In late October last year, the Ministry of Health awarded a $38m contract to Deloitte and Salesforce to deliver the new NIS, with an additional $5.4m per year over the system's first four years of operation. Deloitte and Salesforce are supported by Amazon-owned Amazon Web Services and Salesforce-owned Mulesoft……………………..
Did Orion pitch for the work? McCrae said neither his company nor any other local or international contender could have put in a bid because "there was no tender"…………………….
The situation seemed some distances from “key service requirements” outlined in the business case document, including a simple web interface that could be used by members of the public to access their immunisation data, a secure system that binds multiple agencies, including those outside the public health system, and that serves as a “single source of truth for all immunisations”.
A Ministry of Health spokesperson said the DHB’s were using a mix of systems because while a basic version of the new Salesforce-based systems was ready, it did yet include booking functionality.”
It had always been part of the plan to add new functionality over the course of 2021.
“The national online booking system is being built on the same Salesforce platform as the CIR uses but with an additional plug-in called Skedulo [made by an Australian company of the same name],” the MoH spokeswoman said.
“This platform has been successfully used internationally for similar booking systems. The system will be rolled out nationally in late May to support the ramping up of Covid-19 vaccinations, particularly as we move towards the middle of the year when the general population are able to access their vaccinations.
“The national online booking system will support and, in some instances, replace individual DHB booking systems.”
In McCrae’s view, the whole process is too slow, too complicated and too expensive.
“There’s a fair number at Orion who have been working on immunisations for a long time, and they’re just simply outraged how much money is being spent.”
This is trivial but I get really annoyed and have to vent when people re-write history… the review on stuff about The Handmaid's Tale said this…
Have June’s adventures in Gilead become the televisual equivalent of Groundhog Day? … the continuing perils of Offred/Ofjoseph/June (Elisabeth Moss) risk turning into Prison Break, The Fugitive or The Walking Dead, simply introducing new characters each season for her to butt up against, rather than progressing towards an ultimate tragedy or triumph.
The thing about The Fugitive is that it did have a definite end – It was a two part episode at the end of season 4. At the time it was the first series to have a definite end as the main actor signaled early that he wanted/needed to leave. Also, the final episode was the most watched episode of any tv series in the USA until the final episode of MASH sixteen years later – it had a similar social frisson as "who shot JR" on Dallas.
As an observer of The Fugitive from current times there are really four things that are interesting…
1) The show operates mostly amongst the working class as TF takes on whatever jobs are available. It shows the trials and tribulations of those at the bottom – govt contracts, unions, having to weather terrible bosses. At that time and following it was more typical to show the lives of the middle class and higher. This is probably the more interesting thing for this readership – 1960's working America looked recognisable whereas working life in the USA nowadays looks totally alien.
2) The story about a child of illegal immigrants born in the USA acquiring citizenship by birth, I suspect, had a major impact on illegal immigration to the USA.
3) The fear of teenagers (who were baby boomers at that time) – children are treated kindly but teenagers are treated as dangerous and troublesome. It was similar on Star Trek.
4) Black people were portrayed in very high social status jobs (doctor, diplomat).
(The acting was very patchy in a very 1960s way but David Janssen carried the cast along.)
One of my ideas is that among the retired etc there is a group in each town called the Friends of .. wherever, and they will take pride in their town and back up the authorities in different ways as volunteers which all unemployed people should do, for at least an hour a week – not taking support from government and putting little back – that's childlike.
The group would step in and weed, the hospital would shout them afternoon tea once a week, and it would be a good social and community thing. Some of the group would probably pick up somebody else to provide transport on their morning or afternoon on the job.
hey if the towns would hire all the unemployed people to fix the gardens, sweep the streets etc, that would be awesome. Suddenly all the people would have jobs, pay taxes and not try to survive on a beggars benefit, and then on the weekends they could volunteer for any charity they like to.
Or else what you are advocating is working for the a paid for benefit ‘aka the unemployment benefit’, which frankly should not be as you only get unemployment benefits when you can prove that you just lost a job, b. did nothing to deserve to have lost that job and c. have paid taxes for x amount of time.
One could say that unemployment benefits are actually an earned benefit courtesy of contributing at the very least 17.4 % and then up to 33 – 39% of ones wages to the upkeep of government and services.
So yeah, towns should hire people to keep their common grounds clean, and thus keep unemployment numbers low.
I don't really care about the part where Rimmer lied about not being able to buy properties (even though that is an insult to those who genuinely can't afford to buy a home and who help pay his wages) but the fact that he failed, apparently repeatedly, to declare these as pecuniary interests is cause for great concern.
Rimmer is a rules nerd so for him to claim ignorance does not wash.
Parliament has a register called the Register of Pecuniary and Other Specified Interests, in which MPs have to declare their interests
In February I voluntarily corrected my earlier returns, to declare interests in some properties and a Kiwisaver account. I had not declared these before, as an honest mistake
In reality I have no legally enforceable rights in any of the properties, being a discretionary beneficiary in other people’s trusts that own them, but Parliament’s rules ask that such interests be declared
I lived overseas when Kiwisaver was established, but was opted in as part of a second job upon return (having opted out on my main job). When I discovered this, I had to call AMP to get access to the account (my superannuation is through a separate scheme, which I declare)
I have not benefited from these ommisions, and nobody forced me to correct the record. Nobody had detected these omissions in the nearly seven years I’ve been a Member of Parliament, if I’d stayed silent it’s likely nobody ever would have. Correcting the record was an entirely voluntary choice
Everyone makes mistakes, the question is how you deal with them. I believe I’ve made the right choices, that ACT’s supporters would expect here.
Perhap we should be kinder to MPs for some minor errors and in less haste to make political attacks on the other side ??
i am Taken back by some comments that have been made including the post on this site on this topic when our PM has done something similar.
It’s been revealed the ANZ KiwiSaver scheme, in which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has money saved, has investments in companies which have supplied weapons to Saudi Arabia https://i.stuff.co.nz/business/300224963/air-nz-apologises-after-revelations-it-helped-saudi-arabian-military?rm=a
Our PM making commentary regarding Air NZ involvement with the saudis military and our PM having profited from the Saudi military doesn’t need me to drag her down her own actions have done that 🤭 but keep on being adjective and able to see all sides.
Always appreciate being channaged and reading balanced opinions.
On the sociopathic oink and his oozing, Bullington club entitlement and privilege.
A chronicler of the first Gilded Age, Fitzgerald would have seen Johnson for what he is. His novels are studded with just his type: men and women so thickly swaddled in money and privilege they can’t see the wreckage strewn behind them. Consult your copy of The Great Gatsby and near the end of that 1925 novel you will find a one-sentence portrait of our 2021 prime minister and his set. “They were careless people … they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”
[…]
People like Johnson have always been around, as Fitzgerald reminds us. The most troubling question is how he came to be prime minister.
Agree with the characterisation of Johnson – it matters little whether he did or didn't say "let the bodies pile up", because they unquestionably and unnecessarily did. Yet somehow the story becomes whether he said it or not.
However I still don't like seeing the failures of the UK Covid response attributed to the personality of Johnson – rather than to the far-right, genocidal lunacy of Tory ideology that put an abstraction called "the economy" ahead of public health. "The economy" being nothing more than a sly, coded phrase for the financial interests of their own social class.
As far as Johnson is concerned if one reads the Posh Boys book about the effect of private school boys/men on English politics, it's illuminating. About a quarter of Brit PMs have come from Eton alone e&oe.
It's always been that way in Britain. Its not what you know but who you know that counts. Some of the brightest and most talented youngsters in the land never make it to the first step of the ladder because they come from the 'wrong' families.
Amateur landlord, Cassandra Gore, is a stain of a human being. Ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem but our residential tenancy model allows dangerous people to be in positions of power and soft authority.
If New Zealand's amateur landlords want to be considered a benefit to society, perhaps it's time for licensing and regulation. This I'm sure they would welcome as proof of their responsibility.
I've read a few articles on the property sections of the major news outlets, Homed, One Roof, etc, about 'how to do up the neglected rental you just bought'.
The articles are about what to do with the piece of crap you just bought to bring it up to a liveable standard for a decent, home-owning citizen. See what’s happening here?
The clear and irrefutable inference is that New Zealand landlords do 5/5ths of fudge-all to maintain their investment. They do nothing because they think their tenants aren't worth it and that the house and land lift the value far more than any consistent maintenance does. And they'd be right.
It's proof again that New Zealand landlords are not in it for the social service as they oft like to claim. They are in it for cash and the maximum possible cash at that.
As bwag says above, perhaps a microchip or ankle bracelet might buck their ideas up.
Landlords who do not know how to renovate also irk me. A vanity got installed, it could have been moved 40 cm if 40 cm got taken off a jutting out piece of wall. I cannot clean behind my washing machine as it needs to be lifted in and out. Great when washing machine flooded. As well I cannot have a front loader because the door could not open to load. I live in a really weird flat which could be great if stuff got fixed up properly in the first place when good money was spent. The real estate agent thought the flat was uninhabited as derelict inside until it got improved. I had to take the place to avoid being homeless as my previous landlord sold.
Farm owners could do with abit of that treatment, I went to an interview in a cold part of nz once ,the owners house had double glazing two big fires plus other heating very nice, the house I was offered had a semi outside concrete floored bathroom stained carpets leaky windows and a rusty old fire he got offended when I turned the job down an told him it was because of the house.
For those into trying to understand the dark web etc and also interested in Russia doing things to Ukraine, and Israel and the USA doing things to Iran, and Iran doing things to… and North Korea doing things and on and on. There was a very interesting and foreboding interview on Radionz this morning on Kim Hill. Thanks Kim for some hard-to-listen-to important info about on-line goings-on to keep to hand.
In her new book, This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends, Nicole Perlroth, the cybersecurity and digital espionage reporter for the New York Times exposes threats posed by an international market in cyberweapons.
For decades the US government has been collecting "zero days", a software bug that allows a hacker to break into and silently spy on a computer or device, paying hackers for their code…
[mentioned are] hundreds of Chinese cyberattacks, including a months-long hack of the Times.
Perlroth is a guest lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a graduate of Princeton University and Stanford University.
Some of us believe if the US govt agencies had reported and had these zero day exploits fixed (rather than just recording them and occasionally trying to introduce them), then the Chinese would have had a much harder time breaking in themselves.
“The debate today has moved to: what is the role of the treaty in our democracy going forward? Did the treaty bring us together as one people, or split us apart as two?
Didn't see her answer. No doubt it would be to the affect that if it hasn't split us apart as two she'll do her best to achieve that.
There is nothing virtual about online violence. It has become the new frontline in journalism safety – and women journalists sit at the epicentre of risk. Networked misogyny and gaslighting intersect with racism, religious bigotry, homophobia and other forms of discrimination to threaten women journalists – severely and disproportionately. Threats of sexual violence and murder are frequent and sometimes extended to their families. This phenomenon is also bound up with the rise of viral disinformation, digital conspiracy networks and political polarisation. The psychological, physical, professional, and digital safety and security impacts associated with this escalating freedom of expression and gender equality crisis are overlapping, converging and frequently inseparable. They are also increasingly spilling offline, sometimes with devastating consequences.
Here, we present an edited extract from a major interdisciplinary study produced by the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) under commission from UNESCO. The book-length study will be published by UNESCO in mid-2021.
I have a UK friend who is famous and she has to deal with hate every single day. Some of it concerted and organised. Whole threads about her on other pages. Fake pages pretending to be her. Men contacting her management, husband, friends, anyone… to tell them she's blocked them unfairly and they have the right to call her (insert insult here).
That she should die, that she must die… 'just jokes aye'. 'Bit of banter' it's 'fun and games' for the good old football lads of the UK.
Never see women need to go online and tell male comics they're not funny, and some of them… you'd hope they would.
Minimise threats of sexual violence and gendered abuse directed at woman who speak up about the assorted fascists, autocratic despots, war criminals and genocidal thugs you adore. Way to go, sport.
So you don't want to debate or try and understand your own report Joe… you would rather flame. I'm sure magneto will be along shortly to tidy up your commentary…
What is needed is an IRD decision, or a law change around the definition of Church. I'm sorry, but you can't be good for the community and simultaneously bad for it as well. And the Scientologists and any other "church" who uses similar techniques of pressure and intimidation can go the same way as far as I'm concerned. NZ could then use that money for welfare, housing, and health.
The Kaukapakapa resident regularly spray-paints circles around potholes out of “sheer frustration” over seeing motorists navigating around them.
Driving over road imperfections slowly damages your car and tyres by misaligning wheels and constantly stressing shocks and mounts. Avoiding road hazards is dangerous and distracting.
While Councils and NZTA think about pulling their socks up on potholes and other road veneer failures, they can have a look at utility covers as well.
If you are going to re-lay a road 50mm higher than before, you must lift the utility covers also.
Great story here. Local, innovative, forward thinking and award winning. Make smoothies without a blender, including native foods like kawakawa and puha – love it.
Be sweet to get some hot tips on cultivating puha, sounds like they've got the expertise there too.
AFAIK, he’s not gay and has had female partners in the past; I don’t know if he’s single at the moment. I couldn’t care less about his sexuality. What those two adults do or not do in their personal lives is none of our business. Let’s not turn TS into a gutter blog, thanks.
It doesn't matter of course. But I do worry about people in the public eye who may decide to remain in the closet, or keep a relationship secret for some reason.
I'll take the advice from Incognito on the subject from here on in.
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When in government, Labour pushed to extend the Parliamentary term to four years, to reduce accountability and our ability to vote out a bad government. And now, they're trying to do it through the member's ballot, with a Four-Year Parliamentary Term Legislation Bill. The bill at least requires a referendum ...
A ballot for a single Member's Bill was held today, and the following bill was drawn: Public Works (Prohibition of Compulsory Acquisition of Māori Land) Amendment Bill (Hūhana Lyndon) The bill would prevent the government from stealing Māori land in breach of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. It ...
Simeon Brown, alongside Wayne Brown, is favouring a political figleaf now in exchange for loading up tens of millions in extra interest costs on Auckland ratepayers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s is pushing back hard at suggestions from Local Government Minister Simeon Brown and Mayor Wayne Brown ...
Buzz from the Beehive One headline-grabber from the Beehive yesterday was the OECD’s advice that the government must bring the Budget deficit under control or face higher interest rates. Another was the announcement of a $1.9 billion “investment” in Corrections over the next four years. In the best interests of ...
Chris Trotter writes – Had Zheng He’s fleet sailed east, not west, in the early Fifteenth Century, how different our world would be. There is little reason to suppose that the sea-going junks of the Ming Dynasty, among the largest and most sophisticated sailing vessels ever constructed, would have failed ...
David Farrar writes – Two articles give a useful contrast in balance. Both seek to be neutral explainer articles. This one in the Herald on Social Investment covers the pros and cons nicely. It links to critical pieces and talks about aspects that failed and aspects that are more ...
The tikanga regulations will compel law students to be taught that a system which does not conform with the rule of law is nevertheless law which should be observed and applied…Gary Judd KC writes – I have made a complaint to Parliament’s Regulation ...
The future of Te Huia, the train between Hamilton and Auckland, has been getting a lot of attention recently as current funding for it is only in place till the end of June. The government initially agreed to a five year trial, through to April 2026, but that was subject ...
TL;DR: Hamas has just agreed to Israel’s ceasefire plan. Nelson hospital’s rebuild has been cut back to save money. The OECD suggests New Zealand break up network monopolies, including in electricity. PM Christopher Luxon’s news conference on a prison expansion announcement last night was his messiest yet.Here’s my top six ...
A homicide in Ponsonby, a manhunt with a killer on the run. The nation’s leader stands before a press conference reassuring a frightened nation that he’ll sort it out, he’ll keep them safe, he’ll build some new prison spaces.Sorry what? There’s a scary dude on the run with a gun ...
Hi,I know it’s been awhile since there’s been any Webworm merch — and today that all changes!Over the last four months, I’ve been working with New Zealand artist Jess Johnson to create a series of t-shirts, caps and stickers that are infused with Webworm DNA — and as of right ...
The OECD’s chief economist yesterday laid it on the line for the new Government: bring the deficit under control or face higher Reserve Bank interest rates for longer. And to bring the deficit under control, she meant not borrowing for tax cuts. But there was more. Without policy changes—introducing a ...
After a hiatus of over four months Selwyn Manning and I finally got it together to re-start the “A View from Afar” podcast series. We shall see how we go but aim to do 2 episodes per month if possible. … Continue reading → ...
In 2008, the UK Parliament passed the Climate Change Act 2008. The law established a system of targets, budgets, and plans, with inbuilt accountability mechanisms; the aim was to break the cycle of empty promises and replace it with actual progress towards emissions reduction. The law was passed with near-universal ...
Buzz from the Beehive Local Water Done Well – let’s be blunt – is a silly name, but the first big initiative to put it into practice has gone done well. This success is reflected in the headline on an RNZ report:District mayors welcome Auckland’s new water deal with ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate ConnectionsA farmworker cleans the solar panels of a solar water pump in the village of Jagadhri, Haryana Country, India. (Photo credit: Prashanth Vishwanathan/ IWMI) Decisions made in India over the next few years will play a key role in global ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – The Children’s Minister, Karen Chhour, intends to repeal Section 7AA from the Oranga Tamariki Act 1989 because it creates conflict between claimed Crown Treaty obligations and the child’s best interests. In her words, “Oranga Tamariki’s governing principles and its act should be colour ...
Geoffrey Miller writes – The gloves are off. That might seem to be the undertone of surprisingly tough talk from New Zealand’s foreign and trade ministers. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, may be facing legal action after making allegations about former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr on Radio New Zealand. ...
Brian Easton writes – This is about the time that the Treasury will be locking up its economic forecasts to be published in the 2024 Budget Economic and Fiscal Update (BEFU) on budget day, 30 May. I am not privy to what they will be (I will report on them ...
TL;DR:Winston Peters is reported to have won a budget increase for MFAT. David Seymour wanted his Ministry of Regulation to be three times bigger than the Productivity Commission. Simeon Brown is appointing a Crown Monitor to Watercare to protect the Claytons Crown Guarantee he had to give ratings agencies ...
The gloves are off. That might seem to be the undertone of surprisingly tough talk from New Zealand’s foreign and trade ministers. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, may be facing legal action after making allegations about former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr on Radio New Zealand. Carr had made highly ...
I could be a florist'Round the corner from Rye LaneI'll be giving daisies to craziesBut, baby, I'll wrap you up real safe Oh, I can give you flowers At the end of every dayFor the center of your table, a rainbowIn case you have people 'round to stay Depending on ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to May 12 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Finance Minister Nicola Willis will give a pre-budget speech on Thursday.Parliament sits from Question Time at 2pm on ...
The price of the foreign affairs “reset” is now becoming apparent, with Defence set to get a funding boost in the Budget. Finance Minister Nicola Willis has confirmed that it will be one of the few votes, apart from Health and Education and possibly Police, which will get an increase ...
A listing of 26 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 28, 2024 thru Sat, May 4, 2024. Story of the week "It’s straight out of Big Tobacco’s playbook. In fact, research by John Cook and his colleagues ...
Yesterday I received come lovely feedback following my Star Wars themed newsletter. A few people mentioned they’d enjoyed reading the personal part at the beginning.I often begin newsletters with some memories, or general thoughts, before commencing the main topic. This hopefully sets the mood and provides some context in which ...
April 30 was going to be the day we’d be calling Mum from London to wish her a happy birthday. Then it became the day we would be going to St. Paul's at Evensong to remember her. The aim of the cathedral builders was to find a way to make their ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – Can’t remember the last book by a Kiwi author you read? Think the NZ government should spend less on the arts in favor of helping the homeless? If so, as far as Newsroom is concerned, you probably deserve to be called a cultural ignoramus ...
Today New Zealand First will introduce a Member’s Bill that will protect women’s spaces. The ‘Fair Access to Bathrooms Bill’ will require, primarily in the interest and safety of women and girls, that all new non-domestic publicly accessible buildings provide separate, clearly demarcated, unisex and single sex bathrooms. This Bill ...
The Green Party is welcoming Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ continuation of Hon. James Shaw’s cross-party work on climate adaptation, now in the form of a Finance and Expenditure Committee Inquiry. ...
The National Government plans to cut 390 jobs at ACC, including roles in the areas of prevention of sexual violence, road safety and workplace safety. ...
The Government has been caught in opposition to evidence once again as it looks to usher in tried, tested and failed work seminar obligations for job-seeking beneficiaries. ...
The Green Party is welcoming the announcement by the Minister Responsible for RMA Reform Chris Bishop to approve most of the Wellington City Council’s District Plan recommendations. ...
David Seymour has failed to get the sweeping cuts he wanted to the free and healthy school lunch programme, Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
Hon Willie Jackson has been invited by the Oxford Union to debate the motion “This House Believes British Museums are not Very British’ on May 23rd. ...
Green Party MP Hūhana Lyndon says her Public Works (Prohibition of Compulsory Acquisition of Māori Land) Amendment Bill is an opportunity to right some past wrongs around the alienation of Māori land. ...
A senior, highly respected King’s Counsel with decades of experience in our law courts, Gary Judd KC, has filed a complaint about compulsory tikanga Māori studies for law students - highlighting the utter depths of absurdity this woke cultural madness has taken our society. The tikanga regulations will compel law ...
The Government needs to be clear with the people of the Nelson Marlborough region about the changes it is considering for the Nelson Hospital rebuild, Labour health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall said. ...
Ministers must front up about which projects it will push through under its Fast Track Approvals legislation, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
The Government is again adding to New Zealand’s growing unemployment, this time cutting jobs at the agencies responsible for urban development and growing much needed housing stock. ...
With Minister Karen Chhour indicating in the House today that she either doesn’t know or care about the frontline cuts she’s making to Oranga Tamariki, we risk seeing more and more of our children falling through the cracks. ...
The Labour Party is saddened to learn of the death of Sir Robert Martin, a globally renowned disability advocate who led the way for disability rights both in New Zealand and internationally. ...
Labour is calling for the Government to urgently rethink its coalition commitment to restart live animal exports, Labour animal welfare spokesperson Rachel Boyack said. ...
Today’s Financial Stability Report has once again highlighted that poverty and deep inequality are political choices - and this Government is choosing to make them worse. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to do more for our households in most need as unemployment rises and the cost of living crisis endures. ...
Unemployment is on the rise and it’s only going to get worse under this Government, Labour finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds said. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate grew to 4.3 percent in the March quarter from 4 percent in the December quarter. “This is the second rise in unemployment ...
The New Zealand Labour Party welcomes the entering into force of the European Union and New Zealand free trade agreement. This agreement opens the door for a huge increase in trade opportunities with a market of 450 million people who are high value discerning consumers of New Zealand goods and ...
The National-led Government continues its fiscal jiggery pokery with its Pharmac announcement today, Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall says. “The government has increased Pharmac funding but conceded it will only make minimal increases in access to medicine”, said Ayesha Verrall “This is far from the bold promises made to fund ...
This afternoon’s interim Waitangi Tribunal report must be taken seriously as it affects our most vulnerable children, Labour children’s spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime. ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
Introduction Good morning. It’s a great privilege to be here at the 2024 Infrastructure Symposium. I was extremely happy when the Prime Minister asked me to be his Minister for Infrastructure. It is one of the great barriers holding the New Zealand economy back from achieving its potential. Building high ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced the upcoming Budget will include new funding of $571 million for Defence Force pay and projects. “Our servicemen and women do New Zealand proud throughout the world and this funding will help ensure we retain their services and expertise as we navigate an increasingly ...
New Zealand’s ability to cope with climate change will be strengthened as part of the Government’s focus to build resilience as we rebuild the economy, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “An enduring and long-term approach is needed to provide New Zealanders and the economy with certainty as the climate ...
Jobseeker beneficiaries who have work obligations must now meet with MSD within two weeks of their benefit starting to determine their next step towards finding a job, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “A key part of the coalition Government’s plan to have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker ...
A new standalone Social Investment Agency will power-up the social investment approach, driving positive change for our most vulnerable New Zealanders, Social Investment Minister Nicola Willis says. “Despite the Government currently investing more than $70 billion every year into social services, we are not seeing the outcomes we want for ...
Check against delivery Good morning. It is a pleasure to be with you to outline the Coalition Government’s approach to our first Budget. Thank you Mark Skelly, President of the Hutt Valley Chamber of Commerce, together with your Board and team, for hosting me. I’d like to acknowledge His Worship ...
Your Excellency Ambassador Meredith, Members of the Diplomatic Corps and Ambassadors from European Union Member States, Ministerial colleagues, Members of Parliament, and other distinguished guests, Thank you everyone for joining us. Ladies and gentlemen - In diplomacy, we often speak of ‘close’ and ‘long-standing’ relations. ...
The Therapeutic Products Act (TPA) will be repealed this year so that a better regime can be put in place to provide New Zealanders safe and timely access to medicines, medical devices and health products, Associate Health Minister Casey Costello announced today. “The medicines and products we are talking about ...
The Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop, today released his decision on twenty recommendations referred to him by the Wellington City Council relating to its Intensification Planning Instrument, after the Council rejected those recommendations of the Independent Hearings Panel and made alternative recommendations. “Wellington notified its District Plan on ...
Rape Awareness Week (6-10 May) is an important opportunity to acknowledge the continued effort required by government and communities to ensure that all New Zealanders can live free from violence, say Ministers Karen Chhour and Louise Upston. “With 1 in 3 women and 1 in 8 men experiencing sexual violence ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today announced that the Government will be delivering a more efficient Healthy School Lunches Programme, saving taxpayers approximately $107 million a year compared to how Labour funded it, by embracing innovation and commercial expertise. “We are delivering on our commitment to treat taxpayers’ money ...
New research on the impacts of extreme weather on coastal marine habitats in Tairāwhiti and Hawke’s Bay will help fishery managers plan for and respond to any future events, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. A report released today on research by Niwa on behalf of Fisheries New Zealand ...
Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Winston Peters will lead a broad political delegation on a five-stop Pacific tour next week to strengthen New Zealand’s engagement with the region. The delegation will visit Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, and Tuvalu. “New Zealand has deep and ...
There has been a material decline in gas production according to figures released today by the Gas Industry Co. Figures released by the Gas Industry Company show that there was a 12.5 per cent reduction in gas production during 2023, and a 27.8 per cent reduction in gas production in the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins tonight announced the recipients of the Minister of Defence Awards of Excellence for Industry, saying they all contribute to New Zealanders’ security and wellbeing. “Congratulations to this year’s recipients, whose innovative products and services play a critical role in the delivery of New Zealand’s defence capabilities, ...
Welcome to you all - it is a pleasure to be here this evening.I would like to start by thanking Greg Lowe, Chair of the New Zealand Defence Industry Advisory Council, for co-hosting this reception with me. This evening is about recognising businesses from across New Zealand and overseas who in ...
It is a pleasure to be speaking to you as the Minister for Digitising Government. I would like to thank Akolade for the invitation to address this Summit, and to acknowledge the great effort you are making to grow New Zealand’s digital future. Today, we stand at the cusp of ...
New Zealand is urging both Israel and Hamas to agree to an immediate ceasefire to avoid the further humanitarian catastrophe that military action in Rafah would unleash, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The immense suffering in Gaza cannot be allowed to worsen further. Both sides have a responsibility to ...
A new online data dashboard released today as part of the Government’s school attendance action plan makes more timely daily attendance data available to the public and parents, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. The interactive dashboard will be updated once a week to show a national average of how ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced Rosemary Banks will be New Zealand’s next Ambassador to the United States of America. “Our relationship with the United States is crucial for New Zealand in strategic, security and economic terms,” Mr Peters says. “New Zealand and the United States have a ...
The Government is considering creating a new tier of minerals permitting that will make it easier for hobby miners to prospect for gold. “New Zealand was built on gold, it’s in our DNA. Our gold deposits, particularly in regions such as Otago and the West Coast have always attracted fortune-hunters. ...
Minister for Trade Todd McClay today announced that New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will commence negotiations on a free trade agreement (FTA). Minister McClay met with his counterpart UAE Trade Minister Dr Thani bin Ahmed Al Zeyoudi in Dubai, where they announced the launch of negotiations on a ...
New Zealand Sign Language Week is an excellent opportunity for all Kiwis to give the language a go, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. This week (May 6 to 12) is New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL) Week. The theme is “an Aotearoa where anyone can sign anywhere” and aims to ...
Six tertiary students have been selected to work on NASA projects in the US through a New Zealand Space Scholarship, Space Minister Judith Collins announced today. “This is a fantastic opportunity for these talented students. They will undertake internships at NASA’s Ames Research Center or its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), where ...
New Zealanders will be safer because of a $1.9 billion investment in more frontline Corrections officers, more support for offenders to turn away from crime, and more prison capacity, Corrections Minister Mark Mitchell says. “Our Government said we would crack down on crime. We promised to restore law and order, ...
The OECD’s latest report on New Zealand reinforces the importance of bringing Government spending under control, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The OECD conducts country surveys every two years to review its members’ economic policies. The 2024 New Zealand survey was presented in Wellington today by OECD Chief Economist Clare Lombardelli. ...
The Government has delivered on its election promise to provide a financially sustainable model for Auckland under its Local Water Done Well plan. The plan, which has been unanimously endorsed by Auckland Council’s Governing Body, will see Aucklanders avoid the previously projected 25.8 per cent water rates increases while retaining ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters discussed the need for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and enhanced cooperation in the Pacific with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock during her first official visit to New Zealand today. "New Zealand and Germany enjoy shared interests and values, including the rule of law, democracy, respect for the international system ...
The Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop today released his decision on four recommendations referred to him by the Western Bay of Plenty District Council, opening the door to housing growth in the area. The Council’s Plan Change 92 allows more homes to be built in existing and new ...
Thank you, John McKinnon and the New Zealand China Council for the invitation to speak to you today. Thank you too, all members of the China Council. Your effort has played an essential role in helping to build, shape, and grow a balanced and resilient relationship between our two ...
The Government is modernising insurance law to better protect Kiwis and provide security in the event of a disaster, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly announced today. “These reforms are long overdue. New Zealand’s insurance law is complicated and dated, some of which is more than 100 years old. ...
The coalition Government is refreshing its approach to supporting pay equity claims as time-limited funding for the Pay Equity Taskforce comes to an end, Public Service Minister Nicola Willis says. “Three years ago, the then-government introduced changes to the Equal Pay Act to support pay equity bargaining. The changes were ...
Structured literacy will change the way New Zealand children learn to read - improving achievement and setting students up for success, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “Being able to read and write is a fundamental life skill that too many young people are missing out on. Recent data shows that ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay says Canada’s refusal to comply in full with a CPTPP trade dispute ruling in our favour over dairy trade is cynical and New Zealand has no intention of backing down. Mr McClay said he has asked for urgent legal advice in respect of our ‘next move’ ...
The rights of our children and young people will be enhanced by changes the coalition Government will make to strengthen oversight of the Oranga Tamariki system, including restoring a single Children’s Commissioner. “The Government is committed to delivering better public services that care for our most at-risk young people and ...
The Government is making it easier for minor changes to be made to a building consent so building a home is easier and more affordable, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on making it easier and cheaper to build homes so we can ...
New Zealand lost a true legend when internationally renowned disability advocate Sir Robert Martin (KNZM) passed away at his home in Whanganui last night, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. “Our Government’s thoughts are with his wife Lynda, family and community, those he has worked with, the disability community in ...
Good evening – Before discussing the challenges and opportunities facing New Zealand’s foreign policy, we’d like to first acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. You have contributed to debates about New Zealand foreign policy over a long period of time, and we thank you for hosting us. ...
From today, passengers travelling internationally from Auckland Airport will be able to keep laptops and liquids in their carry-on bags for security screening thanks to new technology, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Creating a more efficient and seamless travel experience is important for holidaymakers and businesses, enabling faster movement through ...
People with an interest in the health of Northland’s marine ecosystems are invited to a public meeting to discuss how to deal with kina barrens, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones will lead the discussion, which will take place on Friday, 10 May, at Awanui Hotel in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sara Dehm, Senior lecturer, international migration and refugee law, University of Technology Sydney The High Court unanimously ruled today that the Australian government can keep asylum seekers in immigration detention indefinitely in cases where they do not “voluntarily” cooperate with their own ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kim Munro, Lecturer, Creative Industries and Digital Media, University of South Australia Twenty-four hours after the release of Macklemore’s pro-Palestine protest song Hind’s Hall on social media on May 7, the video had already notched up over 24 million views. In ...
Failing to anticipate the complexity of the consenting system is being cited as the the current builder's shortcomings, an Infrastructure Commission review says. ...
350 Aotearoa is calling the Environment Select Committee’s decision to allow oral submissions from just 40% of individual, unique submitters who asked to speak to the committee ‘a disgraceful blight to democracy’. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Helal, Assistant Dean (Sustainability), The University of Melbourne Dubai skylineAleksandarPasaric/Pexels Since ancient times, people have built structures that reach for the skies – from the steep spires of medieval towers to the grand domes of ancient cathedrals and mosques. Today ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Edward Musole, PhD Law Student, University of New England Girts Ragelis/ShutterstockRecent trends show Australians are increasingly buying wearables such as smartwatches and fitness trackers. These electronics track our body movements or vital signs to provide data throughout the day, with ...
Papua New Guinea experienced a significant earthquake on 24 March in East Sepik and there has also been recent flooding there and in surrounding provinces. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yousuf Mohammed, Dermatology researcher, The University of Queensland Maridav/Shutterstock You wake up, stagger to the bathroom and gaze into the mirror. No, you’re not imagining it. You’ve developed face wrinkles overnight. They’re sleep wrinkles. Sleep wrinkles are temporary. But as your ...
The Environment Select Committee has just announced that 60 percent of individuals who asked to speak at the hearings will not be heard. This equates to almost 700 people who made individual submissions and more than 1000 more who made a form submission. ...
The Royal New Zealand Ballet is performing Swan Lake around the country. What kind of dream does the ballet sell?Before going to see the Royal New Zealand Ballet perform Swan Lake, I had about as much familiarity with the plot of this ballet as could be expected from having ...
A new poem by Auckland poet Eamonn Tee. High Tide at Local Maxima It is only going to get worse. The streams will be narrow and fickle. The week will bend and buckle like a pot-bellied waist. You will make it to the weekend with one ...
The New Zealand entrepreneur behind beauty business Ethique is gearing up to launch a new eco-venture. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Our thirst for a tasty bevvy is insatiable, but it comes with a hefty plastic price for the planet: 580 billion ...
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 James by Percival Everett (Mantle, $38) A retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from ...
By Kamna Kumar in Suva Pacific Islands Forum Secretary-General Henry Puna stressed the importance of media freedom and its link to the climate and environmental crisis at the 2024 World Press Freedom Day event organised by the University of the South Pacific’s journalism programme. Under the theme “A Planet for ...
Tara Ward previews a new local TV series offering alternative visions of motherhood. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. A woman is clambering up the side of her two-story house, clinging desperately to a drainpipe. Nearby, her child is perched on the ...
Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ) is supportive of the cross-party approach to climate adaptation announced by the Minister of Climate Change today. ...
The Sustainable Business Council (SBC) and Climate Leaders Coalition (CLC) welcome today’s announcement from Government around a bipartisan inquiry into an enduring climate adaptation framework for New Zealand. ...
The Free Speech Union welcomes the decision by the Department of Internal Affairs, and Minister Brooke Van Velden, to abandon proposals to further regulate online speech. ...
Its new building in Wellington will not be nearly big enough for all its records, and it has also run out of money to build its new storage facility in Levin. ...
BusinessNZ is congratulating the Minister of Climate Change for his work in achieving cross-party consensus for a way forward on climate adaptation. ...
Recent research reveals the repeal of smokefree measures is not only bad for our health, but also the economy. The Government has repealed various smokefree measures to ensure it keeps collecting $1.2 billion a year in tobacco taxes, in order to pay for tax cuts already being delivered to ...
The club’s surprisingly good season is built on the desire to prove a random A-League YouTuber wrong… and a few other factors.“There’s no way that Wellington Phoenix play finals this year. I can’t see it happening at all.” Those are the words of Lachlan Raeside, an Australian football content ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By César Albarrán-Torres, Senior Lecturer, Department of Media and Communication, Swinburne University of Technology Apple TV+ As one of billions of bilingual individuals in the world, it disappoints me when a film or TV show with characters of a non-English-speaking background is ...
The under-utilised course is a waste of space, and with a little political will, it could be turned into something better. For the duration of her stay in Wellington, my long-suffering cousin listened to me rant about golf courses. They’re bad for the environment: water intensive and pesticide heavy. They ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Leah Ruppanner, Professor of Sociology and Founding Director of The Future of Work Lab, Podcast at MissPerceived, The University of Melbourne Shutterstock A recent report from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows US fertility rates dropped 2% in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amy Corderoy, Medical doctor and PhD candidate studying involuntary psychiatric treatment, School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney shop_py/Shutterstock Picture two people, both suffering from a serious mental illness requiring hospital admission. One was born in Australia, the other in Asia. Hopefully, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Treby, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, RMIT University P.j.Hickox, Shutterstock Peatlands store more carbon per square metre than any other ecosystem on Earth. These waterlogged, mossy bogs beat even dense rainforests for their ability to act as carbon reservoirs. Under the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Goss, Adjunct Associate Professor, Health Research Institute, University of Canberra Government spending on health has been growing so rapidly that a decade ago the then health minister Peter Dutton called it “unmanageable” and “unsustainable”. Health spending grew in real terms by ...
New Zealand's largest electricity distributor is warning the country to hurry up with controls around charging electric vehicles or face unnecessary bills running into the billions. ...
New Zealanders have been asked to conserve energy this morning to combat a possible electricity shortfall, writes Stewart Sowman-Lund in this extract from The Bulletin. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. A call to conserve power New Zealand is facing a possible electricity shortfall, with people up ...
Writer Rebecca K Reilly breaks down the national book awards. What are the Ockhams?The Ockham New Zealand Book Awards are our annual national awards for books published for adults, and have existed in this form since 2016. There are four categories: Fiction, Poetry, General Non-fiction and Illustrated Non-fiction. There ...
Wellington City Council should keep its 34% ownership share in Wellington International Airport, argue Unions Wellington spokespeople Finn Cordwell and Ashok Jacob. Insanity, as the saying goes, is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Wellington City Council (WCC) is yet again proposing to dispose ...
New Zealand’s largest book publisher has undergone drastic changes this week, leaving its future role in local publishing uncertain. Two of the most recognisable local publishers in New Zealand are among those restructured out of Penguin Random House, it was announced this week. Head of publishing Claire Murdoch will leave ...
The Black Ferns Sevens appeared to be a mile behind Australia at the halfway point of the 2023-24 SVNS international circuit. Winless in three tournaments, a cup quarter-final exit in Perth was one of their worst results. To add insult to injury, talismanic skipper Sarah Hirini had been ruled out ...
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https://i.stuff.co.nz/environment/124993790/feral-deer-running-wild-bulldoze-native-plants-in-canterbury-ecosanctuary
Time to crack up the export freak deer market ,
do what they did last year, hunt them, donate to foodbanks etc. I am sure the many many food insecure people in NZ would love to get a nice slab of meet for free.
Absolutely. Good PR and good will all round.
also wild deer is so much better then the poor fenced of things eating nothing but highly fertilized grass.
Sabine – I love to see what slightly off piste response you come out with to others', always with a little wet blanket.
Unfortunately the wild market has been buggered by covid, Germans aren't going out for dinner and China has prohibited the sale of wild meat. Both factors have also knocked the stuffing out of farmed venison prices as well. Currently the only market for wild game, apart from a few niche suppliers to restaurants, is for pet food and you've got to have everything going your way to make any money out of that.
Would be good if a protocol was developed to allow sale of game meat through butchers. If it's ok to give it away through food banks it should be able to be sold on the open market.
I doubt any food banks would be taking the risk of distributing perishable meat, let alone wild stuff.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/121834937/fiordland-venison-redirected-to-foodbank-freezers
The foundation typically sends its carcasses to Canterbury for processing, before exporting the meat.
just call it free range. 🙂
Heck i would have it. Its better then what you can get in any supermarket.
Ah, I did not think of freezers. Doh.
Are you suggesting that Sabine @ 1.1 and others above are "incorrect" when suggesting that the distribution of wild venison to food banks etc last year did not happen?
Perhaps you should check your facts before hitting your keyboard.
Here is a generic Google search link to "wild venison food banks nz" providing a whole range of links to media reports on the distribution of 18000 kg of the wild deer meat last year to food banks and other charities here in NZ –
https://www.google.com/search?q=wild+venison+food+banks+nz&rlz=1C1LDJZ_enNZ499&oq=wild+venison+food+banks+nz&aqs=chrome..69i57.26185j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Please read my reply just above yours at 11.38am.
There is no market is because NZ never marketed that type of meat to NZ.
You can't get wild boar, hare, rabbit, fowl, pheasants, deer etc in NZ. And t'is a shame cause that meat is delicious.
But that grass fed Deer is and taste the same as grass fed beef. No flavor.
We have access to wild deer, boar, hare, duck in our small rural community from locals who hunt. It's the same in most small communities.
Yes, i know that full well, but if you don't then you don't have access to any of that.
And as i said before it is not marketed to NZ'lers as meat that could be delicious.
If ever you have any spare meat left, tell, me and i get the smoker going and bbq.
Even just a nice hare…i so love hare.
Premium Game in Blenheim have a great range and sell online – venison tahr hare goat, even wallaby and ostrich. They even do bacon, salami, sausages.
Stocked in supermarkets too.
thank you, i will check these guys out. Don't care about the wallaby and ostrich to much, but hare and goat. OH yeas! please! So thanks for that tip!
What does wallaby taste like?
like kangaroo
But wallabies are not kangaroos. I will try Google.
Pleased I did not ask what ostrich tastes like, you might have said emu.
Pet food supply was in media recently, supply chain issues apparently. Turning pests into petfood is good ecological sense even if it doesn't get a gold standard for economics. It can't be that hard to at least supplement the money spent on conservation with income streams such as this.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/124949577/global-supply-issues-and-shipping-delays-hit-the-family-cats-dinner-plate
I guarantee you that instead of government both local and national turning the exploding population of deer in this country into a job ,money,and environmental win they will just turn it into a tax burden that wastes a quality resource. By poisoning them and culling with out extraction.
That would be extremely sad, and in a country with lots of hungry people or people so poor tha they could not even afford a crap cut of meat it would be pure wastage. I hope they will do what they did last year, organise one big hunt, and donate the processed goods to marae and foodbanks. heck, train youngsters who to butcher some game. Skills for life. .
bwaghorn Very likely – the Semmelweis outcome. (He was a man with a good idea, which was tested as a success and saved lives, but the PTB were disturbed that he was changing the status quo without a complete dossier on why and how and ordered him not to proceed further.)
Up until about 10 years ago I or any other good old boy or girl could pot a deer and as long as the liver heart and head where attached trundle down to the local chiller and top their income up , jobs in out of the way places,pest control,and cash in the community, 1080 got picked up due in a carcase to a dick head jumping the wrong boundary,so instead of putting in place a way to stop that they just killed the trade dead.
It is interesting that a government that can live with the fouling of our drinking water from various gunk, is so concerned at one example of something going wrong and someone getting sick. With that sort of safety concern we shouldn't let men go out with rifles at all.
We shouldn't let people go tramping and have them call up our expensive helicopter service when they twist their ankle or get lost. The way that health and safety contracts are drawn up seems to indicate that prevention of any injury is a must for the employee/manager involved. I presume that is why the feral deer market was closed – safety?
stop calling it 'feral' its free range. 🙂
In Germany you have a system where meat that was not meant to be butchered aka road kill etc, can be sold publicly at the Freibank. My family used to get their meat there, and was very unhappy when the last one in our town closed. Essentially it was mainly roadkill, animals that were not meant to be butchered but had to be killed, all sorts of meat horse, dear, boar, etc.
An interesting article here from 1911 outlines the rules.
https://archive.macleans.ca/article/1911/1/1/cheap-meat-the-german-freibank
For those interested in a bit of culinary history the above link is awesome to read. Who knew we ate dog in Germany in 1911. I did not.
But this system of a cheap meat butchery of meat that otherwise would not be used, and it could be pests, game etc, to be used solely by people of no means would not go amiss in certain towns where food insecurity and hunger is an issue.
As far as i know all Freibanks in Germany are closed as meat got plentyful and cheap.
I believe and this is anicdata that the traces of 1080 were picked up in wild venison after arriving in Germany, bit of a fuck up but surely an avoidable problem .
well that escalated quickly. Luckily for them, our MIQ is half empty so maybe we can house all those travelers there for their isolation period?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-coronavirus-immediate-isolation-warning-for-brisbane-to-nz-travellers-caught-in-airport-bubble-breach/FXOK2T6DYIQXR4Q7MK6SNWWGDM/
500 MIQ rooms have been set aside in case there are issues with the trans tasman bubble eg passengers caught by an outbreak while they are in the air.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300276732/transtasman-travel-will-there-be-room-at-the-inn-if-the-bubble-bursts
aren't we lucky.
Surely there is a really innocent explanation, like Covid, emergency, blablablablah ……………..
oh well just another day in Paradise.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/orion-healths-ian-mccrae-sees-tens-of-millions-in-overspend-on-vaccine-register-flawed-procurement/H6N3AH5GU43Q2NCSMK3JQWYEKQ/
If they use Salesforce, I wish the DHB or whatever replaces them good luck.
They have, hence why little has happened and every one seems to not like to talk about it at all.
Saleforce and Amazon. Why not.
Because its is useless, whether for scheduling or bookings etc. Have you ever worked with it?
Any idea how Deloitte ended up working with it? Any history elsewhere?
Looks like McCrae's got his nose out of joint because he couldn't get a govt contract.
This is trivial but I get really annoyed and have to vent when people re-write history… the review on stuff about The Handmaid's Tale said this…
Have June’s adventures in Gilead become the televisual equivalent of Groundhog Day? … the continuing perils of Offred/Ofjoseph/June (Elisabeth Moss) risk turning into Prison Break, The Fugitive or The Walking Dead, simply introducing new characters each season for her to butt up against, rather than progressing towards an ultimate tragedy or triumph.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/stuff-to-watch/300289269/the-handmaids-tale-as-season-4-comes-to-neon-has-gilead-hit-groundhog-day
The thing about The Fugitive is that it did have a definite end – It was a two part episode at the end of season 4. At the time it was the first series to have a definite end as the main actor signaled early that he wanted/needed to leave. Also, the final episode was the most watched episode of any tv series in the USA until the final episode of MASH sixteen years later – it had a similar social frisson as "who shot JR" on Dallas.
As an observer of The Fugitive from current times there are really four things that are interesting…
1) The show operates mostly amongst the working class as TF takes on whatever jobs are available. It shows the trials and tribulations of those at the bottom – govt contracts, unions, having to weather terrible bosses. At that time and following it was more typical to show the lives of the middle class and higher. This is probably the more interesting thing for this readership – 1960's working America looked recognisable whereas working life in the USA nowadays looks totally alien.
2) The story about a child of illegal immigrants born in the USA acquiring citizenship by birth, I suspect, had a major impact on illegal immigration to the USA.
3) The fear of teenagers (who were baby boomers at that time) – children are treated kindly but teenagers are treated as dangerous and troublesome. It was similar on Star Trek.
4) Black people were portrayed in very high social status jobs (doctor, diplomat).
(The acting was very patchy in a very 1960s way but David Janssen carried the cast along.)
Next installment in an occasional series of how neo-liberalism is failing us.
There is hope the new Health NZ will reverse the sub contracting of services and bring them back in-house.
Witness the gardens and grounds of yr local hospital. Here in the Manawatu, they are overgrown, unkempt and clearly a low priority.
One of my ideas is that among the retired etc there is a group in each town called the Friends of .. wherever, and they will take pride in their town and back up the authorities in different ways as volunteers which all unemployed people should do, for at least an hour a week – not taking support from government and putting little back – that's childlike.
The group would step in and weed, the hospital would shout them afternoon tea once a week, and it would be a good social and community thing. Some of the group would probably pick up somebody else to provide transport on their morning or afternoon on the job.
hey if the towns would hire all the unemployed people to fix the gardens, sweep the streets etc, that would be awesome. Suddenly all the people would have jobs, pay taxes and not try to survive on a beggars benefit, and then on the weekends they could volunteer for any charity they like to.
Or else what you are advocating is working for the a paid for benefit ‘aka the unemployment benefit’, which frankly should not be as you only get unemployment benefits when you can prove that you just lost a job, b. did nothing to deserve to have lost that job and c. have paid taxes for x amount of time.
One could say that unemployment benefits are actually an earned benefit courtesy of contributing at the very least 17.4 % and then up to 33 – 39% of ones wages to the upkeep of government and services.
So yeah, towns should hire people to keep their common grounds clean, and thus keep unemployment numbers low.
Both Korea & Japan have city beautification programs specifically to provide jobs to those without them. They do a pretty good job too.
I don't really care about the part where Rimmer lied about not being able to buy properties (even though that is an insult to those who genuinely can't afford to buy a home and who help pay his wages) but the fact that he failed, apparently repeatedly, to declare these as pecuniary interests is cause for great concern.
Rimmer is a rules nerd so for him to claim ignorance does not wash.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2021/05/act-leader-david-seymour-admits-he-s-a-beneficiary-of-property-holding-trusts-after-years-of-saying-he-couldn-t-afford-to-buy.html
The oink tries to excuse himself.
The key facts you may like to know are
Everyone makes mistakes, the question is how you deal with them. I believe I’ve made the right choices, that ACT’s supporters would expect here.
google cache
Rimmer is a stickler for the rules, often using others’ indiscretions for political gain.
Now he wants us to laugh all this off?
Perhap we should be kinder to MPs for some minor errors and in less haste to make political attacks on the other side ??
i am Taken back by some comments that have been made including the post on this site on this topic when our PM has done something similar.
It’s been revealed the ANZ KiwiSaver scheme, in which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has money saved, has investments in companies which have supplied weapons to Saudi Arabia
https://i.stuff.co.nz/business/300224963/air-nz-apologises-after-revelations-it-helped-saudi-arabian-military?rm=a
That's not similar. The case at hand is an MP failing to declare pecuniary interests as required by New Zealand law.
It would be great if you didn't try minimise Seymour's dishonesty here, and even better if you didn't try to drag Ardern down to his level.
Thanks in advance 🙂
Our PM making commentary regarding Air NZ involvement with the saudis military and our PM having profited from the Saudi military doesn’t need me to drag her down her own actions have done that 🤭 but keep on being adjective and able to see all sides.
Always appreciate being channaged and reading balanced opinions.
On the sociopathic oink and his oozing, Bullington club entitlement and privilege.
A chronicler of the first Gilded Age, Fitzgerald would have seen Johnson for what he is. His novels are studded with just his type: men and women so thickly swaddled in money and privilege they can’t see the wreckage strewn behind them. Consult your copy of The Great Gatsby and near the end of that 1925 novel you will find a one-sentence portrait of our 2021 prime minister and his set. “They were careless people … they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”
[…]
People like Johnson have always been around, as Fitzgerald reminds us. The most troubling question is how he came to be prime minister.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/apr/29/sleaze-boris-johnson-careless-privilege.
Agree with the characterisation of Johnson – it matters little whether he did or didn't say "let the bodies pile up", because they unquestionably and unnecessarily did. Yet somehow the story becomes whether he said it or not.
However I still don't like seeing the failures of the UK Covid response attributed to the personality of Johnson – rather than to the far-right, genocidal lunacy of Tory ideology that put an abstraction called "the economy" ahead of public health. "The economy" being nothing more than a sly, coded phrase for the financial interests of their own social class.
As far as Johnson is concerned if one reads the Posh Boys book about the effect of private school boys/men on English politics, it's illuminating. About a quarter of Brit PMs have come from Eton alone e&oe.
It's always been that way in Britain. Its not what you know but who you know that counts. Some of the brightest and most talented youngsters in the land never make it to the first step of the ladder because they come from the 'wrong' families.
To a lesser extent it is true of NZ as well.
Yep, so much waste because the wealthy work the system to protect their own mediocre offspring.
Amateur landlord, Cassandra Gore, is a stain of a human being. Ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem but our residential tenancy model allows dangerous people to be in positions of power and soft authority.
If New Zealand's amateur landlords want to be considered a benefit to society, perhaps it's time for licensing and regulation. This I'm sure they would welcome as proof of their responsibility.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/homed/renting/124788759/nightmare-landlord-drives-tenants-out-but-court-action-has-left-them-unable-to-rent-again
Lisencing would be a good start. And it would be nice to have a register of Landlords that have been taken to the court.
Licensing landlords is a great idea,and if they a spayed or neutered they could get a cheaper fee, stop the buggers breeding.
shhhh……
bwaghorn –
Some people should not be landlords
I find the most annoying landlords are those who procrastinate and nothing gets done. So draining as well.
I've read a few articles on the property sections of the major news outlets, Homed, One Roof, etc, about 'how to do up the neglected rental you just bought'.
The articles are about what to do with the piece of crap you just bought to bring it up to a liveable standard for a decent, home-owning citizen. See what’s happening here?
The clear and irrefutable inference is that New Zealand landlords do 5/5ths of fudge-all to maintain their investment. They do nothing because they think their tenants aren't worth it and that the house and land lift the value far more than any consistent maintenance does. And they'd be right.
It's proof again that New Zealand landlords are not in it for the social service as they oft like to claim. They are in it for cash and the maximum possible cash at that.
As bwag says above, perhaps a microchip or ankle bracelet might buck their ideas up.
Landlords who do not know how to renovate also irk me. A vanity got installed, it could have been moved 40 cm if 40 cm got taken off a jutting out piece of wall. I cannot clean behind my washing machine as it needs to be lifted in and out. Great when washing machine flooded. As well I cannot have a front loader because the door could not open to load. I live in a really weird flat which could be great if stuff got fixed up properly in the first place when good money was spent. The real estate agent thought the flat was uninhabited as derelict inside until it got improved. I had to take the place to avoid being homeless as my previous landlord sold.
I hear you. The idea they do good is a complete fallacy. They do the bare minimum, and sometimes not even that.
Wonder why NZ’s housing stock is in such poor condition? Amateur landlordism.
Time to professionalise the industry in NZ and have proper, regulated adults in place.
Rich pricks can still invest in housing, just through regulated companies, instead of getting their filthy hands directly all over vulnerable tenants.
May be landlords could do a test run to see what living in their rental is like, for 14 days before leasing the property.
Farm owners could do with abit of that treatment, I went to an interview in a cold part of nz once ,the owners house had double glazing two big fires plus other heating very nice, the house I was offered had a semi outside concrete floored bathroom stained carpets leaky windows and a rusty old fire he got offended when I turned the job down an told him it was because of the house.
For those into trying to understand the dark web etc and also interested in Russia doing things to Ukraine, and Israel and the USA doing things to Iran, and Iran doing things to… and North Korea doing things and on and on. There was a very interesting and foreboding interview on Radionz this morning on Kim Hill. Thanks Kim for some hard-to-listen-to important info about on-line goings-on to keep to hand.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/2018793738/nicole-perlroth-the-cyberweapons-arms-race
In her new book, This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends, Nicole Perlroth, the cybersecurity and digital espionage reporter for the New York Times exposes threats posed by an international market in cyberweapons.
For decades the US government has been collecting "zero days", a software bug that allows a hacker to break into and silently spy on a computer or device, paying hackers for their code…
[mentioned are] hundreds of Chinese cyberattacks, including a months-long hack of the Times.
Perlroth is a guest lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a graduate of Princeton University and Stanford University.
Some of us believe if the US govt agencies had reported and had these zero day exploits fixed (rather than just recording them and occasionally trying to introduce them), then the Chinese would have had a much harder time breaking in themselves.
And hey, this may be a far left blessing but here it goes,
A very happy May Day, Workers Day, Labour Day to all workers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Workers%27_Day
Judith Collins asks:
“The debate today has moved to: what is the role of the treaty in our democracy going forward? Did the treaty bring us together as one people, or split us apart as two?
Didn't see her answer. No doubt it would be to the affect that if it hasn't split us apart as two she'll do her best to achieve that.
Some of the vile shit directed at women who dare speak up.
https://twitter.com/julieposetti/status/1387889654221918212
Introduction
There is nothing virtual about online violence. It has become the new frontline in journalism safety – and women journalists sit at the epicentre of risk. Networked misogyny and gaslighting intersect with racism, religious bigotry, homophobia and other forms of discrimination to threaten women journalists – severely and disproportionately. Threats of sexual violence and murder are frequent and sometimes extended to their families. This phenomenon is also bound up with the rise of viral disinformation, digital conspiracy networks and political polarisation. The psychological, physical, professional, and digital safety and security impacts associated with this escalating freedom of expression and gender equality crisis are overlapping, converging and frequently inseparable. They are also increasingly spilling offline, sometimes with devastating consequences.
Here, we present an edited extract from a major interdisciplinary study produced by the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) under commission from UNESCO. The book-length study will be published by UNESCO in mid-2021.
https://en.unesco.org/sites/default/files/the-chilling.pdf
I have a UK friend who is famous and she has to deal with hate every single day. Some of it concerted and organised. Whole threads about her on other pages. Fake pages pretending to be her. Men contacting her management, husband, friends, anyone… to tell them she's blocked them unfairly and they have the right to call her (insert insult here).
That she should die, that she must die… 'just jokes aye'. 'Bit of banter' it's 'fun and games' for the good old football lads of the UK.
Never see women need to go online and tell male comics they're not funny, and some of them… you'd hope they would.
Well they can expect a visit from the popo if she complains, which hopefully she does.
According to the linked Unesco report 55% of the abuse towards Cadwalladr was "highly gendered".
Yet looking at your word cloud picture of most frequent abuse terms, you could hardly call it gendered abuse..
Minimise threats of sexual violence and gendered abuse directed at woman who speak up about the assorted fascists, autocratic despots, war criminals and genocidal thugs you adore. Way to go, sport.
/
So you don't want to debate or try and understand your own report Joe… you would rather flame. I'm sure magneto will be along shortly to tidy up your commentary…
WTF would anyone bother indulging a fucking tankie.
/
What is needed is an IRD decision, or a law change around the definition of Church. I'm sorry, but you can't be good for the community and simultaneously bad for it as well. And the Scientologists and any other "church" who uses similar techniques of pressure and intimidation can go the same way as far as I'm concerned. NZ could then use that money for welfare, housing, and health.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/441479/ex-exclusive-brethren-accuse-church-of-tearing-families-apart-there-are-some-pretty-nasty-stories
Solid activism here:
Driving over road imperfections slowly damages your car and tyres by misaligning wheels and constantly stressing shocks and mounts. Avoiding road hazards is dangerous and distracting.
While Councils and NZTA think about pulling their socks up on potholes and other road veneer failures, they can have a look at utility covers as well.
If you are going to re-lay a road 50mm higher than before, you must lift the utility covers also.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300290088/auckland-transport-to-report-pothole-penis-painter-to-police
Great story here. Local, innovative, forward thinking and award winning. Make smoothies without a blender, including native foods like kawakawa and puha – love it.
Be sweet to get some hot tips on cultivating puha, sounds like they've got the expertise there too.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/pou-tiaki/300285142/south-taranaki-iwis-smoothie-business-about-to-sweep-nz
Is David Seymour gay? If he ain't shagging his deputy and ideological duplicate, Brooke van Velden, then my gaydar is twitching.
AFAIK, he’s not gay and has had female partners in the past; I don’t know if he’s single at the moment. I couldn’t care less about his sexuality. What those two adults do or not do in their personal lives is none of our business. Let’s not turn TS into a gutter blog, thanks.
I'm not sure. Does it matter anyway? Are you homophobic?
It doesn't matter of course. But I do worry about people in the public eye who may decide to remain in the closet, or keep a relationship secret for some reason.
I'll take the advice from Incognito on the subject from here on in.