"Come along for a 'Picnic' at the Pukeahu National War Memorial Park, a place that symbolises our ancestors that fought for our freedom," a statement on Unite's website read.
What a gang of deluded fuckwits! Do they not realise that every service person since way back when has been vaccinated without choice or rights of refusal. To compound this lack of awareness, the most vulnerable to death with/by Covid overwhelmingly are of the age group that most closely represent those they purport to extol.
After WW2, thousands of young men were forced to do Compulsory Military Training. The 'youngsters' of this cohort are now in their 70's – and were all COMPULSORILY vaccinated, in case they were required as war fodder. Guess what they might think of these self-entitled pricks who want to wrap themselves in sham patriotism, while happily handing out premature death sentences to these people- all in the name of their 'freedumbs".
One might suggest that Unite should watching their backs. It is not only the old buggers that will be offended, there are thousands of younger active and former service men and women who may decide that the fuckwit brigade should be physically dealt too for their blatant disrespect.
The Ukranians are neither confirming or denying the attack on the fuel depot, so there has been some speculation that it was a false flag attack by the Russians.
However, I don't see the point of the Russians staging a false flag attack on this asset. It is strategic infrastructure the Russians need to support their heavily armour dependent effort in the region they have just signalled they want to focus on. It would make an ideal opportunistic target for the Ukranians and would fit with their MO of targeting Russian logistics.
I would suspect a false flag attack if an empty school had been hit, or there had been some sort of chemical incident in Russia.
I agree. I don’t think there really is much point. Unless they wanted to do something like staging a chemical attack against Russian civilians to justify using chemical weapons themselves.
That dissatisfied members of the Russian forces in the area may have carried out the attack themselves because they want to force Russia to exit the war.
Attacking that sort of installation as a false flag makes no sense at all. But mutiny in the ranks is certainly a possibility.
Anything to excuse the highly probable eh? You should be engaged by NATO in a psyops role. At least you might sound a little more credible than old sleepy Joe.
Do you have anything to back up your speculation that the US or NATO had anything to do with that attack? Especially given the extraordinary efforts they have gone to to make sure they weren't directly involved in this fight. Imagine if it had been the US and a helicopter crashed and the Americans were caught?
Or is it more likely to be forces that have been refusing to obey orders and shoot down their own air craft, or back a tank over their own commander?
Spokesperson of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, Aleksandr Motuzyanık … said, "Ukraine is carrying out a defensive operation to repel the Russian attack. But this does not mean that Ukraine is responsible for all the disasters and events that occurred on the territory of the Russian Federation. This is not the first time we have seen such accusations. Therefore, we cannot confirm this information. I neither deny it."
To screw with the Russian heads though, the Ukranians (regardless of whether or not they carried out the attack) could issue the following press release:
"After investigating this incident we can confirm that Ukraine did not carry out this attack. However, our sources inside the Russian military advise us that the attack was carried out by discontented members of the Russian airforce…"
How is he a 'good mayor'? He's gone against 72% of his own constituents, and appears to have actively shut down debate on the issue. He's also thrown away the opportunity to work with a powerful block of councils to effect change to what is a deeply flawed plan, which is foolish, considering his own Deputy said that "councillors were generally in agreement about having strong misgivings about aspects of the Government’s reform agenda."
He's gone against 72% of his own constituents, and appears to have actively shut down debate on the issue.
What article have you been reading? It sounds like you’re making up things. As you know, I get tetchy when I get the distinct feeling that commenters make up stuff to suit their biased narrative, especially when they make rather bold allegations.
"An unscientific poll of Otago Daily Times readers found 71.74% of respondents thought the council was wrong to pull out of Communities 4 Local Democracy, while 28.26% thought it had done the right thing. There were a total of 2265 voters in the poll."
'…and appears to have actively shut down debate on the issue.'
"While Aaron Hawkins remained mayor, no serious opposition would be mounted to the city council losing control of assets as part of the Government’s Three Waters reforms, Cr Jim O’Malley said. "He has actively blocked that in the past 12 months," Cr O’Malley said."
Fascinating, how your biased mind seems to work, truly fascinating.
You seem to think that the results of “[a]n unscientific poll” of “2265 voters in the poll” is representative of Dunedin’s constituents.
You also seem to think that reckons of one disgruntled councillor mean that debate was shut down. First, that’s not what the councillor said, but simply your incorrect interpretation. There’s nothing in the linked article suggesting that Hawkins has or did shut down debate as you allege. In addition, there’s mention of at least 2 pivotal votes and “numerous opportunities for the council to express concern”. Looks to me there’s been plenty of lively debate.
"You seem to think that the results of “[a]n unscientific poll” of “2265 voters in the poll” is representative of Dunedin’s constituents."
Do you have any other polls that say differently?
"First, that’s not what the councillor said, but simply your incorrect interpretation. "
How do you interpret the suggestion that the mayor blocked opposition?
"“numerous opportunities for the council to express concern”"
Yes that would be a claim made by the mayor who has been the one accused of shutting down debate.
"there’s mention of at least 2 pivotal votes"
And there's mention by the Deputy mayor Christine Garey of councillors being "generally in agreement about having strong misgivings about aspects of the Government’s reform agenda."
You made up these allegations, you find the evidence, which is not in the article I read. I read the facts, not your interpretations or allegations. Explain how there have been at least 2 pivotal votes without prior debate.
If you have other polls, preferentially scientific ones conducted by an independent party, let’s hear it, from you.
Council minutes will no doubt show there’s been plenty of debate. Go find those minutes and read them before you spread your disinformation here.
Even the Deputy Mayor referes to agreement and misgivings; is she a mindreader too just like you?
It seems I have to activate my recent moderation warning to you.
You're having some reading comprehension issues today.
"You made up these allegations,"
No. I quoted directly from the article.
"Even the Deputy Mayor referes to agreement and misgivings;"
But I didn't say there wasn't any disagreement – the votes were close, so clearly there was. What I said was that the mayor 'appears to have actively shut down debate', a claim supported directly from the article by the comments of Cr O'Malley.
"It seems I have to activate my recent moderation warning to you."
Go for your life. I'm not retracting comments that were based directly on the contents of an article that is in the public domain.
[Your conclusion is untenable from the info in that one single article. You make a serious allegation about the Mayor “actively” obstructing the democratic process, i.e. debate, apparent (to you) or not. There are many ways of a attempting a “serious opposition” (whatever that means) from mounting, e.g. persuasive arguments in open and robust debate and/or a legalistic behaviour. Evidence for this or to the contrary may be found in the minutes of Council meetings and/or elsewhere but you made no effort to find any because you’ve already made your conclusions and closed off your mind to other information. You also extrapolate from an unscientific poll result to come to your conclusion about the constituents of Dunedin. So, it is obvious that you subtly twist things your way to suit your bias and spread misinformation and disinformation. I have warned you recently this misleading behaviour here would result in an instant ban. So, take a week off – Incognito]
Yes I'd suggest the local government elections are a reasonable proxy for what local government feels about 3 Waters. And government will have no choice but to listen if it continues to languish in the 36% range or worse.
My feeling is that the government will "hear the word" of this upcoming result and put the proposal up for central government election.
If he has it right, it's by being lucky that his green party future career points in that direction, more than by his ability.
Not sure how many of the council actually support 3waters. But the mana whenua do support it.
So there is a chunk of council, like the mayor, who have "concern" or "misgivings" about it but will do nothing, and another chunk who are actually prepared to oppose it.
There is a certain poetry to councils losing billions of dollars worth of assets with a farcical amount of compensation, with mana whenua looking on and cheering. Who says history never repeats, lol
The biggest OPEX is the housing of the economy’s workforce….time (well past) to cut our biggest cost, and maybe, just maybe we may improve our productivity.
in the last 2 years the population has been stable,and yet house prices went up 40%,and building costs went through the roof,where a lot of the component's are locally sourced.
The cost of land say in CHCH should not have changed,there is for example 47 hecatres of residential land in the 4 avenues alone.
A lot of the new builds are being used for short term accomodation (airbnb) 2000 in CHCH single use alone.
All supported (made possible) by ever increasing book value…..which im sure we will agree is unsustainable….the moment that book value ceases to grow the whole house of cards collapses, and in the past few months (well before Ukraine) the indications are that enough are beginning to understand that….party is over, hangover to follow.
James Cooney, director of development company Wolfbrook Residential, said low interest rates and Government incentives to buy in new developments had strongly boosted sales of investment properties.
“There’s just so much demand, it’s ridiculous, and 80 to 90 per cent of it is coming from investors.”
New Government rules in force from this year mean mortgages for new properties require smaller deposits than existing ones, and are less likely to attract tax on capital gains.
The Government has announced that New Zealand will release more of its emergency oil stocks in response to the global impact on energy security as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
We do not have a physical reserve,we have a futures contract,too purchase an agreed amount of oil at the spot price.With backwardation the oil prices are less in the future market,then the spot at present.
The US has a wide spread (releasing a million barrels of physical oil) which has brought the spot price down WTI under 100bbl and the december futures up to 94bbl.
Some of those fighting in Ukraine are doing so to cause the fall of Putin, one group are Belarusians. They see Putin as one factor behind the continuance of the rule of the tyrant in Minsk.
About 200 members of the volunteer battalion are serving on the front lines, including in Irpin on Kyiv’s outskirts, where Ukrainian forces recently regained control, Kulazhanka and other recruits said.
They are funded and equipped mostly through donations from the Belarusian and Ukrainian diasporas, including in the United States. But the recent induction of the battalion into the armed forces has meant that some received guns and armor, including some supplied by NATO, from the Ukrainian military.
On my way back across the border, I met two German foreign fighters in their mid-fifties, who were also traveling back to Poland. They’d been at the Yavoriv base earlier the previous morning, when it was bombed. “The international legion is young guys who are hungry for an adventure. They’re cannon fodder,” said one. “They won’t come back from the front lines. They should leave.” He described weapons trainings done with YouTube videos.
KO has been rapped over the knuckles by the Tenancy Tribunal for their gross failure to manage the impact of disruptive tenants on their neighbours. In this case both the parties were KO tenants.
It was declared in the hearing that Kāinga Ora breached its legal obligation by failing to take all reasonable steps in ensuring the peace and comfort of their tenant.
"While the landlord took some reasonable steps, it has become clear that the action taken by the landlord was inadequate," Walker said.
"Some urgent action should have been taken for the landlord to meet their statutory responsibility."
There is nothing in the article, about recent steps (since this new policy was implemented in February) to deal with this issue.
What I'm not seeing (or at least not reported) is a directive to KO to take urgent action – and move out the tenant with the significant and ongoing history of disruptive behaviour.
The wimpish current policy of 'offering both parties alternative accommodation' (especially when they know there is no alternative accommodation) is useless. Evict the problem tenant, and leave the rest of the neighbourhood to enjoy a peaceful life.
The 1st one though indicates those on the state house waiting house includes some who need an accessible wet accessible bathroom area (which would probably push them up the list). They probably usually get a new unit or any existing units once modified as soon as it is available.
The point i was making was that Kainga Ora does evict people. Just not hte violent antisocial assholes.
Yeah, and they get a house when one is available.
Come to Rotorua, go to Fenton street and understand that most of the motels are full with people who wait for a state house. And most of them are not violent antisocial assholes.
Last, i see no difference between L and N, i consider them all unwilling to do what needs to be done when it comes to housing – affordable, clean and tidy housing.
Sabine, Kainga Ora are currently building many homes in Rotorua. More building has happened here in the last 12 months and this year than in the last 5o years we have lived in Rotorua. We built our first home here in 1973, that was the last time you could see new homes in all areas of Rotorua.
A new subdivision is beginning on the corner of Ranolf and Malfroy Streets. Currntly there are 37 new homes in Pukehangi, 190 are planned city wide. So our suggestion they are the same as National is hogwash.
It's estimated that up to 2000 homeless people – many of them from other centres – are staying at about 45 motels in the city. Last year, the Ministry of Social Development spent about $10m on emergency accommodation grants in Rotorua, which has the second worst homeless problem in the country, behind Auckland.
They can't build fast enough and plenty enough to make even just a dent, so now they are buying motels in Rotorua for the homeless families of our fair town.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says emergency accommodation is a "stopgap measure" and is concerned about its long-term social effects
However, she would not say how long motels would be used to house the homeless.
snip
She said the government had built more than 70 public houses and had 180 more in the pipeline.
snip
Rotorua-based list MP Tāmati Coffey said he believed that there were a lot of "desperate" locals who had been pushed out of the rental market in Rotorua's emergency accommodation.
"We don't want them to be in emergency housing, but we also don't want them to be filling up Kuirau Park. We also don't want them in the shops, in the door fronts of some of the shops around the CBD.
Btw, i live next to one of these houses that are being build. The property stood empty for two years, then the property got demolished, then the block stood empty for one year, now they have been building for about half a year, and i would guess it will take another half a year to finish.
At that rate and the number announced it will take another 20 odd years to house the estimated 2000 people (2021 number) in houses.
Btw, my neighbourgh has a family member live in the Garage, it is safer there then in the Motels. Go figure.
Fwiw, i think the effort of N and L in regards to housing are negligable.
Never mind the properties that got demolished, surely for the greater good and some new houses. Hopefully. Never mind that we actually now have less state houses then we used too.
The Government has sold or demolished nearly 2000 state houses since July 2018, Newshub can reveal.
And while Housing Minister Megan Woods continues to trumpet a bonanza state house build, the number of state houses managed by Kāinga Ora – Housing NZ – has actually fallen.
Ms Morris credited Destiny Church's Man Up programme, Whānau Ora, Auckland Action Against Poverty and the Blind Foundation for their continued support throughout the family's tenancy process.
She said Mangere Housing New Zealand staff also treated the family with dignity.
I know two people that have been "saved" from a drunken and lonely old age by Destiny Church.
It appears to be more than just a vanity and self enrichment project of Tamaki's, for many in it.
I suspect like most churches, and other "gangs", they have to be more than just a money making outfit to keep members.
Just heard an acquaintance has transferred from Destiny to Equip. Apparently the tithe is cheaper!
Tempted to let them know that the Presbyterians and Sallies etc, offer the same services, for a voluntary donation!
Well, I guess they can go to the back of the line of the 20,000+ families who are waiting for a KO house.
'Inconvenience' is people parking on the berm, or not mowing the lawn, or having parties every weekend. Annoying. But you just live with it.
This is (as determined by both the police and the Tenancy Tribunal) illegal antisocial behaviour (threats, harassment, etc.). No neighbour should have to put up with it, because KO can't deal with a problem tenant.
And, 9/10 of the problem behaviour would stop immediately, if the tenants concerned knew they would be kicked out for anti-social behaviour.
The government can rent a motel just for these assholes and hide them there just as they do with those that are not antisocial violent assholes but who are unlucky enough to not being put up in state houses as these antisocial violent assholes. Like all the several hundreds of families that can’t get state houses because the government gives them to violent antisocial assholes. .
No they don't need greater support, they need no support. At some stage you cut the abuser out of your life and you put the effort to those that want to be good and law abiding citizens.
The right to safety from your feral neighbours is stronger.
Bear in mind that we are talking about people who conduct a relentless campaign of active harassment, threats, property damage and actual physical violence.
Just imagine what that does to your mental health, let alone physical well-being. We've had story, after story, in the media of families who are literally afraid to leave their houses, because of the (usually gang adjacent) neighbours.
Nothing preventing KO from choosing to house the anti-social in motels – it's still a 'roof over their heads' – just not one that's particularly attractive.
Given that the State can't care for and fix everyone at the same time (9 years of neglect, I hear the echo); then perhaps they need to follow standard triage principles, and deal with the people who 'can' be fixed in the short term. Get them out of the way and resolved, and then try to do something about the long-term dysfunctional.
Because, the fastest way to make a gang life attractive to the next generation, is to see criminals getting way with anti-social and intimidating behaviour with zero consequences.
How – you sit down and have a hard think and pull out your hankies.
And the other people who have been trying to be good citizens and not have their children turn in to a…holes just should look on with a saintly expression and get a big dog with big teeth. I saw in a usa film about a working solo father trying to protect his two boys in their inadequate room. He barked when people rattled the doorknob as he couldn't afford a dog. Or perhaps a recording? Ideas that the helpful government should pass on to it's poor and reasonably honest tenants.
People who are most damged probably can never be rehabilitated. They should have a special working farm prison with amenities and get locked into their rooms at night so they can't get out and start fires, pinch farm bikes, rape women or whatever has become their habitual obsession. They could be happy there so for god's sake take away their freedom – to create misery. And have tough cahps in charge, just practice isolation for people who threaten attack and never trust them completely, safety first and stun guns as backups. If they behave it could be a good place with their own room and decent bedding as long as they don't get the urge to slash it. Most of the men, no women permanently there, would be likely to have been assessed as mentally unbalanced.
So we are not solving anything considering that these people cause harm to law abiding citizens – presumably at their cost. So that is OK?
And some will always end up in Prison – that is why we have prisons, to get the criminal elements that wreak havoc in the community out of hte community.
In the meantime we are warehousing families who work in rundown motels at a million dollar or so
so my solution would be that these guys can live in a run down motel and the good state houses go to good families that work, but don't make enough to pay market rent. But i guess that is not awesome and 'woke' enough.
It is an outrage that you have no qualms about comparing assholes to criminals. They are of course not the same thing.
People who have no money for a long time have a propensity to be assholes because they have to fight for absolutely everything and everything in their life can be taken away – such little as they have.
Anyone who carries the badge 'woke' for actually caring for people that are really really hard to deal with … well those people don't give much thought for your labels.
You'll see such people out every weekend with other badges on them like St Johns, St Vincent De Paul, St Francis, Te Whanau Waipereira, Habitat for Humanity, Barnardo's, Tear Fund, The Compassion Soup Kitchen, City Mission, World Vision, and bunches of Anglican and Catholic trusts and entities. Kiwi volunteers and underpaid staff by the thousand.
They don't give a damn about how you disparage their work or the people they work with.
They understand your scorn, derision, rage and urge to punish. They've seen those stories for several thousand years.
People who have no money for a long time have a propensity to be assholes because they have to fight for absolutely everything and everything in their life can be taken away – such little as they have.
You have hit the nail on the head Ad. The above description is a plan for growing more assholes. You big softie Ad. Could you spread your sympathy wider to people who bear the brunt of thr poor caring of these people by authority figures for many years. As many of those people suffering from the effects of those poorly cared for people is likely to follow the same path as them, never having seen a different life, but forced to live amongst the rough, dishonest or vicious. Role models you know, get copied.
surely Tiny Dean has a motel space available for them on Fenton Street.
That is where we warehouse homeless families that work in many cases and can not afford rent. Just a thought. Or is that to good for criminals that wreak havoc in the areas where they get state houses that seemingly one can only get when one is a lawbreaking antisocial criminal.
That is just sour nastiness Sabine, and your constant attacks on the motelliers who have offered their properties says more about your bitterness than their motives. Constant carping and wild generalisations don't prove a thing. Too broad a brush. You confirmed the building programme, then got hung up on the time it takes to get consents and do infrastructure.. typical.!!
No sour nastiness about that at all Patricia. Just facts, inconvenient facts.
It was facts when National did nothing to alleviate the housing crisis and started housing people in motels and it is a fact now that Labour does it too.
We are warehousing people for month/years on end in Motels. In Rotorua and elsewhere.
And if you are pleased with the little that is happening that is good for you. Me i look at my neighbor in his two bedroom unit, with his wife, his son, the daughter, the grand child and the occasional cuzzy cause they have no where to go. This is now a fact in any town in NZ, but particularly in Auckland and Rotorua. Nothing nasty about that. It is actually just a tragedy. A tragedy of epic proportions.
I think Sabine has been really clear about her proposal – rent a motel for the people who are unable to live in a civilized fashion with their neighbours.
What's your one? Or do you think it's OK for them to continue their reign of terror (and that's exactly what it is, in some instances), with no consequences.
My proposal would be to rent the house next to Poto Williams, and put them there.
In the real world, there are already people living in the said motels on the waiting list for state housing.
And telling people in state housing that Labour will do nothing about their neighbour problems leaves them to wonder whether they would be better off under National.
To prove itself serious about such a social contract Labour would have abandon debt targets and bring in CGT, wealth and estate taxation and MMT. And at some risk of being seen as too radical for the centre.
On current policy settings it would have to plot a more measured course – and that means winning elections regularly if it is to make progress over time. That does not happen if the people in state housing are unhappy, or those in motels, because of the behaviour of their neighbours.
The social contract also involves law – landlords have certain responsibilities – including KO.
So, in your Hobsonville Plus vision – what do you do with a tenant who consistently exhibits anti-social behaviour (loud parties til 3am, smashed bottles across shared driveways, hard-core gang associates visiting, dealing drugs, feral dogs chained on the property, physical intimidation, threats, and actual violence against anyone who is brave enough to complain, regular and open domestic violence against women and children resident at the property, etc.)
[Before you say I'm making this up – all of this has been witnessed by friends at a local KO house – luckily, for them, slightly down the road, rather than actually next door]
Don't say the police will deal with it – because they won't – or at least, not until there is a case of actual assault – and even then it will be 'a visitor to the house' rather than a resident, so KO won't do anything.
Treat people like scum and replicate the problem a hundredfold.
That's exactly what KO are doing to the innocent neighbours caught up in this drama. Treating them like scum….
I do not doubt your example. And I am sure there are hundreds more.
You apply as many wraparound services as are required to change the situation. It usually involves a set of interventions from the following state entities, and there's no particular order to this:
Kainga Ora, NZPolice, MSD, MoE, local Kura, MOH and DHBs, urban Maori trust services, Oranga Tamariki or whatever it will be called, local service trusts, wider family members, tonnes upon tonnes of taxpayer $$ and family group conferences, Corrections and MoJ, and finally employers who are prepared to take on Not in Education Employment or Training …
… literally hundreds of thousands of dollars working day after day to lever each and every one of these people out of the desperation and rage they are in.
And yes not all fo them will work and some will still go to gangs, for which the only control is NZPolice and MoJ and Corrections. But then, how did we bring our jail count down from 13,000 to 8,000 in 2 terms?
Hobsonville has most of those services built in.
No it is not easy. Yes that is is what our taxpayer funding is for. Yes that is the essence of the social democratic state.
Pretty pictures and plans, very artistic. But people who want to be good citizens are being treated like scum under the present system Ad. If you don' think that is right the present system is wrong, and should be changed speedily for a better one. What can you do about that, without having fancy modern housing.
Just help with something now not in future years when built, warm, dry house, with sun and light, safe space for kids to play,some shade area beside for super hot summers, friendly, respectful neighbours, own area with gate for wandering dogs and people (though a man who insisted on entering a property despite a warning notice not to use the back entrance, got bitten by the guard dog in one Nelson property, and was able to plead rights and the dog be ordered to be put down). Makes you realise that you are on a different planet than Labour planners. Send in the clowns – Don't you love a farce? My fault, I fear,
I thought that you'd want what I want
Sorry my dear…
Sabine’s proposal sucks and is a typical simpleton solution. Unless such motel is in the wop-wops there will always be neighbours in the hood, just not in adjacent rooms.
The issue is not going away by not doing anything. It is getting worse. And anyone who will run on 'law and order' will pick up all those that feel that law and order has been abandoned.
We have no issues housing homeless people in motels the up and down the country. At great cost to the tax payer – as they are the ones that pay all the bills.
But i guess we will see what happen in the near future. Elections are only a few months away.
They’re always only a few months away. Which public assets will NAct flog off to their rich mates this time, and what public services will be privatised – gotta fund those tax cuts. My money's on water assets and health services (the pandemic’s over, right?), and they might give Serco another go – plenty of wealth to gorge on yet.
But I guess we'll see what happens in a few months.
"There's nowhere to sleep at the back of this line."
Really, so we have 20,000+ families sleeping in cars, then?
No, they're in motels – which everyone acknowledges is not adequate housing (apart from the most temporary of emergency housing).
But it does give them somewhere to sleep.
In February this year, Kainga Ora national services general manager Nick Maling announced a suite of changes to policy that would strengthen the way it managed disruptive behaviour in its homes.
Maling said the Residential Tenancies Act provided more scope to deal with unruly tenants by enabling Kāinga Ora to move disruptive residents out of communities more easily.
These changes included Kāinga Ora implementing a warnings process that allowed the public housing landlord to take disruptive tenants to the tribunal to end a tenancy if three incidents of a serious nature were documented in a 90-day period.
Maling noted they did not want to make tenants homeless and would work to provide alternative housing and support to address the causes behind residents' behaviour.
The changes were part of a broader Kāinga Ora Customer Programme that was focused on the wellbeing of state housing tenants and the communities they lived in, Maling said.
Maybe Kainga Ora tenants who have concerns about their neighbours behaviour need to become clients of the said agencies … .
Funny thing is National wants some of the said agencies to have a greater role in the lives of those on welfare, agencies that oppose National’s approach on Kainga Ora.
Oh, so it's fine for an 'ordinary' law-abiding family to be stuck in motel accommodation, but it's too sub-standard for anti-social criminals.
If they're a 'really difficult family' then just maybe – bog-standard KO independent living is *not* the most appropriate solution for them.
I'd like to see some actively monitored housing precincts (could be apartments) – which have a zero-tolerance for gang presence, and are gated so residents only.
I would assume that most people in these households are 'ok', but that one or two elements are not. These are the people that need to be removed. And if they are law breaking they need to be arrested, and locked up. And that is the issue, innit, that we are currently not arresting and locking up people who cause havoc.
Oh well, i guess its fair go for the 'tough on law and order crowd' as the current crowd seems to simply pretend that if you don't lock them up they will rehabilitate themselves, and no it wont be cheaper either as per the Corrections Ministers, cause average and fixed costs and leases.
Something is rotten at the heart of UK politics. The Russian oligarchy has embedded its tentacles deep in the Britsh aristocracy and they are exercising considerable power to suppress the truth. Reminds me of the Jian Yang saga and National's (no so hidden) propensity to suck up to CCP money
Like Russia, we are a deeply unequal society with an exceptionally narrow intermarried inter-director network with no more than a handful of key net worth people in: housing, building supplies, ports, airports, groceries, fuel, politics, media, milk, agriculture, meat, banking, bread, fruit, electricity production, broadband, and more. Most of our debt is controlled by Australia, and most of what we make is taken by China: just 2 countries.
We're under a total illusion that we are more economically free than Russia.
Bruce Jesson and WB Sutch would recognise this country as the worst possible scenario they had imagined.
But Kremlin aligned oligarchs are perhaps unusually active in promoting sociopathies like Brexit, which was intended to reduce the UK's influence and the effectiveness and cohesion of European powers.
The sociopathy of a Bill Gates is not intentionally directed towards the wrecking of Western society (though the various windows systems are hardly benign), they are his customers after all. But this limitation is not true of Kremlin operations, who would not be at all sad to see the present order collapse. They are in a very real sense the enemies of our states.
It's no more likely that Russians will be prosecuted for war crimes in Ukraine than Americans have been for theirs, but if tribunals were to be set up then there'd be a bunch of slam-dunk cases.
"Historically weak government finances, badly timed tax cuts and the COVID-19 pandemic, which hit the vital tourism industry, have decimated the economy, triggering a currency crisis that has disrupted fuel imports and caused skyrocketing food prices."
Just read the obit for Dame Miriam Dell – what an outstanding woman. Just reading through this, it's filled with 'only woman on' and 'first woman to' – it's due to her (and the team of strong women around her) that we have made such progress towards equality not, that I – or probably Dell – think that we're there yet
I am not a criminologist or organisational sociologist, so I cannot offer a data-driven opinion on the effectiveness of military-syle so-called ‘boot camps” when it comes to rehabilitating juvenile delinquents and youth offenders. They are popular in the US and … Continue reading → ...
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 ...
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 ...
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"Come along for a 'Picnic' at the Pukeahu National War Memorial Park, a place that symbolises our ancestors that fought for our freedom," a statement on Unite's website read.
What a gang of deluded fuckwits! Do they not realise that every service person since way back when has been vaccinated without choice or rights of refusal. To compound this lack of awareness, the most vulnerable to death with/by Covid overwhelmingly are of the age group that most closely represent those they purport to extol.
After WW2, thousands of young men were forced to do Compulsory Military Training. The 'youngsters' of this cohort are now in their 70's – and were all COMPULSORILY vaccinated, in case they were required as war fodder. Guess what they might think of these self-entitled pricks who want to wrap themselves in sham patriotism, while happily handing out premature death sentences to these people- all in the name of their 'freedumbs".
One might suggest that Unite should watching their backs. It is not only the old buggers that will be offended, there are thousands of younger active and former service men and women who may decide that the fuckwit brigade should be physically dealt too for their blatant disrespect.
I see the villagers around Belgarod in Russia have been getting lots of "entertainment" over the last few nights:
First, a Russian ammunition dump explodes allegedly due to Ukranian shelling, or perhaps a missile attack:
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/huge-explosions-major-russian-ammo-26587639
And now a huge fire at a fuel storage depot caused by two attack helicopters:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60952125
The Ukranians are neither confirming or denying the attack on the fuel depot, so there has been some speculation that it was a false flag attack by the Russians.
However, I don't see the point of the Russians staging a false flag attack on this asset. It is strategic infrastructure the Russians need to support their heavily armour dependent effort in the region they have just signalled they want to focus on. It would make an ideal opportunistic target for the Ukranians and would fit with their MO of targeting Russian logistics.
I would suspect a false flag attack if an empty school had been hit, or there had been some sort of chemical incident in Russia.
What would be the point of a false flag?
Exactly. No point to attack this sort of infrastructure as a false flag.
A false flag would be much more effective if it was attacking some sort of soft target.
itHow would the Russians benefit from any false flag on Russian territory?
I agree. I don’t think there really is much point. Unless they wanted to do something like staging a chemical attack against Russian civilians to justify using chemical weapons themselves.
Since Ukraine denies all knowledge, there is another highly disturbing implication and it ain't got anything to do with false flags.
Care to join the dots Tsmithfield?
Neither confirm nor deny is not the same thing as claiming no knowledge.
But are you suggesting another foreign actor could have done this? And if so, what would be the point?
Throwing a spanner into the works of peace negotiations?
Who might want the war to carry on and turn Ukraine into Afghanistan?
Actually, there is another possibility:
That dissatisfied members of the Russian forces in the area may have carried out the attack themselves because they want to force Russia to exit the war.
Attacking that sort of installation as a false flag makes no sense at all. But mutiny in the ranks is certainly a possibility.
Anything to excuse the highly probable eh? You should be engaged by NATO in a psyops role. At least you might sound a little more credible than old sleepy Joe.
Do you have anything to back up your speculation that the US or NATO had anything to do with that attack? Especially given the extraordinary efforts they have gone to to make sure they weren't directly involved in this fight. Imagine if it had been the US and a helicopter crashed and the Americans were caught?
Or is it more likely to be forces that have been refusing to obey orders and shoot down their own air craft, or back a tank over their own commander?
https://metro.co.uk/2022/03/31/russians-shooting-down-own-planes-and-refusing-to-follow-orders-16377838/
https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/world/russia-ukraine-war-russian-soldier-reportedly-runs-over-his-commander-with-tank-in-protest/
I think there is more basis for my speculation than yours.
Where did you get 'neither confirm nor deny' from?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/300556574/ukraine-denies-they-were-behind-strike-on-russian-territory-as-talks-resume
Making stuff up again to support your obsessions?
Exactly: Also:
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-foreign-minister-says-he-has-no-information-about-who-carried-out-2022-04-01/
To screw with the Russian heads though, the Ukranians (regardless of whether or not they carried out the attack) could issue the following press release:
"After investigating this incident we can confirm that Ukraine did not carry out this attack. However, our sources inside the Russian military advise us that the attack was carried out by discontented members of the Russian airforce…"
classic psyops
Pretty understandable however – flying a helicopter over an enemy country rich in manpads is likely rather stressful.
Yes, such a statement could sow seeds of doubt within the Russian forces on a number of levels: eg:
Do the Ukranians have sources inside our military?
Do we have a mutiny in our own forces? etc.
Or possibly some locals who decided to get involved as they have Ukrainian friends or relatives just across the border?
Mayor Hawkins of Dunedin goes against joining with other Councils who oppose the 3 Waters programme. Maori relationship healed, Council rift deepens.
Council schism over Three Waters broad | Otago Daily Times Online News (odt.co.nz)
Great to see a good Major making a principled stand and also paying a political cost for it. Proper politics.
How is he a 'good mayor'? He's gone against 72% of his own constituents, and appears to have actively shut down debate on the issue. He's also thrown away the opportunity to work with a powerful block of councils to effect change to what is a deeply flawed plan, which is foolish, considering his own Deputy said that "councillors were generally in agreement about having strong misgivings about aspects of the Government’s reform agenda."
What article have you been reading? It sounds like you’re making up things. As you know, I get tetchy when I get the distinct feeling that commenters make up stuff to suit their biased narrative, especially when they make rather bold allegations.
From the article referenced by Ad
'He's gone against 72% of his own constituents…'
"An unscientific poll of Otago Daily Times readers found 71.74% of respondents thought the council was wrong to pull out of Communities 4 Local Democracy, while 28.26% thought it had done the right thing. There were a total of 2265 voters in the poll."
'…and appears to have actively shut down debate on the issue.'
"While Aaron Hawkins remained mayor, no serious opposition would be mounted to the city council losing control of assets as part of the Government’s Three Waters reforms, Cr Jim O’Malley said. "He has actively blocked that in the past 12 months," Cr O’Malley said."
Fascinating, how your biased mind seems to work, truly fascinating.
You seem to think that the results of “[a]n unscientific poll” of “2265 voters in the poll” is representative of Dunedin’s constituents.
You also seem to think that reckons of one disgruntled councillor mean that debate was shut down. First, that’s not what the councillor said, but simply your incorrect interpretation. There’s nothing in the linked article suggesting that Hawkins has or did shut down debate as you allege. In addition, there’s mention of at least 2 pivotal votes and “numerous opportunities for the council to express concern”. Looks to me there’s been plenty of lively debate.
So, again, what article have you been reading?
"You seem to think that the results of “[a]n unscientific poll” of “2265 voters in the poll” is representative of Dunedin’s constituents."
Do you have any other polls that say differently?
"First, that’s not what the councillor said, but simply your incorrect interpretation. "
How do you interpret the suggestion that the mayor blocked opposition?
"“numerous opportunities for the council to express concern”"
Yes that would be a claim made by the mayor who has been the one accused of shutting down debate.
"there’s mention of at least 2 pivotal votes"
And there's mention by the Deputy mayor Christine Garey of councillors being "generally in agreement about having strong misgivings about aspects of the Government’s reform agenda."
It’s all in there.
You made up these allegations, you find the evidence, which is not in the article I read. I read the facts, not your interpretations or allegations. Explain how there have been at least 2 pivotal votes without prior debate.
If you have other polls, preferentially scientific ones conducted by an independent party, let’s hear it, from you.
Council minutes will no doubt show there’s been plenty of debate. Go find those minutes and read them before you spread your disinformation here.
Even the Deputy Mayor referes to agreement and misgivings; is she a mindreader too just like you?
It seems I have to activate my recent moderation warning to you.
You're having some reading comprehension issues today.
"You made up these allegations,"
No. I quoted directly from the article.
"Even the Deputy Mayor referes to agreement and misgivings;"
But I didn't say there wasn't any disagreement – the votes were close, so clearly there was. What I said was that the mayor 'appears to have actively shut down debate', a claim supported directly from the article by the comments of Cr O'Malley.
"It seems I have to activate my recent moderation warning to you."
Go for your life. I'm not retracting comments that were based directly on the contents of an article that is in the public domain.
[Your conclusion is untenable from the info in that one single article. You make a serious allegation about the Mayor “actively” obstructing the democratic process, i.e. debate, apparent (to you) or not. There are many ways of a attempting a “serious opposition” (whatever that means) from mounting, e.g. persuasive arguments in open and robust debate and/or a legalistic behaviour. Evidence for this or to the contrary may be found in the minutes of Council meetings and/or elsewhere but you made no effort to find any because you’ve already made your conclusions and closed off your mind to other information. You also extrapolate from an unscientific poll result to come to your conclusion about the constituents of Dunedin. So, it is obvious that you subtly twist things your way to suit your bias and spread misinformation and disinformation. I have warned you recently this misleading behaviour here would result in an instant ban. So, take a week off – Incognito]
Mode note
Yes I'd suggest the local government elections are a reasonable proxy for what local government feels about 3 Waters. And government will have no choice but to listen if it continues to languish in the 36% range or worse.
My feeling is that the government will "hear the word" of this upcoming result and put the proposal up for central government election.
3 Waters is big enough to need a fresh mandate.
The fact that he has gone against 72% of his constituents doesn't mean he is not a 'good mayor'. Those constituents may be wrong.
What fact?
I support Aaron's actions and rationale. He has it right, imo, and the others have it wrong.
Dunedin resident here, & I support Hawkins.
If he has it right, it's by being lucky that his green party future career points in that direction, more than by his ability.
Not sure how many of the council actually support 3waters. But the mana whenua do support it.
So there is a chunk of council, like the mayor, who have "concern" or "misgivings" about it but will do nothing, and another chunk who are actually prepared to oppose it.
There is a certain poetry to councils losing billions of dollars worth of assets with a farcical amount of compensation, with mana whenua looking on and cheering. Who says history never repeats, lol
30,000 Residents driven out of the Big Lemon over the last three years.Low rate of local GDP,excessive cost plus local economy.
A more sustainable city would need another 100000 to leave.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/homed/housing-affordability/300556431/chief-economist-says-unaffordable-housing-in-auckland-is-driving-people-away
Median house price to income of 14.69…..nothing more needs to be said.
Thats the cost,the OPEX will increase around 15% by August next year (rates insurance,interest,electricity).
Potemkin policy and wasteful spending will not make it better.
But all the inflation is imported….nothing to be done about, so the experts say.
Unsustainable is.
Well some commodities are antifragile,Onions seem unchanged in price.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/opinion-analysis/128192151/pak-n-saves-ageing-shopping-lists-show-steep-rise-in-food-prices
And no futures market…i wonder if theres a connection?
That is why there is always been a future in Onions,the other commodity classes Boom and Bust,
The biggest OPEX is the housing of the economy’s workforce….time (well past) to cut our biggest cost, and maybe, just maybe we may improve our productivity.
in the last 2 years the population has been stable,and yet house prices went up 40%,and building costs went through the roof,where a lot of the component's are locally sourced.
The cost of land say in CHCH should not have changed,there is for example 47 hecatres of residential land in the 4 avenues alone.
A lot of the new builds are being used for short term accomodation (airbnb) 2000 in CHCH single use alone.
All supported (made possible) by ever increasing book value…..which im sure we will agree is unsustainable….the moment that book value ceases to grow the whole house of cards collapses, and in the past few months (well before Ukraine) the indications are that enough are beginning to understand that….party is over, hangover to follow.
Its going to be one hell of a hangover
Bigger then we can expect.(8 months ago)
https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/business/125970733/developers-take-new-tack-in-search-for-land-as-investors-buy-up-new-homes
The gov and finance sector writing cheques the real economy cant possibly honour
the banks have a lot to answer for again.the RBNZ needs to make the banks increase their capital reserves,
Theyre getting around to it…..the Reserve Bank Act (1989) was a coup d'etat unrecognised.
What is 'Potemkin policy'?
All front and no substance
Ah that's the Potemkin Village. Not Battleship Potemkin.
Understand the clarification.
All smoke no hangi.
With the promise of a great feed
here is a good example with Megan Woods.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/128249080/new-zealand-to-release-further-oil-reserves-in-response-to-russian-invasion-of-ukraine
We do not have a physical reserve,we have a futures contract,too purchase an agreed amount of oil at the spot price.With backwardation the oil prices are less in the future market,then the spot at present.
The US has a wide spread (releasing a million barrels of physical oil) which has brought the spot price down WTI under 100bbl and the december futures up to 94bbl.
Some of those fighting in Ukraine are doing so to cause the fall of Putin, one group are Belarusians. They see Putin as one factor behind the continuance of the rule of the tyrant in Minsk.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/01/ukraine-belarus-fighters-russia/?carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3677f44%2F62471fe679d9d21aa1133935%2F602879e6ae7e8a31ba10f3a9%2F8%2F70%2F62471fe679d9d21aa1133935
Foreign fighters are of mixed value
https://pulitzercenter.org/stories/among-ukraines-foreign-fighters
https://nationalpost.com/news/world/ukraine-pauses-new-recruiting-to-foreign-legion-as-it-grapples-with-non-military-volunteers
KO has been rapped over the knuckles by the Tenancy Tribunal for their gross failure to manage the impact of disruptive tenants on their neighbours. In this case both the parties were KO tenants.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/kainga-ora-residents-tenancy-tribunal-complaint-after-neighbour-hell-for-three-years/JHLXUDIR4RO72KZKNQRUNNA7ME/?c_id=1&objectid=12515078&ref=rss
It makes it evident that the statement last year from Poto Williams about KO taking a firmer line, was just so much hot air.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/02/associate-minister-of-housing-poto-williams-steps-in-to-change-k-inga-ora-complaints-process-for-unruly-tenants.html
There is nothing in the article, about recent steps (since this new policy was implemented in February) to deal with this issue.
What I'm not seeing (or at least not reported) is a directive to KO to take urgent action – and move out the tenant with the significant and ongoing history of disruptive behaviour.
The wimpish current policy of 'offering both parties alternative accommodation' (especially when they know there is no alternative accommodation) is useless. Evict the problem tenant, and leave the rest of the neighbourhood to enjoy a peaceful life.
After evicting them, where would you put the inconvenient poor?
i don't know, maybe the same place these guys have to go to?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/pou-tiaki/128142111/theyre-going-to-rip-our-whole-family-apart-a-week-after-mothers-death-kinga-ora-tells-family-to-leave
or where ever these guys went to?
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/338294/housing-nz-orders-eviction-after-grandmother-s-death
It seems that KO can evict people, just not the poor hard done criminal elements.
The 2nd case occurred in 2017 under National.
The 1st one though indicates those on the state house waiting house includes some who need an accessible wet accessible bathroom area (which would probably push them up the list). They probably usually get a new unit or any existing units once modified as soon as it is available.
The point i was making was that Kainga Ora does evict people. Just not hte violent antisocial assholes.
Yeah, and they get a house when one is available.
Come to Rotorua, go to Fenton street and understand that most of the motels are full with people who wait for a state house. And most of them are not violent antisocial assholes.
Last, i see no difference between L and N, i consider them all unwilling to do what needs to be done when it comes to housing – affordable, clean and tidy housing.
Sabine, Kainga Ora are currently building many homes in Rotorua. More building has happened here in the last 12 months and this year than in the last 5o years we have lived in Rotorua. We built our first home here in 1973, that was the last time you could see new homes in all areas of Rotorua.
A new subdivision is beginning on the corner of Ranolf and Malfroy Streets. Currntly there are 37 new homes in Pukehangi, 190 are planned city wide. So our suggestion they are the same as National is hogwash.
Edit function would not respond. "currently"
According to this article from 2021 we have about 2000 homeless housed in motels in Rotorua.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300246795/rotorua-has-become-a-dumping-ground-for-the-countrys-homeless-some-locals-claim#:~:text=It's%20estimated%20that%20up%20to,45%20motels%20in%20the%20city.
They can't build fast enough and plenty enough to make even just a dent, so now they are buying motels in Rotorua for the homeless families of our fair town.
there https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/125821220/govt-moves-from-paying-motels-to-house-homeless-to-buying-its-own-in-rotorua
Housing homeless in Motels may be a stop gag, but its going to be a permanent one. 🙂
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/461753/ardern-motel-housing-a-stopgap-measure-but-no-end-date-in-sight-for-rotorua
Btw, i live next to one of these houses that are being build. The property stood empty for two years, then the property got demolished, then the block stood empty for one year, now they have been building for about half a year, and i would guess it will take another half a year to finish.
At that rate and the number announced it will take another 20 odd years to house the estimated 2000 people (2021 number) in houses.
Btw, my neighbourgh has a family member live in the Garage, it is safer there then in the Motels. Go figure.
Fwiw, i think the effort of N and L in regards to housing are negligable.
Never mind the properties that got demolished, surely for the greater good and some new houses. Hopefully. Never mind that we actually now have less state houses then we used too.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2021/04/government-has-sold-or-demolished-nearly-2000-state-houses-since-july-2018.html
The second eviction never took place. It was cancelled while National were, just, still the Government. The daughter who took over the lease gave special thanks to the Destiny Church. They must do some good.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/339203/grandchildren-facing-loss-of-state-home-given-reprieve
The link also mentions
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/339203/grandchildren-facing-loss-of-state-home-given-reprieve
I know two people that have been "saved" from a drunken and lonely old age by Destiny Church.
It appears to be more than just a vanity and self enrichment project of Tamaki's, for many in it.
I suspect like most churches, and other "gangs", they have to be more than just a money making outfit to keep members.
Just heard an acquaintance has transferred from Destiny to Equip. Apparently the tithe is cheaper!
Tempted to let them know that the Presbyterians and Sallies etc, offer the same services, for a voluntary donation!
Well, I guess they can go to the back of the line of the 20,000+ families who are waiting for a KO house.
'Inconvenience' is people parking on the berm, or not mowing the lawn, or having parties every weekend. Annoying. But you just live with it.
This is (as determined by both the police and the Tenancy Tribunal) illegal antisocial behaviour (threats, harassment, etc.). No neighbour should have to put up with it, because KO can't deal with a problem tenant.
And, 9/10 of the problem behaviour would stop immediately, if the tenants concerned knew they would be kicked out for anti-social behaviour.
The state has a duty to assholes.
There's nowhere to sleep at the back of this line.
We didn't bring our total prison number down from 12,000 to 8000 by more punishment.
The hard cases need even greater state support.
The government can rent a motel just for these assholes and hide them there just as they do with those that are not antisocial violent assholes but who are unlucky enough to not being put up in state houses as these antisocial violent assholes. Like all the several hundreds of families that can’t get state houses because the government gives them to violent antisocial assholes. .
No they don't need greater support, they need no support. At some stage you cut the abuser out of your life and you put the effort to those that want to be good and law abiding citizens.
Yep a motel set up just for these people is the right approach.
We house each criminal in this country with an average subsidy of $150,000 per year.
You can't get rid of the problem until you solve it.
Unfortunately, the 'cost' of not solving the problem is being borne by the neighbours – who are trapped in the situation with no way out.
They have rights, too. As this Tenancy Tribunal case has made crystal clear to KO.
Neighbours have rights. Sure.
The right to safe housing is stronger.
It's weak to simply say you can just chuck them on the streets. As if our duty of care is exhausted because it's hard.
The hard question the left must always answer is:
How do we care for and fix the most damaged?
The right to safety from your feral neighbours is stronger.
Bear in mind that we are talking about people who conduct a relentless campaign of active harassment, threats, property damage and actual physical violence.
Just imagine what that does to your mental health, let alone physical well-being. We've had story, after story, in the media of families who are literally afraid to leave their houses, because of the (usually gang adjacent) neighbours.
Nothing preventing KO from choosing to house the anti-social in motels – it's still a 'roof over their heads' – just not one that's particularly attractive.
Given that the State can't care for and fix everyone at the same time (9 years of neglect, I hear the echo); then perhaps they need to follow standard triage principles, and deal with the people who 'can' be fixed in the short term. Get them out of the way and resolved, and then try to do something about the long-term dysfunctional.
Because, the fastest way to make a gang life attractive to the next generation, is to see criminals getting way with anti-social and intimidating behaviour with zero consequences.
How – you sit down and have a hard think and pull out your hankies.
And the other people who have been trying to be good citizens and not have their children turn in to a…holes just should look on with a saintly expression and get a big dog with big teeth. I saw in a usa film about a working solo father trying to protect his two boys in their inadequate room. He barked when people rattled the doorknob as he couldn't afford a dog. Or perhaps a recording? Ideas that the helpful government should pass on to it's poor and reasonably honest tenants.
People who are most damged probably can never be rehabilitated. They should have a special working farm prison with amenities and get locked into their rooms at night so they can't get out and start fires, pinch farm bikes, rape women or whatever has become their habitual obsession. They could be happy there so for god's sake take away their freedom – to create misery. And have tough cahps in charge, just practice isolation for people who threaten attack and never trust them completely, safety first and stun guns as backups. If they behave it could be a good place with their own room and decent bedding as long as they don't get the urge to slash it. Most of the men, no women permanently there, would be likely to have been assessed as mentally unbalanced.
But apparently you prioritise one right to SAFE housing over the other.
So we are not solving anything considering that these people cause harm to law abiding citizens – presumably at their cost. So that is OK?
And some will always end up in Prison – that is why we have prisons, to get the criminal elements that wreak havoc in the community out of hte community.
In the meantime we are warehousing families who work in rundown motels at a million dollar or so
But then you might consider that cheap.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2021/03/revealed-the-multimillion-dollar-cost-of-the-government-s-emergency-motel-policy.html
so my solution would be that these guys can live in a run down motel and the good state houses go to good families that work, but don't make enough to pay market rent. But i guess that is not awesome and 'woke' enough.
It is an outrage that you have no qualms about comparing assholes to criminals. They are of course not the same thing.
People who have no money for a long time have a propensity to be assholes because they have to fight for absolutely everything and everything in their life can be taken away – such little as they have.
Anyone who carries the badge 'woke' for actually caring for people that are really really hard to deal with … well those people don't give much thought for your labels.
You'll see such people out every weekend with other badges on them like St Johns, St Vincent De Paul, St Francis, Te Whanau Waipereira, Habitat for Humanity, Barnardo's, Tear Fund, The Compassion Soup Kitchen, City Mission, World Vision, and bunches of Anglican and Catholic trusts and entities. Kiwi volunteers and underpaid staff by the thousand.
They don't give a damn about how you disparage their work or the people they work with.
They understand your scorn, derision, rage and urge to punish. They've seen those stories for several thousand years.
People who have no money for a long time have a propensity to be assholes because they have to fight for absolutely everything and everything in their life can be taken away – such little as they have.
You have hit the nail on the head Ad. The above description is a plan for growing more assholes. You big softie Ad. Could you spread your sympathy wider to people who bear the brunt of thr poor caring of these people by authority figures for many years. As many of those people suffering from the effects of those poorly cared for people is likely to follow the same path as them, never having seen a different life, but forced to live amongst the rough, dishonest or vicious. Role models you know, get copied.
Sabine, These "arseholes" have families. What do you propose?
surely Tiny Dean has a motel space available for them on Fenton Street.
That is where we warehouse homeless families that work in many cases and can not afford rent. Just a thought. Or is that to good for criminals that wreak havoc in the areas where they get state houses that seemingly one can only get when one is a lawbreaking antisocial criminal.
How bout that Patricia?
Only Germans would have such conveniently short memories.
Sometimes the You Tube is called for.
Surely that comment Ad doesn't reach the supposed high standard of The Standard? The reference to nationality is egregious surely.
ONLY Germans? You fishing?
That is just sour nastiness Sabine, and your constant attacks on the motelliers who have offered their properties says more about your bitterness than their motives. Constant carping and wild generalisations don't prove a thing. Too broad a brush. You confirmed the building programme, then got hung up on the time it takes to get consents and do infrastructure.. typical.!!![angry angry](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/angry_smile.png?x42494)
No sour nastiness about that at all Patricia. Just facts, inconvenient facts.
It was facts when National did nothing to alleviate the housing crisis and started housing people in motels and it is a fact now that Labour does it too.
We are warehousing people for month/years on end in Motels. In Rotorua and elsewhere.
And if you are pleased with the little that is happening that is good for you. Me i look at my neighbor in his two bedroom unit, with his wife, his son, the daughter, the grand child and the occasional cuzzy cause they have no where to go. This is now a fact in any town in NZ, but particularly in Auckland and Rotorua. Nothing nasty about that. It is actually just a tragedy. A tragedy of epic proportions.
I think Sabine has been really clear about her proposal – rent a motel for the people who are unable to live in a civilized fashion with their neighbours.
What's your one? Or do you think it's OK for them to continue their reign of terror (and that's exactly what it is, in some instances), with no consequences.
My proposal would be to rent the house next to Poto Williams, and put them there.
Sabine's solution is a ghetto worse than any you have ever seen in this country. TReat people like scum and replicate the problem a hundredfold.
My solution would look something like Hobsonville.
Who we are » Hobsonville Point
In the real world, there are already people living in the said motels on the waiting list for state housing.
And telling people in state housing that Labour will do nothing about their neighbour problems leaves them to wonder whether they would be better off under National.
So it should. Unless there is a social contract for all of us, not just the deserving, the left has no leg to stand on.
To prove itself serious about such a social contract Labour would have abandon debt targets and bring in CGT, wealth and estate taxation and MMT. And at some risk of being seen as too radical for the centre.
On current policy settings it would have to plot a more measured course – and that means winning elections regularly if it is to make progress over time. That does not happen if the people in state housing are unhappy, or those in motels, because of the behaviour of their neighbours.
The social contract also involves law – landlords have certain responsibilities – including KO.
So, in your Hobsonville Plus vision – what do you do with a tenant who consistently exhibits anti-social behaviour (loud parties til 3am, smashed bottles across shared driveways, hard-core gang associates visiting, dealing drugs, feral dogs chained on the property, physical intimidation, threats, and actual violence against anyone who is brave enough to complain, regular and open domestic violence against women and children resident at the property, etc.)
[Before you say I'm making this up – all of this has been witnessed by friends at a local KO house – luckily, for them, slightly down the road, rather than actually next door]
Don't say the police will deal with it – because they won't – or at least, not until there is a case of actual assault – and even then it will be 'a visitor to the house' rather than a resident, so KO won't do anything.
That's exactly what KO are doing to the innocent neighbours caught up in this drama. Treating them like scum….
I do not doubt your example. And I am sure there are hundreds more.
You apply as many wraparound services as are required to change the situation. It usually involves a set of interventions from the following state entities, and there's no particular order to this:
Kainga Ora, NZPolice, MSD, MoE, local Kura, MOH and DHBs, urban Maori trust services, Oranga Tamariki or whatever it will be called, local service trusts, wider family members, tonnes upon tonnes of taxpayer $$ and family group conferences, Corrections and MoJ, and finally employers who are prepared to take on Not in Education Employment or Training …
… literally hundreds of thousands of dollars working day after day to lever each and every one of these people out of the desperation and rage they are in.
And yes not all fo them will work and some will still go to gangs, for which the only control is NZPolice and MoJ and Corrections. But then, how did we bring our jail count down from 13,000 to 8,000 in 2 terms?
Hobsonville has most of those services built in.
No it is not easy. Yes that is is what our taxpayer funding is for. Yes that is the essence of the social democratic state.
A hostel might be a solution. Where obstreperous 'guests' could be kept away from those who can play nicely with others.
Pretty pictures and plans, very artistic. But people who want to be good citizens are being treated like scum under the present system Ad. If you don' think that is right the present system is wrong, and should be changed speedily for a better one. What can you do about that, without having fancy modern housing.
Just help with something now not in future years when built, warm, dry house, with sun and light, safe space for kids to play,some shade area beside for super hot summers, friendly, respectful neighbours, own area with gate for wandering dogs and people (though a man who insisted on entering a property despite a warning notice not to use the back entrance, got bitten by the guard dog in one Nelson property, and was able to plead rights and the dog be ordered to be put down). Makes you realise that you are on a different planet than Labour planners. Send in the clowns – Don't you love a farce? My fault, I fear,
I thought that you'd want what I want
Sorry my dear…
Sabine’s proposal sucks and is a typical simpleton solution. Unless such motel is in the wop-wops there will always be neighbours in the hood, just not in adjacent rooms.
Your proposal sounds moronic.
Now that is a really good idea, and some could be housed right next to Carmel Sepuloni, Phil Twyford and so on and so forth.
To see what 300 truly unrepentant undesirable outsiders next door to an MP, look no further than the protests at Parliament weeks ago.
Everyone but Act simply denied they existed.
Your desire for schadenfreude achieves nothing.
I am not sure, Why don't we try?
The issue is not going away by not doing anything. It is getting worse. And anyone who will run on 'law and order' will pick up all those that feel that law and order has been abandoned.
We have no issues housing homeless people in motels the up and down the country. At great cost to the tax payer – as they are the ones that pay all the bills.
But i guess we will see what happen in the near future. Elections are only a few months away.
They’re always only a few months away. Which public assets will NAct flog off to their rich mates this time, and what public services will be privatised – gotta fund those tax cuts. My money's on water assets and health services (the pandemic’s over, right?), and they might give Serco another go – plenty of wealth to gorge on yet.
But I guess we'll see what happens in a few months.
"There's nowhere to sleep at the back of this line."
Really, so we have 20,000+ families sleeping in cars, then?
No, they're in motels – which everyone acknowledges is not adequate housing (apart from the most temporary of emergency housing).
But it does give them somewhere to sleep.
Like every really difficult family is just another can to kick down the road.
Don't become a public servant whatever you do.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/kainga-ora-residents-tenancy-tribunal-complaint-after-neighbour-hell-for-three-years/JHLXUDIR4RO72KZKNQRUNNA7ME/
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/461209/other-agencies-discourage-kainga-ora-from-evicting-misbehaving-tenants-select-committee-told
Maybe Kainga Ora tenants who have concerns about their neighbours behaviour need to become clients of the said agencies … .
Funny thing is National wants some of the said agencies to have a greater role in the lives of those on welfare, agencies that oppose National’s approach on Kainga Ora.
Oh, so it's fine for an 'ordinary' law-abiding family to be stuck in motel accommodation, but it's too sub-standard for anti-social criminals.
If they're a 'really difficult family' then just maybe – bog-standard KO independent living is *not* the most appropriate solution for them.
I'd like to see some actively monitored housing precincts (could be apartments) – which have a zero-tolerance for gang presence, and are gated so residents only.
I would assume that most people in these households are 'ok', but that one or two elements are not. These are the people that need to be removed. And if they are law breaking they need to be arrested, and locked up. And that is the issue, innit, that we are currently not arresting and locking up people who cause havoc.
Oh well, i guess its fair go for the 'tough on law and order crowd' as the current crowd seems to simply pretend that if you don't lock them up they will rehabilitate themselves, and no it wont be cheaper either as per the Corrections Ministers, cause average and fixed costs and leases.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/exclusive-expensive-failure-new-zealands-cost-per-prisoner-rises-while-jail-population-
What happens to the problem tenant after eviction, rather who's problem will it be next?
Does the law have any sway i.e fines or court?
KO are arguably the worst landlord in NZ. And Poto has to be in line to be one of our worst cabinet ministers.
Sorry to see Jen Psaki shifting from the White House to MSNBC.
Maybe Biden could swap for Rachel Maddow.
Good for her, imagine having to clean up after another Biden brain fart.
I would also assume better pay and a longer contract.
MSNBC is bleeding even faster than CNN. Better off joining Joe Rogan.
I consider it all just performative info/entertainment and i don't care nor do i listen/watch to either them.
Something is rotten at the heart of UK politics. The Russian oligarchy has embedded its tentacles deep in the Britsh aristocracy and they are exercising considerable power to suppress the truth. Reminds me of the Jian Yang saga and National's (no so hidden) propensity to suck up to CCP money
https://twitter.com/carolecadwalla/status/1509612965011804162?s=21&t=HBIItVqjpfwUvilulnXicg
Interesting post on the connection between oligarachs and UK torys.
https://fb.watch/c7oBj0CGT4/
Are some billionaires more moral because they are not billionaires called oligarchs?
Anyone who doesn't think we have a fully functioning oligarchy here in New Zealand is gravely mistaken.
Bernie Sanders gets it.
Anybody who thinks we do not have an oligarchy right here in America is sorely mistaken. – YouTube
Like Russia, we are a deeply unequal society with an exceptionally narrow intermarried inter-director network with no more than a handful of key net worth people in: housing, building supplies, ports, airports, groceries, fuel, politics, media, milk, agriculture, meat, banking, bread, fruit, electricity production, broadband, and more. Most of our debt is controlled by Australia, and most of what we make is taken by China: just 2 countries.
We're under a total illusion that we are more economically free than Russia.
Bruce Jesson and WB Sutch would recognise this country as the worst possible scenario they had imagined.
Well it's Michel's Iron Law after all.
But Kremlin aligned oligarchs are perhaps unusually active in promoting sociopathies like Brexit, which was intended to reduce the UK's influence and the effectiveness and cohesion of European powers.
The sociopathy of a Bill Gates is not intentionally directed towards the wrecking of Western society (though the various windows systems are hardly benign), they are his customers after all. But this limitation is not true of Kremlin operations, who would not be at all sad to see the present order collapse. They are in a very real sense the enemies of our states.
As Mickey Savage noted yesterday, our own 1% elite political donor class is pretty open about the politics it funds.
Yeah – wage suppression and climate denial – useless backward turkeys.
It's no more likely that Russians will be prosecuted for war crimes in Ukraine than Americans have been for theirs, but if tribunals were to be set up then there'd be a bunch of slam-dunk cases.
Will no one think of whining, thin-skinned
Nazifar right feels.https://twitter.com/NikkiMcR/status/1509948907899564044
Well I give thanks today that I don't live in Sri Lanka.
As prices soar in crisis-hit Sri Lanka, many forced to moonlight | News | Al Jazeera
"Historically weak government finances, badly timed tax cuts and the COVID-19 pandemic, which hit the vital tourism industry, have decimated the economy, triggering a currency crisis that has disrupted fuel imports and caused skyrocketing food prices."
"Well I give thanks today that I don't live in Sri Lanka."
….yet
We have a few months,and then we will be like the North sea Island off the coast of France.
https://twitter.com/TorstenBell/status/1509820318369693713?cxt=HHwWooC-8ZDl-vMpAAAA
Couldnt possibly happen ….NZ is Godzone.
And all wanting coke cans to rain from the sky
Exhibit 1.
https://www.transpower.co.nz/sites/default/files/interfaces/can/CAN%20Southland%20security%20issues%20and%20request%20for%20information%204289359753.pdf
Its been a funny old summer….quite wet in Canterbury.
Perhaps the climate is changing.
Just read the obit for Dame Miriam Dell – what an outstanding woman. Just reading through this, it's filled with 'only woman on' and 'first woman to' – it's due to her (and the team of strong women around her) that we have made such progress towards equality not, that I – or probably Dell – think that we're there yet
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/women-of-influence/128191223/obituary-teamaking-snub-spurred-a-lifetime-of-advocacy-for-women
That was a lovely read, she would have been awesome to meet. Make us some tea dear! Yeah, nah nah, make your own cuppa. Signed, the token woman.