Does John Armstrong live in Auckland? He certainly doesn’t seem to have a clue about the crisis in Auckland affordable housing for beneficiaries and other renters on low incomes.
Armstrong champions Labour’s housing policy over that of National’s or Greens, even though Shearer was “all over the paddock” when talking about it this week, because:it’s “gone down well with the punters.” Which punters would this be? Those who will be able to afford to buy Labour’s planned houses?
He says the Greens have got it wrong because building state houses in Hobsonville wouldn’t work – the land’s too valuable, you see. And, furthermore, Armstrong reckons that is the wrong place for work-seeking beneficiaries to live, because it’s not near jobs. Does he realise it is precisely in such outer areas that beneficiaries and other low income people are looking for places to rent because there’s nothing available closer to the city? Also, the whole Massey area is being upgraded, including the Westgate centre, because it is seen as becoming a growth area in the future – which should mean more local jobs.
All Armstrong’s latest column shows is, which team he’s throwing his lot in with for the next election.
LOLZ, John Armstrong one of the reasons why i don’t read the Herald even when it’s free online, ”The Green Party’s housing policy would require the Government to go on a continual borrowing binge”
Really, the only answer that little quip deserves from anyone is ”Ha Ha Ha”, Armstrong resorts to bullshit (as usual), The Slippery lead National Government just for Armstrong’s education has in 4 years borrowed 42 billion dollars, not a binge, a f**king orgy of borrowing, that 42 billion dollar borrowing ‘orgy’ at 300 million bucks a weeks is the biggest amount of monies borrowed in the shortest amount of time by any Government in NZ,s history, and that borrowing is set to continue right up to November 2014 where the debt mountain will be topping out at 60 odd billion dollars,
Does Armstrong ever get down to looking at what gives every appearance of being a borrowing regime by this Slippery lead National Government managed by those who suck on P pipes for breakfast,
Money, just to educate John Armstrong, when owed to the Government by us peasants is counted in the Government books as an asset as will the houses that will be built with the money owed,
Depending on coalition negotiations we could expect the Green Party housing policy to take up 25% of the Labour Party proposed 100,000 homes, and it is my contention here that Labour should actually move to include the Green Party housing policy into a position alongside it’s own where everyone has a choice of bank mortgage or Government backed ‘rent to buy’,(place your bets now on the majority opting for Government backed rent to buy),
Armstrong’s whole argument ‘against’ the Green Party housing policy relies upon His prejudice against people who are NOT definitely middle class, His writing reeks of this condescension, why wouldn’t low income Kiwi’s keep their new homes neat tidy and well maintained, why wouldn’t low income Kiwi’s having the one chance they will ever get in this life to own their own homes not pay off the ‘equity’ in their new homes that the state holds as quickly as their incomes allow,
Why in fact doesn’t the fucking toe-rag well past His use-by date Herald hack writer Armstrong just not print lines in capitals saying ‘i hate the poor’,
Does the Herald’s pet hack writer own rental properties and can see part of the rental market disappearing into ‘rent to buy’ home ownership, lowering demand and forcing the Herald’s pet hack writer to take less in rent,
More to the point, are the bank’s getting a little jittery, a wee spot nervous, as they watch the Green party unveil a perfectly logical plan where Government acts as if it were a Government and provides not only the homes for the people it governs,(along with the jobs building them),and removes from the banks completely the need to finance such homes by becoming the lender of note for these homes by holding the equity in such homes instead of the banks via mortgage finance…
I would love to know, if as a young cadet reporter, Armstrong got a Housing Corporation mortgage at 4%, with the deposit capitalised using his family benefit.
This scheme and others, ensured that NZ was free of homelessness and poverty throughout the post World War 2 era.
witofi, been milling this ova
RNZ-(from the top of the Hill) “we don’t have authoritative broadsheet press in NZ”;
anglophile excess / Nordic Exceptionalism, that’s the ‘crux’ of it.
*some Sunday morning reading please?
(Gdansk the safety danzig)
Israel update; Assyrian retaliation threatened, and the Russian Foreign Ministry concurs
while (out of context) 12M is now owed to teachers, IRD Child Support and any other freakin ap
150,000 cases of Child Abuse reported in oh 12 (but hay, its only up a penny %: 16-14) down south Antarctic rapid changes are tongueing there groove into the Deep ocean as Owen Glenns funds are frozen; it’s trustees (sic) see it “no longer appropriate to distribute philanthropy in NZ” đ Ethics needed in the NZX effectively two counts of underarm trading yet don’t worry, according to the quoted bank advertisement “we can lend you enough money to get you out of debt”, sadly, been there, lost that. B.G & B.S
“Truth has no special time of it’s own. It’s hour is now always”
-Albert Schweitzer (any old dime. A dozen should do)
Armstrong’s been sucking up the spoonfuls fed from the Labour Leader’s office for the past 4 years. Sad thing is I used to respect him as a journalist. Not now.
What Armstrong cannot see is that the taxation from building the homes from the profits made by those contracted to do the building, from the higher level of consumption of building materials,from the increased taxation of an enlarged building workforce needed to build these houses and from the shift off of the dole of that labour force needed to build those houses will in fact far exceed any cost to the Government,
Economic illiterates like Armstrong are paid to seek out a plausible negative which the Herald gladly uses as a plank to beat upon the Political Party’s it’s backers dislike…
Seen the home screen on the stuff website yet? Paul Holmes ‘switching roles, he’ll be with Eve now’ the ‘resting kinght’s guide’ in the ever after. I’d link, but that means I’d have to click on it and I’m not going to give tosh like that any page views.
I can’t work out what’s worse – that a ‘news’ outlet thinks selling supernatural fairy tales is front page news, or that they’re starting to venerate Holmes, or that I feel like I’ve encountered a wormhole and I’m in a U.S. southern state. Gobsmackingly cloyingly awful.
Anyone notice that story in the NZHerald this morning about Judith Collins and the appointment of the Director of Human Rights Proceedings? The basic non-disclosure on the Conflict of Interest form is the story that will get her.
But if anyone needs to speak up for Catherine Rodgers, the applicant who was strongly recommended by the appointments panel and overruled by the Minister, Catherine Rodgers is a stunning lawyer.
It’s on Court record that under the utterly useless previous Director of Human Rights Proceedings (remember Robert Hesketh that previously disgraced District Court Judge), she marshalled the team that took on the government about the human rights of caregivers to be provided round the clock state assistance for caregivers.
The Crown and Ministers opposed her and her team every step of the way, court after court, over 7 years, and she and her team won. Right through to the Supreme Court. Anyone on the inside knows the kind of resources the Crown has at their legal disposal will understand what that means.
Catherine Rodgers is a seriously good lawyer, both in the professional and virtuous sense.
But now the story is on Collins. Hopefully its a story that gets some traction. Because if there’s one Minister who needs to go up against the wall come the revolution for crimes against the separation of judicial and executive function, it’s Judith Collins.
How deeply scummy is this government ? What does it take to chip the teflon and begin the unravelling ? Maybe this is an opportunity with the published photo at her mother-in-law’s funeral proving that Collins has been completely disingenuous in her denials of a conflict of interest. Here’s hoping the traction holds some place in the House this week .. come on Winston !!
Aye the selection of Robert Kee is looking more and more suspect. Collins and Rodgers know each other too. They spent time together on the Auckland Women Lawyers Association executive. The gossip that I have heard is that their relationship was not that good …
I think your confusing Catherine Rogers with Francis Joychild. Francis J did the caregiving case in the three Courts (Human Rights Tribunal, High Court and Appeal COurt). It never went to the Supreme Court. And the case wasn’t about round the clock assistance it was about payment for certain types of special cares for high needs family members.
Well there are some many scandals and sleazy carry on’s with this lot I think a lot of people are just turnig off. What I can’t understandis how this incompetent rable are still on top of the polls , Begs the quetion are they?
The latest payroll round – the first of the school term – was filled with errors. Staff who are on leave have incorrectly received full pay, changes that were made in November have not been actioned, staff are being forced to fill forms out twice with exactly the same information, some teachers had to be paid from school funds so they could afford groceries. It’s a nightmare – unnecessary bureaucracy, huge numbers of errors. Payroll systems have changed for the worse … The start of year is a critical period for payroll. At the start of this year, 64,733 changes were made for school employees, generating a 100% increase in workload for clerical staff.
What about NOVOPAYN. Sort of a derivative of Novocaine (a drug given to people to stop them feeling pain, especially during an operation on their teeth) – teachers getting their proper salary seems as hard as pulling teeth.
I think that all in the majority government should have their pay docked while such poor policy results continue. We need to have accountability from these well paid flunkies of our democratic institution, which is dirty and needs water blasting into all its crevices.
If I were cynical, I’d think JB was simply recycling ambergris – whale puke.
But JB’s long history of providing well researched and reputable links for his subtle and erudite analyses makes me ashamed of my own cynicism.
Green Party MP’s are today taking a canoe ride down the Waitara river in the yearly trek to highlight the plight of ‘despicable dirty rivers’,
The Waitara river as measured by NIWA has the lowest water quality of all rivers in New Zealand,
The Green Party has repeatedly ‘asked’ farmers to help clean up such filth as these rivers are not only the life-blood of continual farming they are in fact the taonga and life-blood of us all,
Fonterra the dairy giant has also repeatedly ‘asked’ farmers to clean up these rivers with little actual effect,
Those who are polluting our rivers should, while they still have time, give far more weight to having been ‘asked’ politely to address this issue,
The time when the Green Movement is willing to just ‘ask’ has all but expired, after ‘ask’ comes ‘tell’ and not long after ‘tell’ comes ‘force’, we all including the farming community have ‘choice’,
My ‘suggestion’ is that you begin to make the right ones…
I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point. Stick to Shearer but replace Grant Robertson as deputy and put Andrew Little in there. This should keep most within the party content and appeal to the broader supporter base. Little needs to take the Labour spokespersons role and champion creating job. Shearer needs to be kept in check so any overly overt moves right will be stamped out with Little there.
An innovative option, but roadblocks remain. Cunliffe would need to to be given a serious front bench position and Grant would have to back the overall move. The change would also have to go through, around or over Mallard et al. Not easy.
Mallards needs to be put in his place, a return to the house will be as speaker full-stop. A few others need to go at the end of this term. Fresh blood is needed & this issue needs to be addressed this month, Labour need to take a leaf out of the Greens book ‘refresh.’
Ego’s etc aside and they are all going to need to suck it up and concentrate on the job of sorting the mess National have done. Of course Cunliffe needs to be on the front bench. A rover like Joyce perhaps certainly the innovation portfolio.Â
   Â
Just for clarification ‘overtly right’ are policy’s like raising the age of retirement & ‘compulsory’ Kiwi saver ( low income earners can not afford).
Yuk, Andrew Little. Gross.
Mumble-pants is already unmarketable enough without that greaseball standing next to him.
Image and communication are Labour’s most pressing problems, Little would just exasperate those.
I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point.
Most people were predicting the its too late for change claim to come out in 12 months, you’re a bit early. If we take Shearer’s performance into account, I would say 3 weeks before the election should be considered the cut off point.
I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point
I honestly believe the need for a leadership challenge has never been more urgent. Let’s face it. labour is going nowhere. The polls have stalled, the front bench is not firing, and the Nats keep offering up these huge targets which somehow Labour keeps missing. Key is toying with Shearer.
Honestly, something has to change or we will have three more years of tory rule.
The Monday vote is not a vote on a “leadership challenge”. It is a vote on how caucus sees the rest of the Labour Party.
We need to see evidence that caucus is willing to listen to the membership and that it is willing to give the members (and affiliates) a voice. The energy and excitement a Primary process would build for Labour going into 2014 would be amazing.
And if Key gets back in then the gloves will come off, and that Power mad, megalomaniac, will sell , mine, and drill everything in sight. And still Labour will sit with their fingers in their ears.
The time for the members and unions to have a say is now. Any shuffle within the current failed regime will be compared to re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
13 MP to withhold Confidence in Shearer on Monday.
That is all that is needed to stop the paralysis of the past four years.
Mallard, TRP, various proxies, Mike Smith and Mike Williams are driving a wedge between the members and the Caucus. They have done nothing to unite the party. They think the only problem in the party is The Standard.
The Confidence Vote outcome on Monday will determine their future status. Yes, Mallard is hitting on MPs. He knows his political future is at risk. The pressure has got to him. Hence the incompetent attempt at the Leadership. He lost his rag on these pages yesterday.
Mallard will bully the List members like Darien Fenton who are dependant on a decent list position. He won’t try to bully an Electorate MP like Louisa Wall, because Trevor is a two bit coward.
For Labour to connect with the widest possible cross section of New Zealand society we need to be seen as the Party that:
a) has the right ideas;
b) the right people in place to execute the strategies derived from those ideas, and
c) the right Leader who can convince the public that Labour has a) & b).
Your friendly MP is today pondering how she/he will vote on the CONFIDENCE MOTION at the Caucus meeting on Monday.
Please help them with these three simple questions.
Call now.
My friendly MP is a deceptive Tory lawyer, another ‘safe seat’ that went west in 08 never to return with the bozo labour candidate who’s failed to hold ut or retake it in 2011. Feckless at best.
Personally I’m just sick of losing.
This leader Shearer, according to poll tracking, won’t win.
I want the right to at least ask the question with my vote:
can we please pick the right one, the one that will have the best chance of winning.
We just haven’t had the chance to even ask that question as Members.
“New Zealand needs to strengthen global linkages and tackle government spending and regulatory issues that diminish productivity and competitiveness if it is to lift its economic performance.”
“the other main way of improving prosperity in the longer run – labour productivity growth.”
“First … is the need to lift savings rates.”
“quality of investment is also an issue, with much of it going into housing rather than productivity-promoting investment.”
“New Zealand needs to be more welcoming to foreign investment, and should “re-examine the factors, including tax and regulation, that diminish and distort the incentives to both save and invest”.”
“Second on his priority list is for the Government to return its books to surplus.”
“”This is one reason why it is critical to cut back ineffective government spending, and ensure that our welfare spending is targeted better at those in need.””
“Finally Wheeler calls for a focus on the fat tail of underperformance in the education system.”
” “The bottom income deciles are populated by those with lesser skills, and those who experience prolonged and recurrent spells of unemployment. Addressing these groups would both promote productivity and reduce inequality.”
All of which is bog-standard, Right-wing, how-to-get-an-MBA-without-having-to-think singspiel.
And I somehow don’t think David Shearer et al would disagree with one single word of it.
Wheeler is using snake talk, what he is saying is a return to deregulation is needed and fast tracked at that. Foreign investment ‘sell sell sell’ New Zealand…land, houses, assets so his mates & him can make big profits! Add a more ‘flexible employment market’ ( law changes) increases productivity…and keeps those pesky Unions in their place.
 This guy is scum & needs a good look into his books for any irregular behavior… Stalin style preferably!Â
Frak this guy Wheeler. Another 1980’s trainee of Milton Friedman. Absolutely moronic and unaware of the situation our civilisation is in, and how his ilk are directly responsible.
My point is that I can hear every point of Wheeler’s speech coming out of Shearer’s mouth – and with most of the Labour caucus standing behind him nodding.
Blah blah blah blah blah. Its like they have some speech somewhere in a word file and print it off and give it to whoever is the reserve bank governor of the time.
Wheeler has no brains, that is clear. His message there is keep spinning the wheel faster and faster. Where is some analytical thought? Some original ideas? ha ha ha what a tosser spinning the same shit.
Here is how NZ could easily improve imo….
We need to own our country and its assets. The rich always chase the asset and keep it. Because that leads to long term wealth. So that is what we should do. We can start by banning foreign ownership of our land. Business does not need to own the land. Foreign ownership of land is the most dumbfuck idea going and it is only a negative to us. That is why so many other countries do not allow it, like China. Duh.
We also need to drive down the value of capital assets such as land, housing, plant, business, machinery everything. Paying vast sums to simply buy the capital asset drains the income which flows from that asset and benefits only the creators of credit, the privately owned banks.
Drive down capital values and drive ownership into New Zealanders hands, as many of them as possible.
Then watch the country go from strength to strength.
Come on you bloody dickheads Wheeler and English, do some fucking thinking dumbos. THINK.
The benefit system is under attack by national,we know that, but my situation is that
my disabilities are long term,i had go give up work because of them,i was given a
temporary additional support aligned to my housing costs,and a disability allowance,
all went ok until renewel a month ago, where because of increased medical costs
my disability allowance increased, but i was astounded my level of benefit stayed
the same,i phoned winz and was told that the disability allowance is seen as income
when you have temporary additonal support, penny pinching or just plain nasty?
If you are within the time limit, make an appointment with your case manager and demand the papers to appeal the decision,
Yes they are trying to cut costs by doing what you point out, hoping you will not have either the skills or energy to take their decision to the appeal authority,
I have heard of peoples disability allowance cancelled because they supposedly did not file a renewal,not just once but 3 years in a row,
The problem with that little fallacy is that the disability allowance form for the Invalids Benefit is part of the yearly renewal form for that benefit and it was impossible for WINZ to have missed it…
You have the legal right to review the decision. You don’t need an appointment but as you will know when you submit the Review of Decision form make sure you get a copy that is date stamped in case it is later “lost”.
Contact your local benefit rights service. Mine in Wellington is highly informed and experienced (some benefit rights advocates have little in the way of training and basically go in with you….and that’s about it. The BRS in Wellington has the right type of experience and quality advice you can count on so consider calling them 04 2102012 between 9.30am – 3.30 Tuesday – Friday, and they are in a meeting Monday morning so phone in the afternoon.)
I don’t know about TAS because I’m still on Special benefit which started being phased out in 2006 as I’m on IB too. What happened to you sounds very fishy to me.
You will feel better after you speak with an advocate who KNOWS what they are talking about.
It will help if you take what they tell you over the phone and write this exact wording on the review of decision form (you have to state why you disagree with their decision). I’m cheering you on. LFTHG.
You may find that it never even makes it to the hearing stage as the mistake could be picked up in an internal review.
Thanks all, AWW i will use the ph num and contact them, when i posted i was
wondering if anyone else had a similar problem, I do have a fighting spirit
so now i can go in to battle,so to speak, so thanks all for your support đ
I do have a fighting spirit so now i can go in to battle
Every WINZ appointment should be seen as a battle. There is strength in numbers, if possible, I’d recommend going to the appointment with another person, if you feel comfortable with them witnessing the conversation. A 2 vs 1 environment will change the nature of the appointment, and therefore how you get treated.
Even better if your wing-person is knowledgeable about WINZ tricks. Places like city mission, sallies or Auckland Action Against Poverty can help.
Good luck
This has happened to me to in the last month re renewal. Both TAS for rent and my DA has not been paid. I do not receive the maximum DA so this is not a cost on TAS, (the cut off point for DA is in the mid 50,s but check this). Anything under the cut off for DA has nothing to do with TAS, but TAS can be paid for health costs once over the cut off. Tying DA with TAS is not on as both are individual supplements in there own right with different renewal dates, (TAS every 13 weeks, DA every year).
I read in the NZ Herald today that over the summer 9 million has been paid out by ACC for sunburn, insect bites, barbecue accidents etc. (All trivial stuff).
Something is going down at Work and Income, possibly a directive from Bennett as she can issue one.
an Aad for burglar Good king wencheslas (with a thin paddy and Veuve Clicquot to swallow)
literally, there is no sacred fish sword
evocatively, that’s a different kettle of wish
were you there when they crucified. My Lord!
(there Definitely / Maybe a Champagne Super nova)
From The Stiff Kittens at The Electric Circus
To The Fan Club, Tell Laura I Love Her and that she is the missing link between Elvis Presley and The Banshees. This is our happy Fun House, no need to be a Mayflower at The Electric Ballroom;
King Kong’s not AnTwerp at all swinging Dead Souls at The Moonlight Club (is Kevin The Trojan Horse candidate with Insight?) on a Manchester Beach across the Mersey they Send No Flowers from Republica. Heaven is not The Rock Garden or The Boys Club (Hitchcock Railway) Bus, Le Palace or The Hacienda.
It’s The Venue for Movement and Ceremony, Utopia / Hal4, in The Day of The Lords as New Dawn Fades Something Must Break now 24 Hours into The Eternal Decades Shadowplay just like Sister Ray said, have a good night have a good night have a good night.
-Man of Principle (new world boy on the old Kings Road)
p**s. Phil Collins Henry Rollins Murder Ballads get down get down little Henry Lee
and the wind did howl and the wind did blow she plugged him through and through
they call her The Wild Rose (sorry if I interrupted any mans coitus)
bad things come in threes
Third Eye Blind Hows It Gonna Be. Kryptonite Three Doors get Down. Come on baby light my buick
getting back to The Good Oil,
Yishar shining and clear elaion
shake the fruit with a light stick
bruise in mortar crushed in a press loaded
with wood or stones.rudely hear the whiffletree creek
reservoirs clarified Oil of Tekoa was reckoned nga best. ha!
Trade by the honorable of the earth surpassed that of the Egyptian harvests
Till mercantile cupidity purchased Hebrew slaves repaid by Nebuchadnezzar.
Alexander completed the causeway so the anti-septic function came in Handy
old oil Celsus applied externally with friction to fevers. James certainly recommended it
-Rx (Philo Pliny and Galen)
Job done at 5:13 He catches the wise in their craftiness, and the schemes of the wily are swept away
12:3 a man cannot be established through wickedness yet the righteous cannot be uprooted
8:3 for whoever finds me finds life
Love changes everything (plenty to dive into or pennon there through the limestone at 60 per cm2)
dying to the self everyday wears out soles. Sikhism is strongly opposed to caste divisions.Baptised by the sword (interestingly) all may eat together in the kitchen at parties.
-Singh (thats an irreverent non-extremist pun jab) Has he lost his mind? can he see or is he blind
he was turned to steel in the great magnetic field.
The NZ Labour Party Youth section is important but has the Leadership become relevant to the 16+ young adults who will vote in 2014?
A slice of the Opinion Polls that I saw in the course of a marketing strategy session indicated that the youth of NZ will vote
1. Green
2. National, marginally ahead of
3. Labour.
NOT the positioning for a Party of Radical roots. The Youth saw the greens as the ones challenging the status quo. Many saw Labour as defenders of a status quo.
The Labour MPs need to consider how 16+ kids view them. Obviously there is a signigicant perseption thing that needs to be changed.
Boudicea, I could have told you that for half what you paid!
It is so obvious at Freshers Week in any third level institution.
The Youth will vote Green unless Labour makes a dramatic shift.
I know some union people are doing great work on making young workers politically aware. Will they become Labour voters? Probably yes. The new leaders of the Unions are the key to Labour’s much needed re-birth.
I agree with the concept of ‘new’ Union leaders having a large part in changing Labour’s fortunes. There are a high number of piss weak General Secretary’s that need to be moved out, & the standard of union organisers being employed by some outfits is also unbelievably poor. Too many of these GS’s are in with the sad old faces within labour which is the problem. Â
Chris Trotter had some interesting things to say about Shearers speech and his style of delivery at the recent Young Labour summer camp on Citizen A with Bomber.
Our four children are ALL Green party supporters, despite both of us having worked hard for Labour all our lives.
Last week our youngest son laughed at me and said, “Dad, why would I belong to any organization where I had no say in choosing the leaders? We Greens elect our own leaders and rank our list candidates. Labour is so past it’s use by date.”
Need to get Shearer on an electric guitar…or maybe playing bass.
Can we get him in a dub/reggae band? Like the Mayor off Portlandia?
It’ll have to be real roots reggae.
Other than that, Labour has no chance of attracting youth. Key has sewn up the idiocracy vote (despite Shearer’s best efforts). Greens get the youth who are aware of their future.
What does Labour offer youth. Look at the top MPs since 2008. Stuffy old twats. Don’t expect the youth to vote for their oppressors.
Seriously Rogue Trooper you should step up and write a blog of your own.
Would need an international audience.
But you appear to have a mind like the old arcade game Defender; flashes and reverses, and grand fractal jumps.
– You have several degrees, some of them arts, quite a lot of classics and philosophy
– You are at least in your 40s
– You have described yourself as being from somewhere Deep South
– You are saturated in Ellul and other Christianarchies
– You have memorised a whole bunch of songs, films, and Coltrane-style poetry
Most from this era have simply have that mind wrapped in lines of scar/e tissue in which the whips of the world have worn too deep a groove in their minds. How you sustain that still is quite beyond me.
You have more freedom in that spectral writing-jazz of yours than most have long since forgotten, yet with no shade of The Quiet American or other post-redemptive melancholies.
All it would take is at least a post every week.
What do you think? Can’t hide here under a little bushel forever you know.
I believe I know what the future holds for the world…yet not myself. I have an idea of what is going on since I opened up and began “commenting” on The Standard…(repeated empirical reality testing)…and it is related to words and energy forms, in particular the electromagnetic spectrum…yet this is not occurring in Isolation…I have a deep well of gratitude to many from this site and those that echo beyond…
It is a matter of conceptualization…there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophies…a lot is related to what quantum physics has revealed to us…I owe a great obligation to lprent…may be on the radio and in a band soon…yet waiting patiently, reading, gardening, cooking, cleaning…(and to the tr. yes, I can go anyway in the city I live in and be greeted warmly by people from right across the spectrum yet I’m open about my politics and faith and previous flouting of the Law; may be a lesson in there?). I did not go to University (as a mature student) or develop my knowledge and “understanding” to be materialistically wealthy; I have never been ambitious, although a PhD sounded attractive for a while back…in the deep, distant past. I learn to understand, and like others on here, share that understanding for free.
Wherever you go, there you is no “point” at which our skins stop and The Universe starts.
A Very Big uncalled for ThankUturn. :). (and the A MAZERati)
nite
So I am curious about something. You have maintained that Labour is a right-wing party however the vast, overwhelming consensus among political scientists and the politicians themselves, from all sides, is that Labour is a centre left party.
however the vast, overwhelming consensus among political scientists and the politicians themselves, from all sides, is that Labour is a centre left party.
That reminds me of the old advertising trick where the advertiser would point out how many millions had been sold and then say that x millions of people can’t be wrong. The problem, of course, is that they can.
So, back up your argument.
I have. Several times in fact. Go have a look at what I’ve said about Labour’s KiwiBuild.
But there is a problem – you have personally stated your belief that Labour is a centre-right party however you also mentioned that those who can produce the most factual support for their claims is the opinion that should be more widely held rendering the second opinion worthless.
And the facts overwhelmingly support the view that Labour is a centre-left party therefore shouldn’t you declare your opinion as worthless?
N***ism may have been an ideology to which the United States was â and to which the president is â implacably opposed, but it is hardly âsenseless.â By the early 1930s, the N**i party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the âunification of all Germans,â a demand for âland and territory for the sustenance of our people,â and an assertion that âno Jew can be a member of the race.â Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.
On a different topic I only just noticed this across at kiwiblog:http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2013/02/why_did_labour_put_trevor_up.html which had been speculated about here. But was interested to see the idea that Annette won’t stand for Wellington mayor to keep Andrew out of Rongatai. Hardly the image of party renewal that they are after.
I read that too. If it is true, then it is a disgrace, and it only re-enforces my view of the hopeless state the Labour Party is in. Sorry, my view remains to be, a fresh start for the combined left can only be made by forming a new, inclusive, smart and well organised, newly staffed Left Party, that will not carry such baggage as Labour, either incorporate enough “green” policies, or work better with the Greens, and put Labour into the redundant category.
This upsets some, but I see NO other option now, with Shearer and other hopeless members in Parliament just clinging to their seats and positions.
For all those that have any “doubts” that people get BRAINWASHED by listening to private radio or other media, perhaps have a look at this quite frank set of information from the privately run ‘The Radio Network’, apparently owned largely by an Australian media corporation, and partly by a US share-holder, covering much of NZ radio:
There are comparisons between “media content distribution” and other criterias or information statistics.
I would think the “editorial” content is highly over-stated, as that must include anything but the bare net commercials they hammer your brain and mind with incessantly, repeatedly so it STICKS!
The “editorial content” will in the case of ZM, ZB, or any other of their stations, same as Radio Pacific (another radio broadcaster, not part of this lot), certainly include the highly frequent repeating of the station, it’s mission message and announcements for what comes up, what infotainment they present, and the likes.
So it does not equate with “REAL information”.
I thought this is worth having a look at, to see, how commercial radio works, compared to other commercial media, and how much of the contents is nothing but commercial advertising and much other CRAP.
NZ has the worst statistics and conditions and standards for public broadcasting, when compared with most developed “western” countries, that is for sure. It is dominated by commercial interests, and that even in the state run TV stations. Only Radio NZ National seems to be different, but even they have their internal “rules”, set by the ones that run that station.
Shocking truth. But so many grew up and grow up with this endless inundation of brainwashing into consumerism, superficiality, opportunistic thinking, and individual prioritising, which all somehow is in conflict in maintaining a working “social fabric” and unity.
It's hard times try to make a livingYou wake up every morning in the unforgivingOut there somewhere in the cityThere's people living lives without mercy or pityI feel good, yeah I'm feeling fineI feel better then I have for the longest timeI think these pills have been good for meI ...
In 1974, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Nixon, finding that the President was not a King, but was subject to the law and was required to turn over the evidence of his wrongdoing to the courts. It was a landmark decision for the rule ...
Every day now just seems to bring in more fresh meat for the grinder.In their relentlessly ideological drive to cut back on the “excessive bloat” (as they see it) of the previous Labour-led government, on the mountains of evidence accumulated in such a short period of time do not ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Megan Valére SosouMarket gardening site of the Itchèléré de Itagui agricultural cooperative in Dassa-Zoumè (Image credit: Megan Valère Sossou) For the residents of Dassa-Zoumè, a city in the West African country of Benin, choosing between drinking water and having enough ...
Buzz from the Beehive  Melissa Lee â as may be discerned from the screenshot above â has not been demoted for doing something seriously wrong as Minister of ...
Morning in London Mother hugs beloved daughter outside the converted shoe factory in which she is living.Afternoon in London Travelling writer takes himself and his wrist down to A&E, just to be sure. Read more ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – The recent announcement of the University Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Peter Gluckman, makes very clear where the Governmentâs focus and priorities lie. The remit of the Advisory Group is that Group members will consider challenges and opportunities for improvement in the university sector including: ...
Eric Crampton writes – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand desperately wants to find reasons to have workstreams in climate change. It makes little sense. They’ve run another stress test on the banks looking to see if they could find a prudential regulation case. They couldn’t. They ...
Rob MacCullough writes –Â Pundits from the left and the right are arguing that National’s Fast Track Bill that is designed to speed up infrastructure decisions could end up becoming mired in a cesspool of corruption. Political commentator ...
Looking at the headlines this morning it’s hard to feel anything other than pessimistic about the future of humanity.Note that I’m not speaking about the future of mankind, but the survival of our humanity. The values that we believe in seem to be ebbing away, by the day.Perhaps every generation ...
Swabbing mixed breed baby chicks to test for avian influenzaUh oh. Bird flu â often deadly to humans – is not only being transmitted from infected birds to dairy cows, but is now travelling between dairy cows. As of last Friday, Bloomberg News reports, there were 32 American dairy herds ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
Photo # 1 I am a huge fan of Singapore’s approach to housing, as described here two years ago by copying and pasting from The ConversationWhat Singapore has that Australia does not is a public housing developer, the Housing Development Board, which puts new dwellings on public and reclaimed land, ...
Buzz from the Beehive Reactions to news of the governmentâs readiness to make urgent changes to âthe resource management systemâ through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes donât go far enough. Greenpeace says ...
I’m starting to wonder if Anna Burns-Francis might be the best political interviewer we’ve got. That might sound unlikely to you, it came as a bit of a surprise to me.Jack Tame can be excellent, but has some pretty average days. I like Rebecca Wright on Newshub, she asks good ...
Chris Trotter writes – Willie Jackson is said to be planning a âmedia summitâ to discuss âthe state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalismâ. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes –Â This morning [April 21], the Wellington High Court is hearing a judicial review brought by Hon. Karen Chhour, the Minister for Children, against a decision of the Waitangi Tribunal. This is unusual, judicial reviews are much more likely to brought against ministers, rather than ...
Both of Parliament’s watchdogs have now ripped into the Government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s political economy and beyond on the morning of Tuesday, April 23 are:The Lead: The Auditor General,John Ryan, has joined the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Sarah SpengemanPeople wait to board an electric bus in Pune, India. (Image credit: courtesy of ITDP) Public transportation riders in Pune, India, love the city’s new electric buses so much they will actually skip an older diesel bus that ...
The infrastructure industry yesterday issued a “hurry up” message to the Government, telling it to get cracking on developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects.The hiatus around the change of Government has seen some major projects cancelled and others delayed, and there is uncertainty about what will happen with the new ...
Hi,Over the weekend I revisited a podcast I really adore, Dead Eyes. It’s about a guy who got fired from Band of Brothers over two decades ago because Tom Hanks said he had “dead eyes”.If you don’t recall — 2001’s Band of Brothers was part of the emerging trend of ...
 Buzz from the Beehive The 180 or so recipients of letters from the Government telling them how to submit infrastructure projects for âfast trackâ consideration includes some whose project applications previously have been rejected by the courts. News media were quick to feature these in their reports after RMA Reform Minister Chris ...
It would not be a desirable way to start your holiday by breaking your back, your head, or your wrist, but on our first hour in Singapore I gave it a try.We were chatting, last week, before we started a meeting of Hazel’s Enviro Trust, about the things that can ...
Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure that the new Fast-Track Approvals Bill â currently being pushed through by the ...
Feel worried. Shane Jones and a couple of his Cabinet colleagues are about to be granted the power to override any and all objections to projects like dams, mines, roads etc even if: said projects will harm biodiversity, increase global warming and cause other environmental harms, and even if ...
Bryce Edwards writes-Â The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. ...
Michael Bassett writes – If you think there is a move afoot by the radical Maori fringe of New Zealand society to create a parallel system of government to the one that we elect at our triennial elections, you arenât wrong. Over the last few days we have ...
Without a corresponding drop in interest rates, it’s doubtful any changes to the CCCFA will unleash a massive rush of home buyers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, April 22 included:The Government making a ...
Sunday was a lazy day. I started watching Jack Tame on Q&A, the interviews are usually good for something to write about. Saying the things that the politicians won’t, but are quite possibly thinking. Things that are true and need to be extracted from between the lines.As you might know ...
In our Weekly Roundup last week we covered news from Auckland Transport that the WX1 Western Express is going to get an upgrade next year with double decker electric buses. As part of the announcement, AT also said âSince we introduced the WX1 Western Express last November we have seen ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 29 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Stats NZ releases its statutory report on Census 2023 tomorrow.Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivers a pre-Budget speech at ...
A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 14, 2024 thru Sat, April 20, 2024. Story of the week Our story of the week hinges on these words from the abstract of a fresh academic ...
The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. The Government says this will ...
This is a column to say thank you. So many of have been in touch since Mum died to say so many kind and thoughtful things. You’re wonderful, all of you. You’ve asked how we’re doing, how Dad’s doing. A little more realisation each day, of the irretrievable finality of ...
Identifying the engine type in your car is crucial for various reasons, including maintenance, repairs, and performance upgrades. Knowing the specific engine model allows you to access detailed technical information, locate compatible parts, and make informed decisions about modifications. This comprehensive guide will provide you with a step-by-step approach to ...
Introduction: The allure of racing is undeniable. The thrill of speed, the roar of engines, and the exhilaration of competition all contribute to the allure of this adrenaline-driven sport. For those who yearn to experience the pinnacle of racing, becoming a race car driver is the ultimate dream. However, the ...
Introduction Automobiles have become ubiquitous in modern society, serving as a primary mode of transportation and a symbol of economic growth and personal mobility. With countless vehicles traversing roads and highways worldwide, it begs the question: how many cars are there in the world? Determining the precise number is a ...
Maintaining a safe and reliable vehicle requires regular inspections. Whether it’s a routine maintenance checkup or a safety inspection, knowing how long the process will take can help you plan your day accordingly. This article delves into the factors that influence the duration of a car inspection and provides an ...
Mazda Motor Corporation, commonly known as Mazda, is a Japanese multinational automaker headquartered in Fuchu, Aki District, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan. The company was founded in 1920 as the Toyo Cork Kogyo Co., Ltd., and began producing vehicles in 1931. Mazda is primarily known for its production of passenger cars, but ...
Your car battery is an essential component that provides power to start your engine, operate your electrical systems, and store energy. Over time, batteries can weaken and lose their ability to hold a charge, which can lead to starting problems, power failures, and other issues. Replacing your battery before it ...
In most states, you cannot register a car without a valid driver’s license. However, there are a few exceptions to this rule. Exceptions to the RuleIf you are under 18 years old: In some states, you can register a car in your name even if you do not ...
Mazda, a Japanese automotive manufacturer with a rich history of innovation and engineering excellence, has emerged as a formidable player in the global car market. Known for its reputation of producing high-quality, fuel-efficient, and driver-oriented vehicles, Mazda has consistently garnered praise from industry experts and consumers alike. In this article, ...
Struts are an essential part of a car’s suspension system. They are responsible for supporting the weight of the car and damping the oscillations of the springs. Struts are typically made of steel or aluminum and are filled with hydraulic fluid. How Do Struts Work? Struts work by transferring the ...
Car registration is a mandatory process that all vehicle owners must complete annually. This process involves registering your car with the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and paying an associated fee. The registration process ensures that your vehicle is properly licensed and insured, and helps law enforcement and other authorities ...
Zoom is a video conferencing service that allows you to share your screen, webcam, and audio with other participants. In addition to sharing your own audio, you can also share the audio from your computer with other participants. This can be useful for playing music, sharing presentations with audio, or ...
Building your own computer can be a rewarding and cost-effective way to get a high-performance machine tailored to your specific needs. However, it also requires careful planning and execution, and one of the most important factors to consider is the time it will take. The exact time it takes to ...
Sleep mode is a power-saving state that allows your computer to quickly resume operation without having to boot up from scratch. This can be useful if you need to step away from your computer for a short period of time but don’t want to shut it down completely. There are ...
Introduction Computer-Assisted Translation (CAT) has revolutionized the field of translation by harnessing the power of technology to assist human translators in their work. This innovative approach combines specialized software with human expertise to improve the efficiency, accuracy, and consistency of translations. In this comprehensive article, we will delve into the ...
In today’s digital age, mobile devices have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. Among the vast array of portable computing options available, iPads and tablet computers stand out as two prominent contenders. While both offer similar functionalities, there are subtle yet significant differences between these two devices. This ...
A computer is an electronic device that can be programmed to carry out a set of instructions. The basic components of a computer are the processor, memory, storage, input devices, and output devices. The Processor The processor, also known as the central processing unit (CPU), is the brain of the ...
Voice Memos is a convenient app on your iPhone that allows you to quickly record and store audio snippets. These recordings can be useful for a variety of purposes, such as taking notes, capturing ideas, or recording interviews. While you can listen to your voice memos on your iPhone, you ...
Laptop screens are essential for interacting with our devices and accessing information. However, when lines appear on the screen, it can be frustrating and disrupt productivity. Understanding the underlying causes of these lines is crucial for finding effective solutions. Types of Screen Lines Horizontal lines: Also known as scan ...
Right-clicking is a common and essential computer operation that allows users to access additional options and settings. While most desktop computers have dedicated right-click buttons on their mice, laptops often do not have these buttons due to space limitations. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on how to right-click ...
Powering up and shutting down your ASUS laptop is an essential task for any laptop user. Locating the power button can sometimes be a hassle, especially if you’re new to ASUS laptops. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on where to find the power button on different ASUS laptop ...
Dell laptops are renowned for their reliability, performance, and versatility. Whether you’re a student, a professional, or just someone who needs a reliable computing device, a Dell laptop can meet your needs. However, if you’re new to Dell laptops, you may be wondering how to get started. In this comprehensive ...
Two-thirds of the country think that âNew Zealandâs economy is rigged to advantage the rich and powerfulâ. They also believe that âNew Zealand needs a strong leader to take the country back from the rich and powerfulâ. These are just two of a handful of stunning new survey results released ...
In today’s digital world, screenshots have become an indispensable tool for communication and documentation. Whether you need to capture an important email, preserve a website page, or share an error message, screenshots allow you to quickly and easily preserve digital information. If you’re an Asus laptop user, there are several ...
A factory reset restores your Gateway laptop to its original factory settings, erasing all data, apps, and personalizations. This can be necessary to resolve software issues, remove viruses, or prepare your laptop for sale or transfer. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to factory reset your Gateway laptop: Method 1: ...
âYou talking about me?âThe neoliberal denigration of the past was nowhere more unrelenting than in its depiction of the public service. The Post Office and the Railways were held up as being both irremediably inefficient and scandalously over-manned. Playwright Roger Hallâs âGlide Timeâ caricatures were presented as accurate depictions of ...
Roger Partridge writes – When the Coalition Government took office last October, it inherited a country on a precipice. With persistent inflation, decades of insipid productivity growth and crises in healthcare, education, housing and law and order, it is no exaggeration to suggest New Zealand’s first-world status was ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – In 2022, the Curriculum Centre at the Ministry of Education employed 308 staff, according to an Official Information Request. Earlier this week it was announced 202 of those staff were being cut. When you look up “The New Zealand Curriculum” on the Ministry of ...
Chris Bishop’s bill has stirred up a hornets nest of opposition. Photo: Lynn Grieveson for The KākāTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate from the last day included:A crescendo of opposition to the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill is ...
Monday left me brokenTuesday, I was through with hopingWednesday, my empty arms were openThursday, waiting for love, waiting for loveThe end of another week that left many of us asking WTF? What on earth has NZ gotten itself into and how on earth could people have voluntarily signed up for ...
Hello! Here comes the Saturday edition of More Than A Feilding, catching you up on the past week’s editions.State of humanity, 20242024, it feels, keeps presenting us with ever more challenges, ever more dismay.Do you give up yet? It seems to ask.No? How about this? Or this?How about this?Full story Share ...
Determining the hardest sport in the world is a subjective matter, as the difficulty level can vary depending on individual abilities, physical attributes, and experience. However, based on various factors including physical demands, technical skills, mental fortitude, and overall accomplishment, here is an exploration of some of the most challenging ...
The allure of sport transcends age, culture, and geographical boundaries. It captivates hearts, ignites passions, and provides unparalleled entertainment. Behind the spectacle, however, lies a fascinating world of financial investment and expenditure. Among the vast array of competitive pursuits, one question looms large: which sport carries the hefty title of ...
Introduction Pickleball, a rapidly growing paddle sport, has captured the hearts and imaginations of millions around the world. Its blend of tennis, badminton, and table tennis elements has made it a favorite among players of all ages and skill levels. As the sport’s popularity continues to surge, the question on ...
Abstract: Soccer, the global phenomenon captivating millions worldwide, has a rich history that spans centuries. Its origins trace back to ancient civilizations, but the modern version we know and love emerged through a complex interplay of cultural influences and innovations. This article delves into the fascinating journey of soccer’s evolution, ...
Our two-tiered system for veteransâ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veteransâ affairs spokesperson Greg OâConnor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxonâs management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last yearâs severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labourâs environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our countryâs most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Governmentâs Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a âget out of jail freeâ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealandâs good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National governmentâs lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for TÄmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Governmentâs democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Governmentâs proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change thatâs great for the planet and great for consumers after her memberâs bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the countryâs books after Teanau Tuionoâs membersâ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his memberâs bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Todayâs advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Governmentâs newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealandâs urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. âOur Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealandâs hydrogen future, with the opening of the countryâs first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. âI want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealandâs own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealandâs energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. âThe report shows that New Zealandâs emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,â Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where heâll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Governmentâs work to restore law and order. âAttending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealandâs human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the worldâs largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. âThe reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealandâs wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin  NgÄ mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho  Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today.  I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. âOur Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealandâs overseas missions.  âOur diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealandâs interests around the world,â Mr Peters says.  âI am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. Â âOver 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. âIt is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. âOur coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
âChina remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,â Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says.  Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. âRecently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachersâ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul.  âThe Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. âScience, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During todayâs meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. âThe Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in TaupĹ as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the TaupĹ International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. âAnticipation for the ITM TaupĹ Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. âThe coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. âThis project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sectorâs productivity,â Mr Jones says. âThe project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Governmentâs plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. âBenefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Governmentâs commitment to doubling New Zealandâs renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealandâs latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. âOur Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. âNew Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Governmentâs intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. âThe introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Todayâs announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Governmentâs plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. âInflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sectorâs role in the export-led recovery of the economy. âI am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Governmentâs support for the revitalisation the sector.  "New Zealandâs wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. âThe inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. âMy meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
âNever again - No AUKUSâ was the message of the wreath laid at this morningâs national ANZAC Day commemorative service at Pukeahu National War Memorial Park this morning by the Stop AUKUS group. ...
Until this month, Auckland swimmer Hazel Ouwehand had never met a qualifying time in an Olympic event for a New Zealand team, even as a junior. Now sheâs very likely off to the Paris Olympics after swimming well under the qualifying standard in the 100m butterfly twice â both in ...
While Anzac Day has experienced a resurgence in recent years, our other day of remembrance has slowly faded from view.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand. Original illustrations by Hope McConnell.First published in 2022.The high schoolâs head girl and ...
Australian and New Zealand volunteers fought together in the Waikato War, yet still its place in the Anzac tradition is unacknowledged by our defence forces or Returned Services Association.First published in 2018.When I was a boy cub I attended Anzac Day services in the South Auckland suburb of ...
A poem by Wellington writer Tayi Tibble. Â Hoki Mai She kisses him goodbye with her eyes still wet and alight from their last swim in the Awatere river. At the train station celebration, she leads the Kapa Haka but her voice keeps breaking under and over itself like waves. ...
A poem from Bill Manhireâs 2017 book of verse Some Things to Place in a Coffin.  My World War I Poem  Inside each trench, the sound of prayer. Inside each prayer, the sound of digging.  Image courtesy of Auckland War Memorial Museum. ...
There are three books I have wolfed down in one sitting over the last two years. Colleen Maria Lenihanâs gorgeous and sad debut KĹhine, Noelle McCarthyâs memoir Grand about becoming her mother and then unbecoming her, and now Hine Toa, a staunch yet gentle self-portrait by living legend NgÄhuia te ...
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Asia Pacific Report Students and activist staff at Australiaâs University of Sydney (USyd) have set up a Gaza solidarity encampment in support of Palestinians and similar student-led protests in the United States. The camp was pitched as mass graves, crippled hospitals, thousands of civilian deaths and the near-total destruction of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James B. Dorey, Lecturer in Biological Sciences, University of Wollongong Australian teddy bear bees are cute and fluffy, but get a look at that massive (unbarbed) stinger! James Dorey Photography Most of us have been stung by a bee and we ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jen Roberts, Senior Lecturer, School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, University of Wollongong Aussie~mobs/FlickrVictor Farr, a private in the 1st Infantry Battalion, was among the first to land at Anzac Cove just before dawn on April 25 1915. Victor Farr ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Gregory Moore I had the good fortune to care for the sugar gum at The University of Melbourneâs Burnley Gardens in Victoria where I worked for ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Senior Lecturer, Canberra School of Politics, Economics and Society, University of Canberra BagzhanSadvakassov/Upsplash, CC BY-SA Australiaâs inflation rate has fallen for the fifth successive quarter, and itâs now less than half of what it was back in late 2022. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachel Ong ViforJ, ARC Future Fellow & Professor of Economics, Curtin University Just when we think the price of rentals could not get any worse, this weekâs Rental Affordability Snapshot by Anglicare has revealed low-income Australians are facing a housing crisis like ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Meighen McCrae, Associate Professor of Strategic & Defence Studies, Australian National University American and Australian stretcher bearers working together near the front line during the Battle of Hamel in 1918.Australian War Memorial While the AUKUS alliance is new, the Australian-American partnership ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tracey Holmes, Professorial Fellow in Sport, University of Canberra When the news broke last weekend that 23 Chinese swimmers had tested positive to a banned drug in early 2021 and were allowed to compete at the Tokyo Olympic Games six months later ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cally Jetta, Senior Lecturer and Academic Lead; College for First Nations, University of Southern Queensland Australian War MemorialAboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people, as well as sensitive historical information ...
RNZ News Melissa Lee has been ousted from New Zealandâs coalition cabinet and stripped of the Media portfolio, and Penny Simmonds has lost the Disability Issues portfolio in a reshuffle. Climate Change and Revenue Minister Simon Watts will take Leeâs spot in cabinet. Simmonds was a minister outside of cabinet. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Lindenmayer, Professor, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University laurello/Shutterstock Some reports and popular books, such as Bill Gammageâs Biggest Estate on Earth, have argued that extensive areas of Australiaâs forests were kept open through frequent burning by ...
Analysis - Christopher Luxon framing the demotion of two ministers as the portfolios getting "too complex" is a charitable way of saying they weren't up to the job. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra With Jim Chalmersâs third budget on May 14, Australians will be looking for some more cost-of-living relief â beyond the tax cuts â although they have been warned extra measures will be modest. As ...
Analysis: Melissa Lee has lost the media portfolio and her spot in Cabinet after multiple failed attempts to find solutions for a media industry in crisis. On Wednesday, the Prime Minister announced Lee would be losing her spot in Cabinet along with her media and communications ministerial portfolio. The job ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Simon Wilmot, Senior Lecturer, Film, Deakin University Among the many Australian who served during the second world war, there is a small group of people whose stories remain largely untold. These are the Muslim men and women who, while small in number, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kelly Saunders, PhD Candidate, University of Canberra There has been much analysis and praise of Justice Michael Leeâs recent judgement in Bruce Lehrmannâs defamation case against Channel Ten. Many people were openly relieved to read Leeâs âforensicâ and ânuancedâ application of law ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kathy Gibbs, Program Director for the Bachelor of Education, Griffith University zEdward_Indy/Shutterstock Around one in 20 people has attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Itâs one of the most common neurodevelopmental disorders in childhood and often continues into adulthood. ADHD is diagnosed ...
The Fairer Future coalition of anti-poverty groups say Whaikaha must be properly funded going forward, and that to argue that poor financial management of the new Ministry is a red herring by the Prime Minister. ...
The Taxpayersâ Union is today congratulating Hon. Paul Goldsmith on his appointment as Minister for Media and Communications and urges him to rule out state intervention in the private media sector. ...
Asia Pacific Report The West Papuan resistance OPM leader has condemned Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and US President Joe Biden, accusing their countries of âsix decades of treacheryâ over Papuan independence. The open letter was released today by OPM chairman Jeffrey P Bomanak on the eve of ANZAC Day ...
Welcome to The Spinoff Books Confessional, in which we get to know the reading habits and quirks of New Zealanders at large. This week: writer and one of Time Magazineâs 100 most influential people of 2024, Lauren Groff.The book I wish Iâd writtenIf I wish Iâd written a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Fechner, Research Fellow, Social Marketing, Griffith University mavo/Shutterstock Imagine having dinner at a restaurant. The menu offers plant-based meat alternatives made mostly from vegetables, mushrooms, legumes and wheat that mimic meat in taste, texture and smell. Despite being given that ...
âThree Strikes is a dead-end policy proposed by a dead-end government. The Three Strikes law ignores the causes of crime, instead just brutalising people already crushed by the cost of living.â ...
By Don Wiseman, RNZ Pacific senior journalist An Australian-born judge in Kiribati could well face deportation later this week after a tribunal ruling that he should be removed from his post. The tribunalâs report has just been tabled in the Kiribati Parliament and is due to be debated by MPs ...
With its clear mandate for police use, political nuances, and nuanced public trust, Denmark's insights provide valuable considerations for Australia and New Zealand. ...
Books editor Claire Mabey reviews poet Louise Wallaceâs debut novel. A famous poet once said to me that heâs always suspicious when a poet publishes a novel. I never really understood why but maybe itâs something to do with cheating on your first form. Louise Wallace is a poet. Sheâs ...
For a few months at the turn of the millennium, TrueBliss burned bright as the biggest pop stars in the country. Alex Casey chats to two superfans who still hold the flame. During a humble backyard wedding in Nelson, 1999, one of the cordially invited guests had to excuse themselves ...
How will the recent wave of job cuts impact ethnic diversity in the media? In November last year, I was working a very busy day in the newsroom of a large online news site, interviewing whÄnau about their concerns over the imminent closure of one of the few puna reo ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ruth Knight, Researcher, Queensland University of Technology Have you ever felt sick at work? Perhaps you had food poisoning or the flu. Your belly hurt, or you felt tired, making it hard to concentrate and be productive. How likely would you be ...
Despite heavy criticism and an ongoing select committee process, the Police Minister says the Government will forge ahead with a ban on gang patches. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sam Whiting, Lecturer – Creative Industries, University of South Australia Shutterstock Everyone has a favourite band, or a favourite composer, or a favourite song. There is some music which speaks to you, deeply; and other music which might be the current ...
A new survey says âoutlook not greatâ for those charged with building infrastructure, while RMA changes delight farmers and depress environmentalists, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoffâs morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. First RMA changes announced ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Olli Hellmann, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Waikato Getty Images When New Zealanders commemorate Anzac Day on April 25, itâs not only to honour the soldiers who lost their lives in World War I and subsequent conflicts, but also ...
A leaked document shows the Canterbury/Waitaha arm of health agency Te Whatu Ora is scurrying to save $13.3 million by July. The âfinancial sustainability targetâ, which was âallocatedâ to Waitaha, is consistent with whatâs happening in other districts, says Sarah Dalton, executive director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists. ...
A look at the state of the previous governmentâs affordable housing scheme, and what could come next.Remind me: Whatâs KiwiBuild again?First announced in 2012, KiwiBuild was a flagship policy of the Labour Party heading into both its 2014 and 2017 election campaigns. With Jacinda Ardern as prime minister, ...
Labour in opposition will be shocked to learn which party had six years in power but squandered any chance to make real change. Grant Robertsonâs valedictory speech was a predictably entertaining trip down memory lane. The acid-tongued incoming Otago University chancellor administered a sick burn to the coalition government. He ...
After more than two sleepless days, running through savage terrain, Greig Hamilton didnât know if he was going to finish one of the most gruelling psychological assaults in sport. He was metres away from the finish line, a yellow gate made famous in a Netflix documentary; a race heâd dreamed ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Wednesday 24 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
The following interview with former Green Party MP Sue Kedgley came about because she features in the new memoir Hine Toa by activist NgÄhuia te AwekĹtuku; the two knew each other at the University of Auckland in the early 70s, when they were both took on leadership roles in the ...
Taiwanâs semiconductor industry is seen some as its ‘silicon shield’ against invasion – but how will overseas expansion affect that protection? The post The state of Taiwan’s silicon shield appeared first on Newsroom. ...
There’s relief for building owners bending under the weight of earthquake strengthening rules â and costs â that came into force seven years ago. Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk has announced a scheduled 2027 review of the earthquake-prone building regulations will now start this year. Owners will also get ...
Opinion: It has been announced that nine percent of roles at Oranga Tamariki will be disestablished, presumably to help fund the tax cuts promised by the coalition Government. I am reminded of the graphics used to illustrate pandemic events, where five thousand people are standing in a field and then ...
COMMENTARY:By Murray Horton New Zealand needs to get tough with Israel. Itâs not as if we havenât done so before. When NZ authorities busted a Mossad operation in Auckland 20 years ago, the government didnât say: âOh well, Israel has the right to defend itself.â No, it arrested, prosecuted, ...
NEWSMAKERS:By Vijay Narayan, news director of FijiVillage Blessed to be part of the University of Fiji (UniFiji) faculty to continue to teach and mentor those who want to join our noble profession, and to stand for truth and justice for the people of the country. I was privileged to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Three weeks from now, some of us will be presented with a mountain of budget papers, and just about all of us will get to hear about them on radio, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Lowry, Ice Sheet & Climate Modeller, GNS Science Hugh Chittock/Antarctica New Zealand, CC BY-SA As the climate warms and Antarcticaâs glaciers and ice sheets melt, the resulting rise in sea level has the potential to displace hundreds of millions of ...
I am surprised that I am getting Face TV on my free-to-air telly. It seems this will be happening until the analog switch off later in the year.
Does John Armstrong live in Auckland? He certainly doesn’t seem to have a clue about the crisis in Auckland affordable housing for beneficiaries and other renters on low incomes.
Armstrong champions Labour’s housing policy over that of National’s or Greens, even though Shearer was “all over the paddock” when talking about it this week, because:it’s “gone down well with the punters.” Which punters would this be? Those who will be able to afford to buy Labour’s planned houses?
He says the Greens have got it wrong because building state houses in Hobsonville wouldn’t work – the land’s too valuable, you see. And, furthermore, Armstrong reckons that is the wrong place for work-seeking beneficiaries to live, because it’s not near jobs. Does he realise it is precisely in such outer areas that beneficiaries and other low income people are looking for places to rent because there’s nothing available closer to the city? Also, the whole Massey area is being upgraded, including the Westgate centre, because it is seen as becoming a growth area in the future – which should mean more local jobs.
All Armstrong’s latest column shows is, which team he’s throwing his lot in with for the next election.
LOLZ, John Armstrong one of the reasons why i don’t read the Herald even when it’s free online, ”The Green Party’s housing policy would require the Government to go on a continual borrowing binge”
Really, the only answer that little quip deserves from anyone is ”Ha Ha Ha”, Armstrong resorts to bullshit (as usual), The Slippery lead National Government just for Armstrong’s education has in 4 years borrowed 42 billion dollars, not a binge, a f**king orgy of borrowing, that 42 billion dollar borrowing ‘orgy’ at 300 million bucks a weeks is the biggest amount of monies borrowed in the shortest amount of time by any Government in NZ,s history, and that borrowing is set to continue right up to November 2014 where the debt mountain will be topping out at 60 odd billion dollars,
Does Armstrong ever get down to looking at what gives every appearance of being a borrowing regime by this Slippery lead National Government managed by those who suck on P pipes for breakfast,
Money, just to educate John Armstrong, when owed to the Government by us peasants is counted in the Government books as an asset as will the houses that will be built with the money owed,
Depending on coalition negotiations we could expect the Green Party housing policy to take up 25% of the Labour Party proposed 100,000 homes, and it is my contention here that Labour should actually move to include the Green Party housing policy into a position alongside it’s own where everyone has a choice of bank mortgage or Government backed ‘rent to buy’,(place your bets now on the majority opting for Government backed rent to buy),
Armstrong’s whole argument ‘against’ the Green Party housing policy relies upon His prejudice against people who are NOT definitely middle class, His writing reeks of this condescension, why wouldn’t low income Kiwi’s keep their new homes neat tidy and well maintained, why wouldn’t low income Kiwi’s having the one chance they will ever get in this life to own their own homes not pay off the ‘equity’ in their new homes that the state holds as quickly as their incomes allow,
Why in fact doesn’t the fucking toe-rag well past His use-by date Herald hack writer Armstrong just not print lines in capitals saying ‘i hate the poor’,
Does the Herald’s pet hack writer own rental properties and can see part of the rental market disappearing into ‘rent to buy’ home ownership, lowering demand and forcing the Herald’s pet hack writer to take less in rent,
More to the point, are the bank’s getting a little jittery, a wee spot nervous, as they watch the Green party unveil a perfectly logical plan where Government acts as if it were a Government and provides not only the homes for the people it governs,(along with the jobs building them),and removes from the banks completely the need to finance such homes by becoming the lender of note for these homes by holding the equity in such homes instead of the banks via mortgage finance…
You are just too funny Mr bad12!
I would love to know, if as a young cadet reporter, Armstrong got a Housing Corporation mortgage at 4%, with the deposit capitalised using his family benefit.
This scheme and others, ensured that NZ was free of homelessness and poverty throughout the post World War 2 era.
witofi, been milling this ova
RNZ-(from the top of the Hill) “we don’t have authoritative broadsheet press in NZ”;
anglophile excess / Nordic Exceptionalism, that’s the ‘crux’ of it.
*some Sunday morning reading please?
(Gdansk the safety danzig)
Israel update; Assyrian retaliation threatened, and the Russian Foreign Ministry concurs
while (out of context) 12M is now owed to teachers, IRD Child Support and any other freakin ap
150,000 cases of Child Abuse reported in oh 12 (but hay, its only up a penny %: 16-14) down south Antarctic rapid changes are tongueing there groove into the Deep ocean as Owen Glenns funds are frozen; it’s trustees (sic) see it “no longer appropriate to distribute philanthropy in NZ” đ Ethics needed in the NZX effectively two counts of underarm trading yet don’t worry, according to the quoted bank advertisement “we can lend you enough money to get you out of debt”, sadly, been there, lost that. B.G & B.S
“Truth has no special time of it’s own. It’s hour is now always”
-Albert Schweitzer (any old dime. A dozen should do)
Armstrong’s been sucking up the spoonfuls fed from the Labour Leader’s office for the past 4 years. Sad thing is I used to respect him as a journalist. Not now.
What Armstrong cannot see is that the taxation from building the homes from the profits made by those contracted to do the building, from the higher level of consumption of building materials,from the increased taxation of an enlarged building workforce needed to build these houses and from the shift off of the dole of that labour force needed to build those houses will in fact far exceed any cost to the Government,
Economic illiterates like Armstrong are paid to seek out a plausible negative which the Herald gladly uses as a plank to beat upon the Political Party’s it’s backers dislike…
I opening a book on the who Team Shearer has pencilled in to the Govt Press Secretary role:
John Armstrong. 5 to 2
Fran Mold. 33 to 1
Josie Pagani. 5 to 1
Seen the home screen on the stuff website yet? Paul Holmes ‘switching roles, he’ll be with Eve now’ the ‘resting kinght’s guide’ in the ever after. I’d link, but that means I’d have to click on it and I’m not going to give tosh like that any page views.
I can’t work out what’s worse – that a ‘news’ outlet thinks selling supernatural fairy tales is front page news, or that they’re starting to venerate Holmes, or that I feel like I’ve encountered a wormhole and I’m in a U.S. southern state. Gobsmackingly cloyingly awful.
Anyone notice that story in the NZHerald this morning about Judith Collins and the appointment of the Director of Human Rights Proceedings? The basic non-disclosure on the Conflict of Interest form is the story that will get her.
But if anyone needs to speak up for Catherine Rodgers, the applicant who was strongly recommended by the appointments panel and overruled by the Minister, Catherine Rodgers is a stunning lawyer.
It’s on Court record that under the utterly useless previous Director of Human Rights Proceedings (remember Robert Hesketh that previously disgraced District Court Judge), she marshalled the team that took on the government about the human rights of caregivers to be provided round the clock state assistance for caregivers.
The Crown and Ministers opposed her and her team every step of the way, court after court, over 7 years, and she and her team won. Right through to the Supreme Court. Anyone on the inside knows the kind of resources the Crown has at their legal disposal will understand what that means.
Catherine Rodgers is a seriously good lawyer, both in the professional and virtuous sense.
But now the story is on Collins. Hopefully its a story that gets some traction. Because if there’s one Minister who needs to go up against the wall come the revolution for crimes against the separation of judicial and executive function, it’s Judith Collins.
Yes, just read it and came here to post .. I will add the link for you.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10862947
How deeply scummy is this government ? What does it take to chip the teflon and begin the unravelling ? Maybe this is an opportunity with the published photo at her mother-in-law’s funeral proving that Collins has been completely disingenuous in her denials of a conflict of interest. Here’s hoping the traction holds some place in the House this week .. come on Winston !!
Oi yey.
Aye the selection of Robert Kee is looking more and more suspect. Collins and Rodgers know each other too. They spent time together on the Auckland Women Lawyers Association executive. The gossip that I have heard is that their relationship was not that good …
I think your confusing Catherine Rogers with Francis Joychild. Francis J did the caregiving case in the three Courts (Human Rights Tribunal, High Court and Appeal COurt). It never went to the Supreme Court. And the case wasn’t about round the clock assistance it was about payment for certain types of special cares for high needs family members.
Yep right you are Jonno. I believe Catherine was involved in the proceedings challenging the legality of working for families.
Well there are some many scandals and sleazy carry on’s with this lot I think a lot of people are just turnig off. What I can’t understandis how this incompetent rable are still on top of the polls , Begs the quetion are they?
Datacom January 2008:
The latest payroll round – the first of the school term – was filled with errors. Staff who are on leave have incorrectly received full pay, changes that were made in November have not been actioned, staff are being forced to fill forms out twice with exactly the same information, some teachers had to be paid from school funds so they could afford groceries. It’s a nightmare – unnecessary bureaucracy, huge numbers of errors. Payroll systems have changed for the worse … The start of year is a critical period for payroll. At the start of this year, 64,733 changes were made for school employees, generating a 100% increase in workload for clerical staff.
Sound familiar?
Now imagine that twice as bad and happening every single month, and you have NOGOPAY.
What about NOVOPAYN. Sort of a derivative of Novocaine (a drug given to people to stop them feeling pain, especially during an operation on their teeth) – teachers getting their proper salary seems as hard as pulling teeth.
I think that all in the majority government should have their pay docked while such poor policy results continue. We need to have accountability from these well paid flunkies of our democratic institution, which is dirty and needs water blasting into all its crevices.
Nice. Yours is better than mine. Hope the staffers notice it.
Hmmm.
If I were cynical, I’d think JB was simply recycling ambergris – whale puke.
But JB’s long history of providing well researched and reputable links for his subtle and erudite analyses makes me ashamed of my own cynicism.
lol. yeah, right.
Green Party MP’s are today taking a canoe ride down the Waitara river in the yearly trek to highlight the plight of ‘despicable dirty rivers’,
The Waitara river as measured by NIWA has the lowest water quality of all rivers in New Zealand,
The Green Party has repeatedly ‘asked’ farmers to help clean up such filth as these rivers are not only the life-blood of continual farming they are in fact the taonga and life-blood of us all,
Fonterra the dairy giant has also repeatedly ‘asked’ farmers to clean up these rivers with little actual effect,
Those who are polluting our rivers should, while they still have time, give far more weight to having been ‘asked’ politely to address this issue,
The time when the Green Movement is willing to just ‘ask’ has all but expired, after ‘ask’ comes ‘tell’ and not long after ‘tell’ comes ‘force’, we all including the farming community have ‘choice’,
My ‘suggestion’ is that you begin to make the right ones…
Ask the farmers? And there are people who belief this is not a waste of time? Makes Footrot flats a futuristic movie.
Upcoming Vote
I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point. Stick to Shearer but replace Grant Robertson as deputy and put Andrew Little in there. This should keep most within the party content and appeal to the broader supporter base. Little needs to take the Labour spokespersons role and champion creating job. Shearer needs to be kept in check so any overly overt moves right will be stamped out with Little there.
An innovative option, but roadblocks remain. Cunliffe would need to to be given a serious front bench position and Grant would have to back the overall move. The change would also have to go through, around or over Mallard et al. Not easy.
Mallards needs to be put in his place, a return to the house will be as speaker full-stop. A few others need to go at the end of this term. Fresh blood is needed & this issue needs to be addressed this month, Labour need to take a leaf out of the Greens book ‘refresh.’
Ego’s etc aside and they are all going to need to suck it up and concentrate on the job of sorting the mess National have done. Of course Cunliffe needs to be on the front bench. A rover like Joyce perhaps certainly the innovation portfolio.Â
   Â
Just for clarification ‘overtly right’ are policy’s like raising the age of retirement & ‘compulsory’ Kiwi saver ( low income earners can not afford).
Yuk, Andrew Little. Gross.
Mumble-pants is already unmarketable enough without that greaseball standing next to him.
Image and communication are Labour’s most pressing problems, Little would just exasperate those.
I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point.
Most people were predicting the its too late for change claim to come out in 12 months, you’re a bit early. If we take Shearer’s performance into account, I would say 3 weeks before the election should be considered the cut off point.
I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point
I honestly believe the need for a leadership challenge has never been more urgent. Let’s face it. labour is going nowhere. The polls have stalled, the front bench is not firing, and the Nats keep offering up these huge targets which somehow Labour keeps missing. Key is toying with Shearer.
Honestly, something has to change or we will have three more years of tory rule.
It’s not they somehow keep missing, it’s that They are incapable of hitting.
Geez the hollowmen must be loving this, trevz pillow talk must be a world class session in mutual admiration for each others awesomeness
“I honestly believe the time for any leadership challenge has past the cut off point”
“I honestly believe the need for a leadership challenge has never been more urgent.”
I honestly believe you’ve both got it right.
The Monday vote is not a vote on a “leadership challenge”. It is a vote on how caucus sees the rest of the Labour Party.
We need to see evidence that caucus is willing to listen to the membership and that it is willing to give the members (and affiliates) a voice. The energy and excitement a Primary process would build for Labour going into 2014 would be amazing.
“It is a vote on how caucus sees the rest of the Labour Party.”
Sadly amusing that either of them is going to be upset if they have to rely on the other for support at present.
And if Key gets back in then the gloves will come off, and that Power mad, megalomaniac, will sell , mine, and drill everything in sight. And still Labour will sit with their fingers in their ears.
The time for the members and unions to have a say is now. Any shuffle within the current failed regime will be compared to re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
13 MP to withhold Confidence in Shearer on Monday.
That is all that is needed to stop the paralysis of the past four years.
The time for strength is now.
And you probably have the Mallafia ringing everyone over, and over, just to remind, and warn them about the vote..
Mallard, TRP, various proxies, Mike Smith and Mike Williams are driving a wedge between the members and the Caucus. They have done nothing to unite the party. They think the only problem in the party is The Standard.
The Confidence Vote outcome on Monday will determine their future status. Yes, Mallard is hitting on MPs. He knows his political future is at risk. The pressure has got to him. Hence the incompetent attempt at the Leadership. He lost his rag on these pages yesterday.
Mallard will bully the List members like Darien Fenton who are dependant on a decent list position. He won’t try to bully an Electorate MP like Louisa Wall, because Trevor is a two bit coward.
“Despite all the intractable social problems and the need for new economic positions, big ideas are largely missing from New Zealand politics at the moment.”
A commentary by Bryce Edwards:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10862864
For Labour to connect with the widest possible cross section of New Zealand society we need to be seen as the Party that:
a) has the right ideas;
b) the right people in place to execute the strategies derived from those ideas, and
c) the right Leader who can convince the public that Labour has a) & b).
Your friendly MP is today pondering how she/he will vote on the CONFIDENCE MOTION at the Caucus meeting on Monday.
Please help them with these three simple questions.
Call now.
My friendly MP is a deceptive Tory lawyer, another ‘safe seat’ that went west in 08 never to return with the bozo labour candidate who’s failed to hold ut or retake it in 2011. Feckless at best.
For me at least it’s about simply showing respect to the members and supporters who get MP’s in Labour into parliament in the first place.
I saw real flagrant self-interest from MPs at the November 2012 Conference, arguing against democratisation of the party.
They remain in power, appear not to need the members’ help in any form, and can therefore flagrantly disregard and disrespect the membership.
They are not my employers. They don’t own me.
They have to co-operate.
They have to co-operate with me if they are to win back power.
I simply want the chance to hold then to account, and to say that with my vote on the leadership of the Labour Party.
Personally I’m just sick of losing.
This leader Shearer, according to poll tracking, won’t win.
I want the right to at least ask the question with my vote:
can we please pick the right one, the one that will have the best chance of winning.
We just haven’t had the chance to even ask that question as Members.
I want the right to ask the question.
I read in the Herald:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10862970
that Graeme Wheeler is saying:
“New Zealand needs to strengthen global linkages and tackle government spending and regulatory issues that diminish productivity and competitiveness if it is to lift its economic performance.”
“the other main way of improving prosperity in the longer run – labour productivity growth.”
“First … is the need to lift savings rates.”
“quality of investment is also an issue, with much of it going into housing rather than productivity-promoting investment.”
“New Zealand needs to be more welcoming to foreign investment, and should “re-examine the factors, including tax and regulation, that diminish and distort the incentives to both save and invest”.”
“Second on his priority list is for the Government to return its books to surplus.”
“”This is one reason why it is critical to cut back ineffective government spending, and ensure that our welfare spending is targeted better at those in need.””
“Finally Wheeler calls for a focus on the fat tail of underperformance in the education system.”
” “The bottom income deciles are populated by those with lesser skills, and those who experience prolonged and recurrent spells of unemployment. Addressing these groups would both promote productivity and reduce inequality.”
All of which is bog-standard, Right-wing, how-to-get-an-MBA-without-having-to-think singspiel.
And I somehow don’t think David Shearer et al would disagree with one single word of it.
Wheeler is using snake talk, what he is saying is a return to deregulation is needed and fast tracked at that. Foreign investment ‘sell sell sell’ New Zealand…land, houses, assets so his mates & him can make big profits! Add a more ‘flexible employment market’ ( law changes) increases productivity…and keeps those pesky Unions in their place.
 This guy is scum & needs a good look into his books for any irregular behavior… Stalin style preferably!Â
Frak this guy Wheeler. Another 1980’s trainee of Milton Friedman. Absolutely moronic and unaware of the situation our civilisation is in, and how his ilk are directly responsible.
Thanks English, a genius fucking appointment.
I agree.
My point is that I can hear every point of Wheeler’s speech coming out of Shearer’s mouth – and with most of the Labour caucus standing behind him nodding.
As expected from Shonkeys mob, the opportunity to put a compliant lapdog in wasn’t missed.
Blah blah blah blah blah. Its like they have some speech somewhere in a word file and print it off and give it to whoever is the reserve bank governor of the time.
Yes I often have the feeling the same speech was used previously and will be recycled again as numerical order dictates.
I get the same impression when Shearer Says rolls out.
This one was left behind from the 1984-86 years.
Wheeler has no brains, that is clear. His message there is keep spinning the wheel faster and faster. Where is some analytical thought? Some original ideas? ha ha ha what a tosser spinning the same shit.
Here is how NZ could easily improve imo….
We need to own our country and its assets. The rich always chase the asset and keep it. Because that leads to long term wealth. So that is what we should do. We can start by banning foreign ownership of our land. Business does not need to own the land. Foreign ownership of land is the most dumbfuck idea going and it is only a negative to us. That is why so many other countries do not allow it, like China. Duh.
We also need to drive down the value of capital assets such as land, housing, plant, business, machinery everything. Paying vast sums to simply buy the capital asset drains the income which flows from that asset and benefits only the creators of credit, the privately owned banks.
Drive down capital values and drive ownership into New Zealanders hands, as many of them as possible.
Then watch the country go from strength to strength.
Come on you bloody dickheads Wheeler and English, do some fucking thinking dumbos. THINK.
Thinking not allowed, following hollowmen script is. English is below average at best and looks good alongside the rest of caucus.
The benefit system is under attack by national,we know that, but my situation is that
my disabilities are long term,i had go give up work because of them,i was given a
temporary additional support aligned to my housing costs,and a disability allowance,
all went ok until renewel a month ago, where because of increased medical costs
my disability allowance increased, but i was astounded my level of benefit stayed
the same,i phoned winz and was told that the disability allowance is seen as income
when you have temporary additonal support, penny pinching or just plain nasty?
*sigh*
If you are within the time limit, make an appointment with your case manager and demand the papers to appeal the decision,
Yes they are trying to cut costs by doing what you point out, hoping you will not have either the skills or energy to take their decision to the appeal authority,
I have heard of peoples disability allowance cancelled because they supposedly did not file a renewal,not just once but 3 years in a row,
The problem with that little fallacy is that the disability allowance form for the Invalids Benefit is part of the yearly renewal form for that benefit and it was impossible for WINZ to have missed it…
You have the legal right to review the decision. You don’t need an appointment but as you will know when you submit the Review of Decision form make sure you get a copy that is date stamped in case it is later “lost”.
Contact your local benefit rights service. Mine in Wellington is highly informed and experienced (some benefit rights advocates have little in the way of training and basically go in with you….and that’s about it. The BRS in Wellington has the right type of experience and quality advice you can count on so consider calling them 04 2102012 between 9.30am – 3.30 Tuesday – Friday, and they are in a meeting Monday morning so phone in the afternoon.)
I don’t know about TAS because I’m still on Special benefit which started being phased out in 2006 as I’m on IB too. What happened to you sounds very fishy to me.
You will feel better after you speak with an advocate who KNOWS what they are talking about.
It will help if you take what they tell you over the phone and write this exact wording on the review of decision form (you have to state why you disagree with their decision). I’m cheering you on. LFTHG.
You may find that it never even makes it to the hearing stage as the mistake could be picked up in an internal review.
Thanks all, AWW i will use the ph num and contact them, when i posted i was
wondering if anyone else had a similar problem, I do have a fighting spirit
so now i can go in to battle,so to speak, so thanks all for your support đ
I do have a fighting spirit so now i can go in to battle
Every WINZ appointment should be seen as a battle. There is strength in numbers, if possible, I’d recommend going to the appointment with another person, if you feel comfortable with them witnessing the conversation. A 2 vs 1 environment will change the nature of the appointment, and therefore how you get treated.
Even better if your wing-person is knowledgeable about WINZ tricks. Places like city mission, sallies or Auckland Action Against Poverty can help.
Good luck
Celebrate The Bullet when there is Too Much Pressure
Sicko
Moore clearly seen
Just plain NASTY.
Basically they are saying your increased medical costs are a luxury you should give up.
This has happened to me to in the last month re renewal. Both TAS for rent and my DA has not been paid. I do not receive the maximum DA so this is not a cost on TAS, (the cut off point for DA is in the mid 50,s but check this). Anything under the cut off for DA has nothing to do with TAS, but TAS can be paid for health costs once over the cut off. Tying DA with TAS is not on as both are individual supplements in there own right with different renewal dates, (TAS every 13 weeks, DA every year).
I read in the NZ Herald today that over the summer 9 million has been paid out by ACC for sunburn, insect bites, barbecue accidents etc. (All trivial stuff).
Something is going down at Work and Income, possibly a directive from Bennett as she can issue one.
A new TV show by charlie brooker has started, called Charlie Brooker’s Weekly Wipe
an Aad for burglar Good king wencheslas (with a thin paddy and Veuve Clicquot to swallow)
literally, there is no sacred fish sword
evocatively, that’s a different kettle of wish
were you there when they crucified. My Lord!
(there Definitely / Maybe a Champagne Super nova)
-Victa ( a martyr for the piles) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112637/
From The Stiff Kittens at The Electric Circus
To The Fan Club, Tell Laura I Love Her and that she is the missing link between Elvis Presley and The Banshees. This is our happy Fun House, no need to be a Mayflower at The Electric Ballroom;
King Kong’s not AnTwerp at all swinging Dead Souls at The Moonlight Club (is Kevin The Trojan Horse candidate with Insight?) on a Manchester Beach across the Mersey they Send No Flowers from Republica. Heaven is not The Rock Garden or The Boys Club (Hitchcock Railway) Bus, Le Palace or The Hacienda.
It’s The Venue for Movement and Ceremony, Utopia / Hal4, in The Day of The Lords as New Dawn Fades Something Must Break now 24 Hours into The Eternal Decades Shadowplay just like Sister Ray said, have a good night have a good night have a good night.
-Man of Principle (new world boy on the old Kings Road)
p**s. Phil Collins Henry Rollins Murder Ballads get down get down little Henry Lee
and the wind did howl and the wind did blow she plugged him through and through
they call her The Wild Rose (sorry if I interrupted any mans coitus)
Ah, a random spell-check ap goes feral and attacks its master.
:), but wait, there’s more…
bad things come in threes
Third Eye Blind Hows It Gonna Be. Kryptonite Three Doors get Down. Come on baby light my buick
getting back to The Good Oil,
Yishar shining and clear elaion
shake the fruit with a light stick
bruise in mortar crushed in a press loaded
with wood or stones.rudely hear the whiffletree creek
reservoirs clarified Oil of Tekoa was reckoned nga best. ha!
Trade by the honorable of the earth surpassed that of the Egyptian harvests
Till mercantile cupidity purchased Hebrew slaves repaid by Nebuchadnezzar.
Alexander completed the causeway so the anti-septic function came in Handy
old oil Celsus applied externally with friction to fevers. James certainly recommended it
-Rx (Philo Pliny and Galen)
Job done at 5:13 He catches the wise in their craftiness, and the schemes of the wily are swept away
12:3 a man cannot be established through wickedness yet the righteous cannot be uprooted
8:3 for whoever finds me finds life
Love changes everything (plenty to dive into or pennon there through the limestone at 60 per cm2)
dying to the self everyday wears out soles. Sikhism is strongly opposed to caste divisions.Baptised by the sword (interestingly) all may eat together in the kitchen at parties.
-Singh (thats an irreverent non-extremist pun jab) Has he lost his mind? can he see or is he blind
he was turned to steel in the great magnetic field.
The NZ Labour Party Youth section is important but has the Leadership become relevant to the 16+ young adults who will vote in 2014?
A slice of the Opinion Polls that I saw in the course of a marketing strategy session indicated that the youth of NZ will vote
1. Green
2. National, marginally ahead of
3. Labour.
NOT the positioning for a Party of Radical roots. The Youth saw the greens as the ones challenging the status quo. Many saw Labour as defenders of a status quo.
The Labour MPs need to consider how 16+ kids view them. Obviously there is a signigicant perseption thing that needs to be changed.
Boudicea, I could have told you that for half what you paid!
It is so obvious at Freshers Week in any third level institution.
The Youth will vote Green unless Labour makes a dramatic shift.
I know some union people are doing great work on making young workers politically aware. Will they become Labour voters? Probably yes. The new leaders of the Unions are the key to Labour’s much needed re-birth.
I agree with the concept of ‘new’ Union leaders having a large part in changing Labour’s fortunes. There are a high number of piss weak General Secretary’s that need to be moved out, & the standard of union organisers being employed by some outfits is also unbelievably poor. Too many of these GS’s are in with the sad old faces within labour which is the problem. Â
+1
Chris Trotter had some interesting things to say about Shearers speech and his style of delivery at the recent Young Labour summer camp on Citizen A with Bomber.
Our four children are ALL Green party supporters, despite both of us having worked hard for Labour all our lives.
Last week our youngest son laughed at me and said, “Dad, why would I belong to any organization where I had no say in choosing the leaders? We Greens elect our own leaders and rank our list candidates. Labour is so past it’s use by date.”
My replies fell on deaf ears.
Hmmmm. Far too many captured by Beltway thinking and hoping to get Parliamentary Services jobs.
analytical and applied to the grindstone
Need to get Shearer on an electric guitar…or maybe playing bass.
Can we get him in a dub/reggae band? Like the Mayor off Portlandia?
It’ll have to be real roots reggae.
Other than that, Labour has no chance of attracting youth. Key has sewn up the idiocracy vote (despite Shearer’s best efforts). Greens get the youth who are aware of their future.
What does Labour offer youth. Look at the top MPs since 2008. Stuffy old twats. Don’t expect the youth to vote for their oppressors.
The Selecto/er that you are đ đ đ
Thank you EB. I’ll request a 50% credit from the agency!
sucking back the pea
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10862973
and with a Huff
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/01/31/north-korea-martial-law_n_2588013.html?
and a puff
http://www.independent.ie/world-news/asia-pacific/north-korea-under-martial-law-as-troops-told-to-be-ready-for-war-3371117.html
will there be toil and trouble
http://nwww.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20130201000831
-Sam Gae Tang (Tom Yummmb)
Seriously Rogue Trooper you should step up and write a blog of your own.
Would need an international audience.
But you appear to have a mind like the old arcade game Defender; flashes and reverses, and grand fractal jumps.
Think on it. You’re good.
two kind (partly your doing)
So allow me a moments’ presumption:
– You have several degrees, some of them arts, quite a lot of classics and philosophy
– You are at least in your 40s
– You have described yourself as being from somewhere Deep South
– You are saturated in Ellul and other Christianarchies
– You have memorised a whole bunch of songs, films, and Coltrane-style poetry
Most from this era have simply have that mind wrapped in lines of scar/e tissue in which the whips of the world have worn too deep a groove in their minds. How you sustain that still is quite beyond me.
You have more freedom in that spectral writing-jazz of yours than most have long since forgotten, yet with no shade of The Quiet American or other post-redemptive melancholies.
All it would take is at least a post every week.
What do you think? Can’t hide here under a little bushel forever you know.
I believe I know what the future holds for the world…yet not myself. I have an idea of what is going on since I opened up and began “commenting” on The Standard…(repeated empirical reality testing)…and it is related to words and energy forms, in particular the electromagnetic spectrum…yet this is not occurring in Isolation…I have a deep well of gratitude to many from this site and those that echo beyond…
It is a matter of conceptualization…there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophies…a lot is related to what quantum physics has revealed to us…I owe a great obligation to lprent…may be on the radio and in a band soon…yet waiting patiently, reading, gardening, cooking, cleaning…(and to the tr. yes, I can go anyway in the city I live in and be greeted warmly by people from right across the spectrum yet I’m open about my politics and faith and previous flouting of the Law; may be a lesson in there?). I did not go to University (as a mature student) or develop my knowledge and “understanding” to be materialistically wealthy; I have never been ambitious, although a PhD sounded attractive for a while back…in the deep, distant past. I learn to understand, and like others on here, share that understanding for free.
Wherever you go, there you is no “point” at which our skins stop and The Universe starts.
A Very Big uncalled for ThankUturn. :). (and the A MAZERati)
nite
-Joey
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_Blonde
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdpTcvSn8HQ
(Three Pillars and I only Fell over the centre one just now; thats how it works, no cards up the sleeve, no sleight of hand; Real Magic and I am grateful for His / Their Blessing)
đ đ đ
May all your liminal thresholds be danced over, all thaumaturgies turn real, all entrances en-trance, all numens illumine, ake ake ake.
reply after church
A reaction to the election of Park Geun-hye, daughter of former leader Park Chung-hee who seized power by coup in 1961?.
Now that I am off my week long block I would like to send a question Draco’s way…
Draco – you said If two people are discussing something and one person can back up their arguments with facts and the other canât then the second opinion is worthless.
So I am curious about something. You have maintained that Labour is a right-wing party however the vast, overwhelming consensus among political scientists and the politicians themselves, from all sides, is that Labour is a centre left party.
So, back up your argument.
No wonder you got banned for a week.
They’re using the conventional contemporary political wisdom TC, we’re using a traditional perspective.
Nothing from The Bastard?
Have you ever gotten into a pendantry war with Lanthanide? You both seem like you’re cut from the same cloth.
That reminds me of the old advertising trick where the advertiser would point out how many millions had been sold and then say that x millions of people can’t be wrong. The problem, of course, is that they can.
I have. Several times in fact. Go have a look at what I’ve said about Labour’s KiwiBuild.
Thanks for answering.
But there is a problem – you have personally stated your belief that Labour is a centre-right party however you also mentioned that those who can produce the most factual support for their claims is the opinion that should be more widely held rendering the second opinion worthless.
And the facts overwhelmingly support the view that Labour is a centre-left party therefore shouldn’t you declare your opinion as worthless?
These are all your own words Draco.
RWNJ’s at the NRO hit a new low.
N***ism may have been an ideology to which the United States was â and to which the president is â implacably opposed, but it is hardly âsenseless.â By the early 1930s, the N**i party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the âunification of all Germans,â a demand for âland and territory for the sustenance of our people,â and an assertion that âno Jew can be a member of the race.â Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.
More crazy, spot the difference.
all at sea; maybe The South should listen to more Medlocke
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NT9xbcPyves
or
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzZLBXhsnHc
and finish with
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHQ_aTjXObs
(cos I been down)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvaEJzoaYZk
and found
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpoXBbOAS8
(I used to drink, it let me think of other people and other places)
-Sam
oops, forgot, Johnette Napolitano is my alter / ego; I was a vampire now I’m nothing all; Let the
Bloodletting begin…
On a different topic I only just noticed this across at kiwiblog:http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2013/02/why_did_labour_put_trevor_up.html which had been speculated about here. But was interested to see the idea that Annette won’t stand for Wellington mayor to keep Andrew out of Rongatai. Hardly the image of party renewal that they are after.
I read that too. If it is true, then it is a disgrace, and it only re-enforces my view of the hopeless state the Labour Party is in. Sorry, my view remains to be, a fresh start for the combined left can only be made by forming a new, inclusive, smart and well organised, newly staffed Left Party, that will not carry such baggage as Labour, either incorporate enough “green” policies, or work better with the Greens, and put Labour into the redundant category.
This upsets some, but I see NO other option now, with Shearer and other hopeless members in Parliament just clinging to their seats and positions.
For all those that have any “doubts” that people get BRAINWASHED by listening to private radio or other media, perhaps have a look at this quite frank set of information from the privately run ‘The Radio Network’, apparently owned largely by an Australian media corporation, and partly by a US share-holder, covering much of NZ radio:
http://www.radionetwork.co.nz/advertise/why-radio
There are comparisons between “media content distribution” and other criterias or information statistics.
I would think the “editorial” content is highly over-stated, as that must include anything but the bare net commercials they hammer your brain and mind with incessantly, repeatedly so it STICKS!
The “editorial content” will in the case of ZM, ZB, or any other of their stations, same as Radio Pacific (another radio broadcaster, not part of this lot), certainly include the highly frequent repeating of the station, it’s mission message and announcements for what comes up, what infotainment they present, and the likes.
So it does not equate with “REAL information”.
I thought this is worth having a look at, to see, how commercial radio works, compared to other commercial media, and how much of the contents is nothing but commercial advertising and much other CRAP.
NZ has the worst statistics and conditions and standards for public broadcasting, when compared with most developed “western” countries, that is for sure. It is dominated by commercial interests, and that even in the state run TV stations. Only Radio NZ National seems to be different, but even they have their internal “rules”, set by the ones that run that station.
Shocking truth. But so many grew up and grow up with this endless inundation of brainwashing into consumerism, superficiality, opportunistic thinking, and individual prioritising, which all somehow is in conflict in maintaining a working “social fabric” and unity.
See the “design” in all this?
true