Never mind Jenny, things are looking up in
Aleppo
The textile industry and its people are moving back
That means employment and the ability to sustain life and no more rockets or bombs or suicide attack
“Like most Syrians who have come home, they took refuge during the worst of the fighting in government areas like the coastal province of Latakia”
francesca
Government held?
More like occupied Military base
I actually spent time in Latakia in in late 2010, The Palestinian refugee camp in Latakia was one of the first areas to be shelled by the regime. In scenes reminiscent of Chile hundreds of the Palestinian were rounded up and held in the Latakia football stadium, many never to be seen again. The rest scattered and driven out of the city to join the beginning of the flood of refugees and internally displaced. Currently the regime is erasing all that remains of the camp. What was the Palestinian’s crime?
Joining and supporting the demonstrations against the regime in the city.
I obviously wasn’t there at the time, but I witnessed the live feeds friends sent me of the bombardment of the refugee camp by the regime warships off the coast. And regime jets dropping their bombs on the surrounding town.
I know for a fact that the Palestinian inhabitants of the camp would have been defenceless in the face of this slaughter.
Jenny you get that civil wars are nasty. And that the sides involved are messy and well beyond stuffed up. Let me rewrite what you said, and you think how ridiculous it sounds.
“Jenny and all the other apologist for the head choppers, whether unwitting or conscious, you need to hang your head in shame.”
Great point Adam
In an ugly 7 year cilvil war both sides will have committed their fair share of atrocities.
This is not a black and white issue. We are talking shades of grey.
“Jenny and all the other apologist for the head choppers, whether unwitting or conscious, you need to hang your head in shame.”
So true
For some it seems this disgusting foul obscene proxy Syrian war has simply become as important as a rugby game, (some people are obsessive about rugby) where they will not hear a word of criticism against their chosen side (the head choppers of a 14 year old Palestinian boy, (and others) who showed his support for the Syrian Government).
Further to the OM discussion yesterday. I realise some posts will be going up on the topic but just my 5c worth (hey I got 31c so might as well splurge!).
Naturally opening the comments which ties in with another topic on OM a few days ago (sorry can’t find link) to do with Stuff commentators. My reply to that being how all stories to do with beneficiaries are always open to comment because they know full well what will happen. And they didn’t disappoint- with an “upvote” of +75:
“I cant believe the entitlement culture here. I believe in a hand up not a hand out, all these people complaining about not getting something like it was some kind of birth right. Why don’t we work on how to get people of welfare rather how much more we can give them. We would go a long way to sloving child poverty if we disincentivise single parent hood. Children from single parents are over represented in every negative statistic so why not address a root cause.”
Other posters tried in vain to counter these narratives but didn’t do terribly well with the up votes. I mention those because it’s an example of how certain interests- or in the case of welfare, total bigots- want to rig it, and sadly those without critical thinking ablilities go along with the idea that most upvotes= must be true.
Nothing new of course, but this is what we are up against, and Stuff are willingly giving them a platform, and I truely believe this has to be stopped. I believe Stuff are aiding and abetting hate speech by letting their anonymous commentators say it for them, and things that they can’t even let their paid opinion writers get away with. How can we stop them?
I’m supposed to self censor and not go anywhere near these ‘articles’, yet alone the comments sections, but sometimes I’m, well, just stupid. I was in tears last night from that one, as I imagine were many others. Short of living in a cave we can’t avoid hearing this shit from somewhere.
The fact there are so many up votes and not many down votes shows to me that most caring and empathic people do indeed not read comments after articles. That’s why the Standard is essential to one’s mental health, for me anyway. Take care.
Being depressed goes with being oppressed. I am so sorry you saw that. Please believe they do not represent all of us. They “get off” with pulling people down.
“What’s happening is that Antarctica is being melted away at its base. We can’t see it, because it’s happening below the sea surface,” said Professor Andrew Shepherd, one of the authors of the paper. “The changes mean that very soon the sea-level contribution from Antarctica could outstrip that from Greenland.”
That old hack Soper over in “The National” is first out of the blocks today with a repeat “post Easter” heads up to ram home the “pre Easter” heads up on the state of the PM and Labour……. repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat……………
“she’s struggled to control the troops”
“Labour’s been left looking like a general in control of a mutiny”
“The badly managed Clare Curran debacle”
“Being forced to make statements that are patently ridiculous, such as, there are no Russian spies in New Zealand”
“…“Being forced to make statements that are patently ridiculous, such as, there are no Russian spies in New Zealand…”
The guy is in an intellectual straitjacket born of age, class, complacency and sheer laziness. The utter lack of intellectual curiosity of our right wing journalists continually astounds me. They simply never question the cliched tropes they continually repeat.
Soper continually comes across as a frightened old man out of touch with the modern world, no longer willing to absorb new ideas and who simply desperately wants a return of a 1990s style white male dominated “business friendly” neoliberal government that he can understand.
There is a massive cultural divide now between the neoliberal dinosaurs like Soper – who remember 1984 as a fresh event – and anyone born into the the “new New Zealand” of the 1990s who have no recollection of the pre-Rogernomics NZ. Soper and his ilk now live in a foreign country that they imagine to be still like the one they once lived in the 1980s, before they vanished into their political-media neoliberal elite bubble in the 1990s. Muldoon is a real person from recent history to Soper and the politics of the 1970s colours his thoughts on the politics of NZ almost half a century later.
Basically he is over the hill and a waste of time, the Garth George of our current time.
I have written to Soper previously about the overall bias and insulting tone of many of his columns especially regarding Jacinda Ardern peeing in the shower. He replied and he gave me a “stern” lecture on his longevity in parliament as a political journalist and that he has every right to voice his opinion and that I had no right challenging him.
It is the the way of the right. Only they have the right to say their opinion and your opinion is worthless to them if you do not have the same mindset, so shut up if you do not agree. You are not allowed to challenge them with real facts because to them the facts do not matter, only the way they feel. If the clear facts say one thing and they feel another the facts are clearly wrong and anyone who supports them are stupid and wrong.
You can show them all the proven facts you want, but you are the stupid one for believing in the facts instead of going with your gut and ignoring them in favor of the anecdote he was told that apparently came from his work colleges friends neighbours second cousin who was told the facts on the case where something else entirely diferent to the evidence and even though he no proof this person actually exists and has any evidence he believe what he was told as gospel because it matches how he feels.
I loved his bared faced lie that the previous government was on top of the problem, before pivoting to defend the constant demands for savings to be raked off as a dividend for tax cuts for the rich.
Things like stachybotrys are out of sight, out of mind, and budget shortfalls mean deferred spending, until someone decides to spend a little and there it is, in plain sight.
Obviously to me that if they had they would have been out of the job.
They were told to stay in budget or else I’m sure … if not told then they surmised that and surely Coleman wasn’t MoH for the whole time the decay was going on …. untreated timber that a government let be used on the advice of the industry …. GHU
I wonder if stuff will headline tomorrow with’Opposition Leader denies Nationals responsibility for Middlemore Hospitals ruin’. As reported just now on RNZ. Apparently Coleman knew but didn’t know specifics. Meh..
Simon Bridges came across like a little twerp, chirping “Show us the money, show us the money.”
He is assembling chapters of fuckwittery so that when it is said, “We didn’t plan on having to spend a $billion (or whatever) on Middlemore”, he will go full noise about poor planning, shelving other plans to pay for it, etc., etc.
Knowing that a crescendo of chirping from the choir of other fuckwits on Kiwiblog and other places will be roused to full voice.
Maybe Si needs to be asked for the total amount overall of the dividends that English demanded from Housing Corp. Leaving them in dire financial straits. But hey! We got a surplus.
Turkey is now killing European nationals, and threatening other countries it is supposedly allied with in NATO. The Turkish state is no longer a civil entity, what was the old phrase, a state in support of head choppers. Or a terrorist state. How devilish that it is a western allie.
“National’s leader is refusing to let the Government off easy over the Radio New Zealand meeting scandal, saying the Labour/NZ First coalition looks like an “extended family reunion gone wrong”.
This is the same leader who says that he left the country in great shape financially, but couldn’t find the dosh to fix Middlemore. Now he says, show us the money.
Either the economy is in great shape as left to us by National so we can continue their good work and repair the damage; or, it’s in poor shape as left by their financial mismanagement.
Or has it all changed in four months, Simon?
This is the same leader whose extended family are leaving home having trashed the joint- Coleman from Health, and Joyce from Finance.
To be joined by other family members soon? At a cost of how much per by-election?
And lest we forget.
“Nationals first term in office was a good one… mispaying teachers with Novopay, GST increases when they said they wouldn’t, ministers using tax payers’ money for personal trips and an MP using identity of a dead baby.”
You forgot to mention Key and English and Barclay. So far 5 have left. Leaving Smith Bennett Brownlee and David Carter out of the” Horrid” group still standing.
At least when Key, English and Barclay left, the NZ taxpayers did not have to pick up the costs of by-elections; but if Smith, Bennett, Brownlee and/or David Carter do decide to go causing a by-election, this would cost probably at least $1M for each by-election (see my 12.2 below). OTOH, list only MPs like Findlayson …
This TDB post has a [enter your own description] photo of the “Troika” which I think was taken at Joyce’s valedictory speech in the House.
Good for a caption post here? Post itself is also relevant to this discussion.
Unnecessary cost is the main reason for avoiding a by-election in the six months before a general election. In recent years the average cost of a by-election was $773,500. To hold individual elections in Helensville and New Lynn may have cost taxpayers upwards of $1.4 million.
[Ssssshhh – not $11 million as mentioned about 2/3 down in the “Doofus of the Week – Easter 2018 Edition” post. I think MickySavage hit the ‘1’ button twice in error. ]
I think that’s how fiscal holes a la Joyce develop….
And a little historical memory button just got pressed.
“During the 1928 election, Joseph Ward, leading the Liberal Opposition, promised to borrow a huge £70 million. What exactly he meant is unclear, for even his biographer could not sort it out – he seems to have misread his speech notes. In any case, he did not know that New Zealand was already in deep borrowing difficulties and that the Reform Government had apparently secretly promised the London market to stop borrowing for a while.”
What happens when Tory governments don’t reveal all before elections.
There is a driver shortage. Bus drivers are not on the skills shortage list for migrant entry. So, there are enough skilled drivers. It’s a question of pay, and profit.
Instead of addressing the issue of bus drivers getting poor pay for long hours, the company’s reaction is to try and import labour who I bet won’t get paid properly.
If Ritchie’s needed new senior managers I bet they’d pay the going rate for executives. Why not for drivers, too?
Don’t forget the number of over 65s also employed to drive buses. They already have their pension, and often look on the job as “something to do” (fair enough) and, crucially for bosses, they don’t have to figure out how to live off the wage provided.
Sometimes its more than something to do, but there may still be mortgage payments, children or grand-children to look after, or a top-up to the income. The drivers’ pay and the pension are all taxed of course.
Some monetary pressures last past 65+. I am about to contribute to my daughter’s wedding.for example. Family need financial help. Household maintenance costs just as much, even with Grey Power discounts, rates, insurance the same.
Again, I’d presume to guess that such drivers are probably part-time and non-unionised. They are thus more vulnerable to low wage offers, and far less employable as age precludes more activities and hours worked.
So, Bill, you’re right- “crucially for bosses” is a good point.
Well that was interesting. Stepped off the bus on the way to an appointment this morning and nearly collided with my freshly minted Labour Electorate MP. (Ironically, outside the local WINZ office, although thankfully that wasn’t my destination). Obviously I couldn’t resist raising the Accommodation Supplement issue with him so boy did he hear all about it, as restrained as I could be…
He genuinely had no idea that was happening and I have to believe him on that one, being new to Central Govt, and he does seem very sincere in wanting to find out more, giving me his card and asking me to contact his office and make and appointment. Not that I have any faith he can change the system, but I’ll do it- at the very least, Backbenchers should be informed about these things and there’s a lot of beneficiaries/low income people in his electorate.
Yes I thought so. Email just sent to make an appointment so I shall keep you updated.
I strongly suspect except for the people high up who are involved with budgets that the majority of MPs really don’t have a clue, for the simple reason they don’t need to, and it doesn’t affect them. So obviously they need educating.
Tax who pays the biggest proportion from their income and assets?
As the tax working group examines our system, well we hope, these points are pertinent and I wish that government and Treasury could be penitent about the way that egregious taxes fall on the struggling and poor.
Duncan Greive from The Spinoff wrote an interesting article which is part of a series apparently.
Commenting on the Rich List candidates which appear in the NBR’s annual count: Surprisingly often, though, their impact on New Zealand is relatively muted. As Liam Dann noted last year, New Zealand’s richest man, Graeme Hart, has much of his $13.6bn fortune tied to his multinational packaging group. Its outlook and operations are global. The same goes for a number of our wealthiest, from the secretive emerging markets investor Richard Chandler, to African property developer Stephen Jennings, to the extreme example of tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel, who appears to have largely been a wealth drain through his sharp exploitation of our government venture funds.
The point is that while the individual stories of this wealth are often fascinating, and the data useful, the impact of the Rich List on the rest of us is much less clear. After all, what use is all that wealth to ordinary New Zealanders? Its most tangible benefit is where a portion of it is redistributed through the tax system. And yet for a variety of reasons the link between wealth and tax is not always a strong one.
Which brings us to Tax Heroes. It’s a project which attempts to invert the Rich List, in many ways. To ask not what this country has done for them, but what they have done for this country. I wanted to know who, in any given year, paid the most tax.
The New Zealand roading system wasn’t built to cope with the current population numbers due to the ‘blow out’ immigration policies ( to start with, NZ is not Europe with it’s massive networks of highways etc).
Secondly, National ramming through changes to the road rules to match up with more common global system, has meant in practise that the well long standing, understood and functioning road rules in the New Zealand public’s consciousness has been replaced by an imprecise more situational by situational approach, which along with the increase in population from other cultures, particularly those from countries which have a more helter skelter city road culture, has resulted in open slather on the roads, turning them into abit of a death trap.
Apart from re-building our road system grids to something like European standards which is what abit of fore thought would have realised current approach to associated policy areas would require…..the only option really is to have road medium barriers and signs, in all high risk stretches and cornering areas.
listened to mike foreskin poormouth clarke gayford on the radio. if anyone is to blame for the state of new zeland it is this horrible little squib hosking dribbling bile, day after day night after night and then the kiwi capons baying like the ball less bastards they are on skwarbak radio. well their time has come. suck it up.
“PM Jacinda Ardern’s Point Chevalier home sold to ‘nice Kiwi family'”
Obviously ‘nice kiwi family’ is a code word for white, or at least non-Asian
Real Estate salesperson Lawrence von Sturmer:
“We have a couple of thousand people on our database, so we picked out the ones we thought were the best buyers for it.”
Obviously the ones with obviously non-Chinese or non-Asian names. I understand there are laws prohibiting racially discriminatory practice in commercial transactions. It would be interesting to look at Mr von Sturmer’s list.
And if Jacinda gave instructions to exclude buyers based on ethnicity or race, that would be utterly outrageous —but sadly, not surprising coming from the populist trumpist NZ left.
Wei. Racism is very much alive and well in NZ. But those are really fucking long bows you’re drawing.
“Nice Kiwi family” could be any number of quite obnoxious, dull, grey or sickenly conservative things. Mr von Strumer could even have been talking about an immigrant family that have enthusiastically adopted “the Kiwi way” (whatever that might be when it’s at home 😉 )
“Mr von Strumer could even have been talking about an immigrant family that have enthusiastically adopted “the Kiwi way””
I’m guessing not – Mr Strumer was obviously trying to underline a racially loaded point.
Interestingly he also said: “We have a couple of thousand people on our database, so we picked out the ones we thought were the best buyers for it.”
I assume this was not based on excluding those whose names sounded ‘chinese’ or ‘asian’, as I believe there are laws strictly prohibiting racially discriminatory practices in commercial transactions of any kind (naturally I’m not talking of offshore buyers)
It would be interesting to understand on what criteria Mr Strumer ‘picked out the ones’ he thought ‘were the best buyers for it’
It is probably unlikely that this would ever rise to the level that anything could ever be proven, and logically Mr von Strumer’s comments do not exclude “an immigrant family that have enthusiastically adopted “the Kiwi way””
Of course it is not just the content of what is said, it is how one understands what is being said will be interpreted in the current social and political context. It is obvious that Ardern is trying to milk a bit of political capital here – i’m guessing she is aware of and approves the article.
Many people reading the article will get the drift –that this PM is a racist populist trumpist leader at heart. I believe she will end up to be deeply damaging to the NZ left – platitiudes and virtue signalling overlaying deep incompetence will only get her so far before the wheels start to fall off
Sure – “nice Kiwi family” is a kind of signpost that “Jaccinda’s on our side”. Whatever that might mean. And you’re take is among a range of possibilities.
Can’t see much damage being done to the NZ left by any of it though, whatever the correct take might be, because the left in NZ (the parliamentary left) has been well beyond repair for a few years now.
“We have a couple of thousand people on our database, so we picked out the ones we thought were the best buyers for it.”
The buyers were a “nice Kiwi family,” von Sturmer said.
“As much of Point Chev is.
“We do a lot of business in the area, we know the buyers really well and we can quite easily match up buyers with houses without doing that full marketing if that’s what the owners are after.”
The ethnic make up of Pt Chev residents according to the 2013 census differ according to whether it’s south, east or west of the borough.
West and East Pt Chev residents are overwhelmingly European.
An article written by Susan Edmunds says that “the agency had looked into its database of buyers and found people who would be suitable.” No mention of an instruction from the seller.
Imagine the ‘voyeur’ element of people wanting to see the PM’s for sale house. A sound reason for not listing it on the open market.
I consulted a realtor on whether it is practice in the industry to not go to open homes, but rather rely on known clients. It is a practice.
The other claim that Wei makes about the use of the word ‘nice’ as somehow having racist overtones.
The article mentioned above had the real estate agent using that word two times- “nice neighbourhood,” the sellers were “really nice”- and Wei’s reporting of “nice Kiwi family” is a third example of his possible overuse of the word.
It is an over-used and innocuous word in Kiwi parlance.
She’s the PM for God’s sake and she’s had rather more important matters to attend to, so she understandably left it in the hands of an estate agent to handle the sale as he/she saw fit. Simple as that.
It’s going well beyond a joke when a Labour P.M. can’t even sell her home without attempts being made to introduce pathetic conspiratorial motives.
If you were in her shoes you would be doing exactly the same thing for the same reason… running the country is a 24/7 job.
My comments were not directed against any particular person on this website, but an entirely legitimate comment on a politician. Politicians are open to critique and indeed expect it.
However, because I criticize Ardern, you take personal offense and use that as an excuse to launch a personal attack on me???? What sort of logic is that? Are you related to her or something? Or perhaps her self-annointed guardian angel?
As for accusing me of being ‘sexist’ and ‘misogynistic’, again, huh???????????
Jacinda doesn’t have a racist bone in her body
She’s from the Islands and Murupara. What is your beef?
You are making something from nothing.
Real estate agents burbling on. Get a life.
She’s a dog whistling populist and a number of commentators have picked up on this. When I’m bored and not so busy will post the links.
She rode a populist wave and sold out to the most racist politician in the house for the baubles of office.
I also find it strange how we have all these people popping up mushrooms taking personal affront at some expressed home truths about our pregnant fairy princess.
As for ‘she’s from the islands’, what????? Do you mean her Dad was, and still is the colonial administrator of Niue?
And how do you know she doesn’t have a racist bone in her body —you know her personally?
So what? What’s the point of your comment? If racial discrimination in this case is proven then there should be consequences, as for the case I have raised. Regardless of who is discriminating against who, and regardless of the ethnicity of the person doing the discriminating and the party who is being discriminated against.
Saying Nice kiwi family is generally not considered a racial slur, but there is racism about, such as the article I linked too and it might not be in the direction you are thinking… that’s my point.
National and its lapdog msm are on a roll with the Curran/Hirschfeld saga. A shallow and obvious attempt to discredit the present government, when it knows it needs to answer some serious questions itself!
Middlemore hospital is proving to be a health and safety hazard through neglect of the public health system by the previous National government. Yet this massive public health failure barely gets a mention in media, when it should be a top priority news item, with some scrutiny taking place as to how and why lack of proper maintenance and repair was allowed to reach its present state of neglect.
Despite not being elected government, the opposition is dangerously casting an odious and deceitful influence on NZ still, using its powerful tool msm to manipulate public perception, in favour of National. A situation in need of monitoring I think.
Whose paying for the housing, schools, roads, infrastructure, hospitals, doctors, midwives… etc etc…
There should be a requirement, every person coming in to NZ to settle or to provide labour – the company has to provide the above requirements BEFORE the person comes into the country – because there are only so many hospitals and roads and houses and until we actually see new ones in the flesh (not promises of them in the future) then clearly those who are already working and living in NZ need the resources available until there are clearly more there ….
The National government has let every company worker in but then expects the NZ taxpayers to somehow provide 100,000’s of extra services that are now needed which apart from prisons (also full to brink) their seems little provisioning for… and in many cases for what, it’s crazy, nobody in the Western world would break down their social services voluntarily… but I guess if you want to do that… to privatise… it makes sense of a sort…
However, the overarching issue is why are people paid so little in some parts of the world and so much in other parts, for simply doing the same amount of work?
That is what ultimately drives migration.
The world’s economic system is so utterly distorted and unjust, a legacy of Western imperialism, and it is natural that people will flow to those parts of the world where the wealth is concentrated.
Because in contrast Chinese and Japanese imperial power was so just.
Its natural for people to want to go to nations where wealth is concentrated, it’s just not their right.
Don’t know why you bring up the Japanese—-but actually it reinforces my point. The number of Japanese immigrants we receive is miniscule – because the Japanese are rich and part of the first world —rewarded for being a US lackey.
People, aside from refugees, flow to Western countries because an hour of labour in these parts of the world fetches so much more than an hour of labour from whence they came.
Western wealth was accumulated over several centuries, on the backs of Asians and Africans. New Zealand was the pitbull of British and US imperialism and benefited enormously from being part of the British empire, willingly taking part in wars of aggression against Koreans, Vietnamese, Iraqis, Afghans, and even supported Britain and France’s aggression against the Egyptians in 1956.
On the back of this support of British and US imperialism, NZ became the richest country in the world, until in the 1970s the UK left for the common market.
“Its natural for people to want to go to nations where wealth is concentrated, it’s just not their right.”
Certainly it is not their legal right, but certainly there is a moral right. Non-western people moving to Western countries is simply about reclaiming stolen wealth.
there is no moral right to live in another’s country to accumulate wealth. New Zealand suffered as a vassal state of empire like all the others, it’s indigenous people ripped off, it’s Kauri timber logged, it’s men sent to war.
Interesting now how it’s the Chinese taking our swamp kauri , how the worm turns eh.
“New Zealand suffered as a vassal state of empire like all the others, it’s indigenous people ripped off, it’s Kauri timber logged, it’s men sent to war.”
Your comment is absurd. Yes, the indigenous people were ripped off, but New Zealand’s wealth is a legacy of it being a part of the imperialist camp.
Hardly a vassal state, white New Zealanders considered themselves an integral part of the British empire and considered themselves British for a very long time. Indeed New Zealanders of just a generation ago referred to the UK as ‘home’, and had to have autonomy almost forced on them, being extremely reluctant to adopt the 1947 Westminster agreement.
As for ‘it’s men sent to war’ —they were not forced to go. New Zealanders willingly participated in those wars because they identified themselves as British and so were fighting for themselves. “Where she (i.e. Britain) goes, we go” – at least that particular conflict, i.e. WWII was a just conflict – the only just conflict of New Zealand;s many overseas excursions.
“Interesting now how it’s the Chinese taking our swamp kauri”
Obviously it is some New Zealander selling it to them —they are therefore ‘buying’ the kauri, not simply ‘taking’ it. And if New Zealanders refused to sell the Kauri, the Chinese would not send in troops to force the sale.
This is completely unlike what the Brits and other Western nations did to China – when China did not want to trade tea for opium they were invaded and forced at gunpoint to legalize and conduct the trade.Up until 1943, under extraterritoriality , British people could kill Chinese in China with utter impunity and get away scott free, not being held to the laws of China.
“there is no moral right to live in another’s country to accumulate wealth.”
There is no moral right for a country to live off the wealth that was gained from the exploitation of other people, and not to expect those people to demand their fair share of the world’s resources.
I’m happy for new Zealand not to exploit cheap immigrant labour.
How’s that invasion of Tibet treating you?
Harvested any organs lately? There is no exploitation in China.
Mongol imperialism was also benign.
[lprent: Perhaps you should ease off on the flamewar provocations before I get irritated and decide to clean them up in the interests of moderator workloads.. ]
Unfortunately for many of your ilk, you don’t get to call the shots anymore. If Asians or Africans piss you off you can’t just bomb them or shoot them with the same sort of impunity that you use to do.
That’s just tough for people like you – the tectonic shift in power from the West to the East. Yet if you opt out of it, you know, in your bones, that New Zealand would be reduced to a South Pacific economic swamp.
So you may hate these yellows who are starting to level the playing field a bit. But you know you also need them. So you wail and gnash your teeth and shake your first with impunity at the inexorable and ultimately just change in the world order – that’s just too funny!
That is why there are rules about immigration, to stop the race to the bottom. NZ can’t make other countries pay higher wages, but we can vote for our NZ government to stop us sinking into the third world by for example spending $50 million on housing homeless in 1 room hotels… because someones idea was to make NZ the third highest population growth in the world per capita, based on stupidity like arguing that 100 worker are needed to drive buses at minimum wages when there are hundreds of thousands of unemployed in NZ and no houses for them to live in, let alone money for more infrastructure like hospitals and transport… Funny enough, the Natz did commission more prisons though, I wonder why….
That’s a ridiculous comment. Perhaps other countries simply cannot pay higher wages, because their respective GDP per capita is way way lower than New Zealand’s?
New Zealand’s current problems have little to do with immigration – the highest rates of immigration per capita occurred in the 19th Century, and also the post war decades when we received hundreds of thousands of UK and European migrants.
Watch this person and learn people, to this poster economic migration is people coming to take what’s theirs.
This is what you get when you open your door too easily. Or give away our water and other resources.
They will take all day long.
After all for property, they were apparently paying top dollar. And if the Chinese are told to go away, they will do so politely and quietly – and not send in gunboats and shell Wellington and kill hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders to get their own way – unlike what the British did to them.
It is the Anglo Saxon tribe who have a nasty habit of killing those who get in the way of national and personal enrichment. And they hardly paid top dollar for land they took off the Maoris and Aborigines and Native Americans – often they just drove people off it and outright confiscated the land.
@ Keepcalmcarryon – +1 Natz have purposely decided to concentrate on bringing in people from countries without a welfare system or in many cases democracy for a reason and it’s working.
Years ago we had some friends who migrated here from former Yugoslavia. We asked them how did Milošević and atrocities happen in the middle of Europe. Their view was that they did not have democracy in Yugoslavia and were not used to thinking for themselves. They blindly followed their government or their religion.
As NZ gets more migrants who grew up with undemocratic systems and systemic injustice and corruption, it will percolate into NZ society to our detriment as a society.
That is where NZ is going. Not just race to a bottom with conditions like housing and pollution, but also culturally, just being beaten down with injustice and media propaganda and accepting injustice as a given – just like in other countries that the Natz (and maybe Labour) admire for their strong authoritarian ways, the government is always right and human rights are just lip service to have, but profits and trade is more important.
Best way to stop this “race to the bottom” is for the West to pay its fair share for the products it received from third world countries.
So when you buy something from the warehouse, say, we should all make a donation to match the price we would have paid if the the workers who assembled the product had been paid the same as what workers get here.
That is the best way to keep poor third world people where they are.
@ Wei “West to pay its fair share for the products it received from third world countries”
…. I think that relies on having a government that redistribute the wealth by having higher wages for their workers…. otherwise the profits seem to be being held at the top elite in the country they are working in…
China is full of millionaires and billionaires for example, it’s a very rich country, but it’s that trickle down theory not working again.
I hope I’m wrong but it looks like Clare Curran might have dropped herself in it again.
It seems she left a ‘voicemail’ message for Richard Griffin suggesting that if he couldn’t attend a Select Committee last Thursday she had been advised that a letter containing the correction would suffice. He responded in kind to say that he was planning to attend the following Thursday and if she had a problem with that to let him know. She didn’t reply and as a result she has left herself open to accusations that she was trying to stop him from attending the select committee.
Ok, he only asked her to respond if she wasn’t happy, but anyone with a sense of astuteness would still have responded to advise… Yes, I’m quite happy. I was just letting you know if it was going to be difficult a letter would suffice…
Newshub Thats the way Mike Mc Roberts Interviewing Maoris staying in Australia I thought of going over there but I cannot get to far from my Maunga Awa and Tangata.
Many thanks to the Black Caps win over Britain ka pai e hoa its awesome to see all the Team make there contributions to the win back in the day we relied on one or two players good team effort for this win .
ka kite ano
I.m going to tau toko The Crowd Goes Wild Wairangi and James Mulls eye still looks a bit wonky .
Wairangi what do you think about taking the campervan to Te Tai Rawhiti plenty of kai mona wild pig and deer in Ngati Porou whenua I got a tangi and the unavailing of Te Carvings at Poki tangi at Te Horo this weekend .Well I say Joesph could have won Ka kite ano
Some tangata whanue are that Naive they believe everything te namu onepu tell them when they should no that te namu onepu just want to destroy ECO MAORI anyway they can they just want to suppress Maori or any race that is not like them this is fact .Ana to kai ka kite ano
We have to have a fuel tax of nine cents a ltr to start OUR journey to a carbon neutral economy. Big oil barons will sqeel like a kuni kuni and say te sky is going to fall on our heads YEA RIGHT . If shonky had of looked after the mokopunas future first instead of his wealth m8 and continued the journey Helen Clark started to introduce renewable energy well the tax would be two cents a ltr .
So people we can thank shonky for the tax being nine cents .
Many thanks for the Coalition Goverment for restarting this journey to a bright prosperous future for all Ka pai Ka kite ano
Newshub Mark If I was New Zealand Cricket I would start recruiting young brown players from school Te Samoans love Cricket they have there own version of the game get some young big brown men an we will start being more dominant World Cricket .
There you go Duncan the 70 klm thing was a right wing spin attack on the Government Duncan you don’t no the word respect you obviously don’t GIVE the Ladies the respect they deserve the less carbon we use the better .The fuel tax how do the poor cope well they buy a second hand electric car you can get a good one for $15000 to $20000 thats what I’m going to do you see there are many ways to solve problems .
Amanda I’m off to the place were I was born this weekend have a few hongi and a feed and see the new Carvings to my Marae and send a m8 whano member to his resting place he is only 5 years older than me and we have other cultures making 100 one of my elderly clients is a 100 another is 95 its a shame that Tangata whenua are dieting so young 55 I wonder why???????????.
Kia Kaha Tangata Ka kite ano
I expect the NZF MP to support Labour and the Greens on this policy of reforming the
Parole Act of shonkys 2002 this Act affects Maori mostly it was a sham and should be cast in the history books as a big mistake along with the people who supported IT
heres the link.
Buzz from the Beehive Two speeches delivered by Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters at Anzac Day ceremonies in Turkey are the only new posts on the government’s official website since the PM announced his Cabinet shake-up. In one of the speeches, Peters stated the obvious: we live in a troubled ...
1. Which of these would you not expect to read in The Waikato Invader?a. Luxon is here to do business, don’t you worry about thatb. Mr KPI expects results, and you better believe itc. This decisive man of action is getting me all hot and excitedd. Melissa Lee is how ...
…it has a restricted jurisdiction which must not be abused: it is not an inquisitionNOTE – this article was published before the High Court ruled that Karen Chhour does not have to appear before the Waitangi Tribunal Gary Judd writes – The High Court ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – One of reasons Oranga Tamariki exists is to prevent child neglect. But could the organisation itself be guilty of the same?Oranga Tamariki’s statistics show a decrease in the number and age of children in care. “There are less children ...
David Farrar writes: Graeme Edgeler wrote in 2017: In the first five years after three strikes came into effect 5248 offenders received a ‘first strike’ (that is, a “stage-1 conviction” under the three strikes sentencing regime), and 68 offenders received a ‘second strike’. In the five years prior to ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in politics. That’s refreshing and will be extremely ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the two days to 6:06am on Thursday, April 25:Politics: PM Christopher Luxon has set up a dual standard for ministerial competence by demoting two National Cabinet ministers while leaving also-struggling ...
Hi,Today I mainly want to share some of your thoughts about the recent piece I wrote about success and failure, and the forces that seemingly guide our lives. But first, a quick bit of housekeeping: I am doing a Webworm popup in Los Angeles on Saturday May 11 at 2pm. ...
It is hard to see what Melissa Lee might have done to “save” the media. National went into the election with no public media policy and appears not to have developed one subsequently. Lee claimed that she had prepared a policy paper before the election but it had been decided ...
Open access notablesIce acceleration and rotation in the Greenland Ice Sheet interior in recent decades, Løkkegaard et al., Communications Earth & Environment:In the past two decades, mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet has accelerated, partly due to the speedup of glaciers. However, uncertainty in speed derived from satellite products ...
Buzz from the Beehive A statement from Children’s Minister Karen Chhour – yet to be posted on the Government’s official website – arrived in Point of Order’s email in-tray last night. It welcomes the High Court ruling on whether the Waitangi Tribunal can demand she appear before it. It does ...
Mr Bombastic:Ironically, the media the academic experts wanted is, in many ways, the media they got. In place of the tyrannical editors of yesteryear, advancing without fear or favour the interests of the ruling class; the New Zealand news media of today boasts a troop of enlightened journalists dedicated to ...
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 – as may be discerned from the screenshot above – 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 Government’s 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 – 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 – 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 government’s readiness to make urgent changes to “the resource management system” through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes don’t 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 “media summit” to discuss “the state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalism”. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes – 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 “fast track” 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 – 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- 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 aren’t 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 “Since 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 ...
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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 ...
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Two-thirds of the country think that “New Zealand’s economy is rigged to advantage the rich and powerful”. They also believe that “New Zealand needs a strong leader to take the country back from the rich and powerful”. These are just two of a handful of stunning new survey results released ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
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 Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s 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. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
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 Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s 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 that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s 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 country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ 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 member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s 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. ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
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. “Our 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 Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I 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 Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s 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. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s 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 Ngā 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. “Our 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 Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I 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. “Over 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. “It 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. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” 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. “Recently 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 Teachers’ 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. “The 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. “Science, 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 today’s 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. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō 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. “The 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. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s 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 Zealand’s 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. “Our 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. “New 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 Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s 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 Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation 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 sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
I was initially resistant to the idea often suggested to me that the Government should deliver an arts strategy. The whole point of the arts and creativity is that people should do whatever the hell they want, unbound by the dictates of politicians in Wellington. Peter Jackson, Kiri Te Kanawa, Eleanor ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Queensland state election will be held in October. A YouGov poll for The Courier Mail, conducted April 9–17 from a sample ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Naeni, PhD candidate at Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University There’s been much talk in recent months about what a possible second Donald Trump presidency in the United States could mean for Europe, Russia’s war in Ukraine, the ...
A brief round-up of submissions on the controversial proposed law. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week, submissions on the controversial Fast-track Approvals Bill closed just hours after the government released a list of stakeholder organisations who were sent letters advising how they could ...
A poem from Robin Peace’s new collection Detritus of Empire: feather / grass / rock. Cereal giving I see a woman’s hands, see her curious hands break a stalk as she walks through the tall prairie, the savannah, the steppe, wherever it was. See her idly bite the grass that ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)A handsomely produced (debossed cover, lovely ...
The Commissioner's decision validates the longstanding efforts of the local community and ensures that Awataha Marae will be managed to serve the needs of the local community, particularly for hosting tangihanga. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tristan Salles, Associate professor, University of Sydney Examples of Australian landscapes.Unsplash Seventy thousand years ago, the sea level was much lower than today. Australia, along with New Guinea and Tasmania, formed a connected landmass known as Sahul. Around this time – ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Felicity Castagna, Lecturer, Creative Writing, Western Sydney University Day Day Market, ParramattaPhoto: Garry Trinh I live on the edge of Parramatta, Australia’s fastest-growing city, on the kind of old-fashioned suburban street that has 1950s fibros constructed in the post-war housing boom, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Ryan, Teaching Fellow in Economics, University of Waikato GettyImagesfatido/Getty Images There is an ongoing global debate over whether the high inflation seen in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic can be lowered without a recession. New Zealand is not ...
The ‘Wicked Game’ heartthrob is in his late 60s now. That didn’t stop him putting on a lively, goofy and very sparkly show. Apart from ‘Wicked Game’, which graces a sultry playlist of mine simply called 💋, my last sustained Chris Isaak listening session took place when I was about ...
Analysis - Two ministers were stripped of portfolios in a warning to Cabinet, drama broke out at the Waitangi Tribunal, and the gang patch ban bill ran into opposition. ...
Tara Ward makes an impassioned plea for some vital pop culture merch. In April 1999, I became obsessed with a new reality television show called Popstars. Every Tuesday night, five strangers transformed into music royalty before my very eyes as Joe, Keri, Carly, Erika and Megan were chosen to form ...
PNG Post-Courier In the early hours of ANZAC Day, aerial photographs captured an impressive gathering of Australians and Papua New Guineans at Isurava in the Northern (Oro) Province. The solemn dawn service yesterday was held at a site steeped in history, where some of the fiercest battles of World War ...
The PSA is shocked that Oranga Tamariki has used the cost cutting drive to downgrade its commitment to Te Ao Māori and remove many specialist Māori roles. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Kemish, Adjunct Professor, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, The University of Queensland There can be no more powerful symbol of the relationship between Australia and Papua New Guinea than the prime ministers of these neighbouring countries walking together on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sharon Robinson, Distinguished Professor and Deputy Director of ARC Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future (SAEF), University of Wollongong, University of Wollongong Andrew Netherwood Over the last 25 years, the ozone hole which forming over Antarctica each spring has started to shrink. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Viktoria Kahui, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Economics, University of Otago Getty Images/Amy Toensing Biodiversity is declining at rates unprecedented in human history. This suggests the ways we currently use to manage our natural environment are failing. One emerging concept focuses on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Colin Bednall, Associate Professor in Management, Swinburne University of Technology marvent/Shutterstock Finding the best person to fill a position can be tough, from drafting a job ad to producing a shortlist of top interview candidates. Employers typically consider information from ...
Wondering where to host your next BYO? Whether its a small gathering or a massive party, we’ve got some recommendations. I was first introduced to the concept of BYOs at Dunedin’s India Gardens, a legendary but sadly defunct establishment, which purveyed enormous quantities of mango chicken to Aotearoa’s drunkest future ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julien Cooper, Honorary Lecturer, Department of History and Archaeology, Macquarie University Julien Cooper The hyper-arid desert of Eastern Sudan, the Atbai Desert, seems like an unlikely place to find evidence of ancient cattle herders. But in this dry environment, my new ...
The sector says it’s hopeful her replacement Paul Goldsmith will be able to throw it a lifeline, after six months with a minister deemed missing in action, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign ...
The government can't just rely on axing public sector jobs and has to do more to cut spending, says the chief economist at a free market think tank. ...
Rock The Vote NZ, known for its advocacy for minor party unity and its role within the Freedoms NZ Coalition during the 2023 General Election, celebrates this merger as a strategic enhancement of its operational strength and outreach. ...
Nearly everyone has experienced the frustration of something you use breaking and being difficult or expensive to fix. Proposed legislation could change that. It’s been raining on and off all Sunday afternoon but people are lining up outside a building in a corner of Gribblehirst Park in Sandringham, Auckland. In ...
What does a forever relationship look like when you don’t believe in marriage? And how do you celebrate it? This essay is part of our Sunday Essay series, made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.I’m going to do it, right now. I’m going to say ...
The Prime Minister has committed to resuming direct flights to Thailand. But it’s not a promise he will be able to deliver on anytime soon. The post Prime Minister jumps the gun in Thailand appeared first on Newsroom. ...
It’s not that long ago Eliza McCartney was seriously wondering if the Paris Olympics would be her pole vaulting swansong. After years of being hounded by injury after injury, the Rio Olympics bronze medallist was still confident she would compete at her second Olympics in Paris in July, unless something ...
FICTION 1 Take Two by Danielle Hawkins (Allen & Unwin, $36.99) There’s commercial fiction, like this book, and then there’s quality fiction, quality writers, quality literature; the forthcoming Auckland Writers Festival is full of quality, and ReadingRoom has two tickets to give away to the following events: Paul Lynch (Dublin ...
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You can’t have missed the Gallipoli story as the movies, documentaries, essays and books capture what it was like for New Zealand troops in their eight-month campaign on the Peninsula. But this Anzac Day the Auckland War Memorial Museum has published a book that sheds light on a little-known aspect of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra In the free-for-all between the Australian government and Big Tech boss Elon Musk this week, the government had to be on a winner. Most people would have little sympathy with Musk’s vociferous opposition to ...
Asia Pacific Report Chief Mandla Mandela, a member of the National Assembly of South Africa and Nelson Mandela’s grandson, has joined the Freedom Flotilla in istanbul as the ships prepare to sail for Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. Mandela is also the ambassador for the Global Campaign to Return to ...
Pacific Media Watch Journalists who report on environmental issues are encountering growing difficulties in many parts of the world, reports Reporters Without Borders. According to the tally kept by RSF, 200 journalists have been subjected to threats and physical violence, including murder, in the past 10 years because they were ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in ...
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 Australia’s inflation rate has fallen for the fifth successive quarter, and it’s now less than half of what it was back in late 2022. ...
ACT's Rural Communities and Veterans spokesman Mark Cameron responds to cancellations and protests of ANZAC Day commemorations in Wellington. He says, "These pitiful attempts to detract from ANZAC Day are not at all indicative of the feelings of mainstream ...
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 ...
Pōneke based peace activists staged a silent protest at the ANZAC day service to highlight New Zealand’s complicity in war and genocide, and urge the government to take concrete steps to stop the genocide in Palestine. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Magdalena M.E. Bunbury, Postdoctoral Researcher, James Cook University Burial with a horse at the Rákóczifalva site, Hungary (8th century AD).Sándor Hegedűs, Hungarian National Museum, CC BY How do we understand past societies? For centuries, our main sources of information have been ...
Amanda Thompson doesn’t really do Anzac Day. But what she does do is remember the people she knew who had a lifetime to remember stuff they didn’t really want to, because of a war they didn’t ask for. And she does make Anzac biscuits.First published in 2021.All my ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kathryn Willis, Postdoctoral Researcher, CSIRO Xavier Boulenger/Shutterstock In the two decades to 2019, global plastic production doubled. By 2040, plastic manufacturing and processing could consume as much as 20% of global oil production and use up 15% of the annual carbon ...
With our collective remembrance, and steadfast belief in our common humanity, we strengthen our hope and resolve to do what we can to foster dialogue and understanding, and to heal divisions in our pursuit of peace. ...
Principal reasons for the opposition is the loss of the public’s democratic right to have “a fair say” and the vital need for a government free from corruption, said Casey Cravens of Dunedin, president of the New Zealand Federation of Freshwater ...
Never mind the scoreboard – in the 2000 Bledisloe Cup decider, the real trans-Tasman battle was won before kickoff.First published in 2016. The dawn of the new millennium was a dark time for the All Blacks. Their final game pre-Y2K was a 22-18 loss to South Africa in the ...
I’m on the wrong side of 40, I never pursued creative work and now my job is killing my soul. Help! Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,May I start with the least original conversation opener you’re likely to hear around the motu at the moment, particularly in Wellington: ...
“Never again - No AUKUS” was the message of the wreath laid at this morning’s 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 she’s very likely off to the Paris Olympics after swimming well under the qualifying standard in the 100m butterfly twice – 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 school’s 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.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 Manhire’s 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 Lenihan’s gorgeous and sad debut Kōhine, Noelle McCarthy’s memoir Grand about becoming her mother and then unbecoming her, and now Hine Toa, a staunch yet gentle self-portrait by living legend Ngāhuia te ...
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Asia Pacific Report Students and activist staff at Australia’s 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 ...
Jeremy Corbyn and all the other Assad apologists, whether unwitting or conscious, need to hang their heads in shame.
https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews/videos/10155683110647217/UzpfSTU3NTE5MzgzMjoxMDE1NjM1MjI2OTE2ODgzMw/
Never mind Jenny, things are looking up in
Aleppo
The textile industry and its people are moving back
That means employment and the ability to sustain life and no more rockets or bombs or suicide attack
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jI8JEWDW9_I
“Like most Syrians who have come home, they took refuge during the worst of the fighting in government areas like the coastal province of Latakia”
From RT you reckon? Sana?
No, the BBC, so when even the BBC is saying it..
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-42755045 ….rebuilding Aleppo
And Corbyn’s too busy fending off the Israel lobby lynch mob to apologise to Assad
Government held?
More like occupied Military base
I actually spent time in Latakia in in late 2010, The Palestinian refugee camp in Latakia was one of the first areas to be shelled by the regime. In scenes reminiscent of Chile hundreds of the Palestinian were rounded up and held in the Latakia football stadium, many never to be seen again. The rest scattered and driven out of the city to join the beginning of the flood of refugees and internally displaced. Currently the regime is erasing all that remains of the camp. What was the Palestinian’s crime?
Joining and supporting the demonstrations against the regime in the city.
I obviously wasn’t there at the time, but I witnessed the live feeds friends sent me of the bombardment of the refugee camp by the regime warships off the coast. And regime jets dropping their bombs on the surrounding town.
I know for a fact that the Palestinian inhabitants of the camp would have been defenceless in the face of this slaughter.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/aug/15/syria-palestinians-latakia-assault
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Latakia
Jenny you get that civil wars are nasty. And that the sides involved are messy and well beyond stuffed up. Let me rewrite what you said, and you think how ridiculous it sounds.
“Jenny and all the other apologist for the head choppers, whether unwitting or conscious, you need to hang your head in shame.”
Sounds bloody ridiculous, no?
Because you know what, how about you support people who are actually being democratic and community focused in all this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurds_in_Syria
Great point Adam
In an ugly 7 year cilvil war both sides will have committed their fair share of atrocities.
This is not a black and white issue. We are talking shades of grey.
For once – I have to agree with you.
Yes, which is why the Kurds are seen as a threat to absolutely every government in the Middle East.
“Jenny and all the other apologist for the head choppers, whether unwitting or conscious, you need to hang your head in shame.”
So true
For some it seems this disgusting foul obscene proxy Syrian war has simply become as important as a rugby game, (some people are obsessive about rugby) where they will not hear a word of criticism against their chosen side (the head choppers of a 14 year old Palestinian boy, (and others) who showed his support for the Syrian Government).
Which sort of makes me feel rather sick.
What’s with the fixation on Syria and Russia? There is plenty happening closer to home.
Further to the OM discussion yesterday. I realise some posts will be going up on the topic but just my 5c worth (hey I got 31c so might as well splurge!).
Stuff got in on the act last night with this offering
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/102739729/beneficiaries-say-accommodation-supplement-boost-wont-be-enough
Naturally opening the comments which ties in with another topic on OM a few days ago (sorry can’t find link) to do with Stuff commentators. My reply to that being how all stories to do with beneficiaries are always open to comment because they know full well what will happen. And they didn’t disappoint- with an “upvote” of +75:
“I cant believe the entitlement culture here. I believe in a hand up not a hand out, all these people complaining about not getting something like it was some kind of birth right. Why don’t we work on how to get people of welfare rather how much more we can give them. We would go a long way to sloving child poverty if we disincentivise single parent hood. Children from single parents are over represented in every negative statistic so why not address a root cause.”
Other posters tried in vain to counter these narratives but didn’t do terribly well with the up votes. I mention those because it’s an example of how certain interests- or in the case of welfare, total bigots- want to rig it, and sadly those without critical thinking ablilities go along with the idea that most upvotes= must be true.
Nothing new of course, but this is what we are up against, and Stuff are willingly giving them a platform, and I truely believe this has to be stopped. I believe Stuff are aiding and abetting hate speech by letting their anonymous commentators say it for them, and things that they can’t even let their paid opinion writers get away with. How can we stop them?
I’m supposed to self censor and not go anywhere near these ‘articles’, yet alone the comments sections, but sometimes I’m, well, just stupid. I was in tears last night from that one, as I imagine were many others. Short of living in a cave we can’t avoid hearing this shit from somewhere.
The fact there are so many up votes and not many down votes shows to me that most caring and empathic people do indeed not read comments after articles. That’s why the Standard is essential to one’s mental health, for me anyway. Take care.
Being depressed goes with being oppressed. I am so sorry you saw that. Please believe they do not represent all of us. They “get off” with pulling people down.
“What’s happening is that Antarctica is being melted away at its base. We can’t see it, because it’s happening below the sea surface,” said Professor Andrew Shepherd, one of the authors of the paper. “The changes mean that very soon the sea-level contribution from Antarctica could outstrip that from Greenland.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/02/underwater-melting-of-antarctic-ice-far-greater-than-thought-study-finds
That old hack Soper over in “The National” is first out of the blocks today with a repeat “post Easter” heads up to ram home the “pre Easter” heads up on the state of the PM and Labour……. repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat……………
“she’s struggled to control the troops”
“Labour’s been left looking like a general in control of a mutiny”
“The badly managed Clare Curran debacle”
“Being forced to make statements that are patently ridiculous, such as, there are no Russian spies in New Zealand”
And so it will continue…….
“…“Being forced to make statements that are patently ridiculous, such as, there are no Russian spies in New Zealand…”
The guy is in an intellectual straitjacket born of age, class, complacency and sheer laziness. The utter lack of intellectual curiosity of our right wing journalists continually astounds me. They simply never question the cliched tropes they continually repeat.
Soper continually comes across as a frightened old man out of touch with the modern world, no longer willing to absorb new ideas and who simply desperately wants a return of a 1990s style white male dominated “business friendly” neoliberal government that he can understand.
There is a massive cultural divide now between the neoliberal dinosaurs like Soper – who remember 1984 as a fresh event – and anyone born into the the “new New Zealand” of the 1990s who have no recollection of the pre-Rogernomics NZ. Soper and his ilk now live in a foreign country that they imagine to be still like the one they once lived in the 1980s, before they vanished into their political-media neoliberal elite bubble in the 1990s. Muldoon is a real person from recent history to Soper and the politics of the 1970s colours his thoughts on the politics of NZ almost half a century later.
Basically he is over the hill and a waste of time, the Garth George of our current time.
So well stated.
Good to see RNZ keep spotlight on Middlemore this morning.
Good on them, yes. So much to uncover and ponder about the state of our nation right now.
Hopefully someone will contact the paper and suggest Soapy apologise for lying.
Soper is still living in the Stone Age
These hack columns are so third rate it is best not to read them Kat.
I have written to Soper previously about the overall bias and insulting tone of many of his columns especially regarding Jacinda Ardern peeing in the shower. He replied and he gave me a “stern” lecture on his longevity in parliament as a political journalist and that he has every right to voice his opinion and that I had no right challenging him.
But I am keeping account.
You can just thank your lucky stars you have never had to endure a dinner party with him as another guest – rude, opinionated and ignorant!
Your worst nightmare stuff – Soper AND Griffin at the same dinner party!
It is the the way of the right. Only they have the right to say their opinion and your opinion is worthless to them if you do not have the same mindset, so shut up if you do not agree. You are not allowed to challenge them with real facts because to them the facts do not matter, only the way they feel. If the clear facts say one thing and they feel another the facts are clearly wrong and anyone who supports them are stupid and wrong.
You can show them all the proven facts you want, but you are the stupid one for believing in the facts instead of going with your gut and ignoring them in favor of the anecdote he was told that apparently came from his work colleges friends neighbours second cousin who was told the facts on the case where something else entirely diferent to the evidence and even though he no proof this person actually exists and has any evidence he believe what he was told as gospel because it matches how he feels.
Soper is horrendous to listen to on the radio.
Farce
….4) an empty or patently ridiculous act, proceeding, or situation.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018638768/simon-bridges-addresses-middlemore-hospital-problems
I loved his bared faced lie that the previous government was on top of the problem, before pivoting to defend the constant demands for savings to be raked off as a dividend for tax cuts for the rich.
His quick smart slip from mature adult male into teen vocal fry made me want to go all backpfeifengesicht on the smarmy prick.
How on earth did Croaker Coleman keep that little pile of decay under wraps for 9 years.
Fiscal restraint.
Things like stachybotrys are out of sight, out of mind, and budget shortfalls mean deferred spending, until someone decides to spend a little and there it is, in plain sight.
But the DHB must’ve known about it, but for some reason haven’t gone public til now.
Obviously to me that if they had they would have been out of the job.
They were told to stay in budget or else I’m sure … if not told then they surmised that and surely Coleman wasn’t MoH for the whole time the decay was going on …. untreated timber that a government let be used on the advice of the industry …. GHU
I wonder if stuff will headline tomorrow with’Opposition Leader denies Nationals responsibility for Middlemore Hospitals ruin’. As reported just now on RNZ. Apparently Coleman knew but didn’t know specifics. Meh..
Simon Bridges came across like a little twerp, chirping “Show us the money, show us the money.”
He is assembling chapters of fuckwittery so that when it is said, “We didn’t plan on having to spend a $billion (or whatever) on Middlemore”, he will go full noise about poor planning, shelving other plans to pay for it, etc., etc.
Knowing that a crescendo of chirping from the choir of other fuckwits on Kiwiblog and other places will be roused to full voice.
Perhaps Coleman’s retirement was another example of the reptilian approach to politics that national party practices.
Coleman had to go as he would have been a festering albatross around the neck of the party.
Not only was Coleman a festering Albatross about the “party” but also the NZ public!
Maybe Si needs to be asked for the total amount overall of the dividends that English demanded from Housing Corp. Leaving them in dire financial straits. But hey! We got a surplus.
Malcolm Evans nails it with this brilliant cartoon.
War Toxin
https://thedailyblog.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Screen-Shot-2018-04-03-at-7.21.25-AM-768×495.png
That is brilliant.
Best cartoonist in NZ.
He got fired from the Herald because of his criticism of Israel. The Zionist lobby in NZ is very strong.
Our 2nd best – Sharon Murdoch
Worst – Al Nesbit
Turkey is now killing European nationals, and threatening other countries it is supposedly allied with in NATO. The Turkish state is no longer a civil entity, what was the old phrase, a state in support of head choppers. Or a terrorist state. How devilish that it is a western allie.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-31/turkey-says-france-could-become-target-for-backing-syria-kurds/9607004
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/01/anna-campbell-father-no-right-to-stop-her-fighting-syria-kurds
“National’s leader is refusing to let the Government off easy over the Radio New Zealand meeting scandal, saying the Labour/NZ First coalition looks like an “extended family reunion gone wrong”.
This is the same leader who says that he left the country in great shape financially, but couldn’t find the dosh to fix Middlemore. Now he says, show us the money.
Either the economy is in great shape as left to us by National so we can continue their good work and repair the damage; or, it’s in poor shape as left by their financial mismanagement.
Or has it all changed in four months, Simon?
This is the same leader whose extended family are leaving home having trashed the joint- Coleman from Health, and Joyce from Finance.
To be joined by other family members soon? At a cost of how much per by-election?
And lest we forget.
“Nationals first term in office was a good one… mispaying teachers with Novopay, GST increases when they said they wouldn’t, ministers using tax payers’ money for personal trips and an MP using identity of a dead baby.”
You forgot to mention Key and English and Barclay. So far 5 have left. Leaving Smith Bennett Brownlee and David Carter out of the” Horrid” group still standing.
“And lest we forget.”
Yesterday’s yes-men, forgotten already!
Almost forgotten indeed.
At least when Key, English and Barclay left, the NZ taxpayers did not have to pick up the costs of by-elections; but if Smith, Bennett, Brownlee and/or David Carter do decide to go causing a by-election, this would cost probably at least $1M for each by-election (see my 12.2 below). OTOH, list only MPs like Findlayson …
This TDB post has a [enter your own description] photo of the “Troika” which I think was taken at Joyce’s valedictory speech in the House.
Good for a caption post here? Post itself is also relevant to this discussion.
https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2018/03/31/national-mps-are-quitting-the-party-with-the-same-speed-suspects-flee-the-scene-of-a-crime-why-stacey-kirk-should-be-ashamed/
At a cost of how much per by-election?
This is usually quoted at about $1 million per by election.
https://www.parliament.nz/en/visit-and-learn/parliament-in-election-year/saying-bye-without-a-by-election/ – provides a good explanation of by-elections, with the only mention of actual costs being the following para:
Unnecessary cost is the main reason for avoiding a by-election in the six months before a general election. In recent years the average cost of a by-election was $773,500. To hold individual elections in Helensville and New Lynn may have cost taxpayers upwards of $1.4 million.
This is also interesting re numbers of and costs of by-elections in the last three years of the National govt.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/319967/more-by-elections-than-you-can-shake-a-stick-at
[Ssssshhh – not $11 million as mentioned about 2/3 down in the “Doofus of the Week – Easter 2018 Edition” post. I think MickySavage hit the ‘1’ button twice in error. ]
For other OCD political nerds, Wikipedia has a full list of all parliamentary by-elections held in NZ since 1853.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_New_Zealand_by-elections
WOW! During the first 50 years to 1903, there were massive numbers of by-elections. How on earth did Parliament operate at all?
“hit the ‘1’ button twice in error.”
I think that’s how fiscal holes a la Joyce develop….
And a little historical memory button just got pressed.
“During the 1928 election, Joseph Ward, leading the Liberal Opposition, promised to borrow a huge £70 million. What exactly he meant is unclear, for even his biographer could not sort it out – he seems to have misread his speech notes. In any case, he did not know that New Zealand was already in deep borrowing difficulties and that the Reform Government had apparently secretly promised the London market to stop borrowing for a while.”
What happens when Tory governments don’t reveal all before elections.
Then came the Great Depression.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2018/04/bus-drivers-union-slams-overseas-migrants-plan.html
A union explains why we need unions.
There is a driver shortage. Bus drivers are not on the skills shortage list for migrant entry. So, there are enough skilled drivers. It’s a question of pay, and profit.
Instead of addressing the issue of bus drivers getting poor pay for long hours, the company’s reaction is to try and import labour who I bet won’t get paid properly.
If Ritchie’s needed new senior managers I bet they’d pay the going rate for executives. Why not for drivers, too?
Good question. Good post. This type of undermining workers has to stop.
A continual spiral to the bottom when combined with rewritten contracts!!
Don’t forget the number of over 65s also employed to drive buses. They already have their pension, and often look on the job as “something to do” (fair enough) and, crucially for bosses, they don’t have to figure out how to live off the wage provided.
Sometimes its more than something to do, but there may still be mortgage payments, children or grand-children to look after, or a top-up to the income. The drivers’ pay and the pension are all taxed of course.
Some monetary pressures last past 65+. I am about to contribute to my daughter’s wedding.for example. Family need financial help. Household maintenance costs just as much, even with Grey Power discounts, rates, insurance the same.
Again, I’d presume to guess that such drivers are probably part-time and non-unionised. They are thus more vulnerable to low wage offers, and far less employable as age precludes more activities and hours worked.
So, Bill, you’re right- “crucially for bosses” is a good point.
The bosses are assholes exploiting people.
That said, it’s because we have a economic system built on exploitation.
Well that was interesting. Stepped off the bus on the way to an appointment this morning and nearly collided with my freshly minted Labour Electorate MP. (Ironically, outside the local WINZ office, although thankfully that wasn’t my destination). Obviously I couldn’t resist raising the Accommodation Supplement issue with him so boy did he hear all about it, as restrained as I could be…
He genuinely had no idea that was happening and I have to believe him on that one, being new to Central Govt, and he does seem very sincere in wanting to find out more, giving me his card and asking me to contact his office and make and appointment. Not that I have any faith he can change the system, but I’ll do it- at the very least, Backbenchers should be informed about these things and there’s a lot of beneficiaries/low income people in his electorate.
That is bloody interesting. Maybe your idea of doing a mass letter campaign out to all the govt MPs is a good one. Even just awareness raising.
Yes I thought so. Email just sent to make an appointment so I shall keep you updated.
I strongly suspect except for the people high up who are involved with budgets that the majority of MPs really don’t have a clue, for the simple reason they don’t need to, and it doesn’t affect them. So obviously they need educating.
Total agreement Kay. I have long suspected that many if not most MPs and Ministers are mushrooms.
I am positively green….oh for such an opportunity.
Fill your boots!!!
Tax who pays the biggest proportion from their income and assets?
As the tax working group examines our system, well we hope, these points are pertinent and I wish that government and Treasury could be penitent about the way that egregious taxes fall on the struggling and poor.
https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/inland-revenue/28-03-2018/tax-heroes-forget-the-rich-list-who-pays-the-most-tax-in-nz/
Duncan Greive from The Spinoff wrote an interesting article which is part of a series apparently.
Commenting on the Rich List candidates which appear in the NBR’s annual count:
Surprisingly often, though, their impact on New Zealand is relatively muted. As Liam Dann noted last year, New Zealand’s richest man, Graeme Hart, has much of his $13.6bn fortune tied to his multinational packaging group. Its outlook and operations are global. The same goes for a number of our wealthiest, from the secretive emerging markets investor Richard Chandler, to African property developer Stephen Jennings, to the extreme example of tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel, who appears to have largely been a wealth drain through his sharp exploitation of our government venture funds.
The point is that while the individual stories of this wealth are often fascinating, and the data useful, the impact of the Rich List on the rest of us is much less clear. After all, what use is all that wealth to ordinary New Zealanders? Its most tangible benefit is where a portion of it is redistributed through the tax system. And yet for a variety of reasons the link between wealth and tax is not always a strong one.
Which brings us to Tax Heroes. It’s a project which attempts to invert the Rich List, in many ways. To ask not what this country has done for them, but what they have done for this country. I wanted to know who, in any given year, paid the most tax.
Well that’s encouraging..
https://www.sciencealert.com/google-deep-mind-has-learned-to-become-highly-aggressive-in-stressful-situations
Invent a game with laser beams and rules that encourage their use. Act all surprised when players use them.
I guess they shouldn’t add laser beams to traffic lights then 😉
The New Zealand roading system wasn’t built to cope with the current population numbers due to the ‘blow out’ immigration policies ( to start with, NZ is not Europe with it’s massive networks of highways etc).
Secondly, National ramming through changes to the road rules to match up with more common global system, has meant in practise that the well long standing, understood and functioning road rules in the New Zealand public’s consciousness has been replaced by an imprecise more situational by situational approach, which along with the increase in population from other cultures, particularly those from countries which have a more helter skelter city road culture, has resulted in open slather on the roads, turning them into abit of a death trap.
Apart from re-building our road system grids to something like European standards which is what abit of fore thought would have realised current approach to associated policy areas would require…..the only option really is to have road medium barriers and signs, in all high risk stretches and cornering areas.
listened to mike foreskin poormouth clarke gayford on the radio. if anyone is to blame for the state of new zeland it is this horrible little squib hosking dribbling bile, day after day night after night and then the kiwi capons baying like the ball less bastards they are on skwarbak radio. well their time has come. suck it up.
This is unbelievable:
“PM Jacinda Ardern’s Point Chevalier home sold to ‘nice Kiwi family'”
Obviously ‘nice kiwi family’ is a code word for white, or at least non-Asian
Real Estate salesperson Lawrence von Sturmer:
“We have a couple of thousand people on our database, so we picked out the ones we thought were the best buyers for it.”
Obviously the ones with obviously non-Chinese or non-Asian names. I understand there are laws prohibiting racially discriminatory practice in commercial transactions. It would be interesting to look at Mr von Sturmer’s list.
And if Jacinda gave instructions to exclude buyers based on ethnicity or race, that would be utterly outrageous —but sadly, not surprising coming from the populist trumpist NZ left.
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/business/pm-jacinda-arderns-point-chevalier-home-sold-to-nice-kiwi-family/
Wei. Racism is very much alive and well in NZ. But those are really fucking long bows you’re drawing.
“Nice Kiwi family” could be any number of quite obnoxious, dull, grey or sickenly conservative things. Mr von Strumer could even have been talking about an immigrant family that have enthusiastically adopted “the Kiwi way” (whatever that might be when it’s at home 😉 )
Hi Bill
“Mr von Strumer could even have been talking about an immigrant family that have enthusiastically adopted “the Kiwi way””
I’m guessing not – Mr Strumer was obviously trying to underline a racially loaded point.
Interestingly he also said:
“We have a couple of thousand people on our database, so we picked out the ones we thought were the best buyers for it.”
I assume this was not based on excluding those whose names sounded ‘chinese’ or ‘asian’, as I believe there are laws strictly prohibiting racially discriminatory practices in commercial transactions of any kind (naturally I’m not talking of offshore buyers)
It would be interesting to understand on what criteria Mr Strumer ‘picked out the ones’ he thought ‘were the best buyers for it’
It is probably unlikely that this would ever rise to the level that anything could ever be proven, and logically Mr von Strumer’s comments do not exclude “an immigrant family that have enthusiastically adopted “the Kiwi way””
Of course it is not just the content of what is said, it is how one understands what is being said will be interpreted in the current social and political context. It is obvious that Ardern is trying to milk a bit of political capital here – i’m guessing she is aware of and approves the article.
Many people reading the article will get the drift –that this PM is a racist populist trumpist leader at heart. I believe she will end up to be deeply damaging to the NZ left – platitiudes and virtue signalling overlaying deep incompetence will only get her so far before the wheels start to fall off
Sure – “nice Kiwi family” is a kind of signpost that “Jaccinda’s on our side”. Whatever that might mean. And you’re take is among a range of possibilities.
Can’t see much damage being done to the NZ left by any of it though, whatever the correct take might be, because the left in NZ (the parliamentary left) has been well beyond repair for a few years now.
“Jacinda’s on our side’ against those rapacious asians.
Agree with your point about the state of the NZ left – it’s been adrift ever since Helen Clark departed the scene.
Will be interesting to see how Mr Real Estate salesperson Lawrence von Sturmer “picked out the ones we thought were the best buyers for it.”
Would be really interesting to see that list of suitable buyers.
If it is racially exclusionary, and the PM was cognizant of this (how could she not be), it would make for some extraordinary political theatre.
Obvious concern troll obviously overplays its hand.
Obviously.
It was the estate agent’s wording not Ardern or Gayford’s according to NZ Herald:
The ethnic make up of Pt Chev residents according to the 2013 census differ according to whether it’s south, east or west of the borough.
West and East Pt Chev residents are overwhelmingly European.
South Pt Chev is 58.6% European; 21.6% Asian; 16.4% Pacific people; 11.6% Maori.
Sure it was the agent’s wording. But Ardern of course is not unaware of this, and will obviously be enjoying the political capital from it.
She also asked the agent to sell only to a pre-selected group of interested buyers
Were the pre-selected buyers exclusively or almost all Europeans?
If so there is a good chance the list was arrived at racially (even if foreign buyers were excluded)
If so was Ardern aware of this?
Very likely. If not she as as dumb as rocks .
If she knew then that makes things even more interesting
So I’m very curious about the names of people who were on that list.
How do you know this?
Read the article
Best you cite the bit that says Ardern asked the agent to sell only to a pre-selected group of interested buyers.
No reply so I guess you pulled that particular lie out of your arse, idiot.
An article written by Susan Edmunds says that “the agency had looked into its database of buyers and found people who would be suitable.” No mention of an instruction from the seller.
Imagine the ‘voyeur’ element of people wanting to see the PM’s for sale house. A sound reason for not listing it on the open market.
I consulted a realtor on whether it is practice in the industry to not go to open homes, but rather rely on known clients. It is a practice.
The other claim that Wei makes about the use of the word ‘nice’ as somehow having racist overtones.
The article mentioned above had the real estate agent using that word two times- “nice neighbourhood,” the sellers were “really nice”- and Wei’s reporting of “nice Kiwi family” is a third example of his possible overuse of the word.
It is an over-used and innocuous word in Kiwi parlance.
That’s a load of drivel Wei.
She’s the PM for God’s sake and she’s had rather more important matters to attend to, so she understandably left it in the hands of an estate agent to handle the sale as he/she saw fit. Simple as that.
It’s going well beyond a joke when a Labour P.M. can’t even sell her home without attempts being made to introduce pathetic conspiratorial motives.
If you were in her shoes you would be doing exactly the same thing for the same reason… running the country is a 24/7 job.
“running the country is a 24/7 job.”
So she has time for photoshoots for Women’s Weekly and Vogue and getting pregnant (without telling anyone before the voting)?
[See moderation note below]
” (without telling anyone before the voting)?”
and there it is weis true colours shine through ,
[see moderation note below]
Ahhh… so you’re a pathetic little shit.
Ignore the rw idiot folks!
[see moderation note below]
Who put the agent up to it wei and… whyi?
[see moderation note below]
Can’t asians be a nice kiwi family wei? If not why not?
Just came back to this.
And whatever the merits or otherwise of the original comment, it’s all getting far too far into nasty garbage now.
End the exchange before someone gets a ban.
And yes, that should be seen as a blanket moderation note.
“She has time for photoshoots for Women’s Weekly and Vogue and getting pregnant (without telling anyone before the voting)?”
Can’t get nastier, sexist and more misogynistic than that. Any woman is going to take deep offence.
I was just returning what he dished out but will be saying no more.
Huh?
My comments were not directed against any particular person on this website, but an entirely legitimate comment on a politician. Politicians are open to critique and indeed expect it.
However, because I criticize Ardern, you take personal offense and use that as an excuse to launch a personal attack on me???? What sort of logic is that? Are you related to her or something? Or perhaps her self-annointed guardian angel?
As for accusing me of being ‘sexist’ and ‘misogynistic’, again, huh???????????
Well Bill … it’s up to you.
Jacinda doesn’t have a racist bone in her body
She’s from the Islands and Murupara. What is your beef?
You are making something from nothing.
Real estate agents burbling on. Get a life.
She’s a dog whistling populist and a number of commentators have picked up on this. When I’m bored and not so busy will post the links.
She rode a populist wave and sold out to the most racist politician in the house for the baubles of office.
I also find it strange how we have all these people popping up mushrooms taking personal affront at some expressed home truths about our pregnant fairy princess.
As for ‘she’s from the islands’, what????? Do you mean her Dad was, and still is the colonial administrator of Niue?
And how do you know she doesn’t have a racist bone in her body —you know her personally?
Will any CGT be voluntarily paid…by the vendor?
ok now not allowed by some to call someone a nice kiwi family, because those with an active imagination thinks its racially motivated. Pleeeeeze…..
Maybe this is the next story after the Clare Curren coffee date to keep out the real news….
Couple denied home because they weren’t ‘Asian’ or ‘Chinese’
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/national/kiwi-couple-denied-home-based-on-race-and-marital-status/
So what? What’s the point of your comment? If racial discrimination in this case is proven then there should be consequences, as for the case I have raised. Regardless of who is discriminating against who, and regardless of the ethnicity of the person doing the discriminating and the party who is being discriminated against.
Saying Nice kiwi family is generally not considered a racial slur, but there is racism about, such as the article I linked too and it might not be in the direction you are thinking… that’s my point.
National and its lapdog msm are on a roll with the Curran/Hirschfeld saga. A shallow and obvious attempt to discredit the present government, when it knows it needs to answer some serious questions itself!
Middlemore hospital is proving to be a health and safety hazard through neglect of the public health system by the previous National government. Yet this massive public health failure barely gets a mention in media, when it should be a top priority news item, with some scrutiny taking place as to how and why lack of proper maintenance and repair was allowed to reach its present state of neglect.
Despite not being elected government, the opposition is dangerously casting an odious and deceitful influence on NZ still, using its powerful tool msm to manipulate public perception, in favour of National. A situation in need of monitoring I think.
Another company after cheap migrant labour
http://norightturn.blogspot.co.nz/2018/04/another-company-after-cheap-migrant.html
Whose paying for the housing, schools, roads, infrastructure, hospitals, doctors, midwives… etc etc…
There should be a requirement, every person coming in to NZ to settle or to provide labour – the company has to provide the above requirements BEFORE the person comes into the country – because there are only so many hospitals and roads and houses and until we actually see new ones in the flesh (not promises of them in the future) then clearly those who are already working and living in NZ need the resources available until there are clearly more there ….
The National government has let every company worker in but then expects the NZ taxpayers to somehow provide 100,000’s of extra services that are now needed which apart from prisons (also full to brink) their seems little provisioning for… and in many cases for what, it’s crazy, nobody in the Western world would break down their social services voluntarily… but I guess if you want to do that… to privatise… it makes sense of a sort…
Agree with most of what you say.
However, the overarching issue is why are people paid so little in some parts of the world and so much in other parts, for simply doing the same amount of work?
That is what ultimately drives migration.
The world’s economic system is so utterly distorted and unjust, a legacy of Western imperialism, and it is natural that people will flow to those parts of the world where the wealth is concentrated.
Because in contrast Chinese and Japanese imperial power was so just.
Its natural for people to want to go to nations where wealth is concentrated, it’s just not their right.
Don’t know why you bring up the Japanese—-but actually it reinforces my point. The number of Japanese immigrants we receive is miniscule – because the Japanese are rich and part of the first world —rewarded for being a US lackey.
People, aside from refugees, flow to Western countries because an hour of labour in these parts of the world fetches so much more than an hour of labour from whence they came.
Western wealth was accumulated over several centuries, on the backs of Asians and Africans. New Zealand was the pitbull of British and US imperialism and benefited enormously from being part of the British empire, willingly taking part in wars of aggression against Koreans, Vietnamese, Iraqis, Afghans, and even supported Britain and France’s aggression against the Egyptians in 1956.
On the back of this support of British and US imperialism, NZ became the richest country in the world, until in the 1970s the UK left for the common market.
“Its natural for people to want to go to nations where wealth is concentrated, it’s just not their right.”
Certainly it is not their legal right, but certainly there is a moral right. Non-western people moving to Western countries is simply about reclaiming stolen wealth.
there is no moral right to live in another’s country to accumulate wealth. New Zealand suffered as a vassal state of empire like all the others, it’s indigenous people ripped off, it’s Kauri timber logged, it’s men sent to war.
Interesting now how it’s the Chinese taking our swamp kauri , how the worm turns eh.
“New Zealand suffered as a vassal state of empire like all the others, it’s indigenous people ripped off, it’s Kauri timber logged, it’s men sent to war.”
Your comment is absurd. Yes, the indigenous people were ripped off, but New Zealand’s wealth is a legacy of it being a part of the imperialist camp.
Hardly a vassal state, white New Zealanders considered themselves an integral part of the British empire and considered themselves British for a very long time. Indeed New Zealanders of just a generation ago referred to the UK as ‘home’, and had to have autonomy almost forced on them, being extremely reluctant to adopt the 1947 Westminster agreement.
As for ‘it’s men sent to war’ —they were not forced to go. New Zealanders willingly participated in those wars because they identified themselves as British and so were fighting for themselves. “Where she (i.e. Britain) goes, we go” – at least that particular conflict, i.e. WWII was a just conflict – the only just conflict of New Zealand;s many overseas excursions.
“Interesting now how it’s the Chinese taking our swamp kauri”
Obviously it is some New Zealander selling it to them —they are therefore ‘buying’ the kauri, not simply ‘taking’ it. And if New Zealanders refused to sell the Kauri, the Chinese would not send in troops to force the sale.
This is completely unlike what the Brits and other Western nations did to China – when China did not want to trade tea for opium they were invaded and forced at gunpoint to legalize and conduct the trade.Up until 1943, under extraterritoriality , British people could kill Chinese in China with utter impunity and get away scott free, not being held to the laws of China.
“there is no moral right to live in another’s country to accumulate wealth.”
There is no moral right for a country to live off the wealth that was gained from the exploitation of other people, and not to expect those people to demand their fair share of the world’s resources.
I’m happy for new Zealand not to exploit cheap immigrant labour.
How’s that invasion of Tibet treating you?
Harvested any organs lately? There is no exploitation in China.
Mongol imperialism was also benign.
[lprent: Perhaps you should ease off on the flamewar provocations before I get irritated and decide to clean them up in the interests of moderator workloads.. ]
Unfortunately for many of your ilk, you don’t get to call the shots anymore. If Asians or Africans piss you off you can’t just bomb them or shoot them with the same sort of impunity that you use to do.
That’s just tough for people like you – the tectonic shift in power from the West to the East. Yet if you opt out of it, you know, in your bones, that New Zealand would be reduced to a South Pacific economic swamp.
So you may hate these yellows who are starting to level the playing field a bit. But you know you also need them. So you wail and gnash your teeth and shake your first with impunity at the inexorable and ultimately just change in the world order – that’s just too funny!
Wow
Anyway time to leave this be. Quite revealing.
That is why there are rules about immigration, to stop the race to the bottom. NZ can’t make other countries pay higher wages, but we can vote for our NZ government to stop us sinking into the third world by for example spending $50 million on housing homeless in 1 room hotels… because someones idea was to make NZ the third highest population growth in the world per capita, based on stupidity like arguing that 100 worker are needed to drive buses at minimum wages when there are hundreds of thousands of unemployed in NZ and no houses for them to live in, let alone money for more infrastructure like hospitals and transport… Funny enough, the Natz did commission more prisons though, I wonder why….
“NZ can’t make other countries pay higher wages”
That’s a ridiculous comment. Perhaps other countries simply cannot pay higher wages, because their respective GDP per capita is way way lower than New Zealand’s?
New Zealand’s current problems have little to do with immigration – the highest rates of immigration per capita occurred in the 19th Century, and also the post war decades when we received hundreds of thousands of UK and European migrants.
Watch this person and learn people, to this poster economic migration is people coming to take what’s theirs.
This is what you get when you open your door too easily. Or give away our water and other resources.
They will take all day long.
Whose taking? Whose ‘giving away’ what?
Don’t the Chinese pay for what they ‘take’?
After all for property, they were apparently paying top dollar. And if the Chinese are told to go away, they will do so politely and quietly – and not send in gunboats and shell Wellington and kill hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders to get their own way – unlike what the British did to them.
It is the Anglo Saxon tribe who have a nasty habit of killing those who get in the way of national and personal enrichment. And they hardly paid top dollar for land they took off the Maoris and Aborigines and Native Americans – often they just drove people off it and outright confiscated the land.
@ Keepcalmcarryon – +1 Natz have purposely decided to concentrate on bringing in people from countries without a welfare system or in many cases democracy for a reason and it’s working.
Years ago we had some friends who migrated here from former Yugoslavia. We asked them how did Milošević and atrocities happen in the middle of Europe. Their view was that they did not have democracy in Yugoslavia and were not used to thinking for themselves. They blindly followed their government or their religion.
As NZ gets more migrants who grew up with undemocratic systems and systemic injustice and corruption, it will percolate into NZ society to our detriment as a society.
That is where NZ is going. Not just race to a bottom with conditions like housing and pollution, but also culturally, just being beaten down with injustice and media propaganda and accepting injustice as a given – just like in other countries that the Natz (and maybe Labour) admire for their strong authoritarian ways, the government is always right and human rights are just lip service to have, but profits and trade is more important.
“to stop the race to the bottom”
Best way to stop this “race to the bottom” is for the West to pay its fair share for the products it received from third world countries.
So when you buy something from the warehouse, say, we should all make a donation to match the price we would have paid if the the workers who assembled the product had been paid the same as what workers get here.
That is the best way to keep poor third world people where they are.
@ Wei “West to pay its fair share for the products it received from third world countries”
…. I think that relies on having a government that redistribute the wealth by having higher wages for their workers…. otherwise the profits seem to be being held at the top elite in the country they are working in…
China is full of millionaires and billionaires for example, it’s a very rich country, but it’s that trickle down theory not working again.
I hope I’m wrong but it looks like Clare Curran might have dropped herself in it again.
It seems she left a ‘voicemail’ message for Richard Griffin suggesting that if he couldn’t attend a Select Committee last Thursday she had been advised that a letter containing the correction would suffice. He responded in kind to say that he was planning to attend the following Thursday and if she had a problem with that to let him know. She didn’t reply and as a result she has left herself open to accusations that she was trying to stop him from attending the select committee.
Ok, he only asked her to respond if she wasn’t happy, but anyone with a sense of astuteness would still have responded to advise… Yes, I’m quite happy. I was just letting you know if it was going to be difficult a letter would suffice…
sigh…………….
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/353993/curran-says-rnz-board-should-correct-record-asap
Rejoice!! Keating has resigned.
But not because of ‘Hit and Run’, honest. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/102798309/tim-keating-to-stand-down-as-head-of-the-new-zealand-defence-force
What a lot of crud!!!
Newshub Thats the way Mike Mc Roberts Interviewing Maoris staying in Australia I thought of going over there but I cannot get to far from my Maunga Awa and Tangata.
Many thanks to the Black Caps win over Britain ka pai e hoa its awesome to see all the Team make there contributions to the win back in the day we relied on one or two players good team effort for this win .
ka kite ano
I.m going to tau toko The Crowd Goes Wild Wairangi and James Mulls eye still looks a bit wonky .
Wairangi what do you think about taking the campervan to Te Tai Rawhiti plenty of kai mona wild pig and deer in Ngati Porou whenua I got a tangi and the unavailing of Te Carvings at Poki tangi at Te Horo this weekend .Well I say Joesph could have won Ka kite ano
Some tangata whanue are that Naive they believe everything te namu onepu tell them when they should no that te namu onepu just want to destroy ECO MAORI anyway they can they just want to suppress Maori or any race that is not like them this is fact .Ana to kai ka kite ano
We have to have a fuel tax of nine cents a ltr to start OUR journey to a carbon neutral economy. Big oil barons will sqeel like a kuni kuni and say te sky is going to fall on our heads YEA RIGHT . If shonky had of looked after the mokopunas future first instead of his wealth m8 and continued the journey Helen Clark started to introduce renewable energy well the tax would be two cents a ltr .
So people we can thank shonky for the tax being nine cents .
Many thanks for the Coalition Goverment for restarting this journey to a bright prosperous future for all Ka pai Ka kite ano
Newshub Mark If I was New Zealand Cricket I would start recruiting young brown players from school Te Samoans love Cricket they have there own version of the game get some young big brown men an we will start being more dominant World Cricket .
There you go Duncan the 70 klm thing was a right wing spin attack on the Government Duncan you don’t no the word respect you obviously don’t GIVE the Ladies the respect they deserve the less carbon we use the better .The fuel tax how do the poor cope well they buy a second hand electric car you can get a good one for $15000 to $20000 thats what I’m going to do you see there are many ways to solve problems .
Amanda I’m off to the place were I was born this weekend have a few hongi and a feed and see the new Carvings to my Marae and send a m8 whano member to his resting place he is only 5 years older than me and we have other cultures making 100 one of my elderly clients is a 100 another is 95 its a shame that Tangata whenua are dieting so young 55 I wonder why???????????.
Kia Kaha Tangata Ka kite ano
I expect the NZF MP to support Labour and the Greens on this policy of reforming the
Parole Act of shonkys 2002 this Act affects Maori mostly it was a sham and should be cast in the history books as a big mistake along with the people who supported IT
heres the link.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12025178
Going to miss my posting time here is some good music
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ktvTqknDobU/hqdefault.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEXCNACELwBSFryq4qpAwkIARUAAIhCGAE=&rs=AOn4CLAc-AmN0LT6JTUEN6SziCUtKvOPTw
Some one is stuffing with my computer here’s the song
https://youtu.be/ktvTqknDobU