A frosty start to the day in Southland; clear skies, stars, the sound of waves plashing on the sand; could be worse.MfE are here today to tell us about coastal erosion and climate change. Heard of “managed retreat”?
Surely we need a education system that prepares people for lifelong learning, not one that regards attending a university as the only preferred endpoint?
Lots of kids are well ready to leave school at 16. They want to get a job and get money and get out of home, and out from under someone else’s authority, and make their own way in the world.
Fine, I say. Let them leave school at 16, but keep open learning options as apprentices, night & weekend school options and generally if you want to leave formal schooling at 16 then allow you to return to learning at 19 or 21 while still working.
That would far better suit the the huge majority of young people who are particularly tempramentally, intellectually or inclined to want to go to university and slog their way through a pointless meal ticket exercise.
The older system catered for this with an ‘out’ basically at school cert level with technical schools (United etc) providing the trade start up courses.
Everyone else stayed on to university (govt funded Back then) or found something of interest and went that way. It worked a treat, supplied apprentices to building trades etc and gave kids choice if they chose to leave at 16.
But it wasn’t broken so we fixed it with the start of the great dumbing down where pass/fail seems to have given way to an attendance record and aspirational double speak.
The way that the teacher unions demand the status of white collar professionals is a megaphone that informs us of their middle class educational values and attitudes.
Middle class capture of education means an ambient bias that regards professional, white collar jobs as superior outcomes to the traditional trades and artisan jobs (panel beaters, sign writers, roofers, skilled machinery operators, etc etc) that make up the skilled engine room of the economy and can provide satisfying, fufilling and reasonably paid work for huge numbers of people.
Middle class capture of education means an ambient bias that regards professional, white collar jobs as superior outcomes to the traditional trades and artisan jobs (panel beaters, sign writers, roofers, skilled machinery operators, etc etc) that make up the skilled engine room of the economy and can provide satisfying, fufilling and reasonably paid work for huge numbers of people.
More likely that those types of jobs are becoming obsolete.
How many panel beaters are required when it’s just a quick fix and then attach a new part that’s already the right colour?
How many sign-writers when all that’s needed is a large monitor and a PC? Skilled machine operators?
Technological change is making more and more of the trades obsolete.
They were pretty quick to throw the manual teachers overboard. If it can’t be assessed by essay and doesn’t lead to a university lecturing position, it doesn’t matter.
Unfair, Gabby. Who threw the manual teachers overboard? They were never allowed to be NZEI members, because real old primary schools never had tech classes. Only the disastrous Intermediate schools did (I believe that opponents of the introduction of Intermediate schools back in the 1950s were quite correct) because they (Int schools) introduced wood/metalwork + sewing/cooking classes, but the weird teachers who did it were not NZEI – they were PPTA members of the secondary schools’ union, because all the other tech teachers in NZ were. Consequently they never had any representation in the primary schools’ union.
Later PPTA could not protect them either, because new industrial law (1980s, 1990s) prohibited unions from taking action in support of other unions. NZEI and PPTA negotiated at different times, able to take industrial action at different times. So when Tommorrow’s Schools gave primary and intermediate schools autonomy to some extent through bulk funding (be aware that all schools are still bulk-funded for their Operations Grants: bulk funding was abolished ONLY for teachers’ salaries.)
Bulk funding is aimed at underfunding, and when that happened to intermediate schools, the pressure came on.
It was the neo-liberal Govts who threw those manual teachers overboard, Gabby. Secondary schools are now dangerously short of them too, but the secondary manual teachers still there were not thrown overboard. OK?
Sanctuary (replying to 2.1.1)
Have you ever been a teacher? If yes, what horrible experience perverted your view of teacher unions? 80%+ of teachers belong to those unions, and you are vilifying all of us.
Idiot. Do you think that none of us understand history, the bourgeois, the bias, and that we aim for middle-class comforts?
I find you shallow and insulting. I hope that you can modify your comment and explain.
I long held the belief (reinforced by my time as a teacher), back in the days before Rogernomics fucked up this country, that all kids should be endowed at birth with say 16 years of free education, the first 10 or 11 years to be compulsory.
This would have meant kids free to leave school at 16 and go into the workforce. Some, however, would soon realise they had made a mistake and would want to return to education – and could do so with the 4 or 5 years they were still entitled to.
They could then go to polytechs or universities to upgrade their skill, with few financial consequences.
I would love to see a system whereby after, say, 25-30 years in employment any person can take a 12 month sabbatical at 80% of their wage averaged over the previous five years (with a cap of course) to do any sort of (state approved) training they wish whatsoever. Thus, if a middle aged manager wants to spend a year learning to, say, be a beekeeper or live in Latin country and learn Spanish, this would be allowed – and at 80% of their previous wage.
I’ve come to the conclusion that people should do a few years in work and follow that with a few years in uni. The first uni course will get them a bachelor degree. After that they start doing research landing them doctorates. The time in work would be to give them actual physical experience on which to base their next cycle of research.
Because it’s what’s necessary in a democracy to improve the nation’s living standard while also living within our very limited means. Same as compulsory voting is also necessary so as to ensure people engage in their own governance.
Uneducated people are detrimental to democracy and not investigating everyone’s ideas limits the innovation needed to improve everyone’s living standards.
“Long service leave forms part of the National Employment Standards (NES). The NES apply to all employees covered by the national workplace relations system, regardless of any award, agreement or contract.”
Surely we need a education system that prepares people for lifelong learning
That is exactly what we need but it’s not solely the fault of the education system. Parents as well have been telling their children forever to Get and education, get a job and you’re right for life. This was bollocks in the 1970s and it’s even more so now as technological changes eliminate ever more jobs. We need to get everyone into continual learning but especially those that haven’t yet achieved tertiary education.
Fine, I say. Let them leave school at 16, but keep open learning options as apprentices, night & weekend school options and generally if you want to leave formal schooling at 16 then allow you to return to learning at 19 or 21 while still working.
Most, if not all, universities allow entrance if the person is over 20 even if they don’t have any high-school qualifications. The problem is that our entire socio-economic system effectively discourages people from getting that ongoing education.
Because for most people the best way to learn about a discipline is to learn from someone who’s been studying the field for years, and to learn alongside other people who are also learning about the subject so you can exchange ideas and aid each other’s learning.
Sure, you might find a club to get that sort of environment, but educational institutions have an important part to play.
Personally I think all education should be free from cradle to the grave, with no limits on when to start a new course.
And yet I can’t help wondering whether the guy who allegedly put oxygen and acetylene in the same bottle the other day had received formal welding training or was largely self-taught. Poor bugger.
I’ve had a small artistic hobby for years now. I learn a lot on youtube, I read a lot, get lots of ideas from all around the place. Most of my pinterest pins are all about it. I own pretty much all the equipment I need for it. I’m ok – not brilliant, but these days I can largely make pretty much what I set out to make (albeit with room for improvement).
But I still pay for regular evening classes at the art school. Because the structure and environment suit me, and it’s good to have fellow people learning the same skills to bounce ideas off.
A thought not at all influenced from being kicked out of school for asking questions, but I’ve long been of the persuasion that young people should be strongly dissuaded from seeking jobs or formal education for some five years or so after leaving school.
Five years to breath and experience before getting on the dread mill?
Against the grain, I know, but I’m persuaded we destroy one another by insisting we go from school to job to grave – with maybe a little breather between work and grave.
If you ask anyone, ‘What are you?’ or similar questions, they will invariably answer ‘a plumber, a teacher a . . .’ the job they do. They should, in an ideal world say, ‘I’m an educated and enlightened human being who has a lot of empathy for my fellows . . .’ or something along those lines.
We are defined by the jobs we do, as if this is the be all and end all of life.
The world is running out of time, but it would be good if everyone could have the opportunity to be whatever they wanted to be.
Yes just earn enough to travel, work, experience life sort of on the bread-mill, and this shouldn’t go against the grain of thoughtful government planners.
As you say, it’s about leaving bias aside to the best possible levels…before passing on ‘knowledge and experience’ … that is inadequate or incorrect for the recipient…
In order to achieve such a level requires substantial self awareness…
At face value there is a dearth of self awareness in the general populace…
Way way back in the neolithic age before we had expensive telepathic stones*, when I was 17, I did a year out working after 7th form.
3 months doing night shift in a factory. 6 months on a town supply dairy farm, 5 months on sheep station in Taupo, and 3 months army as a territorial after I turned 18.
Was damn useful because it gave a whole.pile of discrimination about things that I didn’t want to do It also got me out from underfoot at home.
Then I went to university at Waikato because it wasn’t Auckland and living costs were way lower. I also became a underage barman, part time soldier, and fell in love with playing multi user star trek late at night on the DEC 1170 (it was 1979).
That year off working was incredibly valuable.
* As good a description of cellphones and tablets as any.
Was damn useful because it gave a whole.pile of discrimination about things that I didn’t want to do
Finding out what you don’t want to do and also what you actually want to do is important. IMO, most people are ‘unsuccessful’ because they never do find out and never have the opportunity to do so.
Local body politicians have too much authority to dispose of, or take on projects that cost much. They are often businessmen who have been able to crry out their interest successfully and then take on the role of handling the everyday business of a large entity whether city or region with diverse needs and are then at the top level of their aptitude and knowledge related in Peters Principle, ie they have reached their level of incompetence.
Participatory democracy must start being applied immediately. General competence must be withdrawn from local government and they be obliged to go through more complex levels of examination of scenarios involving big money or letting go of resources, or building of them. This would start off by answering what are the long-term effects of this? Is the body’s expressed vision the actual likely one from what is observed elsewhere and by viewing the possibility of misadventure from weather, low tenders and skimping of quality etc.
What jobs will be lost, how many people and animals will be disadvantaged by this, and for short term or likely permanent? What expenditure on remediation and repair is set aside? Double that figure to get true cost and where is this money to come from? What advantage to the region and to jobs? What profit arises to the buyer? How and when will they
want this profit realised? What demands will be made on the public of the region to enable the entity to realise their profit? Will they employ local people in the running of their business?
Then when all these are dealt with under a number of separate headings, the business people or=f the region, the public who have formed groups to study the matters under each heading, will be called to detail their findings to a series of meetings. Decisions will be made and anecdotes and experience in other areas be related as to the viability of the proposal, and its likely outcome and advantage. The ratepayers will be given figures showing the long as well as the short term effects on their rate levels and satisfactory services they require, ie navigable roads, clean water, sewage properly disposed of etc.
Then there are meetings held, reports in the local newspaper with facts, and information about scenarios elsewhere in the country and applicable overseas ones. Then a referendum of all local citizens with five years’ residence which would be binding if 75% reached for or against, and if carried out to legal requirements .
That would limit the lure of $ in eyeballs effect by citizens elected to office, who have never given thought to anything but their private interests before. The OIO does not and can not, consider matters from a ‘coalface’ point of view, but the residents can, and the really alert and able ones can learn what needs to be considered, losses and gains, and be leaders in discussing the facts of the matter with their peers, being all the adults in the area, and then all can vote from a roll of those having 5 year residency.
You aren’t just – A local body politician, you are The very model of a local body politician. I am the very model of a [local body politician]
I’ve information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;[a]
I’m very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I’m teeming with a lot o’ news, (bothered for a rhyme)
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.
Gosman
Joe90 is not you. His opinions are worth something, unlike your meanderings through the forest looking for juicy berries to bite at.
Actually joe90 would not be wrong – I am anonymous and I am (almost) a bedwetter, having a tendency to be incontinent. Lack of muscle tone from sitting too long at the keyboard is possibly part of the problem. It’s time perhaps to do more muscle toning and improve the body and less mind and word-wrestling.
Thanks for ripping off the kids there, Joe with short term thinking.
When the Natz sold off significant parts of power generation companies less than a decade ago, guess what, they got less from the sale than they would have earned from dividends already, so now we don’t have that income for the country to run our schools and hospitals or future income for next generations. The right wingers are financial idiots.
Economic[edit]
The Government was elected in the context of the late 2000s recession.
The Fifth Labour Government’s Emissions Trading Scheme was delayed and the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee was set up to review the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme[4] in accordance with the coalition agreement with the ACT Party.[5] In November 2009, an amended version of the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme was adopted.[6]
Personal tax cuts, reducing taxes on all income; the top personal tax rate was lowered from 39% to 38% and then 33%.[7]
Abolished the Loss Attributing Qualifying Company (LAQC) tax structure, which had allowed individuals (mainly property investors) to reduce their individual income tax by off setting their LAQCs losses (the Look-through company structure replaced LAQCs, but without the tax benefits).
Increased GST from 12.5% to 15% in October 2010.
Increased the minimum wage from $12.00 per hour to $13.00 per hour in its first term, and to $14.25 in its second term.[8] This represents a nominal 3.1% average annual increase, significantly lower than the previous government’s nominal 7.9% annual average increase.
Suspended payments to the New Zealand Superannuation Fund.[9]
Introduced the nine-day working fortnight for businesses who were considering laying off staff.
Capped the minimum employers’ contributions to KiwiSaver at 2%, the amount was due to increase to 4% by 2011 and gave employees the option to contribute as little as 2% of their income to KiwiSaver where previously the smallest contribution amount was 4%. The minimum employee and minimum employer contributions were raised to 3% in April 2013.
Introduced the “mixed ownership model” plan, in which the Government planned to reduce its share in Genesis Energy, Meridian Energy, Mighty River Power and Solid Energy from 100% to 51% and Air New Zealand from 74% to 51%, and sell off the remainder. The plans to sell down Solid Energy were later axed due to the company’s poor financial position. A citizens-initiated referendum on the sell-downs returned a 67.3% vote in opposition (on a turnout of 45.1%).
Ultra-Fast Broadband rollout of fibre to the house to 87% of households
Seven Roads of National Significance
Wonder if the council actually asked the public if they could sell off that land?
$13m may sound like a lot but ongoing income from an actual council forestry operation would have been better for the council and for the local region.
Council and future ratepayers were earning money off that land and trees (incredibly high returns at present plus if we have to axe the plastic, will be worth even more, plus potential carbon credits), plus if the council ever needs land in the future for growth they already own land, that earns them money and capital gains.
Pity our kids and anyone who is retired in the area who are going to have to sort out the mess when our councils and country is bankrupt with idiot short term thinkers and our government and councils have killed the golden gooses.
Public land should be considered a long term asset, not something to be sold and benefit a few for a quick buck, while future needs are not going to be able to be met or it is going to be a lot more expensive to buy a bit back later. They should be forced to consider generational costs not forcing future costs onto the young to sort out the messes so they get cheaper rates for a few years (which they probably won’t anyway).
The thickos at Auckland council for example accidentally sold a bit of the rail access in Auckland according to a local who was complaining about it, which is why they are not using the existing rail line that runs from Helensville right through Kumeu and to the city and could be used now. Instead Auckland rail’s “bright” idea is forcing a massive detour to Swanson in proposed plans and completely new rail options in that area for billions. Doh! Plus they ordered trains that don’t fit thought the tunnel. Oh well, the rate payers will have to pay.
Bought to you by the same council and Natz government that forced planning changes to have 10 acre sections go into 600m2 in Kumeu with thousands of million dollar spec houses being built and only have one, one lane road running through… then wonder why NZ productivity is so low and they can only attract migrants who have little education and no other country will take them or don’t bother working here but plant questionable money here as gold bricks or plan their route to OZ.
A majority of those who bothered to make a submission. My view was that we should retire debt rather than own an asset of dubious value, poor soils on steep/marginal terrain, growing third rate soft wood with limited uses, whose future earnings were dependent on the whims of a global timber market.
A majority of those who bothered to make a submission.
So, just a minority then.
We’re not supposed to be ruled by a minority.
My view was that we should retire debt rather than own an asset of dubious value, poor soils on steep/marginal terrain, growing third rate soft wood with limited uses, whose future earnings were dependent on the whims of a global timber market.
1. The income from the land would have retired the debt
2. According to the article the project proved the feasibility
3. We actually need more wood in NZ to build houses
And do the general public in a catchment area really understand what the factors of concern are concerning the sale of the forest –
Lack of control over workers safety.
Over local employment.
Over access to forest or not when suitable.
Over care for maintaining fire breaks.
Over provision of roading when there is a cut.
Over paying share of fire levy for services.
Over lack of concern for evidence of fire (government used to maintain high watching posts in the fire season.)
Over the access for getting pine cones and clearing slash
for fuel and who is responsible for this (can be handy fund raiser for
local groups who control access reliably.)
Is there opportunity for small local trucking operation
carting slash to wood processor?
Is there opportunity to get work trimming lower braches to provide fine logs with better quality vertical wood and less knots, galls?
Can the forest be sold off by Council in bits over a period when the price is right and then replanted there by locals quickly to avoid erosion?
Can the cutting be chosen carefully so that erosion areas near water courses are left standing?
Can the wood be sold locally at a competitive but reasonable price
for local use?
These sort of matters need to be spelt out and discussed, rather than a general feeling of let’s get the debts down. Keeping and selling some cutting rights to locals or nearby mills would keep money flowing in for infrastructure expenditure.
Their own wood itself could be used direct for some local infrastructure.
And there would be more matters than i have raised. I would be pleasantly surprised if all these points have been thoroughly canvassed at public meetings – it would take more than one.
And the financial advantages of different proposals say – four at most would be interesting. Money now and no resource later along with extra costs for providing usable roads and trying to meet people’s needs for clean air and some break from rattling roaring trucks 7 days a week for months should be thought about.
They are having trouble near Whangarei where there is large felling. Peoples houses are eternally coated with dust inside, they are getting asthma, they can’t use the road as once, the children get dusty while they wait for the school bus, the bus gets squeezed to the side, when it wants to stop and pick up kids it can be difficult, the trucks are rather scary as they go past with their high loads,
Lots to consider; more than just money now, debt drop. And the continuing noise and problem is so different to the regular farm and area noise.
‘nature’ is recognised as one of the most prestigious and most cited scientific journals in the world.
When ‘nature’ takes Australia and Australian political leadership to task, then you know that there is a problem.
In 2015 UN General Secretary Ban Ki Moon called for a one day government leaders summit in New York leading up to the COP 21 Paris agreement.
Moon made it clear that he didn’t want Deputy Leaders or Foreign Ministers or Climate Change Spokespersons. He wanted Government leaders. Moon knew that having the leaders turn up would be symbolic of a government and a nation’s commitment to address climate change.
The Australian Prime MInister of the time, Tony Abbot, refused to go.
Current Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has repeated this snub, for the Pacific Forum.
Australia has two pressing environmental problems: climate change and finding a leader who can tackle it……
…..It’s no coincidence that when Turnbull’s political colleague (and then-treasurer) Scott Morrison wanted to criticize environmentalists last year, he brought a lump of coal to parliament and spoke about it in glowing terms. Last week — after Turnbull confirmed he was quitting politics — his son complained about the “undue level of influence” of the coal lobby….
….Many of those poorer countries are on the front line and will suffer heavily as the weather worsens. So will Australia. Droughts there are projected to increase in length and severity as a result of climate change. Heatwaves, floods and bush fires are also linked to global warming, and are predicted to become more common and more extreme. The country’s island neighbours in the Pacific are likely to be inundated as sea levels rise. As a result, Australia, whose draconian refugee policy is a source of shame to many citizens, is likely to face an increase in climate refugees.
There you have it, climate and refugees.
All power to our Prime Minister under much different personal circumstances for taking the bold and decisive action necessary to get there. She is a real leader.
None of the simpering ‘Fast Follower’ John Key or cowardly Morrison ducking for cover.
Morrison won’t turn up. Pacific Nations are suffering some of the worst affects of climate change on the planet. (so is Australia, but that is another can of worms).
A real leader leads from the front, and is not a ‘fast follower’ like John Key, or stay at home coward like Scott Morrison.
They make the difficult decisions and make the effort to turn up.
On climate Australia is a major global foot dragger, on refugees Australia is the puppet master behind the scenes in Nauru that saw one of this country’s top reporters detained for doing her job.
Australia is imperiously beginning to treat New Zealand as they treat they think that they can treat the other Pacific islands.
My prayer is that our Prime Minister takes up the leadership role on the world stage abdicated by Australia on both climate change and justice for refugees.
I pray that Prime Minister Ardern uses the platform given to her to issue a joint statement rallying the Pacific nations of our region to demand that the Australian leader and government live up to their responsibilities on climate change indifference to human rights and refugee cruelty.
As the nature Editorial says:
Things can change quickly in politics, and Australia has a chance to force that change.
nature
It is our role as smaller Pacific countries to try and make Australia live up to that historic task.
Last time I read Nature it was full of PC-politics, and flag-waving for free-market-democracy. Quickly becoming Just another rag, owned by the capital market, majority owned by Springer, which is majority owned by private equity firm BC Partners.
Are you saying that what Nature has been quoted as saying is wrong? It may be open to being swayed by financial interests but surely this is right to state,
and it stands repeating:
….Many of those poorer countries are on the front line and will suffer heavily as the weather worsens. So will Australia.
Droughts there are projected to increase in length and severity as a result of climate change. Heatwaves, floods and bush fires are also linked to global warming, and are predicted to become more common and more extreme.
The country’s island neighbours in the Pacific are likely to be inundated as sea levels rise. As a result, Australia, whose draconian refugee policy is a source of shame to many citizens, is likely to face an increase in climate refugees….
And the statement below is obviously true, and if we keep our minds on what is true, broadcast correctly and offering a clear path for us to follow to work for effective timely action, we should stick to the path even if it is paved by financiers and self-centred entities, which for a while we can agree and combine with;
“Things can change quickly in politics, and Australia has a chance to force that change.”
From what I can see the PM has decided she should not berate the Australian government in public. Her last experience over the Manus refugeees seems to have sheeted that message home.
So whatever the PIF does in their joint statement there won’t be any direct or indirect criticism of Australia on any issue. Not going to happen on refugees given the PIF is in Nauru, and probably bromides on climate change. Maybe a climate adjustment fund paid for by Aus and NZ.
Ardern should demand that the current Oz government start legislating in accord with the view of most Australian voters, in order to prevent representative democracy from losing credibility.
“The annual Lowy Institute Poll on Australian attitudes to the world and global issues for 2018 has been released. Among a series of interesting findings, one thing is clear: support for climate action and renewable energy continue to grow. In response to the survey’s questions on climate and energy, 59% of respondents agreed with the statement: “climate change is a serious and pressing problem. We should begin taking steps now even if this involves significant costs.”
I am sure you know that governments don’t demand that other government should start legislating on the basis of opinion polls. Ardern is not going to tell Australia how it should govern. She seems to have well and truly learnt that lesson
I know it seems to be the expectation on this site that the New Zealand will give all our close partners lectures on how they should run their countries, but Ardern is a PM, not a political activist.
I hope she hasn’t learnt that lesson, Wayne. Moral leadership is not only required nowadays in practical politics, it will actually be a pre-requisite to the consensus politics of survival for humanity during climate change.
But I share your scepticism inasmuch as she keeps presenting as merely a neoliberal manager of govt. To leave her mark on history, she will have to do much more than just that. She will have to lead a transformational government. One that has consequences on the global stage, not just here. Western statesmen have been conspicuous in their absence since Vaclav Havel. Could be an indicator that western stateswomen are emerging?
Not surprised – the orange roadcone-overcomb is out of options – slippery slope time and many more shockers to come.
“The dramatic and previously untold scene is recounted in Fear, a forthcoming book by Bob Woodward that paints a harrowing portrait of the Trump presidency, based on in-depth interviews with administration officials and other principals.”
White House Chief of Staff John F Kelly frequently lost his temper and told colleagues that he thought the president was “unhinged,” Woodward writes.
In one small group meeting, Kelly said of Trump: “He’s an idiot. It’s pointless to try to convince him of anything. He’s gone off the rails. We’re in Crazytown. I don’t even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had.”
Cohn stole letters off Trump’s desk before he had signed them and Trump never even noticed they had gone. 😯
Stuff reckons “Hate is the name of the game in Trump World”. Author of the review (PAUL WALDMAN ) reckons contempt is the name of the game, and provides the evidence to prove him right. Yet Woodward’s book is entitled Fear to inform us that he & his publisher have a third differing opinion.
We can only marvel at Trump’s ability to confuse everyone else all the time. Whether fear, contempt or hate is a better diagnosis of the political culture he generates, it is, as I mentioned here several weeks ago, social darwinism. Playing all against all, he ensures that only the most fit survive.
Imagine working for the prick. It’d be like:
“look on the bright side Mr POTUS, an orange jump suit matches your complexion and hair. We’ll arrange a hood for you.”
“Your red scarf matches my eyes……..
Loving you has made me babanas”
Fuck what a thicket of dysfunction! There goes the leader of the free Whurl.
The concern is that much of it has rubbed off – including in lil ole NuZull
Must be about time the govt re entered the negotiating room, with an offer better than 2% p.a. (i.e the rate of inflation) otherwise IMO they are just continuing on from the previous govt, and continuing to be part of the problem !!
“”Schools around the country have reported increasing difficulty finding relieving teachers over the last three years.” https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12119342
“”To attract new teachers the offer will see a cumulative increase of14.7 per cent to base salaries for graduates with a teaching degree ($47,980 to $55,030) over three years, and a 14.2 per cent cumulative increase for graduates with a subject degree and graduate teaching diploma ($49,588 to $56,638) over three years.
“Teachers on the next steps (6-11) will see a cumulative increase of between 6.5 to 13.7 per cent to base salaries over three years. Teachers on the maximum step (12) will receive a cumulative increase of 6.1 per cent over three years ($75,949 to $80,599.)”
Its only 2% per year for those on the maximum step. When you look at the actual amounts it was $4500 over 3 years for top of scale and $7000 for new teachers
Apparently not just the teachers have shortages, apparently record amounts of GP’s are due to retire and new doctors are being “encouraged” to have 50% go into being a GP’s and there is predicted to be a shortage.
I’m not so sure it is shortages, but more they have rapidly increased NZ population artificially and in demographics that really impact teachers and doctors and then expect the existing professionals to just work harder… very Rogernomics thinking.
The question also is, why are they having difficulty attracting teachers in the first place or why are they are leaving? I think with teachers it is Dukeofurl comment down (8.2) that hits the nail on the head – too many positions are not guaranteed long term.
Also in NZ the whole system has become too adversarial and so many industries are allowed to rip people off (construction, utilities, councils, food, insurance ) that the cost of living is sky high and people expect to be able to do more than survive, but actually have a decent standard of living if they are in professional jobs.
Part of the problem is that government seem to just write off young Kiwis and not want to encourage them into teaching so therefore you are not getting enough of the people who would be good teachers wanting to do that.
The newish board of trustees system also means they technically ‘hire teachers” so you are getting more of a cultural bias into whatever the board wants as teachers, and the board are not in the teaching profession themselves.
Same has happened with building as soon as they made tertiary about user pays and high fees they automatically encouraged people to go for a career that was considered more financially rewarding.
Teaching should be a high status profession, but somehow they have wrecked that in the last 30 years.
To go into the trades, you used to be paid to do it on the job by industry, not spend time and a lot of money on your education and paperwork for years. They need to get the people in, THEN get them to study and register after a few years of practical paid work under their belts.
Warning – long and detailed but contains some primer points on how things get on the Order Paper for debate in Parliament and what could be an interesting situation in the House today re a Member’s Bill due to be debated probably late afternoon. Also possibly relates to Peters’ current grumpiness and his remarks re refugees vis a vis the Coalition agreement.
Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill (aka Waka Jumping Bill)
This is the first week back to the House in the ‘four weeks on/ two weeks off’ House sitting calendar and for addicts like me it is interesting to see what is on the debating programme for each session.
Of particular interest to me (and possibly very few others except possibly Micksavage and Dennis Frank LOL) was whether the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill – aka the waka jumping bill – would make it back into the House this week. From looking at the Order paper for yesterday and progress made, and today’s Order Paper, the answer is very unlikely. Actually ‘No’ is probably more accurate and may well be intentional.
This Bill went through its Second Reading and half of its Committee stages during the week of 7 – 9 August including under extended hours on the morning of Thurs 9 August, but then lost prominence in the last week of that four week sitting session when the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) Amendment Act was pushed through under urgency in the week of 14 – 16 August .
[NOTE: the make up and placement of Government Bills on each day’s Order Paper is solely at the discretion of the Government (Standing Order 68). OTOH Member‘s Bills appear on the Order Papers for Members‘ Days in accordance with a strict priority set by Standing Orders 71 and 72. and cannot be rearranged by the Government, Speaker etc. Private and Local Bills are similarly governed by Standing Orders 69 and 70.] http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-NZ/00HOHPBReferenceStOrders20171/7868e924149435f4cb3c6e00cfc63ec498a39b37
Yesterday’s Order Paper (4/9/2018) showed the continuation of the Committee stages of this ‘waka jumping bill’ back down to No 11 on the list of Government Bills. Nine other Government Bills were listed for First, Second or Third Readings taking up a total of up to 13½ hours of debating time allocated to the usual set maximum number of 12 X 10 minute speeches (2 hours) for each Reading.
Normally these nine Readings could take up to 18 hours but the first Reading of one Bill started in the previous sitting session had only 90 minutes of speeches left, and three of the Bills (Nos 7 – 9) were being taken together. Following these Bills, at No 10 was the Education (Teaching Council of Aotearoa NZ) Amendment Bill set down for Committee stages which are not limited in terms of time or number of speeches. As National’s current MO is to filibuster every Bill at all stages, but particular at the Committee stages, this Bill is likely to take some time. http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-NZ/OrderPaper_20180904/b131016772ec5be085794488af075758fc7a5b55
A normal week in Parliament involves the House sitting from 2pm – 6pm and 7.30pm -10pm each Tues and Weds and from 2pm – 6pm only on Thursday – a total of 17 hours. Each day, Question Time takes up about one hour, and every Wednesday the General Debate following Question Time is assigned one hour a total of four hours, leaving 13 hours for the House to debate Bills, etc in a normal three day sitting week where the House does not invoke extended hours or urgency.
Every fourth week is also meant to be a Members’ Day on the Wednesday – allowing 4½ hours for the debating of Member’s Bills (and Private and Local Bills), further reducing the time for debating Government Bills to 8½ hours in those weeks. However, this is sometimes changed depending on what else is being debated – eg Budget debates and similar override Members’ days.
Yesterday, the House moved through the first three Government Bills on yesterday’s Order Paper more quickly than the maximum time allowed, meaning they were halfway through No 4 on the list when the House rose at 10pm. This time saving was offset by the House undertaking an Urgent Debate called for by Simon Bridges on the removal of Clare Curran from Cabinet taking just over an hour. (As an aside, over 15 mins of that time was Bridges floundering around, which led to the next speaker, Chris Hipkins, calling Bridges’ speech “the longest 15 minutes in Bridges’ life” and Bridges being “two snappers short of a resignation”. LOL.)
Together with today’s Members Day, this means that the only time left for debating Government Bills this week is about two hours tomorrow, Thursday, after Question Time before the House rises at 6pm.
Today’s Order Paper has also introduced four other Government Bills to replace the three Bills that passed their Readings yesterday ahead of the waka jumping Bill which is now back down to No 12. These are at Nos 1, 5, 6 and 10 on today’s Order Paper. Although these Bills will not come up today being a Members Day, in theory the set time Readings of the eight Bills before the waka jumping bill could take up to a maximum of 10 ½ hours plus three Bills now up for their Committee stages debates of no maximum time. Against only two hours available tomorrow.
So bye bye waka jumping bill for this week at least, unless there are further changes to tomorrow’s Order Paper – highly unlikely IMO. If any, they may well push it further down the pecking order.
————————————————————
Member’s Bill (Rino Tirikatene) – Electoral (Entrenchment of Maori Seats) Amendment Bill
HOWEVER – there is another Electoral Amendment Bill on today’s Order Paper that will be rather controversial and probably will not make it through to Select Committee consideration.
This is the Electoral (Entrenchment of Maori Seats) Amendment Bill sponsored by Rino Tirikatene intended to align the Maori seats with general electorate seats which are already entrenched under section 268 of the Electoral Act 1993. More information is provided in the Explanatory Note in the Bill. http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/member/2018/0056/latest/whole.html#DLM4333801
The First Reading of this Bill is now at No 2 in the order of Members’ Bills and set down for 12 X 10 minute speeches today. The Member’s Bill at No 1 is only set down for 35 mins maximum debate, so taking into account Question Time and the one hour General Debate, Tirikatene’s Bill should pop up for debate about 4.30pm or thereabouts and continue after the dinner break.
When this Bill was pulled out of the biscuit tin ballot back in May 2018 this raised Winston Peters’ blood pressure in view of NZF’s longstanding policy to call for a referendum on the continuation of the Maori seats. He made it clear at the time that NZF will not be supporting this Bill.
Peters’ blood pressure is probably up again with this up for debate today even though if NZF vote against the Bill with National, this Bill will not make it past this First Reading to Select Committee and will die on a Vote of Ayes 54 (L/GP) vs Noes 65 (NZF/Nats) with ACT being an unknown if Seymour votes at all. The latter seems to be his MO at present in many cases.
To avoid this defeat and the further opportunity for claims that the Coalition Govt is in disarray etc, Tirikatene could withdraw or postpone the Bill under Standing Order 74(1)(b) thereby removing it from debate today. In fact, I am surprised it hasn’t been. But then again, maybe an opportune time for it to be debated while both Ardern and Peters are out of the country.
I wonder in fact whether the fact that Peters’ much wanted Electoral Integrity Bill/ waka jumping Bill is not progressing as fast as he wants coupled with the unfortunate coincidence of Titikatene’s entrenchment of the Maori seats Bill coming up for debate today (though the strict Standing Orders mentioned above) has contributed to, or is the cause of, his grumpiness at present, including his challenging remarks etc re refugee numbers. After all , this is politics …and sometimes not dissimilar to chess……
I’m not inclined to see the grumpy old man syndrome as evidence of substantial disagreement, but you could be right that Labour & NZF haven’t reached consensus on refugee policy. Understandable that media seize on apparent discord like a pitbull trying to extricate meat from a body: it’s their industrial process at work.
Just needs govt leader or deputy to say the magic words: ” we haven’t agreed a govt policy on refugee numbers yet”, doesn’t it?
You seem to be missing the point. My post is more about these two Electoral Amendment Bills much more than about the refugee issues.
As you say, the PM and/or the DPM could just say that they have not agreed a govt policy on refugee numbers yet, but they haven’t. Instead Peters has stood his ground on the NZF policy on no increase etc and obviously had not consulted the PM on his intention to do so. Hence my grumpy old man remark (and I have called him that to his face years ago in jest when I had a lot to do with him while working on secondments to Parliament. LOL)
His remarks and the PM’s reaction are not a good look, but I do understand that NZF need to maintain their base conservative policies to maintain their voting core constituency – as is discussed under the post on Winston and the refugees issue by mickysavage.
My point is that last week was a bit of a bumpy one and this week is looking a little so too, so the coincidence of these two Electoral Amendment Bills appearing on the Order Paper at the same time tends to give the perception of more dissonance.
As I said, Peters is very keen to get the waka jumping Bill through, but is opposed in principle to the Tirikatene Member’s Bill to entrench the Maori seats as this is very much against a longstanding NZF policy which they campaigned on to hold a referendum on whether or not the Maori seats should continue. The Tirikatene Bill is to resolve a longstanding technicality which could be left for the moment without any real consequences – in the interests of not raising the preception of more disharmony.
Here is what Peters said back in May when the Tirikatene Bill was drawn in the ballot.
As I also now see, I am not alone in thinking this and I/S has called it on NRT ” … a potential flashpoint in the coalition …” ie
Today is a Member’s day, and finally we’re back to first readings. First up is Hamish Walker’s KiwiSaver (Foster Parents Opting in for Children in their Care) Amendment Bill, and following that is the debate on Rino Tirikatene’s Electoral (Entrenchment of Māori Seats) Amendment Bill. This is a potential flashpoint in the coalition, with Labour and the Greens supporting entrenchment, and NZ First almost certainly opposed. But the bill needs National’s support to work anyway (because entrenchment bills need to be passed by the margin they propose), so we’ll get to see whether they’ve really moved on from the Brash era or not.
Perhaps there has been agreement after all. We only have a few hours to wait.
And it appears that Bridges will not be in the House today, as Bennett is fronting Question No 1 to the PM. With both Peters and Ardern away, who is the Acting PM today?
ADDENDUM – And Seymour actually does have a position on the Maori seats. He wants to abolish them or so it seems. The whole thing is getting even more interesting.
I appreciate your explanations, just saw no need to comment! Hard to tell if they are brokering deals behind the scenes when necessary, of course, as we would expect, to ensure successful governance. If that basic process has been suspended, or has not yet re-engaged after the return of the PM due to scheduling difficulties, some irritation would be natural…
Posted this previously, a few mates of mine sons are currently training to be a builder (A much needed skill) all 3 of them currently have had their son’s in their 3rd or 4th building coys as they proceed thru their apprenticeships. Why is that because they have been placed on contracts not wages, and as work loads for the builders they have been under reduced they are “let go”
In the “old days” apprectices did their time with 1 coy and were waged staff.
The building industry IMO cannot complain about skill shortages and then not have a system that allows ease to obtain the qualifications. It appears much less stress to allow off shore workers to make up for any shortfalls.
Try google and search building apprentices in Auckland the results are to me alarming. There are none
What you have to wonder, is when it is so obvious, why does the government seem so obsessed with doing the opposite and then wringing their hands and/or ignoring poverty, lack of housing, lack of job opportunities for many including school leavers, massive infrastructure costs being forced onto locals instead of business and shoddy workmanship?
Its because of Employment Contracts Act that short term contracts became the norm in building , even for qualified builders.
Is happening in Teaching now as well. Those Schools saying they cant get decent applicants are not saying the job they are offering isnt a staff position but is a contact for a year or so which ‘may’ be renewed. Especially affects those teachers starting out.
Yep, how can you buy a house (or even rent one now) when you don’t know whether you will have a job or not each year and you might be forced to relocate without much notice to get a new job.
I think it is more than that – It is even happening across the ditch – my daughter who has an MA (Hons) and BSc (Hons) and masses of other relevant experience coupled with about 7 years teaching experience simply cannot get a permanent teaching position – and it is not just her – It applies to almost all her colleagues . The jobs being offered are all one year contracts because the schools want to be “flexible” in their staffing requirements. As school rolls go up and down like a yo-yo these days (as they fall in and out of popularity) the school can off load or recruit staff more easily. There is little loyalty to staff these days no matter how dedicated they are.
Yes Chris 73, jacinda beating key at his own game. And although I don’t like it, I am all for jacinda using opportunities like this to counteract the negative spin from msm about labour.
All the bs from garner, soper et al about the cost of jacindas trip tp Nauru. Ffs were any of them outraged by bridges limo use?
I like being clean and smelling clean so I had no other choice but to vote right and, if taking it a step further, my sense of smell comes from my parents then its all their fault 🙂
‘People who have a greater tendency to turn their nose up at the whiff of urine, sweat and other body odours are more likely to have rightwing authoritarian attitudes, research suggests.’
Thing is, like Sir John Key, it’ll take a lot of time before the public tire of Jacinda so best to leave her alone and go after the weaker members of the herd and pick them off one by one
Journalism is on the cutting edge of where it’s at. Or maybe not. I’m obviously not a journalist as who would pay for that sentence!
But it is amazing what will happen to you – TVNZ journalist reporting on Nauru at a cafe after talking to a refugee. Come with us, police station for three hours. But not detained, just have to be careful about being ‘unannounced’ in risk area.
Lost her accreditation, now got it back.
RNZ reporter Gia Garrick – “We had an MFAT official sit the seven of us down, or actually it was the six of us minus Barbara [Dreaver], she wasn’t back at this stage …and tell us that the Nauru government would like to pass on a message to us that it would prefer if we reported on the Forum instead of just focussing on the one issue here.
Really it didn’t want any focus on the refugee issue that has led to problems for the poor Nauruans as well as the inmates. A no win situation for anyone, not even Australians who are so scared of these people. Doesn’t say much for supposedly bold, brave Ozzies in the wars does it.
Good morning Newshub That’s the way Prince Charles lead the way to a environmentally friendly future of sustainable energy ka pai .
I see that great innovative British company Dyson have invested in producing electric cars to ka pai.
That’s sad about that Mana Wahine Penny Bright we need more wahine like her to make a stand for the common people to be treated humanly & fairly by the big boys .
Duncan this is what happen’s when a government denies a housing shortage so there m8 can cash up on capital gain’s. I heard an know of a few people had to live in hotels
4 years ago and the Tsunami of house less tangata is still rolling in & rising .
This same phenomenon has been caused by the greedy people in America Britain Canada Australia the neo libreals buying there voter’s does anyone see a pattion here shonky .
Loyd the fishermen are hard men the scallop fishing dispute between British and French fishermen this must have been going on for a few years they need to Aline there policy’s so this situation you can not two competing fisheries and clearly one is not concerned about preserving the fishery as the other can you see the Bigotry .
Its is laugh able how no negative story’s got to be published and put on TV when the last government was in parliament conclusion FOLLOW THE MONEY.
Duncan there is no magic wand to fix your m8 deliberate shorting our housing markets for there gain . I can see you are all about your EGO ana to kai
Ka kite ano P.S and so are your bosses
Lance O Sullivan does not get the big Picture if
he did he would not go poking holes in the waka that has given the most care for common tangata whenua & then giving the party that caused this mess amo to fire at the Labour party his action could cause us to slide the neo libreals back into power that will be a stuff up for the poor people enough said ka kite ano
You know what makes Eco Maori get a sore face is a lot of Maori leader know that the justice system was and is still un fair to tangata whenua how do I know this well the upper classes are in the no they rub shoulders together they are part of the system and they did nothing to warn te tangata whenua about this un fair justisce system they are just looking out for there own best interest Eco looks out for all people future
Its not just about me in my Papatuanuku
Ka kite ano. Ana to kai
The sirens are going off again did you like my challenge I have sent out to all Maori Leaders He tangata he tangata he atua he tangata . Ka kite ano
P.S these leader’s are still deafening reality all around Papatuanuku the indigenous cultures are being pushed into hardship Australier America Canada Many country’s that are pushing native people under the bridge around Papatuanuku
WOW the sandflys are swarming today they tried a repeat of yesterday’s play by getting some of there young puppets to park right close behind me I could see how nervious the driver was . They think they know me YEA RIGHT
You want to know why they are so unset I used the Infrormation ACT on the New Zealand Police to get all files on me be it written, verbal ,voice recording ,video recording ,written any data and buy the LAWS in there book’s they have to give me this information . I will let you know how my progress is on this subject.
The sandfly’s are interfering in my son’s work life my wife’s work life all of my family’s lives and a lot of people know that this is happening They think they are above the Law that they break every day holding on to there bibles.
If they don’t give me my private information well that will tell all my readers that the justices systems are a SHAM . P.S why are they trying to get me to assault some one because they have nothing on me so they are trying to entice into assaulting one of there undercover muppets so they can beat me in there cells I can see the smoke coming out there ——– Ana to kai ka kite ano
Peter Thiel is one of the people responsible for putting trump in the White House we don;t need him coming down here with the attitude that he is a law on to him self using his money and Lawyers to do just that he will use his money to shape our laws to suit his class of people and who give’s a shit about the consequences of pushing more people onto the bread lines and on the street’s . He backs privatization and smaller governments the first one will siphon more money to the wealty from the poor the people who they don’t care about , There belief is that you have to have poor people this is justified by them they say poor people are what is needed to keep profits flowing up to the wealthy and wages low . The second one is because they want a small weak government so they can do what they want the government,s will be to weak to stop them. Thats how there capitalism WORKS he doe’s not care about the people if he did he would not have backed trump enough said link is below .
Of course Drury is going to back him Thiel is powerful enough to be able to cause a slide in Drurys favorite stock no. Ana to kai ka kite ano link below.Theil will be a raciest like his m8
I filed A Infromation ACT on Ministry of Primary Industry to why because the top cop from Gisborne who started this farce man hunt on me got his ex cop m8 that work for MAF a well known fact that MAF is were cops go when they leave the police force .
So all the information that MAF has will open the door for my court case against the New Zealand Police to stop there un- justified harassment of me and my family .
I have some one of high credibility how told me that MAF was watching me they tryed to get him to sack me he told them were to go. Ana to kai ka kite ano P.S a lot of people can see your bad behavior
Here is a Mana Wahine she discovered the first pulser netron star they emite beams of radiation out two oppsite points on the star over 50 years ago her male colleges got the prize and hounners she was award a major science prize Ka pai the Papatuanuku is growing up. ka kite ano link is below
Good evening Newshub the high price of fuel will encourage people to buy Electric Cars that’s a good thing .
The what Authority ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????.
That organization need to be scraped it is not interdependent it’s is that in NAME ONLY.
Game of Thrones a that’s a good win for Weta digital studio see computer TEC industry’s is big business and NZ is missing out because a lot of contracts for new work is going to over seas company’s.
Humpty Dumpty LOL. his mistress mite be able to put him to gather again.
3d printing is the technology that is going to help us get to a carbon neutral future .
The Mokopunas will just print what they want not shops no low freight Ka pai
Science is going to lead us to a better future that T cell therapy to treat cancer is awsome.
I give Papatuanuku creatures are awesome I had a ridge back dog that was huge .
Ka kite ano .
The Crowd Goes Wild Makere & Mulls I was just writing about Mull’s pronouncing those names he you did better than I would have.
No comment on the ref Mull’s &; Makere for the Leauge .
What was in the drink ??????
Dont cut the cheese Mulls leave the fruit alone guys .
Were’s Wairangi I could guess across the ditch no.
Ka kite ano P.S thats mean That the World Surfing is paying the Wahine the same as the men ka pai
The fake it till you make it class trump everyone could see there were heaps more people at Obama inuarguation than trumps. He still has idiots following him they are idiots as well he is dragging the worst of humanity out of there holes of – – – – fools Ka kite ano
Link is Below P.S lucky his muppets are only actually 20% of the people he fakes all the polls to like shonky
Trump inauguration crowd photos were edited after he intervened
This person is telling us to stop living in the past he would much rather hear about world war 1 & 2 than the real truth about what has happened in the past sure his hapu mite have lost a war and lost there best land but his sad excuse of dont live or look to the past is tipical. The reality is when a country does not teach te Mokopunas about the past they are hiding the facts that they RIPPED off All Maori and not just one hapu they are ashamed of the way they treated Maori full stop.
This writer has a silver spoon in his mouth that will be 1 reason he wants the past hidden he has been sucked into the denial spin what about the thousands of Maori in prison does he think that’s fair enough said link below Ka kite ano
Good evening Newshub has simon sorted out his leak in his canoe enough said.
The Gisborne injection of money is good the roads are bad there back to the future Ka pai.
We can not even control party pill let
alone probiotic go figure.
Burt Reynolds was a excellent old school actor ECO enjoyed his humour and his movies Mike I guessing that you watch some of his movies.
Ka kite ano P.S I’m chasing our Mokopunas at the minute
The Crowd goes Wild Mulls & Wairangi
Wai I thought you were getting a tan in Australia.
That will be mean watching the Wahine League and then the Warriors game straight after Ka pai.
A Japanese Wahine in the finals for the Tennis Kia kaha.
The whenuapai Battlers I miss the name of the your sport.
That was a good win for Kelston college league team Ka kite ano.
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Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
COMMENTARY:By Ronny Kareni Since the atrocious footage of the suffering of an indigenous Papuan man reverberates in the heart of Puncak by the brute force of Indonesia’s army in early February, shocking tactics deployed by those in power to silence critics has been unfolding. Nowhere is this more evident ...
Analysis - Nicola Willis is holding firm on tax cuts despite the economic outlook being worse than forecast and critics urging her to wait, writes Peter Wilson for The Week In Politics. ...
Opposition MPs and unions are criticising a proposal by New Zealand’s Ministry of Pacific Peoples to cut staff by 40 percent. The country’s largest trade union — The Public Service Association — says the ministry has informed staff that it is looking to shed 63 of 156 positions. Opposition MPs ...
A poem by Poetry Aotearoa Yearbook 2024 featured poet Carin Smeaton. Daughtr of the 90s when she gets promoted to usherette a baby blu eel carries her all the way up to mothership she’s hovering high she lets the underaged in to see keanu reeves she lets the only lonely ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Keith Rankin, trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand. My earlier article – Can ‘Good’ be the Greater Evil? – looked at the issue of how wars should end, and how Good versus Evil ...
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 AMMA by Saraid de Silva (Moa Press, $38)A stunning debut novel reviewed by Brannavan ...
From Steve Martin to Ricky Stanicky, a pick’n’mix of things worth watching and listening to this long weekend. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. If you’re at a loss for something to occupy yourself with this Easter, don’t panic: The Spinoff’s got ...
Jesus had dinner with his 12 disciples right before he died. Noted historian Madeleine Chapman finds out who really deserved to be there.First published in 2018 but let’s be honest, the subject is timeless. As you sit on your couch this Easter Sunday, eating a chocolate egg you know ...
The newly-promoted Northern League club is on a mission to return to the National League for the first time in two decades. Plenty about domestic football in New Zealand has changed in that time – but the sense that this amateur competition is not an entirely level playing field remains. ...
Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
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By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
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A frosty start to the day in Southland; clear skies, stars, the sound of waves plashing on the sand; could be worse.MfE are here today to tell us about coastal erosion and climate change. Heard of “managed retreat”?
The retreat managed to manage the perceptions around retreating?
You won’t find a more damning indictment of our middle class dominated, university obsessed education system than in this article –
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12119105
Surely we need a education system that prepares people for lifelong learning, not one that regards attending a university as the only preferred endpoint?
Lots of kids are well ready to leave school at 16. They want to get a job and get money and get out of home, and out from under someone else’s authority, and make their own way in the world.
Fine, I say. Let them leave school at 16, but keep open learning options as apprentices, night & weekend school options and generally if you want to leave formal schooling at 16 then allow you to return to learning at 19 or 21 while still working.
That would far better suit the the huge majority of young people who are particularly tempramentally, intellectually or inclined to want to go to university and slog their way through a pointless meal ticket exercise.
The older system catered for this with an ‘out’ basically at school cert level with technical schools (United etc) providing the trade start up courses.
Everyone else stayed on to university (govt funded Back then) or found something of interest and went that way. It worked a treat, supplied apprentices to building trades etc and gave kids choice if they chose to leave at 16.
But it wasn’t broken so we fixed it with the start of the great dumbing down where pass/fail seems to have given way to an attendance record and aspirational double speak.
The way that the teacher unions demand the status of white collar professionals is a megaphone that informs us of their middle class educational values and attitudes.
Middle class capture of education means an ambient bias that regards professional, white collar jobs as superior outcomes to the traditional trades and artisan jobs (panel beaters, sign writers, roofers, skilled machinery operators, etc etc) that make up the skilled engine room of the economy and can provide satisfying, fufilling and reasonably paid work for huge numbers of people.
More likely that those types of jobs are becoming obsolete.
How many panel beaters are required when it’s just a quick fix and then attach a new part that’s already the right colour?
How many sign-writers when all that’s needed is a large monitor and a PC?
Skilled machine operators?
Technological change is making more and more of the trades obsolete.
They were pretty quick to throw the manual teachers overboard. If it can’t be assessed by essay and doesn’t lead to a university lecturing position, it doesn’t matter.
Unfair, Gabby. Who threw the manual teachers overboard? They were never allowed to be NZEI members, because real old primary schools never had tech classes. Only the disastrous Intermediate schools did (I believe that opponents of the introduction of Intermediate schools back in the 1950s were quite correct) because they (Int schools) introduced wood/metalwork + sewing/cooking classes, but the weird teachers who did it were not NZEI – they were PPTA members of the secondary schools’ union, because all the other tech teachers in NZ were. Consequently they never had any representation in the primary schools’ union.
Later PPTA could not protect them either, because new industrial law (1980s, 1990s) prohibited unions from taking action in support of other unions. NZEI and PPTA negotiated at different times, able to take industrial action at different times. So when Tommorrow’s Schools gave primary and intermediate schools autonomy to some extent through bulk funding (be aware that all schools are still bulk-funded for their Operations Grants: bulk funding was abolished ONLY for teachers’ salaries.)
Bulk funding is aimed at underfunding, and when that happened to intermediate schools, the pressure came on.
It was the neo-liberal Govts who threw those manual teachers overboard, Gabby. Secondary schools are now dangerously short of them too, but the secondary manual teachers still there were not thrown overboard. OK?
Sanctuary (replying to 2.1.1)
Have you ever been a teacher? If yes, what horrible experience perverted your view of teacher unions? 80%+ of teachers belong to those unions, and you are vilifying all of us.
Idiot. Do you think that none of us understand history, the bourgeois, the bias, and that we aim for middle-class comforts?
I find you shallow and insulting. I hope that you can modify your comment and explain.
I long held the belief (reinforced by my time as a teacher), back in the days before Rogernomics fucked up this country, that all kids should be endowed at birth with say 16 years of free education, the first 10 or 11 years to be compulsory.
This would have meant kids free to leave school at 16 and go into the workforce. Some, however, would soon realise they had made a mistake and would want to return to education – and could do so with the 4 or 5 years they were still entitled to.
They could then go to polytechs or universities to upgrade their skill, with few financial consequences.
But then along came Roger et al . . .
I would love to see a system whereby after, say, 25-30 years in employment any person can take a 12 month sabbatical at 80% of their wage averaged over the previous five years (with a cap of course) to do any sort of (state approved) training they wish whatsoever. Thus, if a middle aged manager wants to spend a year learning to, say, be a beekeeper or live in Latin country and learn Spanish, this would be allowed – and at 80% of their previous wage.
I’ve come to the conclusion that people should do a few years in work and follow that with a few years in uni. The first uni course will get them a bachelor degree. After that they start doing research landing them doctorates. The time in work would be to give them actual physical experience on which to base their next cycle of research.
And how did you arrive at the conclusion…
On behalf of other ‘people’…
Because it’s what’s necessary in a democracy to improve the nation’s living standard while also living within our very limited means. Same as compulsory voting is also necessary so as to ensure people engage in their own governance.
Uneducated people are detrimental to democracy and not investigating everyone’s ideas limits the innovation needed to improve everyone’s living standards.
As I’ve said to you before, Draco…
You are strong in certain areas (e.g 3.5.1.2.1.1)…..this is not one of them…
Authoritarian ideals …. nah!
Australia has a system of long service leave, I think its more 3 -4 months rather than 12.
https://www.fairwork.gov.au/how-we-will-help/templates-and-guides/fact-sheets/minimum-workplace-entitlements/long-service-leave
“Long service leave forms part of the National Employment Standards (NES). The NES apply to all employees covered by the national workplace relations system, regardless of any award, agreement or contract.”
Sanctuary +100
That is exactly what we need but it’s not solely the fault of the education system. Parents as well have been telling their children forever to Get and education, get a job and you’re right for life. This was bollocks in the 1970s and it’s even more so now as technological changes eliminate ever more jobs. We need to get everyone into continual learning but especially those that haven’t yet achieved tertiary education.
Most, if not all, universities allow entrance if the person is over 20 even if they don’t have any high-school qualifications. The problem is that our entire socio-economic system effectively discourages people from getting that ongoing education.
Why should lifelong learning involve lifelong institutionalisation draccy?
Because for most people the best way to learn about a discipline is to learn from someone who’s been studying the field for years, and to learn alongside other people who are also learning about the subject so you can exchange ideas and aid each other’s learning.
Sure, you might find a club to get that sort of environment, but educational institutions have an important part to play.
Personally I think all education should be free from cradle to the grave, with no limits on when to start a new course.
Well said.
If someone with a degree can’t be paid handsomely for teaching it, it’s just not worth knowing flockers.
And yet I can’t help wondering whether the guy who allegedly put oxygen and acetylene in the same bottle the other day had received formal welding training or was largely self-taught. Poor bugger.
I’ve had a small artistic hobby for years now. I learn a lot on youtube, I read a lot, get lots of ideas from all around the place. Most of my pinterest pins are all about it. I own pretty much all the equipment I need for it. I’m ok – not brilliant, but these days I can largely make pretty much what I set out to make (albeit with room for improvement).
But I still pay for regular evening classes at the art school. Because the structure and environment suit me, and it’s good to have fellow people learning the same skills to bounce ideas off.
I just don’t get that online, or doing it alone.
@ McFlock (2.4.1.1) … 100+ cheers to all you have said in your post 🙂
A thought not at all influenced from being kicked out of school for asking questions, but I’ve long been of the persuasion that young people should be strongly dissuaded from seeking jobs or formal education for some five years or so after leaving school.
Five years to breath and experience before getting on the dread mill?
Against the grain, I know, but I’m persuaded we destroy one another by insisting we go from school to job to grave – with maybe a little breather between work and grave.
Yes Bill, agreed.
If you ask anyone, ‘What are you?’ or similar questions, they will invariably answer ‘a plumber, a teacher a . . .’ the job they do. They should, in an ideal world say, ‘I’m an educated and enlightened human being who has a lot of empathy for my fellows . . .’ or something along those lines.
We are defined by the jobs we do, as if this is the be all and end all of life.
The world is running out of time, but it would be good if everyone could have the opportunity to be whatever they wanted to be.
Yes just earn enough to travel, work, experience life sort of on the bread-mill, and this shouldn’t go against the grain of thoughtful government planners.
Yes , Bill
Strongly disuaded relies on a point of view…
As you say, it’s about leaving bias aside to the best possible levels…before passing on ‘knowledge and experience’ … that is inadequate or incorrect for the recipient…
In order to achieve such a level requires substantial self awareness…
At face value there is a dearth of self awareness in the general populace…
Ever descending circles…
“the dread mill”
Beautiful!
Way way back in the neolithic age before we had expensive telepathic stones*, when I was 17, I did a year out working after 7th form.
3 months doing night shift in a factory. 6 months on a town supply dairy farm, 5 months on sheep station in Taupo, and 3 months army as a territorial after I turned 18.
Was damn useful because it gave a whole.pile of discrimination about things that I didn’t want to do It also got me out from underfoot at home.
Then I went to university at Waikato because it wasn’t Auckland and living costs were way lower. I also became a underage barman, part time soldier, and fell in love with playing multi user star trek late at night on the DEC 1170 (it was 1979).
That year off working was incredibly valuable.
* As good a description of cellphones and tablets as any.
Finding out what you don’t want to do and also what you actually want to do is important. IMO, most people are ‘unsuccessful’ because they never do find out and never have the opportunity to do so.
Neoliberal New Zealand.
Sold to the highest foreign bidder.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12119118
This sort of transaction is fundamentally wrong and by the time most people realise this it will be too late.
Local body politicians have too much authority to dispose of, or take on projects that cost much. They are often businessmen who have been able to crry out their interest successfully and then take on the role of handling the everyday business of a large entity whether city or region with diverse needs and are then at the top level of their aptitude and knowledge related in Peters Principle, ie they have reached their level of incompetence.
Participatory democracy must start being applied immediately. General competence must be withdrawn from local government and they be obliged to go through more complex levels of examination of scenarios involving big money or letting go of resources, or building of them. This would start off by answering what are the long-term effects of this? Is the body’s expressed vision the actual likely one from what is observed elsewhere and by viewing the possibility of misadventure from weather, low tenders and skimping of quality etc.
What jobs will be lost, how many people and animals will be disadvantaged by this, and for short term or likely permanent? What expenditure on remediation and repair is set aside? Double that figure to get true cost and where is this money to come from? What advantage to the region and to jobs? What profit arises to the buyer? How and when will they
want this profit realised? What demands will be made on the public of the region to enable the entity to realise their profit? Will they employ local people in the running of their business?
Then when all these are dealt with under a number of separate headings, the business people or=f the region, the public who have formed groups to study the matters under each heading, will be called to detail their findings to a series of meetings. Decisions will be made and anecdotes and experience in other areas be related as to the viability of the proposal, and its likely outcome and advantage. The ratepayers will be given figures showing the long as well as the short term effects on their rate levels and satisfactory services they require, ie navigable roads, clean water, sewage properly disposed of etc.
Then there are meetings held, reports in the local newspaper with facts, and information about scenarios elsewhere in the country and applicable overseas ones. Then a referendum of all local citizens with five years’ residence which would be binding if 75% reached for or against, and if carried out to legal requirements .
That would limit the lure of $ in eyeballs effect by citizens elected to office, who have never given thought to anything but their private interests before. The OIO does not and can not, consider matters from a ‘coalface’ point of view, but the residents can, and the really alert and able ones can learn what needs to be considered, losses and gains, and be leaders in discussing the facts of the matter with their peers, being all the adults in the area, and then all can vote from a roll of those having 5 year residency.
“Local body politicians have too much authority”
Hey! I’m one of those 🙂
You aren’t just – A local body politician, you are The very model of a local body politician.
I am the very model of a [local body politician]
I’ve information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;[a]
I’m very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I’m teeming with a lot o’ news, (bothered for a rhyme)
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.
The community owning the asset made the decision to sell and retire debt.
Fortunately, anonymous internet bedwetter’s don’t get a say.
Joe90
Are you callinmg me an anonymous bedwetter Yes or no.
Why do you care if he is? His opinion should have little impact on you.
Gosman
Joe90 is not you. His opinions are worth something, unlike your meanderings through the forest looking for juicy berries to bite at.
Actually joe90 would not be wrong – I am anonymous and I am (almost) a bedwetter, having a tendency to be incontinent. Lack of muscle tone from sitting too long at the keyboard is possibly part of the problem. It’s time perhaps to do more muscle toning and improve the body and less mind and word-wrestling.
So his opinion about your bedwetting status does matter to you.
My post is threaded 3.2, not 3.1.1.1.
Why was a council involved in this activity to begin with?
Because it’s better for society than having a private business do it.
https://screenshots.firefox.com/7Jj2e5NkVD8Ljuwr/www.whanganui.govt.nz
They should sell cutting rights not the land to reduce debt.
You don’t get a say in what my community does, or doesn’t do with their own assets.
Neither do you joey.
Thanks for ripping off the kids there, Joe with short term thinking.
When the Natz sold off significant parts of power generation companies less than a decade ago, guess what, they got less from the sale than they would have earned from dividends already, so now we don’t have that income for the country to run our schools and hospitals or future income for next generations. The right wingers are financial idiots.
But Merryl Lynch apparently did well out of it.
See this blast from the past,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_National_Government_of_New_Zealand
Economic[edit]
The Government was elected in the context of the late 2000s recession.
The Fifth Labour Government’s Emissions Trading Scheme was delayed and the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee was set up to review the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme[4] in accordance with the coalition agreement with the ACT Party.[5] In November 2009, an amended version of the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme was adopted.[6]
Personal tax cuts, reducing taxes on all income; the top personal tax rate was lowered from 39% to 38% and then 33%.[7]
Abolished the Loss Attributing Qualifying Company (LAQC) tax structure, which had allowed individuals (mainly property investors) to reduce their individual income tax by off setting their LAQCs losses (the Look-through company structure replaced LAQCs, but without the tax benefits).
Increased GST from 12.5% to 15% in October 2010.
Increased the minimum wage from $12.00 per hour to $13.00 per hour in its first term, and to $14.25 in its second term.[8] This represents a nominal 3.1% average annual increase, significantly lower than the previous government’s nominal 7.9% annual average increase.
Suspended payments to the New Zealand Superannuation Fund.[9]
Introduced the nine-day working fortnight for businesses who were considering laying off staff.
Capped the minimum employers’ contributions to KiwiSaver at 2%, the amount was due to increase to 4% by 2011 and gave employees the option to contribute as little as 2% of their income to KiwiSaver where previously the smallest contribution amount was 4%. The minimum employee and minimum employer contributions were raised to 3% in April 2013.
Introduced the “mixed ownership model” plan, in which the Government planned to reduce its share in Genesis Energy, Meridian Energy, Mighty River Power and Solid Energy from 100% to 51% and Air New Zealand from 74% to 51%, and sell off the remainder. The plans to sell down Solid Energy were later axed due to the company’s poor financial position. A citizens-initiated referendum on the sell-downs returned a 67.3% vote in opposition (on a turnout of 45.1%).
Ultra-Fast Broadband rollout of fibre to the house to 87% of households
Seven Roads of National Significance
I made my submission.
https://www.whanganui.govt.nz/our-district/have-your-say/Documents/10-Year-Plan%20submissions/10-Year%20Plan%20Volume%202%20Submissions%20101%20-%20200.pdf
That was all you joey?
Wonder if the council actually asked the public if they could sell off that land?
$13m may sound like a lot but ongoing income from an actual council forestry operation would have been better for the council and for the local region.
+100 ED, Grey Area, Greywarshark, Draco
-100 Joe90
Council and future ratepayers were earning money off that land and trees (incredibly high returns at present plus if we have to axe the plastic, will be worth even more, plus potential carbon credits), plus if the council ever needs land in the future for growth they already own land, that earns them money and capital gains.
Pity our kids and anyone who is retired in the area who are going to have to sort out the mess when our councils and country is bankrupt with idiot short term thinkers and our government and councils have killed the golden gooses.
A majority of ratepayer submissions to the proposed 2015 – 2025 plan supported the sale.
Public land should be considered a long term asset, not something to be sold and benefit a few for a quick buck, while future needs are not going to be able to be met or it is going to be a lot more expensive to buy a bit back later. They should be forced to consider generational costs not forcing future costs onto the young to sort out the messes so they get cheaper rates for a few years (which they probably won’t anyway).
The thickos at Auckland council for example accidentally sold a bit of the rail access in Auckland according to a local who was complaining about it, which is why they are not using the existing rail line that runs from Helensville right through Kumeu and to the city and could be used now. Instead Auckland rail’s “bright” idea is forcing a massive detour to Swanson in proposed plans and completely new rail options in that area for billions. Doh! Plus they ordered trains that don’t fit thought the tunnel. Oh well, the rate payers will have to pay.
Bought to you by the same council and Natz government that forced planning changes to have 10 acre sections go into 600m2 in Kumeu with thousands of million dollar spec houses being built and only have one, one lane road running through… then wonder why NZ productivity is so low and they can only attract migrants who have little education and no other country will take them or don’t bother working here but plant questionable money here as gold bricks or plan their route to OZ.
But did the majority of people support it?
Or was it just the majority of business people?
A majority of those who bothered to make a submission. My view was that we should retire debt rather than own an asset of dubious value, poor soils on steep/marginal terrain, growing third rate soft wood with limited uses, whose future earnings were dependent on the whims of a global timber market.
So, just a minority then.
We’re not supposed to be ruled by a minority.
1. The income from the land would have retired the debt
2. According to the article the project proved the feasibility
3. We actually need more wood in NZ to build houses
And do the general public in a catchment area really understand what the factors of concern are concerning the sale of the forest –
Lack of control over workers safety.
Over local employment.
Over access to forest or not when suitable.
Over care for maintaining fire breaks.
Over provision of roading when there is a cut.
Over paying share of fire levy for services.
Over lack of concern for evidence of fire (government used to maintain high watching posts in the fire season.)
Over the access for getting pine cones and clearing slash
for fuel and who is responsible for this (can be handy fund raiser for
local groups who control access reliably.)
Is there opportunity for small local trucking operation
carting slash to wood processor?
Is there opportunity to get work trimming lower braches to provide fine logs with better quality vertical wood and less knots, galls?
Can the forest be sold off by Council in bits over a period when the price is right and then replanted there by locals quickly to avoid erosion?
Can the cutting be chosen carefully so that erosion areas near water courses are left standing?
Can the wood be sold locally at a competitive but reasonable price
for local use?
These sort of matters need to be spelt out and discussed, rather than a general feeling of let’s get the debts down. Keeping and selling some cutting rights to locals or nearby mills would keep money flowing in for infrastructure expenditure.
Their own wood itself could be used direct for some local infrastructure.
And there would be more matters than i have raised. I would be pleasantly surprised if all these points have been thoroughly canvassed at public meetings – it would take more than one.
And the financial advantages of different proposals say – four at most would be interesting. Money now and no resource later along with extra costs for providing usable roads and trying to meet people’s needs for clean air and some break from rattling roaring trucks 7 days a week for months should be thought about.
They are having trouble near Whangarei where there is large felling. Peoples houses are eternally coated with dust inside, they are getting asthma, they can’t use the road as once, the children get dusty while they wait for the school bus, the bus gets squeezed to the side, when it wants to stop and pick up kids it can be difficult, the trucks are rather scary as they go past with their high loads,
Lots to consider; more than just money now, debt drop. And the continuing noise and problem is so different to the regular farm and area noise.
‘nature’ is recognised as one of the most prestigious and most cited scientific journals in the world.
When ‘nature’ takes Australia and Australian political leadership to task, then you know that there is a problem.
In 2015 UN General Secretary Ban Ki Moon called for a one day government leaders summit in New York leading up to the COP 21 Paris agreement.
Moon made it clear that he didn’t want Deputy Leaders or Foreign Ministers or Climate Change Spokespersons. He wanted Government leaders. Moon knew that having the leaders turn up would be symbolic of a government and a nation’s commitment to address climate change.
The Australian Prime MInister of the time, Tony Abbot, refused to go.
Current Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has repeated this snub, for the Pacific Forum.
“Global warming tops the agenda as climate brings down a third Australian prime minister”
nature
International Journal of Science Editorial – September 4, 2018
There you have it, climate and refugees.
All power to our Prime Minister under much different personal circumstances for taking the bold and decisive action necessary to get there. She is a real leader.
None of the simpering ‘Fast Follower’ John Key or cowardly Morrison ducking for cover.
Morrison won’t turn up. Pacific Nations are suffering some of the worst affects of climate change on the planet. (so is Australia, but that is another can of worms).
A real leader leads from the front, and is not a ‘fast follower’ like John Key, or stay at home coward like Scott Morrison.
They make the difficult decisions and make the effort to turn up.
On climate Australia is a major global foot dragger, on refugees Australia is the puppet master behind the scenes in Nauru that saw one of this country’s top reporters detained for doing her job.
Australia is imperiously beginning to treat New Zealand as they treat they think that they can treat the other Pacific islands.
My prayer is that our Prime Minister takes up the leadership role on the world stage abdicated by Australia on both climate change and justice for refugees.
I pray that Prime Minister Ardern uses the platform given to her to issue a joint statement rallying the Pacific nations of our region to demand that the Australian leader and government live up to their responsibilities on climate change indifference to human rights and refugee cruelty.
As the nature Editorial says:
It is our role as smaller Pacific countries to try and make Australia live up to that historic task.
We can’t do it without them.
Last time I read Nature it was full of PC-politics, and flag-waving for free-market-democracy. Quickly becoming Just another rag, owned by the capital market, majority owned by Springer, which is majority owned by private equity firm BC Partners.
Are you saying that what Nature has been quoted as saying is wrong? It may be open to being swayed by financial interests but surely this is right to state,
and it stands repeating:
And the statement below is obviously true, and if we keep our minds on what is true, broadcast correctly and offering a clear path for us to follow to work for effective timely action, we should stick to the path even if it is paved by financiers and self-centred entities, which for a while we can agree and combine with;
“Things can change quickly in politics, and Australia has a chance to force that change.”
From what I can see the PM has decided she should not berate the Australian government in public. Her last experience over the Manus refugeees seems to have sheeted that message home.
So whatever the PIF does in their joint statement there won’t be any direct or indirect criticism of Australia on any issue. Not going to happen on refugees given the PIF is in Nauru, and probably bromides on climate change. Maybe a climate adjustment fund paid for by Aus and NZ.
Ardern should demand that the current Oz government start legislating in accord with the view of most Australian voters, in order to prevent representative democracy from losing credibility.
“The annual Lowy Institute Poll on Australian attitudes to the world and global issues for 2018 has been released. Among a series of interesting findings, one thing is clear: support for climate action and renewable energy continue to grow. In response to the survey’s questions on climate and energy, 59% of respondents agreed with the statement: “climate change is a serious and pressing problem. We should begin taking steps now even if this involves significant costs.”
https://theconversation.com/lowy-institute-poll-shows-australians-support-for-climate-action-at-its-highest-level-in-a-decade-98625
Dennis
I am sure you know that governments don’t demand that other government should start legislating on the basis of opinion polls. Ardern is not going to tell Australia how it should govern. She seems to have well and truly learnt that lesson
I know it seems to be the expectation on this site that the New Zealand will give all our close partners lectures on how they should run their countries, but Ardern is a PM, not a political activist.
I hope she hasn’t learnt that lesson, Wayne. Moral leadership is not only required nowadays in practical politics, it will actually be a pre-requisite to the consensus politics of survival for humanity during climate change.
But I share your scepticism inasmuch as she keeps presenting as merely a neoliberal manager of govt. To leave her mark on history, she will have to do much more than just that. She will have to lead a transformational government. One that has consequences on the global stage, not just here. Western statesmen have been conspicuous in their absence since Vaclav Havel. Could be an indicator that western stateswomen are emerging?
Not surprised – the orange roadcone-overcomb is out of options – slippery slope time and many more shockers to come.
“The dramatic and previously untold scene is recounted in Fear, a forthcoming book by Bob Woodward that paints a harrowing portrait of the Trump presidency, based on in-depth interviews with administration officials and other principals.”
https://i.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/106829020/bob-woodwards-new-book-reveals-a-nervous-breakdown-of-trumps-presidency
Cohn stole letters off Trump’s desk before he had signed them and Trump never even noticed they had gone. 😯
Cray Cray town
Sing it Gnarls Barkley
https://youtu.be/HTAdKdzWrgY
Yes Trump is unhinged; we always suspected this. But the reasons why he is POTUS are far less crazy than he is.
Some insight can be gleaned here: https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/106833345/hate-is-the-name-of-the-game-in-trump-world-bob-woodwards-new-book-reveals
Stuff reckons “Hate is the name of the game in Trump World”. Author of the review (PAUL WALDMAN ) reckons contempt is the name of the game, and provides the evidence to prove him right. Yet Woodward’s book is entitled Fear to inform us that he & his publisher have a third differing opinion.
We can only marvel at Trump’s ability to confuse everyone else all the time. Whether fear, contempt or hate is a better diagnosis of the political culture he generates, it is, as I mentioned here several weeks ago, social darwinism. Playing all against all, he ensures that only the most fit survive.
Imagine working for the prick. It’d be like:
“look on the bright side Mr POTUS, an orange jump suit matches your complexion and hair. We’ll arrange a hood for you.”
“Your red scarf matches my eyes……..
Loving you has made me babanas”
Fuck what a thicket of dysfunction! There goes the leader of the free Whurl.
The concern is that much of it has rubbed off – including in lil ole NuZull
Must be about time the govt re entered the negotiating room, with an offer better than 2% p.a. (i.e the rate of inflation) otherwise IMO they are just continuing on from the previous govt, and continuing to be part of the problem !!
“”Schools around the country have reported increasing difficulty finding relieving teachers over the last three years.”
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12119342
Not just an offer of 2%
“”To attract new teachers the offer will see a cumulative increase of14.7 per cent to base salaries for graduates with a teaching degree ($47,980 to $55,030) over three years, and a 14.2 per cent cumulative increase for graduates with a subject degree and graduate teaching diploma ($49,588 to $56,638) over three years.
“Teachers on the next steps (6-11) will see a cumulative increase of between 6.5 to 13.7 per cent to base salaries over three years. Teachers on the maximum step (12) will receive a cumulative increase of 6.1 per cent over three years ($75,949 to $80,599.)”
Its only 2% per year for those on the maximum step. When you look at the actual amounts it was $4500 over 3 years for top of scale and $7000 for new teachers
Apparently not just the teachers have shortages, apparently record amounts of GP’s are due to retire and new doctors are being “encouraged” to have 50% go into being a GP’s and there is predicted to be a shortage.
I’m not so sure it is shortages, but more they have rapidly increased NZ population artificially and in demographics that really impact teachers and doctors and then expect the existing professionals to just work harder… very Rogernomics thinking.
The question also is, why are they having difficulty attracting teachers in the first place or why are they are leaving? I think with teachers it is Dukeofurl comment down (8.2) that hits the nail on the head – too many positions are not guaranteed long term.
Also in NZ the whole system has become too adversarial and so many industries are allowed to rip people off (construction, utilities, councils, food, insurance ) that the cost of living is sky high and people expect to be able to do more than survive, but actually have a decent standard of living if they are in professional jobs.
So what % of teachers are on the top pay scale either with a degree or diploma ?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11867471
That is partly why teachers in their fifties or older have increased from 35 per cent of teachers in 2005 to 41 per cent a decade later.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2018/01/half-of-all-high-school-teachers-quit-within-5-years.html
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12106964
For me this is why the govt is standing firm “..plus a further $200m or so when it flows through to secondary teachers who lodged their own pay claims last week..”
Part of the problem is that government seem to just write off young Kiwis and not want to encourage them into teaching so therefore you are not getting enough of the people who would be good teachers wanting to do that.
The newish board of trustees system also means they technically ‘hire teachers” so you are getting more of a cultural bias into whatever the board wants as teachers, and the board are not in the teaching profession themselves.
Same has happened with building as soon as they made tertiary about user pays and high fees they automatically encouraged people to go for a career that was considered more financially rewarding.
Teaching should be a high status profession, but somehow they have wrecked that in the last 30 years.
To go into the trades, you used to be paid to do it on the job by industry, not spend time and a lot of money on your education and paperwork for years. They need to get the people in, THEN get them to study and register after a few years of practical paid work under their belts.
Warning – long and detailed but contains some primer points on how things get on the Order Paper for debate in Parliament and what could be an interesting situation in the House today re a Member’s Bill due to be debated probably late afternoon. Also possibly relates to Peters’ current grumpiness and his remarks re refugees vis a vis the Coalition agreement.
Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill (aka Waka Jumping Bill)
This is the first week back to the House in the ‘four weeks on/ two weeks off’ House sitting calendar and for addicts like me it is interesting to see what is on the debating programme for each session.
Of particular interest to me (and possibly very few others except possibly Micksavage and Dennis Frank LOL) was whether the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill – aka the waka jumping bill – would make it back into the House this week. From looking at the Order paper for yesterday and progress made, and today’s Order Paper, the answer is very unlikely. Actually ‘No’ is probably more accurate and may well be intentional.
This Bill went through its Second Reading and half of its Committee stages during the week of 7 – 9 August including under extended hours on the morning of Thurs 9 August, but then lost prominence in the last week of that four week sitting session when the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) Amendment Act was pushed through under urgency in the week of 14 – 16 August .
[NOTE: the make up and placement of Government Bills on each day’s Order Paper is solely at the discretion of the Government (Standing Order 68). OTOH Member‘s Bills appear on the Order Papers for Members‘ Days in accordance with a strict priority set by Standing Orders 71 and 72. and cannot be rearranged by the Government, Speaker etc. Private and Local Bills are similarly governed by Standing Orders 69 and 70.]
http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-NZ/00HOHPBReferenceStOrders20171/7868e924149435f4cb3c6e00cfc63ec498a39b37
Yesterday’s Order Paper (4/9/2018) showed the continuation of the Committee stages of this ‘waka jumping bill’ back down to No 11 on the list of Government Bills. Nine other Government Bills were listed for First, Second or Third Readings taking up a total of up to 13½ hours of debating time allocated to the usual set maximum number of 12 X 10 minute speeches (2 hours) for each Reading.
Normally these nine Readings could take up to 18 hours but the first Reading of one Bill started in the previous sitting session had only 90 minutes of speeches left, and three of the Bills (Nos 7 – 9) were being taken together. Following these Bills, at No 10 was the Education (Teaching Council of Aotearoa NZ) Amendment Bill set down for Committee stages which are not limited in terms of time or number of speeches. As National’s current MO is to filibuster every Bill at all stages, but particular at the Committee stages, this Bill is likely to take some time.
http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-NZ/OrderPaper_20180904/b131016772ec5be085794488af075758fc7a5b55
A normal week in Parliament involves the House sitting from 2pm – 6pm and 7.30pm -10pm each Tues and Weds and from 2pm – 6pm only on Thursday – a total of 17 hours. Each day, Question Time takes up about one hour, and every Wednesday the General Debate following Question Time is assigned one hour a total of four hours, leaving 13 hours for the House to debate Bills, etc in a normal three day sitting week where the House does not invoke extended hours or urgency.
Every fourth week is also meant to be a Members’ Day on the Wednesday – allowing 4½ hours for the debating of Member’s Bills (and Private and Local Bills), further reducing the time for debating Government Bills to 8½ hours in those weeks. However, this is sometimes changed depending on what else is being debated – eg Budget debates and similar override Members’ days.
Today is a Members Day as set down on the Order Paper, thereby further reducing the possibility of the waka jumping Bill surfacing again this week.
http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-NZ/OrderPaper_20180905/936f574159293616ec308aa6f7837e17e7746ab3
Yesterday, the House moved through the first three Government Bills on yesterday’s Order Paper more quickly than the maximum time allowed, meaning they were halfway through No 4 on the list when the House rose at 10pm. This time saving was offset by the House undertaking an Urgent Debate called for by Simon Bridges on the removal of Clare Curran from Cabinet taking just over an hour. (As an aside, over 15 mins of that time was Bridges floundering around, which led to the next speaker, Chris Hipkins, calling Bridges’ speech “the longest 15 minutes in Bridges’ life” and Bridges being “two snappers short of a resignation”. LOL.)
Together with today’s Members Day, this means that the only time left for debating Government Bills this week is about two hours tomorrow, Thursday, after Question Time before the House rises at 6pm.
Today’s Order Paper has also introduced four other Government Bills to replace the three Bills that passed their Readings yesterday ahead of the waka jumping Bill which is now back down to No 12. These are at Nos 1, 5, 6 and 10 on today’s Order Paper. Although these Bills will not come up today being a Members Day, in theory the set time Readings of the eight Bills before the waka jumping bill could take up to a maximum of 10 ½ hours plus three Bills now up for their Committee stages debates of no maximum time. Against only two hours available tomorrow.
So bye bye waka jumping bill for this week at least, unless there are further changes to tomorrow’s Order Paper – highly unlikely IMO. If any, they may well push it further down the pecking order.
————————————————————
Member’s Bill (Rino Tirikatene) – Electoral (Entrenchment of Maori Seats) Amendment Bill
HOWEVER – there is another Electoral Amendment Bill on today’s Order Paper that will be rather controversial and probably will not make it through to Select Committee consideration.
This is the Electoral (Entrenchment of Maori Seats) Amendment Bill sponsored by Rino Tirikatene intended to align the Maori seats with general electorate seats which are already entrenched under section 268 of the Electoral Act 1993. More information is provided in the Explanatory Note in the Bill.
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/member/2018/0056/latest/whole.html#DLM4333801
The First Reading of this Bill is now at No 2 in the order of Members’ Bills and set down for 12 X 10 minute speeches today. The Member’s Bill at No 1 is only set down for 35 mins maximum debate, so taking into account Question Time and the one hour General Debate, Tirikatene’s Bill should pop up for debate about 4.30pm or thereabouts and continue after the dinner break.
When this Bill was pulled out of the biscuit tin ballot back in May 2018 this raised Winston Peters’ blood pressure in view of NZF’s longstanding policy to call for a referendum on the continuation of the Maori seats. He made it clear at the time that NZF will not be supporting this Bill.
Peters’ blood pressure is probably up again with this up for debate today even though if NZF vote against the Bill with National, this Bill will not make it past this First Reading to Select Committee and will die on a Vote of Ayes 54 (L/GP) vs Noes 65 (NZF/Nats) with ACT being an unknown if Seymour votes at all. The latter seems to be his MO at present in many cases.
To avoid this defeat and the further opportunity for claims that the Coalition Govt is in disarray etc, Tirikatene could withdraw or postpone the Bill under Standing Order 74(1)(b) thereby removing it from debate today. In fact, I am surprised it hasn’t been. But then again, maybe an opportune time for it to be debated while both Ardern and Peters are out of the country.
I wonder in fact whether the fact that Peters’ much wanted Electoral Integrity Bill/ waka jumping Bill is not progressing as fast as he wants coupled with the unfortunate coincidence of Titikatene’s entrenchment of the Maori seats Bill coming up for debate today (though the strict Standing Orders mentioned above) has contributed to, or is the cause of, his grumpiness at present, including his challenging remarks etc re refugee numbers. After all , this is politics …and sometimes not dissimilar to chess……
I’m not inclined to see the grumpy old man syndrome as evidence of substantial disagreement, but you could be right that Labour & NZF haven’t reached consensus on refugee policy. Understandable that media seize on apparent discord like a pitbull trying to extricate meat from a body: it’s their industrial process at work.
Just needs govt leader or deputy to say the magic words: ” we haven’t agreed a govt policy on refugee numbers yet”, doesn’t it?
You seem to be missing the point. My post is more about these two Electoral Amendment Bills much more than about the refugee issues.
As you say, the PM and/or the DPM could just say that they have not agreed a govt policy on refugee numbers yet, but they haven’t. Instead Peters has stood his ground on the NZF policy on no increase etc and obviously had not consulted the PM on his intention to do so. Hence my grumpy old man remark (and I have called him that to his face years ago in jest when I had a lot to do with him while working on secondments to Parliament. LOL)
His remarks and the PM’s reaction are not a good look, but I do understand that NZF need to maintain their base conservative policies to maintain their voting core constituency – as is discussed under the post on Winston and the refugees issue by mickysavage.
My point is that last week was a bit of a bumpy one and this week is looking a little so too, so the coincidence of these two Electoral Amendment Bills appearing on the Order Paper at the same time tends to give the perception of more dissonance.
As I said, Peters is very keen to get the waka jumping Bill through, but is opposed in principle to the Tirikatene Member’s Bill to entrench the Maori seats as this is very much against a longstanding NZF policy which they campaigned on to hold a referendum on whether or not the Maori seats should continue. The Tirikatene Bill is to resolve a longstanding technicality which could be left for the moment without any real consequences – in the interests of not raising the preception of more disharmony.
Here is what Peters said back in May when the Tirikatene Bill was drawn in the ballot.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2018/08/nz-first-may-back-entrenchment-of-m-ori-seats-if-there-s-a-referendum-first.html
As I also now see, I am not alone in thinking this and I/S has called it on NRT ” … a potential flashpoint in the coalition …” ie
http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2018/09/members-day.html
BUT wait there is more … Did I mention chess?
I have just found this article re Peters may support Tirikatene’s Bill – if there is a referendum on retaining the Maori seats first.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2018/08/nz-first-may-back-entrenchment-of-m-ori-seats-if-there-s-a-referendum-first.htm
Perhaps there has been agreement after all. We only have a few hours to wait.
And it appears that Bridges will not be in the House today, as Bennett is fronting Question No 1 to the PM. With both Peters and Ardern away, who is the Acting PM today?
ADDENDUM – And Seymour actually does have a position on the Maori seats. He wants to abolish them or so it seems. The whole thing is getting even more interesting.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2018/08/david-seymour-says-wants-to-abolish-m-ori-seats-but-will-he-actually-be-able-to.html
I appreciate your explanations, just saw no need to comment! Hard to tell if they are brokering deals behind the scenes when necessary, of course, as we would expect, to ensure successful governance. If that basic process has been suspended, or has not yet re-engaged after the return of the PM due to scheduling difficulties, some irritation would be natural…
Posted this previously, a few mates of mine sons are currently training to be a builder (A much needed skill) all 3 of them currently have had their son’s in their 3rd or 4th building coys as they proceed thru their apprenticeships. Why is that because they have been placed on contracts not wages, and as work loads for the builders they have been under reduced they are “let go”
In the “old days” apprectices did their time with 1 coy and were waged staff.
The building industry IMO cannot complain about skill shortages and then not have a system that allows ease to obtain the qualifications. It appears much less stress to allow off shore workers to make up for any shortfalls.
Try google and search building apprentices in Auckland the results are to me alarming. There are none
You are 100% right Herodotus.
What you have to wonder, is when it is so obvious, why does the government seem so obsessed with doing the opposite and then wringing their hands and/or ignoring poverty, lack of housing, lack of job opportunities for many including school leavers, massive infrastructure costs being forced onto locals instead of business and shoddy workmanship?
Its because of Employment Contracts Act that short term contracts became the norm in building , even for qualified builders.
Is happening in Teaching now as well. Those Schools saying they cant get decent applicants are not saying the job they are offering isnt a staff position but is a contact for a year or so which ‘may’ be renewed. Especially affects those teachers starting out.
Yep, how can you buy a house (or even rent one now) when you don’t know whether you will have a job or not each year and you might be forced to relocate without much notice to get a new job.
Although to be fair to ministry, a lot of 1 year contracts is because of maternity leave.
I understood it was a way of ‘trying out’ new teachers
I think it is more than that – It is even happening across the ditch – my daughter who has an MA (Hons) and BSc (Hons) and masses of other relevant experience coupled with about 7 years teaching experience simply cannot get a permanent teaching position – and it is not just her – It applies to almost all her colleagues . The jobs being offered are all one year contracts because the schools want to be “flexible” in their staffing requirements. As school rolls go up and down like a yo-yo these days (as they fall in and out of popularity) the school can off load or recruit staff more easily. There is little loyalty to staff these days no matter how dedicated they are.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/books/106800942/PM-Jacinda-Ardern-Clarke-Gayford-and-baby-Neve-star-in-new-kids-book?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
Whenever I think the media have hit peak Jacinda something else comes along…this must be what lefties felt like when Sir John Key was in full swing 🙂
Yes Chris 73, jacinda beating key at his own game. And although I don’t like it, I am all for jacinda using opportunities like this to counteract the negative spin from msm about labour.
All the bs from garner, soper et al about the cost of jacindas trip tp Nauru. Ffs were any of them outraged by bridges limo use?
Just as a matter of interest, what made you a righty?
Have you been one since adolescence?
Not being stupid would have a lot to do with it
I like being clean and smelling clean so I had no other choice but to vote right and, if taking it a step further, my sense of smell comes from my parents then its all their fault 🙂
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/feb/28/hate-body-odour-youre-more-likely-to-have-rightwing-views
‘People who have a greater tendency to turn their nose up at the whiff of urine, sweat and other body odours are more likely to have rightwing authoritarian attitudes, research suggests.’
Very good, chris73 and nicely finished with a 🙂 – that’s the spirit!
Thing is, like Sir John Key, it’ll take a lot of time before the public tire of Jacinda so best to leave her alone and go after the weaker members of the herd and pick them off one by one
I just wonder who’d be the next target…
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/106851077/embattled-minister-clare-curran-struggles-to-explain-using-personal-email-for-government-business
Journalism is on the cutting edge of where it’s at. Or maybe not. I’m obviously not a journalist as who would pay for that sentence!
But it is amazing what will happen to you – TVNZ journalist reporting on Nauru at a cafe after talking to a refugee. Come with us, police station for three hours. But not detained, just have to be careful about being ‘unannounced’ in risk area.
Lost her accreditation, now got it back.
RNZ reporter Gia Garrick –
“We had an MFAT official sit the seven of us down, or actually it was the six of us minus Barbara [Dreaver], she wasn’t back at this stage …and tell us that the Nauru government would like to pass on a message to us that it would prefer if we reported on the Forum instead of just focussing on the one issue here.
Really it didn’t want any focus on the refugee issue that has led to problems for the poor Nauruans as well as the inmates. A no win situation for anyone, not even Australians who are so scared of these people. Doesn’t say much for supposedly bold, brave Ozzies in the wars does it.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/365728/nz-journalist-reaccredited-to-nauru-forum-meeting
Good morning Newshub That’s the way Prince Charles lead the way to a environmentally friendly future of sustainable energy ka pai .
I see that great innovative British company Dyson have invested in producing electric cars to ka pai.
That’s sad about that Mana Wahine Penny Bright we need more wahine like her to make a stand for the common people to be treated humanly & fairly by the big boys .
Duncan this is what happen’s when a government denies a housing shortage so there m8 can cash up on capital gain’s. I heard an know of a few people had to live in hotels
4 years ago and the Tsunami of house less tangata is still rolling in & rising .
This same phenomenon has been caused by the greedy people in America Britain Canada Australia the neo libreals buying there voter’s does anyone see a pattion here shonky .
Loyd the fishermen are hard men the scallop fishing dispute between British and French fishermen this must have been going on for a few years they need to Aline there policy’s so this situation you can not two competing fisheries and clearly one is not concerned about preserving the fishery as the other can you see the Bigotry .
Its is laugh able how no negative story’s got to be published and put on TV when the last government was in parliament conclusion FOLLOW THE MONEY.
Duncan there is no magic wand to fix your m8 deliberate shorting our housing markets for there gain . I can see you are all about your EGO ana to kai
Ka kite ano P.S and so are your bosses
Lance O Sullivan does not get the big Picture if
he did he would not go poking holes in the waka that has given the most care for common tangata whenua & then giving the party that caused this mess amo to fire at the Labour party his action could cause us to slide the neo libreals back into power that will be a stuff up for the poor people enough said ka kite ano
You know what makes Eco Maori get a sore face is a lot of Maori leader know that the justice system was and is still un fair to tangata whenua how do I know this well the upper classes are in the no they rub shoulders together they are part of the system and they did nothing to warn te tangata whenua about this un fair justisce system they are just looking out for there own best interest Eco looks out for all people future
Its not just about me in my Papatuanuku
Ka kite ano. Ana to kai
The sirens are going off again did you like my challenge I have sent out to all Maori Leaders He tangata he tangata he atua he tangata . Ka kite ano
P.S these leader’s are still deafening reality all around Papatuanuku the indigenous cultures are being pushed into hardship Australier America Canada Many country’s that are pushing native people under the bridge around Papatuanuku
Here you go a good education on reality for all tangata link is below ka kite ano
https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2018/sep/03/denialism-what-drives-people-to-reject-the-truth-podcast
WOW the sandflys are swarming today they tried a repeat of yesterday’s play by getting some of there young puppets to park right close behind me I could see how nervious the driver was . They think they know me YEA RIGHT
You want to know why they are so unset I used the Infrormation ACT on the New Zealand Police to get all files on me be it written, verbal ,voice recording ,video recording ,written any data and buy the LAWS in there book’s they have to give me this information . I will let you know how my progress is on this subject.
The sandfly’s are interfering in my son’s work life my wife’s work life all of my family’s lives and a lot of people know that this is happening They think they are above the Law that they break every day holding on to there bibles.
If they don’t give me my private information well that will tell all my readers that the justices systems are a SHAM . P.S why are they trying to get me to assault some one because they have nothing on me so they are trying to entice into assaulting one of there undercover muppets so they can beat me in there cells I can see the smoke coming out there ——– Ana to kai ka kite ano
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XaS93WMRQQ
Peter Thiel is one of the people responsible for putting trump in the White House we don;t need him coming down here with the attitude that he is a law on to him self using his money and Lawyers to do just that he will use his money to shape our laws to suit his class of people and who give’s a shit about the consequences of pushing more people onto the bread lines and on the street’s . He backs privatization and smaller governments the first one will siphon more money to the wealty from the poor the people who they don’t care about , There belief is that you have to have poor people this is justified by them they say poor people are what is needed to keep profits flowing up to the wealthy and wages low . The second one is because they want a small weak government so they can do what they want the government,s will be to weak to stop them. Thats how there capitalism WORKS he doe’s not care about the people if he did he would not have backed trump enough said link is below .
Of course Drury is going to back him Thiel is powerful enough to be able to cause a slide in Drurys favorite stock no. Ana to kai ka kite ano link below.Theil will be a raciest like his m8
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12120090
I filed A Infromation ACT on Ministry of Primary Industry to why because the top cop from Gisborne who started this farce man hunt on me got his ex cop m8 that work for MAF a well known fact that MAF is were cops go when they leave the police force .
So all the information that MAF has will open the door for my court case against the New Zealand Police to stop there un- justified harassment of me and my family .
I have some one of high credibility how told me that MAF was watching me they tryed to get him to sack me he told them were to go. Ana to kai ka kite ano P.S a lot of people can see your bad behavior
Here is a Mana Wahine she discovered the first pulser netron star they emite beams of radiation out two oppsite points on the star over 50 years ago her male colleges got the prize and hounners she was award a major science prize Ka pai the Papatuanuku is growing up. ka kite ano link is below
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45425872
Good evening Newshub the high price of fuel will encourage people to buy Electric Cars that’s a good thing .
The what Authority ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????.
That organization need to be scraped it is not interdependent it’s is that in NAME ONLY.
Game of Thrones a that’s a good win for Weta digital studio see computer TEC industry’s is big business and NZ is missing out because a lot of contracts for new work is going to over seas company’s.
Humpty Dumpty LOL. his mistress mite be able to put him to gather again.
3d printing is the technology that is going to help us get to a carbon neutral future .
The Mokopunas will just print what they want not shops no low freight Ka pai
Science is going to lead us to a better future that T cell therapy to treat cancer is awsome.
I give Papatuanuku creatures are awesome I had a ridge back dog that was huge .
Ka kite ano .
The Crowd Goes Wild Makere & Mulls I was just writing about Mull’s pronouncing those names he you did better than I would have.
No comment on the ref Mull’s &; Makere for the Leauge .
What was in the drink ??????
Dont cut the cheese Mulls leave the fruit alone guys .
Were’s Wairangi I could guess across the ditch no.
Ka kite ano P.S thats mean That the World Surfing is paying the Wahine the same as the men ka pai
The fake it till you make it class trump everyone could see there were heaps more people at Obama inuarguation than trumps. He still has idiots following him they are idiots as well he is dragging the worst of humanity out of there holes of – – – – fools Ka kite ano
Link is Below P.S lucky his muppets are only actually 20% of the people he fakes all the polls to like shonky
Trump inauguration crowd photos were edited after he intervened
This person is telling us to stop living in the past he would much rather hear about world war 1 & 2 than the real truth about what has happened in the past sure his hapu mite have lost a war and lost there best land but his sad excuse of dont live or look to the past is tipical. The reality is when a country does not teach te Mokopunas about the past they are hiding the facts that they RIPPED off All Maori and not just one hapu they are ashamed of the way they treated Maori full stop.
This writer has a silver spoon in his mouth that will be 1 reason he wants the past hidden he has been sucked into the denial spin what about the thousands of Maori in prison does he think that’s fair enough said link below Ka kite ano
https://i.stuff.co.nz/opinion/106877783/NEW-ZEALAND-WE-NEED-TO-STOP-LIVING-IN-THE-PAST PS this guy is a nagti pakeha
Good evening Newshub has simon sorted out his leak in his canoe enough said.
The Gisborne injection of money is good the roads are bad there back to the future Ka pai.
We can not even control party pill let
alone probiotic go figure.
Burt Reynolds was a excellent old school actor ECO enjoyed his humour and his movies Mike I guessing that you watch some of his movies.
Ka kite ano P.S I’m chasing our Mokopunas at the minute
The Crowd goes Wild Mulls & Wairangi
Wai I thought you were getting a tan in Australia.
That will be mean watching the Wahine League and then the Warriors game straight after Ka pai.
A Japanese Wahine in the finals for the Tennis Kia kaha.
The whenuapai Battlers I miss the name of the your sport.
That was a good win for Kelston college league team Ka kite ano.