‘The Dow Jones Industrial Average sank more than 375 points as a selloff in Chinese equities spread around the world, fanned by concerns that economic growth is decelerating from Asia to North America.
The U.S. blue-chip index tumbled toward its worst start to a year since 1932, while banks and technology shares led the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index lower.
A measure of global equities headed for its worst inaugural session in at least three decades. Emerging markets slid the most since August as slowing manufacturing triggered a selloff that halted Shanghai trading. Bonds jumped and the yen rallied on demand for haven assets.
“We’ve had a number of negatives out there in the U.S. throughout most of last year as investors battled to have a flat year and China is a reminder that there aren’t many things to be bullish about going into this year,” Michael O’Rourke, chief market strategist at Jones Trading Institutional Services LLC in Greenwich, Connecticut, said by phone.
Investors returning to the market after the New Year holiday faced a worldwide selloff sparked by weak factory data in China, while a reading that showed the fastest contraction in U.S. manufacturing in six years added to anxiety that slowing growth in the world’s second-largest economy is spreading.
A flareup in tension between Saudi Arabia and Iran increased geopolitical unease.’
MORE BAD NEWS ABOUT WATER QUALITY IN CANTERBURY
This from the Timaru Herald today.
“Potentially toxic algae continues to bring risks to the region’s river users in the warm, dry conditions. Warnings remain in place on the Opihi River at State Highway 1 and Waipopo Huts, the Waihao River below Bradshaws Bridge, the Waihi River at Winchester and Geraldine, the Temuka River at SH1, the Hakataramea River at the SH82 bridge, and the Pareora River at SH1 and Evans Crossing.
Regional authority Environment Canterbury warns “significant quantities” of cyanobacteria algae at the sites could make people and pets who touch the water or algae sick.
As well as the algae, recorded E coli levels nearing “trigger levels” at several sites mean the Opihi River at Saleyards Bridge near Pleasant Point and the Otaio River at Otaio Gorge are the only monitored South Canterbury river sites ECan rates as “good” for swimming. ”
Yesterday only the mid & North Canterbury rivers were named but this report shows that Ecan the National Govt. appointed group are failing the whole of their area.
The Opihi was my childhood river where I learnt to swim, caught cockies, made rafts , drank it. WoooH this is not the New Zealand I grew up in.
Minister Smith and other Nat Ministers responsible are a disgrace, their leader should take their portfolios off them. I wish….
It was interesting to note the other day that both David Cameron and John Key used the same “New Zealand/Britain on the cusp/verge of something special” in their respective election campaigns. The New Zealand election came first so I guess this particular PR spin was tried out here first and then repeated in Britain.
While consumption is happening it gives the impression that there is a real economy (with old-fashioned Form 3 economic systems operating – workers making and doing things, earning, factories and business activity selling things and so on, workers and others buyiing those things, with govt transfers and taxes streaming out from the side to feed the social machine, then the cycle repeating itself).
But style before substance is the order of the day now. Putting cosmetic layers over the bare shell of the economy has become accepted, like women applying make-up every day to cover their natural faces. Pity the natural economy isn’t so comely when revealed plain and simple with all its imperfections and distortions.
it would be nice to have a chart showing how the Christmas Sales went this year in NZ. Not eftpost transaction, but actually Christmas Shopping say from Mid November till 24/12.
Or just a chart with Eftpos Transaction over that period of time, say over a period of 10 – 15 years. Not sure where to find something like that.
i heard from a lot of people that the annual shopping frenzy needed by many retailers to cover the first three month of the new year was not that lucrative.
That survey is pretty broad and doesn’t really separate the really discretionary spend sectors that get hammered when people aren’t feeling flash. Does show when businesses have had a good run in past quarters with vehicle spending.
Xmas eftpos figures aren’t terribly reliable as spending patterns are influenced by which day 25/12 falls on, so reporting can change to keep the news good.
Comparing retail and eftpos stats to what we see across the counter in the gallery, if they are roughly in line with CPI there’s not much money around and it’s hard work for us from the domestic market. 2-3 points above CPI and we’re humming. Right now it’s all international and quite good because of the lower dollar, but only for USD.
What I found interesting was that the same exact line was parroted in two different countries. It showed the complete vapidity of John Key’s comment. It wasn’t even driven by some misguided vision of where New Zealand is headed. There was no unique vision whatsoever. It was completely contrived, with nothing to do with reality. Just a piece of advertising fluff thought up by a PR company. We could be on the verge of something special or on the verge of hell – it made no difference provided it was a line that would sell the government at the election. New Zealand and New Zealanders have basically been commodified into a product to be sold back to us. In a way this is the ultimate end result of Rogernomics/Monetarism. A financial value has been applied to absolutely everything from the clothes we wear to the values we hold as a country.
“The New Zealand election came first so I guess this particular PR spin was tried out here first” and “same exact line was parroted in two different countries. It showed the complete vapidity of John Key’s comment”
I’ll suggest an alternative viewpoint. Given the timing of the statements, and I’ll assume that you are quoting them accurately, we could say something like this.
“Here we have further evidence of the enormous influence that John Key has in the world. Just as Obama and Turnbull showed, Key is respected and admired by most other world statesmen. That everything he says is listened to carefully by other world leaders as is illustrated by Cameron showing the ultimate flattery of imitating him”.
There, I’m sure that with your great respect for our Prime Minister you’ll agree that that is a much more likely scenario?
““Here we have further evidence of the enormous influence that John Key has in the world. Just as Obama and Turnbull showed, Key is respected and admired by most other world statesmen. That everything he says is listened to carefully by other world leaders”
Especially the pony tail pulling bit, Turnbull say’s nice things about any one, and so does Obama, it’s called diplomacy
What a load of BS, the MSM would love to have you believe that, and obviously you do.
I was sure you would. I wrote it just for you.
I thought it was in the same vein of fantasy as was esoteric pineapples actually.
It is amazing what one can come up with when, like ES and I, you decide that for something like this any connection between reality and the comment made can be discarded. You are, of course, living in that world all the time aren’t you?
Brendan starts to make the case for it being the latter not the former, whereas other business leaders make the case for the contrary.
If anyone wants to understand why it continues to be so hard to push New Zealand’s rural rump up the value escalator when Denmark and Finland have made it look so easy, have a read. It’s a good piece.
Alan Duff, who owns chateaux in France and denies poverty exists yet claiming to help those in low decile schools by giving them a few books. Apparently we have a ‘poverty of spirit’ yet he describes kids in Mangere wanting to be orthodontist.
Millsy
Don’t get dirty on Alan Duff. He has done something with his books for kids. Far more than many other people. Even though he is a controversial figure, save your intense scorn for others.
“The Middle East is the most vulnerable to a geopolitical leadership vacuum and is heading toward conflagration. There are six failed states across the broader region (Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Mali, Syria, and Yemen) and more refugees than ever recorded. ISIS has become the most powerful terrorist organization in history. Oil economies are under strain. All of this will get worse in 2016.
Europe will feel much of the pain—in economic costs, security vulnerability, and political blowback. The United States, at the twilight of Barack Obama’s administration, will mostly stick to its knitting, since the western hemisphere remains insulated from the lion’s share of geopolitical instability. In Asia, despite having many of the world’s strongest national leaders, helping manage these problems is not a priority.
This all means a dramatically more fragmented world in 2016 with more intra-, inter-, and extra-state conflict than at any point since World War II. And yet drawing the major powers into military battle against one another—World War III—is virtually unthinkable (recent comments from Pope Francis notwithstanding). The world’s four largest economies—the United States, China, Japan, and Germany—are all deeply reluctant to accept responsibility for crisis management. Only the Germans are affected directly by this turmoil, and they still have plenty of reasons to duck the fight.
And so, in 2016, conflict intensifies. Last year, investors recognized growing uncertainty but remained more focused on the economic improvements: a US economy in recovery and Europe coming out of recession. That’s unlikely to last, as geopolitical risk shakes the global order.”
The broader report also dishes on:
– The hollow and weakening trans-Atlantic partnership
– Conflict between Open Europe and Closed Europe
– China being the only remaining country with a global strategy, and its increasing global footprint
– Rise of ISIS within many more Islamic-dominated countries
– Destabilising discord inside Saudi Arabia
– Technology leaders rising as political agents
– Political and economic crisis worsening in Brazil
And dismisses a few things as red herrings:
“US voters aren’t going to elect a president who will close the country to Muslims. China’s economy isn’t headed for a hard landing, and its politics will remain stable. Continued strong leadership from Japan’s Shinzo Abe, India’s Narendra Modi, and especially China’s Xi Jinping will keep Asia’s three most important players focused on economic reform and longer-term strategy, reducing the risk of conflict in Asia’s geopolitics.”
It’s a fun stab at a bunch of things.
[lprent: This wound up in spam. Did a mod have their finger slip? Cos I checked it and it looks like Ad to me. Comment doesn’t appear to have issues for the site and I see that YourNZ linked to it. Extracted back out of spam.
Mods/Ad: If it was intended, then send it to trash, I don’t evaluate those. ]
[Hi it was me sorry. Wanted to convert it into a post. I was going to replace the text with this. Then when I went back it was no longer in spam … MS]
and then there is Dick Smith Electronics, or maybe it was. But surely all the soon to be unemployed will find a job pronto in our Rock Star Economy. And surely now that we are in 2016 and the run for 2017 has effectively started we can start talking tax cuts to stimulate the economy 🙂
Woolies probably bit anchorage capitals hand off unloading it in 2011 to them and they have behaved like the bankstas they are since with financial tricks and sale after sale in a sector under huge pressure with lotsa real estate, etailing etc.
The geeks who knew stuff cant be found much anymore and everything they sell can be picked up from places with same or better advice with sharper prices like a PB tech, harvey norman, jb etc
My biggest complaint about DSE over the last few years is that it’s no longer a electronics store for hobbyists but is now a whiteware store. Used to be able to go in there and get the knowledge and parts to make the electronics that you wanted to.
Seems really hard to find good hobbyist stores any more – even online – and I think we’ll find that it’s having a detrimental effect upon innovation.
yeah – jaycar has some interesting stuff, probably filling the vacuum left by DSE’s reorientation. Lots of kits, components, that sort of thing. Dedicated computer stores like pb or cellotech handle the other side.
DSE is just another place where you go for a computer and they sell you a standard box with the sales staff on a quota to upsell you the extended warranty. I went in on boxing day and they had espresso machines, ffs.
That is what got DSE in the end, really. They moved away from selling gadgets and hobby electronics to just selling what you could get from Harvey Norman or The Warehouse. They didnt even have HDMI – VGA adapters in there when I was looking for them.
They bought it for about 100 mil, pumped a bit of money in and made it look pretty, conned 500 mil for the float ($2.20 / share) two years ago, it’s 0.34 / share now and Anchorage are long gone, sold the last of their stock 6 months ago. And the thing is carrying huge debt.
The electronics side got sold to Jaycar Electronics who lots of nerds go to now.
Dick Smith just became another retailer with hardly any technical knowledge with buyers who didn’t buy things like limited editions of games even on pre-order cause they are asshats who didn’t realise that those of us who bought both the electronics and limited editions spent a lot of money in their shops on other stuff.
They also populated their store locally with PS4 fanboys who just pissed off us regular Xbox players. You don’t sell stuff to us by telling us that what we (consciously) prefer is crap, particularly when we know a darn sight more about the merits and issues with the different systems than you do.
Even with PC’s I had one dick tell me I couldn’t put the RAM I wanted in myself and needed to pay someone who knew what they were doing to do it. When I said I know how easy it was and explained it he was totally gobsmacked. He’d never actually ever looked inside a PC.
The older (experience not age) staff knew us and tried to hold on to our business but their hands were tied.
That is like walking into Mitre 10 and discovering the staff dont know how to install gib board, or going to Repco, and finding the people who work there dont know how to connect/remove a car battery.
Graeme, I agree with you, I don’t think they lost it, it was simply ripped off them, the share holders, that is.
I saw the in depth report this evening, disturbing really, and blatant.
After closing 100 stores, Woolworths decided to exit the struggling business in 2012, selling it to private equity firm Anchorage Capital Partners. At the time, Vulture South noted the AU$20 million “initial cash proceeds” from the sale was probably less than the value of in-store inventory.
Anchorage then re-floated the business in 2013 for $520 million. Funds manager Forage Funds Management last October called the Anchorage deal “the greatest private equity heist of all time“
“Whilst confident on the long-term viability of the company, the directors have been unsuccessful in obtaining the necessary support of its banking syndicate to see it through this period.”
ACCORDING to the United States government, nearly 7 out of 10 American adults weigh too much. (In 2010, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention categorized 74 percent of men and 65 percent of women as either overweight or obese.)
But a new meta-analysis of the relationship between weight and mortality risk, involving nearly three million subjects from more than a dozen countries, illustrates just how exaggerated and unscientific that claim is.
The meta-analysis, published this week in The Journal of the American Medical Association, reviewed data from nearly a hundred large epidemiological studies to determine the correlation between body mass and mortality risk. The results ought to stun anyone who assumes the definition of “normal” or “healthy” weight used by our public health authorities is actually supported by the medical literature.
The study, by Katherine M. Flegal and her associates at the C.D.C. and the National Institutes of Health, found that all adults categorized as overweight and most of those categorized as obese have a lower mortality risk than so-called normal-weight individuals. If the government were to redefine normal weight as one that doesn’t increase the risk of death, then about 130 million of the 165 million American adults currently categorized as overweight and obese would be re-categorized as normal weight instead.
Family members who were nurses used to oft say to carry a bit of extra weight after 40 in case you had to have an operation.
Twas those that didn’t that most commonly died post-op as their bodies had insufficient surplus fat to use to recover.
Dunno if there any truth to that or whether it’s just an old wives tale but it’s an interesting notion.
I’ve always understood that the BMI index was established by insurance companies to determine risk from their perspective rather than a medical discovery – bit like legally blind doesn’t actually mean blind but sets out a point at which insurance companies would pay out or employers would be liable for costs.
Anyway it’s always been problematic in that the measure varies from country to country and changes in settings can change the number of people that are in any category.
“In 1998, the U.S. National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention brought U.S. definitions in line with World Health Organization guidelines, lowering the normal/overweight cut-off from BMI 27.8 to BMI 25. This had the effect of redefining approximately 29 million Americans, previously healthy to overweight.[21]
This can partially explain the increase in the overweight diagnosis in the past 20 years, and the increase in sales of the weight loss products during the same time. WHO also recommends lowering the normal/overweight threshold for South East Asian body types to around BMI 23, and expects further revisions to emerge from clinical studies of different body types.”
Seems to me that the key take-home message is to not rely on self-reported data when establishing guidelines.
As to the rest of it, it’s not granular enough to draw any conclusions: all causes mortality could be confounded by injuries, degree of medical care (are moderately fact people kept alive by pills?), or even if the issue is with the lower end of the “normal” category (i.e. increased mortality in underweight people throws off the base measurement).
Interesting, though. It’ll keep people in work for the next 20 years trying to narrow down where the ines should be roughly drawn. I’ll get the [unbuttered] popcorn.
This is a pretty good explanation about how deforestation, clearing land and techniques like dredging waterways increase flooding, and how traditional techniques of slowing water flow hold it in the land and decrease flooding. The article actually discusses climate change in the context of a local weather event too.
Droughts and floods have significant manmade causes in addition to climate change.
They got together with top academics from Oxford, Newcastle and Durham Universities to examine all options. Much the best plan turned out indeed to be to try to recreate past conditions by slowing the flow of water from the hills. Impressed by the intellectual endorsement, official bodies like the local councils, the Environment Agency, the Forestry Commission and even the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, joined in.
They built 167 leaky dams of logs and branches – which let normal flows through but restrict and slow down high ones – in the becks above the town; added 187 lesser obstructions, made of bales of heather and fulfilling the same purpose, in smaller drains and gullies; and planted 29 hectares of woodland. And, after much bureaucratic tangling, they built a bund, to store up to 120,000 cubic metres of floodwater, releasing it slowly through a culvert.
After 24 hours of rain, just three months after it was inaugurated, Mr Potter climbed up to the scheme and found it working well. Then he went home, “switched on the TV, and saw the all the floodwaters elsewhere”. He adds: “While there was devastation all over northern England, our newly completed defences worked a treat and our community got on with life as normal.” The total cost, he says, was around £2m, a 10th that of the original wall which, he believes, would not have coped with the Boxing Day conditions anyway.
The Greatest Strategic Impact of 3-D Printing: Local Production Replaces Globalization
Yet the greatest strategic impact of additive manufacturing may not occur on the battlefield, but rather in the mundane manufacturing of clothing, shoes, appliances, phones, medical devices, and much more. In short, localized distributed manufacturing will become the norm. Not only will products be cheaper, but they will also be extremely customizable, rendering traditional manufacturing able to compete in only a few areas. And since 3-D printing technology is so cheap, it will also be incredibly widespread — Cambodia, for instance, already has a 3-D print shop.
They’ll change space exploration as well IMO , imagine a rocket landing and unfolding a series of 3d printers to build habitats for the following ship of humans.!!
These types remind me of the anti-abortionist lobby of the 1970s and 80s – full of venom and hatred for anyone who didn’t support their view point. They are like a NZ version of the American fundamentalist movements.
Yeah well the religious know about the thin end of the wedge stuff. Works well for them.
We’ll set up our own schools in opposition to state funded secular education and pay for those schools ourselves for our religious children – give or take 10%
We’ll take state funding cause there’s less religious people
We’ll take white flight children from state schools and get them to lie about their religious status in order to pretend we only have 10% non-religious people at our school
We’ll infiltrate state schools through boards of trustees and start teaching religion at lunch times
We’ll start teaching religion during class times and make it difficult for pupils to not go
We’ll get our own special religious charter schools fully funded by the tax payer – with even better funding than the state schools
Totally agree. I found the combination of Family First NZ, Hospice New Zealand and the Salvation Army somewhat strange.
Okay the Hospice organisation believes in end of life, quality palliative care and that this should be well funded. It obeys the current law and doesn’t want a law change for euthenasia. Even if there was such a law change the Hospice association could still say that euthenasia was unacceptable to their charity and I for one would accept that.
Ditto the Salavtion army who provide some elder care services.
Both these organisations are fully entitled to their views and to incorporate them in their daily work.
Family First doesn’t appear to do anything hands on for elder care just issue a press release.
but why do any of these organisations feel that it is acceptable to attack an individual for attending a meeting where something they may not agree with is discussed?
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 27 were:1. The Minister for Ford Rangers strikes againTransport Minister Simeon Brown was again the busiest of the Cabinet ministers this week, announcing an ...
You got a fast carAnd I want a ticket to anywhereMaybe we make a dealMaybe together we can get somewhereAny place is betterYesterday’s newsletter, Trust In Me, on the report of abuse in state care, and by religious organisations, between 1950 and 2019, coupled with the hypocrisy of Christopher Luxon ...
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
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TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
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About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
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Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
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I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
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As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
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NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
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 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
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Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
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A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
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Global stocks sink after China index dives seven percent, causing US drop
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/75615516/global-stocks-sink-after-china-index-dives-seven-percent-causing-us-drop
‘The Dow Jones Industrial Average sank more than 375 points as a selloff in Chinese equities spread around the world, fanned by concerns that economic growth is decelerating from Asia to North America.
The U.S. blue-chip index tumbled toward its worst start to a year since 1932, while banks and technology shares led the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index lower.
A measure of global equities headed for its worst inaugural session in at least three decades. Emerging markets slid the most since August as slowing manufacturing triggered a selloff that halted Shanghai trading. Bonds jumped and the yen rallied on demand for haven assets.
“We’ve had a number of negatives out there in the U.S. throughout most of last year as investors battled to have a flat year and China is a reminder that there aren’t many things to be bullish about going into this year,” Michael O’Rourke, chief market strategist at Jones Trading Institutional Services LLC in Greenwich, Connecticut, said by phone.
Investors returning to the market after the New Year holiday faced a worldwide selloff sparked by weak factory data in China, while a reading that showed the fastest contraction in U.S. manufacturing in six years added to anxiety that slowing growth in the world’s second-largest economy is spreading.
A flareup in tension between Saudi Arabia and Iran increased geopolitical unease.’
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11569321
MORE BAD NEWS ABOUT WATER QUALITY IN CANTERBURY
This from the Timaru Herald today.
“Potentially toxic algae continues to bring risks to the region’s river users in the warm, dry conditions. Warnings remain in place on the Opihi River at State Highway 1 and Waipopo Huts, the Waihao River below Bradshaws Bridge, the Waihi River at Winchester and Geraldine, the Temuka River at SH1, the Hakataramea River at the SH82 bridge, and the Pareora River at SH1 and Evans Crossing.
Regional authority Environment Canterbury warns “significant quantities” of cyanobacteria algae at the sites could make people and pets who touch the water or algae sick.
As well as the algae, recorded E coli levels nearing “trigger levels” at several sites mean the Opihi River at Saleyards Bridge near Pleasant Point and the Otaio River at Otaio Gorge are the only monitored South Canterbury river sites ECan rates as “good” for swimming. ”
Yesterday only the mid & North Canterbury rivers were named but this report shows that Ecan the National Govt. appointed group are failing the whole of their area.
The Opihi was my childhood river where I learnt to swim, caught cockies, made rafts , drank it. WoooH this is not the New Zealand I grew up in.
Minister Smith and other Nat Ministers responsible are a disgrace, their leader should take their portfolios off them. I wish….
Canterbury from Blenheim to the Waitaki now resemble a large-scale industrial park. The only border is at the National Parks themselves, and the sea.
And this government reckons ‘wadeable’ is good enough water quality for us plebs, so that corporate dairy farmers can do as they please.
It was interesting to note the other day that both David Cameron and John Key used the same “New Zealand/Britain on the cusp/verge of something special” in their respective election campaigns. The New Zealand election came first so I guess this particular PR spin was tried out here first and then repeated in Britain.
http://news.sky.com/story/1480233/cameron-promises-britain-something-special
https://www.facebook.com/NZNATS/posts/951029848245944
Yeah – on the cusp of a depression!
UK wages set for worst wage growth since 1920’s
and feeling the pinch UK shoppers stay at home
The western economies are now more about consumption than the actual provision of needs – hence the worry in the financial sector as posted by Paul above. The markets are anxious because consumption is falling. Oh dear! What a catastrophe.
Yeah, can’t builds an economy on speculation and, as, that’s all that Western economies are based upon the speculators are stating to panic.
While consumption is happening it gives the impression that there is a real economy (with old-fashioned Form 3 economic systems operating – workers making and doing things, earning, factories and business activity selling things and so on, workers and others buyiing those things, with govt transfers and taxes streaming out from the side to feed the social machine, then the cycle repeating itself).
But style before substance is the order of the day now. Putting cosmetic layers over the bare shell of the economy has become accepted, like women applying make-up every day to cover their natural faces. Pity the natural economy isn’t so comely when revealed plain and simple with all its imperfections and distortions.
it would be nice to have a chart showing how the Christmas Sales went this year in NZ. Not eftpost transaction, but actually Christmas Shopping say from Mid November till 24/12.
Or just a chart with Eftpos Transaction over that period of time, say over a period of 10 – 15 years. Not sure where to find something like that.
i heard from a lot of people that the annual shopping frenzy needed by many retailers to cover the first three month of the new year was not that lucrative.
There’s this from Statistics
http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/industry_sectors/RetailTrade/RetailTradeSurvey_HOTPSep15qtr/Commentary.aspx
That survey is pretty broad and doesn’t really separate the really discretionary spend sectors that get hammered when people aren’t feeling flash. Does show when businesses have had a good run in past quarters with vehicle spending.
Xmas eftpos figures aren’t terribly reliable as spending patterns are influenced by which day 25/12 falls on, so reporting can change to keep the news good.
Comparing retail and eftpos stats to what we see across the counter in the gallery, if they are roughly in line with CPI there’s not much money around and it’s hard work for us from the domestic market. 2-3 points above CPI and we’re humming. Right now it’s all international and quite good because of the lower dollar, but only for USD.
What I found interesting was that the same exact line was parroted in two different countries. It showed the complete vapidity of John Key’s comment. It wasn’t even driven by some misguided vision of where New Zealand is headed. There was no unique vision whatsoever. It was completely contrived, with nothing to do with reality. Just a piece of advertising fluff thought up by a PR company. We could be on the verge of something special or on the verge of hell – it made no difference provided it was a line that would sell the government at the election. New Zealand and New Zealanders have basically been commodified into a product to be sold back to us. In a way this is the ultimate end result of Rogernomics/Monetarism. A financial value has been applied to absolutely everything from the clothes we wear to the values we hold as a country.
“The New Zealand election came first so I guess this particular PR spin was tried out here first” and “same exact line was parroted in two different countries. It showed the complete vapidity of John Key’s comment”
I’ll suggest an alternative viewpoint. Given the timing of the statements, and I’ll assume that you are quoting them accurately, we could say something like this.
“Here we have further evidence of the enormous influence that John Key has in the world. Just as Obama and Turnbull showed, Key is respected and admired by most other world statesmen. That everything he says is listened to carefully by other world leaders as is illustrated by Cameron showing the ultimate flattery of imitating him”.
There, I’m sure that with your great respect for our Prime Minister you’ll agree that that is a much more likely scenario?
Or could just be that both governments are being advised/told what to say by the Crosby’s.
““Here we have further evidence of the enormous influence that John Key has in the world. Just as Obama and Turnbull showed, Key is respected and admired by most other world statesmen. That everything he says is listened to carefully by other world leaders”
Especially the pony tail pulling bit, Turnbull say’s nice things about any one, and so does Obama, it’s called diplomacy
What a load of BS, the MSM would love to have you believe that, and obviously you do.
Love your mix of Monty Python and Ebsolutely Febulous there Alwyn !
I was sure you would. I wrote it just for you.
I thought it was in the same vein of fantasy as was esoteric pineapples actually.
It is amazing what one can come up with when, like ES and I, you decide that for something like this any connection between reality and the comment made can be discarded. You are, of course, living in that world all the time aren’t you?
Something for the FJK folk on here .. thought I would give you at least one post you will like for 2016….
https://scontent.fakl1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xap1/v/t1.0-9/1459053_1047777491911759_5296968342212053825_n.jpg?oh=1d3e2f04308fc57ba617f0f84b9ec77a&oe=5704F7D3
Excellent article by Branda Harre on TransportBlog today: “Is Christchurch a provincial market town or a diversified commercial city?”
http://transportblog.co.nz/2016/01/05/guest-post-is-christchurch-a-provincial-market-town-or-a-diversified-commercial-city/
Brendan starts to make the case for it being the latter not the former, whereas other business leaders make the case for the contrary.
If anyone wants to understand why it continues to be so hard to push New Zealand’s rural rump up the value escalator when Denmark and Finland have made it look so easy, have a read. It’s a good piece.
+1
good article ….so agriculture and tourism is ChCh lot , two of the lowest value activities and ChCh historic low wage economy is well explained.
Look what the cat dragged into the Herald
Alan Duff, who owns chateaux in France and denies poverty exists yet claiming to help those in low decile schools by giving them a few books. Apparently we have a ‘poverty of spirit’ yet he describes kids in Mangere wanting to be orthodontist.
He never owned that chateau he declared bankruptcy from in 2011.
It’s a bed and breakfast, listed in the Loire guides.
I could give you its website (Chateau de la Doree), but can’t link to it as it’s an insecure connection.
Millsy
Don’t get dirty on Alan Duff. He has done something with his books for kids. Far more than many other people. Even though he is a controversial figure, save your intense scorn for others.
For those who need one extra helping of anxiety-inducing risk discussion for 2016, here’s a summary of what the Eurasia Group have to say:
http://www.eurasiagroup.net/pages/top-risks-2016?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Democracy%20Lab%20Weekly%20Brief%2C%20January%204%2C%202016&utm_term=%2ADemocracy%20Lab
“The Middle East is the most vulnerable to a geopolitical leadership vacuum and is heading toward conflagration. There are six failed states across the broader region (Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Mali, Syria, and Yemen) and more refugees than ever recorded. ISIS has become the most powerful terrorist organization in history. Oil economies are under strain. All of this will get worse in 2016.
Europe will feel much of the pain—in economic costs, security vulnerability, and political blowback. The United States, at the twilight of Barack Obama’s administration, will mostly stick to its knitting, since the western hemisphere remains insulated from the lion’s share of geopolitical instability. In Asia, despite having many of the world’s strongest national leaders, helping manage these problems is not a priority.
This all means a dramatically more fragmented world in 2016 with more intra-, inter-, and extra-state conflict than at any point since World War II. And yet drawing the major powers into military battle against one another—World War III—is virtually unthinkable (recent comments from Pope Francis notwithstanding). The world’s four largest economies—the United States, China, Japan, and Germany—are all deeply reluctant to accept responsibility for crisis management. Only the Germans are affected directly by this turmoil, and they still have plenty of reasons to duck the fight.
And so, in 2016, conflict intensifies. Last year, investors recognized growing uncertainty but remained more focused on the economic improvements: a US economy in recovery and Europe coming out of recession. That’s unlikely to last, as geopolitical risk shakes the global order.”
The broader report also dishes on:
– The hollow and weakening trans-Atlantic partnership
– Conflict between Open Europe and Closed Europe
– China being the only remaining country with a global strategy, and its increasing global footprint
– Rise of ISIS within many more Islamic-dominated countries
– Destabilising discord inside Saudi Arabia
– Technology leaders rising as political agents
– Political and economic crisis worsening in Brazil
And dismisses a few things as red herrings:
“US voters aren’t going to elect a president who will close the country to Muslims. China’s economy isn’t headed for a hard landing, and its politics will remain stable. Continued strong leadership from Japan’s Shinzo Abe, India’s Narendra Modi, and especially China’s Xi Jinping will keep Asia’s three most important players focused on economic reform and longer-term strategy, reducing the risk of conflict in Asia’s geopolitics.”
It’s a fun stab at a bunch of things.
[lprent: This wound up in spam. Did a mod have their finger slip? Cos I checked it and it looks like Ad to me. Comment doesn’t appear to have issues for the site and I see that YourNZ linked to it. Extracted back out of spam.
Mods/Ad: If it was intended, then send it to trash, I don’t evaluate those. ]
[Hi it was me sorry. Wanted to convert it into a post. I was going to replace the text with this. Then when I went back it was no longer in spam … MS]
brother, can you spare some water?
http://www.knysnakeep.org/south-africa-needs-water-angel-drivers/
Fuck that’s depressing. Climate change and industrial agriculture and poverty and how they interrelate.
and the earth just shook, luckily they estimate it to be a light earthquake, it was enough to shake the house of my parents in law.
http://www.geonet.org.nz/quakes/felt
yei. good fun.
Yep – I was shook 🙂
Thump, as modem tilted
and then there is Dick Smith Electronics, or maybe it was. But surely all the soon to be unemployed will find a job pronto in our Rock Star Economy. And surely now that we are in 2016 and the run for 2017 has effectively started we can start talking tax cuts to stimulate the economy 🙂
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/75618531/dick-smith-receiver-and-voluntary-administrator-appointed
That article says they don’t know why it’s had to go into receivership. Might not close though.
Been into one lately ?
Woolies probably bit anchorage capitals hand off unloading it in 2011 to them and they have behaved like the bankstas they are since with financial tricks and sale after sale in a sector under huge pressure with lotsa real estate, etailing etc.
The geeks who knew stuff cant be found much anymore and everything they sell can be picked up from places with same or better advice with sharper prices like a PB tech, harvey norman, jb etc
thanks Tc. Haven’t been in one for a long time and hadn’t realised they’d changed so much.
My biggest complaint about DSE over the last few years is that it’s no longer a electronics store for hobbyists but is now a whiteware store. Used to be able to go in there and get the knowledge and parts to make the electronics that you wanted to.
Seems really hard to find good hobbyist stores any more – even online – and I think we’ll find that it’s having a detrimental effect upon innovation.
yeah – jaycar has some interesting stuff, probably filling the vacuum left by DSE’s reorientation. Lots of kits, components, that sort of thing. Dedicated computer stores like pb or cellotech handle the other side.
DSE is just another place where you go for a computer and they sell you a standard box with the sales staff on a quota to upsell you the extended warranty. I went in on boxing day and they had espresso machines, ffs.
That is what got DSE in the end, really. They moved away from selling gadgets and hobby electronics to just selling what you could get from Harvey Norman or The Warehouse. They didnt even have HDMI – VGA adapters in there when I was looking for them.
Yeah, private equity strikes again.
They bought it for about 100 mil, pumped a bit of money in and made it look pretty, conned 500 mil for the float ($2.20 / share) two years ago, it’s 0.34 / share now and Anchorage are long gone, sold the last of their stock 6 months ago. And the thing is carrying huge debt.
Where has the money, like 400 mil, gone?
“Where has the money, like 400 mil, gone?”
Into Anchorage’s back pocket.
can’t understand how the punters keep getting sucked in by these venture capitalist floats
for more on how Anchorage trashed the company read this.
The electronics side got sold to Jaycar Electronics who lots of nerds go to now.
Dick Smith just became another retailer with hardly any technical knowledge with buyers who didn’t buy things like limited editions of games even on pre-order cause they are asshats who didn’t realise that those of us who bought both the electronics and limited editions spent a lot of money in their shops on other stuff.
They also populated their store locally with PS4 fanboys who just pissed off us regular Xbox players. You don’t sell stuff to us by telling us that what we (consciously) prefer is crap, particularly when we know a darn sight more about the merits and issues with the different systems than you do.
Even with PC’s I had one dick tell me I couldn’t put the RAM I wanted in myself and needed to pay someone who knew what they were doing to do it. When I said I know how easy it was and explained it he was totally gobsmacked. He’d never actually ever looked inside a PC.
The older (experience not age) staff knew us and tried to hold on to our business but their hands were tied.
They sadly watched our business go elsewhere.
That is like walking into Mitre 10 and discovering the staff dont know how to install gib board, or going to Repco, and finding the people who work there dont know how to connect/remove a car battery.
Graeme, it’s actually (DSE share) 20c, the point at which trading is suspended.
Yeah, I was looking at an article that was a few days old. May as well say it’s 0.00 now.
It’s still a serious amount of money to “loose” by any measure in two years. But I suppose they will be well practiced at disguising any malfeasance.
Graeme, I agree with you, I don’t think they lost it, it was simply ripped off them, the share holders, that is.
I saw the in depth report this evening, disturbing really, and blatant.
Bought for AU$20 mill, pumped up to $520 mill according to this: http://m.theregister.co.uk/2016/01/04/dick_limps_towards_an_inglorious_end/
“Whilst confident on the long-term viability of the company, the directors have been unsuccessful in obtaining the necessary support of its banking syndicate to see it through this period.”
According to one article I read.
These guys have a good turn of phrase, found this about their fire sale before Christmas
managing director Nick Abboud said Dick Smith would maintain “flexibility on gross margin to reduce inventory and improve our debt position,”
I hope they have another fire sale — I could use a DSE turntable to play my elevator music records on 😉
They’ll sound horrible – particularly if you have a good amp and speakers.
The quality of the amp in particular will magnify the poor quality of the turntable.
Go good quality turntable, then good quality amp, then good speakers.
Good input still sounds good on poor speakers.
Poor input is magnified on good output.
It’s an oddity that many people buy the really cool speakers first and wonder why their records sound like crap.
GIGO principle applies here as well.
If you want to move your vinyl to PC then there’s a few good phono pre-amps that’ll allow you to plug in a USB cable.
I find “vinyl studio” to be pretty good software for this, including tidying up pops etc.
Thats right, “shit in, shit out’.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/03/opinion/our-imaginary-weight-problem.html
Family members who were nurses used to oft say to carry a bit of extra weight after 40 in case you had to have an operation.
Twas those that didn’t that most commonly died post-op as their bodies had insufficient surplus fat to use to recover.
Dunno if there any truth to that or whether it’s just an old wives tale but it’s an interesting notion.
I’ve always understood that the BMI index was established by insurance companies to determine risk from their perspective rather than a medical discovery – bit like legally blind doesn’t actually mean blind but sets out a point at which insurance companies would pay out or employers would be liable for costs.
Anyway it’s always been problematic in that the measure varies from country to country and changes in settings can change the number of people that are in any category.
“In 1998, the U.S. National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention brought U.S. definitions in line with World Health Organization guidelines, lowering the normal/overweight cut-off from BMI 27.8 to BMI 25. This had the effect of redefining approximately 29 million Americans, previously healthy to overweight.[21]
This can partially explain the increase in the overweight diagnosis in the past 20 years, and the increase in sales of the weight loss products during the same time. WHO also recommends lowering the normal/overweight threshold for South East Asian body types to around BMI 23, and expects further revisions to emerge from clinical studies of different body types.”
Seems to me that the key take-home message is to not rely on self-reported data when establishing guidelines.
As to the rest of it, it’s not granular enough to draw any conclusions: all causes mortality could be confounded by injuries, degree of medical care (are moderately fact people kept alive by pills?), or even if the issue is with the lower end of the “normal” category (i.e. increased mortality in underweight people throws off the base measurement).
Interesting, though. It’ll keep people in work for the next 20 years trying to narrow down where the ines should be roughly drawn. I’ll get the [unbuttered] popcorn.
It is important to keep in mind that this study was on mortality and not on general health.
This is a pretty good explanation about how deforestation, clearing land and techniques like dredging waterways increase flooding, and how traditional techniques of slowing water flow hold it in the land and decrease flooding. The article actually discusses climate change in the context of a local weather event too.
Droughts and floods have significant manmade causes in addition to climate change.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/uk-flooding-how-a-yorkshire-flood-blackspot-worked-with-nature-to-stay-dry-a6794286.html
Exposure
Slowly but surely.
The Greatest Strategic Impact of 3-D Printing: Local Production Replaces Globalization
Yet the greatest strategic impact of additive manufacturing may not occur on the battlefield, but rather in the mundane manufacturing of clothing, shoes, appliances, phones, medical devices, and much more. In short, localized distributed manufacturing will become the norm. Not only will products be cheaper, but they will also be extremely customizable, rendering traditional manufacturing able to compete in only a few areas. And since 3-D printing technology is so cheap, it will also be incredibly widespread — Cambodia, for instance, already has a 3-D print shop.
http://warontherocks.com/2015/12/3-d-printing-will-disrupt-the-world-in-ways-we-can-barely-imagine/
previously on TS
They’ll change space exploration as well IMO , imagine a rocket landing and unfolding a series of 3d printers to build habitats for the following ship of humans.!!
SuperDraco!
In late 2013, SpaceX successfully fired a SuperDraco engine at full thrust using a 3D-printed engine chamber developed entirely in-house.
http://www.spacex.com/news/2014/07/31/spacex-launches-3d-printed-part-space-creates-printed-engine-chamber-crewed
What a load of bloody tossers the Care Alliance are – shame on them http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11569572
These types remind me of the anti-abortionist lobby of the 1970s and 80s – full of venom and hatred for anyone who didn’t support their view point. They are like a NZ version of the American fundamentalist movements.
Yeah well the religious know about the thin end of the wedge stuff. Works well for them.
We’ll set up our own schools in opposition to state funded secular education and pay for those schools ourselves for our religious children – give or take 10%
We’ll take state funding cause there’s less religious people
We’ll take white flight children from state schools and get them to lie about their religious status in order to pretend we only have 10% non-religious people at our school
We’ll infiltrate state schools through boards of trustees and start teaching religion at lunch times
We’ll start teaching religion during class times and make it difficult for pupils to not go
We’ll get our own special religious charter schools fully funded by the tax payer – with even better funding than the state schools
+1
Ditto!
Totally agree. I found the combination of Family First NZ, Hospice New Zealand and the Salvation Army somewhat strange.
Okay the Hospice organisation believes in end of life, quality palliative care and that this should be well funded. It obeys the current law and doesn’t want a law change for euthenasia. Even if there was such a law change the Hospice association could still say that euthenasia was unacceptable to their charity and I for one would accept that.
Ditto the Salavtion army who provide some elder care services.
Both these organisations are fully entitled to their views and to incorporate them in their daily work.
Family First doesn’t appear to do anything hands on for elder care just issue a press release.
but why do any of these organisations feel that it is acceptable to attack an individual for attending a meeting where something they may not agree with is discussed?
A diversion perhaps but four times the amount of fish caught with a little more than double the population is rather alarming.
http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141016-your-life-on-earth
Just watching Nigel Latta spelling it out so plainly, even the die hard National’s will have to feel real bad, “The Haves and Have-nots”
Yes, he did well, didn’t he