Directorial standards are slipping, the plot is getting stale, the script needs radical editing and new perspectives. We have a few writers, directors and operators who can do the job. No hobbits, I promise ..
This was on the 7:30 report tonight a very good article about this gas attack.
I’m afraid folks this looks like the real deal and it doesn’t be appear be a VX agent or something similar more off a sarin or mustard agent ,but it might take 1-2 weeks to confirm. I’ll do some digging around tomorrow and see what I can come with.
The Guardian has given over its opinion column to the leader of the west’s favourite terrorist organisation. Is anyone still singing along to this broken record?
Here’s the opening verse (you’ve heard it before).
Yet only this morning we have witnessed a suspected chemical weapon attack – one of the most horrifying in six years of this bloody conflict.At least 60 civilians were gassed to death and more than 300 are still being treated; many are in a critical condition. Members of my team sought to wash the deadly chemical from the eyes of the affected children. Soon afterwards our centre in the town was destroyed, along with all of our life-saving equipment. Then a local hospital where victims were being treated was also bombed. On Sunday, the largest hospital in the region was also bombed, again after treating children affected by Assad’s chemical attacks. Are there no red lines?
Many people are there. Not all people there are Syrian. Some people have agendas that are helped along and supported by explicit and direct western government support.
Do I have to link to the Guardian piece again from a while back that was out of step with their otherwise uniform reporting? The one that perhaps mistakenly or inadvertently, or then again, perhaps by dint of some very cunning work by a journalist or journalists with a conscience, kind of ‘let the cat out of the bag’?
Here you go. Try reading it critically and a little (just a little) deeper than at a mere surface level. I’ll give you some help. (Think, given their genesis is English, “White Helmets”)
Contractors hired by the Foreign Office but overseen by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) produce videos, photos, military reports, radio broadcasts, print products and social media posts branded with the logos of fighting groups, and effectively run a press office for opposition fighters.
Fisk: “…don’t ask me if they’ve used chemical weapons. It’s conceivable. There really isn’t any proof.”
Well, exactly. If there was proof, this wouldn’t just be a matter of competing claims in the media. My own view of it is that people who’ve been murdered by their own government no longer care about the weapons that were used (or anything else, for that matter) – but it’s newsworthy either way.
…supported by explicit and direct western government support.
Do you know how many revolutionary movements of the 20th Century received explicit and direct Soviet government support? It’s certainly too many for me to be arsed counting them all, but only right-wing propagandists claimed those movements were therefore puppets of the USSR. Governments have interests, and sometimes those interests overlap with other people’s interests – it’s a given, ’twas ever thus, and doesn’t necessarily imply the people who find their interests overlapping with a foreign government’s are tools of a foreign power, terrorists, untrustworthy, or very much else.
Mate! you can’t put up links from ‘fake news’ sites! /sarc
So that you know (for future reference) PM and many others will only countenance news coming from more impeccable sources, the likes of CNN, BBC, Guardian, NYT…because thems is fonts of truth, objectivity, serious investigative reporting and critical analysis.
What the hell you thinking? Linking to dodgy foreign (non- western) rubbish… 😉
edit – serious request. Can you please use the reply tabs in future? Thanks.
There’s a difference between propaganda and “fake news” – we’ve had that discussion before. This one looks to be a Syrian regime propaganda site, not a fake news site.
You know I’m of the persuasion that only those desperate to cling to a particular world view divide propaganda into supposed ”fake news” and propaganda, and that they do that in order to justify dismissing out of hand information that might threaten their cotton candy silo.
And I know you disagree.
Al-Masdar News is based in the United Arab Emirates, not Syria.
Totally agree . We do not allow frausters to immigrate to this country. If guilty of it here they should all be sent back to wherever they came from. Same for the Indian shopkeeper found guilty of tricking and exploiting his immigrant workers last week.
Why have our immigration doors not been closed by now except to the people who have skills not found in our own population. Why ? Everyone I speak to wants this to happen. Where are the ears and actions of the politicians who are supposed to be acting on the mainstream will of the legal New Zealand population. Why ?
About halfway down there are a couple of bar graphs, in the second, “Average Length of Stay by Market”, Indian and Thai visitors have the second and third longest average stays at 48 and 29 days, something odd going on there. Most Thai, and all Indian visitors I encounter across are finding New Zealand far too expensive for their budget, so month or so stays would be unexpected. For those markets to be staying that long they would have to be working, so probably shouldn’t be on a tourist visa.
Germans are longest at 49 days which would be right for the backpacker market.
Mum & Dad coming to stay with the kids to look after grandchildren might explain the length of Indian & Thai stays as they may be largish in proportion to the just holidaying tourist market
NZ news item! Interesting contrast in RadioNZ news items today. And some other titbits thrown in for your info. Enjoy….
technology life and society
4 Apr 2017
Robotics in farming – the revolution begins
From Nine To Noon, 9:25 am on 4 April 2017
Listen duration 13′ :46″ http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201839068
Waikato University’s Mike Duke says robots harvesting fruit in New Zealand orchards could be years not decades away. He’s picking that the technology has the potential to revolutionize all aspects of the horticulture industry as well as forestry and dairy.
Professor Duke will be giving a lecture on this topic next Tuesday 11th April at the University of Waikato.
and
money economy
4 Apr 2017
NZ’s homeowners now worth $1.2 trillion
From Nine To Noon, 9:08 am on 4 April 2017
Listen duration 19′ :53″ http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201839067
Kathryn Ryan talks to Bernard Hickey from Newsroom who says figures released by Statistics New Zealand show household net worth has risen from $323 billion to $1.2 trillion in the last 8 years – with most of that increase being driven by rising property prices.
As a side effect he says its now virtually impossible for children of renters to make their way onto the property ladder unless they marry into what he’s dubbed the new landed gentry.
The connection here? Who will be buying and living in houses when the robots take the employment from society’s hands, and contain it in their elegantly sculpted fingers? Wot about the workers? Wot’s left for the humans! Oh that’s right the Conchords told us, they’re dead.
Or soon will be – just wrecks and the nobs left, showing little of our potential to be wonderful creatures living together in uneasy creativity under regularly affirmed and agreed restraints using our rationality.
Scoop needs money to run an effective campaign in election year. If you can channel some of your spending to a donation and regular monthly payments of even $20 to keep the support, you are doing your best to be a wonderfully creative human. But act now, there will be tipping points where we can stop the run of the dominoes, or alter the flow but they can’t be constantly passed by.
Finally Schumacher from essay – Technology with a Human Face in Small is Beautiful. Technology although of course the product of man, tends to develop by its own laws and principles and these are very different from those of human nature or of living nature in general. Nature always, so to speak, knows where and when to stop. Greater even than the mystery of natural growth is the mystery of the natural cessation of growth…which tends to be self-balancing, self-adjusting, self-cleansing. Not so with technology and specialisation….
If that which has been shaped by technology and continues to be so shaped, looks sick, it might be wise to have a look at technology itself…if becoming more inhuman, we might do well to consider…better – a technology with a human face.
@greywarshark
Hundreds of thousands of $$ on robots or $15.50 an hour on backpackers/islanders where you can explain the fruit picking job to them in 30 minutes and that’s just about all the instruction they need for a month?
Hundreds of thousands of dollars on a machine that will do the work of two people for twenty years with good maintenance. Against thirty five thousand per person every year for those twenty years.
Yep, the robot is much cheaper.
And, yep, hopefully it’s only a few years before they’re available.
and then you start adding cost of unemployment – yes even a UBI will cost money, and other societal costs associated with long term unemployment and then maybe your robot is not that cheap after all.
but you make a good point,
its not that we don’t have jobs that needs doing, its just that we don’t want to pay anyone for doing them.
Really what do you expect the people of tomorrow to do on their poverty UBI with fuck all to do during the day cause everything is done by robots.
Oh yeah, they will pick up knitting and drown in jumpers.
The economy is not money no matter how much the economists and RWNJs insist that it is. It the physical resources we have available at any one time and the people to bring about innovative ways to use them for the benefit of society.
its not that we don’t have jobs that needs doing, its just that we don’t want to pay anyone for doing them.
That’s part of it – NZers are generally horribly cheap. But that’s partially because the RWNJs have been saying that taxes are theft and robbery. Now look at what happens when we follow the recommendations of those RWNJs and cut taxes – the people become worse off while a few rich people become much richer.
In other words the lessons that the RWNJs and the rich have thrown at us are a smokescreen to encourage the people to vote against their own best interests.
Really what do you expect the people of tomorrow to do on their poverty UBI with fuck all to do during the day cause everything is done by robots.
Revolution and the permanent removal of rich people.
“its not that we don’t have jobs that needs doing, its just that we don’t want to pay anyone for doing them.”
” That’s part of it – NZers are generally horribly cheap. But that’s partially because the RWNJs have been saying that taxes are theft and robbery. Now look at what happens when we follow the recommendations of those RWNJs and cut taxes – the people become worse off while a few rich people become much richer.”
Actually no, its society. We all want shit done for free or for cheap. We use volunteers to not have to pay people a wage. We hold fundraiser for Ambulances and Fire Engines. We have high unemployment while we have high demand for volunteers. Hmmm? Why? Why not pay people money to do that as a job instead and call it working for the UBI. or, you cold condemn people to death by boredom, once all the work is done by robots and most of us live in chicken cages and try to survive of a UBI.
as for Revolution…sorry mate. Not interested. Revolution generally are not good for women. Especially i have no use for revolutions that involve smashing the lot and replacing it with nothing.
Its a bit like Trumpcare, all repeal, little replacement but a whole lot of grifting for the rich which – and this is historically proven – you will never really get rid of, you chop the head of one family, other will come and take over. Rinse repeat.
oh and society can’t unlearn what it has been tought? Seriously?
yes, the suffragettes were revolutionary, but getting the right to vote was not a revolution. It was a fight to a particular right and they won, but they did not want to dis-stablilze society in order to burn it down and remake a ‘better and brighter future’ from the ashes. They wanted to vote.
But it was not a society changing revolution. It gave women the vote and until the late sixties early seventies that was pretty much what they got. The right to vote. The right to have a bank account and a cheque book came in the 70, the right to the pill came in 1974 and so on and so on, tiny little wars won in a long battle that is still being fought. So maybe this is what you mean when you say revolution? Hundred of years of tiny battle to get a little bit more rights.
No the type of revolution that changes a society radically such as the French Revolution or the Russian Revolution are bloody, messy, full of hunger and violence and it is usually the women and children who are at the receiving end.
And if there is no music and dance, then i have no use in your revolution.
The quicker New Zealand gets rid of most of these poorly paid harvesting jobs that few locals want to do, the better.
QFT
And that’s what many people don’t understand. Get rid of those jobs and we have more people to put into the education and health systems and many other jobs that presently don’t have enough people in them.
Alternative facts did not start with Donald Trump. For years, emotion has played a bigger role than reason in many public debates.
But the rejection of rationalism and faith in experts is getting worse according to Tom Nichols, a Professor of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College.
He says an epidemic of narcissism, where no one is ever wrong, is fueling the problem.
He explores the implications of the ‘post truth’ era in his new book, The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why It Matters.
Hey thanks – just picked up item while passing at Radionz for my comment on tech and housing. I’ll get the gen on all all the expertise stuff at the same time. I do rely on TS when I go to get The Knowledge! I particularly resonates with me as I try to discuss and offer ideas to various others and find I can’t dent the Certainty Carapace.
A few minutes after this report North Korea fired a projectile off it’s east coast.
BREAKING: A senior WH official on the state of North Korea’s nuclear program: “The clock has now run out and all options are on the table”— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) April 4, 2017
The 20 million souls within range of NK artillery will be pleased to have a man with a steady hand in the White House.
/
Secretary of State Tillerson released this statement on Tuesday’s ballistic missile launch:
North Korea launched yet another intermediate range ballistic missile. The United States has spoken enough about North Korea. We have no further comment.
It would be one thing for the US to simply ignore North Korea’s provocations, but Tillerson’s statement follows this warning from a senior White House official just hours earlier:
The clock has now run out and all options are on the table.
I guess wee Stevie will be along soon to tell us Co2 is great because palm trees and crocodiles.
No, the headline is not a typo. Current carbon dioxide levels are unprecedented in human history and are on track to climb to even more ominous heights in just a few decades.
If carbon emissions continue on their current trajectory, new findings show that by mid-century, the atmosphere could reach a state unseen in 50 million years. Back then, temperatures were up to 18°F (10°C) warmer, ice was almost nowhere to be seen and oceans were dramatically higher than they are now.
[…]
“The early Eocene was much warmer than today: global mean surface temperature was at least 10°C (18°F) warmer than today,” Dana Royer, a paleoclimate researcher at Wesleyan University who co-authored the new research, said. “There was little-to-no permanent ice. Palms and crocodiles inhabited the Canadian Arctic.”
Where were humans in this warmer age? Anywhere? Living in palm trees because of the crocodiles? What about now? What about the polar bears and penguins!
Let’s concentrate, and not digress – look here WW1, look here footpaths for cycles and pedestrians walking inside little plastic protective cubes with helmets on, look here pictures from 5 million light years in space, look here implants of stem cells keeping you alive to 200 years. Phooey.
The amount of a UBI is quite important, if its too low (like what TOP is proposing) then it will become a way to undermine welfare.
But this is not the only problem with a UBI. For example what a UBI doesn’t do is engage people in meaningful work, and as such it doesn’t put any pressure on the nature of work in society. You can find discussion of this among the linked blog posts from that one, but just to highlight one issue.
Somebody sitting on a UBI for a long time is not too different to somebody being on a benefit for a number of years. What it doesn’t do is give them the job skills which somebody employed over those years will develop. The person unemployed for this period will still no doubt be discriminated against when trying to enter employment from that position, and will likely start at a lower wage rate than the employed person changing work at that point. There are plenty of good economic reasons to favor employment over just income due to similar factors as this (both for individuals and macro-economic outcomes).
How can Bill English use the word compassionate, when the costs for cannabis products are prohibitive. A total disconnect from reality of the people who need this medicines, and their economic status.
Nice one Roy. I’d say it’s not about the money. It’s about getting an unreserved apology for being accused of corruption by someone whose every word is potentially broadcast to 4 million people.
So it’s not pathetic, it’s a lesson in getting it right and admitting when you got it wrong
“…not about the money…”
He’s unreservedly, publicly apologised already; but they aren’t having it. Moreover, asking for a bit of sunlight isn’t quite an ‘accusation’ is it?
He did get it right – there’s a very bad smell about people getting government funding shortly after making a fat donation to the governing party. Unfortunately, under NZ law, being right doesn’t necessarily keep you out of court if you’re right about vindictive Tories with deep pockets.
They didn’t. The money went to the govt of Niue. That’s why Little is in court. The same sloppy attention to detail you’re showing. He pointed to the wrong village same as some other newsworthy individuals.
Thing about smells is that they’re not about details. They’re the general odour, in the general area of something that might be rotten, or just blue cheese.
When the general picture needs investigating, arguing over details is just weak.
Smells can also be highly misleading as you point out. Rather than shrieking something is dead and rotting under the bed you should first investigate that it’s not your own sweaty socks.
He said something smelled, and that maybe we should look under the bed and make sure it’s all clean under there. That’s all. And it’s his job to do that.
I think the apology was likely a rational cost/benefit calculation on the eve of the trial. I frankly think the complaint about his comments is bullshit, but whatever. It’s a civil matter, not a criminal case.
He made a very genuine apology in court today and good on him. Par;iamentarians have a huge advantage over the public with almost total freedom of speech in Parliament, with next to no comeback if you are maligned. But they have to use that responsibly and if they don’t they deserve to get stung – though not the $2m being spoken about. That said I would have thought their reputation was worth at least double that of Jordan Williams. Juries can be funny folk.
Horseshit. AL has already apologised and offered a settlement. Why do RWNJ’s always want to investigate the whistleblower rather than the criminal stench that surrounds the Nats dodgy deals?
There was nothing dodgy here. Are you in the Labour Research Unit? Because your alternative facts are just fake news.
You need to read the AG report and understand the mechanics of what went on.
The Matavai Hotel is owned by the Govt of Niue. it had something like 20 rooms. The NZ Govt gave them money to double its size. This process was started before the Hagaman donation and SCenic winning the managment contract, and was part of a long term pattern of NZ support for Niue’s only hotel.
Niue only has 1500 people and have shown no real skills at running international hotels. So they decided to contract its management out. There was an open tender run by an expert global hotel consultancy. Scenic was one of two tenders.
They get paid a fee to manage a hotel. They don’t own it, they aren’t being paid to build it. do you really think they are making much money managing a 45 room hotel on an isolated island?
I had the impression that the money went to the owner of the hotel – do you have a reference for where it was said that the hotel is owned by the government of Niue? I presume it is a franchise operation however, so some of the benefit of any improvement to the property should accrue to the franchise holders – else why would the Hagermans be even slightly interested?.
I’m not clear on the time line, but there was apparently an assessment process in place which was considering a possible grant – again I don’t know whether the grant had been requested or whether tenders had been called for ways of assisting Nuie, but it seems reasonable to presume that Mrs Hagerman at least was aware of that process. Murray McCully has a reputation for knowing all details of what is going on in his department, so it is possible he knew about the assessment being made. At some stage around then the President of the National Party just happens to turn up to seek a donation to the party – absolutely no link can ever be proved between that chance visit and anything else, and of course the Hagermans cannot be criticised for doing what many other business people engaged in a commercial relationship with the government seem to have done, which is making a donation to the National Party – there is the example of Oravida for example which also coincidentally may have received government assistance around the time of making a donation – just as and that other friend of National, Kim Dotcom, made political donations around the time that a friendly John Banks had been assisting him. No connection at all between donations and services of course – pure coincidence, but it may perhaps be reasonable to call attention to a series of coincidences where business people may have been under the (obviously mistaken) impression that a donation to National somehow may assist getting assistance from some part of government. That is no criticism of people making donations of course, but it may be hard to give an example of a coincidence without mentioning both a donation and a service that just happens to occur in close proximity . . . However the praise that the Hagermans are now getting for their business acumen (they apparently sure know how to invest to make money) is possibly an unexpected bonus for them, particularly as Mr Hagerman is apparently gravely unwell – a reputation for tenacity, an eye to a chance of making money, and for looking after friends is surely no bad thing?
you had that impression becasue Andrew Little aided by people like Ropata and others, couldn’t be bothered doing proper research. you also were willing to accept their slurs were true because you probably thought they had done their homework. You were misled and you should be angry with the people who did that to you.
It’s all in the AG report http://www.oag.govt.nz/media/2016/niue-hotel. It’s an easy read. The contract was let by Matavai Niue Limited, a company registered in Niue. directors Of MNL are responsible for appointing the manager of the resort. The premier of Niue is one of the directors.
It wasn’t rocket science. A few phone calls could have saved them a lot of grief but political grabs were the priority.
There is also a very rotten smell about vexatious litigation against the leader of the Opposition Party acting in his democratic role.
Potential for a rather chilling effect on free speech and democracy. The court better think carefully, especially given the smog of “dirty politics” is still hanging around the Nats.
It looks exactly like a dirty politics style smear campaign. Little has apologised and offered a huge settlement, but the litigious twats are enjoying their pathetic revenge by trying to drag AL through the mud. Vexatious.
He had plenty of time to apologise when the AG report came out. Why do you feel that ordinary citizens don’t have the right to defend their reputations while politicians have free reign to trample on them?
Even Lani (sp?) gave evidence that all she wants is an apology and costs, but somehow her intentions fell right off and she ended up suing for $2M by accident.
Bwahaha thanks for putting words in my mouth. The job of an Opposition MP is to question the Government and other powerful establishment figures. I know this seems like treason to RW fucktards (no doubt you are dying to send AL to Guantanamo Bay) but it used to be a democratic norm.
prettt silly comment there ropata. He’s got the right to make those comments, his victims have the right to sue if they are libellous. Andrew little has found out the greatest lesson there is on freedom of speech. Say what you want, just accept the consequences.
How democratic is it if politicians can wildly spray allegations around without any consequence.
You mean like the Nat’s campaign of lies against David Cunliffe over a nonexistent 100K donation from Donghua Liu?
Not very “democratic” was it. I find it deeply concerning that the dirty politics machine seems to be gearing up for another assault on democracy in NZ. And yet unprincipled RWNJ’s refuse to admit their own complicity, and moronically slag off truth tellers like Nicky Hager. Disgusting
No problem at all. You would think that the current leader of the opposition would have the wit to use it. Jacinda wouldn’t have made this grievous mistake that is going to cost little and labour a fortune.
Deep legal reasoning and economic understanding aren’t really your thing. yes little has apologised, but only once he realised that he was deep in the kak.
But It certainly won’t keep you out of court if your wrong and refuse to admit that and apologise in a timely fashion. Little is a lawyer, how did he not know this?
It’s right there in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Article 427(b): Everyone has the right to own hotels and make enormous political donations and no free speech about such arrangements is allowed whatsoever.
I was impressed with Michael Wood speaking on the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill (both parts one and two).
He looks a more experienced speaker than I would have imagined for a newby.
Video part one here:
Trevor Mallard criticised Wood at the end, saying he had been talking about a part of the amendment bill that had been axed. After the next speaker also slammed the amendment, Mallard appologised for getting it wrong, and that Wood had been correctly addressing a part still in the bill.
Isn’t it strange how National party politicians can overtly slander people (e.g. Nicky Hager is a left wing conspiracy theorist” despite his acknowledged credentials here and overseas), yet Andrew Little can’t ask questions about hotel owners who receive business benefits after donating to National?
Isn’t it odd that politicians who are a threat to National end up in court? Craig, the Conservative Party leader (taken to court by National Party boys), went to court for speaking out to the media after he’d signed an agreement to keep quiet. He was done on this (it was not actually a court case about the rights and wrongs of his sexual behaviour).
All National need is a TV appearance of their political foes in court. This is what they are after. Most of the public don’t follow the details; National knows this.
And the spin doctors above who’ve infiltrated this site know this.
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Drought: the past is no longer prologue Drought management in the United States (and elsewhere) is highly informed by events of the past, employing records extending 60 years or longer in order to plan for and cope with newly emerging meterorological water deficits. Water resource managers and agricultural concerns use ...
The government announced its budget today, with Finance Minister Grant Robertson giving the usual long speech about how much money they're spending. The big stuff was climate change and health, with the former being pre-announced, and most of the latter being writing off DHB's entirely fictional "debt" to the the ...
Finance Minister Grant Robertson has delivered a Budget that will many asking “Is that all there is?” There is a myriad of initiatives and there is increased spending, but strangely it doesn’t really add up to much at all for those hoping for a more traditional Labour-style Budget. The headline ...
Last year, Cook Islands Deputy Prime Minister Robert Tapaitau stood down as a minister after being charged with conspiracy to defraud after an investigation into corruption in Infrastructure Cook Islands and the National Environment Service. He hasn't been tried yet, but this week he has been reinstated: The seven-month ...
A ballot for three member's bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn: Repeal of Good Friday and Easter Sunday as Restricted Trading Days (Shop Trading and Sale of Alcohol) Amendment Bill (Chris Baillie) Electoral (Strengthening Democracy) Amendment Bill (Golriz Ghahraman) Increased Penalties for ...
No Jesus Here.She rises, unrested, and stepsOnto the narrow balconyTo find the day. To greetThe Sunday God she sings to.But this morning His face is clouded.Grey and wet as a corpseWashed by tears.Behind her, in the tangled bedding,the children bicker and whine.Worrying the cheap furnitureLike hungry puppies.They clutch at her ...
After two years of Corona-induced online meetings in 2020 and 2021, this year's General Assembly of the European Geosciences Union (EGU) will take place as a hybrid conference in both Vienna and online from May 23 to 27. To take hybrid and necessary hygiene restrictions into account, there (unfortunately) will be no ...
“Māori star lore was, and still remains, a blending together of both astronomy and astrology, and while there is undoubtedly robust science within the Māori study of the night sky, the spiritual component has always been of equal importance” writes Professor Rangi Matamua in his book Matariki – Te whetū tapu ...
The foibles of the Aussie electoral system are pretty well-known. The Lucky Country doesn’t have proportional representation. Voting for everyone over 18 is compulsory, but within a preferential system. This means that in the relatively few key seats that decide the final result, it can be the voters’ second, third ...
Julia Steinberger is an ecological economist at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland. She first posted this piece at Medium.com, and it was reposted on Yale Climate Connections with her permission. Today I went to give a climate talk at my old high school in Geneva – and was given a ...
A/Prof Ben Gray* Gray B. Government funding of interpreters in Primary Care is needed to ensure quality care. Public Health Expert Blog.17 May 2022. The pandemic has highlighted many problems in the NZ health system. This blog will address the question of availability of interpreters for people with limited English ...
I have suggested previously that sometimes Tolkien’s writer-instincts get the better of him. Sometimes he departs from his own cherished metaphysics, in favour of the demands of story – and I dare say, that is a good thing. Laws and Customs of the Eldar might be an interesting insight ...
One of the key planks of yesterday's Emissions Reduction Plan is a $650 million fund to help decarbonise industry by subsidising replacement of dirty technologies with clean ones. But National leader Chris Luxon derides this as "corporate welfare". Which probably sounds great to the business ideologues in the Koru club. ...
Poisonous! From a very early age New Zealanders are warned to give small black spiders with a red blotch on their abdomens a wide berth. The Katipo, we are told, is venomous: and while its bite may not kill you, it can make you very unwell. That said, isn’t the ...
“The truth prevails, but it’s a chore.” – Jan Masaryk: The intensification of ideological pressures is bearable for only so-long before ordinary men and women reassert the virtues of tolerance and common sense.ON 10 MARCH 1948, Jan Masaryk, the Foreign Minister of Czechoslovakia, was found dead below his bathroom window. ...
Clearly, the attempt to take the politics out of climate change has itself been a political decision, and one meant to remove much of the heat from the global warming issue before next year’s election. What we got from yesterday’s $2.9 billion Emissions Reduction Plan was a largely aspirational multi-party ...
Michelle Uriarau (Mana Wāhine Kōrero) talks to Dane Giraud of the Free Speech Union LISTEN HERE Michelle Uriarau is a founding member of Mana Wāhine Kōrero – an advocacy group of and for Māori women who took strong positions against the ‘Self ID’ and ‘Conversion Practises Bills’. One of the ...
If we needed any confirmation, we have it in spades in today’s edition of the Herald; our supposedly leading daily newspaper is determined to do what it can to decide the outcome of the next election – to act, that is, not as a newspaper but as the mouthpiece for ...
Sean Plunkett, founding editor of the new media outlet, The Platform, was interviewed on RNZ's highly regarded flagship programme "Mediawatch".Mr Plunkett has made much about "cancel culture" and "de-platforming". On his website promoting The Platform, he outlines his mission statement thusly:The Platform is for everyone; we’re not into cancelling or ...
“That’s a C- for History, Kelvin!”While it is certainly understandable that Māori-Crown Relations Minister Kelvin Davis was not anxious to castigate every Pakeha member of the House of Representatives for the crimes committed against his people by their ancestors; crimes from which his Labour colleagues continue to draw enormous benefits; the ...
The Government promised a major reform of New Zealand’s immigration system, but when it was announced this week, many asked “is that it?” Over the last two years Covid has turned the immigration tap off, and the Government argued this produced the perfect opportunity to reassess decades of “unbalanced immigration”. ...
While the new fiscal rules may not be contentious, what they mean for macroeconomic management is not explained.In a pre-budget speech on 3 May 2022, the Minister of Finance, Grant Robertson, made some policy announcements which will frame both this budget and future ones. (The Treasury advice underpinning them is ...
Under MMP, Parliament was meant to look like New Zealand. And, in a lot of ways, it does now, with better representation for Māori, tangata moana, women, and the rainbow community replacing the old dictatorship of dead white males. But there's one area where "our" parliament remains completely unrepresentative: housing: ...
Justice Denied: At the heart of the “Pro-Life” cause was something much darker than conservative religious dogma, or even the oppressive designs of “The Patriarchy”. The enduring motivation – which dares not declare itself openly – is the paranoid conviction of male white supremacists that if “their” women are given ...
In case of emergency break glass— but glass can cut Fire extinguishers, safety belts, first aid kits, insurance policies, geoengineering: we never enjoy using them. But given our demonstrated, deep empirical record of proclivity for creating hazards and risk we'd obviously be foolish not to include emergency responses in our inventory. ...
After a brief hiatus, the “A View from Afar” podcast is back on air with Selwyn Manning leading the Q&A with me. This week is a grab bag of topics: Russian V-Day celebrations, Asian and European elections, and the impact of the PRC-Solomon Islands on the regional strategic balance. Plus ...
Last year, Vanuatu passed a "cyber-libel" law. And predictably, its first targets are those trying to hold the government to account: A police crackdown in Vanuatu that has seen people arrested for allegedly posting comments on social media speculating politicians were responsible for the country’s current Covid outbreak has ...
Could it be a case of not appreciating what you’ve got until it’s gone? The National Party lost Simon Bridges last week, which has reinforced the notion that the party still has some serious deficits of talent and diversity. The major factor in Bridges’ decision to leave was his failed ...
Who’s Missing From This Picture? The re-birth of the co-governance concept cannot be attributed to the institutions of Pakeha rule, at least, not in the sense that the massive constitutional revisions it entails have been presented to and endorsed by the House of Representatives, and then ratified by the citizens of New ...
Fiji signed onto China’s Belt and Road initiative in 2018, along with a separate agreement on economic co-operation and aid. Yet it took the recent security deal between China and the Solomon Islands to get the belated attention of the US and its helpmates in Canberra and Wellington, and the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Lexi Smith and Bud Ward “CRA” It’s one of those acronyms even many-a-veteran environmental policy geek may not recognize. Amidst the scores and scores of acronyms in the field – CERCLA, IPCC, SARA, LUST, NPDES, NDCs, FIFRA, NEPA and scores more – ...
In a nice bit of news in a World Gone Mad, I can report that Of Tin and Tintagel, my 5,800-word story about tin (and political scheming), is now out as part of the Spring 2022 edition of New Maps Magazine (https://www.new-maps.com/). As noted previously, this one owes a ...
Dr Jennifer Summers, Professor Michael Baker, Professor Nick Wilson* Summers J, Baker M, Wilson N. Covid-19 Case-Fatality Risk & Infection-Fatality Risk: important measures to help guide the pandemic response. Public Health Expert Blog. 11 May 2022. In this blog we explore two useful mortality indicators: Case-Fatality Risk (CFR) and Infection-Fatality ...
In the depths of winter, most people from southern New Zealand head to warmer climes for a much-needed dose of Vitamin D. Yet during the height of the last Ice Age, one species of moa did just the opposite. I’m reminded of Bill Bailey’s En Route to Normal tour that visited ...
In the lead-up to the Budget, the Government has been on an offensive to promote the efficiency and quality of its $74 billion Covid Response and Recovery Fund -especially the Wage Subsidy Scheme component. This comes after criticisms and concerns from across the political spectrum over poor-quality spending, and suggestions ...
Elizabeth Elliot Noe, Lincoln University, New Zealand; Andrew D. Barnes, University of Waikato; Bruce Clarkson, University of Waikato, and John Innes, Manaaki Whenua – Landcare ResearchUrbanisation, and the destruction of habitat it entails, is a major threat to native bird populations. But as our new research shows, restored ...
Unfinished: Always, gnawing away at this government’s confidence and empathy, is the dictum that seriously challenging the economic and social status-quo is the surest route to electoral death. Labour’s colouring-in book, and National’s, have to look the same. All that matters is which party is better at staying inside the lines.DOES ...
Radical As: Māori healers recall a time when “words had power”. The words that give substance to ideas, no matter how radical, still do. If our representatives rediscover the courage to speak them out loud.THERE ARE RULES for radicalism. Or, at least, there are rules for the presentation of radical ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jeff Masters A brutal, record-intensity heat wave that has engulfed much of India and Pakistan since March eased somewhat this week, but is poised to roar back in the coming week with inferno-like temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius (122°F). The ...
The good people at the Reading Tolkien podcast have put out a new piece, which spends some time comparing the underlying moral positions of George R.R. Martin and J.R.R. Tolkien: (The relevant discussion starts about twenty-seven minutes in. It’s a long podcast). In the interests of fairness, ...
Crime is becoming a key debate between Labour and National. This week they are both keen to show that they are tough on law and order. It’s an issue that National has a traditional advantage on, and is one that they’re currently getting good traction from. In response, Labour is ...
The Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand is welcoming the Government’s latest step toward electoral reform, which begins to fulfil an important part of the Co-operation Agreement between the two parties. ...
CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY Mr Speaker, It has taken four-and-a-half years to even start to turn the legacy of inaction and neglect from the last time they were in Government together. And we have a long journey in front of us! ...
Today Greens Te Mātāwaka Chair and Health Spokesperson, Dr Elizabeth Kerekere, said “The Greens have long campaigned for an independent Māori Health Authority and pathways for Takatāpui and Rainbow healthcare. “We welcome the substantial funding going into the new health system, Pae Ora, particularly for the Māori Health Authority, Iwi-Partnership ...
Budget 2022 shows progress on conservation commitments in the Green Party’s cooperation agreement Green Party achievements in the last Government continue to drive investment in nature protection Urgent action needed on nature-based solutions to climate change Future budget decisions must reflect the role nature plays in helping reduce emissions ...
Landmark week for climate action concludes with climate budget Largest ever investment in climate action one of many Green Party wins throughout Budget 2022 Budget 2022 delivers progress on every part of the cooperation agreement with Labour Budget 2022 is a climate budget that caps a landmark week ...
Green Party welcomes extension to half price fares Permanent half price fares for Community Services Card holders includes many students, which helps implement a Green Party policy Work to reduce public transport fares for Community Services Card holders started by Greens in the last Government Budget 2022 should be ...
New cost of living payment closely aligned to Green Party policy to expand the Winter Energy Payment Extension and improvement of Warmer Kiwi Homes builds on Green Party progress in Government Community energy fund welcomed The Green Party welcomes the investment in Budget 2022 to expand Warmer Kiwi ...
Budget 2022 support to reduce homelessness delivers on the Green Party’s cooperation agreement Bespoke support for rangatahi with higher, more complex needs The Green Party welcomes the additional investment in Budget 2022 for kaupapa Māori support services, homelessness outreach services, the expansion of transitional housing, and a new ...
Green Party reaffirms call for liveable incomes and wealth tax Calls on Government to cancel debt owed to MSD for hardship assistance such as benefit advances, and for over-payments The Green Party welcomes the support for people on low incomes Budget 2022 but says more must be done ...
Our Government has just released this year’s Budget, which sets out the next steps in our plan to build a high wage, low carbon economy that gives economic security in good times and in bad. It’s full of initiatives that speed up our economic recovery and ease cost pressures for ...
A stronger democracy is on the horizon, as Golriz Ghahraman’s Electoral (Strengthening Democracy) Amendment Bill was pulled from the biscuit tin today. ...
Tomorrow, the Government will release this year’s Budget, setting out the next steps in our plan to build a high wage, low carbon economy that gives economic security in good times and in bad. While the full details will be kept under wraps until Thursday afternoon, we’ve announced a few ...
As a Government, we made it clear to New Zealanders that we’d take meaningful action on climate change, and that’s exactly what we’ve done. Earlier today, we released our next steps with our Emissions Reduction Plan – which will meet the Climate Commission’s independent science-based emissions reduction targets, and new ...
Emissions Reduction Plan prepares New Zealand for the future, ensuring country is on track to meet first emissions budget, securing jobs, and unlocking new investment ...
The Greens are calling for the Government to reconsider the immigration reset so that it better reflects our relationship with our Pacific neighbours. ...
Hamilton City Council and Whanganui District Council have both joined a growing list of Local Authorities to pass a motion in support of Green Party Drug Reform Spokesperson Chlöe Swarbrick’s Members’ bill to minimise alcohol harm. ...
Today, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced a major package of reforms to address the immediate skill shortages in New Zealand and speed up our economic growth. These include an early reopening to the world, a major milestone for international education, and a simplification of immigration settings to ensure New Zealand ...
Proposed immigration changes by the Government fail to guarantee pathways to residency to workers in the types of jobs deemed essential throughout the pandemic, by prioritising high income earners - instead of focusing on the wellbeing of workers and enabling migrants to put down roots. ...
Ehara taku toa i te toa takatahi, engari taku toa he toa takimano – my strength is not mine alone but the strength of many (working together to ensure safe, caring respectful responses). We are striving for change. We want all people in Aotearoa New Zealand thriving; their wellbeing enhanced ...
The Green Party is throwing its support behind the 10,000 allied health workers taking work-to-rule industrial action today because of unfair pay and working conditions. ...
Since the day we came into Government, we’ve worked hard to lift wages and reduce cost pressures facing New Zealanders. But we know the rising cost of living, driven by worldwide inflation and the war in Ukraine, is making things particularly tough right now. That’s why we’ve stepped up our ...
New Zealand is a step closer to a more resilient, competitive, and sustainable coastal shipping sector following the selection of preferred suppliers for new and enhanced coastal shipping services, Transport Minister Michael Wood has announced today. “Coastal shipping is a small but important part of the New Zealand freight system, ...
Tēnā koutou katoa It’s a pleasure to speak to you today on how we are tracking with the resource management reforms. It is timely, given that in last week’s Budget the Government announced significant funding to ensure an efficient transition to the future resource management system. There is broad consensus ...
Education Minister Chris Hipkins and Associate Education Minister Kelvin Davis have welcomed the release of a paper from independent advisory group, Taumata Aronui, outlining the group’s vision for Māori success in the tertiary education system. “Manu Kōkiri – Māori Success and Tertiary Education: Towards a Comprehensive Vision – is the ...
The best way to have economic security in New Zealand is by investing in wāhine and our rangatahi says Minister for Māori Development. Budget 2022, is allocating $28.5 million over the next two years to strengthen whānau resilience through developing leadership within key cohorts of whānau leaders, wāhine and rangatahi ...
Whānau Ora Commissioning Agencies will receive $166.5 million over four years to help whānau maintain and build their resilience as Aotearoa moves forward from COVID-19, Minister for Whānau Ora Peeni Henare announced today. “Whānau Ora Commissioning Agencies and partners will remain a key feature of the Government’s support for whānau ...
The development of sustainable, plant-based foods and meat alternatives is getting new government backing, with investment from a dedicated regional economic development fund. “The investment in Sustainable Foods Ltd is part of a wider government strategy to develop a low-emissions, highly-skilled economy that responds to global demands,” said Stuart Nash. ...
With New Zealand expecting to see Omicron cases rise during the winter, the Orange setting remains appropriate for managing this stage of the outbreak, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “While daily cases numbers have flattened nationally, they are again beginning to increase in the Northern region and hospitalisation ...
Justice Minister Kris Faafoi today announced appointments to the independent panel that will lead a review of New Zealand’s electoral law. “This panel, appointed by an independent panel of experts, aim to make election rules clearer and fairer, to build more trust in the system and better support people to ...
Honourable Dame Fran Wilde will lead the board overseeing the design and construction of Auckland’s largest, most transformational project of a generation – Auckland Light Rail, which will connect hundreds of thousands of people across the city, Minister of Transport Michael Wood announced today. “Auckland Light Rail is New Zealand’s ...
Boost to Māori Medium property that will improve and redevelop kura, purchase land and build new facilities Scholarships and mentoring to grow and expand the Māori teaching workforce Funding to continue to grow the Māori language The Government’s commitment to the growth and development of te reo Māori has ...
On the eve of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s trade mission to the United States, New Zealand has joined with partner governments from across the Indo-Pacific region to begin the next phase of discussions towards an Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF). The Framework, initially proposed by US President Biden in ...
As part of New Zealand’s ongoing response to the war in Ukraine, New Zealand is providing further support and personnel to assist Ukraine to defend itself against Russia’s unprovoked and illegal invasion, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced today. “We have been clear throughout Russia’s assault on Ukraine, that such a ...
Budget 2022 is providing investment to crackdown on tobacco smuggling into New Zealand. “Customs has seen a significant increase in the smuggling of tobacco products into New Zealand over recent years,” Minister of Customs Meka Whaitiri says. This trend is also showing that tobacco smuggling operations are now often very ...
Prime Minister to lead trade mission to the United States this week to support export growth and the return of tourists post COVID-19. Business delegation to promote trade and tourism opportunities in New Zealand’s third largest export and visitor market Deliver Harvard University commencement address Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has congratulated Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Party on winning the Australian Federal election, and has acknowledged outgoing Prime Minister Scott Morrison. "I spoke to Anthony Albanese early this morning as he was preparing to address his supporters. It was a warm conversation and I’m ...
Tiwhatiwha te pō, tiwhatiwha te ao. Tiwhatiwha te pō, tiwhatiwha te ao. Matariki Tapuapua, He roimata ua, he roimata tangata. He roimata e wairurutu nei, e wairurutu nei. Te Māreikura mārohirohi o Ihoa o ngā Mano, takoto Te ringa mākohakoha o Rongo, takoto. Te mātauranga o Tūāhuriri o Ngai Tahu ...
Three core networks within the tourism sector are receiving new investment to gear up for the return of international tourists and business travellers, as the country fully reconnects to the world. “Our wider tourism sector is on the way to recovery. As visitor numbers scale up, our established tourism networks ...
The Minister of Customs has welcomed legislation being passed which will prevent millions of dollars in potential tax evasion on water-pipe tobacco products. The Customs and Excise (Tobacco Products) Amendment Act 2022 changes the way excise and excise-equivalent duty is calculated on these tobacco products. Water-pipe tobacco is also known ...
The Government is contributing $100,000 to a Mayoral Relief Fund to help the Levin community following this morning’s tornado, Minister for Emergency Management Kiri Allan says. “My thoughts are with everyone who has been impacted by severe weather events in Levin and across the country. “I know the tornado has ...
The Quintet of Attorneys General have issued the following statement of support for the Prosecutor General of Ukraine and investigations and prosecutions for crimes committed during the Russian invasion of Ukraine: “The Attorneys General of the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand join in ...
Morena tatou katoa. Kua tae mai i runga i te kaupapa o te rā. Thank you all for being here today. Yesterday my colleague, the Minister of Finance Grant Robertson, delivered the Wellbeing Budget 2022 – for a secure future for New Zealand. I’m the Minister of Health, and this was ...
Urgent Budget night legislation to stop major supermarkets blocking competitors from accessing land for new stores has been introduced today, Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs Dr David Clark said. The Commerce (Grocery Sector Covenants) Amendment Bill amends the Commerce Act 1986, banning restrictive covenants on land, and exclusive covenants ...
It is a pleasure to speak to this Budget. The 5th we have had the privilege of delivering, and in no less extraordinary circumstances. Mr Speaker, the business and cycle of Government is, in some ways, no different to life itself. Navigating difficult times, while also making necessary progress. Dealing ...
Budget 2022 provides funding to implement the new resource management system, building on progress made since the reform was announced just over a year ago. The inadequate funding for the implementation of the Resource Management Act in 1992 almost guaranteed its failure. There was a lack of national direction about ...
The Government is substantially increasing the amount of funding for public media to ensure New Zealanders can continue to access quality local content and trusted news. “Our decision to create a new independent and future-focused public media entity is about achieving this objective, and we will support it with a ...
$662.5 million to maintain existing defence capabilities NZDF lower-paid staff will receive a salary increase to help meet cost-of living pressures. Budget 2022 sees significant resources made available for the Defence Force to maintain existing defence capabilities as it looks to the future delivery of these new investments. “Since ...
More than $185 million to help build a resilient cultural sector as it continues to adapt to the challenges coming out of COVID-19. Support cultural sector agencies to continue to offer their important services to New Zealanders. Strengthen support for Māori arts, culture and heritage. The Government is investing in a ...
It is my great pleasure to present New Zealand’s fourth Wellbeing Budget. In each of this Government’s three previous Wellbeing Budgets we have not only considered the performance of our economy and finances, but also the wellbeing of our people, the health of our environment and the strength of our communities. In Budget ...
It is my great pleasure to present New Zealand’s fourth Wellbeing Budget. In each of this Government’s three previous Wellbeing Budgets we have not only considered the performance of our economy and finances, but also the wellbeing of our people, the health of our environment and the strength of our communities. In Budget ...
Four new permanent Coroners to be appointed Seven Coronial Registrar roles and four Clinical Advisor roles are planned to ease workload pressures Budget 2022 delivers a package of investment to improve the coronial system and reduce delays for grieving families and whānau. “Operating funding of $28.5 million over four ...
Establishment of Ministry for Disabled People Progressing the rollout of the Enabling Good Lives approach to Disability Support Services to provide self-determination for disabled people Extra funding for disability support services “Budget 2022 demonstrates the Government’s commitment to deliver change for the disability community with the establishment of a ...
Fairer Equity Funding system to replace school deciles The largest step yet towards Pay Parity in early learning Local support for schools to improve teaching and learning A unified funding system to underpin the Reform of Vocational Education Boost for schools and early learning centres to help with cost ...
$118.4 million for advisory services to support farmers, foresters, growers and whenua Māori owners to accelerate sustainable land use changes and lift productivity $40 million to help transformation in the forestry, wood processing, food and beverage and fisheries sectors $31.6 million to help maintain and lift animal welfare practices across Aotearoa New Zealand A total food and ...
House price caps for First Home Grants increased in many parts of the country House price caps for First Home Loans removed entirely Kāinga Whenua Loan cap will also be increased from $200,000 to $500,000 The Affordable Housing Fund to initially provide support for not-for-profit rental providers Significant additional ...
Child Support rules to be reformed lifting an estimated 6,000 to 14,000 children out of poverty Support for immediate and essential dental care lifted from $300 to $1,000 per year Increased income levels for hardship assistance to extend eligibility Budget 2022 takes further action to reduce child poverty and ...
More support for RNA research through to pilot manufacturing RNA technology platform to be created to facilitate engagement between research and industry partners Researchers and businesses working in the rapidly developing field of RNA technology will benefit from a new research and development platform, funded in Budget 2022. “RNA ...
A new Business Growth Fund to support small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) to grow Fully funding the Regional Strategic Partnership Fund to unleash regional economic development opportunities Tourism Innovation Programme to promote sustainable recovery Eight Industry Transformation Plans progressed to work with industries, workers and iwi to transition ...
Budget 2022 further strengthens the economic foundations and wellbeing outcomes for Pacific peoples in Aotearoa, as the recovery from COVID-19 continues. “The priorities we set for Budget 2022 will support the continued delivery of our commitments for Pacific peoples through the Pacific Wellbeing Strategy, a 2020 manifesto commitment for Pacific ...
Boost for Māori economic and employment initiatives. More funding for Māori health and wellbeing initiatives Further support towards growing language, culture and identity initiatives to deliver on our commitment to Te Reo Māori in Education Funding for natural environment and climate change initiatives to help farmers, growers and whenua ...
New hospital funding for Whangārei, Nelson and Hillmorton 280 more classrooms over 40 schools, and money for new kura $349 million for more rolling stock and rail network investment The completion of feasibility studies for a Northland dry dock and a new port in the Manukau Harbour Increased infrastructure ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The QUAD summit in Tokyo has praised Australia raising its ambition on climate change, after Anthony Albanese told fellow leaders his government would do more to assist Pacific countries address it. Albanese stressed Australia’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Benjamin Clark, Deputy Engagement Editor, The Conversation Politics can be slow-moving, until all of a sudden it isn’t. As political scientist Simon Jackman says in today’s episode of Below the Line, “politics is very non-linear. You get these steady, secular ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By D. Bondy Valdovinos Kaye, Lecturer, Queensland University of Technology On Sunday, popular American singer songwriter Halsey shared a video on TikTok with tinny music in the background, the on-screen text reading: Basically I have a song that I love that ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Crowley, Adjunct Associate Professor, Public and Environmental Policy, University of Tasmania During Saturday’s election, 31.5% of the voters deserted the major parties, with a swag of female teal independents tipping Liberal MPs out of their heartland urban seats. By contrast, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rita Matulionyte, Senior Lecturer in Law, Macquarie University Shutterstock Mastercard’s “smile to pay” system, announced last week, is supposed to save time for customers at checkouts. It is being trialled in Brazil, with future pilots planned for the Middle East ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Shutterstock Stand by for something “reckless and dangerous”. That’s what former prime minister Scott Morrison said Prime Minister Anthony Albanese would be if he asked the Fair Work Commission ...
Just in case the affected voters and constituencies haven’t bothered to check how much funding they are being given in Budget 2022 (or how much they have lost in some cases), ministers have been letting them know in post-Budget press statements. At least, they have been letting them know when ...
The Chair of the National Maori Authority, Matthew Tukaki, has called the way a New Zealand mother of two died in custody awaiting deportation from Australia was a disgrace and further evidence that the system is not just broken but responsible ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christian Moro, Associate Professor of Science & Medicine, Bond University Shutterstock You showered this morning, are wearing fresh clothes and having an otherwise normal day, when suddenly you notice that stench. Why do our armpits smell, and why more ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lucinda McKnight, Senior Lecturer in Pedagogy and Curriculum, Deakin University Pixabay The war in Ukraine is being described as the first social media war, even as “the TikTok war”. Memes, tweets, videos and blog posts communicate both vital information and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Stewart, John Bray Professor of Law, University of Adelaide Industrial relations issues were front and centre when federal Labor last won office from opposition in 2007. The backlash against John Howard’s “Work Choices” reforms cost both his government and his own ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Soutphommasane, Acting Director, Sydney Policy Lab & Professor of Practice (Sociology and Political Theory), University of Sydney The message from Saturday’s election result was clear: Australians want a political reset. And not just about issues such as government integrity and climate ...
The Education and Workforce Committee is calling for submissions on the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill. This bill would extend the period of time available to raise a personal grievance ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kelly Menzel, Assistant Professor – First Nations Health, Bond University GettyImages Workplaces can be hostile, overwhelming and unwelcoming places for many First Nations Peoples. My research has explored how this is the case in many organisations, including universities. White organisations ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Breadon, Program Director, Health and Aged Care, Grattan Institute CDC/Unsplash Anthony Albanese campaigned on better pandemic management. Giving the vaccination program a shot in the arm will be his first test. Not long ago, every shipment of vaccines was ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Simon Kingham, Professor, University of Canterbury Shutterstock/Tanya NZ The Dutch have long been recognised as leaders in cycling. Denmark is not far behind, with more bikes than cars in its capital Copenhagen. This is the result of many years of ...
Remaining in the orange traffic light setting is not a constraint or handbrake to accelerating business recovery, rebuilding, and planning for growth, says Auckland Business Chamber CEO Michael Barnett. “Businesses can do everything under Orange, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Breadon, Program Director, Health and Aged Care, Grattan Institute CDC/Unsplash Anthony Albanese campaigned on better pandemic management. Giving the vaccination program a shot in the arm will be his first test. Not long ago, every shipment of vaccines was ...
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This needs saying again and again…
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/04/ripping-up-protections-brexit-trump-freedom
See NZ Heralds weekly Basketball Podcast is Double Dribble. This will piss our Double Dipper Dipton pm right off. Name recognition etc,.tut-tut.
.. they are at it again, but has Deep State trumped Trump or is it the other way around ?
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/jumping-conclusions-something-not-adding-idlib-chemical-weapons-attack/
Directorial standards are slipping, the plot is getting stale, the script needs radical editing and new perspectives. We have a few writers, directors and operators who can do the job. No hobbits, I promise ..
Evening All,
This was on the 7:30 report tonight a very good article about this gas attack.
I’m afraid folks this looks like the real deal and it doesn’t be appear be a VX agent or something similar more off a sarin or mustard agent ,but it might take 1-2 weeks to confirm. I’ll do some digging around tomorrow and see what I can come with.
Have a watch of this and form you own opinion.
http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2017/s4648907.htm
Oh dear.
The Guardian has given over its opinion column to the leader of the west’s favourite terrorist organisation. Is anyone still singing along to this broken record?
Here’s the opening verse (you’ve heard it before).
The offer of an opinion column presumably was prompted by this piece of news:
At least 60 people have been killed in northern Syria after being exposed to a toxic gas that survivors said was dropped from warplanes…
…
The town is also on a crossroads between Hama and Idlib and is considered vital to any regime offensive towards the northern city of Idlib.
Those damn terrorists!
Yeah, yeah. I’m fully aware of that report…furnished by?
The people who live there.
Many people are there. Not all people there are Syrian. Some people have agendas that are helped along and supported by explicit and direct western government support.
Do I have to link to the Guardian piece again from a while back that was out of step with their otherwise uniform reporting? The one that perhaps mistakenly or inadvertently, or then again, perhaps by dint of some very cunning work by a journalist or journalists with a conscience, kind of ‘let the cat out of the bag’?
Here you go. Try reading it critically and a little (just a little) deeper than at a mere surface level. I’ll give you some help. (Think, given their genesis is English, “White Helmets”)
The old chemical weapon canard,
Fisk from 2013 still survives the test of time.
https://www.democracynow.org/2013/5/7/robert_fisk_on_syrias_civil_war
Fisk: “…don’t ask me if they’ve used chemical weapons. It’s conceivable. There really isn’t any proof.”
Well, exactly. If there was proof, this wouldn’t just be a matter of competing claims in the media. My own view of it is that people who’ve been murdered by their own government no longer care about the weapons that were used (or anything else, for that matter) – but it’s newsworthy either way.
…supported by explicit and direct western government support.
Do you know how many revolutionary movements of the 20th Century received explicit and direct Soviet government support? It’s certainly too many for me to be arsed counting them all, but only right-wing propagandists claimed those movements were therefore puppets of the USSR. Governments have interests, and sometimes those interests overlap with other people’s interests – it’s a given, ’twas ever thus, and doesn’t necessarily imply the people who find their interests overlapping with a foreign government’s are tools of a foreign power, terrorists, untrustworthy, or very much else.
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/jumping-conclusions-something-not-adding-idlib-chemical-weapons-attack/
Mate! you can’t put up links from ‘fake news’ sites! /sarc
So that you know (for future reference) PM and many others will only countenance news coming from more impeccable sources, the likes of CNN, BBC, Guardian, NYT…because thems is fonts of truth, objectivity, serious investigative reporting and critical analysis.
What the hell you thinking? Linking to dodgy foreign (non- western) rubbish… 😉
edit – serious request. Can you please use the reply tabs in future? Thanks.
There’s a difference between propaganda and “fake news” – we’ve had that discussion before. This one looks to be a Syrian regime propaganda site, not a fake news site.
You know I’m of the persuasion that only those desperate to cling to a particular world view divide propaganda into supposed ”fake news” and propaganda, and that they do that in order to justify dismissing out of hand information that might threaten their cotton candy silo.
And I know you disagree.
Al-Masdar News is based in the United Arab Emirates, not Syria.
Fraud sentence a joke, some 11 months of home detention plus 180 hours community work for systematic Filipino work visa fraud. This dual passport carrier along with her family should be sent back to her country of origin.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1704/S00035/sentence-in-filipino-visa-fraud-case.htm
And Immigration NZ hopes the sentence will act as a deterrent for anybody else looking to cheat our borders. Ha.
Totally agree . We do not allow frausters to immigrate to this country. If guilty of it here they should all be sent back to wherever they came from. Same for the Indian shopkeeper found guilty of tricking and exploiting his immigrant workers last week.
Why have our immigration doors not been closed by now except to the people who have skills not found in our own population. Why ? Everyone I speak to wants this to happen. Where are the ears and actions of the politicians who are supposed to be acting on the mainstream will of the legal New Zealand population. Why ?
We got this from the Retailer’s Assn yesterday, about the drop off in Chinese tourists. (separate issue, and quite interesting)
http://theregister.co.nz/news/2017/04/data-dump-chinese-new-zealand-tourism
About halfway down there are a couple of bar graphs, in the second, “Average Length of Stay by Market”, Indian and Thai visitors have the second and third longest average stays at 48 and 29 days, something odd going on there. Most Thai, and all Indian visitors I encounter across are finding New Zealand far too expensive for their budget, so month or so stays would be unexpected. For those markets to be staying that long they would have to be working, so probably shouldn’t be on a tourist visa.
Germans are longest at 49 days which would be right for the backpacker market.
Mum & Dad coming to stay with the kids to look after grandchildren might explain the length of Indian & Thai stays as they may be largish in proportion to the just holidaying tourist market
NZ news item! Interesting contrast in RadioNZ news items today. And some other titbits thrown in for your info. Enjoy….
technology life and society
4 Apr 2017
Robotics in farming – the revolution begins
From Nine To Noon, 9:25 am on 4 April 2017
Listen duration 13′ :46″ http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201839068
Waikato University’s Mike Duke says robots harvesting fruit in New Zealand orchards could be years not decades away. He’s picking that the technology has the potential to revolutionize all aspects of the horticulture industry as well as forestry and dairy.
Professor Duke will be giving a lecture on this topic next Tuesday 11th April at the University of Waikato.
and
money economy
4 Apr 2017
NZ’s homeowners now worth $1.2 trillion
From Nine To Noon, 9:08 am on 4 April 2017
Listen duration 19′ :53″ http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201839067
Kathryn Ryan talks to Bernard Hickey from Newsroom who says figures released by Statistics New Zealand show household net worth has risen from $323 billion to $1.2 trillion in the last 8 years – with most of that increase being driven by rising property prices.
As a side effect he says its now virtually impossible for children of renters to make their way onto the property ladder unless they marry into what he’s dubbed the new landed gentry.
The connection here? Who will be buying and living in houses when the robots take the employment from society’s hands, and contain it in their elegantly sculpted fingers? Wot about the workers? Wot’s left for the humans! Oh that’s right the Conchords told us, they’re dead.
Or soon will be – just wrecks and the nobs left, showing little of our potential to be wonderful creatures living together in uneasy creativity under regularly affirmed and agreed restraints using our rationality.
Scoop needs money to run an effective campaign in election year. If you can channel some of your spending to a donation and regular monthly payments of even $20 to keep the support, you are doing your best to be a wonderfully creative human. But act now, there will be tipping points where we can stop the run of the dominoes, or alter the flow but they can’t be constantly passed by.
Finally Schumacher from essay – Technology with a Human Face in Small is Beautiful.
Technology although of course the product of man, tends to develop by its own laws and principles and these are very different from those of human nature or of living nature in general. Nature always, so to speak, knows where and when to stop. Greater even than the mystery of natural growth is the mystery of the natural cessation of growth…which tends to be self-balancing, self-adjusting, self-cleansing. Not so with technology and specialisation….
If that which has been shaped by technology and continues to be so shaped, looks sick, it might be wise to have a look at technology itself…if becoming more inhuman, we might do well to consider…better – a technology with a human face.
@greywarshark
Hundreds of thousands of $$ on robots or $15.50 an hour on backpackers/islanders where you can explain the fruit picking job to them in 30 minutes and that’s just about all the instruction they need for a month?
Robots ARE decades away.
Hooray for decades, then I won’t see them rampant before I die. But AFTER!
Hundreds of thousands of dollars on a machine that will do the work of two people for twenty years with good maintenance. Against thirty five thousand per person every year for those twenty years.
Yep, the robot is much cheaper.
And, yep, hopefully it’s only a few years before they’re available.
and then you start adding cost of unemployment – yes even a UBI will cost money, and other societal costs associated with long term unemployment and then maybe your robot is not that cheap after all.
but you make a good point,
its not that we don’t have jobs that needs doing, its just that we don’t want to pay anyone for doing them.
Really what do you expect the people of tomorrow to do on their poverty UBI with fuck all to do during the day cause everything is done by robots.
Oh yeah, they will pick up knitting and drown in jumpers.
There shouldn’t be any unemployment.
The economy is not money no matter how much the economists and RWNJs insist that it is. It the physical resources we have available at any one time and the people to bring about innovative ways to use them for the benefit of society.
That’s part of it – NZers are generally horribly cheap. But that’s partially because the RWNJs have been saying that taxes are theft and robbery. Now look at what happens when we follow the recommendations of those RWNJs and cut taxes – the people become worse off while a few rich people become much richer.
In other words the lessons that the RWNJs and the rich have thrown at us are a smokescreen to encourage the people to vote against their own best interests.
Revolution and the permanent removal of rich people.
“its not that we don’t have jobs that needs doing, its just that we don’t want to pay anyone for doing them.”
” That’s part of it – NZers are generally horribly cheap. But that’s partially because the RWNJs have been saying that taxes are theft and robbery. Now look at what happens when we follow the recommendations of those RWNJs and cut taxes – the people become worse off while a few rich people become much richer.”
Actually no, its society. We all want shit done for free or for cheap. We use volunteers to not have to pay people a wage. We hold fundraiser for Ambulances and Fire Engines. We have high unemployment while we have high demand for volunteers. Hmmm? Why? Why not pay people money to do that as a job instead and call it working for the UBI. or, you cold condemn people to death by boredom, once all the work is done by robots and most of us live in chicken cages and try to survive of a UBI.
as for Revolution…sorry mate. Not interested. Revolution generally are not good for women. Especially i have no use for revolutions that involve smashing the lot and replacing it with nothing.
Its a bit like Trumpcare, all repeal, little replacement but a whole lot of grifting for the rich which – and this is historically proven – you will never really get rid of, you chop the head of one family, other will come and take over. Rinse repeat.
Yes, it’s society but only because of what society has been taught. Change the lesson.
Depends upon the revolution. Or don’t you think that the actions of the Suffragettes was revolutionary?
https://www.marxist.com/women-in-the-paris-commune.htm
oh and society can’t unlearn what it has been tought? Seriously?
yes, the suffragettes were revolutionary, but getting the right to vote was not a revolution. It was a fight to a particular right and they won, but they did not want to dis-stablilze society in order to burn it down and remake a ‘better and brighter future’ from the ashes. They wanted to vote.
But it was not a society changing revolution. It gave women the vote and until the late sixties early seventies that was pretty much what they got. The right to vote. The right to have a bank account and a cheque book came in the 70, the right to the pill came in 1974 and so on and so on, tiny little wars won in a long battle that is still being fought. So maybe this is what you mean when you say revolution? Hundred of years of tiny battle to get a little bit more rights.
No the type of revolution that changes a society radically such as the French Revolution or the Russian Revolution are bloody, messy, full of hunger and violence and it is usually the women and children who are at the receiving end.
And if there is no music and dance, then i have no use in your revolution.
Like the paraphrasing of Red Emma there Sabine. 🙂
you guys migh be interested in this
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/feb/19/basic-income-finland-low-wages-fewer-jobs
Mechanical harvesters have been used in the wine industry for many years.
Despite that, it’s still a massive and growing industry, great productivity, excellent careers.
The quicker New Zealand gets rid of most of these poorly paid harvesting jobs that few locals want to do, the better.
Hi ad, in respect to your last sentence, better for what/whom?
Society but we have to stop the rich grabbing all the gains as they’ve been doing for the last 30+ years.
QFT
And that’s what many people don’t understand. Get rid of those jobs and we have more people to put into the education and health systems and many other jobs that presently don’t have enough people in them.
Next up, Tiffany Trump’s former babysitter goes to Syria.
Thinkpiece from Radionz yesterday. This has worried many commenters here.
media education
4 Apr 2017
The Death of Expertise
From Jesse Mulligan, 1–4pm, 3:10 pm on 4 April 2017
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201839116
Listen duration 23′ :05″
Alternative facts did not start with Donald Trump. For years, emotion has played a bigger role than reason in many public debates.
But the rejection of rationalism and faith in experts is getting worse according to Tom Nichols, a Professor of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College.
He says an epidemic of narcissism, where no one is ever wrong, is fueling the problem.
He explores the implications of the ‘post truth’ era in his new book, The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why It Matters.
I posted this on TS a couple of years ago.
http://thefederalist.com/2014/01/17/the-death-of-expertise/
Nichols on Twitter – https://twitter.com/RadioFreeTom
Hey thanks – just picked up item while passing at Radionz for my comment on tech and housing. I’ll get the gen on all all the expertise stuff at the same time. I do rely on TS when I go to get The Knowledge! I particularly resonates with me as I try to discuss and offer ideas to various others and find I can’t dent the Certainty Carapace.
A few minutes after this report North Korea fired a projectile off it’s east coast.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-missiles-idUSKBN1762XX
The 20 million souls within range of NK artillery will be pleased to have a man with a steady hand in the White House.
/
Secretary of State Tillerson released this statement on Tuesday’s ballistic missile launch:
It would be one thing for the US to simply ignore North Korea’s provocations, but Tillerson’s statement follows this warning from a senior White House official just hours earlier:
https://www.axios.com/tillersons-cryptic-statement-on-north-korea-missile-launch-2345034795.html
We used to be such a caring nation. Is this a taste of our brighter future?
“One passerby even stopped to take photos before carrying on.”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/91217934/woman-aquaplanes-crashes-in-waikato-floodwaters-during-cummute
I guess wee Stevie will be along soon to tell us Co2 is great because palm trees and crocodiles.
No, the headline is not a typo. Current carbon dioxide levels are unprecedented in human history and are on track to climb to even more ominous heights in just a few decades.
If carbon emissions continue on their current trajectory, new findings show that by mid-century, the atmosphere could reach a state unseen in 50 million years. Back then, temperatures were up to 18°F (10°C) warmer, ice was almost nowhere to be seen and oceans were dramatically higher than they are now.
[…]
“The early Eocene was much warmer than today: global mean surface temperature was at least 10°C (18°F) warmer than today,” Dana Royer, a paleoclimate researcher at Wesleyan University who co-authored the new research, said. “There was little-to-no permanent ice. Palms and crocodiles inhabited the Canadian Arctic.”
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/climate-change-unseen-50-million-years-21312
Where were humans in this warmer age? Anywhere? Living in palm trees because of the crocodiles? What about now? What about the polar bears and penguins!
Let’s concentrate, and not digress – look here WW1, look here footpaths for cycles and pedestrians walking inside little plastic protective cubes with helmets on, look here pictures from 5 million light years in space, look here implants of stem cells keeping you alive to 200 years. Phooey.
More stick, less carrot. Rachel Stewart notes the abject failure of all our environmental regulatory agencies (especially regional councils) to enforce the rules: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11831658
Relatedly, a court has ruled against one regional council for not doing its job: http://norightturn.blogspot.co.nz/2017/04/a-victory-for-clean-rivers.html
Strange bedfellows. The alt-right’s enthusiasm for single payer healthcare, explained. UBI gets a look in too.
http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/4/4/15164598/alt-right-single-payer-health-care-trump
Criticism of UBI here. Its not a progressive policy.
http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=35705
Cheers nic, plenty of food for thought in that essay.
I suppose it would depend on the amount of the UBI.
Enough to take in the concerns weka has expressed.
It was from an American perspective, where one must spit after implying anything socialist.
The amount of a UBI is quite important, if its too low (like what TOP is proposing) then it will become a way to undermine welfare.
But this is not the only problem with a UBI. For example what a UBI doesn’t do is engage people in meaningful work, and as such it doesn’t put any pressure on the nature of work in society. You can find discussion of this among the linked blog posts from that one, but just to highlight one issue.
Somebody sitting on a UBI for a long time is not too different to somebody being on a benefit for a number of years. What it doesn’t do is give them the job skills which somebody employed over those years will develop. The person unemployed for this period will still no doubt be discriminated against when trying to enter employment from that position, and will likely start at a lower wage rate than the employed person changing work at that point. There are plenty of good economic reasons to favor employment over just income due to similar factors as this (both for individuals and macro-economic outcomes).
Eagerly awaiting the results of the select committee hearings today on Medical Cannabis, in the mean time…
https://yournz.org/2017/04/05/medical-cannabis-regime-anything-but-compassionate/#comment-177377
How can Bill English use the word compassionate, when the costs for cannabis products are prohibitive. A total disconnect from reality of the people who need this medicines, and their economic status.
Watching the Hawks
This show has been running for a while on RT America, and I’ve just got into watching it on a more regular basis – the latest show is rather good.
Is it possible to have a ‘Swamp’ on the 68th floor of a 59 floor ‘Tower’ ?
Trump’s advisory team hard at work. Another little gem for Alex Jones aficionados.
http://www.salon.com/2017/04/04/infowars-host-alex-jones-threatens-adam-schiff-ill-beat-your-goddamn-ass/
I just heard the Prime Minister say traffic is so slow in Auckland because of the number of roading projects under way.
He’s allowed to be a fuckwit. Presuming us to be the same and accept such crap just doubles up his quota of that quality.
like all good lies there is an element of truth to it
do you live in Auckland repateet?
I’m glad TS isn’t lowering itself to covering the pathetic story about Andrew in court… is anyone else feeling totally UNsorry for the millionaires who are extracting another $2m because they got ‘hurt feelings’?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/91225586/labour-leader-andrew-little-niue-hotel-comments-aimed-at-government-not-hagamans
Please!
Nice one Roy. I’d say it’s not about the money. It’s about getting an unreserved apology for being accused of corruption by someone whose every word is potentially broadcast to 4 million people.
So it’s not pathetic, it’s a lesson in getting it right and admitting when you got it wrong
“…not about the money…”
He’s unreservedly, publicly apologised already; but they aren’t having it. Moreover, asking for a bit of sunlight isn’t quite an ‘accusation’ is it?
A year too late. A week before court. That smacks of repentance indeed.
So it’s worth $2m – TWO MILLION DOLLARS??!!
Go on, tell me again that that isn’t pathetic.
Oh and since you’re so in to the legal over the moral, lateness and timing isn’t relevant, right? Right.
IMO, he shouldn’t have done that. He was doing his job and it needs to be done espcially when you consider that National are corrupt.
I’d say it’s not about the money.
Er, hello… rich Nat donors not about the money?
…it’s a lesson in getting it right…
He did get it right – there’s a very bad smell about people getting government funding shortly after making a fat donation to the governing party. Unfortunately, under NZ law, being right doesn’t necessarily keep you out of court if you’re right about vindictive Tories with deep pockets.
They didn’t. The money went to the govt of Niue. That’s why Little is in court. The same sloppy attention to detail you’re showing. He pointed to the wrong village same as some other newsworthy individuals.
Thing about smells is that they’re not about details. They’re the general odour, in the general area of something that might be rotten, or just blue cheese.
When the general picture needs investigating, arguing over details is just weak.
Smells can also be highly misleading as you point out. Rather than shrieking something is dead and rotting under the bed you should first investigate that it’s not your own sweaty socks.
Guess which option Andrew chose
He said something smelled, and that maybe we should look under the bed and make sure it’s all clean under there. That’s all. And it’s his job to do that.
Yes but he also has the responsibility to do so within the law. Do you disagree with the auditor general and his apology?
meh
I think the apology was likely a rational cost/benefit calculation on the eve of the trial. I frankly think the complaint about his comments is bullshit, but whatever. It’s a civil matter, not a criminal case.
He made a very genuine apology in court today and good on him. Par;iamentarians have a huge advantage over the public with almost total freedom of speech in Parliament, with next to no comeback if you are maligned. But they have to use that responsibly and if they don’t they deserve to get stung – though not the $2m being spoken about. That said I would have thought their reputation was worth at least double that of Jordan Williams. Juries can be funny folk.
And when the investigation is over not fronting and admitting fault and sorting the mess you created out is even weaker. It’s so petulant.
Horseshit. AL has already apologised and offered a settlement. Why do RWNJ’s always want to investigate the whistleblower rather than the criminal stench that surrounds the Nats dodgy deals?
because those that denied it supplied it?
+1 yep strange odors
There was nothing dodgy here. Are you in the Labour Research Unit? Because your alternative facts are just fake news.
You need to read the AG report and understand the mechanics of what went on.
The Matavai Hotel is owned by the Govt of Niue. it had something like 20 rooms. The NZ Govt gave them money to double its size. This process was started before the Hagaman donation and SCenic winning the managment contract, and was part of a long term pattern of NZ support for Niue’s only hotel.
Niue only has 1500 people and have shown no real skills at running international hotels. So they decided to contract its management out. There was an open tender run by an expert global hotel consultancy. Scenic was one of two tenders.
They get paid a fee to manage a hotel. They don’t own it, they aren’t being paid to build it. do you really think they are making much money managing a 45 room hotel on an isolated island?
I had the impression that the money went to the owner of the hotel – do you have a reference for where it was said that the hotel is owned by the government of Niue? I presume it is a franchise operation however, so some of the benefit of any improvement to the property should accrue to the franchise holders – else why would the Hagermans be even slightly interested?.
I’m not clear on the time line, but there was apparently an assessment process in place which was considering a possible grant – again I don’t know whether the grant had been requested or whether tenders had been called for ways of assisting Nuie, but it seems reasonable to presume that Mrs Hagerman at least was aware of that process. Murray McCully has a reputation for knowing all details of what is going on in his department, so it is possible he knew about the assessment being made. At some stage around then the President of the National Party just happens to turn up to seek a donation to the party – absolutely no link can ever be proved between that chance visit and anything else, and of course the Hagermans cannot be criticised for doing what many other business people engaged in a commercial relationship with the government seem to have done, which is making a donation to the National Party – there is the example of Oravida for example which also coincidentally may have received government assistance around the time of making a donation – just as and that other friend of National, Kim Dotcom, made political donations around the time that a friendly John Banks had been assisting him. No connection at all between donations and services of course – pure coincidence, but it may perhaps be reasonable to call attention to a series of coincidences where business people may have been under the (obviously mistaken) impression that a donation to National somehow may assist getting assistance from some part of government. That is no criticism of people making donations of course, but it may be hard to give an example of a coincidence without mentioning both a donation and a service that just happens to occur in close proximity . . . However the praise that the Hagermans are now getting for their business acumen (they apparently sure know how to invest to make money) is possibly an unexpected bonus for them, particularly as Mr Hagerman is apparently gravely unwell – a reputation for tenacity, an eye to a chance of making money, and for looking after friends is surely no bad thing?
you had that impression becasue Andrew Little aided by people like Ropata and others, couldn’t be bothered doing proper research. you also were willing to accept their slurs were true because you probably thought they had done their homework. You were misled and you should be angry with the people who did that to you.
It’s all in the AG report http://www.oag.govt.nz/media/2016/niue-hotel. It’s an easy read. The contract was let by Matavai Niue Limited, a company registered in Niue. directors Of MNL are responsible for appointing the manager of the resort. The premier of Niue is one of the directors.
It wasn’t rocket science. A few phone calls could have saved them a lot of grief but political grabs were the priority.
There is also a very rotten smell about vexatious litigation against the leader of the Opposition Party acting in his democratic role.
Potential for a rather chilling effect on free speech and democracy. The court better think carefully, especially given the smog of “dirty politics” is still hanging around the Nats.
Really? You think an apology and an offer of $100k in damages is the result of vexatiousness? I suggest you get a new dictionary
I suspect $100k is what he suspects this will cost him, whether he wins or not.
It looks exactly like a dirty politics style smear campaign. Little has apologised and offered a huge settlement, but the litigious twats are enjoying their pathetic revenge by trying to drag AL through the mud. Vexatious.
He had plenty of time to apologise when the AG report came out. Why do you feel that ordinary citizens don’t have the right to defend their reputations while politicians have free reign to trample on them?
Even Lani (sp?) gave evidence that all she wants is an apology and costs, but somehow her intentions fell right off and she ended up suing for $2M by accident.
Bwahaha thanks for putting words in my mouth. The job of an Opposition MP is to question the Government and other powerful establishment figures. I know this seems like treason to RW fucktards (no doubt you are dying to send AL to Guantanamo Bay) but it used to be a democratic norm.
prettt silly comment there ropata. He’s got the right to make those comments, his victims have the right to sue if they are libellous. Andrew little has found out the greatest lesson there is on freedom of speech. Say what you want, just accept the consequences.
How democratic is it if politicians can wildly spray allegations around without any consequence.
You mean like the Nat’s campaign of lies against David Cunliffe over a nonexistent 100K donation from Donghua Liu?
Not very “democratic” was it. I find it deeply concerning that the dirty politics machine seems to be gearing up for another assault on democracy in NZ. And yet unprincipled RWNJ’s refuse to admit their own complicity, and moronically slag off truth tellers like Nicky Hager. Disgusting
PS: Do you have a problem with Parliamentary privilege?
No problem at all. You would think that the current leader of the opposition would have the wit to use it. Jacinda wouldn’t have made this grievous mistake that is going to cost little and labour a fortune.
He shouldn’t have repeated it outside of Parliament.
Little should blame Robertson internally for researching and raising it.
It’s going to be a pretty expensive lesson for Little.
the award should be the grand sum of $1
When little has already offered $100k?
Deep legal reasoning and economic understanding aren’t really your thing. yes little has apologised, but only once he realised that he was deep in the kak.
ethics and democracy arent really your thing are they
It may not, you’re right.
But It certainly won’t keep you out of court if your wrong and refuse to admit that and apologise in a timely fashion. Little is a lawyer, how did he not know this?
“Timely”.
Um, yes. Interesting word, that. Well chosen on your part, although I’m not sure you really thought it through.
That’s strange Roy because only a month ago you upticked an idea of taking people to court on charges of hate speech.
So you want to criminalise people just because they hurt someone else’s feelings?
What’s strange exactly? Having a point of view on two separate issues or…?
ps – I hope it’s not that “pandering” article you’re referring to… Because conflating those two issues would be vexatious trolling.
No it was on attack ads and hate speech, which is not dissimilar from the current context imo.
It’s right there in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
I seen it.
+1+1 OAB
That’s a very entertaining comment AOB.
it’s on the interwebs so it must be true.
That appears to be the motto of the Labour Research Unit.
Watched a bit of parliament today.
I was impressed with Michael Wood speaking on the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill (both parts one and two).
He looks a more experienced speaker than I would have imagined for a newby.
Video part one here:
Trevor Mallard criticised Wood at the end, saying he had been talking about a part of the amendment bill that had been axed. After the next speaker also slammed the amendment, Mallard appologised for getting it wrong, and that Wood had been correctly addressing a part still in the bill.
Isn’t it strange how National party politicians can overtly slander people (e.g. Nicky Hager is a left wing conspiracy theorist” despite his acknowledged credentials here and overseas), yet Andrew Little can’t ask questions about hotel owners who receive business benefits after donating to National?
Isn’t it odd that politicians who are a threat to National end up in court? Craig, the Conservative Party leader (taken to court by National Party boys), went to court for speaking out to the media after he’d signed an agreement to keep quiet. He was done on this (it was not actually a court case about the rights and wrongs of his sexual behaviour).
All National need is a TV appearance of their political foes in court. This is what they are after. Most of the public don’t follow the details; National knows this.
And the spin doctors above who’ve infiltrated this site know this.
Nicky Hager
Bradley Ambrose
Ponytail Victim
Colin Craig
David Cunliffe
and now Andrew Little … it smells a lot like another dirty politics subterfuge