Actually, my fine feathered friend, it is quite a long time since I have been first on the board. I have been so busy lately I just haven’t had the time.
I think discussing the looks of our politicians – particularly women – is poor form. I was uneasy with the way people talked of Helen Clark in similar terms, or even when people talked positively about Nikki Kaye and Jacinda Ardern. Men do get it too – Gerry Brownlee gets flak from time to time for his weight, but it seems to happen far less often for guys, even though men make up the majority of politicians. I realise I can’t stop it, but I do think less of people who resort to such personal statements, much in the same way I think poorly of people who make ad hominem arguments.
I know I used to (I mean lets face it Labour do make it easy) but I’m trying to get away from all that stuff…it should be about their performance and in this case JC is my pick to take over from JK
Jolly good, Pete. And good for you, Winston. Really.
Now would one of you care to get down off your cross and point to where anyone is “discussing the looks of politicians” or “pointing out a female MPs features”?
Would you be just as amused by the following statements?
For a suspect of a male politician so vain as to have had the Botox treatment you cannot go past Trevor(the convicted)Mallard…
or perhaps
For a suspect of a male politician so vain as to have had the Botox treatment you cannot go past Hone(the convicted)Harawira…
That’s a comment about using botox. It’s comment on her vanity
ffs are we not allowed to point out vanity now? How about idiocy? Can we still point out a politician’s idiocy or is that forbidden too? And what about dishonesty?
I’m going to need a serious answer to this: Is it no longer acceptable to notice that we are being governed by vain, dishonest idiots?
“For the real-life effects of clostridium botulinum, refer to Judith Collins’ face.”
Hands up how many people thought the comment was about Collins’ face, or Collins’ vanity?
Felix, there are issues with commenting on either. Prominent women get shit for their appearance, esp politicians. If you want to make jokes about it, expect that joke to be put in its socio-political context.
In fact, when I first read it I thought it was about Collins’ face looking like she had botulism. Whatever. You can interpret the joke however you like, but I’d still like to see how many people read it the way you did, or the possible two other interpretations.
‘very obvious’ may be stretching it and it seems like the people who took the ‘very obvious’ inference are the ones getting worked up.
@felix “ffs are we not allowed to point out vanity now? How about idiocy? Can we still point out a politician’s idiocy or is that forbidden too? And what about dishonesty?”
I think vanity is okay to go for and idiocy and dishonesty too. Personally though ripping into key because he has/has not got a hairpiece is pretty weak imo, there is always a downside to going in with those attacks mainly because none of us, or the politicians we support, are perfect so it can get a bit tit for taty. I just don’t care the collins may or may not have botox in her face perhaps that why I missed the joke.
Hey Marty, when I saw your comment below, “must be a moron I suppose.”
I was going to respond, but figured you were being self depricating, as opposed to fishing for a response, that was my interpretation of your comment, but it could have been varying degress of misinterpretation, from your intent.
What this situation illustrates, is the limitations/barriers of digital communication, once again.
I don’t really think I’m a moron and my initial response to felix’s question was with a straight bat and yes I just didn’t get the jokey inference from the initial comment.
You are correct that language is a very blunt tool to get the message across and within the digital platform any challenges are compounded. Words often have a subjective value and don’t mean the same thing to different people – makes the discussions and debates fun though 🙂
I think felix means that amitrite’s comment didn’t say anything about Collins being a woman, the implication being that they could just as easily have made the comment about a man and the insult joke would have worked. Which is of course daft.
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell 1.3.2.1.3.1
Making a joke about a man having botox doesn’t have the same cultural baggage attached to it that making the joke about a woman does. Women have real, serious barriers in society, and one of the ways those barriers get enforced is by the culturally sanctioned sexism that constantly puts women in their place.
Do you honestly think that the joke would have been made about a male politician? Which one?
Not as much, and you are still missing the point. I’ll put it another way. Commenting on the appearance of women or men happens for different reasons and has different effects because of the different social context and prejudices.
How about you point out how comments about JK’s rug tie in with sexism against men.
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell …
weka: “I think felix means that amitrite’s comment didn’t say anything about Collins being a woman, the implication being that they could just as easily have made the comment about a man and the insult joke would have worked. Which is of course daft.”
No, that’s not what I meant at all. If I’d meant that I would’ve typed it.
What I meant was what I sad: the comment was not a slight on anyone’s physical features.
This thread demonstrates the mighty tide of Left versus Right politics solving the problems of the world. Why am I not surprised that 3/4 of a million people decided to stay at home last time.
This thread demonstrates yet again how the white male left likes to pretend that issues that doesn’t affect it aren’t important and can therefore be marginalised.
I actually agree with your position weka that there is no good reason that gender/identity politics do not necessarily have to stop progressive economic/class politics. And that advances in the two can go hand in hand.
Of course, the “can go hand in hand” hides the fact that it’s just not the way it actually happens. So while the middle class and wealthy left wing elite are happy to partner with the economic right wing to make massive advances in gender and identity issues we go no where except backwards on issues of poverty, class and economic inequity because the left wing elite have given up advocating for those issues. Aside from occasional mutterings of lip service.
But it’s unmistakable progress that a gay couple can now be married, even if they have to live in minimum wage/unemployed poverty on zero hour casual contracts. Left wing beggers can’t be choosy and all you need is love.
And the hope that one day, the left wing elite will once more advocate for a living wage just as stridently and as forcefully as they advocate for gay marriage.
Yep, tend to agree with that to an extent (don’t believe that the gains are massive though, and sometimes we’re losing ground*). No problem with holding the middle classes to account for their classism and privilege. I think it’s more complex than that though (eg Maori issues aren’t being advanced by the white middle classes)
Good to know we disagree on degree rather than principle 🙂
*there was something on TDB recently about young women earning hugely less than their male peers. Will see if I can find it.
The problem remains weka: the influential left wing elite have basically abandoned the underclass and the working class (and they did this a long time ago).
Hip-hooray and all that for the pushing of private members bills on: same sex marriage, same sex couple adoption, euthanasia, etc.
Compared to how many private members bills on extending paid parental leave to 26 weeks? To increasing the minimum wage to a living wage of $18/hour? On forcing employers to give every employee information on joining the local union?
Answer: it rhymes with the word “Hero”.
edit one exception, David Clark’s holiday bill which was helpful to routine Mon-Fri workers (including those on very high salaries) in effectively giving those specific workers a day or two more holidays per year.
CV, what you describe there imo has driven away many people with laboury lefty type sensibilities.
They see those social issues as secondary to the employment economic issues that see so many fall in the ditch. They recognise the importance of those social issues but do not agree with the weighting given to them by Labour (in recent history).
If Labour were to make more of the employment economic issues and less of the social ones then it would achieve more electoral support.
You’re talking about parliamentary politics CV and I tend to agree, although as I said I don’t think the gains have been massive. Plus the GP obviously do better on this.
Compared to how many private members bills on extending paid parental leave to 26 weeks? To increasing the minimum wage to a living wage of $18/hour? On forcing employers to give every employee information on joining the local union?
Commission of Inquiry (Actions of Government Communications Security Bureau) Bill
Kris Faafoi
Corrections (Cost of PPP) Amendment Bill
Hon David Cunliffe
Crimes (Corporate Manslaughter) Amendment Bill
Andrew Little
Education (Community Representation on Polytechnic Councils) Amendment Bill
Hon Nanaia Mahuta
Education (Food in Schools ) Amendment Bill
David Shearer
Employment Relations (Triangular Employment) Amendment Bill
Darien Fenton
Keep Kiwibank Bill
Hon Clayton Cosgrove
Minimum Wage (Contractor Remuneration) Amendment Bill
Hon David Parker
That’s just Labour. The greens also have some excellent bills in the ballot. So yeah, while the issues you mentioned aren’t specifically covered, it’s not like the left’s sole contribution to the ballot revolves around PC social issues that you don’t give a shit about because you don’t think they affect you.
Is there such an animal? If they ‘partner’ with the right are they still left? If they don’t care about inequalities are they still left? Maybe a new term should be used because the oxymoron’s are overrunning the place. Can you be an anti-capitalist capitalist? Can you say you believe in equality but also support inequality? Does not compute imo.
No problem, CV. The elimination of child poverty bill would seem to contribute to your last point.
With regards to the rest of your questions, though, frankly I am shocked and stunned that you seek only to benefit those people who are already on the minimum wage, yet you cruelly choose to abandon those contractors who do not even get the minimum wage at the moment.
I also must view your refusal to devote attention to the issue of corporate manslaughter as a ringing endorsement of protecting CEOs and corporate bigwigs from responsibility for the deaths that they cause through their companies.
Basically, your refusal to address these issues (that are important to vulnerable workers in our society) is further proof that you are in fact a neoliberal stooge who will not commit to supporting socialist policies. I know this because you have not taken the time to express concern, at length, for every single socialist policy that I believe in, so therefore you abandoned the underclass long ago.
or maybe: arguing that somebody has “abandoned the underclass” just because they don’t address the issues that twist your personal nuts is a bit conceited
No problem, CV. The elimination of child poverty bill would seem to contribute to your last point.
Yeah, Ardern wants a law forcing the measurement of child poverty and the setting of appropriate targets. Then she’s going to force the Government of the day to talk about it in parliament once a year, as well as have a Child Poverty Board which will be fucked the first year of the next Tory term.
Real breakthroughs against child poverty, those.
or maybe: arguing that somebody has “abandoned the underclass” just because they don’t address the issues that twist your personal nuts is a bit conceited
that’s odd, because the people I talk to associated with the Alliance, Greens, Mana, Unite, etc. all know what I’m on about.
Yeah, Ardern wants a law forcing the measurement of child poverty and the setting of appropriate targets. Real breakthroughs against child poverty, that.
.
Yes, yes it is. It forces all parties to address the issue, and provides a benchmark of how well we’re doing. Look at the dialogues about GDP and unemployment vs how we talk about child poverty. And I know you hate the concept of thought before action, but it really is the only way we can try to avoid making things worse.
or maybe: arguing that somebody has “abandoned the underclass” just because they don’t address the issues that twist your personal nuts is a bit conceited
that’s odd, because the people I talk to associated with the Alliance, Greens, Mana, Unite, etc. all know what I’m on about.
That’s lovely, and totally relevant to the point. /sarc
They were probably all “smile, nod, and back away from the deranged self-loathing Labourite”.
The last IS meeting I was at, everyone sat around and said how great the world be if only people listened to the IS.
I get enough of that at TS, thanks. Without the body odour.
In case you hadn’t noticed, if a government doesn’t talk about something, then a government doesn’t do anything about it.
Which I think seems to be your justification for calling the labour caucus sellouts just because they haven’t put forward the specific members’ bills that you no doubt have been personally advocating and shepherding through the Labour policy selection process over the last few years (haven’t you?).
No I’m not. Pretty sure CV is, but my point was about CV starting up with the marginalisation of ‘identity politics’ (again, am happy to be corrected if that’s not where he was going).
Nevertheless, I was pointing to the politics of the white, male left (irrespective of the gender/ethnicity of people posting right now).
Nah, you missed the point. I was just rewriting CV’s post, to cut off the marginalisation of ‘identity politics’. If you think such a thing doesn’t happen, I’m sorry you don’t understand but there is nothing I can do about that now.
Indeed. And the whole current twitter debate shows how women get singled out for more abuse than men – not that similar things don’t happen to some men also, but see this article and the comments by a tr*ll, who says he picks on women because they are easy targets/vulnerable/react.
Though, to go off on a tangent, when I read the article I was particularly interested in the wider issue that technology cannot solve social problems.
Which is interesting because we live in a culture which pushes more technology as being good, and that advances in technology will provide answers to the most pressing human needs.
But when you drill down into that…it’s actually a corporate commercial value system that has been widely indoctrinated into society.
Technology does make life easier in many ways. But new technologies often bring new problems. And some older technologies keep on providing benefits: radio, bicycles, etc.
The capitalist value system includes valuing anything “new” – because that means they can encourage people to throw away the old, and buy the newer version.
But social problems tend to migrate to newer technologies, albeit with some changes in how they operate.
Digital technologies do not automatically result in poverty reduction, decreases in inequality, a more democratic society, less misogyny or racism, etc.
Ahhhhh yes it does, but it’s actually the energy channelled or embodied by the technology which makes life easier, and this is well worth listening to in that regard…if you haven’t already seen it that is:
“Gerry Brownlee gets flak from time to time for his weight, but it seems to happen far less often for guys, even though men make up the majority of politicians.”
Indeed. And what Brownlee gets is fatphobia, which is a different thing (still sucks). How many male policitians get shit for their appearance because they’re not conforming to social norms about what real men should like like? Dunne does for his haircut. Anyone else?
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell 1.3.3.1
Slippery the Prime Minister inserted Him into the Cabinet line-up as eye candy to keep the rest of them awake, the sound of pacemakers going berserk was said to be deafening…
I recall a futures broker saying a couple of years ago: “Dairy is a New Zealand play.”
Meaning both that the global dependence of the world on New Zealand dairy exports for the traded global price is incredibly high and vulnerable, and also that the entire economy of New Zealand should be read as one and the same as the dairy price.
Eventually the New Zealand government will wake to how vulnerable its nation and its interests are to Fonterra.
New Zealand is not beholden to dairy, this dreamworld stuff needs to stop.
What New Zealanders are beholden to is the forward selling of dairy by way of taking on massive and unrealistic debt levels to pay for the dairy farms (forward sold value) and to pay for the out-of-control housing bubble in various spots. The government has of course also fallen into this trap by expecting that it can rely on dairy and consequently also take on more debt, or future obligations in return for a return in this term of office.
New Zealand is not beholden to dairy, but many New Zealanders and the New Zealand government is beholden to the masters it has forward-sold dairy to.
The rest of us without debt or future obligation? Nothing to worry about (except the fallout from those other fools when they collapse in a heap).
I think you are right TC, because volumes of trade don’t have to change much for large swings in international dairy prices, as we witnessed with the movement in price caused by the NI drought earlier this year. When I asked a Westpac economist this question, he reckoned that the extra volume created by South America would be easily consumed by the growing demand in Asia/India. But that may well be the picture long term but we will see some real volatility in the mean time. The farmers that will be in trouble will be the farmers with more than $20 debt per kg milk solid produced….which I think is about average. So half of NZ dairy farmers could find themselves in trouble.
These officials “believe there are Al Qaeda operatives already in place for this attack in Yemen and possibly in other countries as well”
John Key had advanced notice of the so called warning, which he casually referenced the there were NZ’ers who were training in Yemen, what a horrid little man!
but…but….but…that has nothing to do our policies…it is due to the GFC and …and….the NZ Labour Party….its all their fault…nothing to do with us We are not responsible(TM) for anything (oh! apart from when stats are good)
~ signed the Irresponsible Bullshit Artists Limited Liability Company (otherwise known as the current government)
Audrey Young, today’s winner of the golden turd award for a grand piece of Jonolism in today’s Herald,
Young simply prints verbatim Slippery the Prime Ministers lines from yesterday that He, the Prime Minister, knew nothing of the Dunne/Vance emails and that that naughty public servant Kibblewhite hid them from everyone on the 9th floor of the Beehive,
Not a query from Young in the vein of ”but surely Eaggleson the Prime Ministers Chief of Staff up to His elbows, sloshing amid the offal and entrails of this dirty little spy scandal must have known and told the Prime Minister”,
There’s a hell of a difference between journalism and political commentary and Young, Armstrong and the various other ‘political columnists’ have for years been engaged by the Herald to produce the latter not the former,
When it suits these tired old hacks that the Herald employs tho, they suddenly resort to journalism where they ‘report’ the ‘facts’ as given to them in this case by the Prime Minister,
You would think from Young’s pathetic effort in today’s Herald that She had never once become aware of politicians using lies, deceit and spin in an effort to fool the public,
A worthy winner of a coveted ‘Golden Turd’ for Her efforts in stooping to new lows in political reporting in my opinion…
The Minister for Food Safety or something while talking this morning on radio about the Fonterra scare said they had to wait on Fonterra to produce the information needed to understand the situation and what is being done to correct it. No mention of any decent regulations or overview or control being introduced.
Federated Farmers want to hold the head of the Board accountable. Nothing constructive about preventing this sort of hoo ha happening again. And how impressive to the Chinese!, neither we nor Nutricia can come up with information because of systems failure with them, and for us, just bloody incompetence, slackness and perhaps machiavellian calculation about the optimum time to release the unwelcome information. And I felt so annoyed with China about the melamine disgrace putting a taint on our milk and NZs good name! I was deluded, and how sad to find that out through this scandal.
We are already suffering from the abject grovelling to the world for the right to get our dairy products through the border controls of various countries. Like a keen shapely whore we have whipped open our enfolding tariff barriers, leaving us naked and vulnerable to the winds of disaster. Sounds OTT and dramatic but this little problem has turned out to be a massive disaster for us. It will result in a massive loss of confidence in th quality of our goods – that we have spent a century building up. Unfortunately we have of latter years eroded our controls and standards in complacency and defiance against imposed safety and quality standards.
Exactly Rosetinted, where in all this is the fail-safe regulation, should not all the regular testing carried out by Fon-terror be subject of a regulation that such testing (a) be mandatory, and (b) the Ministry of Food Safety immediately be in receipt of copies of such testing where ANY anomaly is immediately flagged by the testing agency in terms of good, bad, ugly and the appropriate level of response readiness in terms of knowledge and capability is in place at the Ministry of Food safety to act in an appropriate manner,
Lack of regulation in the workplace/market place kills people, politicians who refuse to enact necessary regulatory reforms are complicit in such deaths…
I commented in the Botulism thread yesterday from a link that the Jackal posted, where a microbiologist pointed out that it’s not normal to test milk for Clostridium.
Maybe we could wait until we have some facts before we start clamouring for action to be taken. Do we even know what happened yet?
You have been consistent with your message Weka, and i suspect that you will be proved right eventually. But there is still going to be some casualties way beyond what should have logically resulted from this scare. Gary Romano from Fonterra was on Campbell Live last night and I think they should have him fronting on behalf of Fonterra. But I do now understand the timing issue of announcements…(I hope Romano does not become a victim because he is probably one of the smartest Logistic/Production Managers in the country).
The big problem is that fonterra does not have a media spokesperson communicating with the media in NZ,so all of the commentators are speculating and creating all sorts of stories.
Fonterra need to get Gary Romano fronting, but I presume he is doing all of the work behind the scenes as well….I guess he cant be everywhere.
Thanks Saarbo. It’s a bummer for me, because if the microbiology was being handled more sensibly I could sit back and watch Fonterra get its just desserts 😉
Federated Farmers want to hold the head of the Board accountable. Nothing constructive about preventing this sort of hoo ha happening again.
I think you have the wrong take on this. Any serious preventative action requires a thorough understanding of the facts and failure mechanisms around this incident. That will take time and will be both a highly technical and in depth management oriented process.
Enforcing accountability at the top of the hierarchy can be done more quickly and is actually the rarer step in todays “anything goes” corporate culture. I am glad that someone is pushing for it. Too often we see empty promises of “corrective/preventative action” while the big guys at the top just sail on happily collecting their pay checks taking no personal responsibility whatsoever for their role in a given mess.
BTW I am still expecting investor law suits to be announced this week.
The correct reaction would have been to collect information about what happened to the tainted ?whey? and got a list of products to recall together, then go public. The problem seems to be downstream buyers of the product have lax managements. But the question still remains how did they find out what happened, and that forced them to look back and find the dirty pipe…
…look as to fed.farmers, they hardly represent farmers since they obvious have no conscience over high farm prices that harm young farmers entering the industry, force existing farmers to pay more to buy more land, and lead to higher mortgages as farmers can take riskier growth strategies. And for what? so the big smoke can grow its own housing bubble off leaky, damp, car sprawling suburbs. Fed.farmers are a disgrace for getting in bed with National.
Further evidence as if we needed it that Privatisation is in important strategic areas of society anti social and destructive this article from the collapsing disaster that is the U$ of selfishness and greed, where the 1% crow with their wealth on top of the steadily getting poorer majority. This is the system that made Yankey rich and which he follows against the wishes of the majority to privatise our power companies.
“I’ve been saying this for 30 years, I suppose it’s comforting that the rest of the country is STARTING to wake up, but how much is it going to cost us to get these PUBLIC things back? The rich aren’t going to give up their cash cows all that easily. They are going to make out like bandits AGAIN when we have to pay to take back what we paid for in the first place.”
And the U$K continues down the same disastrous road. The NHS is the current target despite the protests of the people democracy doesn’t count: rather profit before people. neoliberalism has made the U$ a third world nation but with huge military power. Once the U$ $ loses its reserve petro status the U$ is finished and the USK is following rapidly.
The committee stages of the GCSB Bill will commence this afternoon. As yet, Dunne’s Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) not appeared on the Parliament website.
However, Labour has put up a SOP proposing substantive changes to the Bill to require that:
“… within one month of the commencement of the part of the Bill amending
the GCSB Act (the commencement), the Minister in charge of the GCSB must determine, with the
agreement of the leaders of each political party for the time being recognised for parliamentary
purposes under the Standing Orders of the House of Representatives:
the terms of reference for an independent inquiry into the purposes and functions of New
Zealand’s intelligence agencies; and
the membership of a committee (consisting of 3-5 persons) to oversee and conduct the
independent inquiry into the purposes and functions of New Zealand’s intelligence agencies.
The inquiry committee must within six months of the commencement report to the Minister containing:
recommendations on the proper purposes and functions of New Zealand’s intelligence
agencies; and
any legislative proposals required to implement those recommendations (amending Part 1 of
the Bill by inserting New Clause 25A).
Expiration
Part 1 of the Bill (amending the GCSB Act), Part 2 of the Bill (amending the IGIS Act) and Part 3 of the Bill (amending the ISC Act) each expire 12 months after the respective commencement of each part (inserting new Clause 3A, 27A and 37A into the Bill).
Comment
These new clauses would effectively repeal the Bill.”
The Dunne SOP is now in the link to my 9.2. Semms on a quick read to cover what he agreed with Key to obtain Dunne’s support.
To summarise the Labour SOP
– Amendment Bill provisions to expire after one year ( ie the GCSB Act would revert to the current Act unless amended in the interim).
– a extensive review to be set up within one month of the Amendment Bill coming into force, comprising a panel of 3 – 5 persons agreed by the GCSB Minister and the leaders of all politicial parties
– review to report back within six months.
Since I am swamping OM with Parliamentary links, here is today’s Questions.
Greece once an optimistic reasonably happy holiday destination has been pillaged by loan shark economics back to 3rd World destitution. 🙁
“Greece represents the worst of neoliberal harshness. Social services across the board are disintegrating. They’re in disarray. They’re disappearing in plain sight.”
“The Government has imposed a brutal and self-defeating fiscal austerity; in a confiscatory manner, it tries to collect extra revenue from an already impoverished and afflicted populace, while it neglects its main role, as specified by the Constitution: The Protection of the Rights and the Welfare of the Citizen Body.”
How convenient for Key. He doesn’t have to rely on emails anymore. He can get a staffer to pop along the road and get everything direct…
Phone rings: Chief, Ian Fletcher picks it up. “Hi Fletch. It’s your mate John here. Look, I’ve had enough of that Russel Norman. Too bloody clever by half. Stick a monitor on him will you? I’ll send one of our HQ staffers to get the gen off you in a couple of weeks. Okay? Good. See you soon bye”.
“A Wellington home steeped in political history is being sold by the Government.
The red-brick house at 41 Pipitea St, Thorndon, was the home of prime ministers Sir Sidney Holland, Sir Walter Nash, Sir Keith Holyoake and Sir Geoffrey Palmer, as well as a string of Cabinet ministers, including Jim Sutton and most recently Nick Smith.”
”
But Peters, who lived in the house when he was Foreign Affairs Minister, said if it was to be sold it should have been an auction, rather than a National government selling it to the National Party.
“At no stage were we told that the Government was going to sell this property to its political wing,” Peters said in a statement, adding that the property was of ”great historical significance” to all of New Zealand.
“This Government will sell anything – especially if their political sponsors hold out their hands. Nothing is sacred to these people. It has an historic places designation but what is historic about this building now? It had a certain value so why didn’t the house go to auction?” Peters said.
“This sale has a familiar feel about it – like SkyCity Casino but on a smaller scale.”
Property records show that 41 Pipitea St, nestled in Wellington’s diplomatic quarter, was sold by the Crown on June 21 to an entity controlled by Geoffrey Thompson, a former president of the National Party.
The same day, ownership was transferred to Pipitea St Ltd, whose shareholders include Goodfellow, National Party board member Roger Bridge, former deputy Prime Minister Sir Don McKinnon and Peter Kiely, a lawyer with links to the National Party.
[lprent: This is one of those irritating flaws in the comments system that allows comments to be trashed, and destroying the continuity when they have been replied to. Pulled this out of the trash. BTW: If I think someone is doing this deliberately, then they will get booted permanently. ]
Thanks for your concern.
I’ll file it alongside your previous statements about how it’s not the government’s role to create jobs.
In the meantime, workers will choose which battles they will fight, if only on the grounds that advice from you does not necessarily have their interests at heart.
[lprent: This is one of those irritating flaws in the comments system that allows comments to be trashed, and destroying the continuity when they have been replied to. Pulled this out of the trash. BTW: If I think someone is doing this deliberately, then they will get booted permanently. ]
The incidence of the subsidy passes to the worker. Makes no difference who owns the company. Are you saying that a subsidy for a New Zealand small business owner to employ a disadvantaged worker would be more acceptable?
The wage subsidy is provided on condition that McDonalds employs specified workers who would othwerwise be unemployed. It mostly displaces other workers. Wage subsidy schemes generally have about an 80% displacement effect.
The workers that get employed would otherwsie not have been employed becasuse there are alternative more productive workers available. McDonalds is being (temporarily) compensated for the lower productivity of the disadvantaged worker.
Why are you even engaging with whoever/whatever is behind that rather silly handle.
I notice Gosman came back for a hit and run yesterday, having not been seen for quite some time, perhaps due to my comment referencing him turning in his grave, at the poor quality of cry-pants trooling, then gosman magically appeared!
I challenge anybody who claims to support Labour, to watch that speech (it should be online shortly, in the House from about 4.15 pm).
I challenge anybody who thinks Shearer’s problems are created by the MSM, or critical bloggers, or the “far left”, or Cunliffe, or any other excuse you want to conjure up.
When you watch it, remember that this debate was called for by Shearer himself. He has not been caught on the hop, he has (rightly) asked to speak, to hold the government to account. And so … he speaks. Now watch.
C’mon, there are still a few of you on here who keep saying everything will be fine for the left if we just shut up and support David Shearer. Watch that awful speech, or forever hold your peace.
I think that was a shockingly bad speech – he just went through the motions and seriously did he get one sentence out without fluffing it – I don’t think so. He should just leave politics, he’s not suited to it at all.
Got it in one. The only thing more painful than watching Shearer is reading the posts here blaming ‘the MSM’ and the journos for Labour at 30%. Or less. Surprising they get that much!
Noted while at the local Pak’n’Slave today on the usual food frenzy nutrition quest, one of those little triangular flags you attach to the rear passenger window on your wheels,
A Labour Party flag of all things, go Labour a really staunch supporter this far away from an election,
The wheels under the Labour flag???, a near new BMW, it was ‘wine week’ so i connected the dots for a giggle…
Today’s Panel – Policeman Bell.
Mora had asked an authority on Islam to explain fasting and Ramadan. This Dr. gave a very measured and clear explanation of his faith and what Ramadan means to its adherents. He happened to mention that it was a highly spiritual time and that all desires are set aside for this period, people focussing on refreshing and recreating their spiritual beings. Only a xenophobe like Bell could have asked an appallingly “smuttish” question of the guest. Clearly Mora was embarrassed.
Given the poor level of comments that Bell contributed to the rest of the panel, the man should be retired from the show in the same way that Bradbury was dropped.
If I correctly identified the voice it was Bell also stating that the judiciary is responsible for the fact that Teina Pora is still inside after 21 years. That the judiciary should take some step to rectify this. I’m at a loss to understand quite what the judiciary could legally do.
A transparent and disgusting attempt by Bell to shield an evil police culture in Pora’s case. And conceal that vitally important disclosure was withheld from the defence. And that there were senior detectives who were seriously concerned about the reality of the police case, even before the first trial.
Afternoons with Mora is in the main but an exercise in facilitating blowhards who fancy they’re “someone” to mouth off, unchallenged, in the most ridiculously ignorant and self-indulgent style.
When it comes to the 100% Pure slogan how can the John Key led National Ltd™ government be worried? Its not like National Ltd™ have even the slightest concern for such things, or maybe it just thought the world wouldn’t notice that since its election to power in 2008, National Ltd™ has . . .
been caught out repeatedly lying in the run up to and during the election campaign about its real intentions in relation to the environment
celebrated the opening of the foreign-owned Pike River Coal Ltd mine on DOC land adjacent to the Paparoa National Park from which 1 megatonne of coal will be extracted per year for the next 20 years – Pike River Coal Ltd has announced that it has found additional coal in the national park
cancelled a proposed efficiency standard (MEPS) on incandescent lightbulbs
arbitrarily excised 400 hectares from the brand new Oteake Conservation Park, including the most important and, ecologically, the rarest part of the new Park, the tussock and shrubland that went right down to the banks of the Manuherikia River, to enable future access to lignite
said nothing to say in regard to the World Commission on Protected areas of IUCN’s severe criticism of its intention to investigate mineral resources and mining opportunities in protected conservation areas including our three UNESCO World Heritage Sites of Te Wahi Pounamu-South West New Zealand, Tongariro National Park and the Sub Antarctic Islands
called for caring New Zealanders to halt their “emotional hysteria” and recognise that conservation land should be mined for minerals and went on to say “Mining in a modern, technological way can have a negligible effect”
rubished the Department of Conservation (“Canterbury Farming” June 2010 issue – now offline) suggesting it was incapable of looking after the high country reserves and parks under its control
removed the ability of Auckland to introduce a fuel levy to fund planned public transport upgrades
left electrification of the Auckland rail network up in the air without promised funding commitments and then came through with a dodgy loan scheme and then unilaterally reorganised the local government structure before finally setting about the privatisation-by-stealth model when busting KiwiRail
removed the programme to make Government Departments ‘carbon neutral’ and also began its first wave of public sector redundancies starting with the Ministry for the Environment which was responsible for the scheme
set about revamping Auckland governance in a way that is likely to greatly reduce the ‘Environmental Watchdog’ role of the the current Regional Council (since completely fucked it up with the SuperShitty)
defended internationally the importation of rain-forest-wrecking palm kernel and stood silent while Federated Farmers called Greenpeace “despicable” criminals, traitors, and robbers
took a 0% emissions reduction target to Copenhagen. Yes, seriously, that isn’t a misprint – that was the lower bound of their negotiation platform – then missed the 01/02/10 deadline for commitment to action it had agreed to – meanwhile 55 of the 80 countries which attended did make the deadline
secretly cancelled the internationally recognised scheme for the mandatory labelling of exotic woods to ensure the timber has not been taken from rain forests in direct contradiction of its own statements made at the 13th World Forestry Congress in Argentina
gave the Department of Conservsation $1.7 million to further develop commercial activities on DOC land and started an “off set” plan allowing company’s to damage the conservation estate if they agree to improve land elsewhere – no monitoring regime has been suggested on put in place
announced a $1.69 million industry subsidy to kick start marine farming without identifying no-go areas nor putting in place a consultation process for individiuals, communities, and other general coastal users
been forced to release documents under the Official Information Act which confirm that DOC has “giving up” on ecologically valuable high-country land in the Mackenzie Basin because of funding cuts. The released documents cite “statements made by ministers”, “diminishing funding” and the Government’s new high-country policies as reasons for the changed stance – the comments from DOC were made after Land Information New Zealand (Linz), which manages the tenure review process, ignored DOC’s previous conservation recommendations for the farms
used former National Party minister and current director of Open Country Cheese – a company convicted of filthy farming practices and found by the supreme court to be a dodgy employer – Wyatt Creech to head up an enquiry into Environment Canterbury which had been standing up the dairy farmers’ demands for more and more water resources and less and less regulation. The Creech report recommended the Environmental Canterbury be sacked and replaced with government appointments and the voters of Canterbury do without democracy until the water situation had been resolved. The Canterbury area holds 50 percent of New Zealand’s fresh water reserves and 50 percent of the water required for hyrdo energy. The Creech report said Environmental Centerbury put too much focus on the environment
been subjected to international condemnation for knowing next to nothing about the parlous state of the New Zealand fisheries
bucked international trends and poured more acid on the 100% Pure brand and increases the bluefin tuna quota
squirmed when New Zealand is subject to international criticism for its backing of commericial whaling which National Ltd supports
supported access fees for entrance onto DOC walkways – fee introduced following cuts to DOC’s budget.
pressed on with PR bullshit about how New Zealand’s environment would profit from mining national parks, Conservation Minister Kate Wilkinson says.
Department of Conservation director-general Al Morrison said the conservation estate created “opportunities to do a whole lot for a lot of different people . . . we’ve got to get away from this idea that somehow we have to protect one-third of New Zealand for a certain constituency and put it in a jar of formaldehyde and leave it
done nothing as both its own SOE Meridian and the Department of Conservation to withdraw appeals against an 85m high damn with a 14km long reservoir on conservation land.
granted Energy Resources permission to ship Australian yellowcake uranium ore through New Zealand.
apologised but does nothing else for breaching the Treaty of Waitangi by granting a mining exploration permit to Brazilian company Petrobras
totally reversed gains made in the protection of National Parks and other high-value conservation areas in the South Island.
commenced a divide-and-rule strategy by attempting to paint New Zealanders interested in protecting the environment as outside of the “mainstream” and in defence of the fact that the media is catching to its bare-faced lies in the lead up to the 2008 election
carried on with more lies by talking about modern mining like that at Reefton being carried out by Oceana Golds as being like “key hole surgery”
appeared to believe that the tourists it is attempting to bring to New Zealand are all blind and won’t see for themselves the impact of the dairy farming it is subsidising to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars
employed financial sleight of hand in shuffling funds towards business interests and away from community groups looking to protect the environment
made more empty promises when a report showing that a third of New Zealand lankes have poor quality water is released
backed down on promises to protect New Zealand children (and the environment cleaner by more informed disposal) from harmful chemicals by improving labeling and imposing mandatory standards on containers
Ignored the findings by attacking the messenger when a World Health Organisation report confirms that New Zealand’s main centres have the worst air in Australasia and Auckland is the most polluted with twice the concentration of damaging airborne particles as Sydney.
studiously ignored so as to take piss about dire warnings concerning the quality of drinking water in Reidstone
failed to mention in its 100% Pure promotions that visitors to the Kerikeri Basin near the Stone Store – one of Northland’s iconic tourism and heritage sites – could come face-to-face with warning signs telling them the water is polluted
failed to mention in its 100% Pure promotions that tourists in the Coromandel could come face to face with New Zealand’s environmental standards when finding hundreds of dead snapper washed up on Beaches
done nothing after the United Nations finds that National Ltd™’s targets for reducing pollution are not consistent with the measures put in place to achieve those targets
attempted to defend the Emissions Trading Scheme from comparisons with the Australian model while Environment Minister Nick Smith indicates there’s little chance of the two schemes being integrated any time soon
then further slowed down the implentation of New Zealand’s Emissions Trading Scheme
allowed major retailers to reap the benefits of its earlier and secret decision to abandon the mandatory labelling of exotic woods after it is found that the retailers are contributing to the death of native Australian forests despite an independent, year-long investigation which finds otherwise
tried to keep a meeting between John Key and mininng company Anadarko’s boss secret. The company is responsble for a massive oil spill and is looking to to start drilling off New Zealand soon
continued to ignore yet more evidence of farmers failing to comply with environmental regulations
handed over $400 million to farmers to extend water storage and allow for more land to be used for dairy farms. No mention or provision is made for additional protections required to deal with the increased pollution
failed to point out in its 100% Pure promotion that tourists (and locals) should avoid the Opihi River along State Highway 1 because of the risk of exposure to toxins from phormidium
failed to point out in its 100% Pure promotions that tourists arriving at New Zealand’s “nuclear free” sea ports will be sharing the environment with up to 5,000 tonnes of radioactive yellow cake uranium
Ignored John Key making an international arse out of himself in regard to New Zealand’s 100% Pure image
carried on with its lies as New Zealand is identified as jeoparising its good name by allowing us to become one of a small number of states stalling progress in forming an international climate agreement
kept stringing us along even after Next thing, New Zealand received the 2nd place Fossil Award for “proposing the most Flexible Mechanism imaginable with no oversight or review. Bring on the wild west. They want to be able to use any market mechanisms they wish with absolutely no oversight or international review! There would be no way to ensure that the units from one mechanism have not been sold two or three times to another such mechanism. This would likely unleash a wild west carbon market with double or triple counting of offsets and a likely increase of greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere.”
stood silent when Fonterra was caught out lying by overstating its farmer’s compliance on excluding stock from waterways by 100%
put World class surfing waves and Maui’s dolphin’s at Raglan at severe risk by encouraging a proposed iron ore seabed mining in New Zealand’s coastal waters
never followed up after the scientific models created by New Zealand and the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) to allow fishing are called into question
set the scene for our children heading down to the park to find an overseas’ owned company had set up a dairy farm in one corner. Over time the shit builds up
failed to tell the tourists it hopes to attact with its 100% Pure campaign that every year, New Zealand drops huge quantities of poison-laced food into its forest ecosystems; enough poison to kill its human population 4 times over, every year. No country has ever done anything remotely similar, on such a scale
failed to tell the tourists it hopes to attract with its 100% Pure campaign that more than a third of Auckland’s beaches fail water quality checks and are closed for swimming
ignored the closing of the beaches, this time as extremely high concentrations of the bacteria enterococci are identified
ignored Ministerial conflicts of interest, this time involving John Key who is identified as shareholder in the Bank Of America which is backing mining in New Zealand and Australia . . . even when more information is made available . . . and more information . . . and more information
pressed on with additional policies that move away from the protection of the environment towards exploitation
limited , as part of its effort to cash-in on the environment, access to some of New Zealand’s most endangered species and isolated islands only to those who those who contribute financially displacing conservation staff and scientists
continued to give confidence to Fonterra director Colin Armer being convicted and fined $72,000 for “fouling” a Bay of Plenty waterway after a judge found he could have prevented the pollution were it not for his “systemic” failure to monitor what was happening on his company’s farm
lied when it said New Zealand has the environmental laws and regulations to control oil and gas development on the continental shelf because there is no equivalent of the Resource Management Act to control oil and gas activity outside of the territorial sea (12 nautical miles offshore).
lied when it had already agreed coastal plans to allow marine farming consent holders in the Waikato and Marlborough to move from mussel farming to finfish farming without considering the additional environmental effects imposed
placed short-term business interests ahead of long-term consequences to New Zealand’s environment, particularly biodiversity by allowing damage in one area on the condition that it be “off set” in another creating a dangerous precedent in that such a provisin means that one part of biodiversity can be wrecked in return for “protecting” an area that was never under threat anyway.
promoted proposals that include include a plant producing about 2 billion litres of diesel per year, using at least 12 million tonnes of lignite per year and another producing 3 billion litres using 12-17 million tonnes of lignite annually. A further project would produce by 2016 1.2 tonnes of the nitrogenous fertiliser, urea, using 2 million tonnes of lignite annually
been forced to admit that it has spent $1.67 million in a survey of minerals on the West Coast of New Zealand, including within the Te Wahipounamu South West New Zealand world heritage area. Te Wahipounamu is one of 183 natural heritage
secretly ordered that world heritage sites on the West Coast be surveyed as part of a $3 million mineral study spanning more than 16,000 square kilometres. The survey was only puiblicy revealed after Green MP Catherine Delahunty asked for details in a parliamentary question
under resourced New Zealand’s biosecurity system to such an extent that it is fundamentally flawed preventing any way of identifying how the Kiwifruit killer virus got into New Zealand and, thus, no way of preventing it from happening again.
appointed an advisory group to recommend a significant rewrite of the Resource Management Act to remove references to the protection of coastal areas, wetlands, lakes and rivers and indigenous flora and fauna.
splashed tax payer cash around its consultants considering conservation and environmental protection of the Mackenze Basin and Waitaki Valley
Supported the Department of Conservation into granting foreign-owned multinational mining company OceanaGold permission to destroy 55 hectares of beech forest so as to extend its Reefton mine to a total 81 hectares without public notification
envouraged the Minerals Industry Association to bully local authorities to step aside from what little environmental protections they are able to impose
drastically reduced the size of proposed marine reserves off the West Coast so much so that one advocate says they are “an insult” to those who spent years trying to establish them
instructed its delegates at the world’s largest conservation conference , the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s conference in Korea, to oppose any further measures to protect Maui and Hector dolphins in defiance of 117 other countries and 460 environmental organisations requesting New Zealand ban gill and trawl nets in waters up to 100 metres deep
twisted the knife by exploiting news of redundancies at Solid Energy in a statement which claims opponents to a proposed mine are “getting in the way of” potential jobs as part of an effort to discourage legal action
changed to law allowing a consideration of the effects on climate change to allow Australian-owned mining company Bathurst Resources (also known as Buller Coal) to build a 200-hectare open-cast coal mine on the plateau and excavate 80 million tonnes of coal that, when burnt, will release about 200 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere
avoided its international obligations “to ensure the conservation and management of sharks and their long-term sustainable use” while its fishers carry on with the barbaric practise of shark finning.
vancelled without notice the five-yearly State of the Environment report put together by the Ministry of the Environment, the report is the largest stock-take of trends relating to land, water, air, plants and animals
allowed its on lobbyist to publicly attack a prominent New Zealand scientist for speaking truth about New Zealand’s environment in an effort to silence the accurate reporting of scientific evidence
attracted international mockery for the fact that the pristine landscape featured in The Hobbit and used as the basis for the 100% Pure New Zealand campaign as fantastical as dragons and wizards
remained “relaxed” about the fact that New Zealand is now the 18th worst out of 189 nations when it came to preserving its natural environment
pulled out of Kyoto just weeks after the OECD reports that global greenhouse gas emissions could rise 50 per cent by 2050 without more ambitious climate policies, as fossil fuels continue to dominate the energy mix
laughed when New Zealand received two “Fossil of the Day” – first-equal and second place – awards on the first day of international climate talks in Doha, Qatar
used Hobbiton – Waikato – as the centrepiece of its 100% Pure campaign when the area is the country’s major source of pollution to the Hauraki Gulf
handed over responsibility for the monitoring and reporting of fraking activity , for which it has inadequate legal protections, to the foreign-owned multi-nationals which are carrying out that activity thus totally ignoring its own Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment
lied, obfuscated and used government resources to attack and undermined local authority plans to improve water quality
sanctioned an unnamed foreign-owned multinational to go ahead with a major road through pristine South Island National Parks
refused to investigate the impact on increasing use of neonicotinoid pesticides which is likely to be a major contributor to the sudden and dramatic decline (aka colony collapse disorder) of the New Zealand honey bee population, National Ltd™ also refused to consider the development of a strategy to protect what is left of the honey bee population.
lied about its commitment to addressing climate change
failed to monitor Sanford Ltd’s pollution resulting in an international embarrassment
allowed foreign-owned multinationals to proceed with oil exploration without the financial resources available to mitigate any environmental damage should it occur
been caught out ignoring its own advice on implementing environmental monitoring procedures
mixed the cooperative model of climate change negotiations with the competitive model used in trade negotiations, thus putting outcomes in both areas a risk
ignored the fact that New Zealand carbon credits are no longer the unit of choice in the New Zealand’s own carbon market. Figures from the official Emission Unit Registry show that emitters who initially supported NZUs are now using a range of international units to meet their carbon obligations under the Emissions Trading Scheme
used highly dodgy figures in calculating the reduction New Zealand’s net carbon emissions by including trees due to be harvested in the next few years
stayed silent for five months after being advised that Fonterra’s milk product were contaminated with dicyandiamide (DCD) and now face an international backlash.
set no maximum level of contamination of dicyandiamide (DCD) (AKA cyanoguanidine) in milk products for consumption by New Zealanders, stood silent while the farming industry says the withdrawal of dicyandiamide (DCD) will result in yet more pollution of New Zealand’s waterways
been unable to explain how genetically engineered mould escaped from Massey University laboratories and remains unable or unwilling to provide further information
introduced foreign species without a consideration of the risk to human health
obfuscated on the level of cuts to the Department of Conservation
disengaged the previously widely held concept of environmental protection from any consideration of economic development
sacked 140 staff at the Department of Conservation
inserted last minute changes to environmental legislation that were not announced and, thus, not considered during public submissions and earlier readings of Bills.
here would be significant and irreversible adverse effects on the conservation values and overall ecological integrity of the application area and the Denniston Plateau should the proposed activity be approved”?
It is disgusting that if you are a sportsperson you get no conviction for an offence that endangered peoples lives because it might affect their ability to play overseas, but an actress convicted for taking part in an environmental protest gets no such consideration.
….fancy Keys Govt being ticked off by the Chinese Government for not being Green enough …environmentally conscious enough! …or state responsible enough!….irony upon irony ….but the Truth!
Great comment Blip. I particularly liked this bit:
placed short-term business interests ahead of long-term consequences to New Zealand’s environment, particularly biodiversity by allowing damage in one area on the condition that it be “off set” in another creating a dangerous precedent in that such a provision means that one part of biodiversity can be wrecked in return for “protecting” an area that was never under threat anyway.
+1 You should really put some of your work up on a blog of its own.
So, anyway, the TVNZ poll. The one showing the last Roy Morgan was probably a blip, and suggesting Labour-Green-Mana are within a sniff of victory. Jolly good, eh?
And if Key continues to treat the country with contempt and Shearer continues to make speeches like today, expect the Greens to reach 20% before too long.
Personally I tend to ignore the bi-monthly TV/newspaper polls as being too infrequent to show any relevant trends, and the differences in technique between the polling companies making them useless to compare between. You really have to treat them as being useless singletons. Please explain why you think that I should be interested in a crappy singleton poll?
The bi-weekly Morgan poll has been showing a consistent and discouraging trend for the left over the last 3 or 4 polls. It still has a lot of sampling jitter and is probably off in absolute numbers. But it is a damn sight more useful than any singleton poll…
When I see a *trend* across 3 polls in the Morgan poll the other way, then I might get excited.
I’m not very comfortable with the assumption that a Labour Green alliance will be the way to victory, to be honest. I think the Greens would look on it as very risky – how many minor coalition partners have come out of government enhanced? Thye might risk a backlash for putting a very distant second place, third rate bunch into power – you can argue all you like about the mathematics of it and how Silver and Brze beats gold, but when the silver medal is so very small, it’s a hard sell. They’d also cop ire every time Labour did something that pissed the electorate off, much as the Lib dems have found in Britain – they not only get damed for being part of an unpopulare government, but doubly damned for being the faction that enable the clowns to get into power … I really think there is a risk the Greens will choose to stay out of any coalition with labour unless Labour can claim a respectable percentage of the vote. Problem is, cannibalising the Green vote is not going to help, as it won’t change the left-right balance fundamentally. They need to win over some of the whiney middle classes who have been voting National. Some here may not like it.
“McDonald’s ties nine out of 10 workers to zero-hours contracts
Britain’s biggest food chain has 83,000 staff on controversial contract as employers body claims economy needs flexibility'”
funny thing is that the population is so impoverished in the USA they can’t afford McDonalds any more and their sales are failing. OK maybe not that funny. Same thing happening with Walmart ffs
Unite Union is questioning the $270,000 paid by WINZ as a wage subsidy to McDonald’s between July 2009 and June 2013.
“This subsidy is only for the stores directly owned by the US fast food giant. 80% of stores in New Zealand are franchisee owned so the probable subsidy could be in the millions” said Unite National Director Mike Treen.”
The subsidy is for the benefit for the unemployed worker who gets a job. Companies generally need to be persuaded to take on these workers because they are difficult even with a subsidy. McDonalds – and the dozens of other companies getting these subsidies – are getting no favours.
Anyway these subsidies are not new – they have been around in different forms for 25 years. They are limited and only available for employing employees that could not get a job otherwise – i.e they would be on a benefit.
The CTU supports the limited use of such subsidies as part of WINZ’s active labour market programmes.
“An element of job subsidies or other employer incentives may be appropriate in some cases.”
OK here then. Or does this not match your view of the world either? Yes I know you want a living wage for McDonalds workers.
Correct me if I am wrong but as far as I know the CTU and Labour support these subsidies. They featured in various forms under the last Labour Government.
“Receiving a wage subsidy improves labour market outcomes for recipients, with
impacts still evident after 72 months. Improvements are evident as greater
employment and income, and lower benefit dependence.”
Subsidised firms continue to have higher employment levels than
matched comparison firms for at least 36 months after a subsidy hire,
though the size of the difference declines over time. The retention of
subsidised workers after the end of their subsidy contributes significantly
to the employment effect.”
Look I don’t care – if you want to convince Labour to abolish ALMPs then fine. All you are doing is dissing the most disadvantaged. I don’t like subsidies but the counter factual is probably a life on welfare.
That is not what the research I quote shows. The subsidised workers have lower marginal productivity than non-subsidised workers. Remember – productivity is king.
Hey I don’t give a fuck about what Treasury thinks on the NZ economy, they haven’t got it right so far in 30 years, they failed to spot the GFC until it happened, so why keep expecting them to get it right now?
Tell you what, let’s start by cutting Treasury’s budget in half, then ditching everyone in there who believes that unemployment is useful in fighting inflation, then dump those who don’t acknowledge the Crown’s sovereign right to issue currency, and finally, transfer anyone left who believes in IS-LM forecast modelling to work a Landcorp farm on the West Coast. That might finally give them some clues about how the real economy works.
Tell me a forecaster in New Zealand that over time does a better job?
Fire them all mate, I really wonder why you so need to kowtow at the feet of the ‘most accurate’ astrologer that you can find.
Excellent – please lobby for the abolition of these subsidies. I can guarantee that you will see zero objections from McDonalds or any other large employer.
And what would these unemployable people do for the Government? Wouldn’t it create some incentive problems? You would get folk that could be employed going along to interviews with an attitude, and messing up jobs with a bad attitude, not getting with the program… knowing they can get a living wage with the Government?
Isn’t that kind of what we had pre 1984? I wasn’t in the country then but I read about it. NZ Railways employing 30,000 people to do work that could be done by 5,000… and so productivity started its road south relative to the OECD average…Which in turn made us poorer, hence the left is now reduced to fighting for a redistribution of a disappointing GDP.
Remember it is not the changes that have made NZ poor. It is that the changes were unfinished. Hence back to that productivity research. It will be on R Norman’s desk the first day he is Finance Minister 🙂 I reckon he will get with the programme.
And what would these unemployable people do for the Government?
well, they aren’t unemployable. A hundred billion dollar company thinks it’s fine to employ these people so they can’t be all bad.
NZ Railways employing 30,000 people to do work that could be done by 5,000… and so productivity started its road south relative to the OECD average…
Of course, you are sorely mistaken as in the 1970’s and early 1980’s our GDP per capita was very close to Singapore and Australia. The neoliberal reforms of the Lange government were what fucked things. (Why are you still pushing for outdated neoliberal reforms, by the way?)
Which in turn made us poorer, hence the left is now reduced to fighting for a redistribution of a disappointing GDP.
There’s $40K of GDP for every man woman and child. Plenty to go around – once we stop subsidising your mega-corporate mates.
Remember it is not the changes that have made NZ poor. It is that the changes were unfinished.
You’re a bit of a delusional dickhead. Go home and poison your own well, we’re better off without you.
By that logic, “LT unbuilt” equals “unbuildable”, “LT unpainted” equals “unpaintable”, and “LT unachieved” equals “unachievable”.
And if you were crrect and “LT unempoyed” did equal “unemployable”, then wouldn’t removing their benefits be removing their only source of existence? Or do you find that treating people like shit boosts their “productivity”? Because most people find the opposite is true.
Although shitlands isn’t entirely incorrect…the LT unemployed end up structurally unemployed, and over time as their human capital declines, they often end up permanently unemployable.
harder to employ/train/coach, maybe. Or just more complex
I was once taught some industry law by a guy who, as an adult twelve years before, was a completely illiterate gang member. He was a lawyer when I knew him, and after that became quite successful. I had profound respect for him even before I heard his backstory, and he’s living proof that there is no such thing as “irredeemable”, in employment or anything else.
Subsidised employment. Aka. Free staff for McDonalds.
How it really works.
In our local McDonalds.
Full time staff have their hours cut to allow for the free staff.
Full timers quit because they cannot live on the reduced hours. They get a 13 week stand down because they left their job.
Several people, off the dole, get part time hours, about equal to the wage subsidy. But just enough so WINZ can take them off their books.When their subsidy ends McD’s cuts their hours again, or finds some other way of making them leave. Then employs more on the subsidy.
The result. Very unhappy and depressed youngsters who thought they had a job, but find it is only short term and part time. Only 12 hours a week are guaranteed (And WINZ considers this full time employment for their statistics)..
Win Win though:
WINZ and Government unemployment figures are down.
McDonalds gets free labour.
All good, except for the toll in discouraged, depressed, ill and switched off youngsters, after a year or two of this type of revolving door uncertainty. At the beginning of their working life.
Labour needs to win back the approx 800,000 voters, who traditionally vote Labour, and who chose not to vote last time for Goff as leader……..the left leaning middle class will vote for Labour anyway, more if Labour goes after their traditional voters
There is no way as it stands Labour will cannibalise the Greens
A Labour/ Green alliance is the only way to go….and if Cunliffe leads the Labour Party as the rank and file Labour members want ….then it could be a very good victory indeed.
I can see why a Labour Green alliance would benefit Labour. I’m less sure about the benefits for the Greens. And the 800,000 voters who didn’t bother in 2011 probably aren’t the Labour party rank and file, and don’t give a damn about the Shearer-Cunliffe psychodrama.
The persistant delusion of the left is that a large swathe of the population secretly agree with them while voting against them, perhaps as a cunning ploy to force the party to be even more leftwing … If only the Labour Party would promise to nationalise everything, hundreds of thousands of people who voted National would come flocking to the left, giggling, “What took you so long?!” I don’t think that has much bearing on relaity.
Don’t get me wrong – I would be absolutely delighted if Labour promised to nationalise everything, and made Ode To A Tractor the national anthm … But I have slowly come to realise that I am not representative of the mainstream of New Zealand, or my native Britain. So I don’t expect anything more than a disappointing compromise and lack of vigour from the parliamentary organ of the left – because to be effective in parliament, they need to appeal to a few more people than me and the other sad wights who haunt The Standard.
Labour is not a “parliamentary organ of the left”: it is an economically centrist capitalist party focussed on balancing the interests of the middle class and the investor class/corporates, while ensuring that the working class are not entirely ignored.
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Hi,This week’s Flightless Bird episode was about “fake seizure guy” — a Melbourne man who fakes seizures in order to get members of the public to sit on him.The audio documentary (which I have included in this newsletter in case you don’t listen to Flightless Bird) built on reporting first ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Karin Kirk The 119th Congress comes with a price tag. The oil and gas industry gave about $24 million in campaign contributions to the members of the U.S. House and Senate expected to be sworn in January 3, 2025, according to a ...
Early morning, the shadows still long, but you can already feel the warmth building. Our motel was across the road from the historic homestead where Henry Williams' family lived. The evening before, we wandered around the gardens, reading the plaques and enjoying the close proximity to the history of the ...
Thanks folks for your feedback, votes and comments this week. I’ll be making the changes soon. Appreciate all your emails, comments and subscriptions too. I know your time is valuable - muchas gracias.A lot is happening both here and around the world - so I want to provide a snippets ...
Data released today by Statistics NZ shows that unemployment rose to 5.1%, with 33,000 more people out of work than last year said NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi Economist Craig Renney. “The latest data shows that employment fell in Aotearoa at its fastest rate since the GFC. Unemployment rose in 8 ...
The December labour market statistics have been released, showing yet another increase in unemployment. There are now 156,000 unemployed - 34,000 more than when National took office. And having thrown all these people out of work, National is doubling down on cruelty. Because being vicious will somehow magically create the ...
Boarded up homes in Kilbirnie, where work on a planned development was halted. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Wednesday, February 5 are;Housing Minister Chris Bishop yesterday announcedKāinga Ora would be stripped of ...
This week Kiwirail and Auckland Transport were celebrating the completion of the summer rail works that had the network shut or for over a month and the start of electric trains to Pukekohe. First up, here’s parts of the press release about the shutdown works. Passengers boarding trains in Auckland ...
Through its austerity measures, the coalition government has engineered a rise in unemployment in order to reduce inflation while – simultaneously – cracking down harder and harder on the people thrown out of work by its own policies. To that end, Social Development Minister Louise Upston this week added two ...
This year, we've seen a radical, white supremacist government ignoring its Tiriti obligations, refusing to consult with Māori, and even trying to legislatively abrogate te Tiriti o Waitangi. When it was criticised by the Waitangi Tribunal, the government sabotaged that body, replacing its legal and historical experts with corporate shills, ...
Poor old democracy, it really is in a sorry state. It would be easy to put all the blame on the vandals and tyrants presently trashing the White House, but this has been years in the making. It begins with Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan and the spirit of Gordon ...
The new school lunches came in this week, and they were absolutely scrumptious.I had some, and even though Connor said his tasted like “stodge” and gave him a sore tummy, I myself loved it!Look at the photos - I knew Mr Seymour wouldn’t lie when he told us last year:"It ...
The tighter sanctions are modelled on ones used in Britain, which did push people off ‘the dole’, but didn’t increase the number of workers, and which evidence has repeatedly shown don’t work. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, ...
Catching you up on the morning’s global news and a quick look at the parallels -GLOBALTariffs are backSharemarkets in the US, UK and Europe have “plunged” in response to Trump’s tariffs. And while Mexico has won a one month reprieve, Canada and China will see their respective 25% and 10% ...
This post by Nicolas Reid was originally published on Linked in. It is republished here with permission. Gondolas are often in the news, with manufacturers of ropeway systems proposing them as a modern option for mass transit systems in New Zealand. However, like every next big thing in transport, it’s hard ...
This is a re-post from The Climate BrinkBoth 2023 and 2024 were exceptionally warm years, at just below and above 1.5C relative to preindustrial in the WMO composite of surface temperature records, respectively. While we are still working to assess the full set of drivers of this warmth, it is clear that ...
Hi,I woke up feeling nervous this morning, realising that this weekend Flightless Bird is going to do it’s first ever live show. We’re heading to a sold out (!) show in Seattle to test the format out in front of an audience. If it works, we’ll do more. I want ...
From the United-For-Now States of America comes the thrilling news that a New Zealander may be at the very heart of the current coup. Punching above our weight on the world stage once more! Wait, you may be asking, what New Zealander? I speak of Peter Thiel, made street legal ...
Even Stevens: Over the 33 years between 1990 and 2023 (and allowing for the aberrant 2020 result) the average level of support enjoyed by the Left and Right blocs, at roughly 44.5 percent each, turns out to be, as near as dammit, identical.WORLDWIDE, THE PARTIES of the Left are presented ...
Back in 2023, a "prominent political figure" went on trial for historic sex offences. But we weren't allowed to know who they were or what political party they were "prominent" in, because it might affect the way we voted. At the time, I said that this was untenable; it was ...
I'm going, I'm goingWhere the water tastes like wineI'm going where the water tastes like wineWe can jump in the waterStay drunk all the timeI'm gonna leave this city, got to get awayI'm gonna leave this city, got to get awayAll this fussing and fighting, man, you know I sure ...
Waitangi Day is a time to honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi and stand together for a just and fair Aotearoa. Across the motu, communities are gathering to reflect, kōrero, and take action for a future built on equity and tino rangatiratanga. From dawn ceremonies to whānau-friendly events, there are ...
Subscribe to Mountain Tūī ! Where you too can learn about exciting things from a flying bird! Tweet.Yes - I absolutely suck at marketing. It’s a fact.But first -My question to all readers is:How should I set up the Substack model?It’s been something I’ve been meaning to ask since November ...
Here’s the key news, commentary, reports and debate around Aotearoa’s political economy on politics and in the week to Feb 3:PM Christopher Luxon began 2025’s first day of Parliament last Tuesday by carrying on where left off in 2024, letting National’s junior coalition partner set the political agenda and dragging ...
The PSA have released a survey of 4000 public service workers showing that budget cuts are taking a toll on the wellbeing of public servants and risking the delivery of essential services to New Zealanders. Economists predict that figures released this week will show continued increases in unemployment, potentially reaching ...
The Prime Minister’s speech 10 days or so ago kicked off a flurry of commentary. No one much anywhere near the mainstream (ie excluding Greens supporters) questioned the rhetoric. New Zealand has done woefully poorly on productivity for a long time and we really need better outcomes, and the sorts ...
President Trump on the day he announced tariffs against Mexico, Canada and China, unleashing a shock to supply chains globally that is expected to slow economic growth and increase inflation for most large economies. Photo: Getty ImagesLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate ...
Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on UnsplashHere’s what we’re watching in the week to February 9 and beyond in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty:Monday, February 3Politics: New Zealand Government cabinet meeting usually held early afternoon with post-cabinet news conference possible at 4 pm, although they have not been ...
Trump being Trump, it won’t come as a shock to find that he regards a strong US currency (bolstered by high tariffs on everything made by foreigners) as a sign of America’s virility, and its ability to kick sand in the face of the world. Reality is a tad more ...
A listing of 24 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, January 26, 2025 thru Sat, February 1, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
What seems to be the common theme in the US, NZ, Argentina and places like Italy under their respective rightwing governments is what I think of as “the politics of cruelty.” Hate-mongering, callous indifference in social policy-making, corporate toadying, political bullying, intimidation and punching down on the most vulnerable with ...
If you are confused, check with the sunCarry a compass to help you alongYour feet are going to be on the groundYour head is there to move you aroundSo, stand in the place where you liveSongwriters: Bill Berry / Michael Mills / Michael Stipe / Peter Buck.Hot in the CityYesterday, ...
Shane Jones announced today he would be contracting out his thinking to a smarter younger person.Reclining on his chaise longue with a mouth full of oysters and Kina he told reporters:Clearly I have become a has-been, a palimpsest, an epigone, a bloviating fossil. I find myself saying such things as: ...
Warning: This post contains references to sexual assaultOn Saturday, I spent far too long editing a video on Tim Jago, the ACT Party President and criminal, who has given up his fight for name suppression after 2 years. He voluntarily gave up just in time for what will be a ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park from the Gigafact team in collaboration with members from our team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is global warming ...
Our low-investment, low-wage, migration-led and housing-market-driven political economy has delivered poorer productivity growth than the rest of the OECD, and our performance since Covid has been particularly poor. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty this ...
..Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.As far as major government announcements go, a Three Ministers Event is Big. It can signify a major policy development or something has gone Very Well, or an absolute Clusterf**k. When Three Ministers assemble ...
One of those blasts from the past. Peter Dunne – originally neoliberal Labour, then leader of various parties that sought to work with both big parties (generally National) – has taken to calling ...
Completed reads for January: I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson The Black Spider, by Jeremias Gotthelf The Spider and the Fly (poem), by Mary Howitt A Noiseless Patient Spider (poem), by Walt Whitman August Heat, by W.F. Harvey Charlotte’s Web, by E.B. White The Shrinking Man, by Richard Matheson ...
Do its Property Right Provisions Make Sense?Last week I pointed out that it is uninformed to argue that the New Zealand’s apparently poor economic performance can be traced only to poor regulations. Even were there evidence they had some impact, there are other factors. Of course, we should seek to ...
Richard Wagstaff It was incredibly jarring to hear the hubris from the Prime Minister during his recent state of the nation address. I had just spent close to a week working though the stories and thoughts shared with us by nearly 2000 working people as part of our annual Mood ...
Odd fact about the Broadcasting Standards Authority: for the last few years, they’ve only been upholding about 5% of complaints. Why? I think there’s a range of reasons. Generally responsible broadcasters. Dumb complaints. Complaints brought under the wrong standard. Greater adherence to broadcasters’ rights to freedom of expression in the ...
And I said, "Mama, mama, mama, why am I so alone"'Cause I can't go outside, I'm scared I might not make it homeWell I'm alive, I'm alive, but I'm sinking inIf there's anyone at home at your place, darlingWhy don't you invite me in?Don't try to feed me'Cause I've been ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ star is on the rise, having just added the Energy, Local Government and Revenue portfolios to his responsibilities - but there is nothing ambitious about the Government’s new climate targets. Photo: SuppliedLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate ...
It may have been a short week but there’s been no shortage of things that caught our attention. Here is some of the most interesting. This week in Greater Auckland On Tuesday Matt took a look at public transport ridership in 2024 On Thursday Connor asked some questions ...
The East Is Red: Journalists and commentators are referring to the sudden and disruptive arrival of DeepSeek as a second “Sputnik moment”. (Sputnik being the name given by the godless communists of the Soviet Union to the world’s first artificial satellite which, to the consternation and dismay of the Americans, ...
Hi,Back on inauguration day we launched a ridiculous RFK Jr. “brain worms” tee on the Webworm store, and I told you I’d be throwing my profits over to Mutual Aid LA and Rainbow Youth New Zealand. Just to show I am not full of shit, here are the receipts. I ...
The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts & talking about the week’s news with regular and special guests, including: on the week in geopolitics, including the latest from Donald Trump over Gaza and Ukraine.Health expert and author David Galler ...
In an uncompromising paper Treasury has basically told the Government that its plan for a third medical school at Waikato University is a waste of money. Furthermore, the country cannot afford it. That advice was released this week by the Treasury under the Official Information Act. And it comes as ...
Back in November, He Pou a Rangi provided the government with formal advice on the domestic contribution to our next Paris target. Not what the target should be, but what we could realistically achieve, by domestic action alone, without resorting to offshore mitigation. Their answer was startling: depending on exactly ...
Photo by Mauricio Fanfa on UnsplashKia oraCome and join us for our weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm today.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news with myself , plus regular guest David Patman and ...
I don't like to spend all my time complaining about our government, so let me complain about the media first.Senior journalistic Herald person Thomas Coughlan reported that Treasury replied yeah nah, wrong bro to Luxon's claim that our benighted little country has been in recession for three years.His excitement rose ...
Back in 2022, when the government was consulting internally about proactive release of cabinet papers, the SIS opposed it. The basis of their opposition was the "mosaic effect" - people being able to piece together individual pieces of innocuous public information in a way which supposedly harms "national security" (effectively: ...
With The Stroke Of A Pen:Populism, especially right-wing populism, invests all the power of an electoral/parliamentary majority in a single political leader because it no longer trusts the bona fides of the sprawling political class among whom power is traditionally dispersed. Populism eschews traditional politics, because, among populists, traditional politics ...
I’ve spent the last week writing a fairly substantial review of a recent book (“Australia’s Pandemic Exceptionalism: How we crushed the curve but lost the race”) by a couple of Australian academic economists on Australia’s pandemic policies and experiences. For all its limitations, there isn’t anything similar in New Zealand. ...
Mr Mojo Rising: Economic growth is possible, Christopher Luxon reassures us, but only under a government that is willing to get out of the way and let those with drive and ambition get on with it.ABOUT TWELVE KILOMETRES from the farm on the North Otago coast where I grew up stands ...
You're nearly a good laughAlmost a jokerWith your head down in the pig binSaying, 'Keep on digging.'Pig stain on your fat chinWhat do you hope to findDown in the pig mine?You're nearly a laughYou're nearly a laughBut you're really a crySongwriter: Roger Waters.NZ First - Kiwi Battlers.Say what you like ...
This is a re-post from the Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler Climate denial is dead. Renewable energy denial is here. As “alternative facts” become the norm, it’s worth looking at what actual facts tell us about how renewable energy sources like solar and wind are lowering the price of electricity. As ...
SIR GEOFFREY PALMER is worried about democracy. In his Newsroom website post of 27 January 2025 he asserts that “the future of democracy across the world now seems to be in question.” Following a year of important electoral contests across the world, culminating in Donald Trump’s emphatic recapture of the ...
The Government hasn’t stopped talking about growth since the Prime Minister made his “yes” speech at the Auckland Chamber of Commerce last week. But so far, the measures announced would seem hardly likely to suddenly pitch New Zealand into the fast-growth East Asian league. The digital nomad announcement hardly deserved ...
It's election year for Wellington City Council and for the Regional Council. What have the progressive councillors achieved over the last couple of years. What were the blocks and failures? What's with the targeting of the mayor and city council by the Post and by central government? Why does the ...
Someone defames you anonymously online. Can you find out who it is? Maybe. There are legal avenues to seek a court order that an internet host reveal the identity of the person. One of them is called a Norwich Pharmacal order, but as Hugh Tomlinson KC points out, it only ...
The results of the 2025 Mood of the Workforce survey have been released, with working people revealing deep concerns regarding their work lives, housing, health care, and perceptions of the coalition government in Aotearoa New Zealand.Christopher Luxon has signalled that National may campaign on asset sales in the next election, ...
Te Whatu Ora Chief Executive Margie Apa leaving her job four months early is another symptom of this government’s failure to deliver healthcare for New Zealanders. ...
The Green Party is calling for the Prime Minister to show leadership and be unequivocal about Aotearoa New Zealand’s opposition to a proposal by the US President to remove Palestinians from Gaza. ...
The latest unemployment figures reveal that job losses are hitting Māori and Pacific people especially hard, with Māori unemployment reaching a staggering 9.7% for the December 2024 quarter and Pasifika unemployment reaching 10.5%. ...
Waitangi 2025: Waitangi Day must be community and not politically driven - Shane Jones Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. ...
Despite being confronted every day with people in genuine need being stopped from accessing emergency housing – National still won’t commit to building more public houses. ...
The Green Party says the Government is giving up on growing the country’s public housing stock, despite overwhelming evidence that we need more affordable houses to solve the housing crisis. ...
Before any thoughts of the New Year and what lies ahead could even be contemplated, New Zealand reeled with the tragedy of Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming losing her life. For over 38 years she had faithfully served as a front-line Police officer. Working alongside her was Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson will return to politics at Waitangi on Monday the 3rd of February where she will hold a stand up with fellow co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick. ...
Te Pāti Māori is appalled by the government's blatant mishandling of the school lunch programme. David Seymour’s ‘cost-saving’ measures have left tamariki across Aotearoa with unidentifiable meals, causing distress and outrage among parents and communities alike. “What’s the difference between providing inedible food, and providing no food at all?” Said ...
The Government is doubling down on outdated and volatile fossil fuels, showing how shortsighted and destructive their policies are for working New Zealanders. ...
Green Party MP Steve Abel this morning joined Coromandel locals in Waihi to condemn new mining plans announced by Shane Jones in the pit of the town’s Australian-owned Gold mine. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to strengthen its just-announced 2030-2035 Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement and address its woeful lack of commitment to climate security. ...
Today marks a historic moment for Taranaki iwi with the passing of the Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill in Parliament. "Today, we stand together as descendants of Taranaki, and our tūpuna, Taranaki Maunga, is now formally acknowledged by the law as a living tūpuna. ...
Labour is relieved to see Children’s Minister Karen Chhour has woken up to reality and reversed her government’s terrible decisions to cut funding from frontline service providers – temporarily. ...
It is the first week of David Seymour’s school lunch programme and already social media reports are circulating of revolting meals, late deliveries, and mislabelled packaging. ...
The Green Party says that with no-cause evictions returning from today, the move to allow landlords to end tenancies without reason plunges renters, and particularly families who rent, into insecurity and stress. ...
The Government’s move to increase speed limits substantially on dozens of stretches of rural and often undivided highways will result in more serious harm. ...
In her first announcement as Economic Growth Minister, Nicola Willis chose to loosen restrictions for digital nomads from other countries, rather than focus on everyday Kiwis. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to stand firm and work with allies to progress climate action as Donald Trump signals his intent to pull out of the Paris Climate Accords once again. ...
The Government’s commitment to get New Zealand’s roads back on track is delivering strong results, with around 98 per cent of potholes on state highways repaired within 24 hours of identification every month since targets were introduced, Transport Minister Chris Bishop says. “Increasing productivity to help rebuild our economy is ...
The former Cadbury factory will be the site of the Inpatient Building for the new Dunedin Hospital and Health Minister Simeon Brown says actions have been taken to get the cost overruns under control. “Today I am giving the people of Dunedin certainty that we will build the new Dunedin ...
From today, Plunket in Whāngarei will be offering childhood immunisations – the first of up to 27 sites nationwide, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. The investment of $1 million into the pilot, announced in October 2024, was made possible due to the Government’s record $16.68 billion investment in health. It ...
New Zealand’s strong commitment to the rights of disabled people has continued with the response to an important United Nations report, Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston has announced. Of the 63 concluding observations of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), 47 will be progressed ...
Resources Minister Shane Jones has launched New Zealand’s national Minerals Strategy and Critical Minerals List, documents that lay a strategic and enduring path for the mineral sector, with the aim of doubling exports to $3 billion by 2035. Mr Jones released the documents, which present the Coalition Government’s transformative vision ...
Firstly I want to thank OceanaGold for hosting our event today. Your operation at Waihi is impressive. I want to acknowledge local MP Scott Simpson, local government dignitaries, community stakeholders and all of you who have gathered here today. It’s a privilege to welcome you to the launch of the ...
Racing Minister, Winston Peters has announced the Government is preparing public consultation on GST policy proposals which would make the New Zealand racing industry more competitive. “The racing industry makes an important economic contribution. New Zealand thoroughbreds are in demand overseas as racehorses and for breeding. The domestic thoroughbred industry ...
Business confidence remains very high and shows the economy is on track to improve, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis says. “The latest ANZ Business Outlook survey, released yesterday, shows business confidence and expected own activity are ‘still both very high’.” The survey reports business confidence fell eight points to +54 ...
Enabling works have begun this week on an expanded radiology unit at Hawke’s Bay Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital which will double CT scanning capacity in Hawke’s Bay to ensure more locals can benefit from access to timely, quality healthcare, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. This investment of $29.3m in the ...
The Government has today announced New Zealand’s second international climate target under the Paris Agreement, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand will reduce emissions by 51 to 55 per cent compared to 2005 levels, by 2035. “We have worked hard to set a target that is both ambitious ...
Nine years of negotiations between the Crown and iwi of Taranaki have concluded following Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/the Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill passing its third reading in Parliament today, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “This Bill addresses the historical grievances endured by the eight iwi ...
As schools start back for 2025, there will be a relentless focus on teaching the basics brilliantly so all Kiwi kids grow up with the knowledge, skills and competencies needed to grow the New Zealand of the future, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “A world-leading education system is a key ...
Housing Minister Chris Bishop and Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson have welcomed Kāinga Ora’s decision to re-open its tender for carpets to allow wool carpet suppliers to bid. “In 2024 Kāinga Ora issued requests for tender (RFTs) seeking bids from suppliers to carpet their properties,” Mr Bishop says. “As part ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today visited Otahuhu College where the new school lunch programme has served up healthy lunches to students in the first days of the school year. “As schools open in 2025, the programme will deliver nutritious meals to around 242,000 students, every school day. On ...
Minister for Children Karen Chhour has intervened in Oranga Tamariki’s review of social service provider contracts to ensure Barnardos can continue to deliver its 0800 What’s Up hotline. “When I found out about the potential impact to this service, I asked Oranga Tamariki for an explanation. Based on the information ...
A bill to make revenue collection on imported and exported goods fairer and more effective had its first reading in Parliament, Customs Minister Casey Costello said today. “The Customs (Levies and Other Matters) Amendment Bill modernises the way in which Customs can recover the costs of services that are needed ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Department of Internal Affairs [the Department] has achieved significant progress in completing applications for New Zealand citizenship. “December 2024 saw the Department complete 5,661 citizenship applications, the most for any month in 2024. This is a 54 per cent increase compared ...
Reversals to Labour’s blanket speed limit reductions begin tonight and will be in place by 1 July, says Minister of Transport Chris Bishop. “The previous government was obsessed with slowing New Zealanders down by imposing illogical and untargeted speed limit reductions on state highways and local roads. “National campaigned on ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has announced Budget 2025 – the Growth Budget - will be delivered on Thursday 22 May. “This year’s Budget will drive forward the Government’s plan to grow our economy to improve the incomes of New Zealanders now and in the years ahead. “Budget 2025 will build ...
For the Government, 2025 will bring a relentless focus on unleashing the growth we need to lift incomes, strengthen local businesses and create opportunity. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today laid out the Government’s growth agenda in his Statement to Parliament. “Just over a year ago this Government was elected by ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour welcomes students back to school with a call to raise attendance from last year. “The Government encourages all students to attend school every day because there is a clear connection between being present at school and setting yourself up for a bright future,” says Mr ...
The Government is relaxing visitor visa requirements to allow tourists to work remotely while visiting New Zealand, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis, Immigration Minister Erica Stanford and Tourism Minister Louise Upston say. “The change is part of the Government’s plan to unlock New Zealand’s potential by shifting the country onto ...
The opening of Kāinga Ora’s development of 134 homes in Epuni, Lower Hutt will provide much-needed social housing for Hutt families, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “I’ve been a strong advocate for social housing on Kāinga Ora’s Epuni site ever since the old earthquake-prone housing was demolished in 2015. I ...
Trade and Investment Minister Todd McClay will travel to Australia today for meetings with Australian Trade Minister, Senator Don Farrell, and the Australia New Zealand Leadership Forum (ANZLF). Mr McClay recently hosted Minister Farrell in Rotorua for the annual Closer Economic Relations (CER) Trade Ministers’ meeting, where ANZLF presented on ...
A new monthly podiatry clinic has been launched today in Wairoa and will bring a much-needed service closer to home for the Wairoa community, Health Minister Simeon Brown says.“Health New Zealand has been successful in securing a podiatrist until the end of June this year to meet the needs of ...
The Judicial Conduct Commissioner has recommended a Judicial Conduct Panel be established to inquire into and report on the alleged conduct of acting District Court Judge Ema Aitken in an incident last November, Attorney-General Judith Collins said today. “I referred the matter of Judge Aitken’s alleged conduct during an incident ...
Students who need extra help with maths are set to benefit from a targeted acceleration programme that will give them more confidence in the classroom, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “Last year, significant numbers of students did not meet the foundational literacy and numeracy level required to gain NCEA. To ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has announced three new diplomatic appointments. “Our diplomats play an important role in ensuring New Zealand’s interests are maintained and enhanced across the world,” Mr Peters says. “It is a pleasure to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and ...
Ki te kahore he whakakitenga, ka ngaro te Iwi – without a vision, the people will perish. The Government has achieved its target to reduce the number of households in emergency housing motels by 75 per cent five years early, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. The number of households ...
The opening of Palmerston North’s biggest social housing development will have a significant impact for whānau in need of safe, warm, dry housing, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. The minister visited the development today at North Street where a total of 50 two, three, and four-bedroom homes plus a ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced the new membership of the Public Advisory Committee on Disarmament and Arms Control (PACDAC), who will serve for a three-year term. “The Committee brings together wide-ranging expertise relevant to disarmament. We have made six new appointments to the Committee and reappointed two existing members ...
Ka nui te mihi kia koutou. Kia ora, good morning, talofa, malo e lelei, bula vinaka, da jia hao, namaste, sat sri akal, assalamu alaikum. It’s so great to be here and I’m ready and pumped for 2025. Can I start by acknowledging: Simon Bridges – CEO of the Auckland ...
The Government has unveiled a bold new initiative to position New Zealand as a premier destination for foreign direct investment (FDI) that will create higher paying jobs and grow the economy. “Invest New Zealand will streamline the investment process and provide tailored support to foreign investors, to increase capital investment ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins today announced the largest reset of the New Zealand science system in more than 30 years with reforms which will boost the economy and benefit the sector. “The reforms will maximise the value of the $1.2 billion in government funding that goes into ...
Turbocharging New Zealand’s economic growth is the key to brighter days ahead for all Kiwis, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says. In the Prime Minister’s State of the Nation Speech in Auckland today, Christopher Luxon laid out the path to the prosperity that will affect all aspects of New Zealanders’ lives. ...
The latest set of accounts show the Government has successfully checked the runaway growth of public spending, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. “In the previous government’s final five months in office, public spending was almost 10 per cent higher than for the same period the previous year. “That is completely ...
The Government’s welfare reforms are delivering results with the number of people moving off benefits into work increasing year-on-year for six straight months. “There are positive signs that our welfare reset and the return consequences for job seekers who don't fulfil their obligations to prepare for or find a job ...
Jon Kroll and Aimee McCammon have been appointed to the New Zealand Film Commission Board, Arts Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “I am delighted to appoint these two new board members who will bring a wealth of industry, governance, and commercial experience to the Film Commission. “Jon Kroll has been an ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has hailed a drop in the domestic component of inflation, saying it increases the prospect of mortgage rate reductions and a lower cost of living for Kiwi households. Stats NZ reported today that inflation was 2.2 per cent in the year to December, the second consecutive ...
Two new appointed members and one reappointed member of the Employment Relations Authority have been announced by Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden today. “I’m pleased to announce the new appointed members Helen van Druten and Matthew Piper to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) and welcome them to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dee Ninis, Earthquake Scientist, Monash University Greece’s government has just declared a state of emergency on the island of Santorini, as earthquakes shake the island multiple times a day and sometimes only minutes apart. The “earthquake swarm” is also affecting other ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Western Australian state election will be held on March 8. A Newspoll, conducted January 29 to February 4 from a sample ...
She’s back behind the wheel, and this time, she wants to find out what it is that makes us tick. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. After a prolific career on stage and screen, 83-year-old Miriam Margolyes is on the road again. ...
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For the real-life effects of clostridium botulinum, refer to Judith Collins’ face.
I suppose that makes a change from Jenny or Morrissey postin first up…
Actually, my fine feathered friend, it is quite a long time since I have been first on the board. I have been so busy lately I just haven’t had the time.
Really? Pointing out a female MPs features…so sad to see sexism still existing here
For once I agree with you, WS, much as I have no time for Collins.
Don’t be such a little PC git
A few guys in the NAT caucus get their botox too by the looks of it
To say nothing of the psychopathic lying, and running around looking like they have a turd on their top lips.
Poor Winston, didn’t even understand the joke.
But because of his own attitudes, he assumed it was about Judith Collins’ features.
Oops. Fuckwit.
classy
Lighten the fuck up.
I think discussing the looks of our politicians – particularly women – is poor form. I was uneasy with the way people talked of Helen Clark in similar terms, or even when people talked positively about Nikki Kaye and Jacinda Ardern. Men do get it too – Gerry Brownlee gets flak from time to time for his weight, but it seems to happen far less often for guys, even though men make up the majority of politicians. I realise I can’t stop it, but I do think less of people who resort to such personal statements, much in the same way I think poorly of people who make ad hominem arguments.
I know I used to (I mean lets face it Labour do make it easy) but I’m trying to get away from all that stuff…it should be about their performance and in this case JC is my pick to take over from JK
Jolly good, Pete. And good for you, Winston. Really.
Now would one of you care to get down off your cross and point to where anyone is “discussing the looks of politicians” or “pointing out a female MPs features”?
“For the real-life effects of clostridium botulinum, refer to Judith Collins’ face.”
I think that is the bit. The wiki page shows the real-life effects.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botulism
The point (I hope) is that clostridium botulinum is used for botox not that she looks like she has Botulism
Only oral botulism which in the afflicted forces from them a continuous stream of ugly poisonous, pus filled conversation…
For a suspect of a male politician so vain as to have had the Botox treatment you cannot go past John(the convicted)Banks…
Would you be just as amused by the following statements?
For a suspect of a male politician so vain as to have had the Botox treatment you cannot go past Trevor(the convicted)Mallard…
or perhaps
For a suspect of a male politician so vain as to have had the Botox treatment you cannot go past Hone(the convicted)Harawira…
A funny thing happened
tonight in the front of the telly
I looked hard at Minister Collins forehead
it was rather smooth
from rubbing it against
the brick wall of
the law no doubt
That’s a comment about using botox. It’s comment on her vanity
ffs are we not allowed to point out vanity now? How about idiocy? Can we still point out a politician’s idiocy or is that forbidden too? And what about dishonesty?
I’m going to need a serious answer to this: Is it no longer acceptable to notice that we are being governed by vain, dishonest idiots?
Sheesh.
edit: snap Chris!
Here is what was said.
“For the real-life effects of clostridium botulinum, refer to Judith Collins’ face.”
Hands up how many people thought the comment was about Collins’ face, or Collins’ vanity?
Felix, there are issues with commenting on either. Prominent women get shit for their appearance, esp politicians. If you want to make jokes about it, expect that joke to be put in its socio-political context.
I’m sorry you didn’t understand the joke, weka. But there’s nothing I can do about that now.
Giving up so easily felix?
In fact, when I first read it I thought it was about Collins’ face looking like she had botulism. Whatever. You can interpret the joke however you like, but I’d still like to see how many people read it the way you did, or the possible two other interpretations.
As you know, weka, I’m not responsible for the way morons might interpret a relatively straightforward statement.
You on the other hand are welcome to fill your boots.
Lolz, who elected you final arbiter of the meaning of every statement on ts?
Never suggested I was.
Neither am I going to apologise for being able to read and comprehend something you’ve demonstrably failed to.
The original comment from, amirite, was very obvious…
I concur with Chris/Felix here, it seemed very obvious, and even if it wasn’t that’s how I took it.
People here need to either:
A: focus
B: relax
C: both
‘very obvious’ may be stretching it and it seems like the people who took the ‘very obvious’ inference are the ones getting worked up.
@felix “ffs are we not allowed to point out vanity now? How about idiocy? Can we still point out a politician’s idiocy or is that forbidden too? And what about dishonesty?”
I think vanity is okay to go for and idiocy and dishonesty too. Personally though ripping into key because he has/has not got a hairpiece is pretty weak imo, there is always a downside to going in with those attacks mainly because none of us, or the politicians we support, are perfect so it can get a bit tit for taty. I just don’t care the collins may or may not have botox in her face perhaps that why I missed the joke.
Hey Marty, when I saw your comment below, “must be a moron I suppose.”
I was going to respond, but figured you were being self depricating, as opposed to fishing for a response, that was my interpretation of your comment, but it could have been varying degress of misinterpretation, from your intent.
What this situation illustrates, is the limitations/barriers of digital communication, once again.
Have a good one.
I don’t really think I’m a moron and my initial response to felix’s question was with a straight bat and yes I just didn’t get the jokey inference from the initial comment.
You are correct that language is a very blunt tool to get the message across and within the digital platform any challenges are compounded. Words often have a subjective value and don’t mean the same thing to different people – makes the discussions and debates fun though 🙂
You have a good one too muzza.
“it seems like the people who took the ‘very obvious’ inference are the ones getting worked up.”
Yeah, I don’t like it when people pretend I’ve said things I haven’t. I imagine you probably feel the same way.
Oh well I didn’t get the joke – must be a moron I suppose.
I think felix means that amitrite’s comment didn’t say anything about Collins being a woman, the implication being that they could just as easily have made the comment about a man and the insult joke would have worked. Which is of course daft.
I am surprised Collins uses botox. But you wouldn’t be able to tell by looking at my face.
lolz
Could you explain what’s daft about that please weka?
Making a joke about a man having botox doesn’t have the same cultural baggage attached to it that making the joke about a woman does. Women have real, serious barriers in society, and one of the ways those barriers get enforced is by the culturally sanctioned sexism that constantly puts women in their place.
Do you honestly think that the joke would have been made about a male politician? Which one?
Oh what utter bullshit weka.
Banks regularly gets stick for using botox. Key gets stick for wearing a rug.
Males who openly display vanity are regularly pilloried throughout our society.
Not as much, and you are still missing the point. I’ll put it another way. Commenting on the appearance of women or men happens for different reasons and has different effects because of the different social context and prejudices.
How about you point out how comments about JK’s rug tie in with sexism against men.
If it is any consolation, weka, I do not think Collins would be offended.
Why would I care whether Collins was offended or not?
“How about you point out how comments about JK’s rug tie in with sexism against men.”
Why would I do that, weka? I never suggested sexism was behind such comments.
And why choose that comparison rather than the direct one with Banks?
“I never suggested sexism was behind such comments.”
Then why compare it to a sexist joke about women?
weka: “I think felix means that amitrite’s comment didn’t say anything about Collins being a woman, the implication being that they could just as easily have made the comment about a man and the insult joke would have worked. Which is of course daft.”
No, that’s not what I meant at all. If I’d meant that I would’ve typed it.
What I meant was what I sad: the comment was not a slight on anyone’s physical features.
This thread demonstrates the mighty tide of Left versus Right politics solving the problems of the world. Why am I not surprised that 3/4 of a million people decided to stay at home last time.
This thread demonstrates yet again how the white male left likes to pretend that issues that doesn’t affect it aren’t important and can therefore be marginalised.
how do you get that from that weka?
I know CV’s view on this. He thinks gender politics are identity politics and not important like the Real politics (economics, class, poverty etc).
At least that’s what I think he meant. Am happy to be corrected 🙂
I actually agree with your position weka that there is no good reason that gender/identity politics do not necessarily have to stop progressive economic/class politics. And that advances in the two can go hand in hand.
Of course, the “can go hand in hand” hides the fact that it’s just not the way it actually happens. So while the middle class and wealthy left wing elite are happy to partner with the economic right wing to make massive advances in gender and identity issues we go no where except backwards on issues of poverty, class and economic inequity because the left wing elite have given up advocating for those issues. Aside from occasional mutterings of lip service.
But it’s unmistakable progress that a gay couple can now be married, even if they have to live in minimum wage/unemployed poverty on zero hour casual contracts. Left wing beggers can’t be choosy and all you need is love.
And the hope that one day, the left wing elite will once more advocate for a living wage just as stridently and as forcefully as they advocate for gay marriage.
Yep, tend to agree with that to an extent (don’t believe that the gains are massive though, and sometimes we’re losing ground*). No problem with holding the middle classes to account for their classism and privilege. I think it’s more complex than that though (eg Maori issues aren’t being advanced by the white middle classes)
Good to know we disagree on degree rather than principle 🙂
*there was something on TDB recently about young women earning hugely less than their male peers. Will see if I can find it.
The problem remains weka: the influential left wing elite have basically abandoned the underclass and the working class (and they did this a long time ago).
Hip-hooray and all that for the pushing of private members bills on: same sex marriage, same sex couple adoption, euthanasia, etc.
Compared to how many private members bills on extending paid parental leave to 26 weeks? To increasing the minimum wage to a living wage of $18/hour? On forcing employers to give every employee information on joining the local union?
Answer: it rhymes with the word “Hero”.
edit one exception, David Clark’s holiday bill which was helpful to routine Mon-Fri workers (including those on very high salaries) in effectively giving those specific workers a day or two more holidays per year.
CV, what you describe there imo has driven away many people with laboury lefty type sensibilities.
They see those social issues as secondary to the employment economic issues that see so many fall in the ditch. They recognise the importance of those social issues but do not agree with the weighting given to them by Labour (in recent history).
If Labour were to make more of the employment economic issues and less of the social ones then it would achieve more electoral support.
2c
You’re talking about parliamentary politics CV and I tend to agree, although as I said I don’t think the gains have been massive. Plus the GP obviously do better on this.
I was talking about politics in general.
It’s amazing how shit the parliamentary left look when you cherry-pick specific issues for private members’ bills, CV:
Child Poverty Reduction and Eradication Bill
Jacinda Ardern
Commission of Inquiry (Actions of Government Communications Security Bureau) Bill
Kris Faafoi
Corrections (Cost of PPP) Amendment Bill
Hon David Cunliffe
Crimes (Corporate Manslaughter) Amendment Bill
Andrew Little
Education (Community Representation on Polytechnic Councils) Amendment Bill
Hon Nanaia Mahuta
Education (Food in Schools ) Amendment Bill
David Shearer
Employment Relations (Triangular Employment) Amendment Bill
Darien Fenton
Keep Kiwibank Bill
Hon Clayton Cosgrove
Minimum Wage (Contractor Remuneration) Amendment Bill
Hon David Parker
That’s just Labour. The greens also have some excellent bills in the ballot. So yeah, while the issues you mentioned aren’t specifically covered, it’s not like the left’s sole contribution to the ballot revolves around PC social issues that you don’t give a shit about because you don’t think they affect you.
“the middle class and wealthy left wing elite”
Is there such an animal? If they ‘partner’ with the right are they still left? If they don’t care about inequalities are they still left? Maybe a new term should be used because the oxymoron’s are overrunning the place. Can you be an anti-capitalist capitalist? Can you say you believe in equality but also support inequality? Does not compute imo.
hey McFlock, thanks for that random list of private members bills from Labour MPs.
Which one of those Bills was the one moving the minimum wage up to a living wage?
Or establishing a policy of full employment?
Or lifting benefit levels up from below the poverty line?
No problem, CV. The elimination of child poverty bill would seem to contribute to your last point.
With regards to the rest of your questions, though, frankly I am shocked and stunned that you seek only to benefit those people who are already on the minimum wage, yet you cruelly choose to abandon those contractors who do not even get the minimum wage at the moment.
I also must view your refusal to devote attention to the issue of corporate manslaughter as a ringing endorsement of protecting CEOs and corporate bigwigs from responsibility for the deaths that they cause through their companies.
Basically, your refusal to address these issues (that are important to vulnerable workers in our society) is further proof that you are in fact a neoliberal stooge who will not commit to supporting socialist policies. I know this because you have not taken the time to express concern, at length, for every single socialist policy that I believe in, so therefore you abandoned the underclass long ago.
or maybe: arguing that somebody has “abandoned the underclass” just because they don’t address the issues that twist your personal nuts is a bit conceited
massive advances in gender and identity issues
lol what.
You and about 1500 other voters, feel free to chuckle all you want.
Yeah, Ardern wants a law forcing the measurement of child poverty and the setting of appropriate targets. Then she’s going to force the Government of the day to talk about it in parliament once a year, as well as have a Child Poverty Board which will be fucked the first year of the next Tory term.
Real breakthroughs against child poverty, those.
that’s odd, because the people I talk to associated with the Alliance, Greens, Mana, Unite, etc. all know what I’m on about.
Perhaps you should catch up.
Yes, yes it is. It forces all parties to address the issue, and provides a benchmark of how well we’re doing. Look at the dialogues about GDP and unemployment vs how we talk about child poverty. And I know you hate the concept of thought before action, but it really is the only way we can try to avoid making things worse.
That’s lovely, and totally relevant to the point. /sarc
They were probably all “smile, nod, and back away from the deranged self-loathing Labourite”.
Planks from your own eye, and all that.
Thanks for your gallant advocacy of Labour measuring child poverty, setting goals and enforcing regular parliamentary chat about it of Molesworth St.
That’s what I call an effective (appear to do something but actually do-nothing) policy to help children out of poverty.
You’re out of touch McFlock. You should head to a few GP, Mana or Unite meetings. International Socialists can be fun too.
The last IS meeting I was at, everyone sat around and said how great the world be if only people listened to the IS.
I get enough of that at TS, thanks. Without the body odour.
In case you hadn’t noticed, if a government doesn’t talk about something, then a government doesn’t do anything about it.
Which I think seems to be your justification for calling the labour caucus sellouts just because they haven’t put forward the specific members’ bills that you no doubt have been personally advocating and shepherding through the Labour policy selection process over the last few years (haven’t you?).
Are you a white male, weka? Who else in the thread is?
No I’m not. Pretty sure CV is, but my point was about CV starting up with the marginalisation of ‘identity politics’ (again, am happy to be corrected if that’s not where he was going).
Nevertheless, I was pointing to the politics of the white, male left (irrespective of the gender/ethnicity of people posting right now).
Ah, irrespective of people posting right now but nonetheless applying the assumption to them anyway.
Goodo.
Nah, you missed the point. I was just rewriting CV’s post, to cut off the marginalisation of ‘identity politics’. If you think such a thing doesn’t happen, I’m sorry you don’t understand but there is nothing I can do about that now.
Right, so you were only talking about CV and not about the other commenters in the thread, about which you know fuck all.
Whatever weka.
No, I’m also referring to your marginalising of sexism too. I don’t care what your gender/ethnicity is, I’m referring to your politics now.
Ok, so you’re referring to something I didn’t do at all then.
Indeed. And the whole current twitter debate shows how women get singled out for more abuse than men – not that similar things don’t happen to some men also, but see this article and the comments by a tr*ll, who says he picks on women because they are easy targets/vulnerable/react.
Though, to go off on a tangent, when I read the article I was particularly interested in the wider issue that technology cannot solve social problems.
Which is interesting because we live in a culture which pushes more technology as being good, and that advances in technology will provide answers to the most pressing human needs.
But when you drill down into that…it’s actually a corporate commercial value system that has been widely indoctrinated into society.
Technology does make life easier in many ways. But new technologies often bring new problems. And some older technologies keep on providing benefits: radio, bicycles, etc.
The capitalist value system includes valuing anything “new” – because that means they can encourage people to throw away the old, and buy the newer version.
But social problems tend to migrate to newer technologies, albeit with some changes in how they operate.
Digital technologies do not automatically result in poverty reduction, decreases in inequality, a more democratic society, less misogyny or racism, etc.
Ahhhhh yes it does, but it’s actually the energy channelled or embodied by the technology which makes life easier, and this is well worth listening to in that regard…if you haven’t already seen it that is:
(Nikiforuk on ‘Energy Slaves’)
Thanks Pete.
“Gerry Brownlee gets flak from time to time for his weight, but it seems to happen far less often for guys, even though men make up the majority of politicians.”
Indeed. And what Brownlee gets is fatphobia, which is a different thing (still sucks). How many male policitians get shit for their appearance because they’re not conforming to social norms about what real men should like like? Dunne does for his haircut. Anyone else?
Simon Bridges for his impossibly good looks?
Slippery the Prime Minister inserted Him into the Cabinet line-up as eye candy to keep the rest of them awake, the sound of pacemakers going berserk was said to be deafening…
Key for his short podgy fingers.
Key for his lack of muscles
Key for his big honker.
Key for his general podginess.
Key for his toupe.
Key for his lying eyes.
Citations vto, because we wouldn’t want to miss the sexism attached to those comments.
btw, I’m not averse to talking about how society sanctions social control of how men look. Just that it’s different than the issue for women.
I recall a futures broker saying a couple of years ago: “Dairy is a New Zealand play.”
Meaning both that the global dependence of the world on New Zealand dairy exports for the traded global price is incredibly high and vulnerable, and also that the entire economy of New Zealand should be read as one and the same as the dairy price.
Eventually the New Zealand government will wake to how vulnerable its nation and its interests are to Fonterra.
New Zealand is not beholden to dairy, this dreamworld stuff needs to stop.
What New Zealanders are beholden to is the forward selling of dairy by way of taking on massive and unrealistic debt levels to pay for the dairy farms (forward sold value) and to pay for the out-of-control housing bubble in various spots. The government has of course also fallen into this trap by expecting that it can rely on dairy and consequently also take on more debt, or future obligations in return for a return in this term of office.
New Zealand is not beholden to dairy, but many New Zealanders and the New Zealand government is beholden to the masters it has forward-sold dairy to.
The rest of us without debt or future obligation? Nothing to worry about (except the fallout from those other fools when they collapse in a heap).
+1 Fonterra is a bloated inefficient organisation hiding behind the high Price/kg mild solids fetch.
Once china/sth america catch up in terms of milk powder production (mostly taught by Fonterra/Wrightsons etc) the game’s up and it’s not too far away.
Most dairy farms will then become unprofitable as the price /kg drops as they’re over farming/fertilising now polluting the waterways etc
Even country calendar has shown more than once that the sustainable dairy model is better for land, animal welfare and farmer returns.
I think you are right TC, because volumes of trade don’t have to change much for large swings in international dairy prices, as we witnessed with the movement in price caused by the NI drought earlier this year. When I asked a Westpac economist this question, he reckoned that the extra volume created by South America would be easily consumed by the growing demand in Asia/India. But that may well be the picture long term but we will see some real volatility in the mean time. The farmers that will be in trouble will be the farmers with more than $20 debt per kg milk solid produced….which I think is about average. So half of NZ dairy farmers could find themselves in trouble.
A chorus of criminals, speaks
This last link is interesting…
http://web.test.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/08/04/20-Embassies-Consulates-Closed-As-Al-Qaeda-Affiliate-Is-Set-To-Strike
John Key had advanced notice of the so called warning, which he casually referenced the there were NZ’ers who were training in Yemen, what a horrid little man!
Another note from the “Brighter Future”
our future with National = 1984
@ Ropata
but…but….but…that has nothing to do our policies…it is due to the GFC and …and….the NZ Labour Party….its all their fault…nothing to do with us We are not responsible(TM) for anything (oh! apart from when stats are good)
~ signed the Irresponsible Bullshit Artists Limited Liability Company (otherwise known as the current government)
Audrey Young, today’s winner of the golden turd award for a grand piece of Jonolism in today’s Herald,
Young simply prints verbatim Slippery the Prime Ministers lines from yesterday that He, the Prime Minister, knew nothing of the Dunne/Vance emails and that that naughty public servant Kibblewhite hid them from everyone on the 9th floor of the Beehive,
Not a query from Young in the vein of ”but surely Eaggleson the Prime Ministers Chief of Staff up to His elbows, sloshing amid the offal and entrails of this dirty little spy scandal must have known and told the Prime Minister”,
There’s a hell of a difference between journalism and political commentary and Young, Armstrong and the various other ‘political columnists’ have for years been engaged by the Herald to produce the latter not the former,
When it suits these tired old hacks that the Herald employs tho, they suddenly resort to journalism where they ‘report’ the ‘facts’ as given to them in this case by the Prime Minister,
You would think from Young’s pathetic effort in today’s Herald that She had never once become aware of politicians using lies, deceit and spin in an effort to fool the public,
A worthy winner of a coveted ‘Golden Turd’ for Her efforts in stooping to new lows in political reporting in my opinion…
The Minister for Food Safety or something while talking this morning on radio about the Fonterra scare said they had to wait on Fonterra to produce the information needed to understand the situation and what is being done to correct it. No mention of any decent regulations or overview or control being introduced.
Federated Farmers want to hold the head of the Board accountable. Nothing constructive about preventing this sort of hoo ha happening again. And how impressive to the Chinese!, neither we nor Nutricia can come up with information because of systems failure with them, and for us, just bloody incompetence, slackness and perhaps machiavellian calculation about the optimum time to release the unwelcome information. And I felt so annoyed with China about the melamine disgrace putting a taint on our milk and NZs good name! I was deluded, and how sad to find that out through this scandal.
We are already suffering from the abject grovelling to the world for the right to get our dairy products through the border controls of various countries. Like a keen shapely whore we have whipped open our enfolding tariff barriers, leaving us naked and vulnerable to the winds of disaster. Sounds OTT and dramatic but this little problem has turned out to be a massive disaster for us. It will result in a massive loss of confidence in th quality of our goods – that we have spent a century building up. Unfortunately we have of latter years eroded our controls and standards in complacency and defiance against imposed safety and quality standards.
Exactly Rosetinted, where in all this is the fail-safe regulation, should not all the regular testing carried out by Fon-terror be subject of a regulation that such testing (a) be mandatory, and (b) the Ministry of Food Safety immediately be in receipt of copies of such testing where ANY anomaly is immediately flagged by the testing agency in terms of good, bad, ugly and the appropriate level of response readiness in terms of knowledge and capability is in place at the Ministry of Food safety to act in an appropriate manner,
Lack of regulation in the workplace/market place kills people, politicians who refuse to enact necessary regulatory reforms are complicit in such deaths…
“Fonterror” – lol. Very good.
I commented in the Botulism thread yesterday from a link that the Jackal posted, where a microbiologist pointed out that it’s not normal to test milk for Clostridium.
Maybe we could wait until we have some facts before we start clamouring for action to be taken. Do we even know what happened yet?
Just looks like a real mess at the moment:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/dairy/9006461/Local-and-global-frustration-at-Fonterra
You have been consistent with your message Weka, and i suspect that you will be proved right eventually. But there is still going to be some casualties way beyond what should have logically resulted from this scare. Gary Romano from Fonterra was on Campbell Live last night and I think they should have him fronting on behalf of Fonterra. But I do now understand the timing issue of announcements…(I hope Romano does not become a victim because he is probably one of the smartest Logistic/Production Managers in the country).
The big problem is that fonterra does not have a media spokesperson communicating with the media in NZ,so all of the commentators are speculating and creating all sorts of stories.
Fonterra need to get Gary Romano fronting, but I presume he is doing all of the work behind the scenes as well….I guess he cant be everywhere.
Thanks Saarbo. It’s a bummer for me, because if the microbiology was being handled more sensibly I could sit back and watch Fonterra get its just desserts 😉
I think you have the wrong take on this. Any serious preventative action requires a thorough understanding of the facts and failure mechanisms around this incident. That will take time and will be both a highly technical and in depth management oriented process.
Enforcing accountability at the top of the hierarchy can be done more quickly and is actually the rarer step in todays “anything goes” corporate culture. I am glad that someone is pushing for it. Too often we see empty promises of “corrective/preventative action” while the big guys at the top just sail on happily collecting their pay checks taking no personal responsibility whatsoever for their role in a given mess.
BTW I am still expecting investor law suits to be announced this week.
The correct reaction would have been to collect information about what happened to the tainted ?whey? and got a list of products to recall together, then go public. The problem seems to be downstream buyers of the product have lax managements. But the question still remains how did they find out what happened, and that forced them to look back and find the dirty pipe…
…look as to fed.farmers, they hardly represent farmers since they obvious have no conscience over high farm prices that harm young farmers entering the industry, force existing farmers to pay more to buy more land, and lead to higher mortgages as farmers can take riskier growth strategies. And for what? so the big smoke can grow its own housing bubble off leaky, damp, car sprawling suburbs. Fed.farmers are a disgrace for getting in bed with National.
Industrial food supply chains are inherently risky.
And Fed Farmers, what percentage of NZ farmers actually belong?
Under 30% now, from what I heard, and falling.
Now we can see the need for the GCSB bill, the flush out the terrorists in Fonterror.
Further evidence as if we needed it that Privatisation is in important strategic areas of society anti social and destructive this article from the collapsing disaster that is the U$ of selfishness and greed, where the 1% crow with their wealth on top of the steadily getting poorer majority. This is the system that made Yankey rich and which he follows against the wishes of the majority to privatise our power companies.
“8 Ways Privatization Has Failed America”
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/08/05
“I’ve been saying this for 30 years, I suppose it’s comforting that the rest of the country is STARTING to wake up, but how much is it going to cost us to get these PUBLIC things back? The rich aren’t going to give up their cash cows all that easily. They are going to make out like bandits AGAIN when we have to pay to take back what we paid for in the first place.”
And the U$K continues down the same disastrous road. The NHS is the current target despite the protests of the people democracy doesn’t count: rather profit before people. neoliberalism has made the U$ a third world nation but with huge military power. Once the U$ $ loses its reserve petro status the U$ is finished and the USK is following rapidly.
Parliament Today.
The committee stages of the GCSB Bill will commence this afternoon. As yet, Dunne’s Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) not appeared on the Parliament website.
However, Labour has put up a SOP proposing substantive changes to the Bill to require that:
“… within one month of the commencement of the part of the Bill amending
the GCSB Act (the commencement), the Minister in charge of the GCSB must determine, with the
agreement of the leaders of each political party for the time being recognised for parliamentary
purposes under the Standing Orders of the House of Representatives:
the terms of reference for an independent inquiry into the purposes and functions of New
Zealand’s intelligence agencies; and
the membership of a committee (consisting of 3-5 persons) to oversee and conduct the
independent inquiry into the purposes and functions of New Zealand’s intelligence agencies.
The inquiry committee must within six months of the commencement report to the Minister containing:
recommendations on the proper purposes and functions of New Zealand’s intelligence
agencies; and
any legislative proposals required to implement those recommendations (amending Part 1 of
the Bill by inserting New Clause 25A).
Expiration
Part 1 of the Bill (amending the GCSB Act), Part 2 of the Bill (amending the IGIS Act) and Part 3 of the Bill (amending the ISC Act) each expire 12 months after the respective commencement of each part (inserting new Clause 3A, 27A and 37A into the Bill).
Comment
These new clauses would effectively repeal the Bill.”
http://www.parliament.nz/resource/0001732120
I may be wrong, but the provision re leaders of politicial parties for the time being recognised … appears to currently rule out Dunne!
EDIT – As I was typing the above, three more SOPs popped up on the Parliament site. Two under Key’s name and one under Dunne’s name.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/pb/legislation/sops/50DBHOH_SOP1740_1/government-communications-security-bureau-and-related-legislation
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/pb/legislation/sops/50DBHOH_SOP1739_1/government-communications-security-bureau-and-related-legislation
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/pb/legislation/sops/50DBHOH_SOP1738_1/government-communications-security-bureau-and-related-legislation
Revised link for the Labour SOP if the original link above does not work.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/pb/legislation/sops/50DBHOH_SOP1737_1/government-communications-security-bureau-bill
Fruther Edit – forget those later links. The Key and Dunne SOPs have not yet been put up properly.
The two Key SOPs are now up – one covers substantive amendments and the other proposes breaking the Bill into three separate Bills.
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/government/2013/0109/latest/versions.aspx
The Dunne SOP should pop up in this link when it is included.
The Dunne SOP is now in the link to my 9.2. Semms on a quick read to cover what he agreed with Key to obtain Dunne’s support.
To summarise the Labour SOP
– Amendment Bill provisions to expire after one year ( ie the GCSB Act would revert to the current Act unless amended in the interim).
– a extensive review to be set up within one month of the Amendment Bill coming into force, comprising a panel of 3 – 5 persons agreed by the GCSB Minister and the leaders of all politicial parties
– review to report back within six months.
Since I am swamping OM with Parliamentary links, here is today’s Questions.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/?document=00HOH_OralQuestions
Today’s Questions include 20 Questions to Members as well as the usual 12 to Ministers.
Let the fillabusting begin!
PS – RNZ National Midday news reported that Key will not be in the House for the Committee stages of the GCSB Bill. Coward.
More Loan Shark NeoLiberal economics:
“Destroying Greece to Save it ”
http://rense.com/general96/greecetosave.html
Greece once an optimistic reasonably happy holiday destination has been pillaged by loan shark economics back to 3rd World destitution. 🙁
“Greece represents the worst of neoliberal harshness. Social services across the board are disintegrating. They’re in disarray. They’re disappearing in plain sight.”
“The Government has imposed a brutal and self-defeating fiscal austerity; in a confiscatory manner, it tries to collect extra revenue from an already impoverished and afflicted populace, while it neglects its main role, as specified by the Constitution: The Protection of the Rights and the Welfare of the Citizen Body.”
Nah, couldn’t be …
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BQ8UoZ_CUAAAOK6.jpg:large
contrails!
Hahaha……National Party purchase $2million Thorndon mansion to setup new HQ close to GCSB HQ !
How convenient for Key. He doesn’t have to rely on emails anymore. He can get a staffer to pop along the road and get everything direct…
Phone rings: Chief, Ian Fletcher picks it up. “Hi Fletch. It’s your mate John here. Look, I’ve had enough of that Russel Norman. Too bloody clever by half. Stick a monitor on him will you? I’ll send one of our HQ staffers to get the gen off you in a couple of weeks. Okay? Good. See you soon bye”.
Just noticed this dated 20 Feb 2013 in a search.
“Hank Schouten at Stuff reports:
“A Wellington home steeped in political history is being sold by the Government.
The red-brick house at 41 Pipitea St, Thorndon, was the home of prime ministers Sir Sidney Holland, Sir Walter Nash, Sir Keith Holyoake and Sir Geoffrey Palmer, as well as a string of Cabinet ministers, including Jim Sutton and most recently Nick Smith.”
”
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2013/02/a_historic_home.html
Interesting. So they couldn’t sell it last December – going for $1.6 mill.
Background to the house.
Winston Peters is very critical.
Wow. Winston has just woken up.
The place has been for sale for at least 6 months.
They actually would appear to have got a very good price for it.
+1
Great research Karol…..this Key government is so unlike anything NZ has seen before!
[recovered from trash]
[lprent: This is one of those irritating flaws in the comments system that allows comments to be trashed, and destroying the continuity when they have been replied to. Pulled this out of the trash. BTW: If I think someone is doing this deliberately, then they will get booted permanently. ]
I’m sure Unite will receive your concerns in the spirit they are intended.
That has not been my experience.
Well, your intent is one of barely suppressed malice if you ask me; that might explain its poor reception.
Thanks for your concern.
I’ll file it alongside your previous statements about how it’s not the government’s role to create jobs.
In the meantime, workers will choose which battles they will fight, if only on the grounds that advice from you does not necessarily have their interests at heart.
You really are a very silly little boy.
[recovered from trash]
[lprent: This is one of those irritating flaws in the comments system that allows comments to be trashed, and destroying the continuity when they have been replied to. Pulled this out of the trash. BTW: If I think someone is doing this deliberately, then they will get booted permanently. ]
So why do you support tax payer provided corporate welfare, for foreign corporates no less?
The incidence of the subsidy passes to the worker. Makes no difference who owns the company. Are you saying that a subsidy for a New Zealand small business owner to employ a disadvantaged worker would be more acceptable?
The wage subsidy is provided on condition that McDonalds employs specified workers who would othwerwise be unemployed. It mostly displaces other workers. Wage subsidy schemes generally have about an 80% displacement effect.
” It mostly displaces other workers”
are you saying this is a good thing?
a subsidy is a subsidy – the worker doesnt get it, but McDs sure get to reduce their wage bill dont they
also – im pretty sure this isnt available to anyone but McDs (though could be wrong there)
testing reply function
definately not working on firefox/win 7
Someone has deleted a comment that people have already replied to. Who were you all talking to?
Wage subsidies are used widely in New Zealand (and overseas) to help disadvantaged workers. It is not just available to McDonalds.
http://www.workandincome.govt.nz/business/develop-your-workforce/training-and-wage-subsidies/
The workers that get employed would otherwsie not have been employed becasuse there are alternative more productive workers available. McDonalds is being (temporarily) compensated for the lower productivity of the disadvantaged worker.
So you’re good with subsidising foreign corporates with NZ tax payers money then?
Does it occur to you that McDonalds should be paying the full wages of those workers themselves, without tax payer subsidies?
bullshit. That “lower productivity” is entirely fictitious. McDonalds is an employer responsible for training and upskilling their own staff.
This is simply a money funnel from the tax payer to the corporate.
“Incidence of the subsidy”? What the fuck kind of obfuscation is that?
All I can see is McDonalds getting cheap labour on the tax payers ticket.
Why are you even engaging with whoever/whatever is behind that rather silly handle.
I notice Gosman came back for a hit and run yesterday, having not been seen for quite some time, perhaps due to my comment referencing him turning in his grave, at the poor quality of cry-pants trooling, then gosman magically appeared!
You do have a lot of spare time on your hands.
Shearer speaking now on Fonterra, worst speech ever!! Really really bad… Thank God the bell has just gone!,
Totally agree – what a disaster. This can’t go on – can it?
I challenge anybody who claims to support Labour, to watch that speech (it should be online shortly, in the House from about 4.15 pm).
I challenge anybody who thinks Shearer’s problems are created by the MSM, or critical bloggers, or the “far left”, or Cunliffe, or any other excuse you want to conjure up.
When you watch it, remember that this debate was called for by Shearer himself. He has not been caught on the hop, he has (rightly) asked to speak, to hold the government to account. And so … he speaks. Now watch.
C’mon, there are still a few of you on here who keep saying everything will be fine for the left if we just shut up and support David Shearer. Watch that awful speech, or forever hold your peace.
That man cannot be Prime Minister. Period.
Watching it. Looks like a student given an oral presentation assignment and counting down til home time.
Got a link?
Watching a recording on myfreeview. So, no. I would have to look for a link just like you.
The video will be on here some time this PM, or tomorrow:
http://inthehouse.co.nz/video_archive
This one? http://inthehouse.co.nz/node/20234
Thank you
I’m not sure if that’s the one. I’m watching it now, not all the way through it, but IMO it’s not as terrible as gobsmacked makes out.
I think that was a shockingly bad speech – he just went through the motions and seriously did he get one sentence out without fluffing it – I don’t think so. He should just leave politics, he’s not suited to it at all.
Got it in one. The only thing more painful than watching Shearer is reading the posts here blaming ‘the MSM’ and the journos for Labour at 30%. Or less. Surprising they get that much!
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9007292/Labour-stands-with-Govt-over-Fonterra
Hopeless.
Noted while at the local Pak’n’Slave today on the usual food frenzy nutrition quest, one of those little triangular flags you attach to the rear passenger window on your wheels,
A Labour Party flag of all things, go Labour a really staunch supporter this far away from an election,
The wheels under the Labour flag???, a near new BMW, it was ‘wine week’ so i connected the dots for a giggle…
Today’s Panel – Policeman Bell.
Mora had asked an authority on Islam to explain fasting and Ramadan. This Dr. gave a very measured and clear explanation of his faith and what Ramadan means to its adherents. He happened to mention that it was a highly spiritual time and that all desires are set aside for this period, people focussing on refreshing and recreating their spiritual beings. Only a xenophobe like Bell could have asked an appallingly “smuttish” question of the guest. Clearly Mora was embarrassed.
Given the poor level of comments that Bell contributed to the rest of the panel, the man should be retired from the show in the same way that Bradbury was dropped.
What was the question?
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/2564694/the-panel-with-graham-bell-and-simon-farrell-green-part-2 About 27:38 minutes
correction – item is about 23 minutes in.
If I correctly identified the voice it was Bell also stating that the judiciary is responsible for the fact that Teina Pora is still inside after 21 years. That the judiciary should take some step to rectify this. I’m at a loss to understand quite what the judiciary could legally do.
A transparent and disgusting attempt by Bell to shield an evil police culture in Pora’s case. And conceal that vitally important disclosure was withheld from the defence. And that there were senior detectives who were seriously concerned about the reality of the police case, even before the first trial.
Afternoons with Mora is in the main but an exercise in facilitating blowhards who fancy they’re “someone” to mouth off, unchallenged, in the most ridiculously ignorant and self-indulgent style.
Holy guacamole has John Key just been slapped hard by the Chinese over the 100% Pure thing that Key also happens to be responsible for?
Will Key take responsibility for that?
The flaming paper bag full of Chinese dog poo has been left on his veranda, so yeah, he sorta needs to even if he doesn’t want to.
Parliament can be a frustrating place to watch. But I like that we have a House where the gallery and members from all sides join in a Waiata.
‘
When it comes to the 100% Pure slogan how can the John Key led National Ltd™ government be worried? Its not like National Ltd™ have even the slightest concern for such things, or maybe it just thought the world wouldn’t notice that since its election to power in 2008, National Ltd™ has . . .
been caught out repeatedly lying in the run up to and during the election campaign about its real intentions in relation to the environment
celebrated the opening of the foreign-owned Pike River Coal Ltd mine on DOC land adjacent to the Paparoa National Park from which 1 megatonne of coal will be extracted per year for the next 20 years – Pike River Coal Ltd has announced that it has found additional coal in the national park
cancelled a proposed efficiency standard (MEPS) on incandescent lightbulbs
reversed a moratorium on building new gas/oil/coal power stations
removed the bio fuel subsidy
scrapped the scheme that would have penalised imported vehicles producing high emissions
removed regulations for water efficient new housing by Order in Council
renewed leases on sensitive high country farms which were meant to return to DOC
reversed restrictions on the freeholding of vast swathes of land on the edge of the Southern Lakes
arbitrarily excised 400 hectares from the brand new Oteake Conservation Park, including the most important and, ecologically, the rarest part of the new Park, the tussock and shrubland that went right down to the banks of the Manuherikia River, to enable future access to lignite
said nothing to say in regard to the World Commission on Protected areas of IUCN’s severe criticism of its intention to investigate mineral resources and mining opportunities in protected conservation areas including our three UNESCO World Heritage Sites of Te Wahi Pounamu-South West New Zealand, Tongariro National Park and the Sub Antarctic Islands
approved two prospecting permit applications lodged by Australian iron-ore giant Fortescue Metals Group subsidiary FMG Pacific lodged in June – areas covered by the two-year permits include an 8204-square-kilometre area of seabed adjoining the west coast from Cape Reinga to the Manukau Harbour and a 3798-square-kilometre prospecting area of land from Cape Reinga to the Kaipara Harbour including Ninety Mile Beach, the west side of the Aupouri Peninsula, Kaitaia and the Hokianga.
approved an additional prospecting permit for Fortescue Metals in relation to 3568sq km right next door to the Kahurangi National Park where the Heaphy Track is
was forced to release its Ministry of Economic Development (MED) report under the Official Information Act that proclaims “significant mineral potential” in the Fiordland, Kahurangi and Paparoa national parks – the report said the Waitutu area of the Fiordland National Park had sufficient petroleum reserves to be “worthy” of inclusion in a review of conservation land protected from mining
secretly granted the minerals industry the right to veto proposed National Park boundaries and permission for any such vetoes to be kept confidential – in spite of recommendations from its own officials against any such a veto
called for caring New Zealanders to halt their “emotional hysteria” and recognise that conservation land should be mined for minerals and went on to say “Mining in a modern, technological way can have a negligible effect”
rubished the Department of Conservation (“Canterbury Farming” June 2010 issue – now offline) suggesting it was incapable of looking after the high country reserves and parks under its control
gutted the home insulation scheme
pulled $300 million out of public transport, walking and cycling schemes and added it to a pot of $2 billion to ‘upgrade’ state highways
changed the law to provide billions of dollar in subsidies for polluters via the ETS casino
begun a process of gutting the Resource Management Act to make it difficult/impossible for the public to lodge appeals against developers
removed the ability of Auckland to introduce a fuel levy to fund planned public transport upgrades
left electrification of the Auckland rail network up in the air without promised funding commitments and then came through with a dodgy loan scheme and then unilaterally reorganised the local government structure before finally setting about the privatisation-by-stealth model when busting KiwiRail
removed the programme to make Government Departments ‘carbon neutral’ and also began its first wave of public sector redundancies starting with the Ministry for the Environment which was responsible for the scheme
removed funding for public tv advertising on sustainability and energy efficiency
pulled funding for small-town public litter bin recycling schemes
displayed cabinet ministers expressing public support the bulldozing of Fiordland
reduced Department of Conservation funding by $54 million over three years
cancelled funding for the internationally acclaimed ‘Enviroschools’ programme
usurped the democratic role of local Councils of determining policies for their citizens by requiring the abandonment of the efficient and well-established tree protection rules for urban areas
set about revamping Auckland governance in a way that is likely to greatly reduce the ‘Environmental Watchdog’ role of the the current Regional Council (since completely fucked it up with the SuperShitty)
removed Auckland’s metropolitan limits and opened the gateway for unfettered urban sprawl
defended internationally the importation of rain-forest-wrecking palm kernel and stood silent while Federated Farmers called Greenpeace “despicable” criminals, traitors, and robbers
stood silent while Godfrey Bloom, a Member of the European Parliament and infamous Climate Change Denialist, publicly rejoiced in the 1985 bombing of the Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior – who was doing so while standing on a dock next to the replacement vessel
took a 0% emissions reduction target to Copenhagen. Yes, seriously, that isn’t a misprint – that was the lower bound of their negotiation platform – then missed the 01/02/10 deadline for commitment to action it had agreed to – meanwhile 55 of the 80 countries which attended did make the deadline
secretly cancelled the internationally recognised scheme for the mandatory labelling of exotic woods to ensure the timber has not been taken from rain forests in direct contradiction of its own statements made at the 13th World Forestry Congress in Argentina
supported the Department of Conservation’s decision to open up the pristine Cathedral Cove to an ice-cream franchise
gave the Department of Conservsation $1.7 million to further develop commercial activities on DOC land and started an “off set” plan allowing company’s to damage the conservation estate if they agree to improve land elsewhere – no monitoring regime has been suggested on put in place
left DOC director-general Al Morrison to announce that DOC is to charge for services that had been free and, to soften the public up to the idea that there will be more “energy generation schemes” operating on DOC land
took no action to reduce existing pollution pouring into the Manawatu River and is “leaving it up to industry” to come up with solutions to heal the river which was described by the Cawthorn Institute as “one of the worst polluted in the Western world”
announced a $1.69 million industry subsidy to kick start marine farming without identifying no-go areas nor putting in place a consultation process for individiuals, communities, and other general coastal users
been forced to release documents under the Official Information Act which confirm that DOC has “giving up” on ecologically valuable high-country land in the Mackenzie Basin because of funding cuts. The released documents cite “statements made by ministers”, “diminishing funding” and the Government’s new high-country policies as reasons for the changed stance – the comments from DOC were made after Land Information New Zealand (Linz), which manages the tenure review process, ignored DOC’s previous conservation recommendations for the farms
used former National Party minister and current director of Open Country Cheese – a company convicted of filthy farming practices and found by the supreme court to be a dodgy employer – Wyatt Creech to head up an enquiry into Environment Canterbury which had been standing up the dairy farmers’ demands for more and more water resources and less and less regulation. The Creech report recommended the Environmental Canterbury be sacked and replaced with government appointments and the voters of Canterbury do without democracy until the water situation had been resolved. The Canterbury area holds 50 percent of New Zealand’s fresh water reserves and 50 percent of the water required for hyrdo energy. The Creech report said Environmental Centerbury put too much focus on the environment
been subjected to international condemnation for knowing next to nothing about the parlous state of the New Zealand fisheries
bucked international trends and poured more acid on the 100% Pure brand and increases the bluefin tuna quota
squirmed when New Zealand is subject to international criticism for its backing of commericial whaling which National Ltd supports
funded Government-owned company Solid Energy runs an essay competition entitled “ The role of coal in sustainable energy solutions for New Zealand” for school children. First prize is a trip to New Zealand’s largest coal customer, China.
supported access fees for entrance onto DOC walkways – fee introduced following cuts to DOC’s budget.
pressed on with PR bullshit about how New Zealand’s environment would profit from mining national parks, Conservation Minister Kate Wilkinson says.
Department of Conservation director-general Al Morrison said the conservation estate created “opportunities to do a whole lot for a lot of different people . . . we’ve got to get away from this idea that somehow we have to protect one-third of New Zealand for a certain constituency and put it in a jar of formaldehyde and leave it
created random fantasies of abundant wealth to promote all forms of mining
ignored reports on sustained non-compliance with resource consents and worsening pollution of water ways.
ignored its own Ministers possible conflicts of interest
done nothing as both its own SOE Meridian and the Department of Conservation to withdraw appeals against an 85m high damn with a 14km long reservoir on conservation land.
granted Energy Resources permission to ship Australian yellowcake uranium ore through New Zealand.
apologised but does nothing else for breaching the Treaty of Waitangi by granting a mining exploration permit to Brazilian company Petrobras
continued to remove environmental protection powers from local authorities
totally reversed gains made in the protection of National Parks and other high-value conservation areas in the South Island.
commenced a divide-and-rule strategy by attempting to paint New Zealanders interested in protecting the environment as outside of the “mainstream” and in defence of the fact that the media is catching to its bare-faced lies in the lead up to the 2008 election
carried on with more lies by talking about modern mining like that at Reefton being carried out by Oceana Golds as being like “key hole surgery”
appeared to believe that the tourists it is attempting to bring to New Zealand are all blind and won’t see for themselves the impact of the dairy farming it is subsidising to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars
appeared itself to be blind when it comes to the Chairman of Fonterra
forced the Commissioner for the Environment to delay the release of a report into the ramifications for climate change in regard to lignite mining and proposals to convert the lignite into diesel
employed financial sleight of hand in shuffling funds towards business interests and away from community groups looking to protect the environment
made more empty promises when a report showing that a third of New Zealand lankes have poor quality water is released
backed down on promises to protect New Zealand children (and the environment cleaner by more informed disposal) from harmful chemicals by improving labeling and imposing mandatory standards on containers
Ignored the findings by attacking the messenger when a World Health Organisation report confirms that New Zealand’s main centres have the worst air in Australasia and Auckland is the most polluted with twice the concentration of damaging airborne particles as Sydney.
studiously ignored so as to take piss about dire warnings concerning the quality of drinking water in Reidstone
failed to mention in its 100% Pure promotions that visitors to the Kerikeri Basin near the Stone Store – one of Northland’s iconic tourism and heritage sites – could come face-to-face with warning signs telling them the water is polluted
failed to mention in its 100% Pure promotions that tourists in the Coromandel could come face to face with New Zealand’s environmental standards when finding hundreds of dead snapper washed up on Beaches
presented bogus evidence concerning air pollution
made more empty promises in relation to air pollution while also extending deadlines for local councils to reduce air pollution
extended deadlines for businesses previously require to reduce air pollution by 2013
put tourism operators in Akaroa at risk by refusing to make the harbour a marine reserve . . . and then rubs salt into their wounds
done nothing after the United Nations finds that National Ltd™’s targets for reducing pollution are not consistent with the measures put in place to achieve those targets
attempted to defend the Emissions Trading Scheme from comparisons with the Australian model while Environment Minister Nick Smith indicates there’s little chance of the two schemes being integrated any time soon
then further slowed down the implentation of New Zealand’s Emissions Trading Scheme
allowed major retailers to reap the benefits of its earlier and secret decision to abandon the mandatory labelling of exotic woods after it is found that the retailers are contributing to the death of native Australian forests despite an independent, year-long investigation which finds otherwise
tried to keep a meeting between John Key and mininng company Anadarko’s boss secret. The company is responsble for a massive oil spill and is looking to to start drilling off New Zealand soon
continued to ignore yet more evidence of farmers failing to comply with environmental regulations
handed over $400 million to farmers to extend water storage and allow for more land to be used for dairy farms. No mention or provision is made for additional protections required to deal with the increased pollution
failed to point out in its 100% Pure promotion that tourists (and locals) should avoid the Opihi River along State Highway 1 because of the risk of exposure to toxins from phormidium
failed to point out in its 100% Pure promotions that tourists arriving at New Zealand’s “nuclear free” sea ports will be sharing the environment with up to 5,000 tonnes of radioactive yellow cake uranium
lied about how bad the RMA is
ignored top scientists and academics who point out that its underfunding of the Department of Conservation will send more species into extinction and hurt its 100% Pure image.
Ignored John Key making an international arse out of himself in regard to New Zealand’s 100% Pure image
carried on with its lies as New Zealand is identified as jeoparising its good name by allowing us to become one of a small number of states stalling progress in forming an international climate agreement
kept stringing us along even after Next thing, New Zealand received the 2nd place Fossil Award for “proposing the most Flexible Mechanism imaginable with no oversight or review. Bring on the wild west. They want to be able to use any market mechanisms they wish with absolutely no oversight or international review! There would be no way to ensure that the units from one mechanism have not been sold two or three times to another such mechanism. This would likely unleash a wild west carbon market with double or triple counting of offsets and a likely increase of greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere.”
stood silent when Fonterra was caught out lying by overstating its farmer’s compliance on excluding stock from waterways by 100%
put World class surfing waves and Maui’s dolphin’s at Raglan at severe risk by encouraging a proposed iron ore seabed mining in New Zealand’s coastal waters
never followed up after the scientific models created by New Zealand and the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) to allow fishing are called into question
set the scene for our children heading down to the park to find an overseas’ owned company had set up a dairy farm in one corner. Over time the shit builds up
ignored data which shows the expansion of fish-farming in the Marlborough Sounds could cause unacceptable changes in the coastal environment
strategically removed the word “environment” from the lexicon of local and central government
failed to tell the tourists it hopes to attact with its 100% Pure campaign that every year, New Zealand drops huge quantities of poison-laced food into its forest ecosystems; enough poison to kill its human population 4 times over, every year. No country has ever done anything remotely similar, on such a scale
failed to tell the tourists it hopes to attract with its 100% Pure campaign that more than a third of Auckland’s beaches fail water quality checks and are closed for swimming
ignored the closing of the beaches, this time as extremely high concentrations of the bacteria enterococci are identified
ignored Ministerial conflicts of interest, this time involving John Key who is identified as shareholder in the Bank Of America which is backing mining in New Zealand and Australia . . . even when more information is made available . . . and more information . . . and more information
pressed on with additional policies that move away from the protection of the environment towards exploitation
limited , as part of its effort to cash-in on the environment, access to some of New Zealand’s most endangered species and isolated islands only to those who those who contribute financially displacing conservation staff and scientists
ignored a World Wildlife Fund report, Beyond Rio, which makes clear New Zealand now risks some of the highest rates of biodiversity loss on Earth unless urgent action is taken
continued to give confidence to Fonterra director Colin Armer being convicted and fined $72,000 for “fouling” a Bay of Plenty waterway after a judge found he could have prevented the pollution were it not for his “systemic” failure to monitor what was happening on his company’s farm
lied when it said New Zealand has the environmental laws and regulations to control oil and gas development on the continental shelf because there is no equivalent of the Resource Management Act to control oil and gas activity outside of the territorial sea (12 nautical miles offshore).
lied when it had already agreed coastal plans to allow marine farming consent holders in the Waikato and Marlborough to move from mussel farming to finfish farming without considering the additional environmental effects imposed
placed short-term business interests ahead of long-term consequences to New Zealand’s environment, particularly biodiversity by allowing damage in one area on the condition that it be “off set” in another creating a dangerous precedent in that such a provisin means that one part of biodiversity can be wrecked in return for “protecting” an area that was never under threat anyway.
promoted proposals that include include a plant producing about 2 billion litres of diesel per year, using at least 12 million tonnes of lignite per year and another producing 3 billion litres using 12-17 million tonnes of lignite annually. A further project would produce by 2016 1.2 tonnes of the nitrogenous fertiliser, urea, using 2 million tonnes of lignite annually
tried to hide the fact that its Department of Conservation was ordered to permit Meridian to to build a damn on the Mohikinui River despite its position that “the public conservation land within the Mokihinui River has such high value that it is most unlikely to be suitable for exchange at all
continued to ignore the slow-motion extinction of Maui’s dolphins:
gone into hiding after it was discovered that significant cuts to the Ministry for the Environment in the 2012 Budget are not publicly detailed or announced
continued to ignore its international obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea to “protect and preserve” the martime environment
refused in the face of repeated calls to set national standards for water quality despite mounting evidence of the need to do so
further weakened protection for wild rivers in Canterbury with the ECan Act and indicates that further weakening provisions will follow.
rubber stamped a motorway project with no economic benefit and likely to waste over $1 billion of tax payers’ funds.
been forced to admit that it has spent $1.67 million in a survey of minerals on the West Coast of New Zealand, including within the Te Wahipounamu South West New Zealand world heritage area. Te Wahipounamu is one of 183 natural heritage
secretly ordered that world heritage sites on the West Coast be surveyed as part of a $3 million mineral study spanning more than 16,000 square kilometres. The survey was only puiblicy revealed after Green MP Catherine Delahunty asked for details in a parliamentary question
appointed thoroughtly unsuitable but politically useful members to the Establishment Board for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
facilitated by neglect the employment of inexperienced managers, making poor policy decisions resulting in additional threats to New Zealand’s biosecurity.
under resourced New Zealand’s biosecurity system to such an extent that it is fundamentally flawed preventing any way of identifying how the Kiwifruit killer virus got into New Zealand and, thus, no way of preventing it from happening again.
handed over a further $80 million to business and farmers to subsidise their pollution.
ignored its own guidelines to when considering the Milford Dart tunnel and Fiordland Link Experience which would otherwise never have got off the ground.
appointed an advisory group to recommend a significant rewrite of the Resource Management Act to remove references to the protection of coastal areas, wetlands, lakes and rivers and indigenous flora and fauna.
splashed tax payer cash around its consultants considering conservation and environmental protection of the Mackenze Basin and Waitaki Valley
further weakened the resource consent process for foreign-owned mining companies,
locked New Zealanders out of the consultation process on the alloting of areas being made available for resource exploration.
ignored the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment and scrapped government grants for solar water heating
used the Navy along with police and Crown Law to bully environmental protesters in a legal case they knew could not be won
put 23 massive blocks of deep and wild waters east of Wellington and Dunedin on the international market for exploratory oil drilling
allowed its own consultants do a u-turn on the economic benefits of additional roading and then handed them a $200 million contract for further consultation work
Supported the Department of Conservation into granting foreign-owned multinational mining company OceanaGold permission to destroy 55 hectares of beech forest so as to extend its Reefton mine to a total 81 hectares without public notification
envouraged the Minerals Industry Association to bully local authorities to step aside from what little environmental protections they are able to impose
reduced its environment agencies to little more than a ramshackle collection of underfunded and ineffective small back offices with no direction or policy for dealing with the vast marine resources of New Zealand
eroded New Zealand’s bio-security to such an extent that Christchurch Airport is found to have failed at a basic level
removed the directive terms “protect”, “preserve”, “maintain” and “enhance” from the RMA fundamentally weakening the legislation and deliberately introducing confusion as to its overall intent.
futher ensured that New Zealand tax payers continue to subsidise 95% of big polluters’ emissions
drastically reduced the size of proposed marine reserves off the West Coast so much so that one advocate says they are “an insult” to those who spent years trying to establish them
instructed its delegates at the world’s largest conservation conference , the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s conference in Korea, to oppose any further measures to protect Maui and Hector dolphins in defiance of 117 other countries and 460 environmental organisations requesting New Zealand ban gill and trawl nets in waters up to 100 metres deep
lied about the environmental impact of fraking
refused to enforce its own legislation to protect the environment
ignored concerns about fracking which has seen the practise banned around the world
twisted the knife by exploiting news of redundancies at Solid Energy in a statement which claims opponents to a proposed mine are “getting in the way of” potential jobs as part of an effort to discourage legal action
changed to law allowing a consideration of the effects on climate change to allow Australian-owned mining company Bathurst Resources (also known as Buller Coal) to build a 200-hectare open-cast coal mine on the plateau and excavate 80 million tonnes of coal that, when burnt, will release about 200 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere
further ensured the extinction of New Zealand sea lions by failing to extend necessary fishing restrictions
failed to protect the New Zealand marine environment and ignored international obligation with its Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf Act oil drilling legislation
continued to obfuscate and dither while More than half of monitored recreational sites on our rivers are declared unsafe for swimming
ignored its own scientific evidence and advice from its own authorities to lock-in tax payer funding of business which pollutes New Zealand’s air
refused to enforce its own laws in respect to water pollution
changed the law to make it more difficult to build a deck on a house than it is to drill for oil
avoided its international obligations “to ensure the conservation and management of sharks and their long-term sustainable use” while its fishers carry on with the barbaric practise of shark finning.
ignored public support for conservation by ordering another round of cuts to the Department of Conservation.
stood alone at the world’s largest conservation summit and voted against more protection for species at risk
further gutted environmental protection legislation to speed up the building consent process for developers
vancelled without notice the five-yearly State of the Environment report put together by the Ministry of the Environment, the report is the largest stock-take of trends relating to land, water, air, plants and animals
abandoned the Kyoto agreement completely
allowed its on lobbyist to publicly attack a prominent New Zealand scientist for speaking truth about New Zealand’s environment in an effort to silence the accurate reporting of scientific evidence
attracted international mockery for the fact that the pristine landscape featured in The Hobbit and used as the basis for the 100% Pure New Zealand campaign as fantastical as dragons and wizards
remained “relaxed” about the fact that New Zealand is now the 18th worst out of 189 nations when it came to preserving its natural environment
pulled out of Kyoto just weeks after the OECD reports that global greenhouse gas emissions could rise 50 per cent by 2050 without more ambitious climate policies, as fossil fuels continue to dominate the energy mix
laughed when New Zealand received two “Fossil of the Day” – first-equal and second place – awards on the first day of international climate talks in Doha, Qatar
used Hobbiton – Waikato – as the centrepiece of its 100% Pure campaign when the area is the country’s major source of pollution to the Hauraki Gulf
handed over responsibility for the monitoring and reporting of fraking activity , for which it has inadequate legal protections, to the foreign-owned multi-nationals which are carrying out that activity thus totally ignoring its own Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment
lied, obfuscated and used government resources to attack and undermined local authority plans to improve water quality
sanctioned an unnamed foreign-owned multinational to go ahead with a major road through pristine South Island National Parks
employed disingenuous gobbledeegook to defend its decision to withdraw from the Kyoto Agreement.
turned a deaf ear to calls for New Zealand to assist pacfic island nations by taking a stronger position on climate change
displayed contempt for existing agreements and Environment Case law by approving new salmon farms in recreational areas within the Marlborough Sounds
refused to investigate the impact on increasing use of neonicotinoid pesticides which is likely to be a major contributor to the sudden and dramatic decline (aka colony collapse disorder) of the New Zealand honey bee population, National Ltd™ also refused to consider the development of a strategy to protect what is left of the honey bee population.
lied about its commitment to addressing climate change
failed to monitor Sanford Ltd’s pollution resulting in an international embarrassment
allowed foreign-owned multinationals to proceed with oil exploration without the financial resources available to mitigate any environmental damage should it occur
been caught out ignoring its own advice on implementing environmental monitoring procedures
used changes to the Resource Management Act to remove local authorty’s rights and planning for the protection of trees
commenced removing local authority’s rights to plan for housing
allowed more than 53 percent of Canterbury’s major water users to avoid having meters installed
mixed the cooperative model of climate change negotiations with the competitive model used in trade negotiations, thus putting outcomes in both areas a risk
ducked questions asking for evidence as to the safety of genetically engineered food
ignored the fact that New Zealand carbon credits are no longer the unit of choice in the New Zealand’s own carbon market. Figures from the official Emission Unit Registry show that emitters who initially supported NZUs are now using a range of international units to meet their carbon obligations under the Emissions Trading Scheme
used highly dodgy figures in calculating the reduction New Zealand’s net carbon emissions by including trees due to be harvested in the next few years
ignored news that New Zealand’s first glyphosate resistant weed has been found and the resulting call for the use of glyphosate (Monsanto’s “Roundup”) to cease
stayed silent for five months after being advised that Fonterra’s milk product were contaminated with dicyandiamide (DCD) and now face an international backlash.
set no maximum level of contamination of dicyandiamide (DCD) (AKA cyanoguanidine) in milk products for consumption by New Zealanders, stood silent while the farming industry says the withdrawal of dicyandiamide (DCD) will result in yet more pollution of New Zealand’s waterways
stood silent as NIWA announced findings of research which showed 20 per cent of marine life in the Milford Sounds port area could be killed off as a result of copper leaching from anti-fouling paints on boat hulls
secretly without consultation and any right of appeal used a short-term draconian law to ammend a water conservation order for the Rakaia River
been locked out of the international carbon market because of its trucculent attitude
continued in its efforts to eliminate tree protection of any kind in Auckland and elsewhere
stood alone as the only developed country not to have tabled an unconditional single number target as part of the international climate change negotiations
cut funding into research about protecting the last remaining giant kauri
continued to endanger the 100% Pure brand
been unable to explain how genetically engineered mould escaped from Massey University laboratories and remains unable or unwilling to provide further information
introduced foreign species without a consideration of the risk to human health
allowed oil companies to ignore breaches of resource consent and set neihhbours against neighbours
obfuscated on the negative economic benefits of major raod works
obfuscated on the level of cuts to the Department of Conservation
disengaged the previously widely held concept of environmental protection from any consideration of economic development
sacked 140 staff at the Department of Conservation
inserted last minute changes to environmental legislation that were not announced and, thus, not considered during public submissions and earlier readings of Bills.
lied about the practise of fracking going on in New Zealand for the past 30 years
funded its Economic Development Ministry’s membership of the Coal Association lobby group
staged a consultation process on the restructuring for the Department of Conservation and then completely ignored any submissions generated
proposed handing over recreational paua gathering areas to commercial operators
opened a further 190,000 square kilometers of New Zealand’s coastal waters for oil exploration
allowed the Minister of Energy’s own political adviser to make public calls for the boycotting of the environmental iniative Earth House
held secret meetings with oil company executives known international as irresponsible and mendacious
exposed Auckland beaches to the unmonitored risk of oil exploration by companies unable to afford any clean up operations if required
breached international law and used parliamentary urgency and ignored international guidelines to rush through legislation depriving New Zealanders of the right to protest against drilling for oil within 350 miles if New Zealand coast
given permission for oil drilling to take place over earthquake ridden continental plate fault lines just off shore from Wellington
stood idle while water quality used by households continyes to worsen
ensured that the MacKenzie Basin is turned from a conservation estate into a development area
used parliamentary urgency to avoid public notification, consultation and/or consideration of a law allowing companies with no experience nor financial resources to drill for oil on earthquake-ridden fault lines lying in New Zealand coastal waters
here would be significant and irreversible adverse effects on the conservation values and overall ecological integrity of the application area and the Denniston Plateau should the proposed activity be approved”?
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0903/S00452.htm <— back up on Chris Bishop
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10869801 <— irony much
It is disgusting that if you are a sportsperson you get no conviction for an offence that endangered peoples lives because it might affect their ability to play overseas, but an actress convicted for taking part in an environmental protest gets no such consideration.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1306/S00244/savage-attack-on-bee-health.htm
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1306/S00240/positive-changes-to-fishing-regulations-announced.htm
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1306/S00219/report-highlights-risk-of-governments-mining-agenda.htm
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10892481
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/pollution/news/article.cfm?c_id=281&objectid=10884397
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10892985
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/AK1306/S00647/new-zealand-waste-policies-stuck-in-the-past.htm
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1306/S00309/environment-commissioner-releases-water-report-update.htm
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1307/S00024/iwc-says-govt-must-act-for-survival-of-mauis-dolphins.htm
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10895428
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10904557
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/planet-oz/2013/jul/29/hobbit-new-zealand-lord-of-the-rings-middle-earth-oil-gas-drilling
. . . but wait, there's more!!
Wow, brilliant research!
Brilliant indeed. Just one thing, BLiP: could you number each of these points in future? It makes it much easier for the archivally minded amongst us.
Hey BLiP, maybe the Chinese saw your list and figured it would be a piece of piss to lampoon Key and his guardianship of…
… our environment
… our tourism industry
… and our clean green ‘brand’
.OO.
failure on a grand scale
.OO.
I wonder if Key has realised that money-trading really is an ability with few other applications
BLiP that is quite something you have produced there, again.
Very well done, and graphic as!
Thanks for that – I think it is excellent research too. It is a valuable checklist of a number of policies. I had forgotten some of the earlier ones.
As busy as ever, I see.
+ 1 BLip
….fancy Keys Govt being ticked off by the Chinese Government for not being Green enough …environmentally conscious enough! …or state responsible enough!….irony upon irony ….but the Truth!
Great comment Blip. I particularly liked this bit:
+1 You should really put some of your work up on a blog of its own.
I think you should put this up as a post.
So, anyway, the TVNZ poll. The one showing the last Roy Morgan was probably a blip, and suggesting Labour-Green-Mana are within a sniff of victory. Jolly good, eh?
Hello?
Hello?
And if Key continues to treat the country with contempt and Shearer continues to make speeches like today, expect the Greens to reach 20% before too long.
Personally I tend to ignore the bi-monthly TV/newspaper polls as being too infrequent to show any relevant trends, and the differences in technique between the polling companies making them useless to compare between. You really have to treat them as being useless singletons. Please explain why you think that I should be interested in a crappy singleton poll?
The bi-weekly Morgan poll has been showing a consistent and discouraging trend for the left over the last 3 or 4 polls. It still has a lot of sampling jitter and is probably off in absolute numbers. But it is a damn sight more useful than any singleton poll…
When I see a *trend* across 3 polls in the Morgan poll the other way, then I might get excited.
Did we have to agree to let 17000 workers into the country for the ChCh rebuild before the meat ban was lifted?
I’m not very comfortable with the assumption that a Labour Green alliance will be the way to victory, to be honest. I think the Greens would look on it as very risky – how many minor coalition partners have come out of government enhanced? Thye might risk a backlash for putting a very distant second place, third rate bunch into power – you can argue all you like about the mathematics of it and how Silver and Brze beats gold, but when the silver medal is so very small, it’s a hard sell. They’d also cop ire every time Labour did something that pissed the electorate off, much as the Lib dems have found in Britain – they not only get damed for being part of an unpopulare government, but doubly damned for being the faction that enable the clowns to get into power … I really think there is a risk the Greens will choose to stay out of any coalition with labour unless Labour can claim a respectable percentage of the vote. Problem is, cannibalising the Green vote is not going to help, as it won’t change the left-right balance fundamentally. They need to win over some of the whiney middle classes who have been voting National. Some here may not like it.
83 000 reasons not to go to McDonalds
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2013/aug/05/mcdonalds-workers-zero-hour-contracts
“McDonald’s ties nine out of 10 workers to zero-hours contracts
Britain’s biggest food chain has 83,000 staff on controversial contract as employers body claims economy needs flexibility'”
yeah saw that its really shit
funny thing is that the population is so impoverished in the USA they can’t afford McDonalds any more and their sales are failing. OK maybe not that funny. Same thing happening with Walmart ffs
And we pay them to pay their workers! Thanks for the slave rates..here have some money so you make your profits even bigger!
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1308/S00078/unite-union-decries-winz-wage-subsidy-to-mcdonalds.htm
“Union decries WINZ wage subsidy to McDonald’s
Unite Union is questioning the $270,000 paid by WINZ as a wage subsidy to McDonald’s between July 2009 and June 2013.
“This subsidy is only for the stores directly owned by the US fast food giant. 80% of stores in New Zealand are franchisee owned so the probable subsidy could be in the millions” said Unite National Director Mike Treen.”
The subsidy is for the benefit for the unemployed worker who gets a job. Companies generally need to be persuaded to take on these workers because they are difficult even with a subsidy. McDonalds – and the dozens of other companies getting these subsidies – are getting no favours.
Anyway these subsidies are not new – they have been around in different forms for 25 years. They are limited and only available for employing employees that could not get a job otherwise – i.e they would be on a benefit.
The CTU supports the limited use of such subsidies as part of WINZ’s active labour market programmes.
“An element of job subsidies or other employer incentives may be appropriate in some cases.”
http://union.org.nz/sites/union.org.nz/files/NZCTU-Submission-Social-Security-Benefit-Categories-and-Work-Focus-Amendment-Bill.pdf
You are still looking in the wrong place you idiot
OK here then. Or does this not match your view of the world either? Yes I know you want a living wage for McDonalds workers.
Correct me if I am wrong but as far as I know the CTU and Labour support these subsidies. They featured in various forms under the last Labour Government.
“Receiving a wage subsidy improves labour market outcomes for recipients, with
impacts still evident after 72 months. Improvements are evident as greater
employment and income, and lower benefit dependence.”
Subsidised firms continue to have higher employment levels than
matched comparison firms for at least 36 months after a subsidy hire,
though the size of the difference declines over time. The retention of
subsidised workers after the end of their subsidy contributes significantly
to the employment effect.”
http://www.dol.govt.nz/publications/research/impact-wage-subsidies/impact-wage-subsidies.pdf
Look I don’t care – if you want to convince Labour to abolish ALMPs then fine. All you are doing is dissing the most disadvantaged. I don’t like subsidies but the counter factual is probably a life on welfare.
Don’t know about you, but I don’t believe in tax payers subsidising hundred billion dollar corporations.
If Labour or whoever else supports subsidising these multinational mega-corporates, well they can go get fucked too.
Sure, especially if they put unimaginative corporate welfarists like you in charge of policy.
BULLSHIT the subsidy is there to offset the payroll costs of the McDonalds corporation.
That is not what the research I quote shows. The subsidised workers have lower marginal productivity than non-subsidised workers. Remember – productivity is king.
Productivity is not king, corporate profits are king – that’s why McDonalds likes corporate welfare.
umm you do know a bunch of folk from WINZ probably have to beg McDonalds to take these subsidised workers?
Well, that’s no longer needed either.
umm no for New Zealand it is productivity. That is now well established – I can repost all the links to the Treasury research if you missed it.
Hey I don’t give a fuck about what Treasury thinks on the NZ economy, they haven’t got it right so far in 30 years, they failed to spot the GFC until it happened, so why keep expecting them to get it right now?
“hey haven’t got it right so far in 30 years”
Because they perform at the top end of forecasting performance. Tell me a forecaster in New Zealand that over time does a better job?
Not sure if you have seen this comparative analysis?
http://www.treasury.govt.nz/publications/informationreleases/forecastingperformance/reviews/tsyforperf13.pdf
Figure 2 on page 6 looks the most interesting. What conclusions do you draw from that?
Tell you what, let’s start by cutting Treasury’s budget in half, then ditching everyone in there who believes that unemployment is useful in fighting inflation, then dump those who don’t acknowledge the Crown’s sovereign right to issue currency, and finally, transfer anyone left who believes in IS-LM forecast modelling to work a Landcorp farm on the West Coast. That might finally give them some clues about how the real economy works.
Fire them all mate, I really wonder why you so need to kowtow at the feet of the ‘most accurate’ astrologer that you can find.
Excellent – please lobby for the abolition of these subsidies. I can guarantee that you will see zero objections from McDonalds or any other large employer.
Yep OK, no more corporate welfare for mega-multinationals.
Glad you agree.
OK and no more welfare for the LT unemployed
Agreed. Government to be the employer of last resort. No more long term unemployment welfare required.
And what would these unemployable people do for the Government? Wouldn’t it create some incentive problems? You would get folk that could be employed going along to interviews with an attitude, and messing up jobs with a bad attitude, not getting with the program… knowing they can get a living wage with the Government?
Isn’t that kind of what we had pre 1984? I wasn’t in the country then but I read about it. NZ Railways employing 30,000 people to do work that could be done by 5,000… and so productivity started its road south relative to the OECD average…Which in turn made us poorer, hence the left is now reduced to fighting for a redistribution of a disappointing GDP.
http://www.amazon.com/Unfinished-Business-Roger-Douglas/dp/009181930X
Remember it is not the changes that have made NZ poor. It is that the changes were unfinished. Hence back to that productivity research. It will be on R Norman’s desk the first day he is Finance Minister 🙂 I reckon he will get with the programme.
well, they aren’t unemployable. A hundred billion dollar company thinks it’s fine to employ these people so they can’t be all bad.
Of course, you are sorely mistaken as in the 1970’s and early 1980’s our GDP per capita was very close to Singapore and Australia. The neoliberal reforms of the Lange government were what fucked things. (Why are you still pushing for outdated neoliberal reforms, by the way?)
There’s $40K of GDP for every man woman and child. Plenty to go around – once we stop subsidising your mega-corporate mates.
You’re a bit of a delusional dickhead. Go home and poison your own well, we’re better off without you.
fuck, spylands – since when did “LT unemployed” equal “unemployable“?
By that logic, “LT unbuilt” equals “unbuildable”, “LT unpainted” equals “unpaintable”, and “LT unachieved” equals “unachievable”.
And if you were crrect and “LT unempoyed” did equal “unemployable”, then wouldn’t removing their benefits be removing their only source of existence? Or do you find that treating people like shit boosts their “productivity”? Because most people find the opposite is true.
Although shitlands isn’t entirely incorrect…the LT unemployed end up structurally unemployed, and over time as their human capital declines, they often end up permanently unemployable.
harder to employ/train/coach, maybe. Or just more complex
I was once taught some industry law by a guy who, as an adult twelve years before, was a completely illiterate gang member. He was a lawyer when I knew him, and after that became quite successful. I had profound respect for him even before I heard his backstory, and he’s living proof that there is no such thing as “irredeemable”, in employment or anything else.
Being in a gang is definitely not the same as being unemployed 😈
point flew over the cuckoo’s nest [again]. I’m off to bed.
Subsidised employment. Aka. Free staff for McDonalds.
How it really works.
In our local McDonalds.
Full time staff have their hours cut to allow for the free staff.
Full timers quit because they cannot live on the reduced hours. They get a 13 week stand down because they left their job.
Several people, off the dole, get part time hours, about equal to the wage subsidy. But just enough so WINZ can take them off their books.When their subsidy ends McD’s cuts their hours again, or finds some other way of making them leave. Then employs more on the subsidy.
The result. Very unhappy and depressed youngsters who thought they had a job, but find it is only short term and part time. Only 12 hours a week are guaranteed (And WINZ considers this full time employment for their statistics)..
Win Win though:
WINZ and Government unemployment figures are down.
McDonalds gets free labour.
All good, except for the toll in discouraged, depressed, ill and switched off youngsters, after a year or two of this type of revolving door uncertainty. At the beginning of their working life.
@ lurgee
Disagree with your analysis
Labour needs to win back the approx 800,000 voters, who traditionally vote Labour, and who chose not to vote last time for Goff as leader……..the left leaning middle class will vote for Labour anyway, more if Labour goes after their traditional voters
There is no way as it stands Labour will cannibalise the Greens
A Labour/ Green alliance is the only way to go….and if Cunliffe leads the Labour Party as the rank and file Labour members want ….then it could be a very good victory indeed.
I can see why a Labour Green alliance would benefit Labour. I’m less sure about the benefits for the Greens. And the 800,000 voters who didn’t bother in 2011 probably aren’t the Labour party rank and file, and don’t give a damn about the Shearer-Cunliffe psychodrama.
The persistant delusion of the left is that a large swathe of the population secretly agree with them while voting against them, perhaps as a cunning ploy to force the party to be even more leftwing … If only the Labour Party would promise to nationalise everything, hundreds of thousands of people who voted National would come flocking to the left, giggling, “What took you so long?!” I don’t think that has much bearing on relaity.
Don’t get me wrong – I would be absolutely delighted if Labour promised to nationalise everything, and made Ode To A Tractor the national anthm … But I have slowly come to realise that I am not representative of the mainstream of New Zealand, or my native Britain. So I don’t expect anything more than a disappointing compromise and lack of vigour from the parliamentary organ of the left – because to be effective in parliament, they need to appeal to a few more people than me and the other sad wights who haunt The Standard.
Labour is not a “parliamentary organ of the left”: it is an economically centrist capitalist party focussed on balancing the interests of the middle class and the investor class/corporates, while ensuring that the working class are not entirely ignored.