Besides lying and breaking the law, how far will the National Government and our state forces go to please our US ally?
Will John Key and our military leaders condemn our Afghan interpreters and their families to certain death?
Will our courts without hearing the evidence against him, condemn Kim Dotcom to prison conditions which may well constitute torture under the UN conventions against torture?
Just last week Juan Mandez the UN Rapporteur on Torture came out with a statement against the extradition of suspected Islamist terrorists to the US because they will be subjected to a type of incarceration that risks being constituted as torture under the UN conventions against torture.
….. the solitary confinement they will be put in, the lack of communication they will be under, their ability to do anything there, may well constitute torture under the UN torture convention.
“People cannot be sent to the United States because they will be tortured in US custody.”
Michael Ratner President emeritus of the Centre for Constitutional Rights (CCR) in New York and chair of the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights in Berlin.
Should Dotcom be worried that these conditions will be imposed on him?
Going by the anti-terror tactics used in his arrest and the secret anti-terror organisations that have been deployed against him. The chances are more than even, that Kim Dotcom will find himself in an underground cell under 23 hour solitary confinement in ADX Florence.
this is just dreadful. there are “hells on earth indeed” -some people want their pound of flesh.
and these drones, 1000’s of associated civilian deaths from Drone Strikes. So sad that it has come to this.
The US now has laws which enable indefinite military detention without charges or trial of anyone deemed (either in secret or publically) to be a national security risk.
CHICAGO (MarketWatch) — Tucked into the U.S. Supreme Court’s busy agenda this fall is a little-known case that could upend your ability to resell everything from your grandmother’s antique furniture to your iPhone 4.
At issue in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons is the first-sale doctrine in copyright law, which allows you to buy and then sell things like electronics, books, artwork and furniture as well as CDs and DVDs, without getting permission from the copyright holder of those products.
Under the doctrine, which the Supreme Court has recognized since 1908, you can resell your stuff without worry because the copyright holder only had control over the first sale.
Its what PC game makers have been trying to do for years. Kill the second hand market for PC games with copy protection (e.g. limited numbers of licence activations) in order to force people to buy new copies of games at premium prices.
But wait. If we need to recycle more, as the worlds raw material run out, then we need to
regulate materials better. If, as I believe, producers need to take responsibility for the waste,
then it follows that ownership in a object isn’t just the holder. This idea then is more in tune with
our per-industrial forebears, sole ownership of any property was essentially theft.
The whole idea behind legislation, its preventative effect, requires a invasion not so invisible
hand into the market place in order to direct the effects of the market towards social goods.
Away from slavery, serfdom…monopolies, regulatory capture (obviously our current regimes
are in denial about that particular one).
Information should be free, ideas should never be patentable (including genes).
The case stems from Supap Kirtsaeng’s college experience. A native of Thailand, Kirtsaeng came to the U.S. in 1997 to study at Cornell University. When he discovered that his textbooks, produced by Wiley, were substantially cheaper to buy in Thailand than they were in Ithaca, N.Y., he rallied his Thai relatives to buy the books and ship them to him in the U.S.
He then sold them on eBay, making upwards of $1.2 million, according to court documents.
haha, that’s funny.
Of course, what we’re actually seeing here is the actions of capitalism to control the market clearly showing that we do not have a free-market. And the reason why we don’t have a free-market is because capitalism would never survive in one.
BTW, reports are that the TPPA will ban parallel imports.
Watching Nigel Latta’s Darklands program last night was sad and depressing. It was about the circumstances that led to Nia Glassie’s death at the hands of her family in 2007. It looked at the broken families and the cycle of violence.
A question occurred to me… When did these broken dyusfunctional families come into existence? I understand how such dysfunctionality can arise and how difficult it is to break, but I don’t understand when this started. Using the Nia Glassie example, she was effectively killed by the Curtis brothers who were raised in an incrediblty violent household, especially from their father Bill Curtis.
So Bill Curtis must also have been raised in similar circumstances, I assume, following the accepted logic and wisdom around this issue. Bill Curtis looks like he would be a baby boomer, meaning he was born around 1950-60. His parents would therefore probably have been born around 1930-40. Did Bill Curtis’s parents start the cycle? Or was it their parents again?
What I am trying to ascertain is when this destructive feature arose in these families. Was it in the 1950s? Or was it in the 1930s? Or was it the generation prior to that? Once that is established the next questions would seem to be around what circumstances existed in NZ at that particular time to ignite this destruction..? When and what circumstances?
Hi vto – my personal theory is that a large number of men came back to NZ from WW2, put everything behind them , married, raised a family, worked hard etc. Many were severely traumatised and the effect on children was sometimes extreme. Just a theory.
It is a great question VTO and would be a fascinating study.
I am not sure it is a 20th century problem. Discipline, was mistaken for violence for generations. Society as whole decided to break the cycle of violent discipline in the second half of last century.
The Curtis family was more violent that most others, but having a father that beat the shit out of his kids for them spilling some milk was not uncommon at all. It was not considered dysfunctional.
I don’t think it began during any period. I think it ended as a result of the left campaigning against domestic violence.
Essentially child abuse and neglect has always been with us. The ‘idyllic’ 50s and 60s were also a time of widespread ‘stranger’ child adoption, fostered out children and private and state run childrens/teens homes and borstals often with violent cultures. Mental health care was institutionalised with little public scrutiny with elctro shock therapy–ECT and ‘chemical straightjackets’ being worse than some disorders. Priests and others charged with looking after kids were often happily kid fiddling away.
Corporal punishment was the norm, can you imagine todays school kids being repeatedly whacked with leather straps and canes? Poorer kids were effected more as ever, the government used to run health camps where disadvantaged kids would go for 6 weeks and be properly fed up. Some is family bred, the abused as modern research show often go on to abuse. Spousal assault was viewed by the Police as a domestic until recent times, rape in marriage was not considered possible again until recent times. So New Zealand has definitely a dark sadistic past and some of us maintain it is still there in some with the bennie bashing etc.
So while today there is more reporting and social work around abuse and public campaigns that have made a difference there is also more of the factors that promote child abuse. It can be about power too, alienated men and women rendered useless by unemployment and poverty lash out at the vulnerable and feel good about themselves for a small while in obviously the most twisted way.
Yes I watched it as well, and of being that age myself I’m 57 I noticed the same thing when growing up in England. Alcoholism mixed with PTSD and god knows what other mental problems after WWII and there were NO psychologists and very few Psychiatrists and the favoured form of Torture treatment was the Electro shock therapy where they fried your synapses and screwed with your memory. So of course people kept away from the Doctor and also it’s not the image of a Man in the 50’s&60’s to have mental problems. And of course this attitude has just been handed down from Father to son and it’s a destructive cycle.
edit:Damn The word Torture should have a strike through, for some reason it didn’t work.
Hmm, all interesting points. There is surely an element of the old school “discipline” hangover from colonists and other immigrants carrying over to the different norms of today. But it is seemingly more prevalent in polynesian families so how would that have transferred to them so viciously? I can understand how it has come about in families of british background but not how it has come about in the others, and when it comes to that when and how did it arise? We are told that it didn’t exist in pre-european maori society yet it exists today – when did that happen? In the generation of Bill Curtis’ parents born around 1930’s? Or the generations prior to that? 1930’s, 1950’s, 1910’s, 1880’s? When did it start? And then, why?
For the upright will live in the land,
and the blameless will remain in it;
but the wicked will be cut off from the land,
and the unfaithful will be torn from it.
-Pr 3:21
God Bless Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers (“I Should Have Known”)
How to help bail out Australia with its refugee “problem” perhaps? ….and of course at the same time find a way of legitimising recent POINTLESS NZ legislation to do with those countless waves of “boat people/queue jumpers/illegals” we supposedly going to get.
Nearly missed this from yesterday. Hope Draco doesn’t mind but it seems important to me:
Draco T Bastard 26
9 October 2012 at 12:01 am
“Spin me a brain exchange”, said Dear Leader!
I offer this salient piece of advice to Dear Leader and the National Party; if we expect commitment from New Zealanders – then, as a nation, we must show commitment to our young folk, and to each other.
That involves old fashioned concepts and values such as pride in our country. Not just our flag or rugby team or latest successful movie by Peter Jackson – but pride in a nation that invests in each citizen with universal, free education; food in schools programmes; decent housing; comprehensive free healthcare for our young people; fair wages sufficient to raise a family on; everyone paying their taxes (no exceptions for capital gains, sorry), and ensuring that no one is left behind.
A simple clear statement of aspiration which would suit many, -I reckon.
In the last hour, Winston Peters has issued a press release saying he has evidence that the PM’s office knew about Dotcom earlier than previously stated. Key claims his staff didn’t pass the information on to him?
The Prime Minister confirmed in reply to a written question from New Zealand First that his office knew about Dotcom in July last year.
“In July 2011 one of my staff was advised by Hon Simon Power’s office by phone that Hon Power was declining an OIO [Overseas Investment Office] application from Kim Dotcom.
“This information was not conveyed to me as it was routine,” Mr Key said in his written reply.
It’s the headline story on TV3 6pm news, and Garner reckons it’s not good news for Key.
TV One News haven’t included it in it’s headline summary. It’s leading with the cuts to youth wage.
I’ve taken to recording the 6pm news on My freeview so I can switch between them, and stop and start – flick through the ads.
I would like to know what documentation Dotcom has got from Power in regard to OIO if any and what the documentation from OIO is to Power and Dotcom. As well if Key signed anything to do with the OIO regarding Dotcom.
Different story to what he said in Parliament,where he now has to make a personal statement.Which which will be the third statement ( 3 strikes).Winston if framed correctly can now call him a liar in parliament thanks to Lockwood’s ruling.
Of course the Right Honourable Prime Minister John Key (Knighthood Pending), would be constantly thinking of high level Philosophical Aspirations for his Gated Planet Key, and therefore the trivial matters like Growing Unemployment, National Security Mega-upload, and unobtrusive constituents such as Kim Dotcom would not dare to be referred to him.
Beggars belief John Key. Either Dishonest, or Incompetent. Choose one.
It’s called Plausible Deniability, a term first coined by the CIA. What Key and the GCSB are doing is taken directly out of their handbook:
In politics and espionage, deniability refers to the ability of a “powerful player” or intelligence agency to avoid “blowback” by secretly arranging for an action to be taken on their behalf by a third party ostensibly unconnected with the major player.
Yes. I can imagine Powers phone clerk in PM’s office. The clerk tells a special person. The special person tells Key in a lift or somewhere private. Key nods and says “I did not hear what you just said. Get it?”
The trouble with that is that the clerk knows Key knows.
If the staffer was Phil de Joux (as rumoured) then he would know not to tell Key.
Plausible deniability is more than just “I didn’t hear”, it’s having staff who know the drill in the first place. Those who have worked with Brand Key since he was in opposition (as de Joux has) would know automatically that protecting the Brand is paramount.
Now it begins to work against Key however, as it looks like what it is: a pattern of deliberate ignorance brought about by a strategy of active avoidance.
there’s a reason one-trick ponies are not regarded highly.
Oh, I’ll grant them it was a good trick for a couple of elections, but they need to pull finger and find something else doubleplus fast.
“No-one tells John Key anything to do with Kim Dotcom! Could an instruction have been issued along the lines:
If its to do with that Dotcom guy, I don’t want to know?”
I’ve been thinking this for a while.
Key is very adamant he’d never heard of Dotcom before the raid. So I think there won’t be any evidence to contradict this claim, because he’ll have made sure there isn’t.
With 8 Countries involved and the number of NZ. Government agencies acknowledged by the FBI for their “substantial and critical assistance” it is difficult to believe that Mr Slip, Slide and walk away was oblivious to what was going on.
Yes Lanth. He has always been pretty smug about his denials. But if he was in total ignorance some one or people must have believed that it was wise for the PM to distance himself – at least on paper, records or any traceable means. Maybe a leak might appear eventually to explain the link that must have occurred?
Why. So that his office can decide if he needs to know. They are all paranoid gatekeepers of information. Same thing happened under Clark. Just cos Heather Simpson knew about things didn’t mean HC did.
Mickey I was comparing processes not people. I don’t think anyone would disagree that Clark was a micro manager and is a once in a generation event. but even she did not know everything her office knew at all times. Flunkies filter. That’s their job.
Perhaps. But once your boss is telling the country that he had never heard of Dotcom before the raid, then it’s certainly the flunky’s job to tell the boss: “Excuse me Sir, the office knew” – so the PM can stop giving hostages to fortune.
Unless, of course, the flunky has been told (directly or not) that such information should not be passed on, even after the fact.
I don’t think anyone would disagree that Clark was a micro manager and is a once in a generation event.
May have been a once in a generation event (I doubt it though as far too many people don’t get to sit in the spotlight to be able to tell) but I don’t think she was a micro-manager – she didn’t move into managing someone else’s responsibility unless that someone else fucked up. Just a manager that knew what she should have known.
Flunkies filter. That’s their job.
They filter it down to bite size pieces – they do not keep it from the person they work for.
No they also filter out stuff that they don’t consider important or relevant, and timing and context are important criteria in those decisions. You’re saying the boss gets to hear about absolutely everything the minions know, just in précis. Organisations don’t work that way, because i suspect we all know that huge amounts of information gets passed on between individuals for a range of reasons, but not all of it is useful. Can you say that every single email you’ve received this week contained something relevant to you?
No, but I can say that if my boss ever goes on TV and says he’s never heard of somebody, and I had previously had a phone call from a senior colleague about that somebody, then I would make damn sure I told my boss about it after he’d gone on telly. To save his blushes, or mine.
So … Did Key’s office tell him AFTER Dotcom became NZ’s Number One news story?. There is a gap of eight months between then and now – during which Key has said nothing about it … until today. Until he was forced to.
Your “hear about absolutely everything” line is classic evasion by hyperbole. It’s THE thing for Key, and has been since February. Why has he wanted not to know – or say?
If they thought that the Dotcom stuff was immaterial and Key did not have to know about it then it is difficult to know what he would have to know about.
I’ve called ministers offices plenty of times and passed on info I’ve had no expectation of them hearing at the time. I’m briefing the officials just in case something related comes up and they can use it if they see fit. In July 2011 kdc probably was irrelevant to the pm. I don’t disagree that since January something should have been said by one of his officials somewhere.
No they also filter out stuff that they don’t consider important or relevant, and timing and context are important criteria in those decisions.
Generally speaking, if it’s reaching the office of the PM then, at a guess, I’d say it was important enough for him to know about. He doesn’t need to know all the details but he does need to know about it. Sure, there’d be some that gets passed on to other ministers (wrong address) but stuff about intelligence operations would go to him.
There’s some confusion here- it was not an intelligence issue when either peters asked his question or powers office contacted keys. Your guess i think is wrong. Officials give each other heads ups all the time, just like peers in many organisations. That doesn’t mean the info is intended for the boss.
Bollocks insider. You’re not fooling anyone except yourself. When Simon Power contacted the PM’s office he was giving the PM a heads up on where things were at with Dotcom. That means he was given the information by a member of his staff.
John Key and his staff are indulging in “plausible deniability”. See Jackal @ 8.1.1.1
I wonder if the staff member was Captain Panic Pants?
They could have a the “Panic Pants Suit” on the wall for the next “Not John Key” meeting.
That way he’ll never forget 🙂
Diapers on the outside maybe M8!
The “Protocol” Grows M8!
Imagine the Bus ride to the Beehive!
Actualy I remember that, Wasn’t it John Key himself who allowed Dotcom to buy the mansion?
(i.e. Vetoed his minister)
Would’ve been a Herald Article of course.
If you are going to cry bollocks anne getting the facts right first would help your case. It was one of powers staff not power himself. That lowers the issue down the food chain quite significantly.
It came from Powers office, and went to the Prime Mincer’s office. Where is that picture of the monkey chiefs covering their eyes and ears when you need it.
That is probably the reason why he chose to inform the PM’s Office of his intention to deny Dotcom’s overseas investment application. And if that’s the case, then Key probably had some prior knowledge.
The fact is Power deliberated over Dotcom’s application for three months before making a decision. Is it believable that he didn’t discuss it with the PM at some point?
the US govt knows one thing for sure, having the growing middle east wars as a distraction allows all sorts of space for what you get up to at home. Remember, in the modern Amerika you are a suspected terrorist first and a citizen second.
“the extent that 1021(b)(2) purports to encompass protected First Amendment activities, it is unconstitutionally overbroad”
This ruling has been overturned, then an injunction was won, then a stay was put on the injunction, so now a whole bunch of other judges have been asked by the big boss man to secure the stay permanently and get his ‘lock em up then ask the questions’ law rolling nationwide. Sure it’s over in America so what does it matter right? Not like they are gonna start spying on kiwis, imprisoning people without charges, ask for troops on the ground or start flying Drone missions over here . . .
and business not looking too positive in the land of the long grey crowd either according to the daily fish and chip wrappings.
(sorry Prism, it was “Infidels” by Bob Dylan i keep forgetting to reference)
What a prophet dear Bob has been; The only international concert i have seen was Bob with Patti Smith at a stadium in Christchurch; Patti Smith, now she is as wonderful as Helen Kelly and Julie-Ann
(i am such a man)
-“The Minstrel In The Gallery….looked down upon the smiling faces…”
who read todays Dompost?
one story is about Annette King complaining to the speaker of the house about craig (hamburger) heatley giving incoherent mumbling replies to oral questions.
On the letters page one writer is complaining about Russell Norman getting too much time on teevee3.
Nashnil cant have it both ways.
If they put up up drawling bumblers on the floor of the house who cant make it in the world at large then tough luck.
From the foregoing survey of conspicuous leisure and consumption, it appears that the the utility of both alike for the purposes of reputability lies in the element of waste that is common to both.
In the one case it is a waste of time and effort, in the other it is a waste of goods.
“Theory of the Leisure Class”
-Thorstein Veblen; american economist and social scientist
Agreed, I’ve suspected this for some time now, hence all the belt tightening rhetoric.
2.34 years before some people will even start to rebuild their lives.
4.44 Years after the quake they start to rebuild.
And Brownlee is calling them ungrateful ……
What does this Gnat government actually do for us!.
There, sources report, Huawei readily admitted that it was undertaking such data interception and collection.
The ISS conference is an annual gathering of Middle East and African law enforcement, intelligence and homeland security telecom operators responsible for “lawful interception, electronic investigations and network intelligence gathering,” according to the ISS agenda. A similar event is scheduled from March 4-6, 2013, also in Dubai.
In its presentation, Huawei said that it had this capability using a particular technology called Deep Packet Inspection, or DPI.
DPI is the key technology in high capacity data interception and mining, according to the WND source who asked not to be named but attended the Huawei briefing.
WND has obtained a copy of Huawei’s DPI briefing.
While Huawei’s presentation of its DPI capability was meant to show how it protected Huawei-equipped networks by detecting malicious code, sources said that the very same technology “can be very effectively used to conduct widespread industrial espionage and breach national telecommunications security.”
While many of these techniques are not unique to Huawei, one only has to look at the CCP’s overtly totalitarian history vis a vis the internet (The Great Wall of China) to quickly conclude that they are wholly the authors of their own misfortune here.
But that can’t be real TRP, everyone knows cops are the best of the best doing the hardest most thankless job around for entirely altruistic reasons.
There’s no way the job would attract thugs and rapists and murderers, certainly not the kind of cowardly scum who would electrocute a man to death after they already had him in handcuffs.
+1
I remember when Julia Gillard became Prime Minister of Australia, she spoke of Helen Clark as “having been her role model.” Well, I could see Helen Clark standing there making exactly the same speech. Congratulations Julia.
I agree, but while Helen refused to engage with the vile misogyny that was directed at her (does anyone else recall the filth that was being email circulated in the months before the 2008 election?) … it’s remarkable to see Gillard name it and shame it so very directly.
Thanks for the link. My impression was that the Aussie house isn’t as shouty as the NZ one. Gillard delivers her ticking off emphatically – but it’s in the way it’s stated, and the body language.
The opposition front bench looks a glum ,rum, unimpressed and unimpressive lot.
And Gillard does something I don’t recall Helen Clark ever doing: she publicly and clearly calls out the leader of the opposition, opposition MPs and members of their party for some of the slurs they have directed at her personally. She calls them out for calling out to her in the House that she needs to be made “an honest woman”; she calls them out for the way they refer to her as a bitch and a witch.
That’s the way to do it – take them on in public. Clark tried to avoid giving such slurs oxygen by publicly ignoring them.
Clark tried to avoid giving such slurs oxygen by publicly ignoring them.
That’s true Karol but I don’t think Helen had much choice. Most of the vitriol was being spread in bars, sports clubs, work-places etc. With the exception of the ‘childless’ barb, very little of it came out in the House or by way of the MSM. The ‘Alan Jones slur’ on the other hand gave Julia the opportunity to get stuck into all of them.
Most of the nasty stuff against Helen began very soon after she was selected to be the new MP for Mt Albert. She was extremely hurt by them, but because she didn’t know who was spreading them there wasn’t much she could do about it.
She did come out in public over the disgusting stories about her husband, Peter Davis but it didn’t stop her opponents from continuing to spread those stories.
Thanks for that. It makes complete sense. All I can say is that the slurs, the jokes and nastiness while obviously less personal and pointed for us than it was for HC, it was still nonetheless felt by many of us on the left as a malign, shameful episode in this nation’s history.
What I can tell you RedLogix is: most of the individuals who started the rumours lived in the locality, and they all ended up in ACT. Are you surprised?
these Youth Wages; occupational trenching.into Agricultural Colleges.
Low Wages.What is the incentive? only the stick of benefit sanctions.
Low Wages.What is the incentive for productivity?
Low Wages.What will the displaced boomers live on?
Low Wages.Will keep young people domestically dependent.
Targeting Beneath Vote Majority. How Slippery Is That?
that Lovely Sister Wendy and her Art Illustrations.
Pay It Forward
Traditionally Modern
these “niche schools”. I enjoyed the exploration of the Sikh School from Birmingham.
“not counter-productive to their children” the Head suggested.
They Teach All Faiths; Teachers of All Ethnicities and Religions
Think Kura. (that John Tamihere, his mouth is less disciplined than Hone; arrogant! Wow!)
As useful as a bucket of Dog Slobber – That’s our memory impaired leader – He and his Partys latest edition on the Jobs front. = $10,80/hr Jobs rate. Wooo Hooo economic Genius or what!
He and his fool minions have just handed all Fast Food Corparates a 33% profit increase on the wage bill they currently pay their young workers.
It’s a gift to companies already rolling about in a sea of excess cash. At the expense of the NZ worker.
One has to ask how desparate are these eejit Tories. And what else are they not telling an increasingly impoverished NZ public.
Bernie Monk rips John Key a new one for weaseling out of the effort to retrieve the Pike River dead. It’s a new personal worst in a month of lows for Johnny Sparkles and National may as well stop standing candidates in the West Coast for a generation or two.
“Mr Monk says he got the impression that the Pike River mine was no longer a priority for the Prime Minister – but told Mr Key that if he thinks that the issue will go away, it won’t happen”.
Weirdly, Stuff’s front page are reporting Key’s latest bout of forgetfulness under the headline “Pike recovery revisted”, but. hey, who needs sub editors these days?
I found this article by putting in the search engine ‘john key and bank of america’
It says that shonkey was the head of global forex at meryll lynch as they
transfered enough debt into the irish economy to completely wipe it out
along with the middle us classes and their homes.
Key started borrowing $380 million a week here in nz and i can remember
he was borrowing more than needed, ‘his reply from memory was that it
was ‘cheap money’,what he didn’t tell the tax payers of nz is that he has
substantial shares in the bank of america where he got those ‘nz’ loans.
From observations it seems that our ‘dear leader’ is steering nz in the
same direction as those economies he has overseen in his bankster days,
i would bet that he is still ’employed’ with them as a pm’s job is not a long
one, just long enough to cause a country immeasurable damage,there is a
concerning pattern emerging in correlation with what i have read.
Some good reading on www. mediawhore.co.nz.
Also bank of america bankrolls bathurst,so that is why the front bench
of the nacts are pushing the enviromentalist to back off court action,key
is ‘shonkey’ deep in this as well, what a ‘slippery’ slope, when we try to
deceive’ eh shokey.
I don’t think that Greens and Labour should jump in unequivocally to the Chinese-USA techno dispute. Back doors have been mentioned in the Chinese programs well Microsoft was accused of doing this. And as the USA is trying to flex its muscles over China we should be wary and try to remain neutral.
Unfortunately Australia feels threatened by its closer Asian neighbours and welcomes USA defence, there is a contingent in Darwin I think now, and as it aligns with the USA and we tend to integrate with Oz and sign up for TPP (all done in secret), it will be hard to think for ourselves if we ever get round to that.
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I’m here in lockdown with my flatmate and her two girls (6 and 2) and it. is. a time. They’re usually really active so to start with the only boardgame in the house is the copy of Guess Who that the 6 year old got for her birthday. Flatmate commented ...
The CV-19 (COVID) pandemic has seen the imposition of a government ordered national quarantine and the promulgation of a series of measures designed to spread the burden of pain and soften the economic blow on the most strategically important and most vulnerable sectors of society. The national narrative is framed ...
. . Lock Down: Day 2 – A photo essay with observations . March 27 – Day 2 of our Strange New World. The Park and Ride near my suburb, usually filled with hundreds of vehicles, had just… four; . . Another drive into Wellington City on a highway nearly ...
Fortune's Children: Under extraordinary pressure, the leader of the Government and the leader of the Opposition will each show us what they are made of. Have they been blessed with intelligence, grace, wit, poise, toughness, empathy and humour – and in what measure? More importantly, to what extent have they ...
If you’ve ever had the misfortune of having to rent a property on the open market in New Zealand, which is one of the most expensive in the entire world, you’ll likely be keenly aware of just how arrogant and entitled landlords and their real estate agents can be.Unfortunately for ...
Society-wise, aside from the specific morbidity shall we say of the medically-oriented aspects of this COVID-19 crisis, what is unfolding before the world is in more than one way an instructive study of humanity and reactions to a high intensity, high stress environment in real time. Friends, we are at ...
Right now low waged and insecure workers are feeling the economic brunt of the looming #Covid19 Recession. In response legal advocate Toby Cooper* and hospitality and worker’s rights advocate Chloe Ann-King, are putting together a series of legal blogs about your employment rights:In this legal blog we outline some ...
by Equipo Jurídico Pueblos and Gearóid Ó Loingsigh (25/03/2020) An escape plan in question On the night of March 21st and the early morning of the 22nd, the forces of the Colombian state stormed into the Modelo prison in Bogotá, murdering 23 prisoners and injuring 83, in response to the ...
When the government banned semi-automatic weapons in response to a terrorist atrocity, gun-nuts were outraged. Mired in toxic American gun culture, they thought owning weapons whose sole purpose was killing people was some sort of "constitutional right", a necessity for "defending themselves" against the government. Now, the Court of Appeal ...
Just before midnight on Wednesday March 25, Aotearoa New Zealand entered a countrywide alert level four lockdown. For at least the next four weeks, everyone who isn’t an essential worker is confined to their bubble. We are doing this to stop the explosive growth in people contracting and dying from ...
. . Lock Down: Day 1 – A photo essay with observations . Day one of the Level 4 nationwide lock-down (or, DefCon 4 as I sometimes cheekily call it) started at 11.59PM on 25 March. For a moment, most of the nation held it’s collective breath. In that brief ...
Broad, Sunlit Uplands: How those words fired my young imagination! Or, perhaps, it is more accurate to say: how those words fused, in my young mind, with the image printed on every packet of Fielder’s Cornflour. Always fascinated by history, especially modern history, I cannot hear Churchill’s wonderfully evocative words, even ...
. . 24 March 2020 9.46AM Number of covid19 cases in Aotearoa New Zealand: 102 . As of 11.59 on Thursday, most of New Zealand will go into “lock down”. People will be expected not to travel to work; not to socialise; and to stay home. I will not be ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections A respected research group, Project Drawdown, finds that deploying solutions consistent with meeting the Paris climate targets would cost tens of trillions of dollars globally. But crucially, those outlays would also yield long-term savings many times larger than the up-front costs. The new 2020 Drawdown ...
It will pass. What happens next? Not immediately, but longer term. There are many opinions, fewer certainties. Will it “change everything!” as many confidently, and contradictorily predict? In this post I look at how foresight can help bound some of the uncertainties so you can more objectively consider the future. ...
We’ve been meaning t write something on Cuba and the coronavirus but have just discovered a very good article on the subject in the US left publication Jacobin. The article looks at how Cuba, a poor country but one where capitalism has been done away with, is leading the way ...
In 2018, El Shafee Elsheikh and Alexanda Kotey - two British citizens who had purportedly been stripped of their citizenship by the British government - were captured while fighting for Isis in Syria. The British government then conspired to hand them over to the US, and agreed to provide evidence ...
Transformers: The disaster of the Great Depression was transformed into a new and fairer society by the democratic socialism of the First Labour Government. The disaster of the Covid-19 Pandemic offers a similar transformative possibility to the Labour-NZ First-Green Government. Seize the time, Jacinda! You will never have a better ...
Tamper with The System? Well, we already are. But there's a difference between accidentally trickling sand into a precision gearbox versus formulating a plan to alter it on the fly with improvements in mind. One action is more or less innocently unscrupulous, the other amenable to earning an easy ...
Associate Prof George Thomson, Louise Delany, Prof Nick WilsonWhile it is possible that New Zealand can use intense public health controls to eradicate COVID-19 from the country – we must also plan for other scenarios where thousands of New Zealanders are sick – including many urgently hospitalised.1 Better resilience ...
Kia ora my name is Chloe Ann-King* and I am the founder of Raise the Bar, a campaign and non-profit that gives free legal aid, advocacy and tautoko to hospitality workers in Aotearoa. Right now all over our country hospo workers are being fired at will, having shifts cut or being ...
We're about to do something unprecedented as a nation. We hope that by taking this extraordinary action before a single life in New Zealand has been lost to the deadly novel virus we will save tens of thousands of lives. Our lives. We'll do it together, in households, in isolation ...
“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens.”So writes the author of Ecclesiastes, a book in the Old Testament that’s counted as a ‘wisdom’ book and written as if by an unnamed king of Jerusalem. But who would have thought there would be a time ...
I was surprised when the prime minister described the Economic Response to Covid-19 package as the ‘largest peacetime government spend in New Zealand's history’. Reflecting – checking through history – I realised that the term ‘spend’ was crucial and the package had no income tax cuts. Even so, it has ...
Years ago the Argentine sociologist Carlos Weisman wrote a book titled “Living within our Means.” It was a critique of Argentine society that focused on the paradoxical question of why, in a land of plenty, there was so much economic instability, inequality, corruption and political turmoil. His conclusion was basically ...
Parliament will be leading by example and adjourning tomorrow after a special sitting to consider an epidemic notice and state of emergency. Day-to-day oversight of the government will be delegated to a select committee. But that's not the only overight mechanism. The OIA will still be law, and (so far) ...
Michael Baker, University of OtagoOverjoyed. That’s not a word epidemiologists normally use, but that’s how I felt after hearing Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s announcement about New Zealand’s COVID-19 shutdown of everything except essential services for at least four weeks from midnight on Wednesday. More than anything, I just ...
How much homelessness is caused by house hoarding? We're about to find out. The pandemic has destroyed tourism, which means that house hoarders who put their hoarded properties up as short-term tourist rentals are now offering them on the ordinary rental market:Property investors are pulling properties from Airbnb to offer ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Bruce Lieberman It seems like such a simple, straightforward, empowering idea: plant trees – a lot of trees – all over the world, and watch the planet’s temperature fall. Who doesn’t love a tree or two, even far more – the right ...
According to Newshub, Simon Bridges is open to joining a “grand coalition” with Labour as we hunker down to go into a month long lockdown. The idea is sound. Before now, the role of the opposition was to scrutinise and oppose. In the context of what almost amounts to a ...
Kia ora my name is Chloe Ann-King* and I am the founder of Raise the Bar, a campaign and non-profit that gives free legal aid, advocacy and tautoko to hospitality workers in Aotearoa. Right now all over our country hospo workers are being fired at will, having shifts cut or ...
We need to be lifting our game against COVID-19. You and I need to help those working to prevent the spread of COVID-19 while they’re trying to lift the testing and treatment efforts. We don’t want to be playing this game running backwards. Best to play it solidly forward, from ...
Prof Tony Blakely, Prof Michael Baker, and Prof Nick WilsonThe NZ Government must do more to clearly articulate its COVID-19 strategy: eradication or ‘flattening the curve’ mitigation. But to do so means understanding the maths and ethics of both these strategies. In this blog, we adapt our work for ...
A few days ago I was starting to write something about the pandemic, which now seems unconscionable. It took the form of a letter to an agony aunt:“Dear Deidre, I have an ugly confession. I am quite excited by Covid-19.”This is how the piece went:“I’m not a psychopath, honest. Although the ...
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Climate Feedback Article Review... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Claim Reviews... SkS Week in Review... Poster of the Week... Story of the Week... In Just 10 Years, Warming Has Increased the Odds of DisastersThe likelihood of extreme events ...
Last week, the government announced a $12 billion initial package to support people during the pandemic. Today, the Reserve Bank is buying government bonds - effectively printing money - to keep up the money supply during the crisis. Normally such moves would have the right apoplectic. Instead, the National Party ...
I am a pundit, somebody who opines and comments on the news. There are no real qualifications to punditry though having a rudimentary way with words and good general knowledge helps. That is one reason there is a constant oversupply of would-be pundits and why it is quite hard to ...
I recently encountered the following prescription from a Faculty of Education at a leading New Zealand University. At first I wondered if it was another product of the postmodern generator (http://www.elsewhere.org/journal/pomo/), designed to create gibberish in the postmodern form, but I’m told it is real: The “schooled” society: Towards the ...
The coronavirus pandemic has of course had a major impact on individual lives and on societies as a whole. But, long after the crisis has passed (assuming it does), we will begin to realise that its real and lasting significance lies in the lessons it has taught us, if only ...
COVID-19 has plunged Aotearoa New Zealand (indeed, the world) into territory that, while maybe not totally unprecedented, certainly hasn’t been seen during the lifetimes of most of us here today. Our borders are closed to non-citizens, we’re being told not to gather in groups of more than 500 outside/100 inside, ...
For the last few weeks, I’ve been urging you to prepare yourself, your family, business, and community for Covid-19. Now it’s time for real action. Yesterday the director-general of health Dr Ashley Bloomfield announced another 13 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand, bringing our total to date to 52. ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Mar 15, 2020 through Sat, Mar 21, 2020 Editor's Pick Now Isn’t the Time to Forget About Our Climate Change EffortsTasha Tilberg, Lindsey Wixson, and Liu Wen photographed ...
by Jan Rivers The article has been corrected to show that it was Ewen MacAskill, former Guardian journalist and not Luke Harding who travelled to meet Edward Snowden with journalist Glenn Greenwald and filmmaker Laura Poitras. Some of the Guardian’s well-known journalists who did not sign the protest letter are ...
by Cultural Worker Late March 2020 amidst the virus. With gigs crashing and burning all around it was without much hope that I called a long standing rest home booking: “ Hi, I’m supposed to be entertaining at your place this afternoon – is it still on?” “”If you don’t ...
Whenever people demand real change from their politicians, we're told that "politics is the art of the possible". The implication is that change isn't possible, so we'd better just get used to the sucky status quo. But now that there's a pandemic, a lot of things we were previously told ...
Together: In leading New Zealand through the Covid-19 Pandemic, the Prime Minister could do a lot worse than allow herself to be guided by the spirit of collective sacrifice and co-operation that animated the New Zealanders of 80 years ago. Most Kiwis alive today have had no opportunity to prove their ...
It is said that generals fight the last war. In the case of the early stages of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) they had learned from the Great Depression of the 1930s and they fought intelligently and successfully. Later their advice would be ignored in favour of the Austerians who ...
Solidarity Forever: All over the world, the arrival of the Covid-19 virus has exposed the fragility of the walls we erect around ourselves and our loved ones. It has shattered our illusions of autonomy and revealed to us how utterly dependent we all are on other human-beings. Finally, we see ...
Looking across the various arguments for/against the leading candidates to take the Democratic Nomination, you might honestly be very hard pressed to tell. There are a number of things that have now started happening since Amy Klobuchar and “Mayor Pete” Buttigieg both threw the towel in and immediately (and ...
by Daphna Whitmore Abortion is no longer in the Crimes Act in New Zealand. The law reform passed yesterday and now abortion is a medical matter between a woman and her doctor. Many women’s groups and progressive people have campaigned for reform for decades. The women’s liberation movement and some ...
Doug Specht, University of Westminster and Julio Gimenez, University of Westminster When fake news, misreporting and alternative facts are everywhere, reading the news can be a challenge. Not only is there plenty of misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic, climate change and other scientific topics floating around social media, you also ...
Michael Baker, University of Otago and Nick Wilson, University of OtagoWith some of the toughest border restrictions and a newly-announced NZ$500 million boost to health services, New Zealand is among a small number of countries with a strategy to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. New Zealand is also fortunate in ...
As expected, the government has introduced a sessional order to allow Parliament to operate during the pandemic. You can read it on the Order Paper here, but the short version is that questions and motions can be filed electronicly, select committees can work remotely, and the the Business Committee can ...
Axel Bruns, Queensland University of Technology; Daniel Angus, Queensland University of Technology; Timothy Graham, Queensland University of Technology, and Tobias R. Keller, Queensland University of Technology News and views about coronavirus has spread via social media in a way that no health emergency has done before. Platforms like Twitter, Facebook, ...
So you’ve recently returned from overseas, come into contact with someone who tested positive, got a bit of a dry cough yourself or perhaps just want to self isolate for 14 days to avoid other people who might have COVID-19. Here are a few tips and tricks to help get ...
Our Good Fortune: Precisely because she has never been an ideologue (she calls herself a “pragmatic idealist”) Jacinda Ardern has a political nimbleness and spontaneity which, when infused with her exceptional emotional intelligence, produces spectacular demonstrations of leadership. Jacinda's empathic political personality contrasts sharply with the less-than-sunny ways of her ...
The Abortion Legislation Bill has just passed its third reading, 68-51. NZ First MPs bailed because their referendum amendment didn't pass, but there were plenty of MPs to provide a majority without them. The bill is a long way from perfect - most significantly, it subjects pregnant people who need ...
As most of the world tries to suppress the coronavirus spread, some countries are going it alone – trying to manage the pandemic through so-called “herd immunity”. Herd immunity means letting a large number of people catch a disease, and hence develop immunity to it, to stop the virus spreading. ...
So, as I sit at home with a very, very slight headache (i.e. not at work when I would otherwise be so), the now familiar figure of Ashley Bloomfield reports eight new confirmed cases of COVID-19 including two in Waikato. A surprise, given that we had just twelve yesterday? No. ...
Many who advocated for, and voted for, the current Coalition – particularly those who voted Labour and the Green Party – expected to see a sea change in the reality of social services. A real, deep change of attitude, approach of process through which the system negotiates the difficult and ...
All 45 New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel are either on their way back to New Zealand, or already in the country, according to Defence Minister Ron Mark."Twenty-eight personnel arrived back in New Zealand last week and are in isolation at the Royal New Zealand Air Force base in ...
The COVID-19 situation in New Zealand is moving fast - and to avoid what we've seen overseas - the Government's response must be to move fast too. We're committed to keeping New Zealanders safe and well-informed every step of the way. ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters is encouraging New Zealanders overseas to stay where they are amid the COVID-19 pandemic. "We are reaching a point where the best option for most New Zealanders offshore is to shelter in place, by preparing to safely stay where they are.” "This includes following the instructions ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs Foreign Minister Winston Peters is encouraging the tens of thousands of New Zealanders travelling overseas to consider sheltering in place, in light of COVID-19. “Since 18 March, we have been warning New Zealanders offshore that the window for flying ...
Ground-breaking law has passed that will decriminalise abortion and ensure women and pregnant people seeking abortions have compassionate healthcare. ...
The Green Party says that the measures announced by the Government today will help families and businesses to prioritise our collective health and wellbeing in the response to COVID-19. ...
As New Zealanders brace for a global downturn due to Covid-19, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters says his Coalition Government’s rescue package "more significant" than any other he's seen around the world. The Coalition is to reveal a multi-billion-dollar stimulus plan on Tuesday afternoon designed to cushion the economic blow ...
We know some people are feeling anxious about COVID-19. While the situation is serious, New Zealand has a world-class health system and we’re well-prepared to keep New Zealanders safe. ...
Darroch Ball MP, Spokesperson for Law and Order A New Zealand First member’s bill drawn from the ballot today seeks to overhaul the youth justice system by instigating a system of demerit points for offences committed by young offenders. “The ‘Youth Justice Demerit Point System’ will put an end to ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Foreign AffairsHonourable Ministers, Members of Parliament, members of the diplomatic corps, distinguished guests and official delegates, ladies and gentlemen – Welcome to you all.We are also privileged to have with us here today Ms Izumi Nakamitsu, the United Nations ...
Fletcher Tabuteau MP, Under-Secretary for Disarmament and Arms ControlThe Public Advisory Committee for Disarmament and Arms Control (PACDAC) is holding a Parliamentary Symposium on Tuesday to mark the 50th Anniversary of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) hosted by PACDAC Chair and Under-Secretary for Disarmament and ...
Hon. Shane Jones, Minister for Regional Economic DevelopmentThe Provincial Growth Fund is investing $6 million in a land-based aquaculture pilot to see whether yellowtail kingfish can be commercially farmed in Northland, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today.A recirculating land-based aquaculture system will be built and operated ...
Hon. Shane Jones, Minister for ForestryForestry Minister Shane Jones has announced two One Billion Trees programme grants of more than $1.18 million to help hapu and iwi in Northland restore whenua and moana.“Many communities around Aotearoa have benefited from One Billion Trees funding since the programme was launched ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign AffairsAhead of the start of the criminal trial in the Netherlands on 9 March, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has reaffirmed the need to establish truth, accountability and justice for the downing of Flight MH17 ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime MinisterThe Government is investing $19.9 million through the Provincial Growth Fund in a game-changing hydrogen energy facility in South Taranaki, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters announced today.“The development of alternative energy initiatives like this one is vital for the Taranaki region’s economy. ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Minister for Foreign AffairsForeign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says New Zealand is partnering with countries in the Pacific to ensure they are prepared for, and able to respond to the global threat of Coronavirus (COVID-19).“There are currently no confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the ...
The Government has fast-tracked up to $1 million to help Air New Zealand move urgent freight to and from New Zealand, with the first flight to Shanghai leaving tonight, Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today. Phil Twyford says it’s crucial that trade in vital goods such as medical supplies and ...
New Zealand will temporarily remove tariffs on all medical and hygiene imports needed for the COVID-19 response. Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker and Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Kris Faafoi said today that the New Zealand Customs Service will apply tariff concessions to all diagnostic reagents and testing ...
Minister of Finance Grant Robertson has clarified that the changes to the wage subsidy scheme announced yesterday mean that employers should be passing on the full subsidy to workers, except in the case where the person’s normal income is less than the level of the subsidy. “We still want employers ...
Medical face masks from the national reserve supply are now being distributed to District Health Boards, while at the same time local production is being ramped up. Yesterday more than 640,000 masks were sent to DHBS – that is an immediate two week supply, with more to follow in coming ...
The Government has made modifications to the wage subsidy scheme to ensure people don’t lose their jobs during the national lockdown. These changes will soften the impact of COVID-19 on workers, families and businesses, and position them to exit the lockdown and look to recovery, Finance Minister Grant Robertson says. ...
Farmers whose herds were culled in response to the outbreak of Mycoplasma bovis will be able to minimise the tax treatment of their income in some circumstances. Revenue Minister Stuart Nash says Cabinet has agreed to change the law. It means farmers may be eligible to spread their income over ...
A $27 million dollar package, effective immediately, is being provided to social sector services and community groups to ensure they can continue to provide essential support to communities as we stay at home as a nation to stop the spread of COVID-19, Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni announced. “At ...
“The guilty plea today will provide some relief to the many people whose lives were shattered by what happened on March 15,” Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said. “These guilty pleas and conviction bring accountability for what happened and also save the families who lost loved ones, those who were injured, ...
The Prime Minister is holding daily press conferences to update New Zealanders on the Government's response to COVID-19. Links to videos and transcripts of these updates below. These transcripts also include All of Government press conferences led by Director Ministry of Health's Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield. 25 March: Live update from the Prime ...
Frontline Police numbers have broken through the 10,000 mark for the first time in history as officers step forward to keep the community safe during the COVID19 lockdown. “Two Police graduations in Auckland and Wellington in the past week have been conducted in unprecedented circumstances,” Police Minister Stuart Nash said. ...
Urgent legislation has been passed to support the package of economic and social measures needed to recover from the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. “The COVID-19 Response (Taxation and Social Assistance Urgent Measures) Bill will cushion New Zealanders from the worst economic impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak,” said Revenue Minister ...
From tomorrow, Government support for farmers and growers affected by drought will be expanded and extended across the country, with access to Rural Assistance Payments (RAPS) available throughout the North Island, parts of the South Island and the Chatham Islands, Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni announced. “These challenging conditions have ...
Parliament has passed amendments to legislation that give the Secretary of Education stronger powers to act in the fight to limit the spread of COVID-19, Education Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “They are part of a suite of changes passed under the COVID-19 Response (Urgent Management Measures) Legislation Bill,” Chris ...
Canada, Australia, Chile, Brunei and Myanmar have joined forces with New Zealand and Singapore by committing to keep supply chains open and remove any existing trade restrictive measures on essential goods, especially medical supplies, in the face of the Covid-19 crisis. Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker today welcomed ...
Immediate freeze on rent increases Tenancies will not be terminated during the lock-down period, unless the parties agree, or in limited circumstances Tenants who had previously given notice can stay in their if they need to stay in the tenancy during the lock-down period Tenants will still be able to ...
As New Zealand unites to lock-down in the fight against COVID-19, the Finance Minister is urging all businesses and workers to stay connected over the next four weeks. “We understand the extreme pressure many businesses are under right now. I know most business owners think of their workers as family ...
A State of National Emergency has been declared across the country as the Government pulls out all the stops to curtail the spread of COVID-19. “Today we put in place our country’s second ever State of National Emergency as we fight a global pandemic, save New Zealanders’ lives and prevent ...
Mr Speaker I wish to make a Ministerial Statement under Standing Order 347 in relation to the recent declaration of a State of National Emergency. Having considered the advice of the Director Civil Defence Emergency Management, the Minister of Civil Defence declared a State of National Emergency for the whole of ...
People needing to travel on domestic flights, trains and Cook Strait ferries to get home before the country moves into level 4 lock-down tomorrow night will be able to continue using the passenger services until midnight on Friday, Transport Minister Phil Twyford said today. Domestic passenger services, particularly ferries, have ...
The Government, retail banks and the Reserve Bank are today announcing a major financial support package for home owners and businesses affected by the economic impacts of COVID-19. The package will include a six month principal and interest payment holiday for mortgage holders and SME customers whose incomes have been ...
Minister of Transport Phil Twyford has today announced details of the Government’s support package to keep key air freight moving and ensure New Zealanders retain access to essential goods during the four-week level 4 lockdown. “The Government is working with airlines and air freight operators to ensure New Zealand’s key ...
New Zealand moved up to COVID-19 Alert Level 3 – Restrict New Zealand to move up to COVID-19 Alert Level 4 – Eliminate, in 48 hours Two-staged approach to give people and businesses time to prepare Level 3, from tomorrow Non-essential businesses must close All events and gatherings must be ...
Good afternoon The Cabinet met this morning to discuss our next actions in the fight against COVID-19. Like the rest of the world, we are facing the potential for devastating impacts from this virus. But, through decisive action, and through working together, do we have a small window to get ...
The Government is announcing significant further support for the economy, workers and businesses as the country unites to prepare for Alert Level 4 in the fight against COVID-19. Cabinet today agreed to remove the cap on the Government’s wage subsidy scheme, which will inject a further $4 billion into the ...
The Government is backing the Reserve Bank’s latest action to support the economy by reducing longer-term interest rates, meaning lower costs for businesses and mortgage holders, and a lower currency to help our exporters. The Minister of Finance has signed a memorandum of understanding and a letter of indemnity with ...
The Government has asked the Commerce Commission to take account of the exceptional circumstances created by COVID-19 when monitoring business behaviour in coming weeks. “The purpose of my request to the Commerce Commission is to make sure businesses can work together in ways that will allow them to provide ...
The New Zealand Government has temporarily closed its High Commission in Bridgetown, Barbados and its Embassy in Yangon, Myanmar due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “Due to the increasing scarcity of air links in and out of Bridgetown and Yangon, and the pressure COVID-19 is placing ...
Associate Health and Whānau Ora Minister Peeni Henare has today announced the Government’s plan to support Māori communities and businesses in the face of COVID-19. “Our Government’s $12.1 billion economic package will help many Māori whānau, workers and businesses, whether it’s through wage subsidies, income support and worker redeployment, or ...
The Government and the hospitality industry have worked together to produce guidelines to assist with managing and reducing transmission of COVID-19, Health Minister David Clark announced today. The guidelines developed between the Government, Hospitality New Zealand and SkyCity Entertainment Group, set out how the new restrictions on physical distancing and ...
Four stage Alert System for COVID-19 announced New Zealand moved up to COVID-19 Alert Level 2 – Reduce Contact New Zealanders over 70 and those with certain medical conditions told to stay at home as much as they can to reduce risk of contact with the virus Workplaces to implement ...
Kia ora koutou katoa I’m speaking directly to all New Zealanders today to give you as much certainty and clarity as we can as we fight Covid-19. Over the past few weeks, the world has changed. And it has changed very quickly. In February it would have seemed unimaginable to ...
New Zealand and Singapore have jointly committed to keep supply chains open and to remove any existing trade restrictive measures on essential goods, especially medical supplies, in the face of the Covid-19 crisis. Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker welcomed the commitment. “This is an important collective response, and ...
JOINT MINISTERIAL STATEMENT BY SINGAPORE AND NEW ZEALAND AFFIRMING COMMITMENT TO ENSURING SUPPLY CHAIN CONNECTIVITY AMIDST THE COVID-19 SITUATION The COVID-19 pandemic is a serious global crisis. As part of our collective response to combat COVID-19, Singapore and New Zealand are committed to maintaining open and connected supply chains. We ...
Travel restrictions, closing our border to almost all travelers came into force from 23:59 on Thursday 19 March 2020 (NZDT). All airlines were informed of these restrictions before they came into force. Immigration Minister Iain Lees-Galloway says “The transit of passengers between Australia and New Zealand has been agreed upon and ...
The Government has allocated $100 million to help redeploy workers affected by the economic impact of COVID-19, with the hard-hit region of Gisborne-Tairāwhiti to be the first helped, Economic Development Minister Phil Twyford, Forestry and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones and Employment Minister Willie Jackson announced today. Phil Twyford ...
The Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) is ramping up support for Tairāwhiti’s wood processing sector to bolster the region’s economy at a time of heightened uncertainty, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today. Following earlier announcements today of a regional support package for Tairāwhiti, Minister Jones has also announced a ...
The Coalition Government has stepped in to protect Air New Zealand with a significant financial deal that protects essential routes and allows the company to keep operating. The Government and Air New Zealand have agreed a debt funding agreement through commercial 24-month loan facilities of up to $900 million*. The ...
The Government has taken further measures to protect New Zealanders from the COVID-19 virus, effectively stopping all people from boarding a plane to New Zealand from 11:59pm today, except for returning New Zealanders, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced today. New Zealanders’ partners, legal guardians or any dependent children travelling with ...
The Government has reinforced its commitment to protecting the health of New Zealanders from COVID-19 through the cancellation of indoor events with more than 100 people. “Protecting the health of New Zealanders is our number one priority, and that means we need to reduce the risks associated with large gatherings,” ...
The New Zealand Government is advising New Zealanders not to travel overseas due to COVID-19, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “We are raising our travel advice to the highest level: do not travel,” Mr Peters said. “This is the first time the New Zealand Government has advised New Zealanders ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacinta Carroll, Senior Research Fellow, Counter Terrorism and Social Cohesion, National Security College, Australian National University There are now nearly 300 cases of COVID-19 linked to passengers who disembarked from the Ruby Princess cruise ship without any health checks from authorities. Amid ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emily Brayshaw, Lecturer, Fashion and Design History, Theory, and Thinking, University of Technology Sydney Once again, global crafting communities are stepping up to help in a crisis, sewing face masks desperately needed in American hospitals to help stop the spread of COVID-19. ...
Retailer Smiths City has reached an agreement with ASB Bank to delay a $1.5 million dollar repayment of a loan due tomorrow. It also said it is starting talks with potential investors to support the business. The company said Covid-19 has caused an unforeseen and unprecedented shock to the business, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Quentin Grafton, Director of the Centre for Water Economics, Environment and Policy, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University In 1997, a bestselling book by Jared Diamond purported to explain how the West “won” world dominance based on the good luck ...
Figures from around the world show that Covid-19, while vicious and contagious, does behave like other infections, rampaging quickly through a community, hospitalising a small percentage and causing death in an even smaller percentage. The World Health ...
Video of PM Ardern’s Post Cabinet Press Conference is available here: New Zealand Labour Party - #LIVE: Post-Cabinet Press Conference 2 March 2020 Today Cabinet was focused on the response to protect NZers from COVID-19. Ardern outlined ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin To get a correct picture, we need regional data – indeed sub-regional statistics – because the virus does not respect political boundaries. Unfortunately, it is very hard to get regional data from European countries. The Johns Hopkins data – most widely used by the media (and ...
An extract from Jacinda Ardern: A New Kind of Leader, the brand new biography of the prime minister by Madeleine Chapman, formerly of this parish.Out today, Madeleine’s biography of the prime minister is magnificent. We cracked up. We had a wee cry. We’ve never read a political biography like it. Tomorrow ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Misha Ketchell, Editor & Executive Director, The Conversation You might have seen recent mediareports in various outlets of a paper, commissioned by the federal government, reporting the coronavirus advice of a group of experts from Group Of Eight universities. Dated March ...
Analysis: On the face of it, New Zealand's epidemic curve is going exponential. But are case numbers really rising for the same reasons as overseas? If you've been following any news about Covid-19 over the past three months, you've heard of The Curve. It looks, variously, like a sky-high pillar ...
MediaRoom column: A decision to block publication of community newspapers under the State of Emergency could be changed tomorrow. Tim Murphy reports. A decision to stop community newspapers from circulating in the country's suburbs, towns and settlements appears to have been an example of officials scratching their regulatory itch. On Friday, ...
A Waikato berry grower has been ordered to pay over $76,000 for employment law breaches. Olde Berry Farm has been fined $50,000 and forced to pay over $16,000 in unpaid wages and holiday pay. Its managing director, Andrew Molly, has been made personally responsible fo an additional $10,000 in penalties. ...
The Government has set up a dedicated service for reporting fears of price gouging, as Jacinda Ardern flags the expansion of "essential services" Kiwis concerned about potential price gouging at supermarkets during the coronavirus lockdown can now report the issue directly to government officials, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced. Ardern ...
A new report by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment into the ban on new petroleum exploration permits outside onshore Taranaki has been welcomed by the Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of New Zealand (PEPANZ). "This ...
The takeover offer for Abano Healthcare is off the table - a casualty of the Covid-19 pandemic. The company said the $150-million takeover scheme agreement with Adams NZ Bidco Ltd. was terminated, with no fees payable by either party, as a result as the material adverse change to the company's ...
The New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) contribution to the successful mission to train members of the Iraqi Security Forces to combat ISIS is at an end and the first troops from the final contingent have arrived home. Since December the NZDF has had 45 personnel ...
On Sunday it was reported there is a high demand for New Zealand Police's online form to report lockdown breaches. This news should act as a red flag, signalling the potentially corrosive effects on public trust within Aotearoa that may occur in these troubled times. Concerns have already been expressed ...
The Prime Minister is giving the latest updates on the government's fight against the impact of Covid-19 at her weekly post-Cabinet media conference. Watch live here. ...
Watch the replay of our fourth live Q&A session with Dr Ayesha Verrall, a senior lecturer at Otago University who specialises in infectious diseases. Ayesha Verrall is an infectious diseases physician and senior lecturer at Otago University's Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine (Wellington). Dr Verrall has been monitoring the spread and impact ...
Recognising how much of the burden women are carrying in this crisis - and how much they always carry - may take us closer to a society in which caring work is seen and valued for the essential work it is, writes Jess Berentson-Shaw COVID-19 has thrown a window wide ...
You’ve lost your job and your income has reduced due to the Covid-19 crisis, so how do you hold onto your home? Mortgage adviser Cameron Marcroft talks to Bonnie Sumner.Tell us about the changes you’ve seen since the lockdown began. We’ve had many enquiries coming through from both existing ...
When officials – including police themselves – don’t seem clear on the rules around movement, it makes it harder for everyone to do the right thing, writes Andrew Geddis.Aotearoa New Zealand has committed to trying to eradicate the virus that causes Covid-19 from its shores. To do that, as a ...
The EMA is urging the Government to postpone the planned significant increase to the minimum wage on Wednesday, as employers grapple with keeping their doors open amid COVID-19. Chief Executive Brett O’Riley says that while it may be politically ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Wark, Conjoint Professor, School of Medicine and Public Health, University of Newcastle As the number of COVID-19 cases around the world continues to climb, hospitals are under increased pressure to provide emergency care for the most severely ill patients. What does ...
Philanthropy New Zealand will release a weekly update to share philanthropic and grantmaking activity and insight as the sector seeks to support communities in the wake of COVID-19. This update is a general public document, provided to Ministers, ...
By Elias Nanau in Port Moresby Indonesia has issued a stern warning over illegal border crossers from Papua New Guinea. This follows Indonesia stepping up its security measures at the border in response to the global Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic. The First Secretary to the governor for West Sepik, Adam ...
As two staff members test positive for Covid-19, police are grappling with ways to keep their workforce safe while still enforcing the rules of the lockdown, Marc Daalder reports Two police staff have tested positive for Covid-19, Police Commissioner Mike Bush said Monday, while nearly 400 others are now in self-isolation ...
The Covid-19 crisis in media has claimed New Zealand’s last surviving radio station solely dedicated to sport. Amid a wider crisis in media funding right now, the first outlet has been forced to close the doors – and it isn’t likely to return.Staff at Radio Sport have been told that the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendan Coates, Program Director, Household Finances, Grattan Institute New Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development estimates paint a grim picture of the direct economic costs of public health measures to contain the spread of COVID-19, and the need for more government support ...
Tips on how television can help educate your kids, for parents who have to keep working.It feels as if a great many parents are simply flourishing during this lockdown with fairy gardens, bird song and mason jars, daily bongo drum dancing and essays written by three-year-old prodigies about how satisfying ...
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening. There were 76 new cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand, up from the previous day's 63 new cases. Details of how many tests have been completed are now being ...
Supermarkets and some publishers are favoured by the government’s imposition of severe restrictions on what we can do and from whom we can buy during the Covid-19 lock-down. But one consumer watchdog is challenging the legality of an edict by Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi which favours supermarkets while Act leader ...
Robyn Hunt writes on the challenges facing disabled people and what needs to be done to support them as we go into lockdown, and beyond.Disabled people at higher risk need more help. Many of the almost one quarter of New Zealanders who are disabled are doing it hard as the ...
An online focus is coming back to bite newspaper companies, the Otago Daily Times’ editor says. David Williams reports. Despite advertising falling off a cliff, and its community papers dormant, the group editor of the country’s third-biggest publisher says there haven’t been layoffs and it’s unlikely any of its newspapers ...
Cabinet ministers will patch into a video conference this afternoon to discuss the Covid-19 lockdown, including complaints about high prices at supermarkets. ...
Talks will be ongoing between local leaders and Government in an effort to have them deploy both personnel and other resources to Tairāwhiti to support regional measures to contain COVID-19. Mayor Rehette Stoltz, Gisborne District Council ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers' Union is joining calls for the Government to extend submission deadlines for Select Committees during the immediate fallout of the COVID-19 crisis. New Zealand Taxpayers' Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke says, "Old political ...
FIRST Union welcomes the announcements made by supermarket chains Foodstuffs and Progressive Enterprises that workers will receive lockdown pay increases but is cautioning that the details of these promises matter and all essential workers should be earning ...
By Imelda V. Abano in Manila The novel coronavirus now sweeping the globe has left many countries struggling to cope with rising numbers of infections and journalists grappling with how to best cover this evolving public health crisis. In addition to questions about how governments, health care systems and ...
The government has fast-tracked up to $1 million to help Air New Zealand move urgent freight in and out of the country - with the first flight to Shanghai leaving tonight. ...
Join Leonie Hayden as she works through the first four weeks of Scotty Morrison’s Māori Made Easy.Kia ora e te whānau, welcome to MME with me! I know a lot of us have this little green book on our shelves. Maybe you bought it and never got round to opening ...
The Free Speech Coalition is preparing to launch an urgent judicial review of the Ministry of Culture and Heritage’s decision to deem non-daily newspapers and publications not an essential service for the purposes of the COVID-19 Level-4 nationwide shutdown. ...
Increasingly concerned home support workers are worried that without adequate personal protective equipment and mandatory protocols for risk assessments, they may end up spreading COVID-19 around the homes and communities they work in. The news that 21 ...
The kiwifruit industry is fighting for survival as it tries to pick and pack the season's crop while enforcing Covid-19 restrictions. The apple industry is also predicting problems with at least 10 percent of the crop not likely to be picked. The nationwide lockdown has come right in the middle ...
The Reserve Bank is ramping up support for businesses and banks by accepting corporate debt and other assets as security for loans to banks. The latest measure is designed to pump more money into the economy through the banking system. Assistant governor Christian Hawkesby said the aim is to encourage ...
The first days of national lockdown have truly brought out the best in our social media stars. Alex Casey counts down the classics. Yesterday I got served with the Instagram notification that normally only pops up around Christmas-time. “You’re all caught up!” it chirps, “you’ve seen every post from the last ...
In our new series The Lockdown Letters, some of New Zealand’s best writers tell us what they’ve been up to in the days of Covid-19 alert level four. Today, writer and doctor Glenn Colquhoun goes full epistolary, with a letter to Hone Tūwhare – and his Travelling Band of Constant Companions.Kia ...
By John Gerritsen of RNZ News The $5 billion foreign student industry is facing a massive downturn with as many as half of this year’s enrolments now in doubt. Immigration New Zealand figures show that of 76,203 valid study visas at 15 March, 60,348 were in New Zealand, and ...
As New Zealand looks toward an uncertain future in all areas of life, Auckland school principal Claire Amos sees an opportunity to change high school education for the better. The last week has been an interesting one for school leaders. Monday arrived, it was all on – schools were closing the ...
The Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told Morning Report, she’s expecting the country to be restricted to visitors for some time after the lockdown period ends. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Albert Van Dijk, Professor, Water and Landscape Dynamics, Fenner School of Environment & Society, Australian National University 2019 was the year Australians confronted the fact that a healthy environment is more than just a pretty waterfall in a national park; a nice ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yale Z Wong, Research Associate, Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies, University of Sydney ZMinimising health risks has rightly been the focus of discussion during the coronavirus outbreak. This includes efforts to protect both frontline public transport employees and the travelling public. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tyler Riordan, PhD Candidate, The University of Queensland Along with home delivery of groceries, pharmaceuticals and alcohol, demand for food delivery is booming. Services such as Uber Eats and Deliveroo have become essential to cafes and restaurants that can now only sell ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nishanathe Dahanayake, PhD Candidate, Ethics/Philosophy, University of New England The coronavirus pandemic is challenging our health, work, family, food and fun. It’s also disturbing our peace of mind and forcing us to question our own existence. We are each asking our own ...
ASB sees 6 percent GDP fall in 2020; Chorus, King Salmon and Stride reassure their profits are still on track; Augusta withdraws fund on rent relief fears; US stocks slide again; US jobs data looms ...
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Conditions for leaving lockdown explored, nation’s first death from Covid-19 reported, and Australian govt continues to discriminate against NZers.When will the Covid-19 lockdown across New Zealand end? Short answer – when it’s actually safe to do so. Officially, the current state ...
For all The Spinoff’s latest coverage of Covid-19 see here. Read Siouxsie Wiles’s work here. New Zealand is currently in alert level four. The country is shut down, apart from essential services. For updated official government advice, see here.The Spinoff’s coverage of the Covid-19 outbreak is funded by The Spinoff Members. To support this work, join The ...
People over 70 and those with underlying health conditions faced the lockdown four days before the rest of the country - but some of the elderly still aren't taking any notice. ...
Steve Braunias presents a photo essay of the one thing that New Zealanders are holding close to their hearts during the Lockdown: their bookshelves. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern's bookcase at Premier House in Wellington. The photograph which she posted this weekend on her Instagram page reveals two novels by Elizabeth ...
Police start “initial” investigation into abuse at a notorious psychiatric hospital. David Williams reports The Government has missed a 90-day deadline for responding to a United Nations committee over torture at Lake Alice’s child and adolescent unit in the 1970s. However, in a move that might represent a glimmer of ...
Dr Neal Curtis looks at all the points of implicit trust within society, and how Covid-19 is revealing how important this trust is As I stood in the queue to get into our local supermarket it was encouraging to see how carefully people were engaging in social distancing to minimise ...
From growing up on the remote East Cape to becoming a Black Fern and a lawyer, Ruahei Demant wants to show young Māori that anything is possible. In the long run, Ruahei Demant wants to be a sports lawyer. But in the short term, the Black Ferns first-five is juggling her ...
Having toughed it out alone with Covid-19 and survived, one Kiwi man learned the hard way how self-isolation really can save lives, writes Jill Herron Choosing to self-isolate early with only Sophie the spaniel as company led to a lonesome, rough ride through Covid-19 for a Christchurch asthmatic – but ...
As we begin what could become a long period of self-isolation, we encounter a dilemma. On the one hand, epidemiological research and recent global events show us the dangers of not responding swiftly to Covid-19. With community spread now within our shores, it is critical that we follow government orders ...
Emma Espiner makes a slow and deliberate trip to the supermarket yesterday, where she finds we are approaching social distancing in a very New Zealand way It took me three attempts to go to the supermarket. Two days ago I saw the cheerless conga line snaking around the car park ...
Community health and care workers talk of their fear of infection - for themselves, their vulnerable clients and New Zealand Over the last few days, Newsroom has written several articles about the fact that thousands of home and community health care workers, who care for elderly, disabled and sick people, have ...
Calls are growing for extra payment for those who continue to head out to work every day, including many on very low wages.The Spinoff’s coverage of the Covid-19 outbreak is funded by The Spinoff Members. To support this work, join The Spinoff Members here.Two petitions have been circulating over the weekend ...
Covid-19 will transform society, just as the plague and smallpox transformed nations centuries ago. This time, however, we have something they didn’t, writes historian Ayelet Zoran-Rosen.Throughout history, epidemics and pandemics have been a threat to people and states. They strike societies with little or no notice, upend their social and ...
The Covid-19 epidemic is only the second time New Zealand has entered a state of national emergency. Newsroom’s Sam Sachdeva had first-hand experience of the first - the devastating Christchurch earthquakes - and tries to make sense of how the two compare. There is so much that is new about New ...
In another of his interviews with key industry CEOs on their response to the Covid-19 crisis, Rod Oram talks with Simon Mackenzie of lines company Vector, who expects permanent changes in where and why people consume electricity even once the lockdown ends At mid-afternoon on Wednesday, nine hours before New ...
In the lead-up to the general election, Facebook has launched a fact-checking service for New Zealand and the Pacific, Marc Daalder reports Facebook has contracted the Australian Associated Press' fact-checking division to serve as a certified agency to review content pertaining to New Zealand and the Pacific and rate its ...
Open mike 09/10/2012 
by Phil Duncan For Marxists, a key concern about social trends is their context – not just their causes, but why they happen when they do. Events and phenomena have causes, but they also are time or period-specific. While much of the left have capitulated recently to postmodernism, most notably ...1 hour ago
Since the lockdown began, we've all suddenly been reminded who the actually essential workers in our society are: not the people at the top who pay themselves the big bucks and rort the perks, but the people at the bottom they screw over and squeeze: cleaners, warehouse staff, truck drivers ...2 hours ago
Kia ora! As I've watched nearly all my remaining work vanish over the past couple of days, it has occured to me that one good way to keep me away from arguing with fools on Twitter all the time (in the knowledge that all we're really doing is processing our ...3 hours ago
Aotearoa New Zealand has committed to trying to extirpate the virus that causes COVID-19 from its shores. To do that, as a society we’ve moved to “Level 4”. That means adapting to unprecedented restrictions on our personal freedoms, particularly to our rights to move freely and associate with friends and ...4 hours ago
. . Lock Down: Day 4 – A photo essay with observations . March 29: Usual wake up routine as RNZ snaps on my radio-clock. Jim Mora’s voice slowly enters my conciousness; there’s talk of a second wave of covid19 taking hold in South Korea; the week in Parliament – ...6 hours ago
Yesterday, New Zealand recorded its first Covid-19 related death on the West Coast. Unfortunately this is unlikely to be the only fatality, with the virus now being found in every region of the country.However despite the significant danger, people are still unfortunately breaching lockdown rules.There’s really only one main very ...6 hours ago
The kids did surprisingly well today – meltdown count was about 3, and mostly fairly short ones. (And a fourth while I was writing.) Game-wise I had a go at Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark. It’s a fairly standard RPG with turn-based combat and what they call a “mature storyline” (it ...21 hours ago
by Don Franks Hi David, Nice hearing from you, I’m glad to hear you’re getting by okay in these grim times. You asked how’s it going for us back here in New Zealand. You would have heard that the whole country is locked down and with breaks for exercise and ...22 hours ago
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Mar 22, 2020 through Sat, Mar 28, 2020 Articles Linked to on Facebook Sun, Mar 22, 2020 In Just 10 Years, Warming Has Increased the Odds of Disasters by Chelsea Harvey, ...2 days ago
The CV-19 (COVID) pandemic has seen the imposition of a government ordered national quarantine and the promulgation of a series of measures designed to spread the burden of pain and soften the economic blow on the most strategically important and most vulnerable sectors of society. The national narrative is framed ...2 days ago
Fortune's Children: Under extraordinary pressure, the leader of the Government and the leader of the Opposition will each show us what they are made of. Have they been blessed with intelligence, grace, wit, poise, toughness, empathy and humour – and in what measure? More importantly, to what extent have they ...2 days ago
Society-wise, aside from the specific morbidity shall we say of the medically-oriented aspects of this COVID-19 crisis, what is unfolding before the world is in more than one way an instructive study of humanity and reactions to a high intensity, high stress environment in real time. Friends, we are at ...3 days ago
Right now low waged and insecure workers are feeling the economic brunt of the looming #Covid19 Recession. In response legal advocate Toby Cooper* and hospitality and worker’s rights advocate Chloe Ann-King, are putting together a series of legal blogs about your employment rights: In this legal blog we outline some ...3 days ago
Just before midnight on Wednesday March 25, Aotearoa New Zealand entered a countrywide alert level four lockdown. For at least the next four weeks, everyone who isn’t an essential worker is confined to their bubble. We are doing this to stop the explosive growth in people contracting and dying from ...3 days ago
Kia ora my name is Chloe Ann-King* and I am the founder of Raise the Bar, a campaign and non-profit that gives free legal aid, advocacy and tautoko to hospitality workers in Aotearoa. Right now all over our country hospo workers are being fired at will, having shifts cut or being ...5 days ago
According to Newshub, Simon Bridges is open to joining a “grand coalition” with Labour as we hunker down to go into a month long lockdown. The idea is sound. Before now, the role of the opposition was to scrutinise and oppose. In the context of what almost amounts to a ...7 days ago
Kia ora my name is Chloe Ann-King* and I am the founder of Raise the Bar, a campaign and non-profit that gives free legal aid, advocacy and tautoko to hospitality workers in Aotearoa. Right now all over our country hospo workers are being fired at will, having shifts cut or ...1 week ago
A few days ago I was starting to write something about the pandemic, which now seems unconscionable. It took the form of a letter to an agony aunt:“Dear Deidre, I have an ugly confession. I am quite excited by Covid-19.”This is how the piece went:“I’m not a psychopath, honest. Although the ...1 week ago
I am a pundit, somebody who opines and comments on the news. There are no real qualifications to punditry though having a rudimentary way with words and good general knowledge helps. That is one reason there is a constant oversupply of would-be pundits and why it is quite hard to ...1 week ago
The coronavirus pandemic has of course had a major impact on individual lives and on societies as a whole. But, long after the crisis has passed (assuming it does), we will begin to realise that its real and lasting significance lies in the lessons it has taught us, if only ...1 week ago
COVID-19 has plunged Aotearoa New Zealand (indeed, the world) into territory that, while maybe not totally unprecedented, certainly hasn’t been seen during the lifetimes of most of us here today. Our borders are closed to non-citizens, we’re being told not to gather in groups of more than 500 outside/100 inside, ...1 week ago
Looking across the various arguments for/against the leading candidates to take the Democratic Nomination, you might honestly be very hard pressed to tell. There are a number of things that have now started happening since Amy Klobuchar and “Mayor Pete” Buttigieg both threw the towel in and immediately (and ...2 weeks ago
Some fave speeches: ...2 weeks ago
Many who advocated for, and voted for, the current Coalition – particularly those who voted Labour and the Green Party – expected to see a sea change in the reality of social services. A real, deep change of attitude, approach of process through which the system negotiates the difficult and ...2 weeks ago
All 45 New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel are either on their way back to New Zealand, or already in the country, according to Defence Minister Ron Mark. "Twenty-eight personnel arrived back in New Zealand last week and are in isolation at the Royal New Zealand Air Force base in ...1 hour ago
The COVID-19 situation in New Zealand is moving fast - and to avoid what we've seen overseas - the Government's response must be to move fast too. We're committed to keeping New Zealanders safe and well-informed every step of the way. ...2 days ago
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The scale of what we face right now is unlike anything we have ever seen before. Overcoming it is our common purpose. ...5 days ago
The Government has fast-tracked up to $1 million to help Air New Zealand move urgent freight to and from New Zealand, with the first flight to Shanghai leaving tonight, Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today. Phil Twyford says it’s crucial that trade in vital goods such as medical supplies and ...8 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacinta Carroll, Senior Research Fellow, Counter Terrorism and Social Cohesion, National Security College, Australian National University There are now nearly 300 cases of COVID-19 linked to passengers who disembarked from the Ruby Princess cruise ship without any health checks from authorities. Amid ...24 mins ago
Retailer Smiths City has reached an agreement with ASB Bank to delay a $1.5 million dollar repayment of a loan due tomorrow. It also said it is starting talks with potential investors to support the business. The company said Covid-19 has caused an unforeseen and unprecedented shock to the business, ...36 mins ago
Figures from around the world show that Covid-19, while vicious and contagious, does behave like other infections, rampaging quickly through a community, hospitalising a small percentage and causing death in an even smaller percentage. The World Health ...45 mins ago
An extract from Jacinda Ardern: A New Kind of Leader, the brand new biography of the prime minister by Madeleine Chapman, formerly of this parish.Out today, Madeleine’s biography of the prime minister is magnificent. We cracked up. We had a wee cry. We’ve never read a political biography like it. Tomorrow ...53 mins ago
Analysis: On the face of it, New Zealand's epidemic curve is going exponential. But are case numbers really rising for the same reasons as overseas? If you've been following any news about Covid-19 over the past three months, you've heard of The Curve. It looks, variously, like a sky-high pillar ...58 mins ago
MediaRoom column: A decision to block publication of community newspapers under the State of Emergency could be changed tomorrow. Tim Murphy reports. A decision to stop community newspapers from circulating in the country's suburbs, towns and settlements appears to have been an example of officials scratching their regulatory itch. On Friday, ...1 hour ago
A Waikato berry grower has been ordered to pay over $76,000 for employment law breaches. Olde Berry Farm has been fined $50,000 and forced to pay over $16,000 in unpaid wages and holiday pay. Its managing director, Andrew Molly, has been made personally responsible fo an additional $10,000 in penalties. ...1 hour ago
The Government has set up a dedicated service for reporting fears of price gouging, as Jacinda Ardern flags the expansion of "essential services" Kiwis concerned about potential price gouging at supermarkets during the coronavirus lockdown can now report the issue directly to government officials, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced. Ardern ...1 hour ago
The takeover offer for Abano Healthcare is off the table - a casualty of the Covid-19 pandemic. The company said the $150-million takeover scheme agreement with Adams NZ Bidco Ltd. was terminated, with no fees payable by either party, as a result as the material adverse change to the company's ...1 hour ago
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says while she has found no evidence of price gouging, the public will be able to to report any they see. ...1 hour ago
On Sunday it was reported there is a high demand for New Zealand Police's online form to report lockdown breaches. This news should act as a red flag, signalling the potentially corrosive effects on public trust within Aotearoa that may occur in these troubled times. Concerns have already been expressed ...1 hour ago
Watch the replay of our fourth live Q&A session with Dr Ayesha Verrall, a senior lecturer at Otago University who specialises in infectious diseases. Ayesha Verrall is an infectious diseases physician and senior lecturer at Otago University's Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine (Wellington). Dr Verrall has been monitoring the spread and impact ...2 hours ago
Recognising how much of the burden women are carrying in this crisis - and how much they always carry - may take us closer to a society in which caring work is seen and valued for the essential work it is, writes Jess Berentson-Shaw COVID-19 has thrown a window wide ...2 hours ago
You’ve lost your job and your income has reduced due to the Covid-19 crisis, so how do you hold onto your home? Mortgage adviser Cameron Marcroft talks to Bonnie Sumner. Tell us about the changes you’ve seen since the lockdown began. We’ve had many enquiries coming through from both existing ...3 hours ago
As two staff members test positive for Covid-19, police are grappling with ways to keep their workforce safe while still enforcing the rules of the lockdown, Marc Daalder reports Two police staff have tested positive for Covid-19, Police Commissioner Mike Bush said Monday, while nearly 400 others are now in self-isolation ...4 hours ago
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening. There were 76 new cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand, up from the previous day's 63 new cases. Details of how many tests have been completed are now being ...4 hours ago
Supermarkets and some publishers are favoured by the government’s imposition of severe restrictions on what we can do and from whom we can buy during the Covid-19 lock-down. But one consumer watchdog is challenging the legality of an edict by Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi which favours supermarkets while Act leader ...4 hours ago
An online focus is coming back to bite newspaper companies, the Otago Daily Times’ editor says. David Williams reports. Despite advertising falling off a cliff, and its community papers dormant, the group editor of the country’s third-biggest publisher says there haven’t been layoffs and it’s unlikely any of its newspapers ...5 hours ago
Cabinet ministers will patch into a video conference this afternoon to discuss the Covid-19 lockdown, including complaints about high prices at supermarkets. ...5 hours ago
The kiwifruit industry is fighting for survival as it tries to pick and pack the season's crop while enforcing Covid-19 restrictions. The apple industry is also predicting problems with at least 10 percent of the crop not likely to be picked. The nationwide lockdown has come right in the middle ...6 hours ago
The Reserve Bank is ramping up support for businesses and banks by accepting corporate debt and other assets as security for loans to banks. The latest measure is designed to pump more money into the economy through the banking system. Assistant governor Christian Hawkesby said the aim is to encourage ...7 hours ago
Supermarkets are set to open on Good Friday and Easter Sunday as the Government places extra scrutiny on their behaviour and pricing. ...9 hours ago
The Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told Morning Report, she’s expecting the country to be restricted to visitors for some time after the lockdown period ends. ...9 hours ago
ASB sees 6 percent GDP fall in 2020; Chorus, King Salmon and Stride reassure their profits are still on track; Augusta withdraws fund on rent relief fears; US stocks slide again; US jobs data looms ...11 hours ago
Steve Braunias presents a photo essay of the one thing that New Zealanders are holding close to their hearts during the Lockdown: their bookshelves. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern's bookcase at Premier House in Wellington. The photograph which she posted this weekend on her Instagram page reveals two novels by Elizabeth ...12 hours ago
Police start “initial” investigation into abuse at a notorious psychiatric hospital. David Williams reports The Government has missed a 90-day deadline for responding to a United Nations committee over torture at Lake Alice’s child and adolescent unit in the 1970s. However, in a move that might represent a glimmer of ...12 hours ago
Dr Neal Curtis looks at all the points of implicit trust within society, and how Covid-19 is revealing how important this trust is As I stood in the queue to get into our local supermarket it was encouraging to see how carefully people were engaging in social distancing to minimise ...12 hours ago
From growing up on the remote East Cape to becoming a Black Fern and a lawyer, Ruahei Demant wants to show young Māori that anything is possible. In the long run, Ruahei Demant wants to be a sports lawyer. But in the short term, the Black Ferns first-five is juggling her ...12 hours ago
Having toughed it out alone with Covid-19 and survived, one Kiwi man learned the hard way how self-isolation really can save lives, writes Jill Herron Choosing to self-isolate early with only Sophie the spaniel as company led to a lonesome, rough ride through Covid-19 for a Christchurch asthmatic – but ...12 hours ago
As we begin what could become a long period of self-isolation, we encounter a dilemma. On the one hand, epidemiological research and recent global events show us the dangers of not responding swiftly to Covid-19. With community spread now within our shores, it is critical that we follow government orders ...12 hours ago
Emma Espiner makes a slow and deliberate trip to the supermarket yesterday, where she finds we are approaching social distancing in a very New Zealand way It took me three attempts to go to the supermarket. Two days ago I saw the cheerless conga line snaking around the car park ...12 hours ago
Community health and care workers talk of their fear of infection - for themselves, their vulnerable clients and New Zealand Over the last few days, Newsroom has written several articles about the fact that thousands of home and community health care workers, who care for elderly, disabled and sick people, have ...12 hours ago
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Besides lying and breaking the law, how far will the National Government and our state forces go to please our US ally?
Will John Key and our military leaders condemn our Afghan interpreters and their families to certain death?
Will our courts without hearing the evidence against him, condemn Kim Dotcom to prison conditions which may well constitute torture under the UN conventions against torture?
Just last week Juan Mandez the UN Rapporteur on Torture came out with a statement against the extradition of suspected Islamist terrorists to the US because they will be subjected to a type of incarceration that risks being constituted as torture under the UN conventions against torture.
US state no longer upholds legal rights: “Violates the law”, lawyer
At 7:20 on the tape
Should Dotcom be worried that these conditions will be imposed on him?
Going by the anti-terror tactics used in his arrest and the secret anti-terror organisations that have been deployed against him. The chances are more than even, that Kim Dotcom will find himself in an underground cell under 23 hour solitary confinement in ADX Florence.
“A cleaner version of hell”
this is just dreadful. there are “hells on earth indeed” -some people want their pound of flesh.
this is just dreadful. there are “hells on earth indeed” -some people want their pound of flesh.
and these drones, 1000’s of associated civilian deaths from Drone Strikes. So sad that it has come to this.
The US now has laws which enable indefinite military detention without charges or trial of anyone deemed (either in secret or publically) to be a national security risk.
Say bye bye to democracy.
Why not, they have laws in their own country prohibiting food being given away in public to the needy, good old uncle sam eh.
US dumpster diving resource. Forget being “vegan”, in this economic climate its about being “freegan”.
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-great-online-resources-support-dumpster-diving-lifestyle-si/
Cv
That can’t be good USA sounds more like bad Russia. That wouldn’t be’baseball’ would it.
Day by day the USA is becoming the great enemy and oppressor of citizens that it worked so hard and so long to defeat.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/feb/29/ndaa-danger-american-liberty
Your right to resell your own stuff is in peril
Interesting….
Madness. Pure and simple madness. But what can you expect from the land of the Paranoid and Insane?
Its what PC game makers have been trying to do for years. Kill the second hand market for PC games with copy protection (e.g. limited numbers of licence activations) in order to force people to buy new copies of games at premium prices.
But wait. If we need to recycle more, as the worlds raw material run out, then we need to
regulate materials better. If, as I believe, producers need to take responsibility for the waste,
then it follows that ownership in a object isn’t just the holder. This idea then is more in tune with
our per-industrial forebears, sole ownership of any property was essentially theft.
The whole idea behind legislation, its preventative effect, requires a invasion not so invisible
hand into the market place in order to direct the effects of the market towards social goods.
Away from slavery, serfdom…monopolies, regulatory capture (obviously our current regimes
are in denial about that particular one).
Information should be free, ideas should never be patentable (including genes).
QFT
haha, that’s funny.
Of course, what we’re actually seeing here is the actions of capitalism to control the market clearly showing that we do not have a free-market. And the reason why we don’t have a free-market is because capitalism would never survive in one.
BTW, reports are that the TPPA will ban parallel imports.
Watching Nigel Latta’s Darklands program last night was sad and depressing. It was about the circumstances that led to Nia Glassie’s death at the hands of her family in 2007. It looked at the broken families and the cycle of violence.
A question occurred to me… When did these broken dyusfunctional families come into existence? I understand how such dysfunctionality can arise and how difficult it is to break, but I don’t understand when this started. Using the Nia Glassie example, she was effectively killed by the Curtis brothers who were raised in an incrediblty violent household, especially from their father Bill Curtis.
So Bill Curtis must also have been raised in similar circumstances, I assume, following the accepted logic and wisdom around this issue. Bill Curtis looks like he would be a baby boomer, meaning he was born around 1950-60. His parents would therefore probably have been born around 1930-40. Did Bill Curtis’s parents start the cycle? Or was it their parents again?
What I am trying to ascertain is when this destructive feature arose in these families. Was it in the 1950s? Or was it in the 1930s? Or was it the generation prior to that? Once that is established the next questions would seem to be around what circumstances existed in NZ at that particular time to ignite this destruction..? When and what circumstances?
Hi vto – my personal theory is that a large number of men came back to NZ from WW2, put everything behind them , married, raised a family, worked hard etc. Many were severely traumatised and the effect on children was sometimes extreme. Just a theory.
It is a great question VTO and would be a fascinating study.
I am not sure it is a 20th century problem. Discipline, was mistaken for violence for generations. Society as whole decided to break the cycle of violent discipline in the second half of last century.
The Curtis family was more violent that most others, but having a father that beat the shit out of his kids for them spilling some milk was not uncommon at all. It was not considered dysfunctional.
I don’t think it began during any period. I think it ended as a result of the left campaigning against domestic violence.
There are studies of this on the net. Once over lightly intro here at Te Ara http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/child-abuse/5
Essentially child abuse and neglect has always been with us. The ‘idyllic’ 50s and 60s were also a time of widespread ‘stranger’ child adoption, fostered out children and private and state run childrens/teens homes and borstals often with violent cultures. Mental health care was institutionalised with little public scrutiny with elctro shock therapy–ECT and ‘chemical straightjackets’ being worse than some disorders. Priests and others charged with looking after kids were often happily kid fiddling away.
Corporal punishment was the norm, can you imagine todays school kids being repeatedly whacked with leather straps and canes? Poorer kids were effected more as ever, the government used to run health camps where disadvantaged kids would go for 6 weeks and be properly fed up. Some is family bred, the abused as modern research show often go on to abuse. Spousal assault was viewed by the Police as a domestic until recent times, rape in marriage was not considered possible again until recent times. So New Zealand has definitely a dark sadistic past and some of us maintain it is still there in some with the bennie bashing etc.
So while today there is more reporting and social work around abuse and public campaigns that have made a difference there is also more of the factors that promote child abuse. It can be about power too, alienated men and women rendered useless by unemployment and poverty lash out at the vulnerable and feel good about themselves for a small while in obviously the most twisted way.
Yes I watched it as well, and of being that age myself I’m 57 I noticed the same thing when growing up in England. Alcoholism mixed with PTSD and god knows what other mental problems after WWII and there were NO psychologists and very few Psychiatrists and the favoured form of Torture treatment was the Electro shock therapy where they fried your synapses and screwed with your memory. So of course people kept away from the Doctor and also it’s not the image of a Man in the 50’s&60’s to have mental problems. And of course this attitude has just been handed down from Father to son and it’s a destructive cycle.
edit:Damn The word Torture should have a strike through, for some reason it didn’t work.
Truth in All The Above.
This can be one dark freakin country unfortunately. It is It is Extremely Necessary and Sufficient that
We Seek The Light
🙂
Very true Jokerman, very true!
IMO, When the nuclear family started to become the norm and extended families and community integration were shut down.
As far as NZ goes, I’ve heard that it was imported from Britain in the 19th century.
Labour was in power so it must be their fault, just like everything happening now is Key’s 🙂
Hmm, all interesting points. There is surely an element of the old school “discipline” hangover from colonists and other immigrants carrying over to the different norms of today. But it is seemingly more prevalent in polynesian families so how would that have transferred to them so viciously? I can understand how it has come about in families of british background but not how it has come about in the others, and when it comes to that when and how did it arise? We are told that it didn’t exist in pre-european maori society yet it exists today – when did that happen? In the generation of Bill Curtis’ parents born around 1930’s? Or the generations prior to that? 1930’s, 1950’s, 1910’s, 1880’s? When did it start? And then, why?
oh well, shall have to go elsewhere to find the answer …….
The Poor
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/08/new-delhi-westminster-cavalier-poor?
Monbiot on The Poison of Colonisation
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/08/empire-torture-kenya-catastrophe-europe?
Chavez The Faithful
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/08/venezuela-election-hugo-chavez?
Commodus
http://www.smh.com.au/business/markets/stocks-commodities-weaker-on-world-outlook-20121009-279v8.html?
The Olive Pit
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article36907.html?
For the upright will live in the land,
and the blameless will remain in it;
but the wicked will be cut off from the land,
and the unfaithful will be torn from it.
-Pr 3:21
God Bless Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers (“I Should Have Known”)
Thanks Jokerman.
The Manibot link was particularly powerful, and is very pertinent to the discussion at 3, above.
Muff McGillicuddy to visit Malaysia, Indonesia
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1210/S00137/mccully-to-visit-malaysia-indonesia.htm
What do you reckon might be on his agenda?
How to help bail out Australia with its refugee “problem” perhaps? ….and of course at the same time find a way of legitimising recent POINTLESS NZ legislation to do with those countless waves of “boat people/queue jumpers/illegals” we supposedly going to get.
Nearly missed this from yesterday. Hope Draco doesn’t mind but it seems important to me:
A simple clear statement of aspiration which would suit many, -I reckon.
Why would I mind? I didn’t write it.
BTW, it’s polite to include the link to the article.
Oops. The link as in “Spin me a brain exchange” did not survive the copy. Sorry. Anyway a great post.
Excellent article….. and advice. Thanks for the link. I absolutely agree with this clear statement of aspiration. We pass this way but once…..
In the last hour, Winston Peters has issued a press release saying he has evidence that the PM’s office knew about Dotcom earlier than previously stated. Key claims his staff didn’t pass the information on to him?
Simple question:
“Does the PM hold any concerns that he has been kept isolated from other important information by his staff?”
Love it.
Just listened to the news and it was all bad for key, real bad – Winston ripping key. I’m starting to believe that he might go down for this.
It’s the headline story on TV3 6pm news, and Garner reckons it’s not good news for Key.
TV One News haven’t included it in it’s headline summary. It’s leading with the cuts to youth wage.
I’ve taken to recording the 6pm news on My freeview so I can switch between them, and stop and start – flick through the ads.
I would like to know what documentation Dotcom has got from Power in regard to OIO if any and what the documentation from OIO is to Power and Dotcom. As well if Key signed anything to do with the OIO regarding Dotcom.
Different story to what he said in Parliament,where he now has to make a personal statement.Which which will be the third statement ( 3 strikes).Winston if framed correctly can now call him a liar in parliament thanks to Lockwood’s ruling.
Seriously:
There’s a pattern developing here and its been going on for a long time.
No-one tells John Key anything to do with Kim Dotcom! Could an instruction have been issued along the lines:
If its to do with that Dotcom guy, I don’t want to know?
Of course the Right Honourable Prime Minister John Key (Knighthood Pending), would be constantly thinking of high level Philosophical Aspirations for his Gated Planet Key, and therefore the trivial matters like Growing Unemployment, National Security Mega-upload, and unobtrusive constituents such as Kim Dotcom would not dare to be referred to him.
Beggars belief John Key. Either Dishonest, or Incompetent. Choose one.
Dishonest
It’s called Plausible Deniability, a term first coined by the CIA. What Key and the GCSB are doing is taken directly out of their handbook:
Yes. I can imagine Powers phone clerk in PM’s office. The clerk tells a special person. The special person tells Key in a lift or somewhere private. Key nods and says “I did not hear what you just said. Get it?”
The trouble with that is that the clerk knows Key knows.
If the staffer was Phil de Joux (as rumoured) then he would know not to tell Key.
Plausible deniability is more than just “I didn’t hear”, it’s having staff who know the drill in the first place. Those who have worked with Brand Key since he was in opposition (as de Joux has) would know automatically that protecting the Brand is paramount.
Now it begins to work against Key however, as it looks like what it is: a pattern of deliberate ignorance brought about by a strategy of active avoidance.
there’s a reason one-trick ponies are not regarded highly.
Oh, I’ll grant them it was a good trick for a couple of elections, but they need to pull finger and find something else doubleplus fast.
I agree – active avoidance + deliberate ignorance = shifty. And once that sticks down he goes.
“No-one tells John Key anything to do with Kim Dotcom! Could an instruction have been issued along the lines:
If its to do with that Dotcom guy, I don’t want to know?”
I’ve been thinking this for a while.
Key is very adamant he’d never heard of Dotcom before the raid. So I think there won’t be any evidence to contradict this claim, because he’ll have made sure there isn’t.
This FBI press release makes interesting reading, given that it was issued on the same day of the Dotcom Raid.
http://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/justice-department-charges-leaders-of-megaupload-with-widespread-online-copyright-infringement
With 8 Countries involved and the number of NZ. Government agencies acknowledged by the FBI for their “substantial and critical assistance” it is difficult to believe that Mr Slip, Slide and walk away was oblivious to what was going on.
Yes Lanth. He has always been pretty smug about his denials. But if he was in total ignorance some one or people must have believed that it was wise for the PM to distance himself – at least on paper, records or any traceable means. Maybe a leak might appear eventually to explain the link that must have occurred?
Why. So that his office can decide if he needs to know. They are all paranoid gatekeepers of information. Same thing happened under Clark. Just cos Heather Simpson knew about things didn’t mean HC did.
BS on that insider.
Helen Clark had this amazing really scary ability to know what was happening around her. She knew most ministers’ portfolios better than they did.
Key is the opposite. It seems that all sorts of carnage can happen around him and he has no idea, and he never sees it coming.
To compare him to Clark is to compare chalk and cheese.
Mickey I was comparing processes not people. I don’t think anyone would disagree that Clark was a micro manager and is a once in a generation event. but even she did not know everything her office knew at all times. Flunkies filter. That’s their job.
Flunkies filter. That’s their job.
Perhaps. But once your boss is telling the country that he had never heard of Dotcom before the raid, then it’s certainly the flunky’s job to tell the boss: “Excuse me Sir, the office knew” – so the PM can stop giving hostages to fortune.
Unless, of course, the flunky has been told (directly or not) that such information should not be passed on, even after the fact.
May have been a once in a generation event (I doubt it though as far too many people don’t get to sit in the spotlight to be able to tell) but I don’t think she was a micro-manager – she didn’t move into managing someone else’s responsibility unless that someone else fucked up. Just a manager that knew what she should have known.
They filter it down to bite size pieces – they do not keep it from the person they work for.
No they also filter out stuff that they don’t consider important or relevant, and timing and context are important criteria in those decisions. You’re saying the boss gets to hear about absolutely everything the minions know, just in précis. Organisations don’t work that way, because i suspect we all know that huge amounts of information gets passed on between individuals for a range of reasons, but not all of it is useful. Can you say that every single email you’ve received this week contained something relevant to you?
No, but I can say that if my boss ever goes on TV and says he’s never heard of somebody, and I had previously had a phone call from a senior colleague about that somebody, then I would make damn sure I told my boss about it after he’d gone on telly. To save his blushes, or mine.
So … Did Key’s office tell him AFTER Dotcom became NZ’s Number One news story?. There is a gap of eight months between then and now – during which Key has said nothing about it … until today. Until he was forced to.
Your “hear about absolutely everything” line is classic evasion by hyperbole. It’s THE thing for Key, and has been since February. Why has he wanted not to know – or say?
If they thought that the Dotcom stuff was immaterial and Key did not have to know about it then it is difficult to know what he would have to know about.
Is that what you really mean insider?
I’ve called ministers offices plenty of times and passed on info I’ve had no expectation of them hearing at the time. I’m briefing the officials just in case something related comes up and they can use it if they see fit. In July 2011 kdc probably was irrelevant to the pm. I don’t disagree that since January something should have been said by one of his officials somewhere.
Generally speaking, if it’s reaching the office of the PM then, at a guess, I’d say it was important enough for him to know about. He doesn’t need to know all the details but he does need to know about it. Sure, there’d be some that gets passed on to other ministers (wrong address) but stuff about intelligence operations would go to him.
There’s some confusion here- it was not an intelligence issue when either peters asked his question or powers office contacted keys. Your guess i think is wrong. Officials give each other heads ups all the time, just like peers in many organisations. That doesn’t mean the info is intended for the boss.
Bollocks insider. You’re not fooling anyone except yourself. When Simon Power contacted the PM’s office he was giving the PM a heads up on where things were at with Dotcom. That means he was given the information by a member of his staff.
John Key and his staff are indulging in “plausible deniability”. See Jackal @ 8.1.1.1
I wonder if the staff member was Captain Panic Pants?
Awesome idea Anne ….
They could have a the “Panic Pants Suit” on the wall for the next “Not John Key” meeting.
That way he’ll never forget 🙂
Diapers on the outside maybe M8!
The “Protocol” Grows M8!
Imagine the Bus ride to the Beehive!
Sorry, it wasn’t Panic Pants – Deputy Chief of Staff. Still, that’s a very senior staff member and he didn’t tell Key? Pull the other one.
Here’s the TV3 news item – pretty damming of JK in my view.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Documents-show-police-knew-Dotcom-a-resident/tabid/370/articleID/272091/Default.aspx
Actualy I remember that, Wasn’t it John Key himself who allowed Dotcom to buy the mansion?
(i.e. Vetoed his minister)
Would’ve been a Herald Article of course.
If you are going to cry bollocks anne getting the facts right first would help your case. It was one of powers staff not power himself. That lowers the issue down the food chain quite significantly.
It came from Powers office, and went to the Prime Mincer’s office. Where is that picture of the monkey chiefs covering their eyes and ears when you need it.
“..the Magical Mystery Tour…they coming to take you away…take you away….take you away.”
The difference here is that in July 2011, Simon Power knew that the FBI was interested in Dotcom. Recall: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10816772
That is probably the reason why he chose to inform the PM’s Office of his intention to deny Dotcom’s overseas investment application. And if that’s the case, then Key probably had some prior knowledge.
The fact is Power deliberated over Dotcom’s application for three months before making a decision. Is it believable that he didn’t discuss it with the PM at some point?
the US govt knows one thing for sure, having the growing middle east wars as a distraction allows all sorts of space for what you get up to at home. Remember, in the modern Amerika you are a suspected terrorist first and a citizen second.
“the extent that 1021(b)(2) purports to encompass protected First Amendment activities, it is unconstitutionally overbroad”
This ruling has been overturned, then an injunction was won, then a stay was put on the injunction, so now a whole bunch of other judges have been asked by the big boss man to secure the stay permanently and get his ‘lock em up then ask the questions’ law rolling nationwide. Sure it’s over in America so what does it matter right? Not like they are gonna start spying on kiwis, imprisoning people without charges, ask for troops on the ground or start flying Drone missions over here . . .
THE CHILDREN OF WAR
https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/208063_313184525455648_1734282819_n.jpg
night
“The Gold War”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10839360
and business not looking too positive in the land of the long grey crowd either according to the daily fish and chip wrappings.
(sorry Prism, it was “Infidels” by Bob Dylan i keep forgetting to reference)
What a prophet dear Bob has been; The only international concert i have seen was Bob with Patti Smith at a stadium in Christchurch; Patti Smith, now she is as wonderful as Helen Kelly and Julie-Ann
(i am such a man)
-“The Minstrel In The Gallery….looked down upon the smiling faces…”
who read todays Dompost?
one story is about Annette King complaining to the speaker of the house about craig (hamburger) heatley giving incoherent mumbling replies to oral questions.
On the letters page one writer is complaining about Russell Norman getting too much time on teevee3.
Nashnil cant have it both ways.
If they put up up drawling bumblers on the floor of the house who cant make it in the world at large then tough luck.
not craig heatley .. phil heatley
National determined to increase exodus
Be ready to wave goodbye to more of your loved ones, especially if they’re just trying to start out in the workforce…
From the foregoing survey of conspicuous leisure and consumption, it appears that the the utility of both alike for the purposes of reputability lies in the element of waste that is common to both.
In the one case it is a waste of time and effort, in the other it is a waste of goods.
“Theory of the Leisure Class”
-Thorstein Veblen; american economist and social scientist
Believe It, Or Not
https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/c0.0.403.403/p403x403/383437_506700752673514_1752747703_n.jpg
6090 people have decided to sell their red zone properties to the Govt.
The Govt is processing them a 50 per week ….
That’s 121.8 weeks before they’re all paid (2.34 years)
Ha yep, doesn’t pay to add up timeframes in Chch, they are too frightening.
Also, see my post at Mr Wrong re the government’s current smoke and fire around not being able to pay its bills. Perhaps the two are linked …….
Agreed, I’ve suspected this for some time now, hence all the belt tightening rhetoric.
2.34 years before some people will even start to rebuild their lives.
4.44 Years after the quake they start to rebuild.
And Brownlee is calling them ungrateful ……
What does this Gnat government actually do for us!.
Investigative Report on the U.S. National Security Issues Posed by Chinese Telecommunications Companies Huawei and ZTE
Those Americans are seriously paranoid, more than a little hypocrytical, and not willing to investigate the hardware properly for themselves.
I’m sure a good Engineer could suss those switches out in short order.
Hence the UK response.
and not willing to investigate the hardware properly for themselves.
Maybe they don’t need to.
While many of these techniques are not unique to Huawei, one only has to look at the CCP’s overtly totalitarian history vis a vis the internet (The Great Wall of China) to quickly conclude that they are wholly the authors of their own misfortune here.
Or maybe not so paranoid after all.
I feel we should give due recognition to the the benefits that this National led Government is delivering to many….(or perhaps I should say some):
http://localbodies-bsprout.blogspot.co.nz/2012/10/national-govt-brings-much-happiness-to.html
Video of Sydney cops tasering a student to death. Warning, contains nudity and police brutality.
But that can’t be real TRP, everyone knows cops are the best of the best doing the hardest most thankless job around for entirely altruistic reasons.
There’s no way the job would attract thugs and rapists and murderers, certainly not the kind of cowardly scum who would electrocute a man to death after they already had him in handcuffs.
If you haven’t seen the video of Gillard dealing to the, for now, leader of the opposition, it is soooooo well worth the 15 minutes.
http://t.co/YbGgkwcL
That’s a hiding.
Bloody hell. That’s a thrashing.
Spectacular!
Makes Helen look downright meek and mild. Impassioned and intelligently coherent at the same time … bloody impressive.
Unequivocal
+1
I remember when Julia Gillard became Prime Minister of Australia, she spoke of Helen Clark as “having been her role model.” Well, I could see Helen Clark standing there making exactly the same speech. Congratulations Julia.
I agree, but while Helen refused to engage with the vile misogyny that was directed at her (does anyone else recall the filth that was being email circulated in the months before the 2008 election?) … it’s remarkable to see Gillard name it and shame it so very directly.
it’s remarkable to see Gillard name it and shame it so very directly.
Snap, RL. I just said something similar.
‘kin A.
Thanks for the link. My impression was that the Aussie house isn’t as shouty as the NZ one. Gillard delivers her ticking off emphatically – but it’s in the way it’s stated, and the body language.
The opposition front bench looks a glum ,rum, unimpressed and unimpressive lot.
And Gillard does something I don’t recall Helen Clark ever doing: she publicly and clearly calls out the leader of the opposition, opposition MPs and members of their party for some of the slurs they have directed at her personally. She calls them out for calling out to her in the House that she needs to be made “an honest woman”; she calls them out for the way they refer to her as a bitch and a witch.
That’s the way to do it – take them on in public. Clark tried to avoid giving such slurs oxygen by publicly ignoring them.
Clark tried to avoid giving such slurs oxygen by publicly ignoring them.
That’s true Karol but I don’t think Helen had much choice. Most of the vitriol was being spread in bars, sports clubs, work-places etc. With the exception of the ‘childless’ barb, very little of it came out in the House or by way of the MSM. The ‘Alan Jones slur’ on the other hand gave Julia the opportunity to get stuck into all of them.
Most of the nasty stuff against Helen began very soon after she was selected to be the new MP for Mt Albert. She was extremely hurt by them, but because she didn’t know who was spreading them there wasn’t much she could do about it.
She did come out in public over the disgusting stories about her husband, Peter Davis but it didn’t stop her opponents from continuing to spread those stories.
Thanks for that. It makes complete sense. All I can say is that the slurs, the jokes and nastiness while obviously less personal and pointed for us than it was for HC, it was still nonetheless felt by many of us on the left as a malign, shameful episode in this nation’s history.
Collectively we owe her an apology.
Aye
New Zealand’s loss was the United Nation’s gain.
I saw Helen speak in NZ recently and I thought “why do we have this buffoon as a leader when we could still have Helen” …
What I can tell you RedLogix is: most of the individuals who started the rumours lived in the locality, and they all ended up in ACT. Are you surprised?
these Youth Wages; occupational trenching.into Agricultural Colleges.
Low Wages.What is the incentive? only the stick of benefit sanctions.
Low Wages.What is the incentive for productivity?
Low Wages.What will the displaced boomers live on?
Low Wages.Will keep young people domestically dependent.
Targeting Beneath Vote Majority. How Slippery Is That?
that Lovely Sister Wendy and her Art Illustrations.
Pay It Forward
Traditionally Modern
these “niche schools”. I enjoyed the exploration of the Sikh School from Birmingham.
“not counter-productive to their children” the Head suggested.
They Teach All Faiths; Teachers of All Ethnicities and Religions
Think Kura. (that John Tamihere, his mouth is less disciplined than Hone; arrogant! Wow!)
Key’s Sunset Boulevard:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunset_Boulevard_(film)
what I want to see is David shearer giving kweewee his beans.
that will be fun!
When spiritually successful men go bankrupt
http://gcxweb.org/Misc/LarryPile-OtherSideOfDiscipleship.aspx
As useful as a bucket of Dog Slobber – That’s our memory impaired leader – He and his Partys latest edition on the Jobs front. = $10,80/hr Jobs rate. Wooo Hooo economic Genius or what!
He and his fool minions have just handed all Fast Food Corparates a 33% profit increase on the wage bill they currently pay their young workers.
It’s a gift to companies already rolling about in a sea of excess cash. At the expense of the NZ worker.
One has to ask how desparate are these eejit Tories. And what else are they not telling an increasingly impoverished NZ public.
Bernie Monk rips John Key a new one for weaseling out of the effort to retrieve the Pike River dead. It’s a new personal worst in a month of lows for Johnny Sparkles and National may as well stop standing candidates in the West Coast for a generation or two.
“Mr Monk says he got the impression that the Pike River mine was no longer a priority for the Prime Minister – but told Mr Key that if he thinks that the issue will go away, it won’t happen”.
Weirdly, Stuff’s front page are reporting Key’s latest bout of forgetfulness under the headline “Pike recovery revisted”, but. hey, who needs sub editors these days?
The interview on Radio Live is even more devastating – one of the most passionate, furious denunciations of Key you will ever hear.
(audio on website from 4.45 pm … perhaps somebody with a fast connection could embed a link? I listened on ye olde radio …).
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/John-Key-not-supporting-Pike-River-families-proposal/tabid/506/articleID/31213/Default.aspx
Here ’tis.
“He showed no emotion”.
nada
Headless Chickens
http://gcxweb.org/Misc/LarryPile-OtherSideOfDiscipleship.aspx
oops,
Headless Chickens
(very distorted)
tempting Destiny.
other than those abominations, increased gestation of ethnic sectarianism may successfully parasite WASP capitalism
critical reflection
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foucault%E2%80%93Habermas_debate
“Verlaine…verlaine….verlaine….verlaine…”
I found this article by putting in the search engine ‘john key and bank of america’
It says that shonkey was the head of global forex at meryll lynch as they
transfered enough debt into the irish economy to completely wipe it out
along with the middle us classes and their homes.
Key started borrowing $380 million a week here in nz and i can remember
he was borrowing more than needed, ‘his reply from memory was that it
was ‘cheap money’,what he didn’t tell the tax payers of nz is that he has
substantial shares in the bank of america where he got those ‘nz’ loans.
From observations it seems that our ‘dear leader’ is steering nz in the
same direction as those economies he has overseen in his bankster days,
i would bet that he is still ’employed’ with them as a pm’s job is not a long
one, just long enough to cause a country immeasurable damage,there is a
concerning pattern emerging in correlation with what i have read.
Some good reading on www. mediawhore.co.nz.
Also bank of america bankrolls bathurst,so that is why the front bench
of the nacts are pushing the enviromentalist to back off court action,key
is ‘shonkey’ deep in this as well, what a ‘slippery’ slope, when we try to
deceive’ eh shokey.
I don’t think that Greens and Labour should jump in unequivocally to the Chinese-USA techno dispute. Back doors have been mentioned in the Chinese programs well Microsoft was accused of doing this. And as the USA is trying to flex its muscles over China we should be wary and try to remain neutral.
Unfortunately Australia feels threatened by its closer Asian neighbours and welcomes USA defence, there is a contingent in Darwin I think now, and as it aligns with the USA and we tend to integrate with Oz and sign up for TPP (all done in secret), it will be hard to think for ourselves if we ever get round to that.