Richard Seymour offers an outstanding summary of the miserable Remain camp in the UK…
His acute analysis of the arrogance of the liberal "centre' holds true here as much as in the UK.
"…What, then, has been the response of sensible liberalism to its downfall? For over three years, against this ruthless enemy of seasoned rightist militants, Remainers have launched platoons, battalions, phalanxes of blue-and-yellow unicorns. As if sent straight from central casting, they have called on every force of officialdom to try every improbable means to rescue them from popular malice and ‘mob rule’. An online petition to stop Brexit. Immediate re-run of the referendum. Revoke Article 50. Independence for the capital. One court case after another to overturn the result. Change UK (as little as possible). Install Yvonne Cooper as Prime Minister. Write to the Queen to stop Boris’s ‘no deal’. At no point in this blizzard of time-wasting, futile, impossibilist demands, has any part of the Hard Remain campaign taken seriously the forces of fervid popular nationalism, and its accompanying call to race war. At no point has it developed a serious strategy to split the forces of the Brexit Right, and undercut rather than consolidate the dramatic growth of popular reaction. It has rejected any word or deed designed to counter the Right’s race propaganda, insisting only that immigration can be ‘controlled’ within the European Union. If one had asked Nigel Farage or Jacob Rees-Mogg three years ago what sort of opposition they hoped for, and they answered honestly, they would have prayed for an antagonist so timid, loyal and yet libidinally invested as to constitute a symbiont. A phoney war is so much better than a real war.
Easy as it is to mock, the rise of liberal impossibilism has been an absolute political calamity. Having absolutely no grounding sense of its limitations, the Remain camp began by arrogantly disdaining ‘mob rule’, hoping for the institutions to save the day – as though millions galvanised by collective hate would simply give up if the establishment stole their victory. Having allowed the Right unchallenged claim to the idiom of ‘democracy’, they then undertook a cynical and groundless tilt toward a referendum re-run before there was any case for it and without any plausible strategy for victory. They have brooked no compromise on this issue that could split the Leave camp and have baited Corbyn relentlessly for his (momentarily successful) efforts to do so. At decisive moments, the most sensible of sensibles, the avatars of Remain liberalism, have acted to block such compromises, as when the Liberals and the CHUK/TIG splinter group voted down even Ken Clarke’s proposal for a customs union for being too close to a solution that might feasibly put the Brexit issue to bed. They have been unwilling to take ‘yes’ for an answer, braying with dismay even as Corbyn has ultimately given them the referendum promise they want. They have artificially cohered the schismatic forces of the Right when it was weak, and split the opposition for the sole reason that they cannot abide Corbynism. They have given the Right their yearned for ‘treason’ narrative…"
With the UK Parliament sitting for the last time for five weeks, returning just two weeks before the Brexit deadline, it has been an historic day and night at Westminister. The Prime Minister Boris Johnson is calling for a snap election, which has already been rejected once, and the Speaker John Bercow has announced his tenure will end at the next election, or by the date the UK is due to leave the EU – 31st of October.
Keeping abreast of the latest developments, Kathryn talks to Sir John Curtice, he's a professor of politics at Strathclyde University, and Anand Menon, who is the director of the UK in a Changing Europe initiative. He is also a professor of European politics and foreign affairs at King's College London and the co author of Brexit and British Politics.
And Seymour's analysis is proved to be bang on, as arch-sensible "centrist", arch-liberal and arch-Corbyn basher in chief Polly Toynbee has a sudden epiphany when it is all too little, too late…
And bang on cue, the Liberal Democrats are looking to shift their policy to Revoke Article 50 ahead of the election. That's no second referendum, the thing they've been advocating since late 2016 – just no Brexit at all.
This will have a double effect, and none of it's good;
Johnson's Tories will likely go No Deal in response and ally with the Brexit Party at any election. Electoral calculus puts that down as a big Tory/BXP win at the minute.
The Opposition, who had managed to inflict repeated defeats on Johnson (He hasn't won a vote yet) and was looking to form an electoral agreement regarding a second referendum/remain policies, can't do that now because the Lib Dems are now at odds with all the major Opposition parties.
Why? Well the Lib Dems hated the idea of supporting Corbyn in anything, and have repeatedly claimed he wants Brexit – when Labour's policy is to renegotiate the deal, then have a Labour Deal v Remain referendum – a referendum where Labour MPs would be free to support either side of the argument.
The fact that was becoming a desirable option for the Opposition meant they had to act, and in doing so they might have made it easier for Brexit to happen.
Yup. the Liberal Impossibilism of Jo Swinson overlapping with Farragist disaster nationalism.
You know, any good model should give you the tools to be able interpret past events in a way that allows you offer a reasonable prediction of the future.
Seymour's hypothesis of a symbiotic relationship between reactionary catastrophism and liberal impossibilism is looking good so far.
Seems to me the anti-liberals have been successfully suckered into shooting at the wrong target. The big factor accounting for the rise of problems like increasing inequality, decrease of community and social support etc is the rise of corporatocracy. Corporatocracy operates in direct opposition to one of the key ideas of liberalism, equality of all, by giving those few with power in the corporates a vastly increased influence in government and civic affairs.
Liberalism is now, at least from a class and economic perspective, indistinguishable from neoliberalism. That is the real problem.
"Liberal" has now become an epithet for a certain kind of pearl clutching, identity obsessed middle class hypocrite who spends his or her spare time uber-policing what is acceptable for discussion on the "left" in mind-bending detail and their work time ruthlessly managing in pitiless detail the authoritarian machinery of the neoliberal consensus from the position of comfortable white collar jobs. The obsession of our liberal conservative Radio NZ and the liberal twitterati with the minutaie of the management of a sex assault allegation within the Labour party fits this mode perfectly. They'll consume themselves with the viciously internecine politics of the tangential and utterly ignore the real problems of real New Zealanders then profess a perplexed horror when the oiks flock to a National party that as gone full Trump, before declaring "the establishment" must do something to protect them and their values.
"Nothing to see here. Move along to other stuff please"
[stop trolling. No more warnings, and I suggest you think very carefully before commenting on Labour’s handling of the sexual abuse accusations about how you comment, because I’m likely to ban people today who are politicising this or posting idiotic flaming comments – weka]
Would you please explain how the matter is not a political one when it is being handled by the political party and not by say the police? If it was being handled by the police then I would entirely agree with you that it would not be a matter to politicise.
It's a political matter in a number of ways. One is the politics of rape culture. Another is party politics eg Labour's handling of the situations.
Politicising is a different thing. It would be for instance right wingers using the sexual assault of women to Labour bash.
Your behaviour got my attention this morning, because you looked like you were gearing up to troll generally and I have zero tolerance for that today. The warning about politicising was an addition, so that if you start doing stupid shit I've already warned you and can move straight to moderating.
If you want to understand more, have a read of yesterday's Open Mike.
Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, consent of the governed, and equality before the law. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but they generally support limited government, individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), capitalism (free markets), democracy, secularism, gender equality, racial equality, internationalism, freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of religion.
Yup, I support all of that, with just a few caveats around the free markets bit to prevent the accumulation and exercise of corporate power.
In New Zealand, we are indeed uncomfortably close to a corporatocracy. The dominance and influence of a few corporate monopolies, duopolies etc should give us pause, but then there's the outrageous loopholes allowing foreign actors to influence our local politics by the simple expedient of setting up a local shell corporate and funneling cash through that.
As you have noted, none of our political parties seem interested in tackling the corporatocracy, Well, maybe there's a slight flicker of interest among the Greens. But that really isn't helped by those misguidedly attacking liberalism by conflating it with neoliberalism and neoliberalism's spawn, corporatocracy. Liberalism and neoliberalism really are very different things, despite the similarity in the label.
This discussion feels like a political shell game. If there is actually none of this liberalism stuff about in politics it makes scant difference if the greens prefix their criticism with neo or not.
And if you want to talk about unnecessary alienation you should just take a brief look through your own comment history. Its a case study in unnecessary alienation (mostly of collectives of political factions). Grow up and look at your behaviour before winging about how others percieve your political ideology is working out.
I think the think that pisses people off is where liberals support Corporatocracy (hence neoliberalism is still a thing). This seems fair criticism to me.
There may be some that self-identify as liberals that support corporatocracy, but I don't personally know any.
But I do know plenty of people that self-identify as liberal that are disgusted by the elements of corporatocracy we have, both here and in the US. These are people that get unnecessarily alienated by lefties attacking liberals and liberalism, when what is really being attacked is neoliberalism and corporatocracy.
Labour still support corporatocracy and most NZ liberals vote Labour even where they're not that happy with neoliberalism. But I think it would be fair to say that most liberals in NZ want a fairer form of neoliberalism rather than changing it.
The US situation is quite different I think.
I agree that the left attacking liberals is not helpful and think it is probably setting us back. That's different from critiquing liberals though. Fine line I guess.
Indeed. I would even hazard a guess that if they were presented with the definition of liberalism, the strong majority of Labour's supporters would describe themselves as liberal. Swing voters and Greens, too, prob'ly.
If presented the choice between liberalism with a bit of corporatocracy mixed in, and anti-liberal, I suspect most would choose to accept the contamination of corporatocracy mixed with their liberalism over being asked to give up the other aspects of liberalism they value.
Which is why I think it's important to be clear about criticising neoliberalism and corporatocracy, rather than giving the impression of wanting to replace liberalism with some form of illiberal alternative.
The Spinoff continues it's coverage of the second badly bungled Labour party assaults.
‘Incredibly frustrated, deeply disappointed’: Ardern speaks on Labour inquiry
The prime minister and leader of the Labour Party, Jacinda Ardern, has this afternoon responded to questions relating to allegations of sexual assault by a Labour staffer, and the controversial process surrounding an inquiry into his behaviour. She was “incredibly frustrated and deeply disappointed” by the way it had been handled, she said.
“I want to make it very clear that I am deeply concerned and incredibly frustrated by the process that has been undertaken by the Labour Party, but also obviously by the nature of the allegations,” she said, speaking to reporters at her weekly post-cabinet press conference.
“I was informed in the very beginning that the allegations made were not sexual in nature. That is obviously directly counter to what is now being reported.”
Ardern said she had attended a meeting of the New Zealand Council, the governing body of the Labour Party, on August 10, after the story was broken by Newshub. She had “very seriously shared my view that they were not the appropriate place to undertake inquiries around concerning behaviour by members of the Labour Party, but particularly they are not the appropriate place to ever undertake an investigation into a sexual assault, and that would be their view, too”, she said.
Following that meeting, Maria Dew, QC, was appointed to undertake a review of the original inquiry.
The prime minister would not say whether the individual at the centre of the inquiry had been stood down from his role in the Labour Party, but that “the person referenced in the article has not been on the precinct … for roughly five weeks now and will not be on the precinct at least for the duration of the inquiry that’s being undertaken by a QC appointed by the Labour Party.”
She said she does not believe the alleged is still attending party meetings and events
Ardern said she had “sought assurances that they were not [sexual in nature] in the very beginning. I have obvious since seen and heard questions in the media raised as to whether or not that was accurate.”
I understand Ardern distancing herself from this on political management terms, but she is at risk of being badly tainted by all of this failing of victims within the Labour Party.
She shouldn't be just seeking assurances that didn't work well after the first bungle.
She should be demanding immediate explanations and answers from Haworth, and if they are unsatisfactory responses he should either resign or be stood down.
The staffer should also be stood down pending the outcome of the latest inquiry. I think that's standard practice in other employment situations.
This is already seriously affecting Brand Jacinda, and is likely to be a major threat to Labour's re-election chances.
But the priority should be on doing as much as possible to rectify the appalling handling of this suffered by the victims. Of all politicians I would have hoped that Ardern would have stepped up and dealt with this properly, as she did with the mosque killings and got a lot of deserved credit. But on this she is on the debit side. perhaps she is too close to the problems and people to deal with it adequately.
[come on Pete, you know it’s a requirement here to link to cut and pastes. I’m short on patience today, so I suggest everyone ups their game when talking about this topic – weka]
This "Following that meeting, Maria Dew, QC, was appointed to undertake a review of the original inquiry" it is then hoped that all political parties "reviews" on this issue are properly aired.
Jacinda will take charge and decisively sack someone. She'll remain above it all because she was misled.
The liberal twitterati will unite with the mysogynistic right to neither forgive, forget or move on. Alex Casey will be lauded, and get a nicer and better paying job. The Liberal-conservative establishment MSM will applaud the PM's decisive action whilst spending the next few weeks raking over the stale muck at the bottom of the barrel – hey, this stuff writes it own feature article in papers no one any longer reads!
Meanwhile, 95% of the population will have no idea this "scandal" ever happened.
Sanctuary Your conspiracy and dismissive comments are ridiculous. The MSM is, if you ever bothered to read/watch it, heavily covering this and in great depth. It was even one of the lead items on TV news last night.
The MSM that you so disparage is still and will remain the primary source of news and information for most people. Check out readership stats for the main newspapers, dwarfs the readership of all the blogs combined. And for good reason.
The MSM is, if you ever bothered to read/watch it, heavily covering this and in great depth. It was even one of the lead items on TV news last night.
I thought the beat-up leading item on TV1 would have blotted out the following stories somewhat. SHOCK HORROR: $7m of taxpayer dollars are being spent, mostly by Tourism NZ, to promote New Zealand as a tourism destination. (/sarc/ if required)
and i read a herald yesterday (i was waiting for something – that is my excuse..)
could not believe what an irrelevant supermarket-giveaway/rag it has become…
and the m.s.m. has always bent the knee to powers-that-be..
(witness their craven grovelling before key..)
it has always – in the main – been a peddler of irrelevant crap/distractions..
and peddlers of rightwing memes..
(they just seem to have woken up to the fact that climate-change is a thing..)
there is nothing new there..
those online sources you so disparage – are doing the job the m.s.m. has consistantly failed to do..
and if you are including the likes of garner/richardson/hoskings et al as being this m.s.m. we should read/watch (for anything other than cheap laughs)..?
on the surface – it doesn't take a genius to conclude that it would seem he screwed up big-time -and is dead man walking..
but the q.c. inquiry will clarify that..
until them you are just flapping yr gums..
my takeaway from the ardern interview was her hinting that other labour party people colluded in keeping the truth from her..(something the q.c. is looking into..)
so if only for that reason – (aside from the original allegations) – this has more to run/reveal..
It seems odd to me that Nigel Haworth would give an account to Jacinda that can later be easily contradicted. My guess is the QC will exonerate Haworth and Bennett will be seen to have been playing fast and loose with the facts for political reasons….after all she has a track record on this.
Oddly driving today Sean Plunkett, no friend of Labour's agrees about Bennett and now hearing Bridges "opinion" on it says they are politicking in a pretty disgusting way. Essentially it should have gone to police and that you can not "sack" someone because of accusations alone.
What mess, I have changed my "opinion" on it at least four times now and don;t know what to think any more – sadly though B&B and the media will make sure that it is negative behaviour by any one to do with or associated with "Labour", possibly that was what was intended – so now I have a fifth option to consider.
I hope it backfires on B&B big-time and the media learns an overdue lesson, but that will probably set them on some Collins path of back back double or something.
What's really sad is paula and the media politicising it rather than wrapping the person up in love and taking them to the nearest police station to press charges.
It's sickening how paula is using this to score points it seems like this is paulas only angle, she's been baiting media with it for ages instead of taking action and looking after the person concerned. I'm fairly sure the person concerned didn't want it to play out like this.
Thank goodness it is clear that the victim stuck to her guns, it looks like the "media" was the only way past very naive (the kindest view), stupid or self-serving behaviour at the top of the party which does huge disservice not just to the victim but others as well.
Hopefully this will be a lesson in the face of wherever this or other abuses happens in NZ for people to listen and deal with it not just "manage" it to suit a narrow purpose.
There is something wrong with this story and it is not just Paula Bennetts involvement.
What if this is true:
“I was informed in the very beginning that the allegations made were not sexual in nature. That is obviously directly counter to what is now being reported.”
Alarm bells anyone? If the victim did not tell the Labour Party what is now in Spinoff, then the above quote is true. And if she did tell the Labour Party that harrowing story it will be in the minutes, but it seems so unlikely that Labour Party would just ignore such a story.
Everyone including the MSM (surprise,surprise 🙄 ) is jumping the gun here.
There was more than one complainant and as far as I can judge the other claims were more to do with bullying behaviour in the work-place. But "Sarah" (pseudonym of course) has now come forward with what are very serious claims of sexual harassment.
She is on record (I saw it yesterday somewhere) as revealing she did not originally report the full extent of the harassment she experienced because she was too afraid to. So, to be fair to the L.P. president, it is quite possible he and his advisers were not aware of them when they made their original decision to take the matter no further. People need to calm down and wait a few weeks when the report will become available before shots are fired in their direction.
It's time people thought more about the trauma and hurt suffered by this young woman and made so much worse by the publicity surrounding it. Many women over the years have gone through this process and been left feeling shamed, disbelieved and rejected by those who should have supported them and helped to facilitate a proper investigation.
I sincerely hope for her sake that such an investigation will eventuate because otherwise she will have to carry the consequences around for the rest of her life.
There was more than one complainant and as far as I can judge the other claims were more to do with bullying behaviour in the work-place.
And that is what Jacinda is saying. She said that the first that she knew of the serious sexual attack was reading it in Spinoff. Bennett attempted to attack the PM today Q5 but she was ruled out of order in most respects. I cannot get past a suspicion that National is using the victims not out of search for justice but to wound the Labour Party.
I see Ms Ardern is to talk to Mike Hosking and the alleged assaults. Waste of time. He has made up his mind on all things Ardern and Labour and the coalition.
I saw a t shirt on the street two days ago which would be a most fine addition to his wardrobes of finery, summing up his attitude:
"If you think I'm dick all of the time go fuck yourself."
Not completely implausible – the first the CIA knew of Pakistan's nuclear capacity (subsequently exported to North Korea) was when they read it in the paper.
Our spooks will naturally have been concentrating on things like identifying Rawshark, that would have gratified the then government – protecting our international reputation goes a bit over their heads.
It is well worth the effort rising a little earlier to catch one of the many gems being aired on Natrad's "First Up".
This morning it was Maori Council Chair Matthew Tukaki who, ahead of the impending announcement from The Beehive on the suicide prevention plan, is hoping like hell that there are fewer of the usual guard who have been leading the suicide intervention business for the past umpteen years and room (and funding) is made available for those with a much needed different approach.
Tukaki was channeling Mike King with the message that as well as 'mental health' we need to be teaching communities and individuals about the importance of listening…and basically being caring and kind.
Among them was a commitment to review or develop policies for sexual harassment and assault, bullying and the party's code of conduct, as well as introducing "a new open complaints process to enable complaints to be received and responded to without delay and with the appropriate degree of specialist advice".
Now, claims about Labour's approach to allegations made against one of its employees suggests the party has not changed as much as it should have – but its president may have to.
Ardern told John Campbell on TVNZ's Breakfast show this morning that Haworth sets high standards for himself, and implied she would not need to ask him to leave. I see no reason why he should wait another 4 weeks for a QC to report back to the party about the mess he has overseen. Less dignity every day that goes by.
Sacha would you consider the possibility that the Labour plan that you published above has been followed? Is it possible that the latest Spinoff report may not have been the same as what the previous complaint which had been dealt with by the enquiry last year?
The original complaint was that a staffer had behaved badly to several women. These complaints were dealt with. To fit within the process of enquiry they would have to have been of "lower" level.
The Spinoff complaint may be a "new" complaint has unheard of before now at least by the PM and possibly Haworth. It seems very very improbable that Haworth would have ignored the content of the "new" complaint if made at the original time.
To make judgements on insufficient evidence is rather cruel and Suzie should know better.
This is great news. The Work to Release Scheme was always a great thing, and one good thing that Judith Collins did was to significantly extend this scheme, at least within the ChCh prisons complex. Great move by the Coalition Government and Kiwirail!
Your mention of track workers reminds me of the time when Railways Minister Richard Prebble spoke of the complaint he had received from a passenger who scathingly wrote of the lazy track workers who were always leaning on their shovels when he passed by….
So who was worse – the middle-class snob on the train who assumed that the working class were lazy and undeserving, or Richard Prebble who knew that they aren't, but gave the anecdote oxygen anyway in order to boost his privatisation agenda? Answers on the back of a postcard.
In the House Minister Prebble was scathing of the passenger who, and this is the point of the story which is all about jumping to conclusions, jumped to conclusions thar the workers were lazy.
Prebble wrote back saying that it was not Railways policy for track staff to be working on a railway track when trains were passing over it……..
I can't see that boosting a privatisation agenda.
But I take the point about privatisation. I felt quite betrayed in Picton when I heard Prebble address staff on the Railways and then find out about privatisation later.
As I was when party president Jim Anderton visited our local LEC full of party rhetoric and then shortly after left to form his own party. He of course argued that the party left him.
MMP did do our political system quite some good in allowing people to find more congenial and less abrasive groupings.
Yep, agree with your comments re MMP. A positive change for sure.
I well remember that bs about 'saving rail' from Prebble. I joined NZR in 1987 and redundancies were already underway (itself classic stupidity – giving redundancy to existing staff whilst hiring new staff to fill the same role).
But to be fair, there were a hell of a lot of NZR workers who had no concept of 'work' (I am talking here about the admin staff). My first job was issuing the chits to buy boots. This had been the fulltime job of my predessor. It took me maybe one very slow hour a day!
Your recollection is better than mine obviously mac1. Given the 'Polish Shipyard' mythology that was propagated at the time, I connected two dots that weren't adjacent.
Dot connection is a human hazard. I had a neighbour who one Sunday pointed out the track workers engaged on maintenance. His take was that this was driven by the workers who got double time for Sunday work.
I pointed out that the work might be management driven, as there was less traffic on the rail line on a Sunday, and less disruption therefore to Railways freight moving business.
"Oh!" was his reaction.
Several months later. Same observation, same reply. Same old same old.
Explains a lot of political reality.
Argument does not necessarily defeat bias. As my old Latin teacher once infamously said, "I don't care what the book says, sonny, it's what I say that counts!"
Anyway I wish the Northland prisoners well. Anything that keeps them on track, so to speak……………
Latest update on Sharpiegate. It seems senior members of NOAA were threatened with dismissal if "contradiction" to Trumps's Alabama claim was not reversed.
We are a group of Labour Party members who are writing to you to urge you to immediately take action regarding the allegations of repeated sexual assaults, harassment and predatory behaviour of one of your staff, who is a member of the Labour Party, as detailed in these stories:
Some of us are the survivors. Others are their friends and supporters. All of us have watched in horror as this story has unfolded, as the survivors have been repeatedly re-traumatised, and as the Labour Party has run a shambles of a process that has enabled an alleged attacker and shut out his survivors. This issue has been discussed for too long in secret meetings and private conversations, and it is our hope that by drawing attention to it in the light of day we will get the action that the survivors deserve. We are sending this letter to the Labour Party caucus, the entirety of the New Zealand Council of the Labour Party, and to all Labour Party LECs.
What has been outlined in the stories is nothing short of sexual assault. What has been outlined as the party’s process in addressing this assault is nothing short of enabling. What has been outlined as the response from other parts of the party – for instance, a senior party official and ministerial employee telling a survivor that the alleged attacker was ‘too important’ to the party, or the survivors being banned from entering Bowen House or other parts of the Parliamentary precinct – is nothing short of despicable. Every day this enabling is allowed to continue is another day that the survivors are silenced and the alleged attacker is allowed to continue enjoying his position of privilege and authority within the party and indeed, your own office.
We know that you will be as horrified as us by the descriptions of the violent sexual attacks inflicted on these women, and we hope that you also recognise the many failures of the Labour Party in addressing them. With that in mind, we have a list of requests for you to consider, to right this situation:
1. We call on Nigel Haworth to issue a formal apology to all complainants in this investigation for the mishandling of the process under his leadership, at his direction and by him directly.
2. We call on Nigel Haworth to formally resign as President of the Labour Party and to withdraw his candidacy for re-election at the November Conference
3. We call on the New Zealand Council of the Labour Party to immediately amend the Sexual Harm Prevention and Handling Policy and the Investigating Cases of Alleged Misconduct Policy to specify that where a complaint is of a sexual nature, a Senior Lawyer or other Agency with specific experience in handling cases of Sexual Harm be delegated responsibility for the investigation. Or, if the complainant(s) consents, that the investigation be conducted by a panel of New Zealand Council per the current provision in this policy, who are given access to such an external agency to consult.
4. That the New Zealand Labour Party require all staff and New Zealand Councillors to undergo sexual harassment prevention and handling training
5. That the New Zealand Labour Party create a plenary session, closed to media, at the 2019 Annual Conference and that they bring in a Senior Sexual Assault Survivor Advocate to speak on the topic of institutionalised sexual violence, harassment and bullying.
6. That the Party’s ban on the survivors entering Bowen House and other parts of the Parliamentary precinct be immediately lifted.
7. That the New Zealand Labour Party inform and refer this matter to the alleged attacker’s employer, Parliamentary Services
8. That the alleged attacker be barred from attending Labour Party events until such time as the Appeal Process is completed and New Zealand Council have reached a final decision on whether or not to pursue punitive action from the resolution of that complaint.
Prime Minister, we have looked up for you for years as a champion of women, survivors and other marginalised people. To address this matter with the urgency and decency it deserves would be to justify the faith that so many place in you.
Appalling. As a member of the Labour Party I could not consider signing such a false and slanderous document. Until the facts are known desist.
No name on the petition. But I bet Bennett and her ilk would be first to further the Dirty Tricks element of this. I cannot believe that the Leaders of any organised group such as the Labour Party Council could behave as claimed. The smear in the meantime is being compounded by repetition and Pete George is facilitating this.
The letter is a form letter. It opens with a statement that we are Labour members. At the bottom it asks the signer to tick one of two boxes saying whether they are or are not a Labour member.
It is a nonsense to ask someone who is not a member to sign a letter which opens with a statement that they are a member.
What is the provenance of this 'open' letter?
Is a letter 'open' if a person does not sign it with a name?
Can the origin of the letter be clearly spelled out as to who the author is so that any person who considers such a signing may examine the authenticity of the document and of the matters which are alleged?
In a world of dirty politics, such questions must be addressed.
A bunch of naive 'members' who have lost the plot?
There is now an official investigation in place to establish ALL the facts after which appropriate action will take place according to the outcome.
To have a group of emotionally over-charged individuals passing judgement and demanding responses before that process is complete not only undermines the investigation but is ultimately unhelpful to the very people they purport to support.
Only if the women assaulted go to the police and lay a complaint. Even if they did that, Labour still has to deal with its own complaints process and employer responsibilities.
"ooo we completely fucked it up so we're going to overrule your wishes to satisfy the told-you-sos of perennially-unsatisfied talkback fuckwits" is an even worse response than what they seem to already have done.
Howarth can't be pushed out by caucus, but I suspect that very soon there will be a categorical vindication of what he wasn't told or evidence that he was explicitly told, and even without that some folks in Labour are probably already looking up "removal from office" clauses just in case.
At the root of this there are apparently more than a few complainants and complaints about a single individual, and Labour has apparently fucked up its response to every single complaint.
Whether this is the result of a group or individual in leadership intentionally protecting the individual, or systemic incompetence by well-meaning individuals missing emails, applying fucked up rules of fairness and evidence while conducting an incompetent investigation and an incompetently-scoped or incompetent review of that investigation, the bottom line is that this is beginning to look like the Labour party HQ has reacted abysmally in response to a difficult but foreseeable situation.
Women are afraid to go to the police. They fear rejection because it has happened to so many women before them.
What is worse, work-mates, friends and even kith and kin are not always supportive. They don't want to become involved, so they take the easy way out and convince themselves you're making it up or exaggerating. The perpetrators know this and play on it for all it's worth. Even the police will take the same line if it suits them.
I hope this young lady is now getting the support she needs and will be able to take her case to the police.
However, Stuff has confirmed swipe card records and CCTV footage have been checked and confirm he has not visited the parliamentary complex during that time. It would seem more and more that some of what is being said does not play out in reality.
Reminds me of the kind of thing that dickhead young Nat Ben Guerin specialises in these days.
Incidentally PG – I guess I called that one right after the reports back from the UK about the brexit false news and sexual predation at the unit that young arsehole went to help run for Crosby. https://publicaddress.net/hardnews/digital-persuasion-and-the-dark-places-of/ . Reminds me that I must dig out the article about sexual payoffs.
I'd suggest assuming it is bogus until the organisers prove otherwise. Google docs? Yeah right – how to be anonymous.
An “open letter to the prime minister” is circulated within the party by “Me Too Labour”, an unnamed “group of Labour Party members who are writing to you to urge you to immediately take action regarding the allegations” surrounding the staffer. It makes a series of demands including the resignation of Haworth. The letter, which The Spinoff has verified originates from party members, had by lunchtime attracted more than 100 signatures.
I just had a read through the various articles that have been circulating.
These are my observations from what is visible in public.
The current claims as far as I can see haven’t been directly reported to anyone actually legally capable of actually investigating them. If the behaviour is unlawful or even close to it then it needs to be reported to the police by the complainant. FFS one of these sounds like an unreported assault! If it is workplace related then it needs to be directly reported to the employer. Frankly, not taking a complaint to the appropriate authorities just hamstrings any investigation and any reporting on it. In both cases take along supporting people and get a record of the interview.
From what is reported, the Labour party itself hasn’t been the appropriate place for any complaint to have been laid for the claims of the victims. The occasions sound as if they were either social or private within the legal sense of how these are handled. The NZLP should have been informed and taken some kind of action – which it sounds like they have done. But they are hamstrung because the only real sanction that is possible would be to dump the persons membership. That requires an actual formal complaint and request to the NZ council, a vote, and probable court action like a judicial review.
So what we’re left with is a series of allegations by various people against someone else with apparently no substantive actionable complaint and therefore no possibility of any through investigation looking for substantiating evidence. Which simply isn’t good enough in all respects. It lacks any natural justice for the alleged victims or the alleged perpetrator – and a ridiculously daft trial by media.
Now I’m sure that I’m going to get the arguments.
Who would go to the police given their awful track record on handling everything from sexual harassment to rape complaints that have subsequently proved to be unlawful. Same for the usual issues with HR departments protecting the arses of bullies and sexual predators. That I agree with.
However the issue here for me is that I can’t see alleged victim actually taking the critical step of laying a formal complaint. I’d advise that gets done as soon as possible because in the framework of our legal system, merely making an allegation is completely and utterly meaningless. It simply denies investigation justice to anyone involved – including any future victims and future employers.
Basically indignation is cheap, it sells newspapers, and it allows oppositions an easy way to attack governments – which they seldom follow through on. It simply doesn’t change social and legal structures. It is a meaningless gesture. Something that I’m not that interested in.
For that you need some serious discussion
If you want to change the laws or the behaviour and obligations of the police and employers then that is a target that I’m happy to work on. The problem there, as always, is coming up with workable solutions that work within the legal framework for the problems that are below our current legal thresholds of evidence and proof. To date I haven’t been seeing many of those out of the various me too campaigns. I’m afraid that merely making an allegation doesn’t meet my standards of evidence.
What has been clear in the media is that the negative coverage in this case has been directed towards Labour party, who by the sound of it isn’t the employer, isn’t the police, and appears to have not had a formal written complaint detailing the allegations directed to the NZ council – its governing body. Having hearsay uncorroborated reports of what was said in interviews with Nigel isn’t exactly any kind of evidence I could take much credence in.
Personally I just find the process being used to have been deeply suspicious. It doesn’t look like it is calculated to actually have anything apart from indignation. It certainly doesn’t seem to orientated to get a resolvable outcome.
Could someone please advise whoever is talking to the media to just lay some actual complaints using the formal processes (not some anonymous form letter on google docs).
The problem here is that our legal system requires that individuals have to front up with formal complaints before our legal system or employment systems can do much. The most that can be done legally to an alleged perpetrator otherwise is to remove them from situations that could be problematic. Which appears to have been done already several different ways.
So lay formal complaints to get action.
FFS: PG – you should know this. In a different context, but with the same underlying principles, do you regard the allegations by Dermot Nottingham against you or me to have been accurate? It took a formal complaint to the police (which was rejected) followed by a private prosecution to get that to a resolution. That is a process that is in place to allow action whilst sort of protecting all sides.
You simply can’t take much action on an simple undocumented allegation. Actual formal complaints to the appropriate places are what is really required. The people making allegations should get some support and start the process.
I think you're largely missing a key element in this issue – complainants who are Labour Party members and volunteers, and a seemingly significant number of other party members, appear to be extremely disappointed with how the party has dealt with all of this, and are increasingly disappointed with how Ardern is dealing with it.
They have said that they aren't keen on laying a complaint with the police, considering the added trauma this often entails, and the low success rate. The summer camp prosecution shows how complainants can be depicted as 'asking for it'.
What I think they want is for their party to deal with this specific issue properly, albeit belatedly. They want Ardern to walk what she has talked often enough. They want the decent party they were promised. They're not getting anything like that.
I think you’re largely missing a key element in this issue – complainants who are Labour Party members and volunteers, and a seemingly significant number of other party members, appear to be extremely disappointed with how the party has dealt with all of this, and are increasingly disappointed with how Ardern is dealing with it.
Look I think that you’re basically missing the point here.
Some of the allegations made appear relate to activities that are unlawful in nature – they should be complained about to the police and haven’t been.
Some should be of concern to the employer, parliamentary services, and don’t appear to have been complained about to them.
The allegations that I have seen appear to have had only peripheral relationship to the Labour party in that it is alleged that the perpetrator is a member of the Labour party (as I am) and some of these the alleged activities have happened on the periphery of Labour party organising activities.
When I give up my membership fees to the Labour party, I don’t authorise them to be a ruling body over my life for anything except my membership and the formal parts of Labour party activities – like being able to go to meetings. Other aspects of my life certainly aren’t constrained in the contract in the way that I have (for instance) in my employment contracts.
What exactly is your point?
So far, what I can’t see is any direct line of responsibility to anything that the Labour party is actually responsible for beyond making sure that the participants don’t come in contact with each other at functions. And as far as I can see that was done early. The best that they could possibly do is to remove the membership and to try to learn what do do about this kind of issue in the future.
They have said that they aren’t keen on laying a complaint with the police, considering the added trauma this often entails, and the low success rate. The summer camp prosecution shows how complainants can be depicted as ‘asking for it’.
So? Until the law is changed (if it ever could be in these kinds of circumstances) then that is what has to happen. Nothing can be done without formal complaints to the people and organisations with the appropriate responsibilities. In this case the police and/or the employer.
That is because there are laws constraining what anyone else can do. I can’t fire an employee of parliamentary services – nor can the Labour party. Even the employer can’t fire them without cause – it just leaves them open to a lawsuit and even possible criminal prosecution. The police are constrained about investigating without a complainant. The courts can’t act without someone
I can’t go and name the person involved, even if I wanted to (and so far I haven’t seen anything substantive enough for me to wanted to do so), without facing legal actions against me.
What I think they want is for their party to deal with this specific issue properly, albeit belatedly. They want Ardern to walk what she has talked often enough. They want the decent party they were
promised. They’re not getting anything like that.
Ignoring your rhetorical allegations about promises – which weren’t what you are bullshitting about
The party is limited by laws about what they can and cannot do. I personally wouldn’t want to any other way. I know exactly how I’d react if someone tried to exert an authority that they neither I nor society via the laws conceded them.
Wishing for magic simply doesn’t work for dealing with situations like the allegations being made. It requires that someone actually formally complains and to the appropriate place(s).
To do anything else is to simply allow meaningless indignation and no bloody action. So far that is all that I am seeing.
I haven't read the full discussions here on TS on this subject over the last few days, and so far only your exchanges with PG above, but a part of your comment above quoted below stuck out to me, ie:
Some should be of concern to the employer, parliamentary services, and don’t appear to have been complained about to them.
I am not disputing or questioning your comment but wondered whether you watched Question Time yesterday as there was an interesting exchange between Trevor Mallard, as Speaker etc, and Paula Bennett (plus Gerry Brownlee) under Question 5 where Bennett questioned the PM on this matter which appears very relevant vis a vis your comment above ie this comment by Mallard:
EDIT – damn it, it really needs to be read in context so here is the whole of the exchanges under Q 5 with the specific relevant comments bolded:
Question No. 5—Prime Minister
5. Hon PAULA BENNETT (Deputy Leader—National) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by her statement that "On … the difficult issues, the hard issues, we will be there, we are there in those conversations"?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. I stand by my full statement which was: "On issues like Ihumātao, the difficult issues, the hard issues, we will be there, we are there in those conversations". I went on to describe the importance, in this situation, of trying to find a by Māori for Māori solution to the issue.
Hon Paula Bennett: What is her response to the open letter sent to her as Prime Minister by Labour Party members regarding the allegations of repeated sexual assaults, harassment, and predatory behaviour by one of her staff?
SPEAKER: Order! There are a number of reasons I think I could rule that question out, part of which is ministerial responsibility—but it must relate to the original question. Taking a partial quote on another issue and suggesting that it relates to a secondary issue is not an acceptable way of working.
Hon Paula Bennett: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. A couple of things, Mr Speaker, then, if I can just clarify: so the open letter is blatantly to the Prime Minister—
SPEAKER: Yes.
Hon Paula Bennett: —and so it certainly is, in that respect. And as far as a quote around hard issues, then I think it is a direct quote. And this is certainly one of those hard issues that I would imagine the Prime Minister would have comment on.
SPEAKER: I can understand where the member is coming from. The area that the member is referring to is an area of my responsibility. The fact that someone else has been written to about it does not make it their responsibility. The member might want to try rephrasing her question to get it within the Prime Minister's responsibility.
Hon Gerry Brownlee: Speaking to the point of order, while I appreciate you correctly saying that it may well be in your area of responsibility, I think it is also reasonable that we believe the public statements of the Prime Minister. One of those statements, in an interview with Mr Hosking, was that she is the employer in this case. I don't think, therefore, it's reasonable to have the Prime Minister making that claim in the public arena and then not being able to answer questions, having said that, in this very public arena also.
SPEAKER: The member will be absolutely aware that in this particular case the Prime Minister is not the employer. The fact that she may have said that she was, she was wrong. The member trying to use that as a way of getting a question for which I have responsibility—there is not ministerial responsibility for this—is not appropriate.
Hon Paula Bennett: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. So the Prime Minister can go out and categorically make a statement that she is the employer, and because you then judge that that is incorrect after the fact, she then no longer has to make—so can she make statements about anything, be wrong, and you then make that judgment?
SPEAKER: If the member had asked a question about the Prime Minister's statement—which happened to be incorrect—then I could well have allowed it. But the fact that the Prime Minister has made a statement in a particular area does not bring an otherwise out of order supplementary question into order.
Hon Paula Bennett: Thank you. My supplementary question is: when the Prime Minister is addressing difficult issues, does she include that in regards to allegations of repeated sexual assaults, harassment, and predatory behaviour that are alleged to have been done by one of her staff?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes. I will be clear, of course: convention in this House, of course, requires me to respond to those things that I have ministerial responsibility for. But I will answer in general terms. The member will have seen that I have conducted a number of interviews this morning, and will continue to answer those questions from my capacity as a Prime Minister. Of course, we need to make sure that we have environments in all of our workplaces that meet the expectations of alleged victims, and that respond to those situations. There are things that need to be dealt with here, and I will continue to work to ensure that they are addressed, whilst also taking very seriously my responsibility as leader of New Zealand to create a justice system where people feel confident going through. We have seen an example—[Interruption]
SPEAKER: Order! Now, the Prime Minister will sit down, and I will hear the rest of this in silence. Some of us have been dealing with this issue for some time, and having the points of view of survivors of alleged abuse shouted down when they are put to the House is just not acceptable in the 21st century.
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: So I do take very seriously the systemic issues we need to address in our justice system so that we have an environment where people feel, and victims feel, comfortable using that system. We have seen clear examples in the public domain currently where that has not been the case, and I take that very seriously.
Hon Paula Bennett: Has she seen reports in the public domain where victims were told not to go to the police but keep their complaints internal?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I can speak for the area where I have responsibility. I would never, ever, ever encourage someone not to take a complaint to the proper authorities. The member, if she reflects back on my statements in this House—I have conveyed that time and time again. What we have to accept is that some do not feel comfortable doing that. We have to improve our system. That is the place where we're most able to take these issues forward—through our criminal justice system—and we have a lot of work to do to fix that.
Hon Paula Bennett: Is it correct that her Minister of Finance, the Hon Grant Robertson, has known about the allegations made about a staff member in her office for some time, and does she expect us to believe that she hasn't spoken with him about it?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, I've answered many questions on this issue in the public domain, but what I will stick to in this House is convention, which is answering where people have ministerial responsibility.
Hon Paula Bennett: How many of her Ministers know about these allegations concerning one of her staff members?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, I refer to the previous answer. Again, this is an area where I absolutely accept the public interest, and I'm responding to that, but when I'm in this House I will maintain the conventions of this House.
This seems to suggest that Mallard as Speaker (and thus his role in respect of Parliamentary Services) has been involved for quite some time.
I will butt out now, but thought you might be interested if you missed yesterday's QT. I suspect there will be more today …
I'd guess that someone has referred the articles and information to Parliamentary Services and something has been done about it. Probably after the newspaper reports in August.
It may even be that a complaint may have been laid with Parliamentary Services. I can't remember when the statement by Mallard was about a lack of complaint – but I thought it was weeks ago.
That probably relates to the 5 weeks at home by the person in question.
But there is a pretty strong rule about (with good reason) about parliamentarians not being in an employment relationship with their staff and that is the role of parliamentary services. It doesn’t take a lot of work to dig into the archives to find instances of bullying and abuse by MPs.
But that is the correct approach for bullying in situations related to employment related behaviour issues – the employing organisation. The trick after that is to follow the process rigorously and make damn sure that you have support and a timely written and preferably signed by all parties record.
For some it seems a prime requirement to be head of the Labour Party is to have a hanging rope which is automatically used on anyone accused of anything. Failure to implement the action instantly should entail resignation. Those thinking like that will never change their minds.
I think we are in insane period of our political history. The affront and aggrievement National and their supporters feel for not being elected is at a festering, resentful, desperate stage. The bitterness coming from that would normally be a spectacle the rational could put into context and appreciate for the circus it is. Instead it has became the wallpaper, we wouldn't know what to do without it.
The Conservatives/Right have come to feel a sense of entitlement as the left has fallen before them with neo lib, free market taking over, unions under pressure, Communism beaten – the world is theirs. But what's this, the NZ Labour Party sneakily getting elected making a stand about something – ridiculous. What stone did they crawl out from under? The British Labour Party thinking they can run the country better, ditto.
I am really incensed at the continued use of the term : "synthetic cannabis" in the news media.
": something resulting from synthesis rather than occurring naturally especially : a product (such as a drug or plastic) of chemical synthesis "
there is no relationship claimed or shown between this "synthetic cannabis" and the active ingredients in natural cannabis. This relationship would be essential if any drug were to be described as "synthetic cannabis" THESE DRUGS ARE NOT "synthetic cannabis"
furthermore in tvnz news frequent reference is made to "this drug" there is no claim or evidence to suggest that we are dealing with a single identifiable chemical (which quite possibly there IS that is causing these deaths)… what is it?
This is sloppy reportage and given the proximity to a referendum on real cannabis a scientifically and factually misleading headline linking "synthetic cannabis" and deaths is either ignorant or dishonest.
They may be chemically (structurally) unrelated to ‘natural’ cannabis but many are pharmacologically related in the sense that they target and activate the same cannabinoid receptors in the brain.
An open letter to Ardern has emerged calling for Haworth to resign, but he told reporters this morning that he was confident he had handled the process "professionally".
He batted away further questions, refusing to say when he was first told about sexual assault claims.
"I am making no comment on the current processes. I am bound by confidentiality.
"I am not resigning. I am going to look at my situation as the process develops. If I have been found at fault, I will consider my position."
The 19-year-old complainant told The Spinoff that she had told Haworth of her claims of sexual assault during a meeting in a private room at Wellington Central Library, and then told the party's investigating panel both verbally and via email.
But Haworth rejected that.
"The serious allegation of a sexual assault, outlined in The Spinoff article and in other media, was not provided to the president and acting general secretary at a meeting in the Wellington Central Library or subsequently to the Labour Party Investigation Panel," he said in a statement this afternoon.
It seems to me that all is speculation until we get the report from the Q.C. – which must be made public.
Paula Bennett is taking "attack politics" to new depths and she is working straight out of the Crosby Textor manual. If the report from the Q.C. shows that the actions taken by all those involved were entirely appropriate then Bennett will end up with "egg all over her face". That would be a most satisfactory outcome.
If Paula Bennett's attacks on individual Labour personnel turn out to be false then she is the one who should resign.
I also think a clear separation should be made between the young woman who was sexually assaulted and the other complainants. As far as I can ascertain their claims were about workplace bullying which is a matter for Parliamentary Services not the Police. I also suspect they are being manipulated by Paula Bennett and co. for political gain and that doesn't make me feel too sympathetic towards them. They should know better.
so you want to isolate the victim of a sexual assault from her peers, and what appears to be her support network in this case?
Im not sure what school of victim support you came from Anne, but those actions lead to silencing and the enabling of rape culture. It sends a clear signal to others in the structure that behaviour like that alleged will be isolated to make it easier to make it disappear.
[lprent: She didn’t say that – she expressed concern that Paula Bennett was involved. Which is pretty reasonable considering that Paula Bennett has some pretty good motives for attacking the Labour Party and a track record of apparently leaking sexual allegations to the media for her own political purposes in the Jamie-Lee Ross breakdown last year. That is what I assume that was the ‘support network’ you were referring to.
If you wish to directly lie about what other people have said then I suggest you return to a place like Kiwiblog where that is expected behaviour. ].
Climaction serves to confirm how dirty the Nats play this seedy game. I was pointing out that the victim of alleged sexual assault – for whom I have much sympathy and compassion – comes under a different and more serious category than what appear to be the complaints of the others.
Another person (male) has gone to media, corroborating what others have claimed, and claiming the accused man took a swing at him when he confronted him over his treatment of women, and claims a separate physical assault.
Labour assault investigation retraumatised victims – witness
A man who says he was assaulted by a Labour Party staffer would like to meet with Jacinda Ardern to discuss the party's handling of claims of sexual abuse and assault.
This is a problem that doesn't look like going away for Ardern and Labour. Waiting weeks for the outcome of the QC inquiry to be completed may be too little, too late to avert or stem irreparable damage.
This may or may not be a different complainant again but the claims are a little different to what was said on RNZ.
Former Labour party volunteer says he raised allegations with party president Nigel Haworth
But one of the 12 complainants told Stuff he directly raised the matter with the investigating panel in March this year.
He has provided Stuff with an email he sent to Haworth in May which refers directly to "this investigation …which involved elements of predatory behaviour, sexual violence and physical violence."
And the man says he spoke about it in a two-hour meeting with Haworth in early July.
Haworth has been approached for comment but has not replied.
"I definitely had those conversations with him and there is an email proving it," the complainant told Stuff.
[lprent: A email printed from the senders computer that may or may not have been sent simply isn’t ‘proving it’. It is an allegation. You’d have to be an fool to believe to think that it constitutes proof. I believe that there was a denial of receiving it? ]
Good frost this morning,and soil temperature 8 degrees and the soil is at field capacity as measured by the neutron probes. Average cover of 2165 as measured by the Satelites and supply should meet demand on the 27 th of September .It's been a lovely day and I planted some natives down the swamp . This current wave of madness will pass,and common sense will prevail.Looking forward to going whitebaiting tommorrow.
"While the birds were generating more than 50 per cent of ecoli in the river, it was still important to reduce other known sources, like livestock, he said."
Low river flows due to low rainfall cause all sorts of problems. Look at how the Selwyn river has rejuvenated over the last 2 years , after some decent rain.The farmers that stopped pumping from deep bores and now use CPI water have also helped restore river flows and groundwater levels in that area.
Canterbury was deforested by Maori moa hunters many hundreds of years ago.I often wonder what our natural landscape looked like pre-Maorideforestation.
Reverting back to what the moahunters dun lots and lots of years ago, and then trying to put a gloss of an educated modern viewpoint to your comment is a sort of oxymoron or something.
Just try and stay in the now Ian, it is obvious from reading your comments that you have trouble understanding present and near future problems and those of even 2030 are going to be required reading for you to catch up.
Yes if you drive a vehicle in NZ you will be fouling our rivers from road contaminants emitted from vehicles.
Many types of contaminants including ‘micro plastics’ in the form of ‘tyre dust’ are killing all our invertebrates which are the life of our waterways.
I do get out on the road occasionally and have often wondered where all the tyre tread, brake and clutch linings end up. Having road frontage on a busy state highway probably means that my farm is being contaminated as I type. We should be planting riparian strips along roads to protect our land from all this shit. Those Ev's powered by slave labour are not exempt either.
The British scientist finding water and a atmosphere on planet k2.18b that could be habitatable is cool . I agree we have to look after this planet first don't stuff up your own back yard.
Chris this whole situation with our governments staff issues is man made many un answers question around this the right wing people are very maliptive they will do any thing to win.
I think it's is a great day when we are finally going to be teaching our OWN history of Aotearoa to our tamariki.
I just hope it is factual and not used as a tool to make Tangata Whenua O Aotearoa look bad. We are one of the few indigenous cultures to be colonised and still have Mana and some Whenua left thanks to our TIPUNA. A lot of other indigenous cultures look to Maori as a Mounga for their fight for Equality.
I say it needs to be taught The truth about the World War 2 holocaust. Mrs Goldstein evey one should learn to respect other cultures just because some are different doesn't give anyone a reason to disrespect anyone. That is one reason WHY Eco Maori is discussed with the Altb Right who impower the HATERS to try and win votes.
NO to air nz Trade marking Kia Ora Te reo is Tangata Whenua O Aotearoa taonga and I think it stinks that a business is trying to get exclusive rights to Kia Ora. I say it OK to use Te reo and Haka but to try and steal it in front of OUR Eyes is a insult there are links to this issue.
TV 3 I thought it was Te Reo Week one day of support doesn’t cut it in Eco Maori View
Ka kite Ano
Its is going to be a lot less expensive investing a Trillions now than risk OUR WHOLE SOCIETIES to collapse that is were the direction that the carbon pro people are trying to take US
World 'gravely' unprepared for effects of climate crisis – report
Trillions of dollars needed to avoid ‘climate apartheid’ but this is less than cost of inaction
The world’s readiness for the inevitable effects of the climate crisis is “gravely insufficient”, according to a report from global leaders.
This lack of preparedness will result in poverty, water shortages and levels of migration soaring, with an “irrefutable toll on human life”, the report warns.
Trillion-dollar investment is needed to avert “climate apartheid”, where the rich escape the effects and the poor do not, but this investment is far smaller than the eventual cost of doing nothing.
The study says the greatest obstacle is not money but a lack of “political leadership that shakes people out of their collective slumber”. A “revolution” is needed in how the dangers of global heating are understood and planned for, and solutions are funded.
How global heating is causing more extreme weather
The report has been produced by the Global Commission on Adaptation (GCA), convened by 18 nations including the UK. It has contributions from the former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, the Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, environment ministers from China, India and Canada, the heads of the World Bank and the UN climate and environment divisions, and others
I ran across a recent essay from The Brothers Krynn, which attempts to map common horror monsters onto the Seven Deadly Sins: https://canadianculturecorner.substack.com/p/horror-monsters-and-vice My interest, however, is not in the meat of the piece, but rather the opening paragraph: It is an interesting fact that in recent decades, Vampires have ...
Buzz from the Beehive Transport Minister Simeon Brown dutifully issued advice to all road users to keep safe on our roads during the Easter weekend. He encouraged them to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. ...
Oliver Hartwich writes – New Zealanders recently learned about a new feature film. It will be about former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern – and taxpayers will subsidise it to the tune of NZ$800,000. Ardern had nothing personally to do with either the film or the subsidy. But her government’s ...
TL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate news for Aotearoa-NZ this week, and a discussion above that was recorded yesterday afternoon above between and The Kākā’s climate correspondent : An independent review panel into the emergency response to Cyclone Gabrielle in Hawkes Bayconcluded “that ...
There are now only a few days left to give feedback on the Draft Government Policy Statement (GPS) on Land Transport 2024-34 (see our earlier post this week on GPS submission guides). As we’ve reported, the GPS is a disaster for Local Government, so we were particularly interested to hear ...
Willis has pledged to go ahead with the debt-funded tax cuts, despite growing opposition from her own supporters worried about appearing fiscally irresponsible. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for ...
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
COMMENTARY:By Ronny Kareni Since the atrocious footage of the suffering of an indigenous Papuan man reverberates in the heart of Puncak by the brute force of Indonesia’s army in early February, shocking tactics deployed by those in power to silence critics has been unfolding. Nowhere is this more evident ...
Analysis - Nicola Willis is holding firm on tax cuts despite the economic outlook being worse than forecast and critics urging her to wait, writes Peter Wilson for The Week In Politics. ...
Opposition MPs and unions are criticising a proposal by New Zealand’s Ministry of Pacific Peoples to cut staff by 40 percent. The country’s largest trade union — The Public Service Association — says the ministry has informed staff that it is looking to shed 63 of 156 positions. Opposition MPs ...
A poem by Poetry Aotearoa Yearbook 2024 featured poet Carin Smeaton. Daughtr of the 90s when she gets promoted to usherette a baby blu eel carries her all the way up to mothership she’s hovering high she lets the underaged in to see keanu reeves she lets the only lonely ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Keith Rankin, trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand. My earlier article – Can ‘Good’ be the Greater Evil? – looked at the issue of how wars should end, and how Good versus Evil ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 AMMA by Saraid de Silva (Moa Press, $38)A stunning debut novel reviewed by Brannavan ...
From Steve Martin to Ricky Stanicky, a pick’n’mix of things worth watching and listening to this long weekend. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. If you’re at a loss for something to occupy yourself with this Easter, don’t panic: The Spinoff’s got ...
Jesus had dinner with his 12 disciples right before he died. Noted historian Madeleine Chapman finds out who really deserved to be there.First published in 2018 but let’s be honest, the subject is timeless. As you sit on your couch this Easter Sunday, eating a chocolate egg you know ...
The newly-promoted Northern League club is on a mission to return to the National League for the first time in two decades. Plenty about domestic football in New Zealand has changed in that time – but the sense that this amateur competition is not an entirely level playing field remains. ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Friday 29 March appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Hesp, Professor, Flinders University Patrick Hesp In some parts of Australia, coastal dunes are retreating from the ocean at an alarming rate, as waves carve up the beach and wind blows the sand inland. But coastal communities are largely ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Heemsbergen, Senior Lecturer, Digital, Political, Media, Deakin University With an impressive 60% of the US smartphone market, Apple is undeniably big, but not a clear monopoly. Yet, years of innovation by Apple have effectively given the company its own exclusive ...
Whether you’re facing layoffs or are just an emotional junior staffer, it’s always a good idea to scout out a good crying place before you need it. It’s an incredibly hard time for Wellington. Across the city, thousands of public servants are hearing tough news about redundancies and layoffs. Government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Miller-Jones, Professor, Curtin University Nuclear explosions on a neutron star feed its jets. Danielle Futselaar and Nathalie Degenaar, Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, CC BY-SA How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daryl Adair, Associate Professor of Sport Management, University of Technology Sydney Earlier this week, independent MP Andrew Wilkie accused the AFL of conducting “off the books” illicit drug testing to identify players using substances of abuse, then inappropriately withdrawing them from matches ...
The Government’s announcement that it will scrap plans for a vast marine sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands is ‘shameful’ and will make it impossible for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its international commitments, says the World Wide Fund for Nature ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Shutterstock The federal government has bowed to pressure from the car industry, announcing it will relax proposed emissions rules for utes and vans and delay enforcement of the new standards ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Rutland, Professor Emerita, University of Sydney In his latest book, Jewish Life in Medieval Spain, Jonathan Ray focuses on the tumult of the 14th century in Spain – a time of the plague, civil strife and war between the two largest ...
While creating a slate of world-class shows, Whakaata Māori also developed a generation of world-class creatives. Television is an odd word. It mixes the Ancient Greek and Latin languages, and its most literal meaning is “far-off sight”. In the contemporary and living language of te reo Māori, “whakaata” as a ...
Yesterday the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. This significant step and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza prompted an urgent debate in the New Zealand Parliament. Leader ...
The Government’s decision to reduce access to continuous glucose monitors (CGM) not only threatens the lives of children with type 1 diabetes and increases the potential for ‘Dead in Bed’ syndrome, but also threatens the health of their parents an ...
Apples are available year-round, but the wide variety on offer involves intensive scientific research – and large-scale commercialisation. What’s beautiful, red, sweet and crunchy? Tony Martin’s favourite kind of apple: Sassy. The CEO of apple and pear breeding organisation Prevar, Martin’s fondness for Sassy represents professional success as well as ...
Family violence specialist service Shine is calling on employers to stop asking for proof of domestic violence in order for employees to access domestic violence leave. The call comes five years after the introduction of the Domestic Violence ...
The Deputy Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is calling for public submissions on the Budget Policy Statement 2024. The Budget Policy Statement 2024 (BPS) sets out the Government's priorities for the 2024 Budget. It explains the approach ...
Brutal government spending cuts that will see the size of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples slashed by 40% will hit Pasifika communities hard, the PSA says. The Ministry has told staff that it is seeking voluntary redundancies, and to redeploy and reassign ...
I live with five people I mostly love, but our different ideas about generosity are starting to really irk me.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,This is a bit of a random one but here goes. I’m 22 and work an OK job (OK meaning I get paid ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maria Nicholas, Senior Lecturer in Language and Literacy Education, Deakin University Earlier this month, the New South Wales government announced it would roll out programs for gifted students in every public school in the state. This comes amid concerns gifted school ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Rudge, Law lecturer, University of Sydney Massachusetts General Hospital In a world first, we heard last week that US surgeons had transplanted a kidney from a gene-edited pig into a living human. News reports said the procedure was a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tombs, Howard Paterson Chair of Theology and Public Issues, University of Otago The 5th-century Maskell panel showing Jesus in a loincloth.British Museum, CC BY-NC-SA When Jesus is shown on the cross, he is almost always depicted wearing a loincloth around ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University Shutterstock When you think about a red object, you might picture a red carpet, or the massive ruby in the Queen’s crown. Indeed, Western monarchies and marketing from brands such ...
COMMENTARY:Jewish Voice for Peace The UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza on Monday — and for the first time since the beginning of the Israeli military’s genocide of Palestinians, the United States abstained rather than vetoing it. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, ...
Asia Pacific Report A New Zealand investigative journalist and author says the US spy system hosted by the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) appears to be a controversial intelligence system used in global capture-kill operations. Writing a commentary for RNZ News today, Nicky Hager, author of Secret Power, a 1996 ...
While Nicola Willis wouldn’t give any details on its size, she said a package of tax cuts is definitely still coming in this year’s budget, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the investigation into the Department of Internal Affairs after it was revealed that the Department’s Chief Executive personally reached out to expedite a DJs passport application. Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns ...
Finance minister Nicola Willis delivers her first budget statement, and unwittingly helps Joel MacManus save his relationship. Nicola Willis strode into the Beehive Theatrette. Around me, on the green foldout seats, were the country’s top business and political journalists. They were all here to see her announce the Budget Policy ...
Twenty years ago today, Māori Television launched after much controversy. Jamie Tahana looks back on its survival and impact across two decades. Chad Chambers stepped onto the stage, the brim of his cap casting a shadow across his face. His smile beamed as bright as his white freezing works gumboots, ...
Tauranga, Rotorua, Wellsford, Onehunga, Westhaven marina – Gavin Strawhan walks the meanish streets of New Zealand in his entertaining debut novel The Call, almost sure to roar into the number 1 position on the Nielsen bestseller chart, its front cover bearing a rave from somebody: “A really good and genuinely ...
Richard Seymour offers an outstanding summary of the miserable Remain camp in the UK…
His acute analysis of the arrogance of the liberal "centre' holds true here as much as in the UK.
"…What, then, has been the response of sensible liberalism to its downfall? For over three years, against this ruthless enemy of seasoned rightist militants, Remainers have launched platoons, battalions, phalanxes of blue-and-yellow unicorns. As if sent straight from central casting, they have called on every force of officialdom to try every improbable means to rescue them from popular malice and ‘mob rule’. An online petition to stop Brexit. Immediate re-run of the referendum. Revoke Article 50. Independence for the capital. One court case after another to overturn the result. Change UK (as little as possible). Install Yvonne Cooper as Prime Minister. Write to the Queen to stop Boris’s ‘no deal’. At no point in this blizzard of time-wasting, futile, impossibilist demands, has any part of the Hard Remain campaign taken seriously the forces of fervid popular nationalism, and its accompanying call to race war. At no point has it developed a serious strategy to split the forces of the Brexit Right, and undercut rather than consolidate the dramatic growth of popular reaction. It has rejected any word or deed designed to counter the Right’s race propaganda, insisting only that immigration can be ‘controlled’ within the European Union. If one had asked Nigel Farage or Jacob Rees-Mogg three years ago what sort of opposition they hoped for, and they answered honestly, they would have prayed for an antagonist so timid, loyal and yet libidinally invested as to constitute a symbiont. A phoney war is so much better than a real war.
Easy as it is to mock, the rise of liberal impossibilism has been an absolute political calamity. Having absolutely no grounding sense of its limitations, the Remain camp began by arrogantly disdaining ‘mob rule’, hoping for the institutions to save the day – as though millions galvanised by collective hate would simply give up if the establishment stole their victory. Having allowed the Right unchallenged claim to the idiom of ‘democracy’, they then undertook a cynical and groundless tilt toward a referendum re-run before there was any case for it and without any plausible strategy for victory. They have brooked no compromise on this issue that could split the Leave camp and have baited Corbyn relentlessly for his (momentarily successful) efforts to do so. At decisive moments, the most sensible of sensibles, the avatars of Remain liberalism, have acted to block such compromises, as when the Liberals and the CHUK/TIG splinter group voted down even Ken Clarke’s proposal for a customs union for being too close to a solution that might feasibly put the Brexit issue to bed. They have been unwilling to take ‘yes’ for an answer, braying with dismay even as Corbyn has ultimately given them the referendum promise they want. They have artificially cohered the schismatic forces of the Right when it was weak, and split the opposition for the sole reason that they cannot abide Corbynism. They have given the Right their yearned for ‘treason’ narrative…"
Could you please provide a link?
try this…
https://twitter.com/leninology/status/1170992612439941120
Good from Kathryn Ryan on Radionz today. Complicated ifs and thens.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018712583/uk-parliament-suspension-as-brexit-deadline-looms 29 mins
UK Parliament suspension as Brexit deadline looms
With the UK Parliament sitting for the last time for five weeks, returning just two weeks before the Brexit deadline, it has been an historic day and night at Westminister. The Prime Minister Boris Johnson is calling for a snap election, which has already been rejected once, and the Speaker John Bercow has announced his tenure will end at the next election, or by the date the UK is due to leave the EU – 31st of October.
Keeping abreast of the latest developments, Kathryn talks to Sir John Curtice, he's a professor of politics at Strathclyde University, and Anand Menon, who is the director of the UK in a Changing Europe initiative. He is also a professor of European politics and foreign affairs at King's College London and the co author of Brexit and British Politics.
And Seymour's analysis is proved to be bang on, as arch-sensible "centrist", arch-liberal and arch-Corbyn basher in chief Polly Toynbee has a sudden epiphany when it is all too little, too late…
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/09/boris-johnson-mps-jeremy-corbyn-no-deal-leader-alliance#comment-132933541
And bang on cue, the Liberal Democrats are looking to shift their policy to Revoke Article 50 ahead of the election. That's no second referendum, the thing they've been advocating since late 2016 – just no Brexit at all.
This will have a double effect, and none of it's good;
Why? Well the Lib Dems hated the idea of supporting Corbyn in anything, and have repeatedly claimed he wants Brexit – when Labour's policy is to renegotiate the deal, then have a Labour Deal v Remain referendum – a referendum where Labour MPs would be free to support either side of the argument.
The fact that was becoming a desirable option for the Opposition meant they had to act, and in doing so they might have made it easier for Brexit to happen.
Good work Lib Dems, you've farked it up again.
Yup. the Liberal Impossibilism of Jo Swinson overlapping with Farragist disaster nationalism.
You know, any good model should give you the tools to be able interpret past events in a way that allows you offer a reasonable prediction of the future.
Seymour's hypothesis of a symbiotic relationship between reactionary catastrophism and liberal impossibilism is looking good so far.
Liberalism gets used as somewhat of an epithet in some circles. Here's a longish but worthwhile read exploring that.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/9/9/20750160/liberalism-trump-putin-socialism-reactionary
Seems to me the anti-liberals have been successfully suckered into shooting at the wrong target. The big factor accounting for the rise of problems like increasing inequality, decrease of community and social support etc is the rise of corporatocracy. Corporatocracy operates in direct opposition to one of the key ideas of liberalism, equality of all, by giving those few with power in the corporates a vastly increased influence in government and civic affairs.
Liberalism is now, at least from a class and economic perspective, indistinguishable from neoliberalism. That is the real problem.
"Liberal" has now become an epithet for a certain kind of pearl clutching, identity obsessed middle class hypocrite who spends his or her spare time uber-policing what is acceptable for discussion on the "left" in mind-bending detail and their work time ruthlessly managing in pitiless detail the authoritarian machinery of the neoliberal consensus from the position of comfortable white collar jobs. The obsession of our liberal conservative Radio NZ and the liberal twitterati with the minutaie of the management of a sex assault allegation within the Labour party fits this mode perfectly. They'll consume themselves with the viciously internecine politics of the tangential and utterly ignore the real problems of real New Zealanders then profess a perplexed horror when the oiks flock to a National party that as gone full Trump, before declaring "the establishment" must do something to protect them and their values.
FIFY
"Nothing to see here. Move along to other stuff please"
[stop trolling. No more warnings, and I suggest you think very carefully before commenting on Labour’s handling of the sexual abuse accusations about how you comment, because I’m likely to ban people today who are politicising this or posting idiotic flaming comments – weka]
You could make an effort to contribute here, if you wish. Scattering your droppings of wisdom here doesn’t cut it, I’m afraid.
See below for more contributions from me.
Pointing out the pigs ear that Labour have made of this is a valid contribution.
mod note for you Gosman.
Would you please explain how the matter is not a political one when it is being handled by the political party and not by say the police? If it was being handled by the police then I would entirely agree with you that it would not be a matter to politicise.
It's a political matter in a number of ways. One is the politics of rape culture. Another is party politics eg Labour's handling of the situations.
Politicising is a different thing. It would be for instance right wingers using the sexual assault of women to Labour bash.
Your behaviour got my attention this morning, because you looked like you were gearing up to troll generally and I have zero tolerance for that today. The warning about politicising was an addition, so that if you start doing stupid shit I've already warned you and can move straight to moderating.
If you want to understand more, have a read of yesterday's Open Mike.
there is more than a grain of truth in what sanctuary sez…
Really? Your puting up a defence of, liberalism would have worked but these politicians are not actually doing it.
(I am going to assume you agree present day NZ can also be reasonably described as a corporatocracy).
Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, consent of the governed, and equality before the law. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but they generally support limited government, individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), capitalism (free markets), democracy, secularism, gender equality, racial equality, internationalism, freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of religion.
Yup, I support all of that, with just a few caveats around the free markets bit to prevent the accumulation and exercise of corporate power.
In New Zealand, we are indeed uncomfortably close to a corporatocracy. The dominance and influence of a few corporate monopolies, duopolies etc should give us pause, but then there's the outrageous loopholes allowing foreign actors to influence our local politics by the simple expedient of setting up a local shell corporate and funneling cash through that.
As you have noted, none of our political parties seem interested in tackling the corporatocracy, Well, maybe there's a slight flicker of interest among the Greens. But that really isn't helped by those misguidedly attacking liberalism by conflating it with neoliberalism and neoliberalism's spawn, corporatocracy. Liberalism and neoliberalism really are very different things, despite the similarity in the label.
This discussion feels like a political shell game. If there is actually none of this liberalism stuff about in politics it makes scant difference if the greens prefix their criticism with neo or not.
And if you want to talk about unnecessary alienation you should just take a brief look through your own comment history. Its a case study in unnecessary alienation (mostly of collectives of political factions). Grow up and look at your behaviour before winging about how others percieve your political ideology is working out.
I think the think that pisses people off is where liberals support Corporatocracy (hence neoliberalism is still a thing). This seems fair criticism to me.
There may be some that self-identify as liberals that support corporatocracy, but I don't personally know any.
But I do know plenty of people that self-identify as liberal that are disgusted by the elements of corporatocracy we have, both here and in the US. These are people that get unnecessarily alienated by lefties attacking liberals and liberalism, when what is really being attacked is neoliberalism and corporatocracy.
Labour still support corporatocracy and most NZ liberals vote Labour even where they're not that happy with neoliberalism. But I think it would be fair to say that most liberals in NZ want a fairer form of neoliberalism rather than changing it.
The US situation is quite different I think.
I agree that the left attacking liberals is not helpful and think it is probably setting us back. That's different from critiquing liberals though. Fine line I guess.
Indeed. I would even hazard a guess that if they were presented with the definition of liberalism, the strong majority of Labour's supporters would describe themselves as liberal. Swing voters and Greens, too, prob'ly.
If presented the choice between liberalism with a bit of corporatocracy mixed in, and anti-liberal, I suspect most would choose to accept the contamination of corporatocracy mixed with their liberalism over being asked to give up the other aspects of liberalism they value.
Which is why I think it's important to be clear about criticising neoliberalism and corporatocracy, rather than giving the impression of wanting to replace liberalism with some form of illiberal alternative.
How long will the Labour Party President last do you think?
Will he make lunchtime?
The Spinoff continues it's coverage of the second badly bungled Labour party assaults.
I understand Ardern distancing herself from this on political management terms, but she is at risk of being badly tainted by all of this failing of victims within the Labour Party.
She shouldn't be just seeking assurances that didn't work well after the first bungle.
She should be demanding immediate explanations and answers from Haworth, and if they are unsatisfactory responses he should either resign or be stood down.
The staffer should also be stood down pending the outcome of the latest inquiry. I think that's standard practice in other employment situations.
This is already seriously affecting Brand Jacinda, and is likely to be a major threat to Labour's re-election chances.
But the priority should be on doing as much as possible to rectify the appalling handling of this suffered by the victims. Of all politicians I would have hoped that Ardern would have stepped up and dealt with this properly, as she did with the mosque killings and got a lot of deserved credit. But on this she is on the debit side. perhaps she is too close to the problems and people to deal with it adequately.
https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/09-09-2019/incredibly-frustrated-and-deeply-disappointed-ardern-speaks-on-labour-inquiry/
[link added – weka]
[come on Pete, you know it’s a requirement here to link to cut and pastes. I’m short on patience today, so I suggest everyone ups their game when talking about this topic – weka]
This "Following that meeting, Maria Dew, QC, was appointed to undertake a review of the original inquiry" it is then hoped that all political parties "reviews" on this issue are properly aired.
A review of the review. How refreshing from Labour. Perhaps this time they might stand down the person involved until the "review" is complete.
you seem to be over-excited there pg..
i heard the interview with ardern on rnz…
her suppressed rage was palpable..
she first 'found out' from the piece in the spinoff..yesterday..
and an independent qc is looking at it..
given the circumstances – i can't see anything wrong in her actions..
Jacinda will take charge and decisively sack someone. She'll remain above it all because she was misled.
The liberal twitterati will unite with the mysogynistic right to neither forgive, forget or move on. Alex Casey will be lauded, and get a nicer and better paying job. The Liberal-conservative establishment MSM will applaud the PM's decisive action whilst spending the next few weeks raking over the stale muck at the bottom of the barrel – hey, this stuff writes it own feature article in papers no one any longer reads!
Meanwhile, 95% of the population will have no idea this "scandal" ever happened.
Sanctuary Your conspiracy and dismissive comments are ridiculous. The MSM is, if you ever bothered to read/watch it, heavily covering this and in great depth. It was even one of the lead items on TV news last night.
The MSM that you so disparage is still and will remain the primary source of news and information for most people. Check out readership stats for the main newspapers, dwarfs the readership of all the blogs combined. And for good reason.
I thought the beat-up leading item on TV1 would have blotted out the following stories somewhat. SHOCK HORROR: $7m of taxpayer dollars are being spent, mostly by Tourism NZ, to promote New Zealand as a tourism destination. (/sarc/ if required)
@ miss-spelt christchurch..
and fox news is the biggest in u.s…ye point..?
and i read a herald yesterday (i was waiting for something – that is my excuse..)
could not believe what an irrelevant supermarket-giveaway/rag it has become…
and the m.s.m. has always bent the knee to powers-that-be..
(witness their craven grovelling before key..)
it has always – in the main – been a peddler of irrelevant crap/distractions..
and peddlers of rightwing memes..
(they just seem to have woken up to the fact that climate-change is a thing..)
there is nothing new there..
those online sources you so disparage – are doing the job the m.s.m. has consistantly failed to do..
and if you are including the likes of garner/richardson/hoskings et al as being this m.s.m. we should read/watch (for anything other than cheap laughs)..?
yeah..nah…eh..?
It was on the 6 o'clock news both channels so I would say a fair percentage of the population will know of the 'scandal'
Do you see something wrong in the Labour Party President's handling of the situation?
on the surface – it doesn't take a genius to conclude that it would seem he screwed up big-time -and is dead man walking..
but the q.c. inquiry will clarify that..
until them you are just flapping yr gums..
my takeaway from the ardern interview was her hinting that other labour party people colluded in keeping the truth from her..(something the q.c. is looking into..)
so if only for that reason – (aside from the original allegations) – this has more to run/reveal..
Na Arden needs to show some muscle a sack him. None of this letting him resign shit.
The president of the party does not report to its parlimentary caucus leader.
The caucus leader does not have the power to sack the president of the Labour Party.
Democracy 101.
edit: snap Sacha 🙂
It seems odd to me that Nigel Haworth would give an account to Jacinda that can later be easily contradicted. My guess is the QC will exonerate Haworth and Bennett will be seen to have been playing fast and loose with the facts for political reasons….after all she has a track record on this.
Bennett will be seen to have been playing fast and loose with the facts for political reasons…
Judging by her most recent outbursts, that is exactly what she's doing. Leopards never change their spots.
Oddly driving today Sean Plunkett, no friend of Labour's agrees about Bennett and now hearing Bridges "opinion" on it says they are politicking in a pretty disgusting way. Essentially it should have gone to police and that you can not "sack" someone because of accusations alone.
What mess, I have changed my "opinion" on it at least four times now and don;t know what to think any more – sadly though B&B and the media will make sure that it is negative behaviour by any one to do with or associated with "Labour", possibly that was what was intended – so now I have a fifth option to consider.
I hope it backfires on B&B big-time and the media learns an overdue lesson, but that will probably set them on some Collins path of back back double or something.
Please provide a link when you are quoting an article: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/09-09-2019/incredibly-frustrated-and-deeply-disappointed-ardern-speaks-on-labour-inquiry/
What's really sad is paula and the media politicising it rather than wrapping the person up in love and taking them to the nearest police station to press charges.
It's sickening how paula is using this to score points it seems like this is paulas only angle, she's been baiting media with it for ages instead of taking action and looking after the person concerned. I'm fairly sure the person concerned didn't want it to play out like this.
Sexual violence goes on every single day in NZ.
Thank goodness it is clear that the victim stuck to her guns, it looks like the "media" was the only way past very naive (the kindest view), stupid or self-serving behaviour at the top of the party which does huge disservice not just to the victim but others as well.
Hopefully this will be a lesson in the face of wherever this or other abuses happens in NZ for people to listen and deal with it not just "manage" it to suit a narrow purpose.
There is something wrong with this story and it is not just Paula Bennetts involvement.
What if this is true:
Alarm bells anyone? If the victim did not tell the Labour Party what is now in Spinoff, then the above quote is true. And if she did tell the Labour Party that harrowing story it will be in the minutes, but it seems so unlikely that Labour Party would just ignore such a story.
Would Paula Bennett be part of Dirty Tricks?
The Spinoff writer mentions sighting material from the complainant that backs up what she said. Perhaps go and read it again.
Thanks Cinny.
Everyone including the MSM (surprise,surprise 🙄 ) is jumping the gun here.
There was more than one complainant and as far as I can judge the other claims were more to do with bullying behaviour in the work-place. But "Sarah" (pseudonym of course) has now come forward with what are very serious claims of sexual harassment.
She is on record (I saw it yesterday somewhere) as revealing she did not originally report the full extent of the harassment she experienced because she was too afraid to. So, to be fair to the L.P. president, it is quite possible he and his advisers were not aware of them when they made their original decision to take the matter no further. People need to calm down and wait a few weeks when the report will become available before shots are fired in their direction.
It's time people thought more about the trauma and hurt suffered by this young woman and made so much worse by the publicity surrounding it. Many women over the years have gone through this process and been left feeling shamed, disbelieved and rejected by those who should have supported them and helped to facilitate a proper investigation.
I sincerely hope for her sake that such an investigation will eventuate because otherwise she will have to carry the consequences around for the rest of her life.
Hear Hear Anne.
And that is what Jacinda is saying. She said that the first that she knew of the serious sexual attack was reading it in Spinoff. Bennett attempted to attack the PM today Q5 but she was ruled out of order in most respects. I cannot get past a suspicion that National is using the victims not out of search for justice but to wound the Labour Party.
https://www.parliament.nz/en/watch-parliament/ondemand?itemId=208656
mod note for you Pete.
Feel free to delete my comment with link if you like.
all good, thanks Sacha.
"…This is already seriously affecting Brand Jacinda, and is likely to be a major threat to Labour's re-election chances…"
Your concern troll is noted, now run along back to your own blog.
I see Ms Ardern is to talk to Mike Hosking and the alleged assaults. Waste of time. He has made up his mind on all things Ardern and Labour and the coalition.
I saw a t shirt on the street two days ago which would be a most fine addition to his wardrobes of finery, summing up his attitude:
"If you think I'm dick all of the time go fuck yourself."
paul buchanan on rnz blowing up that bullshit claim that our spooks didn't know the americans were torturing in afghanistan..
(as he points out – this information was in the public domain..)
but they didn't know..?
rght-ho..!
Not completely implausible – the first the CIA knew of Pakistan's nuclear capacity (subsequently exported to North Korea) was when they read it in the paper.
Our spooks will naturally have been concentrating on things like identifying Rawshark, that would have gratified the then government – protecting our international reputation goes a bit over their heads.
no..completely plausible..
they either know – and are lying..
or they didn't know – and so must confess to an eye-watering degree of incompetence in their basic role – of gathering intelligence..
(they have clearly gone for option one – the big-lie..)
and yr pakistan comparison is trite..
our spooks were giving questions to the torturers…
..to ask of those they were torturing..
It is well worth the effort rising a little earlier to catch one of the many gems being aired on Natrad's "First Up".
This morning it was Maori Council Chair Matthew Tukaki who, ahead of the impending announcement from The Beehive on the suicide prevention plan, is hoping like hell that there are fewer of the usual guard who have been leading the suicide intervention business for the past umpteen years and room (and funding) is made available for those with a much needed different approach.
Tukaki was channeling Mike King with the message that as well as 'mental health' we need to be teaching communities and individuals about the importance of listening…and basically being caring and kind.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/first-up/audio/2018712556/govt-s-suicide-prevention-plan-2-years-late
I love how you make that sound like a choice. 🙂
Very clear summary of Labour party's situation today: https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2019/09/10/798729/labour-fails-to-learn-from-its-mistakes
Ardern told John Campbell on TVNZ's Breakfast show this morning that Haworth sets high standards for himself, and implied she would not need to ask him to leave. I see no reason why he should wait another 4 weeks for a QC to report back to the party about the mess he has overseen. Less dignity every day that goes by.
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/shows/breakfast/clips/i-m-in-a-very-difficult-position-here-ardern-says-over-sexual-assault-allegation-against-labour-party-staffer
Sacha would you consider the possibility that the Labour plan that you published above has been followed? Is it possible that the latest Spinoff report may not have been the same as what the previous complaint which had been dealt with by the enquiry last year?
What parts of the reporting so far lead you to believe that the party has addressed its internal failings around this matter?
The original complaint was that a staffer had behaved badly to several women. These complaints were dealt with. To fit within the process of enquiry they would have to have been of "lower" level.
The Spinoff complaint may be a "new" complaint has unheard of before now at least by the PM and possibly Haworth. It seems very very improbable that Haworth would have ignored the content of the "new" complaint if made at the original time.
To make judgements on insufficient evidence is rather cruel and Suzie should know better.
Thats what Im thinking.
The 'core' of the original complaints was work based bullying and harassment.
The complaint of sexual attack seems to either made at the time/made later and wasnt an event at work but on a 'date'.
Something of that nature , should have been referred to Police no ifs or buts and not an internal review/personal grievance
There is enough detail in that first Spinoff srticle to answer your concerns and Ian's.
'Kiwirail to train prisoners as track workers'.
This is great news. The Work to Release Scheme was always a great thing, and one good thing that Judith Collins did was to significantly extend this scheme, at least within the ChCh prisons complex. Great move by the Coalition Government and Kiwirail!
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/398455/kiwirail-to-train-prisoners-as-track-workers-in-northland
Your mention of track workers reminds me of the time when Railways Minister Richard Prebble spoke of the complaint he had received from a passenger who scathingly wrote of the lazy track workers who were always leaning on their shovels when he passed by….
we knew him as 'dick' prebble…
prebble – putting the 'dick' in richard…
He was smarter than his critical passenger……
Though a sleeper left them both in the shade.
that's quite clever..
bordering on zinger…
So who was worse – the middle-class snob on the train who assumed that the working class were lazy and undeserving, or Richard Prebble who knew that they aren't, but gave the anecdote oxygen anyway in order to boost his privatisation agenda? Answers on the back of a postcard.
Interesting take on the story, AB.
In the House Minister Prebble was scathing of the passenger who, and this is the point of the story which is all about jumping to conclusions, jumped to conclusions thar the workers were lazy.
Prebble wrote back saying that it was not Railways policy for track staff to be working on a railway track when trains were passing over it……..
I can't see that boosting a privatisation agenda.
But I take the point about privatisation. I felt quite betrayed in Picton when I heard Prebble address staff on the Railways and then find out about privatisation later.
As I was when party president Jim Anderton visited our local LEC full of party rhetoric and then shortly after left to form his own party. He of course argued that the party left him.
MMP did do our political system quite some good in allowing people to find more congenial and less abrasive groupings.
Yep, agree with your comments re MMP. A positive change for sure.
I well remember that bs about 'saving rail' from Prebble. I joined NZR in 1987 and redundancies were already underway (itself classic stupidity – giving redundancy to existing staff whilst hiring new staff to fill the same role).
But to be fair, there were a hell of a lot of NZR workers who had no concept of 'work' (I am talking here about the admin staff). My first job was issuing the chits to buy boots. This had been the fulltime job of my predessor. It took me maybe one very slow hour a day!
i could do with a job like that now..
occaisonally lifting the head – to issue a boot-chit…
i could handle that..!
is there an employment agency that specialises in jobs like that..?
(i do also like to be dry and warm..)
You forget the consensus of NZ governments from both parties in the 50s ,60s, and 70s was FULL employment.
And they meant it.
You are looking back with modern blinkers on.
i am all for full employment..
will they have boot-chit issuing jobs up for grabs..?
'cos if so..
Your recollection is better than mine obviously mac1. Given the 'Polish Shipyard' mythology that was propagated at the time, I connected two dots that weren't adjacent.
Dot connection is a human hazard. I had a neighbour who one Sunday pointed out the track workers engaged on maintenance. His take was that this was driven by the workers who got double time for Sunday work.
I pointed out that the work might be management driven, as there was less traffic on the rail line on a Sunday, and less disruption therefore to Railways freight moving business.
"Oh!" was his reaction.
Several months later. Same observation, same reply. Same old same old.
Explains a lot of political reality.
Argument does not necessarily defeat bias. As my old Latin teacher once infamously said, "I don't care what the book says, sonny, it's what I say that counts!"
Anyway I wish the Northland prisoners well. Anything that keeps them on track, so to speak……………
Latest update on Sharpiegate. It seems senior members of NOAA were threatened with dismissal if "contradiction" to Trumps's Alabama claim was not reversed.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2019/sep/09/trump-news-today-latest-mark-sanford-north-carolina-washington
It’s a ‘live’ report so will need to scroll down to item.
Dondementia J Twitterfinger is going to end up writing NOAAs tweets for them. Like it seems he's writing Pence's.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/09/trump-pence-noaa-tweets-hurricane-taliban.html
Open Letter to Prime Minister
Link is here
Appalling. As a member of the Labour Party I could not consider signing such a false and slanderous document. Until the facts are known desist.
No name on the petition. But I bet Bennett and her ilk would be first to further the Dirty Tricks element of this. I cannot believe that the Leaders of any organised group such as the Labour Party Council could behave as claimed. The smear in the meantime is being compounded by repetition and Pete George is facilitating this.
The letter is a form letter. It opens with a statement that we are Labour members. At the bottom it asks the signer to tick one of two boxes saying whether they are or are not a Labour member.
It is a nonsense to ask someone who is not a member to sign a letter which opens with a statement that they are a member.
What is the provenance of this 'open' letter?
Is a letter 'open' if a person does not sign it with a name?
Can the origin of the letter be clearly spelled out as to who the author is so that any person who considers such a signing may examine the authenticity of the document and of the matters which are alleged?
In a world of dirty politics, such questions must be addressed.
+1 mac1
(Am still banned, but comment is on-topic so maybe it'll get through moderation)
That's not an open letter – it's a subscription form. Look at the format:
*stuff to get your attention*
*request for personal info*
*request for your email address and permission to contact you*
Nothing about where the email addresses are going to be recorded, no privacy policy, no acknowledgement of NZ anti-spam legislation.
Looks like someone's putting a marketing database together, and doing so in a very underhanded fashion.
Isnt there a way to track the Origin of Google Forms, like you can with a website. ?
They give away it came from national/acts dirty tricks is right at the end
"Me Too labour."
Watch it get featured by Farrar on his blog
Just checked and it was there at 10 am, which was a time based release of something done earlier
farrar – putting the 'dirt' in 'dirty politics' since..?
@ ianmac and mac1:
A bunch of naive 'members' who have lost the plot?
There is now an official investigation in place to establish ALL the facts after which appropriate action will take place according to the outcome.
To have a group of emotionally over-charged individuals passing judgement and demanding responses before that process is complete not only undermines the investigation but is ultimately unhelpful to the very people they purport to support.
Isnt the official investigation something the police should be doing in cases of sexual assault?
Only if the women assaulted go to the police and lay a complaint. Even if they did that, Labour still has to deal with its own complaints process and employer responsibilities.
Interesting that actually.
I made the same comment yesterday and was told what you say by lprent and some one else.
Was listening to Drive today and both Rodney Hyde and Trotter implied the complaints could be referred to the police by their employer.
And both said they should.
Probably a bit pointless without the accusers giving the police their versions, but found it interesting.
Blowhards suggesting courses of action that are pointless at best, legally actionable at worst.
But looking highly necessary given the hash job
Not if that's not what the complainants want.
"ooo we completely fucked it up so we're going to overrule your wishes to satisfy the told-you-sos of perennially-unsatisfied talkback fuckwits" is an even worse response than what they seem to already have done.
Howarth can't be pushed out by caucus, but I suspect that very soon there will be a categorical vindication of what he wasn't told or evidence that he was explicitly told, and even without that some folks in Labour are probably already looking up "removal from office" clauses just in case.
At the root of this there are apparently more than a few complainants and complaints about a single individual, and Labour has apparently fucked up its response to every single complaint.
Whether this is the result of a group or individual in leadership intentionally protecting the individual, or systemic incompetence by well-meaning individuals missing emails, applying fucked up rules of fairness and evidence while conducting an incompetent investigation and an incompetently-scoped or incompetent review of that investigation, the bottom line is that this is beginning to look like the Labour party HQ has reacted abysmally in response to a difficult but foreseeable situation.
Tom:
Women are afraid to go to the police. They fear rejection because it has happened to so many women before them.
What is worse, work-mates, friends and even kith and kin are not always supportive. They don't want to become involved, so they take the easy way out and convince themselves you're making it up or exaggerating. The perpetrators know this and play on it for all it's worth. Even the police will take the same line if it suits them.
I hope this young lady is now getting the support she needs and will be able to take her case to the police.
However, Stuff has confirmed swipe card records and CCTV footage have been checked and confirm he has not visited the parliamentary complex during that time. It would seem more and more that some of what is being said does not play out in reality.
I’m making an exception to let through this comment from SHG, who is currently banned for three days, because it is indeed topical:
Many thanks to SHG!
Yeah looks to me to be a false flag operation.
Reminds me of the kind of thing that dickhead young Nat Ben Guerin specialises in these days.
Incidentally PG – I guess I called that one right after the reports back from the UK about the brexit false news and sexual predation at the unit that young arsehole went to help run for Crosby. https://publicaddress.net/hardnews/digital-persuasion-and-the-dark-places-of/ . Reminds me that I must dig out the article about sexual payoffs.
I'd suggest assuming it is bogus until the organisers prove otherwise. Google docs? Yeah right – how to be anonymous.
Is there no way to know who put it up?
From the Spinoff this morning:
That timeline lays out much of what is publicly known to date.
I just had a read through the various articles that have been circulating.
These are my observations from what is visible in public.
Now I’m sure that I’m going to get the arguments.
Who would go to the police given their awful track record on handling everything from sexual harassment to rape complaints that have subsequently proved to be unlawful. Same for the usual issues with HR departments protecting the arses of bullies and sexual predators. That I agree with.
However the issue here for me is that I can’t see alleged victim actually taking the critical step of laying a formal complaint. I’d advise that gets done as soon as possible because in the framework of our legal system, merely making an allegation is completely and utterly meaningless. It simply denies investigation justice to anyone involved – including any future victims and future employers.
Basically indignation is cheap, it sells newspapers, and it allows oppositions an easy way to attack governments – which they seldom follow through on. It simply doesn’t change social and legal structures. It is a meaningless gesture. Something that I’m not that interested in.
For that you need some serious discussion
If you want to change the laws or the behaviour and obligations of the police and employers then that is a target that I’m happy to work on. The problem there, as always, is coming up with workable solutions that work within the legal framework for the problems that are below our current legal thresholds of evidence and proof. To date I haven’t been seeing many of those out of the various me too campaigns. I’m afraid that merely making an allegation doesn’t meet my standards of evidence.
What has been clear in the media is that the negative coverage in this case has been directed towards Labour party, who by the sound of it isn’t the employer, isn’t the police, and appears to have not had a formal written complaint detailing the allegations directed to the NZ council – its governing body. Having hearsay uncorroborated reports of what was said in interviews with Nigel isn’t exactly any kind of evidence I could take much credence in.
Personally I just find the process being used to have been deeply suspicious. It doesn’t look like it is calculated to actually have anything apart from indignation. It certainly doesn’t seem to orientated to get a resolvable outcome.
Could someone please advise whoever is talking to the media to just lay some actual complaints using the formal processes (not some anonymous form letter on google docs).
The problem here is that our legal system requires that individuals have to front up with formal complaints before our legal system or employment systems can do much. The most that can be done legally to an alleged perpetrator otherwise is to remove them from situations that could be problematic. Which appears to have been done already several different ways.
So lay formal complaints to get action.
FFS: PG – you should know this. In a different context, but with the same underlying principles, do you regard the allegations by Dermot Nottingham against you or me to have been accurate? It took a formal complaint to the police (which was rejected) followed by a private prosecution to get that to a resolution. That is a process that is in place to allow action whilst sort of protecting all sides.
You simply can’t take much action on an simple undocumented allegation. Actual formal complaints to the appropriate places are what is really required. The people making allegations should get some support and start the process.
I think you're largely missing a key element in this issue – complainants who are Labour Party members and volunteers, and a seemingly significant number of other party members, appear to be extremely disappointed with how the party has dealt with all of this, and are increasingly disappointed with how Ardern is dealing with it.
They have said that they aren't keen on laying a complaint with the police, considering the added trauma this often entails, and the low success rate. The summer camp prosecution shows how complainants can be depicted as 'asking for it'.
What I think they want is for their party to deal with this specific issue properly, albeit belatedly. They want Ardern to walk what she has talked often enough. They want the decent party they were promised. They're not getting anything like that.
Look I think that you’re basically missing the point here.
Some of the allegations made appear relate to activities that are unlawful in nature – they should be complained about to the police and haven’t been.
Some should be of concern to the employer, parliamentary services, and don’t appear to have been complained about to them.
The allegations that I have seen appear to have had only peripheral relationship to the Labour party in that it is alleged that the perpetrator is a member of the Labour party (as I am) and some of these the alleged activities have happened on the periphery of Labour party organising activities.
When I give up my membership fees to the Labour party, I don’t authorise them to be a ruling body over my life for anything except my membership and the formal parts of Labour party activities – like being able to go to meetings. Other aspects of my life certainly aren’t constrained in the contract in the way that I have (for instance) in my employment contracts.
What exactly is your point?
So far, what I can’t see is any direct line of responsibility to anything that the Labour party is actually responsible for beyond making sure that the participants don’t come in contact with each other at functions. And as far as I can see that was done early. The best that they could possibly do is to remove the membership and to try to learn what do do about this kind of issue in the future.
So? Until the law is changed (if it ever could be in these kinds of circumstances) then that is what has to happen. Nothing can be done without formal complaints to the people and organisations with the appropriate responsibilities. In this case the police and/or the employer.
That is because there are laws constraining what anyone else can do. I can’t fire an employee of parliamentary services – nor can the Labour party. Even the employer can’t fire them without cause – it just leaves them open to a lawsuit and even possible criminal prosecution. The police are constrained about investigating without a complainant. The courts can’t act without someone
I can’t go and name the person involved, even if I wanted to (and so far I haven’t seen anything substantive enough for me to wanted to do so), without facing legal actions against me.
Ignoring your rhetorical allegations about promises – which weren’t what you are bullshitting about
The party is limited by laws about what they can and cannot do. I personally wouldn’t want to any other way. I know exactly how I’d react if someone tried to exert an authority that they neither I nor society via the laws conceded them.
Wishing for magic simply doesn’t work for dealing with situations like the allegations being made. It requires that someone actually formally complains and to the appropriate place(s).
To do anything else is to simply allow meaningless indignation and no bloody action. So far that is all that I am seeing.
I haven't read the full discussions here on TS on this subject over the last few days, and so far only your exchanges with PG above, but a part of your comment above quoted below stuck out to me, ie:
I am not disputing or questioning your comment but wondered whether you watched Question Time yesterday as there was an interesting exchange between Trevor Mallard, as Speaker etc, and Paula Bennett (plus Gerry Brownlee) under Question 5 where Bennett questioned the PM on this matter which appears very relevant vis a vis your comment above
ie this comment by Mallard:EDIT – damn it, it really needs to be read in context so here is the whole of the exchanges under Q 5 with the specific relevant comments bolded:
This seems to suggest that Mallard as Speaker (and thus his role in respect of Parliamentary Services) has been involved for quite some time.
I will butt out now, but thought you might be interested if you missed yesterday's QT. I suspect there will be more today …
Cheers
Oops links
Hansard Transcript – https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/hansard-debates/rhr/combined/HansDeb_20190910_20190910_04
Video
https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/hansard-debates/rhr/combined/HansDeb_20190910_20190910_04
Interesting.
I'd guess that someone has referred the articles and information to Parliamentary Services and something has been done about it. Probably after the newspaper reports in August.
It may even be that a complaint may have been laid with Parliamentary Services. I can't remember when the statement by Mallard was about a lack of complaint – but I thought it was weeks ago.
That probably relates to the 5 weeks at home by the person in question.
But there is a pretty strong rule about (with good reason) about parliamentarians not being in an employment relationship with their staff and that is the role of parliamentary services. It doesn’t take a lot of work to dig into the archives to find instances of bullying and abuse by MPs.
But that is the correct approach for bullying in situations related to employment related behaviour issues – the employing organisation. The trick after that is to follow the process rigorously and make damn sure that you have support and a timely written and preferably signed by all parties record.
+1 ianmac
For some it seems a prime requirement to be head of the Labour Party is to have a hanging rope which is automatically used on anyone accused of anything. Failure to implement the action instantly should entail resignation. Those thinking like that will never change their minds.
I think we are in insane period of our political history. The affront and aggrievement National and their supporters feel for not being elected is at a festering, resentful, desperate stage. The bitterness coming from that would normally be a spectacle the rational could put into context and appreciate for the circus it is. Instead it has became the wallpaper, we wouldn't know what to do without it.
The Conservatives/Right have come to feel a sense of entitlement as the left has fallen before them with neo lib, free market taking over, unions under pressure, Communism beaten – the world is theirs. But what's this, the NZ Labour Party sneakily getting elected making a stand about something – ridiculous. What stone did they crawl out from under? The British Labour Party thinking they can run the country better, ditto.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/business/115638935/save-the-subbies-rogernomics-left-the-little-guys-defenceless
Common you labour fallas ,you're meant to be here for the working man !!!
Easy pickings I reckon
They arent self employed contractors for these big projects, mostly larger businesses them selves with from dozens to 100s employees.
Little one man bands cant wait 3 months to be paid and later for retentions.
I am really incensed at the continued use of the term : "synthetic cannabis" in the news media.
": something resulting from synthesis rather than occurring naturally especially : a product (such as a drug or plastic) of chemical synthesis "
there is no relationship claimed or shown between this "synthetic cannabis" and the active ingredients in natural cannabis. This relationship would be essential if any drug were to be described as "synthetic cannabis" THESE DRUGS ARE NOT "synthetic cannabis"
furthermore in tvnz news frequent reference is made to "this drug" there is no claim or evidence to suggest that we are dealing with a single identifiable chemical (which quite possibly there IS that is causing these deaths)… what is it?
This is sloppy reportage and given the proximity to a referendum on real cannabis a scientifically and factually misleading headline linking "synthetic cannabis" and deaths is either ignorant or dishonest.
Good luck with that one. Just as you can try changing the 'smoking doesnt impair your ability."
They may be chemically (structurally) unrelated to ‘natural’ cannabis but many are pharmacologically related in the sense that they target and activate the same cannabinoid receptors in the brain.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/115646451/the-synthetic-cannabis-and-zombie-drug-killing-more-and-more-kiwis
Ahh you are correct so they can technically call it a synthetic cannabinoid but that does not make it synthetic cannabis.
So there you go RNZ has come up with good authoritative info on this matter https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/398528/four-deadly-synthetic-cannabinoids-identified
altho.. while ESR clearly knows the difference between cannabinoids and cannabis the RNZ reporters,editors not so much
nice
/
https://twitter.com/John_Hudson/status/1170465602537959426
No idea who either of them are, but the taller geezer could be a Jimmy Page party looky likey if he ever wanted to changed gigs.
Paula Bennett must be as happy as a pig rolling in shit.
Read her twitter posts and comments. Political point scoring is her priority.
https://www.twitter.com/paulabennettmp?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
Paula Bennett is acting like the nations counsellor, media consultant, judge, jury and executioner.
We obviously no longer need a criminal justice system, just let Paula do it all (sarc).
Probably is, but then the Labour Party shouldn't have stuffed up…..again over sexual assault.
Party Pres doubles down: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12266343
It seems to me that all is speculation until we get the report from the Q.C. – which must be made public.
Paula Bennett is taking "attack politics" to new depths and she is working straight out of the Crosby Textor manual. If the report from the Q.C. shows that the actions taken by all those involved were entirely appropriate then Bennett will end up with "egg all over her face". That would be a most satisfactory outcome.
If Paula Bennett's attacks on individual Labour personnel turn out to be false then she is the one who should resign.
I also think a clear separation should be made between the young woman who was sexually assaulted and the other complainants. As far as I can ascertain their claims were about workplace bullying which is a matter for Parliamentary Services not the Police. I also suspect they are being manipulated by Paula Bennett and co. for political gain and that doesn't make me feel too sympathetic towards them. They should know better.
so you want to isolate the victim of a sexual assault from her peers, and what appears to be her support network in this case?
Im not sure what school of victim support you came from Anne, but those actions lead to silencing and the enabling of rape culture. It sends a clear signal to others in the structure that behaviour like that alleged will be isolated to make it easier to make it disappear.
[lprent: She didn’t say that – she expressed concern that Paula Bennett was involved. Which is pretty reasonable considering that Paula Bennett has some pretty good motives for attacking the Labour Party and a track record of apparently leaking sexual allegations to the media for her own political purposes in the Jamie-Lee Ross breakdown last year. That is what I assume that was the ‘support network’ you were referring to.
If you wish to directly lie about what other people have said then I suggest you return to a place like Kiwiblog where that is expected behaviour. ].
Thanks lprent.
Climaction serves to confirm how dirty the Nats play this seedy game. I was pointing out that the victim of alleged sexual assault – for whom I have much sympathy and compassion – comes under a different and more serious category than what appear to be the complaints of the others.
Another person (male) has gone to media, corroborating what others have claimed, and claiming the accused man took a swing at him when he confronted him over his treatment of women, and claims a separate physical assault.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/checkpoint/audio/2018712678/labour-assault-investigation-retraumatised-victims-witness
This is a problem that doesn't look like going away for Ardern and Labour. Waiting weeks for the outcome of the QC inquiry to be completed may be too little, too late to avert or stem irreparable damage.
RNZ also gave credence to the open letter.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/checkpoint/audio/2018712686/ardern-urged-by-labour-members-to-act-on-assault-complaints
As did One News.
Also:
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/complaint-made-parliamentary-service-against-labour-staffer
They have said the inquiry is 4 weeks.
Which by pure co-incidence is smack bang in the middle of recess.
Who would have thought?
This may or may not be a different complainant again but the claims are a little different to what was said on RNZ.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/115693354/former-labour-party-volunteer-says-he-raised-allegations-with-party-president-nigel-haworth
[lprent: A email printed from the senders computer that may or may not have been sent simply isn’t ‘proving it’. It is an allegation. You’d have to be an fool to believe to think that it constitutes proof. I believe that there was a denial of receiving it? ]
Good frost this morning,and soil temperature 8 degrees and the soil is at field capacity as measured by the neutron probes. Average cover of 2165 as measured by the Satelites and supply should meet demand on the 27 th of September .It's been a lovely day and I planted some natives down the swamp . This current wave of madness will pass,and common sense will prevail.Looking forward to going whitebaiting tommorrow.
How much extra money do you get from fouling our waterways?
Seagulls are fouling the Kakanui and Ashburton rivers making them unsafe for swimming due to E. Coli contamination I don't foul any rivers.
"While the birds were generating more than 50 per cent of ecoli in the river, it was still important to reduce other known sources, like livestock, he said."
https://www.guardianonline.co.nz/news/official-birds-blame/
I'd also be wondering if low river flows are an issue, and deforestation or other landscape alterations. It's rarely none thing.
Low river flows due to low rainfall cause all sorts of problems. Look at how the Selwyn river has rejuvenated over the last 2 years , after some decent rain.The farmers that stopped pumping from deep bores and now use CPI water have also helped restore river flows and groundwater levels in that area.
Canterbury was deforested by Maori moa hunters many hundreds of years ago.I often wonder what our natural landscape looked like pre-Maorideforestation.
Reverting back to what the moahunters dun lots and lots of years ago, and then trying to put a gloss of an educated modern viewpoint to your comment is a sort of oxymoron or something.
Just try and stay in the now Ian, it is obvious from reading your comments that you have trouble understanding present and near future problems and those of even 2030 are going to be required reading for you to catch up.
Light relief from The Civilian alias Te Papa.
http://www.thecivilian.co.nz/cadbury-rumoured-to-be-releasing-the-pineapple-trump/
Hi Ian.
Yes if you drive a vehicle in NZ you will be fouling our rivers from road contaminants emitted from vehicles.
Many types of contaminants including ‘micro plastics’ in the form of ‘tyre dust’ are killing all our invertebrates which are the life of our waterways.
https://www.transport.govt.nz/assets/Import/Documents/9fa2b3a10b/stormwater-emission-factors.pdf
I do get out on the road occasionally and have often wondered where all the tyre tread, brake and clutch linings end up. Having road frontage on a busy state highway probably means that my farm is being contaminated as I type. We should be planting riparian strips along roads to protect our land from all this shit. Those Ev's powered by slave labour are not exempt either.
I can feel a taxpayer funded subsidy coming on.
You bring up valid points Ian. Don't spoil your effort by reverting to an attempt at RW cynicism which you are probably thinking is political satire.
Kia Ora The Am Show.
Great win Mana Wahine.
The British scientist finding water and a atmosphere on planet k2.18b that could be habitatable is cool . I agree we have to look after this planet first don't stuff up your own back yard.
Chris this whole situation with our governments staff issues is man made many un answers question around this the right wing people are very maliptive they will do any thing to win.
I think it's is a great day when we are finally going to be teaching our OWN history of Aotearoa to our tamariki.
I just hope it is factual and not used as a tool to make Tangata Whenua O Aotearoa look bad. We are one of the few indigenous cultures to be colonised and still have Mana and some Whenua left thanks to our TIPUNA. A lot of other indigenous cultures look to Maori as a Mounga for their fight for Equality.
I say it needs to be taught The truth about the World War 2 holocaust. Mrs Goldstein evey one should learn to respect other cultures just because some are different doesn't give anyone a reason to disrespect anyone. That is one reason WHY Eco Maori is discussed with the Altb Right who impower the HATERS to try and win votes.
NO to air nz Trade marking Kia Ora Te reo is Tangata Whenua O Aotearoa taonga and I think it stinks that a business is trying to get exclusive rights to Kia Ora. I say it OK to use Te reo and Haka but to try and steal it in front of OUR Eyes is a insult there are links to this issue.
TV 3 I thought it was Te Reo Week one day of support doesn’t cut it in Eco Maori View
Ka kite Ano
Eco Maori champions this thinking.
Its is going to be a lot less expensive investing a Trillions now than risk OUR WHOLE SOCIETIES to collapse that is were the direction that the carbon pro people are trying to take US
World 'gravely' unprepared for effects of climate crisis – report
Trillions of dollars needed to avoid ‘climate apartheid’ but this is less than cost of inaction
Damian Carrington Environment editor
@dpcarrington
The world’s readiness for the inevitable effects of the climate crisis is “gravely insufficient”, according to a report from global leaders.
This lack of preparedness will result in poverty, water shortages and levels of migration soaring, with an “irrefutable toll on human life”, the report warns.
Trillion-dollar investment is needed to avert “climate apartheid”, where the rich escape the effects and the poor do not, but this investment is far smaller than the eventual cost of doing nothing.
The study says the greatest obstacle is not money but a lack of “political leadership that shakes people out of their collective slumber”. A “revolution” is needed in how the dangers of global heating are understood and planned for, and solutions are funded.
How global heating is causing more extreme weather
The report has been produced by the Global Commission on Adaptation (GCA), convened by 18 nations including the UK. It has contributions from the former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, the Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, environment ministers from China, India and Canada, the heads of the World Bank and the UN climate and environment divisions, and others
Ka kite Ano link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/10/climate-crisis-world-readiness-effects-gravely-insufficient-report