The neighbourhood had deteriorated since the HNZ units opened in mid-2016, they said. The development replaced two older state houses.
“This is absolutely a governance issue that’s got to come from the top . . . What I’m hearing is it’s likely to be [a problem] replicated in different places around New Zealand.”
Yep, government policies looking at everything in insolation. You can’t just get groups of disadvantaged people and then push them all together and think everything’s gonna be rosy.
State houses should be integrated into all housing and all areas rich and poor. Instead the government has sold all the expensive (rich) parts off and thinks putting up ‘social’ apartment blocks or hotels as social housing with large groups of people is gonna work.
Not only has the social housing never arrived but it would never work anyway as quickly it would quickly become slums. All the new developments should have had to have 5 – 10% reserved for state or affordable housing as part of the consent and forced to be sold at a rate against the average wage.
But the trick is of raising people out of poverty is actually to get upwards mobility and invest in the people themselves – decent schools, decent food and decent health and decent opportunities including decent wages and jobs that are secure. Hard to do that when you keep putting more and more people into the country to provide for with a falling base of income.
In any society nobody is perfect – but in NZ the whole system is encouraging people to go backwards into poverty. Giving $30 or $60 a week more is a waste of time long term (especially if you have rising food, power, transport and housing costs that the government can’t control).
If the government can’t plan for local people to get decent jobs or meaningful social engagement and become more self sufficient and be able to plan for their future and instead wants to pander to an ideology of selling off land and assets to the highest bidder (generally overseas folks) and letting those people bring in their own workers (aka 200 Chinese workers for the luxury hotel) then it’s a wasted opportunity. It’s taking away opportunities for local prosperity because the government has allowed a culture of getting other labour from other countries in so that the corporations can make more profit and then even giving residency or citizenship so that it becomes more people who need support.
In the hotel example most of the locals are then locked out, as it’s being built and then when it is being run and finally the profits from it. The locals get the pollution, wastewater issues, transport issues and need to find more housing both to house and provide services for the new workers (temporary or not) working on it, as well as the hotel space being used for rich tourists providing no amenity or accomodation for locals in that prime location. It’s lose, lose for locals and win win for large offshore corporations.
TPPA is being introduced to ensure it because a tangled web that is hard to exit from, even if the people vote against this model of inequality transfer from local people to big business.
@UncookedSelachimorpha, You can have as many rent controls as you like, the houses are not there to be rented because we have inward migration and a massive shortage to begin with. To make matters worse anyone in the world can buy our houses for whatever reason they like.
Even with the new Labour policy foreigners are free to buy new houses, land and assets. So it will make little benefit and its too late anyway because it’s clear that existing housing stock is already been bought and regulary traded increasing the prices already.
In Sweden they have rent controls which meant in some cases only 2 houses were available in a major city. People just would not give up their rental so no new ones ever came up.
“You can have as many rent controls as you like, the houses are not there to be rented because we have inward migration and a massive shortage to begin with. To make matters worse anyone in the world can buy our houses for whatever reason they like.”
Agree that the underlying problem is lack of supply vs demand, including for the reasons you mention.
I don’t think rent control is the actual solution – but it would reduce the ability of people with money to exploit the current shortage to gouge tenants, at least in the interim while the supply / demand situation is sorted out by other means.
You could argue that the situation you mention in Sweden is also primarily a supply / demand problem, not actually a result of the rent controls (rent control doesn’t directly create or destroy housing). Neolibs would argue that you must allow rent to rise without limit to encourage the market to invest in house building…but strangely that policy doesn’t seem to have fixed anything. People with money can just buy existing stock and start gouging, when there is a housing shortage.
@ Solka Not as much as 70,000 new residents a year and 180,000 work permits issued with all those people per year needing to be housed on top of the existing people.
The balance is out of kilter with massive demand for housing and services like transport and health and infrastructure like wastewater, while the ability for locals to afford to pay for that with in effect lower and less secure wages is not able to keep pace.
More and more people will have to rely on benefits so when that is factored in it’s not very sustainable as a practise. Nor is pretending 1 hour of paid work a week is a job so nobody knows the true figures.
It’s not 70,000 new residents a year, it’s 45-50 thousand new residents, most of whom are already in NZ when their resident visas are granted.
And most of the 200,000 work visas are working holidaymakers who travel a lot, so mostly use short term accommodation, not housing (mostly – some certainly rent houses, but most of them don’t).
The main big number is 70,000 net migration, which is a huge problem and does have a big impact on the housing crisis since they do have to housed, but let’s not overstate the issue.
Agree with your comments about looking at everything in isolation. There will be no effective proposal to housing all our people until this is acknowledged and addressed.
But the trick is of raising people out of poverty is actually to get upwards mobility…
The only way to get upwards mobility is to have increasing poverty. For a few to be well off a lot need to be poor.
What we really need is to have everyone with a minimum living standard. Access to the food that they need, a place to call home, interesting work available, a place to play, and access to healthcare. There’s probably more that I’m missing.
Hard to do that when you keep putting more and more people into the country to provide for with a falling base of income.
You’ll note that a few people are getting richer as the majority get poorer. In other words, a few people have ‘upward mobility’.
If the government can’t plan for local people to get decent jobs or meaningful social engagement and become more self sufficient…
Nobody can be self-sufficient. A person must live within a society, a community.
Exactly. We need wealth itself to have some “downwards mobility” – instead wealth is the main thing that is moving upward, leaving most of the people behind!
“You can’t just get groups of disadvantaged people and then push them all together and think everything’s gonna be rosy.”
Yes. Especially in large clusters, such as apartment blocks or whole suburbs. But even in smaller clusters (as reported in the article linked above) issues arise. Which then creates the NIMBY (not in my backyard) effect.
Cinny’s suggestion of a live in manager may help reduce issues. But what to do with the ones that continue to play up? Sure they can be weeded out and moved along, but where too? They’ll still need to be housed somewhere.
Another problem for the Government is if this discontent snowballs, it’s going to piss a lot of voters off nationwide.
New developments with even a small number of state houses will impact on buyers desire to buy into these new developments, thus will negatively impact upon their value. Putting developers off.
It will be interesting to see how Labour move to manage this fallout. Moreover, will National attempt to capitalise from it?
While improving peoples skills and education results in upward mobility. It’s low wages and benefit rates that keep people in poverty as not all are in a position to up-skill or work.
Sunday Star Times continue their investigation in the decline of meat eating.
This was particularly heartening news.
“a Sunday Star-Times/Stuff online survey of nearly 15,000 readers this week reports only 36 per cent of respondents are committed carnivores. A fifth have already cut most or all meat from their diet (21 per cent); the rest are considering cutting back for health (15 per cent), budget (14 per cent), environmental (10 per cent), animal welfare (3 per cent) or personal taste (1 per cent) reasons.”
I’m the same eat less than I used to and only purchase from the local butcher – higher cost but can’t stomach the rubbish they sell at the supermarkets.
Supermarkets seemed to have wrecked the quality of fish too, in their quest to maximise profits. Fish new seemed to be caught here, transported to China for cheaper labour processing and then sent back here. Funny enough a lot of problems can happen in that process. Least of all, they don’t taste too good.
Then the fish farms which seem to be springing up and turning fish into factory farms full of pollutants and biohazards. Can’t remember where, but a whole lot of farmed fish escaped recently and will be a huge hazard apparently to the native fish. Then they are removing all the small fish before they can breed in the sea to turn them into food for the farmed fish.
Most of NZ prime meat is exported. The Kiwis get the leftovers or imported meat.
Then the farmers say they have to keep the inhumane conditions for animals like pigs and chicken’s to ‘compete’ with the cheap imports.
Lots of scams like the meat being injected with water in a sludge of bovine and animal particles to get the weight up.
Then you start getting issues with biosecurity with all the imported foods and have so spend money firefighting the growing issue of overseas viruses and insects being introduced (Like PSA for example) destroying our food supply, exports and crops.
Having seen the mad cow and foot and mouth in the UK and the burning pyres of dead animals, (note the UK foot and mouth was traced to imported Polish pork from school dinners fed to the cows, if that is not disgusting enough, on every level), the deaths in the US from coli in meat and god knows what goes on in Asia with all the dead carcasses lined up in the restaurants.
I’m not sure how 2nd rate our meat is. But certainly the cost of it bears scrutiny because why are we paying so much for food we produce? Exporting the best stuff and importing in crap without clearly declaring it to be imported meat.
I’ve been trying to figure that one out too. Had not thought about it from a ‘pet’ perspective, however. Extreme youth, naivity: yes. LOL.
Due to my age, experience etc (and that of many here), that old meme “teach grandmother to suck eggs” pops into my head often with many of his ‘listen to me, i know everything and you people here know nothing’ posts.
For the hell of it, I counted his comments yesterday on OM. Thirty comments in total – the first at 7.06am and the last at 11.18pm.
Wow – I missed that one but it was during the period of about 18+ months that I left TS of my own accord because of the behaviour and moderation decisions etc of certain authors/moderators. I have since met in person a few others who also left at that time. We had an interesting discussion!
The ones considering it for their health should do more research. There’s nothing unhealthy about eating meat, unless it’s been prepared in unsanitary conditions. And if you cut down on protein and fat the only thing you can replace them with is carbohydrate, which genuinely is bad for your health.
The ones considering it for the environment should also do more research, unless they’re planning to move to the US or Europe sometime soon.
We applied percentages derived from outbreak-associated illnesses for each etiology to the 9.6 million estimated annual illnesses assessed and attributed ≈4.9 million (≈51%) to plant commodities, ≈4.0 million (≈42%) to land animal commodities, and ≈600,000 (≈6%) to aquatic animal commodities. [My emphasis]
…
More illnesses were attributed to leafy vegetables (22%) than to any other commodity; illnesses associated with leafy vegetables were the second most frequent cause of hospitalizations (14%) and the fifth most frequent cause of death (6%).
It is a mockumentary set in the future, and appears to give a different reflective perspective on eating meat in a way that does not bring out the defensive reflex in people. (Full disclosure: Haven’t yet watched it, but did listen to a podcast on the movie and have it lined up for family night at home.)
Spare a though today for the poor besieged Harpers from Taneatua,
” At home this week, Yvonne Harper indicated she was unhappy with the way things turned out but referred questions to her lawyer.
“Don’t make me feel bad. I don’t like it, but we’ve been through a very, very hard time ourselves – emotionally, financially, it’s been hurting us too. I’ve really suffered.””
Seems a bit odd that as the sole director he can’t be held accountable despite proceeding with what on the face of it appears to be a completely contrived receivership.
“John Key’s lawyer, Ken Whitney, was criticised by the High Court after creating a sham trust for a bankrupt property developer then failing to disclose it to authorities probing his client’s insolvency.”
“When asked during cross-examination if he had concerns around setting up structures to allow a bankrupt to continue in business, Mr Whitney told the court: “No, not particularly. It’s a common thing for people to do. It may not be morally as white as it could be but it’s normal practice.”
The move infuriated Eruera’s legal team as there had been no mention in court of an inability to pay. They questioned whether it was a deliberate ploy to avoid the order.
As these things happen all the time when a small business gets fined and told to pay reparations and the owners then go on about their life as if nothing happened?
Yeah, probably.
These fines need to be sheeted home to the owners and not the business so that simply closing the business doesn’t get rid of the consequences.
A “clueless idiot” who has a 1st Class Honours degree in Law (and a BA in History/Politics) and who has been admitted to the NZ Bar as a Barrister and Solicitor.
His partner, Jenna Raeburn, (PR Consultant) also has a BA and LLB as well as considerable experience working for the National Party and MPs in Parliament before becoming Director of Barton Deakin’s NZ office last year.
“Barton Deakin is the largest government relations firm in Australia, and now the first trans-Tasman company in our field.”
One would have hoped that between them, they would have realised beforehand how “clueless” Bishop’s actions would be (and were) in contacting young female teenagers via social media. There may well have been nothing sinister (eg perviness) intended, but perception is everything in public relations, politics and the like.
Bit odd a man of Bishop’s age and position should be contacting teenage girls on social media! Power feeding an underlying dark urge perhaps? Suspicious to say the least.
John Key … female hair fettish
Chris Bishop … chatting up teenage girls on social media …
any more to add to the growing list of Natz pervy creeps?
It will be a nervous few days for National as they wait to see whether this is a #metoo moment, or just a case of an experienced lawyer and MP messaging young women on Snapchat. 🙄
Chris Bishop on Snapchat, eh? Mothers made complaints (one even wrote to another mp about it!) so obviously there was something inappropriate going on.
1 – the law works and the employers who were clearly not being fair have been punished.
2 – that there are shit employees out there who just are not up to the job and employers need to be able to get rid of them and hire people who turn up on time and get the work done.
BTW – remind me – who was the climate change minister for the last 9 years again? you seem to have forgotten the post thread above – as you often do when confronted with facts.
“2 – that there are shit employees out there who just are not up to the job and employers need to be able to get rid of them and hire people who turn up on time and get the work done.”
Employers can already do that, through proper process. Happens all the time.
We don’t need to add the 90 day “fire at will” exploiting garbage.
But, for number two, it seems I am twenty years older than you. I remember full employment. There seemed little problem then with retaining good workers, and sacking the hopeless.
The difference was that with full employment employers had more difficulty in hiring so were more careful in training and retention.
With 5% unemployment, employers can be less.
A great deal of business problems in NZ are not with workers, but management. Our middle management are in world terms under-skilled and underperforming.
The law only “worked” in this case because it didn’t apply, because the employers were incompetent and tried to do consecutive trial periods. It is only because the law didn’t apply that the manifest injustice of her summary dismissal could be addressed.
Also, there are shit employers who have neither the people skills nor the paperwork skills to manage staff. With those folk, the 90-day bill is a loaded firearm – whether they shoot their employees or their own foot is a betting matter.
1. How many have been unjustly dismissed and not ended up in court?
2. It’s probably more accurate to say that there are shit employers who don’t know how to deal with people, how to engage them.
I comprehended your hatred for working people rather well, the snide and vicious attacks against working people have been pretty constant on this site.
Now you doing your level best to keep that roling on by more of your horse excrement, and trying to do the whole personalizing the argument to score points.
I’ve been open about what I do, you need to keep up.
The problem isn’t the shit employers or the shit staff.
The problem is that competent employers didn’t need the 90-day fire at will to manage or even get rid of staff, good or bad.
But under fire at will, good staff don’t have any redress against shit employers, unless the employer is so incompetent that they can’t even implement fire at will competently.
It’s the imbalance that is the major problem with the fire at will act. If the employer is incompetent but not catastrophically incompetent, the employees bear the brunt and and the business suffers.
“The taxpayers of Miami and Tampa should not have to facilitate bigotry and anti-Semitism, and I look forward to the Miami Sports and Exhibition Authority and the Tampa Sports Authority complying with the law and cancelling these concerts.“
If this gets upheld- her US career is toast – 20 states have the same laws (and growing).
It’s an interesting way to fight back treating BDS and it’s supporters in the same manner that they are attacking others – in their pocket.
… treating BDS and it’s supporters in the same manner that they are attacking others – in their pocket.
“The same manner?” Can you elaborate a bit on how the BDS movement is using the political leverage of their supporters in the world’s most powerful country to pass laws damaging to Israeli interests? Because, if they aren’t, it’s not “the same manner,” is it?
It is of course much easier to hit people’s revenues when you have government politicians in your pocket. In that sense it is “the same,” just like Tank Man and the tanks he was facing were doing the same thing (attempting to achieve political objectives). I doubt Tank Man considered the tanks to be “the same” as him, though.
Nothing like freedom of speech and freedom of movement (or choosing not to go to a venue), sarcasm.
Sad that aggressors can and seek to control everything, even trying to wreck some teenager’s career. Nice to have that sort of time and influence on your hands. NOT.
The Jews who don’t agree with the land seizures in Israel and even the UN are harassed just as much as everyone else.
Goes against the idea of a free-market as well. But, then, the RWNJs have never been for a free-market. Just one that’s controlled by them and in their favour.
Wow, looks like Canada is going to lead the world in Nuclear fusion. If you have 13 minutes, including ads. This is a great introduction piece, with a tour General Fusions, the company in Canada who are making great leaps in this direction.
So in 4 years these could very well be viable replacements for all coal burning plants.
They are just one of a whole bunch of companies wildly overhyping their fusion technology and falling way way short of their claims. Wikipedia’s page is somewhat useful for an very brief overview of these efforts.
But I haven’t found anything that says they have even achieved ignition, let alone breakeven or any demonstrated means of usefully extracting any of the energy from the fusion reactions.
A few years ago Lockheed were claiming they would be selling container sized self-contained fusion power systems within five years.
Bottom line: until someone produces an actual working fusion reactor-generator that puts out more power than is fed into it, their claims aren’t even worth a pinch of fairy dust.
The video lays out all the pitfalls and the problems, it also talks about spending most of its time studying plasma. It’s why I said – “could” because there are real problems.
And I might add, why I said introduction.
for more fulsome analysis rather than wikipedia – try
hadn’t heard the “always will be” joke before – just the one that it has been “five years away” for the last fifty years 🙂
There’s a lot of tech where we know the eventual development path once we figure out how to overcome the initial hurdles, fusion is just one of them.
More promising ones are the energy harvesters from the great fusion reactor in the sky: wind and solar. Also, battery tech is leaping forward at the moment.
But really, we only need to overcome some technical thresholds in just a few of all the energy tech directions under development and fossil fuels will be accelerated out the door – not by policy, but because they’re not as practical.
It’s one of the reasons I refuse to be constantly depressed.
I agree, if we crack plasma problem – goodbye fossil fuels.
I like from the video the way they have finally worked out how to get a constant temperature reading. And they fact they built their own supercomputer.
I think we are getting close, a lot of layers of information, and tech are starting to come together on this. 3- 4 more years of plasma research may just crack it.
Interesting points to me about history of the pandemic of flu in 1918. This is to be a year of discussion and memorial – the fastest deadly one there has ever been.
What stands out is that it was largely dealt with by women, children and the elderly – everybody else was overseas still, involved with WW1.
Also there was intelligence sensitivity – giving out info could break morale, let out useful info to the enemy etc. So people were not informed about it officially and nation-wide. Local government had to organise a system to deal with it – the baker’s van would deliver the bread and take away the bodies each day! Boy Scouts went round delivering leaflets. There is a huge story about how NZ coped in difficult times that we should know about, as today our national information, knowledge and action is also being weakened by events and approaches.
Spain wasn’t in the war, other countries couldn’t mention the flu, so when Spain reported its outbreak it became okay to mention it; calling it the Spanish flu.
Actually they think it originally came from pig farms in Kansas. But that would have been the first wave which had not been so deadly, another one mutated and started about three weeks later and it was much more severe.
There are only a handful of memorials around the country – the devastation is often overlooked because it occurred at the same time as the war in Europe in ended. Ryan McLane, a communicable diseases specialist who’s a health advisor at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, explains why it was so lethal.
An interesting discussion from Aus onthe privileges associated with being a male politician, looking at the way Barnaby Joyce is able to swat away the news about his affair and “love child” with a former staffer compared to the way the Aus media treats female politicians. It’s based on PhD research and focuses in particular on the case of Cheryl Kernot, a rising star of the 90’s who was attacked in the media for having the “morals of an alleycat on heat” when it was revealed that she had had an affair 20 years earlier with a former student. She got the whole “Does her heart rule her head?” thing thrown at her, too, and was eventually hounded out of politics.
The piece discusses the convention that politicians’ private lives should be kept private, and finds “And the evidence is clear: it was more likely to be broken for women in politics, whose relationships, sexuality and gender rendered them somehow more accessible. The private life convention has often rested on an assumption that men are not affected by love affairs, flings and trysts, while women are.
It’s a peculiar kind of unconscious bias.”
Strong links to the recent “concerns” from some that our PM shouldn’t continue to serve while she’s pregnant or new to motherhood.
I have to use my daughter phone to get this post out you see people Spark is a neoliberal run company the sand fly’s are using this company as a weapon against Ecothey have many times blocked my data as I only blog and read other sites in reality I should never run out of my data enough said .
Give a little got back to me on Friday asking me to change some things information on my give a little page I emailed them that I will think about choices.
My choice is I don’t need to use give a little site the sandfly are going to try and play me using that site. This is the internet age as everyone who reads my word is internet savvy I can just make my own site and put a bank account number up and wallar people who want to help me can use internet banking to make donations for my cause of holding the NZ justice system to account for the farcical game they are
Trying to play against me. I will set up a charitable trust to help other common Kiwis
Sue the Nz justice .when I win my case I will put the money back in the trust for other people to apply for funding to nz justice system for breaching there privacy/human rights I will keep you updated on my progress as the first stage will take about 2 weeks. Many thanks to all the good people who run the standard for letting ECO Maori use this site to get funding to sue the Crown. Ka psi I’m nakered the mokos have tired me out lol PS I don’t trust give a little and they won’t be getting 15persent of my Mana
.ka kite ano
Yes I have a big problem with that tpp why are we not privay to all the information on ttp is it a weapon for the 1%,to get total control of the common 99%.
3 minutes after I posted that post and wallar my data is back I rang 123 4 times muppets enough said on that.
I have a lot of good information that I want to cut and paste on here one can see that it’s the original book. This information will lift MAORI Mana up high as it show how the NZ company ripped off and coned the British people they went to Britain and sold lies when the settlers landed in Atoearoa there was nothing that they were sold and promised they would have starved to death Maori built them housing and feed all the common British people that landed in Atoearoa with nothing??????? neoliberals theves.
Ana to kai This information is from the missionarys and another society
Ka kite ano
From earlier this week (may already have been discussed here, but I was busy when it was published – and it’s very important and there need to be constant reminders about it:
The prizes for excessive spin go to Winston Peters (1st place) and David Parker (2nd place).
The latest version of the TPPA is not much better or different from the Nats’ version.
A lot of nonsense has been talked about the second bottom line: preserving the right to regulate. The entire agreement is designed to restrict the right of sovereign governments to regulate in the national interest on matters as diverse as banking, government procurement and platform operators like Uber and Amazon. Even Tim Groser and I could agree on that.
Te Tiriti is not protected as claimed in the spin, and then there’s the secrecy.
Ask Maori if the treaty was a fair deal. Nope thought not.
TPPA is NOT some simple 5 page trade agreement to remove tariffs. If it was then there would be no problem.
Nope it is a way for those with international power and resources to continue to exploit new countries and resources without censorship or be compensated for it and to control new ideas and IP and stifle innovation.
Oil/cars is an example, if that industry was not so powerful the world could have saved a lot of the environmental pollution and potentially climate change a lot sooner and had green energy.
You can not micro manage the future with these agreements.
Government officials are blind to what they are signing. It’s the emperor’s new clothes.
But the biggest reason I’m against the TPPA is that it is inherently undemocratic.
The agreement sits over the top of the countries undermining democracy from local government decisions to central government decisions to the person on the street or living on the farm.
And that is why the agreement texts needs to be kept a secret because it’s an insane thing to do and falls down when examined as why a government would sign up it’s people to it.
Look at the billions it’s going to cost the UK to Brexit. Once in, too expensive and complicated to exit multi country agreements.
And the reason the UK wanted to exit in the first place was probably nothing to do with the EU but to do with neoliberalism and not being able to afford housing and transport, lack of security, poorer healthcare and schooling having little say in your community.
The same thing that is plaguing NZ and we are trying to make worse with neoliberal trade agreements.
“Look at the billions it’s going to cost the UK to Brexit. Once in, too expensive and complicated to exit multi country agreements. “
Was in the UK when the EU was being discussed, and couldn’t see how the democracy of each country was going to be protected, and how policies could be enacted that protected each citizen. The result for the referendum for Brexit is understandable when you consider how many have been left behind in the last three decades.
I have the same concern with the TPPA that you do. And it is not alleviated by the smooth murmurings of David Parker.
The alienation of large sections of English society was done by Tory and Labour governments since Thatcher came to power in 1979.
The EU, and its ECJ, brought massive improvement to working conditions and to civil rights in England. The single market brought the UK out of its economic malaise and, along with Scottish oil, underwrote the growth of the last 30 years.
If it was not for Europe England would be a far bigger mess that the shocker it is currently suffering.
I’ll bet you never expected to see prose like this in The Economist:
Some of the biggest changes in recent decades have made the meritocracy even more intolerable than it was in the glory days of the 11-plus. One is the marriage of merit and money. The plutocracy has learned the importance of merit: British public schools have turned themselves into exam factories and the children of oligarchs study for MBAs. At the same time the meritocracy has acquired a voracious appetite for money. The cleverest computer scientists dream of IPOs, and senior politicians and civil servants cash in when they retire with private-sector jobs. A second is supersized smugness. Today’s meritocrats are not only smug because they think they are intellectually superior. They are smug because they also think that they are morally superior, convinced that people who don’t share their cosmopolitan values are simple-minded bigots. The third is incompetence. The only reason people tolerate the rule of swots is that they get results. But what if they give you the invasion of Iraq and the financial crisis?
It’s review of a book called The Rise of the Meritocracy, by Michael Young, published sixty years ago.
rhinocrates
Good to read, but will it be by the smug? They know all they need to and any other thoughts are from those who are the wrong fit to belong to the group who are making it in the world.
Of course what ‘it’ is, is fairly narrowly defined and a bit vague around the edges after the assurance that it is proving profitable. And as the old people say about proof, ‘The proof of the pudding is in the eating’. That’s all that needs to be explained. ‘Nuff said. (Though someone coined the phrase ‘ Eat the rich’. This has an unsettling ring to it. End of memo to self.)
You mean an actual meritocracy, in which the truly talented are promoted rather than those who are good at exams and are the children of those who can send them to the best schools. Meritocracy in practise becomes self-perpetuating oligarchy.
Yep. Like ‘aristocracy’ means literally ‘rule by the best’ but Oscar Wilde described Burke’s Peerage as “the one book a young man about town should know thoroughly, and it is the best thing in fiction the English have ever done'”
I always considered one of the primary benefits of any privately funded schools to be the contacts, and networks made that provide benefits over and above any academic or meritocracy.
The amount of money spent could provide a wealth of experiences and tutors, but would not give that access to others on the same path to wealth.
All the more reason to close private schools: get those networks to extend further into society, and let little Tarquin and Jeremy-Charles get a more rounded view of life.
Well folks it raining cats and dogs up here in the North – thankfully the drains are working but we have a lagoon on our front lawn. Cyclone Gita is on its way and Cyclone Hola in its wake – climate change showing its force in a very wet way. The plants are confused and don’t know one season fron the next.
Also my thought for the day – Julie Bishop the Australian Foreign Minister is standing firm on their NZ detention laws – I wonder what will happen in the future when Australian citizens will be begging in their thousands to come over here escaping being roasted alive in their country as climate refugees. Will we be a stand over and let them in like we have been with the Peter Theil’s of this world and all the other bolt hole rich listers and receive them in with generous arms, or will we stand firm and say we have other priorities like the Pacific Islanders whose countries will be under water – I think not. We need to, the Australians don’t care one jot for us.
Bucketing down in Auckland, too. I expect some flooding in some parts of the city.
Many of us have relatives in Aussie.
The Aussies are very keen on sending people born in NZ, or with NZ family history, back to NZ. So, when Aussie bakes, and is short of potable water, maybe we should say we’ll just take back the Kiwis….. and the rest can have Aussie to themselves?
WK
Funny to hear Julie Bishop talk like a real person with concern and thoughts – they must have given her a very good dinner before the interview and quieted the hysterical indigestion. We are stuck with Oz as neighbours, and they always have at least 3 plans on stand-by for us, they will be milking us as long as they can.
Her Australian line will be straight from ‘Hotel California’ – they keep ‘stabbing us with their steely knives but they just can’t kill the beast’. Thanks to excellent AZ Lyrics. I wonder if our handsome winsome Winston soft-soaped her?
Mirrors on the ceiling
The pink champagne on ice
And she said “We are all just prisoners here, of our own device”
And in the master’s chambers
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives
But they just can’t kill the beast
Last thing I remember
I was running for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
“Relax, ” said the night man
“We are programmed to receive
You can check-out any time you like
But you can never leave!”
Because climate change is a political problem & not a scientific question, The Daily Blog is naming all cyclones after our MPs and Companies who have done so much to hold back genuine climate change reform – this new one that is joining our increasingly erratic and weather pattern is called ‘Cyclone Gerry’ in honour of Gerry Brownlee who did sweet FA in 9 years on climate change.
““Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”
So it was you that read something – couldn’t even comprehend even the most basic of story from the Daily Blog, then made up your own “facts” (“Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”) and added them when posting here as your own clever idea without linking to the original story.
You keep getting more stupid.
So again ““Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”
Who was the climate change minister Ed – come on – you know you can do it…….(or perhaps not)
Another article pointing out the oncoming crash.
John Adams, a former Australian government economist has warned. “a small tremor before the big earthquake” as the world moves “ever closer to economic armageddon”.
The signs are out there folks.
Ten signs we’re heading for ‘economic armageddon’
Sign 1: Record Household Debt
Sign 2: Declining Household Savings
Sign 3: Continued Record Low Interest Rates
Sign 4: Growing Housing Bubble
Sign 5: Continued Increase In Global Debt
Sign 6: Major International Asset Bubbles Keep Growing
Sign 7: Increasing Inflation
Sign 8: Tightening Monetary Policy And Rising Global Interest Rates
Sign 9: Inverted And Flattening Yield Curves
Sign 10: Return Of Risky Derivatives
Is texting minors a lapse of judgment or grooming? Does anyone know what the definition is and when one becomes the other? This distinction must be a minefield for the judiciary. Even more so in the days of the me too movement.
I think it would depend very much on the content of the text. Given that the parents have not kicked up a fuss – I doubt that they were unsavoury. But it was a stupid thing to be doing.
It is also wrong just to assume that a male texting younger people could be grooming.
Thanks Bill.
You will learn more from reading that those comments than days of watching the msm’s propaganda on Syria.
I particularly found this comment illuminiating.
The Open University of the interweb.
The reason for the sudden revival in coverage of Syria isn’t hard to fathom. It is connected to several recent and ongoing developments:
The Syrian military, having largely succeeded in defeating ISIS, is now pushing to reclaim the lucrative oil fields east of Deir-ez-Zor. The American “Coalition” has marked the Euphrates as a deconfliction zone and has sold that in the Western media as a consensus position where it is in fact a unilateral imposition made during their occupation of Syrian land.
It was in this region of Mesopotamia that the American military and their Islamist/Kurdish proxies engaged with and killed roughly 100 Syrian forces earlier in the week. There has also been the suggestion that there were Russian casualties. The wider point is that despite the defeat of ISIS, there remains conflict over the spoils – or would be spoils – of war…
Which explains America’s typically atavistic declaration that it would retain an open-ended presence in the region, particularly in the NE Syria/Iraqi border, under the pretence of training/supporting a cross-border security force staffed with Kurdish forces and the remnants of its covertly backed Islamist militias.
This brings America into conflict with an increasingly Iran-aligned Iraqi government and, more importantly, Turkey, who will not under any circumstances accept a border force of American-backed Kurdish forces in the 10s of thousands as proposed by the Pentagon.
This in turn partially explains the Turkish attack on Afrin, which is ongoing and likely to be bloody.
The Syrian downing of an Israelli F-16, which resulted in Israel retaliating with missiles deep into Syrian territory. The more important point here is that Syria wouldn’t have aimed its air defences against an Israeli air force that has made persistent, offensive raids into Syrian air space without the explicit support of the Russian military. This was, in other words, a warning – back off. As of now, it seems that Israel is not willing to escalate the conflict any further.
There is also the ongoing rapprochement between Russian and Turkey and the Russia-mediated talks, while the US has rallied back around its position of no progress without the Assad government stepping down. So there is a mixture of deadlock and movement to end the conflict.
That’s the background context for the recent uptick in Western media propaganda about Syria. The fact that it is mostly couched in terms of nostalgia for what might have been suggests that even with the best warmongering will in the world, the moment for massive Western destabilisation and imperial adventurism has passed. That doesn’t mean, however, that there isn’t the possibility for tactical mistakes with broader implications, and America continues to play an invidious role.
None of this, of course, is seriously dealt with in the current glut of coverage – but we shouldn’t expect it after the last 5 years. And lest it need be said, one doesn’t need to “support” (whatever that means) the Syrian or Russian governments in order be curious about the actual real-world implications of what is happening or how they fit into the geostrategic network of power-interests. It’s just a shame that none of these issues will be covered in anything like an honest fashion by an increasingly shameless Western propaganda consensus.
Bill, Eva Bartlett is always interesting on Syria.
This is worth watching.
In a funny way, despite his political leanings in the past, I still miss John Armstrong’s opinion pieces in the Herald following his retirement due to serious health problems. So it is good to see he still contributes from time to time on TVNZ’s website – and this week it seems that even he has not escaped the Jacinda effect:
Sounds like a breath of fresh air in Derry.
It is rare one gets the opportunity to hear the truth, not the corporate media’s narrative.
Five passionate and well-informed speakers, who included the former British Ambassador to Syria Peter Ford, detailed the carnage and chaos that has been unleashed around the globe by the aggressive, warmongering policies of the US and its closest allies.
Eva Bartlett, Investigative Journalist
Dr Marcus Papadopoulos, Editor Politics First
Neil Clark, Journalist, Author, Broadcaster
Peter Ford, Former UK Ambassador to Syria
Professor Piers Robinson, Sheffield University
Vanessa Beely, Investigative Journalist
Here is one of those speakers.
Neil Clark on Yogoslavia, Iraq, Libya, Iraq.
As a commentator says.
Because everyone in Britain, Europe and America swallowed the narrative about Yugoslavia and more specifically Serbia, it allowed the governments in those places to carry out their subsequent attacks on Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria….not to mention the coup in Ukraine and the attack on Yemen. Everyone accepted the Kosovo and Bosnia narrative. The lies were obvious to me. I encountered the ”poor Kosovar” and ”poor Bosniaks” in London as many of them took advantage of a free passage to the rich West. I noticed that these ”victims” immediately engaged in criminal activities in London. That was what the Serbs had had to deal with for years. Yet they were the bad guys. Even now on the left, the Serbs are accepted without question as the ”’bad guys”….some seem to have caught up now, but none of them spoke up at the time.
Imperialism On Trial: Writers And Activists Convene In Derry, Ireland
Imperialism has run like a broken thread throughout human history, but so has Resistance to Imperialism. In this regard, I’d like to take a moment to pay tribute to the Syrian Arab Army, Hezbollah, Iran, Russia, in short, all those whose efforts in combating this genocidal project of a latter day Khmer Rouge has prevented Syria from being pushed into an abyss in which its minorities—people who can trace their presence in that part of the world back over a millenia and more—would have been gone, extirpated, annihilated.
Everybody on this panel tonight has felt the lash of the mainstream media. They call us ‘cranks’, they call us ‘stooges’, they call us “Putin’s puppets’, they call us ‘Assadists’. But yet, why do they attack us if we’re so marginal, why take the time to attack what we do? It’s because we ask the question ‘why’…
John Wight‘s talk was a poetic, searing condemnation of Imperialism and the corporate media, with literary and historical references included.
Alternative media and those who go on it are under attack because they have the temerity to ask the most subversive question in the English language which is:
Why?
Why did we go to war in Iraq?
Why are there sanctions on Cuba?
Why are we going after Iran but are close friends with the Saudis?
This question is so powerful. We are attacked because we ask the question, why?
I am reminded of the African proverb that until lions have their own historians, tales of the hunt will always glorify the hunter. Now with the alternative media, the lions have their historians.
We can put the case for the Syrian people; we can put the case for the Venezuelan people; we can put the case why Russia should not be our enemy.
Capitalism is killing the world.
And we are letting it do so.
After 200,000 years of modern humans on a 4.5 billion-year-old Earth, we have arrived at new point in history: the Anthropocene. The change has come upon us with disorienting speed. It is the kind of shift that typically takes two or three or four generations to sink in.
Our best scientists tell us insistently that a calamity is unfolding, that the life-support systems of the Earth are being damaged in ways that threaten our survival. Yet in the face of these facts we carry on as usual.
Most citizens ignore or downplay the warnings; many of our intellectuals indulge in wishful thinking; and some influential voices declare that nothing at all is happening, that the scientists are deceiving us. Yet the evidence tells us that so powerful have humans become that we have entered this new and dangerous geological epoch, which is defined by the fact that the human imprint on the global environment has now become so large and active that it rivals some of the great forces of nature in its impact on the functioning of the Earth system.
I find it quite incredible for you to now be referencing Jane Kelsey after bagging her and the Labour opposition for opposing the TPPA as it stood then.
It’s an unhappy time for National and Nat voters like yourself to have lost out on signing this (or any) free trade deal, but I’m sure you’ll get over it in time. Just leave it to the professionals in Labour to get it over the line. 🙂
By the way, please find one quote where I have backed or even referenced Jane Kelsey’s work on this.
You are a very dishonest person, James. But I think you know this. You like to make apologies when you get it totally wrong in public, like the 3-0 episode, and the change of government in 2017 but that is not the same thing.
The new team has won significant amendments which the Nats were happy to forego. The current deal helps protect working Kiwis, not that they’ve ever been a concern of yours.
In your own words, in your own time. Take your time, James, don’t be shy. I admire people who try to deal with complex issues in their own words, I really do – live (and let live) and learn. People who play silly games, James, not so much.
The bill:
defines who is eligible for assisted dying
details the provisions to ensure that this a free choice
outlines the steps to ensure a person is mentally capable of understanding the nature and consequences of assisted dying.
What do you need to know?
Submissions are publicly released and published to the Parliament website. Only your name or organisation’s name is required on a submission. Please keep your contact details separate, because if they are included on the submission they will become publicly available when the submission is released.
If you wish to include information of a private or personal nature in your submission you should discuss this with the clerk of the committee before submitting.
If you wish to speak to your submission, please state this clearly. The committee will decide at a later date how it will hear from submitters.
Looking at google (keywords – submission re euthanasia) and on the first page there were 10 headings relating to nz and euthanasia and 9 were against, mostly from the Catholic Church. It would be better for churches that have been involved in burning people and torturing them in past mistaken behaviour seeking to cleanse them of sin?, to be backward about interfering in this matter between a person and their God. Churches should not attempt to stop people from meeting their Maker when they feel they are ready, it is wrong for the Church to do so.
I intended to watch The Brisbane Global Rugby Tens when I finished milking .
When I got to my daughters place on the farm well PaPa was to busy looking after our mokos to even get time to think about watching the Tens + I had to drive my wife back to Rotorua from Putaruru and back to milk at 5 am for her mahi sorry guys I will watch the games reruns .
The Blues won Ka pai E hoa .Tana I wish you and your men all the best I wont say to much you see there is some phenomenon .I.E There was no information on your win on the 2 websites I frequently observe stuff /herald .I know why these neolibrals are trying there hardest to limit my Mana but know every time they try there actions just adds to my Mana enough said . Here,s a AUSSIE site with your fabulous win
I have been to busy defending my whano and I from the stupid plays of the sandflys to put some serious thought into this farcical tpp. You may ask your self why I call it FARCIAL they wont show us the wording so that is a farce . In my view if the government is to sign all the people of Aotearoa mokos futures up to this binding agreement that is being rammed down OUR throats by big business
whose only goal is to take more of OUR hard earned resources away from us all this is a fact . Big business are manipulating it so they can do anything and if they cannot get or do what they want they will sue . Who wins when you get to the upper scales of big money well the Organization with the biggest check book always wins in that scenario ka pai.
In my view we will all be held to ransom by big business if there products or services poision or kill other people wild life or ruin OUR mokos future environment there will be absolutely nothing we can do to stop them or hold big business accountable for there evil actions . Look at the nz company they sold lies to Britons took there money as they new that when the common people got to Aotearoa there was absolutely nothing they could do to get there money back. These people who are probably my ancestors only survived because Maori are a humane Culture that feed and built them houses .
If we let the tpp be sign up into OUR laws in ten years time the scenario will be like this .
You will have to be in the Billions club not the Millions club as it is at the moment to get Big business or the goverment to respect your human & privacy rights this is a fact .
The 000.1% will have total control of Aotearoa full stop .
Not including a clause for OUR Treaty of Waitangi is a spit in the face to ALL Maori.
We have already lost enough Mana in the last 200 years the tpp will have us all living under the bridge working 80 hours a week just to eat or in sub standard housing estates full of drugs and crime this will be OUR reality.
It is now that I challange all OUR Maori leaders to sue the coalition government into abandoning this farcical tpp that we know nothing about why are they hiding the laws of this contract because they know that we the 99% will be protesting and voting them out of Parliament.
When a Hunter is hunting a wild Boar and its piglets he does not shout out to the Boar we are going caste a Kupenga /net over you and your mokos we are going to eat you and put your mokos in a Hinaki /trap and breed your mokos for our food as the Boar and his mokos will run away and never get caught ka pai
ECO MAORI SAYS THIS IS THE WAY THESE EVIL bigots are behaving.
I call on all the people of Aotearoa to stop this going through to OUR parliament .
The neolibral civil servents who run the country are lying to our new goverment they have weaved a vale of lies and caste it over the new governments EYES.
Now is the time for Maori to SUE the government in the high court to at the least have the Treaty of Waitangi INCLUSION clause sign into this farcical tpp .
This action will protect all the 99.99% of people of Aoetearoa from big business cruel inhumane practice .
One mite say you said that the action of SUING OUR new Labour lead goverment could cause them to lose the 2020 election to the neolibreals ECO MAORI says not to threat national are backing this farcial new treaty that just benefits the 000.1% of people on Papatuanuku so they will not beable to use it as a tool to steal votes off our new goverment .
Ana to kai Ka kite ano
“It will be remembered that Lord John Russell’s feelings in favour of the Natives of New Zealand were very strongly and publicly expressed on the occasion of his dining with the Company in the City. The following short quotations, from documents issued from the Colonial Office, will shew what were his views with respect to the land.
Mr Vernon Smith to Mr Somes
Downing Street, December 2, 1840.
With regards to all lands in the colony acquired under any other title than that of grants made in the name and on behalf of Her Majesty, it is proposed that the titles of the claimants should be subjected to the investigation of a Commission to be constituted for that purpose. The basis of that inquiry will be the assertion, on behalf of the Crown, of a title to all lands situate in New Zealand, which have, heretofore, been granted by the Chiefs of those islands, according to the customs of the country, and in return for some adequate consideration. Lord J. Russell is not aware that any exception can arise to this general principle; but if so, every such exception will be considered on its own merits, and dealt with accordingly.
Lord Stanley’s sentiments, as expressed in the following passages of a letter written by his under Secretary, are quite in unison with those of Lord J. Russell, as respects the Native rights.
Extract of a Letter from G.W. Hope, Esq., to J. Somes, Esq.
1st February, 1843.
In answer to these claims, Lord Stanley desires me to remind you, that he has offered, on the part of the Crown, as matter, not of right, but of grace and favour, to “instruct the Governor to make them a conditional grant, subject to prior titles to be established as bylaw provided, not only of such portion of the Wellington Settlement as is in the actual occupation of Settlers under them but also of all parts not in the occupation or possession of others; the extent of such grants, of course, not to exceed that to which they are entitled under Mr. Pennington’s award.”
Further than this, Lord Stanley cannot consent to go, consistently with the obligations by which the Crown as he conceives, is bound. Lord Stanley is not prepared, as Her Majesty’s Secretary of State, to join with the Company in setting aside the Treaty of Waitangi after obtaining the advantages guaranteed by it, even though it might be made with “naked savages,” or though it might “be treated by lawyers as a praise-worthy device for amusing and pacifying savages for the moment.” Lord Stanley entertains a different view of the respect due to obligations contracted by the Crown of England; and his final answer to the demands of the Company must be, that, as long as he has the honour of serving the Crown he will not admit that any person, or any Government acting in the name of Her Majesty, can contract a legal moral, or honorary obligation to despoil others of their lawful and equitable rights.”
(Smith & Elder, 1846, p61-63)
The Committee Of The Aborigines’ Protection Society (1846). On The British Colonization of New Zealand. London, Smith and Elder.
I apologize to Elizabeth II Queen of the United Kingdom for the use of the Crown as a attack against the NZ police Ka kite ano
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 27 were:1. The Minister for Ford Rangers strikes againTransport Minister Simeon Brown was again the busiest of the Cabinet ministers this week, announcing an ...
You got a fast carAnd I want a ticket to anywhereMaybe we make a dealMaybe together we can get somewhereAny place is betterYesterday’s newsletter, Trust In Me, on the report of abuse in state care, and by religious organisations, between 1950 and 2019, coupled with the hypocrisy of Christopher Luxon ...
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
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TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
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“Intensified housing, intensified issues.”
The neighbourhood had deteriorated since the HNZ units opened in mid-2016, they said. The development replaced two older state houses.
“This is absolutely a governance issue that’s got to come from the top . . . What I’m hearing is it’s likely to be [a problem] replicated in different places around New Zealand.”
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/101299398/phillipstown-not-alone-as-christchurch-residents-come-forward-to-discuss-housing-nz-issues
Yep, government policies looking at everything in insolation. You can’t just get groups of disadvantaged people and then push them all together and think everything’s gonna be rosy.
State houses should be integrated into all housing and all areas rich and poor. Instead the government has sold all the expensive (rich) parts off and thinks putting up ‘social’ apartment blocks or hotels as social housing with large groups of people is gonna work.
Not only has the social housing never arrived but it would never work anyway as quickly it would quickly become slums. All the new developments should have had to have 5 – 10% reserved for state or affordable housing as part of the consent and forced to be sold at a rate against the average wage.
But the trick is of raising people out of poverty is actually to get upwards mobility and invest in the people themselves – decent schools, decent food and decent health and decent opportunities including decent wages and jobs that are secure. Hard to do that when you keep putting more and more people into the country to provide for with a falling base of income.
In any society nobody is perfect – but in NZ the whole system is encouraging people to go backwards into poverty. Giving $30 or $60 a week more is a waste of time long term (especially if you have rising food, power, transport and housing costs that the government can’t control).
If the government can’t plan for local people to get decent jobs or meaningful social engagement and become more self sufficient and be able to plan for their future and instead wants to pander to an ideology of selling off land and assets to the highest bidder (generally overseas folks) and letting those people bring in their own workers (aka 200 Chinese workers for the luxury hotel) then it’s a wasted opportunity. It’s taking away opportunities for local prosperity because the government has allowed a culture of getting other labour from other countries in so that the corporations can make more profit and then even giving residency or citizenship so that it becomes more people who need support.
In the hotel example most of the locals are then locked out, as it’s being built and then when it is being run and finally the profits from it. The locals get the pollution, wastewater issues, transport issues and need to find more housing both to house and provide services for the new workers (temporary or not) working on it, as well as the hotel space being used for rich tourists providing no amenity or accomodation for locals in that prime location. It’s lose, lose for locals and win win for large offshore corporations.
TPPA is being introduced to ensure it because a tangled web that is hard to exit from, even if the people vote against this model of inequality transfer from local people to big business.
But if wages rise won’t that just fuel house price inflation?
Potentially, which is why there needs to be other more direct intervention in the housing market (e.g. rent controls, state house building).
@UncookedSelachimorpha, You can have as many rent controls as you like, the houses are not there to be rented because we have inward migration and a massive shortage to begin with. To make matters worse anyone in the world can buy our houses for whatever reason they like.
Even with the new Labour policy foreigners are free to buy new houses, land and assets. So it will make little benefit and its too late anyway because it’s clear that existing housing stock is already been bought and regulary traded increasing the prices already.
In Sweden they have rent controls which meant in some cases only 2 houses were available in a major city. People just would not give up their rental so no new ones ever came up.
“You can have as many rent controls as you like, the houses are not there to be rented because we have inward migration and a massive shortage to begin with. To make matters worse anyone in the world can buy our houses for whatever reason they like.”
Agree that the underlying problem is lack of supply vs demand, including for the reasons you mention.
I don’t think rent control is the actual solution – but it would reduce the ability of people with money to exploit the current shortage to gouge tenants, at least in the interim while the supply / demand situation is sorted out by other means.
You could argue that the situation you mention in Sweden is also primarily a supply / demand problem, not actually a result of the rent controls (rent control doesn’t directly create or destroy housing). Neolibs would argue that you must allow rent to rise without limit to encourage the market to invest in house building…but strangely that policy doesn’t seem to have fixed anything. People with money can just buy existing stock and start gouging, when there is a housing shortage.
@ Solka Not as much as 70,000 new residents a year and 180,000 work permits issued with all those people per year needing to be housed on top of the existing people.
The balance is out of kilter with massive demand for housing and services like transport and health and infrastructure like wastewater, while the ability for locals to afford to pay for that with in effect lower and less secure wages is not able to keep pace.
More and more people will have to rely on benefits so when that is factored in it’s not very sustainable as a practise. Nor is pretending 1 hour of paid work a week is a job so nobody knows the true figures.
It’s not 70,000 new residents a year, it’s 45-50 thousand new residents, most of whom are already in NZ when their resident visas are granted.
And most of the 200,000 work visas are working holidaymakers who travel a lot, so mostly use short term accommodation, not housing (mostly – some certainly rent houses, but most of them don’t).
The main big number is 70,000 net migration, which is a huge problem and does have a big impact on the housing crisis since they do have to housed, but let’s not overstate the issue.
“But if wages rise won’t that just fuel house price inflation?”
That depends on how wage increases are structured, coupled with how well we improve housing supply.
If wage increases are funded by slowing increases at the upper end of the pay scale, that will help offset inflationary pressure.
+100.
Agree with your comments about looking at everything in isolation. There will be no effective proposal to housing all our people until this is acknowledged and addressed.
The only way to get upwards mobility is to have increasing poverty. For a few to be well off a lot need to be poor.
What we really need is to have everyone with a minimum living standard. Access to the food that they need, a place to call home, interesting work available, a place to play, and access to healthcare. There’s probably more that I’m missing.
You’ll note that a few people are getting richer as the majority get poorer. In other words, a few people have ‘upward mobility’.
Nobody can be self-sufficient. A person must live within a society, a community.
DTB
+1
Exactly. We need wealth itself to have some “downwards mobility” – instead wealth is the main thing that is moving upward, leaving most of the people behind!
+++++ SaveNZ re integrated housing.
Mum took me out to Porirua as a kid to see Muldoons ‘think big’ project and explained why housing isolation was a bad bad idea. etc.
“You can’t just get groups of disadvantaged people and then push them all together and think everything’s gonna be rosy.”
Yes. Especially in large clusters, such as apartment blocks or whole suburbs. But even in smaller clusters (as reported in the article linked above) issues arise. Which then creates the NIMBY (not in my backyard) effect.
Cinny’s suggestion of a live in manager may help reduce issues. But what to do with the ones that continue to play up? Sure they can be weeded out and moved along, but where too? They’ll still need to be housed somewhere.
Another problem for the Government is if this discontent snowballs, it’s going to piss a lot of voters off nationwide.
New developments with even a small number of state houses will impact on buyers desire to buy into these new developments, thus will negatively impact upon their value. Putting developers off.
It will be interesting to see how Labour move to manage this fallout. Moreover, will National attempt to capitalise from it?
@ savenz
While improving peoples skills and education results in upward mobility. It’s low wages and benefit rates that keep people in poverty as not all are in a position to up-skill or work.
100% savenz;
National policy = encourages ghettos
This must be awful for people, was thinking about it last night.
If there are social housing blocks, maybe there needs to be a ‘building manager’ living on site. Among other things.
“This must be awful for people…”
Indeed.
I see some were also upset about the two story building going up next door. This in itself is going to irate a lot of people.
How Labour manage this growing fallout is going to be vital to their popularity come next election.
+++
Sunday Star Times continue their investigation in the decline of meat eating.
This was particularly heartening news.
“a Sunday Star-Times/Stuff online survey of nearly 15,000 readers this week reports only 36 per cent of respondents are committed carnivores. A fifth have already cut most or all meat from their diet (21 per cent); the rest are considering cutting back for health (15 per cent), budget (14 per cent), environmental (10 per cent), animal welfare (3 per cent) or personal taste (1 per cent) reasons.”
https://i.stuff.co.nz/life-style/food-wine/100870623/government-warning-farmers-ignore-concerns-about-meat-at-their-peril
Personally I have. It’s really come down to nzs shit meat quality
Where do you buy from ?
We’ve only just recently got a butcher back in town so I’ve started buying again. But nowhere near as much as I use. Veggie stuff is quite nice
I’m the same eat less than I used to and only purchase from the local butcher – higher cost but can’t stomach the rubbish they sell at the supermarkets.
Supermarkets seemed to have wrecked the quality of fish too, in their quest to maximise profits. Fish new seemed to be caught here, transported to China for cheaper labour processing and then sent back here. Funny enough a lot of problems can happen in that process. Least of all, they don’t taste too good.
Then the fish farms which seem to be springing up and turning fish into factory farms full of pollutants and biohazards. Can’t remember where, but a whole lot of farmed fish escaped recently and will be a huge hazard apparently to the native fish. Then they are removing all the small fish before they can breed in the sea to turn them into food for the farmed fish.
Go to farmers markets.
Mmm yes. Yummy fresh as snapper fillets yesterday.
This fresh? Mind you Clarke put that one back “to do his business”!
https://twitter.com/NZClarke/status/935000095908544513
But fresh snapper – yummmm And so good for you, Vitamin B12, Omega 3 etc etc
Makes you wonder how a certain Psycho got his handle 😈
To OAG – never made the connection! LOLOLOLOL
The mind boggles 🙂
Most of NZ prime meat is exported. The Kiwis get the leftovers or imported meat.
Then the farmers say they have to keep the inhumane conditions for animals like pigs and chicken’s to ‘compete’ with the cheap imports.
Lots of scams like the meat being injected with water in a sludge of bovine and animal particles to get the weight up.
Then you start getting issues with biosecurity with all the imported foods and have so spend money firefighting the growing issue of overseas viruses and insects being introduced (Like PSA for example) destroying our food supply, exports and crops.
I’m not sure the PSA would enjoy being classified as a virus or insect.
Ok bacteria too, you get the drift. http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2017/08/infected-kiwifruit-from-china-caused-psa-outbreak-court-told.html
In that article the classic line,
“MPI denies all the claims, including that it has a duty of care.”
“The Kiwis get the leftovers or imported meat.”
I speak to many travelers from Europe and they can’t believe how much we pay for 2nd grade NZ produce. They’d be taking to the streets….
Having seen the mad cow and foot and mouth in the UK and the burning pyres of dead animals, (note the UK foot and mouth was traced to imported Polish pork from school dinners fed to the cows, if that is not disgusting enough, on every level), the deaths in the US from coli in meat and god knows what goes on in Asia with all the dead carcasses lined up in the restaurants.
I’m not sure how 2nd rate our meat is. But certainly the cost of it bears scrutiny because why are we paying so much for food we produce? Exporting the best stuff and importing in crap without clearly declaring it to be imported meat.
That’s why we home kill.
Do they pay you overtime?
Why do you ask?
Do you want to compare his pay and overtime rates with yours as you seem to be here for very long hours each day, probably longer than James.
It’s a shame the marker-pen won’t follow you around and put a stop to your flamebait behaviour. You seem immune, like a pet.
I’ve been trying to figure that one out too. Had not thought about it from a ‘pet’ perspective, however. Extreme youth, naivity: yes. LOL.
Due to my age, experience etc (and that of many here), that old meme “teach grandmother to suck eggs” pops into my head often with many of his ‘listen to me, i know everything and you people here know nothing’ posts.
For the hell of it, I counted his comments yesterday on OM. Thirty comments in total – the first at 7.06am and the last at 11.18pm.
Yes, and giving grandmother links to others work hardly constitutes as I have been warning people about our levels of debt for ages
edit: Can’t be easy having the empty feed bag blues
OMG – that second link takes me back to my teens which were spent in the US over that same period!
On occasion the hammer falls suddenly and hard.
https://thestandard.org.nz/poto-williams-statement-after-meeting-with-willie-jackson/#comment-1297975
Wow – I missed that one but it was during the period of about 18+ months that I left TS of my own accord because of the behaviour and moderation decisions etc of certain authors/moderators. I have since met in person a few others who also left at that time. We had an interesting discussion!
You know Paul and Ed have very similar writing styles.
Very similar hobby horses they ride all the time, too.
Wasn’t Paul a vegan also ??
edit – your lies and allegations are boring and pathetic.
But if I was being paid (which I’m not) I would obviously be earning a fuck ton more than you because you seem poor, bitter and envious.
The ones considering it for their health should do more research. There’s nothing unhealthy about eating meat, unless it’s been prepared in unsanitary conditions. And if you cut down on protein and fat the only thing you can replace them with is carbohydrate, which genuinely is bad for your health.
The ones considering it for the environment should also do more research, unless they’re planning to move to the US or Europe sometime soon.
Ecoli
Antibiotics
Salmonella
US Center for Disease Control study:
Attribution of Foodborne Illnesses, Hospitalizations, and Deaths to Food Commodities by using Outbreak Data, United States, 1998–2008
Results:
We applied percentages derived from outbreak-associated illnesses for each etiology to the 9.6 million estimated annual illnesses assessed and attributed ≈4.9 million (≈51%) to plant commodities, ≈4.0 million (≈42%) to land animal commodities, and ≈600,000 (≈6%) to aquatic animal commodities. [My emphasis]
…
More illnesses were attributed to leafy vegetables (22%) than to any other commodity; illnesses associated with leafy vegetables were the second most frequent cause of hospitalizations (14%) and the fifth most frequent cause of death (6%).
Thanks for that link, PM. A very interesting study and results. Have bookmarked it for a more in depth read, and future use.
Of course this doesn’t fit with Ed’s bias so will of course continued to be ignored by him.
Hi Ed,
Wondered if you had seen this movie by Simon Anstell: Carnage: Swallowing the Past?
It is a mockumentary set in the future, and appears to give a different reflective perspective on eating meat in a way that does not bring out the defensive reflex in people. (Full disclosure: Haven’t yet watched it, but did listen to a podcast on the movie and have it lined up for family night at home.)
Yes I did see it.
Very entertaining and a clever film.
Thank you for highlighting it.
Spare a though today for the poor besieged Harpers from Taneatua,
” At home this week, Yvonne Harper indicated she was unhappy with the way things turned out but referred questions to her lawyer.
“Don’t make me feel bad. I don’t like it, but we’ve been through a very, very hard time ourselves – emotionally, financially, it’s been hurting us too. I’ve really suffered.””
There’s suffering, and then there’s suffering.
What would Helen do?
We’ve worked hard all our lives to get to where we are now, I don’t have to justify anything.
I expect it was terribly hard work to step over a body.
It’s all legal though 🙄
Seems a bit odd that as the sole director he can’t be held accountable despite proceeding with what on the face of it appears to be a completely contrived receivership.
It seems “odd” to you that a part-time nurse doesn’t have the resources to hold Harper to account?
Seriously?
No, H&SNZ and the other relevant government departments that were involved.
It was a private prosecution after H&SNZ failed to get involved.
Helen would be mighty pissed…
There must be something that can be done, other than holding the guilty down and sticking fingers down their throats, to make them cough up?
This is a legal single digit salute to the courts….
…and also “normal practice”.
The law is an ass.
It may not be morally as white as it could be but it’s normal practice.
Pretty clear why Key and Whitney got on so well – that could have served as the motto of the Key administration.
There really should’ve been a trigger warning on that link OAB….
🙂
As these things happen all the time when a small business gets fined and told to pay reparations and the owners then go on about their life as if nothing happened?
Yeah, probably.
These fines need to be sheeted home to the owners and not the business so that simply closing the business doesn’t get rid of the consequences.
MPs and social media do not mix.
Is Chris Bishop simply another pervy old man, or is there something more sinister at play?
Not sure that you can class clueless idiocy as something sinister.
Poor old Hutt South finally got rid of one munter only to be replaced by another.
A “clueless idiot” who has a 1st Class Honours degree in Law (and a BA in History/Politics) and who has been admitted to the NZ Bar as a Barrister and Solicitor.
https://www.victoria.ac.nz/law/study/creating-careers/christopher-bishop
His partner, Jenna Raeburn, (PR Consultant) also has a BA and LLB as well as considerable experience working for the National Party and MPs in Parliament before becoming Director of Barton Deakin’s NZ office last year.
“Barton Deakin is the largest government relations firm in Australia, and now the first trans-Tasman company in our field.”
https://www.victoria.ac.nz/law/study/creating-careers/jenna-raeburn
One would have hoped that between them, they would have realised beforehand how “clueless” Bishop’s actions would be (and were) in contacting young female teenagers via social media. There may well have been nothing sinister (eg perviness) intended, but perception is everything in public relations, politics and the like.
“…and who has been admitted to the NZ Bar as a Barrister and Solicitor.”
Hmmm…if I had nothing better to do today I’d be tempted to set up a side thread to share lawyer jokes.
The article I read said there was no suggestion of perviness, etc. Just a clueless MP apparently.
Bit odd a man of Bishop’s age and position should be contacting teenage girls on social media! Power feeding an underlying dark urge perhaps? Suspicious to say the least.
John Key … female hair fettish
Chris Bishop … chatting up teenage girls on social media …
any more to add to the growing list of Natz pervy creeps?
get a grip
It will be a nervous few days for National as they wait to see whether this is a #metoo moment, or just a case of an experienced lawyer and MP messaging young women on Snapchat. 🙄
Key did, get a grip of hair that is.
Did Bishop, well we hope not.
But you need to face reality infused, you Tory types are chock full of nasty pervs exploting their power.
its been written to suggest that. click bait at play. but no.
Chris Bishop on Snapchat, eh? Mothers made complaints (one even wrote to another mp about it!) so obviously there was something inappropriate going on.
“so obviously there was something inappropriate going on.”
Really?
Its people like you who cast accusations like this around that can ruin lives.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2018/02/mp-chris-bishop-confronted-over-social-media-contact-with-teenage-girls.html
It says CLEARLY that “However, neither parent was concerned that his intentions were anything other than misguided.”
so what was so obvious that there was something inappropriate going on?
Beating kids, and then when there a little older harassing them online, is this the great Tory heaven you dream of james?
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/101252766/human-rights-commission-finance-boss-sexually-harasses-young-intern-keeps-job
Please don’t bother them.
They have far more important things to do.
Like attacking Bob Jones.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/101308155/employer-tries-to-fire-worker-under-90day-trial-fails
Two points about this. Firstly, justice can still be found.
Secondly, it demonstrates why that law has to go, and why it should go, entirely.
This shows a couple of things.
1 – the law works and the employers who were clearly not being fair have been punished.
2 – that there are shit employees out there who just are not up to the job and employers need to be able to get rid of them and hire people who turn up on time and get the work done.
Horse excrement.
Take you hatred of working people somewhere else james.
People like you…
100% Adam.
I wish he would be banned.
Like Paul was ?
BTW – remind me – who was the climate change minister for the last 9 years again? you seem to have forgotten the post thread above – as you often do when confronted with facts.
“2 – that there are shit employees out there who just are not up to the job and employers need to be able to get rid of them and hire people who turn up on time and get the work done.”
Employers can already do that, through proper process. Happens all the time.
We don’t need to add the 90 day “fire at will” exploiting garbage.
James, your number one is correct.
But, for number two, it seems I am twenty years older than you. I remember full employment. There seemed little problem then with retaining good workers, and sacking the hopeless.
The difference was that with full employment employers had more difficulty in hiring so were more careful in training and retention.
With 5% unemployment, employers can be less.
A great deal of business problems in NZ are not with workers, but management. Our middle management are in world terms under-skilled and underperforming.
MBIE says https://www.business.govt.nz/business-performance/management-and-leadership/performance-issues/
or, https://www.cognology.com.au/asked-seven-workplace-experts-number-one-tip-dealing-underperforming-employee-2/
or https://insideretail.co.nz/2017/05/23/red-herrings-and-scapegoats/
The law only “worked” in this case because it didn’t apply, because the employers were incompetent and tried to do consecutive trial periods. It is only because the law didn’t apply that the manifest injustice of her summary dismissal could be addressed.
Also, there are shit employers who have neither the people skills nor the paperwork skills to manage staff. With those folk, the 90-day bill is a loaded firearm – whether they shoot their employees or their own foot is a betting matter.
1. How many have been unjustly dismissed and not ended up in court?
2. It’s probably more accurate to say that there are shit employers who don’t know how to deal with people, how to engage them.
1 – No idea
2 – also true – but they are not mutually exclusive.
I can agree there are shit employers out there if you can agree there are shit employees 😉
Like I said earlier james – Take your hatred of working people, and bugger off back to the cesspit you crawled out of.
No hatred from me. I can happily admit there are piss poor employers. But its amazing that you cannot even admit that there are some shit staff ?
funny that -Im guessing you must just be a model employee.
(thats assuming you have a job of course)
Do you have bifolding doors in you mansion James?
Just wondering how you get you big ‘blokes’ head through.
Now you hating on the unemployed, what low life Tory idiot you prove yourself to be james.
Everyday with your hate, it gets tiresome. I’d say try love, I know asking a bit much – but you might actually turn out to be a better human being.
Rather than play your silly little hate games.
You may read it as hating on the unemployed – but thats just your bias again (and low level of reading comprehension).
My comment about you being a model employee required you to be employed.
I comprehended your hatred for working people rather well, the snide and vicious attacks against working people have been pretty constant on this site.
Now you doing your level best to keep that roling on by more of your horse excrement, and trying to do the whole personalizing the argument to score points.
I’ve been open about what I do, you need to keep up.
Your hate however, keeps rolling on.
The problem isn’t the shit employers or the shit staff.
The problem is that competent employers didn’t need the 90-day fire at will to manage or even get rid of staff, good or bad.
But under fire at will, good staff don’t have any redress against shit employers, unless the employer is so incompetent that they can’t even implement fire at will competently.
It’s the imbalance that is the major problem with the fire at will act. If the employer is incompetent but not catastrophically incompetent, the employees bear the brunt and and the business suffers.
+111
Totally agree.
James and his ilk ruin this site.
I posted this last night – but thought it an interesting discussion:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11991993
Law makers move to cancel Lorde concerts.
“The taxpayers of Miami and Tampa should not have to facilitate bigotry and anti-Semitism, and I look forward to the Miami Sports and Exhibition Authority and the Tampa Sports Authority complying with the law and cancelling these concerts.“
If this gets upheld- her US career is toast – 20 states have the same laws (and growing).
It’s an interesting way to fight back treating BDS and it’s supporters in the same manner that they are attacking others – in their pocket.
I see the Herald is still getting material from Cameron Slater.
Lorde might have to book private venues instead. Oh noes!
… treating BDS and it’s supporters in the same manner that they are attacking others – in their pocket.
“The same manner?” Can you elaborate a bit on how the BDS movement is using the political leverage of their supporters in the world’s most powerful country to pass laws damaging to Israeli interests? Because, if they aren’t, it’s not “the same manner,” is it?
The b is for boycott. Which is expressly designed to hit revenues. The law in the us does the same.
It is of course much easier to hit people’s revenues when you have government politicians in your pocket. In that sense it is “the same,” just like Tank Man and the tanks he was facing were doing the same thing (attempting to achieve political objectives). I doubt Tank Man considered the tanks to be “the same” as him, though.
Nothing like freedom of speech and freedom of movement (or choosing not to go to a venue), sarcasm.
Sad that aggressors can and seek to control everything, even trying to wreck some teenager’s career. Nice to have that sort of time and influence on your hands. NOT.
The Jews who don’t agree with the land seizures in Israel and even the UN are harassed just as much as everyone else.
What happened to ‘free speech’? Passing laws against BDS seems to contravene that principle.
Goes against the idea of a free-market as well. But, then, the RWNJs have never been for a free-market. Just one that’s controlled by them and in their favour.
Wow, looks like Canada is going to lead the world in Nuclear fusion. If you have 13 minutes, including ads. This is a great introduction piece, with a tour General Fusions, the company in Canada who are making great leaps in this direction.
So in 4 years these could very well be viable replacements for all coal burning plants.
They are just one of a whole bunch of companies wildly overhyping their fusion technology and falling way way short of their claims. Wikipedia’s page is somewhat useful for an very brief overview of these efforts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power
In 2009 General Fusion claimed ‘within the next decade’.
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/414559/a-new-approach-to-fusion/
But I haven’t found anything that says they have even achieved ignition, let alone breakeven or any demonstrated means of usefully extracting any of the energy from the fusion reactions.
A few years ago Lockheed were claiming they would be selling container sized self-contained fusion power systems within five years.
Bottom line: until someone produces an actual working fusion reactor-generator that puts out more power than is fed into it, their claims aren’t even worth a pinch of fairy dust.
The video lays out all the pitfalls and the problems, it also talks about spending most of its time studying plasma. It’s why I said – “could” because there are real problems.
And I might add, why I said introduction.
for more fulsome analysis rather than wikipedia – try
https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2016/05/the-real-problem-with-fusion-energy/
This has a great discussion on the problems and possible solutions
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-problem-with-controlled-fusion-Why-is-it-so-difficult-to-harness-energy-from-fusion-on-earth-How-long-do-we-have-to-wait-before-we-see-a-fusion-based-power-plant
And a more optimistic outlook – because it’s all about the plasma.
http://www.techradar.com/news/world-of-tech/nuclear-fusion-what-s-taking-so-long-1329056
hadn’t heard the “always will be” joke before – just the one that it has been “five years away” for the last fifty years 🙂
There’s a lot of tech where we know the eventual development path once we figure out how to overcome the initial hurdles, fusion is just one of them.
More promising ones are the energy harvesters from the great fusion reactor in the sky: wind and solar. Also, battery tech is leaping forward at the moment.
But really, we only need to overcome some technical thresholds in just a few of all the energy tech directions under development and fossil fuels will be accelerated out the door – not by policy, but because they’re not as practical.
It’s one of the reasons I refuse to be constantly depressed.
I agree, if we crack plasma problem – goodbye fossil fuels.
I like from the video the way they have finally worked out how to get a constant temperature reading. And they fact they built their own supercomputer.
I think we are getting close, a lot of layers of information, and tech are starting to come together on this. 3- 4 more years of plasma research may just crack it.
Trying to duplicate the SUN YEA RIGHT
Centre of the sun even.
Interesting points to me about history of the pandemic of flu in 1918. This is to be a year of discussion and memorial – the fastest deadly one there has ever been.
What stands out is that it was largely dealt with by women, children and the elderly – everybody else was overseas still, involved with WW1.
Also there was intelligence sensitivity – giving out info could break morale, let out useful info to the enemy etc. So people were not informed about it officially and nation-wide. Local government had to organise a system to deal with it – the baker’s van would deliver the bread and take away the bodies each day! Boy Scouts went round delivering leaflets. There is a huge story about how NZ coped in difficult times that we should know about, as today our national information, knowledge and action is also being weakened by events and approaches.
Spain wasn’t in the war, other countries couldn’t mention the flu, so when Spain reported its outbreak it became okay to mention it; calling it the Spanish flu.
Actually they think it originally came from pig farms in Kansas. But that would have been the first wave which had not been so deadly, another one mutated and started about three weeks later and it was much more severe.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday/audio/2018631543/ryan-mclane-lessons-from-the-1918-killer-flu
9:37 Ryan McLane: lessons from 1918’s killer flu
This year marks 100 years since the most deadly epidemic in NZ’s history claimed nearly 10,000 lives. The influenza pandemic of 1918, at the end of WW1, hit hard and fast killing four times as many Maori as pakeha.
There are only a handful of memorials around the country – the devastation is often overlooked because it occurred at the same time as the war in Europe in ended. Ryan McLane, a communicable diseases specialist who’s a health advisor at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, explains why it was so lethal.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/assets/news/140824/four_col_flu-poster.jpg?1518137927
Flu, you say.
An interesting discussion from Aus onthe privileges associated with being a male politician, looking at the way Barnaby Joyce is able to swat away the news about his affair and “love child” with a former staffer compared to the way the Aus media treats female politicians. It’s based on PhD research and focuses in particular on the case of Cheryl Kernot, a rising star of the 90’s who was attacked in the media for having the “morals of an alleycat on heat” when it was revealed that she had had an affair 20 years earlier with a former student. She got the whole “Does her heart rule her head?” thing thrown at her, too, and was eventually hounded out of politics.
The piece discusses the convention that politicians’ private lives should be kept private, and finds “And the evidence is clear: it was more likely to be broken for women in politics, whose relationships, sexuality and gender rendered them somehow more accessible. The private life convention has often rested on an assumption that men are not affected by love affairs, flings and trysts, while women are.
It’s a peculiar kind of unconscious bias.”
Strong links to the recent “concerns” from some that our PM shouldn’t continue to serve while she’s pregnant or new to motherhood.
Israel is a racist, rogue state.
It is supported and armed by the US, also a racist, rogue state.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/world/350137/israeli-air-strikes-against-syria-biggest-since-1982
And this is something new?
Sheesh it’s BAU as it has been for decades. Sharpen up Ed!
Creates a distraction from Bibis corruption investigation.
Following the developments with interest.
I have to use my daughter phone to get this post out you see people Spark is a neoliberal run company the sand fly’s are using this company as a weapon against Ecothey have many times blocked my data as I only blog and read other sites in reality I should never run out of my data enough said .
Give a little got back to me on Friday asking me to change some things information on my give a little page I emailed them that I will think about choices.
My choice is I don’t need to use give a little site the sandfly are going to try and play me using that site. This is the internet age as everyone who reads my word is internet savvy I can just make my own site and put a bank account number up and wallar people who want to help me can use internet banking to make donations for my cause of holding the NZ justice system to account for the farcical game they are
Trying to play against me. I will set up a charitable trust to help other common Kiwis
Sue the Nz justice .when I win my case I will put the money back in the trust for other people to apply for funding to nz justice system for breaching there privacy/human rights I will keep you updated on my progress as the first stage will take about 2 weeks. Many thanks to all the good people who run the standard for letting ECO Maori use this site to get funding to sue the Crown. Ka psi I’m nakered the mokos have tired me out lol PS I don’t trust give a little and they won’t be getting 15persent of my Mana
.ka kite ano
Yes I have a big problem with that tpp why are we not privay to all the information on ttp is it a weapon for the 1%,to get total control of the common 99%.
3 minutes after I posted that post and wallar my data is back I rang 123 4 times muppets enough said on that.
I have a lot of good information that I want to cut and paste on here one can see that it’s the original book. This information will lift MAORI Mana up high as it show how the NZ company ripped off and coned the British people they went to Britain and sold lies when the settlers landed in Atoearoa there was nothing that they were sold and promised they would have starved to death Maori built them housing and feed all the common British people that landed in Atoearoa with nothing??????? neoliberals theves.
Ana to kai This information is from the missionarys and another society
Ka kite ano
So – no more donations huh?
Since you want to setup a charitable trust – this might help.
https://www.publictrust.co.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/17625/PTEL18_P-FC-Charitable-Trusts-Fees_Charges-FA-10-10.pdf
This, and your previous attacks on this poster amounts to bullying, imo.
No surprises there.
From earlier this week (may already have been discussed here, but I was busy when it was published – and it’s very important and there need to be constant reminders about it:
Jane Kelsey: Excess of spin on revised TPP cause for concern
The prizes for excessive spin go to Winston Peters (1st place) and David Parker (2nd place).
The latest version of the TPPA is not much better or different from the Nats’ version.
Te Tiriti is not protected as claimed in the spin, and then there’s the secrecy.
The problems with this agreement are substantial.
Ask Maori if the treaty was a fair deal. Nope thought not.
TPPA is NOT some simple 5 page trade agreement to remove tariffs. If it was then there would be no problem.
Nope it is a way for those with international power and resources to continue to exploit new countries and resources without censorship or be compensated for it and to control new ideas and IP and stifle innovation.
Oil/cars is an example, if that industry was not so powerful the world could have saved a lot of the environmental pollution and potentially climate change a lot sooner and had green energy.
You can not micro manage the future with these agreements.
Government officials are blind to what they are signing. It’s the emperor’s new clothes.
But the biggest reason I’m against the TPPA is that it is inherently undemocratic.
The agreement sits over the top of the countries undermining democracy from local government decisions to central government decisions to the person on the street or living on the farm.
And that is why the agreement texts needs to be kept a secret because it’s an insane thing to do and falls down when examined as why a government would sign up it’s people to it.
Look at the billions it’s going to cost the UK to Brexit. Once in, too expensive and complicated to exit multi country agreements.
And the reason the UK wanted to exit in the first place was probably nothing to do with the EU but to do with neoliberalism and not being able to afford housing and transport, lack of security, poorer healthcare and schooling having little say in your community.
The same thing that is plaguing NZ and we are trying to make worse with neoliberal trade agreements.
“Look at the billions it’s going to cost the UK to Brexit. Once in, too expensive and complicated to exit multi country agreements. “
Was in the UK when the EU was being discussed, and couldn’t see how the democracy of each country was going to be protected, and how policies could be enacted that protected each citizen. The result for the referendum for Brexit is understandable when you consider how many have been left behind in the last three decades.
I have the same concern with the TPPA that you do. And it is not alleviated by the smooth murmurings of David Parker.
The alienation of large sections of English society was done by Tory and Labour governments since Thatcher came to power in 1979.
The EU, and its ECJ, brought massive improvement to working conditions and to civil rights in England. The single market brought the UK out of its economic malaise and, along with Scottish oil, underwrote the growth of the last 30 years.
If it was not for Europe England would be a far bigger mess that the shocker it is currently suffering.
TPP was hatched by the global elite for them to rape and pillage the world nothing more clear then that.
Pity Jacinda has not woken up to her placing her child into economic bondage for the next thirty years once TPP is triggered.
😆
+ 1000 cleangreen I will have more to say on the Tpp when I get back to my computer Ka kite ano
I’ll bet you never expected to see prose like this in The Economist:
Some of the biggest changes in recent decades have made the meritocracy even more intolerable than it was in the glory days of the 11-plus. One is the marriage of merit and money. The plutocracy has learned the importance of merit: British public schools have turned themselves into exam factories and the children of oligarchs study for MBAs. At the same time the meritocracy has acquired a voracious appetite for money. The cleverest computer scientists dream of IPOs, and senior politicians and civil servants cash in when they retire with private-sector jobs. A second is supersized smugness. Today’s meritocrats are not only smug because they think they are intellectually superior. They are smug because they also think that they are morally superior, convinced that people who don’t share their cosmopolitan values are simple-minded bigots. The third is incompetence. The only reason people tolerate the rule of swots is that they get results. But what if they give you the invasion of Iraq and the financial crisis?
It’s review of a book called The Rise of the Meritocracy, by Michael Young, published sixty years ago.
https://www.economist.com/news/britain/21736524-book-published-60-years-ago-predicted-most-tensions-tearing-contemporary-britain?fsrc=scn/fb/te/bl/ed/themeritsofrevisitingmichaelyoungmeritocracyanditsdiscontents
Meritocracy? Show me some.
…the pursuit of meritocracy at the workplace may be more difficult than it first appears…
rhinocrates
Good to read, but will it be by the smug? They know all they need to and any other thoughts are from those who are the wrong fit to belong to the group who are making it in the world.
Of course what ‘it’ is, is fairly narrowly defined and a bit vague around the edges after the assurance that it is proving profitable. And as the old people say about proof, ‘The proof of the pudding is in the eating’. That’s all that needs to be explained. ‘Nuff said. (Though someone coined the phrase ‘ Eat the rich’. This has an unsettling ring to it. End of memo to self.)
You mean an actual meritocracy, in which the truly talented are promoted rather than those who are good at exams and are the children of those who can send them to the best schools. Meritocracy in practise becomes self-perpetuating oligarchy.
http://thewireless.co.nz/articles/the-pencilsword-on-a-plate
As usual, the theoretical ideal of how something should work is used to excuse or obscure its failure in practice.
It strikes me as one of those words coined for political purposes rather than by observation. Sophistry by any other name.
Yep. Like ‘aristocracy’ means literally ‘rule by the best’ but Oscar Wilde described Burke’s Peerage as “the one book a young man about town should know thoroughly, and it is the best thing in fiction the English have ever done'”
I always considered one of the primary benefits of any privately funded schools to be the contacts, and networks made that provide benefits over and above any academic or meritocracy.
The amount of money spent could provide a wealth of experiences and tutors, but would not give that access to others on the same path to wealth.
All the more reason to close private schools: get those networks to extend further into society, and let little Tarquin and Jeremy-Charles get a more rounded view of life.
Well folks it raining cats and dogs up here in the North – thankfully the drains are working but we have a lagoon on our front lawn. Cyclone Gita is on its way and Cyclone Hola in its wake – climate change showing its force in a very wet way. The plants are confused and don’t know one season fron the next.
Also my thought for the day – Julie Bishop the Australian Foreign Minister is standing firm on their NZ detention laws – I wonder what will happen in the future when Australian citizens will be begging in their thousands to come over here escaping being roasted alive in their country as climate refugees. Will we be a stand over and let them in like we have been with the Peter Theil’s of this world and all the other bolt hole rich listers and receive them in with generous arms, or will we stand firm and say we have other priorities like the Pacific Islanders whose countries will be under water – I think not. We need to, the Australians don’t care one jot for us.
Bucketing down in Auckland, too. I expect some flooding in some parts of the city.
Many of us have relatives in Aussie.
The Aussies are very keen on sending people born in NZ, or with NZ family history, back to NZ. So, when Aussie bakes, and is short of potable water, maybe we should say we’ll just take back the Kiwis….. and the rest can have Aussie to themselves?
Exactly!
WK
Funny to hear Julie Bishop talk like a real person with concern and thoughts – they must have given her a very good dinner before the interview and quieted the hysterical indigestion. We are stuck with Oz as neighbours, and they always have at least 3 plans on stand-by for us, they will be milking us as long as they can.
Her Australian line will be straight from ‘Hotel California’ – they keep ‘stabbing us with their steely knives but they just can’t kill the beast’. Thanks to excellent AZ Lyrics. I wonder if our handsome winsome Winston soft-soaped her?
Cyclone Gerry.
Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.
Ed – here you go telling lies – or are you really so stupid ?
Im going with both stupid and a liar.
read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minister_for_Climate_Change_(New_Zealand)
and you will find that there has never been a “Gerry” as a climate change minister.
facts – they used to trip up Paul all the time as well.
An example of Gerry’s incompetence.
Technology will save the world from climate change – Gerry Brownlee
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2017/06/technology-will-save-the-world-from-climate-change-gerry-brownlee.html
An example of Ed’s incompetence.
“Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”
about a guy who wasnt climate change minister.
Come on Ed – admit you fucked up – you are looking stupid (again).
TDB names next Cyclone Gerry
https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2018/02/09/tdb-names-next-cyclone-gerry/
““Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”
So it was you that read something – couldn’t even comprehend even the most basic of story from the Daily Blog, then made up your own “facts” (“Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”) and added them when posting here as your own clever idea without linking to the original story.
You keep getting more stupid.
So again ““Nine years as climate change minster and no useful action at all.”
Who was the climate change minister Ed – come on – you know you can do it…….(or perhaps not)
Another article pointing out the oncoming crash.
John Adams, a former Australian government economist has warned. “a small tremor before the big earthquake” as the world moves “ever closer to economic armageddon”.
The signs are out there folks.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11992189
Financiers love these scary sounding words like “Armageddon”.
That being so it’s important to remember some words that scare financiers: like jubilee, and default, or the fact that Argentina still exists.
Is texting minors a lapse of judgment or grooming? Does anyone know what the definition is and when one becomes the other? This distinction must be a minefield for the judiciary. Even more so in the days of the me too movement.
I think it would depend very much on the content of the text. Given that the parents have not kicked up a fuss – I doubt that they were unsavoury. But it was a stupid thing to be doing.
It is also wrong just to assume that a male texting younger people could be grooming.
‘It is also wrong just to assume that a male texting younger people could be grooming.’
True, it’s not as if he’s a member of the clergy.
Disgusting comment. Was this really necessary to ingratiate yourself?
Well, blow me over with a feather!
The Guardian actually has a meaningful article with an open comments section.
Simon Tisdall does a predictable bias piece on Syria and….well, the comments are worth the read.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/10/epic-failure-of-our-age-how-west-failed-syria
Thanks Bill.
You will learn more from reading that those comments than days of watching the msm’s propaganda on Syria.
I particularly found this comment illuminiating.
The Open University of the interweb.
Bill, Eva Bartlett is always interesting on Syria.
This is worth watching.
?
Nah. That’s straight from the book about the autonomous regions all being a dastardly Zionist plot. 🙄
Turkey is employing the services of jihadists in their incursions into the autonomous regions.
Turkey (rightly or wrongly) wants any hint of Kurdish influence in the area eradicated.
Both Turkey and the US have no legal basis for being in the region.
Israel meantime simply doesn’t want the area between Damascus and the Lebanon to fall back into government control “because Hezbollah” (hence Ghouta).
In a funny way, despite his political leanings in the past, I still miss John Armstrong’s opinion pieces in the Herald following his retirement due to serious health problems. So it is good to see he still contributes from time to time on TVNZ’s website – and this week it seems that even he has not escaped the Jacinda effect:
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/opinion-jacinda-may-not-able-walk-water-yet-anyway-but-give-her-time
Bill won’t be pleased.
As no edit time option appeared – that is meant to be Bill English in the last sentence.
“The National Party received $771,736, including $150,000 from the Inner Mongolia Rider Horse Industry.”
For that they get Matthew Hooton.
Sounds like a breath of fresh air in Derry.
It is rare one gets the opportunity to hear the truth, not the corporate media’s narrative.
Eva Bartlett, Investigative Journalist
Dr Marcus Papadopoulos, Editor Politics First
Neil Clark, Journalist, Author, Broadcaster
Peter Ford, Former UK Ambassador to Syria
Professor Piers Robinson, Sheffield University
Vanessa Beely, Investigative Journalist
Here is one of those speakers.
Neil Clark on Yogoslavia, Iraq, Libya, Iraq.
As a commentator says.
Imperialism On Trial: Writers And Activists Convene In Derry, Ireland
https://ingaza.wordpress.com/2018/02/08/imperialism-on-trial-writers-and-activists-convene-in-derry-ireland/
John Wight‘s talk was a poetic, searing condemnation of Imperialism and the corporate media, with literary and historical references included.
Potatoe !
Capitalism is killing the world.
And we are letting it do so.
The great climate silence: we are on the edge of the abyss but we ignore it
“The Earth is not dying, it is being killed, and those who are killing it have names and addresses”
100 people turn up to support the ACT Party leader’s protest.
Blanket wall to wall media headlines.
Tens of thousands turn up to protest the TPP.
Barely makes the news.
The elite have an agenda.
Most of the press concur there were more than 100 – looks closer to 150.
Funny how the labour mps who protested the tpp are now the government passing it. Must be so proud of them.
After making significant changes. Your position is to ignore that however.
They haven’t really.
They have. There’s 12 changes not including the foreign buyer ban. That’s significant, and what’s more has assuaged most Kiwi’s concerns.
Are you channelling Jane Kelsey or just parsing her? Feel free to elaborate in your own words, in your own time.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11989194
Some reading for muttonbird.
I find it quite incredible for you to now be referencing Jane Kelsey after bagging her and the Labour opposition for opposing the TPPA as it stood then.
It’s an unhappy time for National and Nat voters like yourself to have lost out on signing this (or any) free trade deal, but I’m sure you’ll get over it in time. Just leave it to the professionals in Labour to get it over the line. 🙂
By the way, please find one quote where I have backed or even referenced Jane Kelsey’s work on this.
You are a very dishonest person, James. But I think you know this. You like to make apologies when you get it totally wrong in public, like the 3-0 episode, and the change of government in 2017 but that is not the same thing.
Are you saying she is wrong and you know better?
And I never said you backed her work.
But I’m sure you know better than her and it’s great to have you on the pro-tpp signing team. I always knew you would come around.
The new team has won significant amendments which the Nats were happy to forego. The current deal helps protect working Kiwis, not that they’ve ever been a concern of yours.
So no you haven’t read it and think you know better.
Amusing.
In your own words, in your own time. Take your time, James, don’t be shy. I admire people who try to deal with complex issues in their own words, I really do – live (and let live) and learn. People who play silly games, James, not so much.
Euthanasia submissions to be in by midnight on Tuesday, 20 February 2018.
Don’t wait till the last minute:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1802/S00083/submissions-on-euthanasia-failing-to-get-through.htm
https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/make-a-submission/document/52SCJU_SCF_BILL_74307/end-of-life-choice-bill
This bill proposes to give people with a terminal illness or a grievous and irremediable medical condition the option of requesting assisted dying.
The bill:
defines who is eligible for assisted dying
details the provisions to ensure that this a free choice
outlines the steps to ensure a person is mentally capable of understanding the nature and consequences of assisted dying.
What do you need to know?
Submissions are publicly released and published to the Parliament website. Only your name or organisation’s name is required on a submission. Please keep your contact details separate, because if they are included on the submission they will become publicly available when the submission is released.
If you wish to include information of a private or personal nature in your submission you should discuss this with the clerk of the committee before submitting.
If you wish to speak to your submission, please state this clearly. The committee will decide at a later date how it will hear from submitters.
Looking at google (keywords – submission re euthanasia) and on the first page there were 10 headings relating to nz and euthanasia and 9 were against, mostly from the Catholic Church. It would be better for churches that have been involved in burning people and torturing them in past mistaken behaviour seeking to cleanse them of sin?, to be backward about interfering in this matter between a person and their God. Churches should not attempt to stop people from meeting their Maker when they feel they are ready, it is wrong for the Church to do so.
Some thoughts on referendums – looking at Australia’s and warnings about possibilities when we do them.
Graeme Edgeler on https://publicaddress.net/legalbeagle/if-australia-jumped-off-a-cliff-or-how-not/
I intended to watch The Brisbane Global Rugby Tens when I finished milking .
When I got to my daughters place on the farm well PaPa was to busy looking after our mokos to even get time to think about watching the Tens + I had to drive my wife back to Rotorua from Putaruru and back to milk at 5 am for her mahi sorry guys I will watch the games reruns .
The Blues won Ka pai E hoa .Tana I wish you and your men all the best I wont say to much you see there is some phenomenon .I.E There was no information on your win on the 2 websites I frequently observe stuff /herald .I know why these neolibrals are trying there hardest to limit my Mana but know every time they try there actions just adds to my Mana enough said . Here,s a AUSSIE site with your fabulous win
https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.news.com.au/sport/rugby/brisbane-global-rugby-tens-2018-live-coverage-from-suncorp-stadium/news-story/fc0934fd1cab386cc417411c4525052e&sa=U&ved=0ahUKEwig2oajtp3ZAhXHfrwKHQrzAqYQFggFMAA&client=internal-uds-cse&cx=012148326047351459851:fgzrg0zysrs&usg=AOvVaw06ERa1p_A_9_xXbH0VaWQ1
And heres one of 2 men showing how proud of the mokos they are daughters at that ka pai Brad & Reggie
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11991411 I have a more serious topic on my next post which is about looking after the mokos future Ka kite ano
I have been to busy defending my whano and I from the stupid plays of the sandflys to put some serious thought into this farcical tpp. You may ask your self why I call it FARCIAL they wont show us the wording so that is a farce . In my view if the government is to sign all the people of Aotearoa mokos futures up to this binding agreement that is being rammed down OUR throats by big business
whose only goal is to take more of OUR hard earned resources away from us all this is a fact . Big business are manipulating it so they can do anything and if they cannot get or do what they want they will sue . Who wins when you get to the upper scales of big money well the Organization with the biggest check book always wins in that scenario ka pai.
In my view we will all be held to ransom by big business if there products or services poision or kill other people wild life or ruin OUR mokos future environment there will be absolutely nothing we can do to stop them or hold big business accountable for there evil actions . Look at the nz company they sold lies to Britons took there money as they new that when the common people got to Aotearoa there was absolutely nothing they could do to get there money back. These people who are probably my ancestors only survived because Maori are a humane Culture that feed and built them houses .
If we let the tpp be sign up into OUR laws in ten years time the scenario will be like this .
You will have to be in the Billions club not the Millions club as it is at the moment to get Big business or the goverment to respect your human & privacy rights this is a fact .
The 000.1% will have total control of Aotearoa full stop .
Not including a clause for OUR Treaty of Waitangi is a spit in the face to ALL Maori.
We have already lost enough Mana in the last 200 years the tpp will have us all living under the bridge working 80 hours a week just to eat or in sub standard housing estates full of drugs and crime this will be OUR reality.
It is now that I challange all OUR Maori leaders to sue the coalition government into abandoning this farcical tpp that we know nothing about why are they hiding the laws of this contract because they know that we the 99% will be protesting and voting them out of Parliament.
When a Hunter is hunting a wild Boar and its piglets he does not shout out to the Boar we are going caste a Kupenga /net over you and your mokos we are going to eat you and put your mokos in a Hinaki /trap and breed your mokos for our food as the Boar and his mokos will run away and never get caught ka pai
ECO MAORI SAYS THIS IS THE WAY THESE EVIL bigots are behaving.
I call on all the people of Aotearoa to stop this going through to OUR parliament .
The neolibral civil servents who run the country are lying to our new goverment they have weaved a vale of lies and caste it over the new governments EYES.
Now is the time for Maori to SUE the government in the high court to at the least have the Treaty of Waitangi INCLUSION clause sign into this farcical tpp .
This action will protect all the 99.99% of people of Aoetearoa from big business cruel inhumane practice .
One mite say you said that the action of SUING OUR new Labour lead goverment could cause them to lose the 2020 election to the neolibreals ECO MAORI says not to threat national are backing this farcial new treaty that just benefits the 000.1% of people on Papatuanuku so they will not beable to use it as a tool to steal votes off our new goverment .
Ana to kai Ka kite ano
“It will be remembered that Lord John Russell’s feelings in favour of the Natives of New Zealand were very strongly and publicly expressed on the occasion of his dining with the Company in the City. The following short quotations, from documents issued from the Colonial Office, will shew what were his views with respect to the land.
Mr Vernon Smith to Mr Somes
Downing Street, December 2, 1840.
With regards to all lands in the colony acquired under any other title than that of grants made in the name and on behalf of Her Majesty, it is proposed that the titles of the claimants should be subjected to the investigation of a Commission to be constituted for that purpose. The basis of that inquiry will be the assertion, on behalf of the Crown, of a title to all lands situate in New Zealand, which have, heretofore, been granted by the Chiefs of those islands, according to the customs of the country, and in return for some adequate consideration. Lord J. Russell is not aware that any exception can arise to this general principle; but if so, every such exception will be considered on its own merits, and dealt with accordingly.
Lord Stanley’s sentiments, as expressed in the following passages of a letter written by his under Secretary, are quite in unison with those of Lord J. Russell, as respects the Native rights.
Extract of a Letter from G.W. Hope, Esq., to J. Somes, Esq.
1st February, 1843.
In answer to these claims, Lord Stanley desires me to remind you, that he has offered, on the part of the Crown, as matter, not of right, but of grace and favour, to “instruct the Governor to make them a conditional grant, subject to prior titles to be established as bylaw provided, not only of such portion of the Wellington Settlement as is in the actual occupation of Settlers under them but also of all parts not in the occupation or possession of others; the extent of such grants, of course, not to exceed that to which they are entitled under Mr. Pennington’s award.”
Further than this, Lord Stanley cannot consent to go, consistently with the obligations by which the Crown as he conceives, is bound. Lord Stanley is not prepared, as Her Majesty’s Secretary of State, to join with the Company in setting aside the Treaty of Waitangi after obtaining the advantages guaranteed by it, even though it might be made with “naked savages,” or though it might “be treated by lawyers as a praise-worthy device for amusing and pacifying savages for the moment.” Lord Stanley entertains a different view of the respect due to obligations contracted by the Crown of England; and his final answer to the demands of the Company must be, that, as long as he has the honour of serving the Crown he will not admit that any person, or any Government acting in the name of Her Majesty, can contract a legal moral, or honorary obligation to despoil others of their lawful and equitable rights.”
(Smith & Elder, 1846, p61-63)
The Committee Of The Aborigines’ Protection Society (1846). On The British Colonization of New Zealand. London, Smith and Elder.
I apologize to Elizabeth II Queen of the United Kingdom for the use of the Crown as a attack against the NZ police Ka kite ano