Profits are easily manipulated with deferring income and creating provisions and write downs, wouldn’t surprise me if it’s ok but disappointing in some respects with reference made to costs of the new convention centre planning etc etc
All part of the neo lib con job NACT run via the MSM and the pathetic international joke that is the NZX.
I can see Peters pushing the envelop over the legality of being muzzled from speaking
under parliamentary privilege about we know what. I hope he pushes Carter to the point of booting him out of the house, now that will get the media excitable and the sheep nattering.
Really do hope he stands in Northland? If he does will organise a major public forum against the contenders.
“i am really looking forward to doing the commentary on q-time 2day…”
– your commentary cannot be worse than the professional’s efforts yesterday
(no offence intended phillip 🙂 )
Most pathetic award: John Key for trying to hilariously pretend that the opposition not liking the idea of the taxpayer throwing cash at Sky City means that they suddenly really like the original Sky City deal.
I just finished watching Question Time. It was clear SkyCity is a distraction to the real issue which is the sudden resignation of Sabin and all the murky details surrounding it.
It was a pity Peters had used up his allocated sups and lost the opportunity to jump in on the patsy question new Whangarei Nat MP Shane Reti asked Bridges.
The Northland By-Election ‘will’ expose to the New Zealand public the cover up and corruption being harboured by National. I can pretty much guarantee this personally.
Yes because the police are sooooo trustworthy and honest whatever they say must be correct and they always obey the laws…..what planet have you been on lately.
All the evidence appears that he was only informed in December. Unless you wish to progress another theory that goes against what Key, the Police, and the media are saying.
It’s part of the characteristics of RWNJs. Despite demanding that people take personal responsibility for their actions they will never take responsibility for theirs unless they get some sort of benefit from it. On that latter point, they’re more than willing to take responsibility for someone else’s actions if they think that they can spin it to make it look like they did it. This is shown by National claiming success from what Labour led governments have done.
Phil, the relatively few times I’ve got something wrong here, I’ve always put my hand up. A couple of times I’ve even outed myself before anyone else saw the mistake. I know I often argue my corner staunchly, but that doesn’t mean I’m not beyond admitting my errors. I suspect your problem is you’d like to be the one to find one, but they don’t live at the bottom of the bong, dude.
Shearer was shockingly disloyal to the team, he is no poker playein. nor the god botherer Nat whip showing his nervousness at Key getting grilled over the Shonkey Sky deal. Sitting there behind Davis looking sceptical at Kelvins line of questioning.
You know when you look at the hand Little has to play with, you really realise the opposition is fucked without Peters. Bit the bullet and run a few by elections, parachute some talent in.
Also Phil Goff was very good. But Labour’s Defence spokesperson, Phil Goff, said the pretence that no Government decision has been made just was not honest.
“The reason the Prime Minister [has given] for taking that decision isn’t honest either.
“This isn’t about the need to protect human rights and fight evil. It’s about, as he admitted earlier, the price of ‘being in the club’ led by other countries such as Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States.”
Mr Goff questioned what the New Zealand Defence Force could do that the Iraqi Army could not do for itself.
“Over $25 billion has been invested by the United States over the past 10 years in training and equipping them, and that investment has made practically no difference.
“Our efforts can do very little to help with the real problems of persistent corruption, deep sectarian divisions and poor leadership which lie behind the incompetence of the Iraqi Army.”
Just note that Phil Goff starts talking about 1.30 mins into the audio clip. Just in case you tire of listening to Key’s anguished rant about the awful things happening under ISIS. He is so tender hearted, and hasn’t heard of all the dreadful happenings that occur daily around the world. Really he’s too sensitive and unworldly to be PM. yek for gardening leave for the duration?
I would pay no credence to anything Slater said about Labour but a lot of credence about anything he says about National. Besides rumours have been swirling around for a while.
“I would pay no credence to anything Slater said about Labour but a lot of credence about anything he says about National. Besides rumours have been swirling around for a while”
Anything negative Slater says about National must be true but anything negative he says about Labour isn’t true, Don’t you see how stupid that is. You cant have it both ways Mickey.
I don’t think Andrew Little exchanges texts with slater.
Apparently Key does, though.
That’s how it can happen both ways – one lot talk to him (to stab each other in the back, most likely), the other lot he makes shit up about.
Yeah right. As I have said before. In my opinion Matt is a bit of a technophobe. He can use a cellphone.
A damn good thing really. He is a hell of a worker of people and people systems from what I have seen of him. Almost over-compensated in that respect….
Surely Cam Slater realises that? He should realise the effects of over-compensation. Cam appears to be vastly over compensated as being a hypocritical arsehole with delusions of grandeur and a reality of repeated incompetence.
Tolley was told in August. She said the police did not tell her who the MP was but I would bet dollars to donuts she found out from other sources.
Which has got to be another lie. There’s no point in the police telling the minister that an MP is under investigation under the ‘No Surprises’ policy if they don’t tell them who the MP is.
True. I very strongly doubt that she would have been informed without a name. How stupid do NAct think the electorate is? Stupid enough to vote Key in three times in a row?
its a shame that JK gave two different dates then isnt it
which kinda does make him a liar
and for that to even work we have to believe that JK finds out about such issues via a tip off from their opponents before any internal party channels tell him – which is just simply not believable
All the evidence appears that he was only informed in December.
No, all the evidence (when the police told the minister) shows that National have known since before the election. Everything else that we’ve heard is National Making Shit Up to try and hide the fact that they knew before the election.
National are just on borrowed time for now, due to the suppression order of January 30 2015. The prominent person was remanded by a district court to reappear on 19 February 2015.
Up to now national have not misled the house and this will continue until name suppression is lifted, (if lifted at all).
A lot more water to go under the bridge on this topic.
Jestirer the Police haven’t told media when they told Key.
But under no surprises Key would have been told about any serious prosecutions.
Key has kept a lid on it till after the election combined with dirty politics it would have been a disaster.
Now the perverbial has hit the fan not even Slater believes your pathetic attempt to smear little.
Hope you have posted on WO.
It seems only National MP’s can get blanket suppression orders even after the drafting of new laws reducing excuses for suppresion.
It was Ironic that a former National MP who posted a suppressed former MP’s name got name suppression himself.
Their needs to be an independent enquiry.
If it were anyone on the left it would be all over the headlines like Dominique Straus Kahn.
While Thatcher managed to cover up a spy associated to conseravative peer pedophile ring who managed to destroy evidence that would have prevented further predatory rampant abuse of victims.
Its time for an independent enquiry into police and Justice dept behaviour.
As these decisions lack of openess is essential so police Moral is not undermined.
Even an inquiry the Attorney General could embargo the full police or parliamentary evidence. This has been done before e.g. Colin Moyle incident 17 June 1975 (full police evidence is still locked up) and Sir Alfred North’s December 1976 inquiry was embargoed until mid April 1978. Prior to Christmas 1976 there was a partial release of information by the media, but the cop involved in the 17 June 1975 incident had name suppression until mid April 1978.
Actually, the evidence points to two possibilities: either Key knew before december, maybe even august, or both tolley and eagleson were informed of a serious situation and withheld that information from Key. I suspect the former, because the latter possibility means that Key is routinely kept out of the loop on matters of nation-wide importance and therefore effectively does nothing as prime minister.
I like to think that he actually does the job he was elected and paid to do. The fact that his sole responsibilities now consist of tourismand the prime minister’s office (with everyone else doing the heavy lifting) suggest that the role isn’t too onerous.
Various Government ministers knew an MP was under police investigation before the 2014 election, though they were not told who it was until later that year, according to the New Zealand Herald.
Now, if you believe that various minister knew and that the PM didn’t and that they didn’t know who then I’ve got a bridge to sell you.
Jester you are dead right a conspiracy to keep bad news under wraps till after the election.
Unbridled power and corruption of the police and justice system by National and its cronies.
We need an NSW style enquiry to sort out any ambiguity.
And a completely seperate police complaints Authority.
The Police should be able to tell the Media within a maximum of 48 hrs of charging prominent people including politicians.
One law for the powerful(predators rely on power to operate).
One law for the rest.
The Sabin story has changed again. Apparently just before the election, the cops told two Ministers an MP was under investigation but did not name him. Then they apparently disclosed his name in November.
Sure, sure.
As I have stated before Key & Joyce treated Sabin like a leper at an election forum that Sabin organised. They were not comfortable being there, when Sabin mucked up by insisting Key to take questions from the floor, where someone nailed him over the Northland’s broken roads & wasted money on the holiday highway, team Key sneered
Sabin’s way, like your a liability, I laughed.
Now the way Tolley is refusing to answer questions really stinks of a cover up, a deliberate cover up orchestrated by Joyce and Key.
What was behind leaving this lap dog in place rather than cutting him is the question I’d like to know.
How do upstanding members of the community usually strengthen their positions: through their support networks.
Sabin’s authoritarian support network in the National Party obviously wields considerable influence. You wouldn’t want to piss them off without a very good excuse.
Present : John Key, Anne Tolley, Wayne Eagleson, Steven Joyce.
Anne Tolley – The cops rang me yesterday. Apparently they’re investigating an MP.
John Key – Oh yeah? Did they say who it was?
Anne Tolley – No, didn’t mention it.
Wayne Eagleson – Would you like me to check out police sources John.
John Key – nah don’t bother. This is more interesting. I’ve got some designs for the new flag here. Have a look at them. Which one do you like the best?
“President Barack Obama says that Russia’s aggression in the Ukraine….”
Does Wendy Petrie ever think about what she reads out on air?
Television One 6 p.m. News, Tuesday 10 February 2015
Wendy Petrie first came to television viewers’ attention for a minor gaffe, caused by nervousness, on the very last evening of 1999. She was the weather presenter for TV3 at the time… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EBIj1L7KVc
After her stint at TV3, Petrie moved to TVNZ, where some pathetic old git in management obviously noticed that she was a good looking young blonde. She was eventually promoted to the position of main news co-anchor and a huge swathe of taxpayers’ money was soon being spent on a slickly produced campaign to promote her, ridiculously and demeaningly, as a sex object. TVNZ viewers were inflicted for several months with a series of toe-curlingly embarrassing station promos, showing sad middle-aged males taking a break from their work to leeringly yell at the camera: “Wendy, she’s HOT!”
In other words, TVNZ’s disgusting campaign treated her pretty much like the morons promoting the 2001 Heineken Open had treated Anna Kournikova. Eventually, however, someone—probably friends and family of Petrie’s—must have had a concerned word with someone in authority, because after a while the sex kitten thing was quietly retired, and Petrie was no longer the face of the future for the struggling channel.
Petrie escaped the axe at TVNZ, but her star had faded; by 2009 she was reduced to doing live crosses from the street—the television equivalent of being the No. 11 batsman in a very poor cricket team. Even in that humble position, she managed to upset many viewers by crassly signalling her approval of the Bain retrial verdict…. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M35WAmfPK68
These days, despite being a regular fill-in newsreader, she has pretty much managed to languish in obscurity—deservedly so, for she doesn’t seem to have a single thought in her head. Of course, that makes her not a lot worse than the likes of her colleagues Rawdon Christie, Peter Williams, Simon Dallow and Greg Boyed.
As any thoughtful and discriminating viewer is all too painfully aware, much of what is presented as “news” on television is nothing more than handouts from corporate PR firms, barely if at all modified, and extremely biased political cant. In spite of many years of watching television news, I’m still astonished when newsreaders manage to keep a straight face and read out some of the outrageous scripts they are given. Hearteningly, though, now and again these people DO register some kind of reaction, contriving to subtly undermine and cast doubt on the nonsense they are forced to mouth. Greg Boyed sometimes flinches and raises an eyebrow at the absurdity of the crap unrolling on his monitor, and Simon Dallow occasionally comes up with a troubled, conflicted look. I even saw Peter Williams frown last July, as he read out brutal and shameless canards, as if straight from the Israeli embassy, about the massacre in Gaza.
But Wendy Petrie? No, I have never detected that there’s a thoughtful or serious person underneath that carefully maintained, pleasant exterior. Tonight she read out, in the most serious tone she could muster, another of those pieces of nasty propaganda masquerading as a news item: “President Barack Obama says that Russia’s aggression in the Ukraine….”
What an honest and impartial news script would have said was: “President Barack Obama says that what he calls Russia’s aggression in the Ukraine….”
Wendy Petrie, however, didn’t register even a flash of discomfort at what she was reading. This is only an instance, of course, but it’s a telling example of the way that newsreaders play a vital part in campaigns of disinformation, whether they’re compliantly using National Government distortions such as “reform”, “changes” and “restructuring” instead of “government cuts”, or reading out equally cynical, but far more ominous and dangerous, statements saying it is Russia rather than the neo-Nazi junta that is the aggressor in the Ukraine.
You missed the obvious pun involving ‘Petrie’ and ‘dish’, in your gender focussed assessment, Moz. And you also missed the bit where newsreaders are paid to read the news not editorialise. Despite your sexist summary of Petrie’s alleged weaknesses, the essence of your complaint is that she is too professional. Weird, huh?
You missed the obvious pun involving ‘Petrie’ and ‘dish’
DAMN! I completely missed that slam dunk. That’s why you’re the man, Te Reo—fair play to you.
in your gender focussed assessment
In what way was my analysis of Wendy Petrie’s seeming lack of consciousness a “gender focussed assessment”? I mentioned that four of her male colleagues were more or less just as bad as she was. You need to read what I wrote once again, my friend, and I’m sure you’ll realize that what I was attacking was her almost preternatural lack of awareness, not her gender.
newsreaders are paid to read the news not editorialise
They editorialise all the time—like Petrie did after the Bain verdict—about things that don’t matter at all. So most of them manage to say something censorious about the silly antics of Kim Kardashian or Kanye West or some petty criminal, but they are too frightened to comment on the crimes and seriously outrageous words of Barack Obama, David Cameron and, of course, John Key.
Despite your sexist summary of Petrie’s alleged weaknesses, the essence of your complaint is that she is too professional. Weird, huh?
Could you point out how what I wrote was “sexist”? I pointed out that some old fool at TVNZ obviously salivated over Petrie and set in train that risible–and mercifully short-lived—advertising campaign. Obviously TVNZ was—maybe still is—an organization riddled with sexism as well as racism: does pointing that out make me somehow, magically, become the same as them?
Petrie didn’t celebrate the Bain verdict, she was celebrating a successful live cross. And importantly, she turned from the viewers and celebrated with a single other person to her right, maybe her producer, having thought the camera was off. So clearly not editorialising as you claim.
Your review emphasised gender in a way you do not do when you critique males of the media. You suggest her entire early career at TVNZ was based on her looks not her ability. Without any evidence other than a single 30 spot among many supposed vox pops from the ad campaign for her and Dallow. You twice suggest she is empty headed and in one of those references you define her as being more empty headed than four male colleagues. You use phrases like “good looking young blonde” and “underneath that carefully maintained, pleasant exterior”.
I reckon you should have a good think about your own rhetoric and see if you aren’t the real salivating old fool.
Petrie didn’t celebrate the Bain verdict, she was celebrating a successful live cross.
Sure. By the way, Te Reo, I have a bridge in Whanganui you might be interested in buying.
You suggest her entire early career at TVNZ was based on her looks not her ability.
It was, just like the entire career of the great gorgeous emptiness that is Simon Dallow. Can you perhaps point the rest of us to an example of this “ability” you suggest she possesses?
I reckon you should have a good think about your own rhetoric
I explicated her failure to register any human emotion as she read out a frightful, preposterous piece of political propaganda. I did not use rhetoric, except to describe the old goats at TVNZ who treated her as little better than a porn star.
and see if you aren’t the real salivating old fool.
I assure you that I have never salivated over Wendy Petrie. I did nearly choke last night, however, during her dreadful performance.
Some people would be upset, but I know you well enough now to simply be amused by how quickly you turn to personal abuse after failing to convince others that black is white and up is down.
I don’t know what’s funnier—your insisting that it’s me, instead of the people that marketed her with the “Wendy, she’s HOT” slogan that treated her like a porn star, or your bizarre interpretation of her triumphal fist-pumping after the Bain verdict.
It’s not personal abuse, it’s pointing out an aspect of your behaviour in print. Remember, it’s you who claims that there was a ‘Wendy, she’s HOT’ campaign, you who claim that TVNZ exec’s hired her for her looks and you who wrote the sexist descriptions of her. Own it mate, it’s entirely your invention.
and re: the fist pump, all I can suggest is that you actually watch the video. My explanation fits the evidence, yours is complete and utter bollocks.
You called my analysis of Petrie’s robotic news-reading “sexist” and “gender focussed”. If Petrie were Māori rather than Pākehā, I have no doubt you would have called me a racist.
You’ll no doubt be encouraged to see that dear old McFlock has waddled up to support you. He’s a bit slow to the party, as always, but you need all the help you can get—even if it’s about as useful as mighty Tonga’s contribution to that surreally comical “Coalition of the Willing” in 2003.
I would only have called your analysis racist if you’d focussed on race. In this case your analysis (and fantasies about Petrie’s career) were sexist, so I called you on that.
Still, no matter, I’m sure no one thinks any less of you because of one thoughtless piece. And I’ve no doubt you’ll be even more skillful in your future skewerings of other talking heads as a result of this discussion 😉
Moz’s little line about Petrie “signalling her approval of the Bain retrial verdict” links to the “fist pump” clip that took place before she even knew what the verdict was. They just knew that the jury were coming in, as is evident from the clip.
Couldn’t agree more morrissey about the crap that newsreaders have to read out.
Of course it was the USA which overthrow the democratically elected government in the Ukraine.
Yes that’s right – the USA effectively invaded Ukraine and threw out a government put in place by elections and voting of the people, by the people and for the people.
The USA is the biggest rogue state in the world.
The USA is a liar and a traitor to the people.
The USA is out of control – of that there is no doubt. We must all be very very wary of such a state, particularly as our own leader is so in love with it.
+1. There is an interesting youtube video of a Ukrainian politician addressing the Rada prior to the Maidan protests about a coming civil war within Ukraine fomented by the US Embassy. What happened subsequently? You be the judge.
Of course not, but so many New Zealanders, who have been swamped by massive anti-ruskie propaganda since WWI and before, seem to think the yanks are different and can be trusted more.
No it wasn’t. What happened there is that the Crimeans voted, under the UN guarantee of self-determination, to move back to being Russian. The US didn’t like this after they’d gone to a lot of effort to overthrow Ukraine’s elected government and thus bring the Ukraine into their sphere of influence.
Now it appears that East Ukraine doesn’t want to be a part of the Ukraine either and the US is even more upset that people just won’t do what they’re told.
Don’t trust the Russkies any more than the Yanks mate.
Indeed. But Ukraine is not the US security neighbourhood. The Ruskies are naturally concerned about the USA wanting to put NATO missile bases in the Ukraine, just a few hundred kms from Moscow.
The US wouldn’t look kindly on Russia trying to put missiles back on Cuba now, would they.
The US does not have any intermediate range nuclear missiles in its operational arsenal. Neither does Russia, for that matter. Under the New START treaty, they are both limited to 1550 active warheads on ICBMs, SLBMs and heavy bombers. There is an in-depth verification process that both parties follow to ensure transparency.
Tactical nuclear warheads with yields of less than 10kt delivered by drones or nuclear tipped cruise missiles or various other delivery systems can take the place of intermediate range cruise missiles.
Ukraine in 2015 is not Turkey in 1962.
It’s not but the point remains – Moscow is not going to allow adversary nuclear forces to be stationed just hundreds of kilometres from it.
That’s strange, saying the junta is the aggressor. I mean, Ukraine didn’t invade Crimea. Ukraine didn’t invade Donbass. I mean, yes, their government is unsavoury and the US is playing Xanatos Speed Chess manipulating in Ukraine, but Ukraine hasn’t invaded anywhere.
Russia gave Crimea to the Ukraine back in the 1950s when both were part of the USSR. The Crimeans didn’t like it then and have now decided to go back to being Russian.
Russia didn’t invade the Ukraine, Crimea, of their own free will, left the Ukraine.
I’m aware of the history. There’s no ‘free will’ when there’s Russian troops and tanks everywhere. Chechnya, Ossetia, Ingushetia and Dagestan show that. And Ukrainians and Crimean Tartars didn’t get much of a say in things did they?
And if Russia didn’t invade, did they give back to Ukraine the military equipment they stole in Sevastopol? Thought not.
Most of that “Ukranian military equipment” was Soviet era Russian military equipment.
And who are you to deny a population the right to self determination? A vote was held and 96% of Crimeans under massive turn out voted to join the Russian Federation.
Are you trying to suggest that another Crimean election held now under independent UN supervision would show us that the populace would majority vote to go with the morally, politically and financially unstable Kiev government?
You simply cannot fairly hold a referendum in such a short interval after troops have piled into an area. The actually responsible, mature country thing to do for Russia and Crimea would be to pressure Ukraine to give Crimea a referendum on independence, rejoining Russia or autonomy.
The same could be worked towards in Donbass, Luhansk (both ~40% Russian, and ~70% native Russian speaking, though historically much less than this) and other eastern provinces of Ukraine.
But no, tanks and guns. Mess everything up so Putin can claim the wreckage. And the coal.
Regarding Iraq, I was thoroughly opposed to the US invasion. I was not following political affairs as closely in 2003, so I do not know the particulars of the vote you refer to.
Indeed. With so many rounds of goodwill.
If soldiers “on leave” but wearing “army surplus” uniforms and National party rosettes were hanging around election booths in otago, how free would you feel to vote left?
You’re right, they should hold the elections again, run and monitored by neutral international observers.
Given what a shite job Kiev has done of ruling Ukraine (and bringing it to the edge of financial and energy bankruptcy) in the last 12 months, I think the pro-Moscow vote will go up on last time.
Well, Russia is never going to let Sevastapol become a NATO base, so at least I am being realistic.
By the way are you against re-running the referendum? Like I said, the pro-Moscow vote is likely to increase. No one is Crimea is going to want to subject themselves to Kiev’s suicide draft.
Actually, I am against rerunning the referendum. The Russians screwed the pooch. They should pull out and let things stabilize, refugees return, that sort of thing.
But as you say, not realistic. So I think that if Russia is prepared to escalate, Europe should as well. They’ve seen how appeasement just results in more territorial demands. Maybe the next one will be further down the caucuses. At least Chechnya gave them a bloody nose for a while.
The nato base line was funny. Russia losing Sevastopol was as much an issue as the US losing guantanamo.
But at least you’ve stopped hiding behind the sham legitimacy of a so-called referendum, pleading realpolitik instead. “Pro-moscow vote is likely to increase” – lol. I’m sure RT reckons so. /sarc
The “massive turnout” was 30-40% apparently. And that was in a referendum held at gunpoint in which the retaining the status quo was not even an option on the ballot paper. It was a crock.
You mean in your opinion if a referendum was held under fairer conditions, the people of Crimea would choose to return to Kiev control?
“At gun point”
There were barely two or three casualties in the Russian takeover of Crimea. Totally minimal resistance at “gun point.” Shows you the pro-Russian mood of the people there.
No, I meant it was a crock. The option of staying in the Ukraine was not on the ballot, so it’s a completely moot point what might have happened in a fair referendum.
However you quibble, the vote was taken under the rule of the gun. It doesn’t matter if it was 3 deaths or 300, it was not democratic or legitimate.
As I said to McFlock above, maybe you are right and they should re-run the referendum. Given what a political and financial shit fight Ukraine has descended into over the last 12 months, I think the pro-Moscow vote will increase.
I see you’ve been drinking the Kool-aid again. Wikipedia:
The official result from the Autonomous Republic of Crimea was a 96.77 percent vote for integration of the region into the Russian Federation with an 83.1 percent voter turnout.
With that sort of turnout and that result I’m pretty sure that the people of Crimea, if they held the referendum under the ideal conditions that you demand, would still vote to join Russia. As the saying goes: Quantity has a quality that’s hard to argue with.
Keep reading the wikipedia page, Draco. There’s more info there than just the Russian state sponsored Koolaid you’ve been swallowing. For a start, you need to factor in the thousands who fled the Russian advance who couldn’t vote, then the thousands still there who just denied the opportunity to vote, then those that were too scared to either register or vote.
Funny old world when someone like you goes into defence mode for an oppressive state invading its neighbors. I was pretty sure you stood against that sort of thing.
That’s an interesting article, Joe. It’s amazing what intellectual compromises people will make if they see an advantage in another area they have an interest in.
Yep, quite a lot including polls that indicate that the Crimeans are happy with the move back to being Russian. In fact, the only people who are upset with it seem to be the US and their lickspittles.
Operation Chokepoint is forcing US business to shut down by pressuring banks to close merchant accounts of businesses in certain industries. Among the targeted industries are dating services (??!), credit repair services and coin dealers.
So the cops inform two ministers that an “unamed” MP is under investigation and neither minister delved further into who it might be ? That’ll take some believing !
Yes, Tolley not willing to answer a fair question on a topic of public interest.
Is this how journalists are going to fare with this government which has been stone walling, hanging up on the journalist, refusing to come onto radio where they may be questioned closely for some time?
This has become a technique of unplausible deniability. Can’t be caught lying if you say nothing. If you can’t remember. Much easier for a deceitful person to remember what they haven’t said.
Might the technique here to talk to a minister about ostensibly one aspect of his/her portfolio and then shift onto a more contentious area be a new tactic?
I can’t say I blame any of the vegetables for not wanting to discuss it openly. On the one hand, legal matters, on the other hand John Key has been lying very much, and on the other hand (three hands, yay!), Sabin’s National Party enablers haven’t gone anywhere.
Yes Adam
Behind the scene the jockeying for the leadership has been bubbling away for some time.
Joyce and Collins have been undermining each other. While Joyce like Key is more a centralist compared to Judith who positions herself further Right. Key backs Joyce and has aided him by removing dead end MP’s like Henare and others who Collins could have counted on for support.
Sabin & son were called upon by Joyce to put the slipper into Collins while she appeared weak. Key was too frightened and gutless to remove JC when the milk company scandel broke, for fear of upsetting wealthy party backers that JC charmed and pulled to the party. Key was smart enough to be wary of Slater and his scheming with Collins. Look for him to be forced to bring Collins back on to the front bench as Nationals bench starts floundering under opposition and a turning media’s pressure. I do respect Collins for being the toughest Ministers the Tories have had.
Paddy Gower seems a bit quiet this morning I wonder if it’s due to him having to spend 2 minutes talking about all that’s going wrong for the godkey at the mo.
Is that the wind of change blowing down the halls of power.
Defence Minister Brownlee on RNZ this morning responded to close Espiner questioning about how long he had been organising the armed forces into training for conflict with ISIS with a snarky “well you’d know much more than I do about that.” Not a good way to treat a journalist who do after all get the last word. As they say, never argue with the man with the microphone.
The government’s lackey ministers like Tolley and Brownlee have been so long protected by Key’s fronting National’s media front that they’ve forgotten how to deal with journalists who are starting to themselves remember how to question closely and perseveringly.
Key seems to be getting flustered more too- mocking, misquoting, misrepresenting other’s points of view seems to be more of his game now. How many times did he make fun of Little’s name in the speech yesterday on government’s intentions for 2015?
I’ve always thought of Brownlee as the village idiot of the National Party. Unbelievable that he was once deputy-leader, although once they got near power they dumped him pretty quickly for the ‘dream team’ of Bill and John.
Key doesn’t handle pressure well. When it’s all going his way he has a smarmy look; when it isn’t he has a kind of caught in the headlights look. I guess in the money markets he never had to front up to any sort of stiff questioning.
The wheels may well start to come off in the third term, just as they did for Helen Clark (who was a lot like Key in my view).
I don’t have any particular view of LIttle because the problem for anti-capitalists is not the leader of the Labour Party but the Labour Party *as an institution*. Whose side is it on?
Here’s one view that it is clearly not on the side of the working class and oppressed: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/the-truth-about-labour-a-bosses-party/
I’m just working on a piece in the next couple of days about the 1949 Auckland carpenters’ dispute; another indication of which class Labour is ultimately loyal to.
Brownlee knows where bodies are buried, that is the only plausible explanation from Nat party conference bouncer and bully boy to… to whatever he is today
what is the up-date status of Nicky Hager’s computer in police custody?
…in many countries this is a big scandal and investigations are happening…closer to home in Australia for example…shouldnt we be doing the same in New Zealand?…parliamentary questions?
Nicky is not keen for the fuzz to take copies of all his stuff, something about protecting sources, corrupt senior cops, journalistic integrity, blah blah
well super sleuth Chooky has just checked out the internet and there is a report yesterday from our very own Herald ….some New Zealanders are involved in this international scandal of tax evasion and tax avoidance!…who are they?….any MPs?…anyone we on The Standard should kinow about ?…any Nact MPs?
And I can only imagine what the poor Greeks must be thinking right now since it seems that the same governments that have shoved austerity down their throats as a punishment for being feckless, money borrowing, tax avoiding, southern European ne’er-do-wells were quite happy to turn a blind eye to the goings-on at HSBC Zurich on behalf of the wealthiest people on the planet. This is the sort of shit that started the French Revolution.
That was a massive “let them eat cake” gig and still all those old Etonians in the Conservative Party can’t quite fathom why they aren’t more palatable to the average UK voter.
Not sure if paranoid or just untrusting of comms technology in the hands of authorities but I have no need, want or the money for a smart phone. They can be easily tracked can’t they? And why develop a crook in your neck staring at useless bits of info when you can be observing your fellow humans, observing the fucked up edness, as well as the beauty of the changing seasons around you, and generally staying connected to the living world? How much electronic white noise to you need in your life?
I have an old skool pre pay phone and spend about $20 on it every 3 months as it’s hardly ever used. I use cash. A credit card is used about twice a year for absolute emergencies only. Not on fb, not on twitter.
I prefer it that way.
Use the post. Send birthday cards to your friends. It will bowl over those who are over reliant of technology. They love it, a card in the post.
Absolutely easily. If the telephone company’s computers can direct an incoming call or txt to your phone, then they know where you are in the network down to the nearest cell tower. If your smart phone is GPS enabled, they will have your location down to the nearest 5m.
@ Rosie Use the post. Send birthday cards to your friends. It will bowl over those who are over reliant of technology. They love it, a card in the post.
+1
I just saw a piece on US grade schools only being required to teach handwriting to Grade 1 now. From then on schools can focus solely on keyboard and touchscreen entry.
It’s going to destroy the creativity and skills of the younger generation.
Nikki kaye was on tv the other day excited about heading us in the same direction. She was in a primary school where everyone had an i-pad…
That’s the NZ she and the Liar in Chief visit, the Sallies visit the NZ where not even the classroom has an i-pad, maybe a laptop for everyone to share…
Percentages seem so straightforward that they can confuse. Like GST used to be 10% added to the the cost price but 11% off the total price.
In that advert of course 20% off $4 is not $1. And the real joke about it is that 4 Croissants at 75c will amount to $3 anyway so it’s a blatant con. But the shop can rely on busy buyers not nutting all that out.
It reminds me of a joke I read – a doughnut seller had a sign –
Doughnuts each 60 cents, four for $3.00. A friend pointed this out and he explained. People put me right about the price and then buy four at the full price, feeling pleased they haven’t overpaid. I sell a lot more doughnuts because of that sign.
That strategy of getting info is costing donations I bet , I personally am not against giving my details but I bet some possible donors shy away from it.
I find it very amusing that we are supposedly superior enough in our military capabilities to be able to ‘train’ people in warfare who have been fighting wars since day dot. If anything I would have expected the middle east people to be training us.
Of course everybody knows it is a ruse to free up US resources for more frontline activity. We are effectively on the frontline.
Expect a Sydney-Ottawa-Boston-London event in NZ….
The Peshmerga could train our infantry. They are considered as the best light infantry in the world. A shame that FJK considers many of them terrorists because of the PKK. A Kurdish taxi driver was very happy that I knew about them and told me stories of the Turkish Army pissing their pants and running when the Peshmerga turned up. I was careful not to tip him in case FJK withdrew my passport for supporting terrorism.
Labour and NZ First should work together and get that message out there, don’t vote National in the byelection!
Where was National when Northland Flooded?
Where was National when the PSA virus hit?
Where was National when rates and insurance premiums have skyrocketed?
Why are National selling off our power?
Why are National selling off our state houses?
Why are National selling off our farms?
Why are National selling off our country?
Why is National funding Real estate for Sky City?
Do you want to get National’s attention?
DON’T VOTE FOR THEM IN THE BY ELECTION!
Prime Minister John Key has confirmed he offered a deal to Sky City allowing the casino to have more pokie machines in return for building a multimillion-dollar convention centre. Mr Key, speaking from Indonesia, confirmed he made the offer to Sky City in his capacity as Minister of Tourism, Newstalk ZB reported…
… Mr Key was asked last July in a question for written answer from Green MP Sue Kedgley whether he or any of his ministers had met representatives from the casino to discuss changes to the Gambling Act.
He replied: “I attended a dinner with the Sky City board 4 November 2009 where we discussed a possible national convention centre and they raised issues relating to the Gambling Act 2003″. ”
* NO INCREASE IN GST—(From 12.5 to 15%..Fooled you!)
* NO MORE ASSET SALES—(We will sell state houses!..Gotcha!)
* NO TAX PAYER GOVT FUNDS TO SKY CITY, EVER!—(Ha, ha! Fooled you again, suckers!)
This has been interesting to follow over the past few days:
Nazi Germany’s 3.5-year occupation of Greece was bloody and destructive. The Paris reparations conference in 1945 accepted calculations that estimated damage to Greece to amount to 7bn pre-war US dollars…
Greece received 115 million Deutsche Marks – a sum that has since been subject to myths and legends from both sides of the Greek-German divide.
Further compensation for war damages were denied, supposedly on the grounds that only a reunified Germany could agree to make such payments, but it was an open secret that Germany’s government actively tried to postpone the payment indefinitely (“until Greek calends”)– even after reunification… Once one reparation payment had been granted to one country, officials in newly unified Germany with urgent investment needs in the east asked themselves where it would end.
Yet it’s important in this case to make a distinction between reparation payments for war crimes and repayments of so-called Besatzungsanleihe: monthly loans demanded from the Greek government in 1942-44 to pay for the maintenance costs of the Greek army and further military activity in the Mediterranean… 476m Reichsmarks, which would be roughly €10bn today.
Lynn, I think Pat O’Dea’s comments at the dailyblog are insulting to other authors here at the standard. Especially Bill, and all the fine – well thought out, and written post he has done on man made climate change.
If you get ban people – read what Lynn sends you – read the rules around posts, and learn what the standard expects. Your the guest here – would you walk into a house and put you muddy shoes on someone’s couch? Or walk into someone’s house and change the TV channel on them?
Sorry – but, this pisses me off. If you get banned don’t complain about it. Adult up, and take responsibility for your own comments.
As someone who was banned – I accept my comment broke the standards and I deserved what happened. Please if you cop a ban – do the same, then come back and try to be constructive.
Why is it anarchists, get that people have their own standards and expectations, and we can respect them for it. We may disagree – but, and quite frankly – respect is a very simple concept.
Pat does appear to have an agenda. For all of his talk about the left working together, it appears that his actual (unthoughtful) view on it is effectively that everyone should think like him and listen to the font of his obsessions. He reads more like a poor evangelist than someone anyone could really work with. It is also a pity that his grasp of climate change issues reads a bit like that of an excitable adolescent or a climate change denier.
Anyway, I have been using the posts over there (when I have time) as an opportunity to carry on eliciting and widening the actual moderation policies at The Daily Blog. It is a bit of a moving target at present, and post-election I think that the uncertainty is contributing rather too much to their falling readership.
I haven’t been banned yet and don’t really want to be, but I’d prefer a truce between lprent and Bumbler. Anyone who starts a blog must have a healthy ego, and I think them for doing it, but the Romans are the real enemy. Aqueducts were OK, but their weird sex and convention centres are taking things a bit far.
As for Pat, he’s been a bit uncompromising ever since I’ve known him. I probably am too, but it’s more important to me to inspire thinking than having people agree with me. Just as well, I suppose.
From DPF @ Kiwiblog: “Greens host GE deniers conference at Parliament”
“89% of scientists think GM food is safe, a slightly higher percentage (88%) who think humans are mostly responsible for climate change.”
Given that 48% of Meteorologists are skeptics and survey after survey shows that two-thirds of geoscientists and engineers are skeptics, the 87% figure “across the sciences” seems hard to believe. 3748 members of AAAS took the survey — and as A.Scott points out on WUWT in comments, only 7% of the respondents were from the Earth Sciences, and nearly half were “biomedical”.
Engdahl carefully documents how the intellectual foundations of ‘eugenics,’ mass culling of the sick, coloured, and otherwise disposable races, were actually first established, and even legally approved, in the United States. Eugenics research was financially supported by the Rockefeller and other elite families and first tested on Jews under Nazi Germany.
…
He describes how the Rockefellers guided the US agriculture policy, used their powerful tax-free foundations worldwide to train an army of bright young scientists in hitherto unknown field of microbiology. He traces how the field of Eugenics was renamed “genetics” to make it more acceptable and also to hide the real purpose.
Francis Galton (the Englishman who developed the term “eugenics”) was also a pioneer in meteorology, so meteorologists are unreliable, and they named the field after an astrological method of predicting meteor impacts (according to someone on the interwebz). /sarc
I believe I recall the conversation to which you claim to be referring, but the conversation I recall is so distant from what you seem to now be recollecting that maybe you are referring to another conversation which I have since forgotten.
Even if the conversation in question went as you remembered it (which seems to be pretty doubtful), I never called myself anything like “exceptional”. In fact, the idea that I am fairly unexceptional was intrinsic to the point I recall making.
So how about you link to it, just so everyone can see how fucking deluded you are? Is your ego so fragile that you are incapable of even that?
If you are anything other than a liar or delusional blow-hard, linking to a conversation where I explicitly or implicitly stated that I was “exceptional” should be pretty simple.
Me saying that I’m “an exception” to a bullshit delusion you have does not mean I’m “exceptional“. Indeed, if my abilities were unusually good as well as contradicting your general[ly stupid] rule, then that would have defeated my own point. The fact that I am unexceptional means that pretty much anyone can do it once they know where the important switches are.
Now I’m glad that Ure is unintelligible for the most part – he’s easy to skip over without reading, where as your comments are just as facile and egotistical as his, but initially tend towards the vaguely possible. And then we drill down to what you’re actually saying, and you turn out to be a fucking idiot with more ego than braincells.
Rawshark…
I looked at those fatalities. And there are more factors to consider than GE. How much of the deaths were connected with GE? Could you give a link? I would have to look back through my stuff to find what I put up.
Definitely worth checking other possible causes, but much of what I’ve read on the subject indicates that the stock losses are closely linked to GE swedes – “a strong link” as quoted in this article.
Genoreinhart propaganda site.
Ulgy truth.
Cherry picking spurious facts.
You should not stop watching Fox news.
Otherwise you might have to live up to your name!
There was a time when capitalism was able to substantially reduce the working week, albeit not without workers having to struggle to achieve the 40-hour week.
Nevertheless there was a very substantial reduction. Whereas in the decades following the Industrial revolution, workers in Britain were working 60 or 70 hours a week, this was progressively reduced. In NZ, the 40-hour week was won without massive battles.
A century on, then, shouldn’t we be down to a 20-hour week?
Keynes in 1930 suggested that before the end of the twentieth century this would be the case. Instead there was the Great Depression and WW2. However, after WW2 came the long postwar economic boom, from late 1940s to early 1970s.
Since the end of that boom there has been nothing comparable. Capitalist economies have returned to a shorter boom and bust cycle, with the booms increasingly being short and centred in the artificial economy (or around individual sectors) and the busts have been deeper and more protracted, eg the fallout from the GFC.
Far from shortening, and us now enjoying the benefits of living in a leisure society, as capitalist ideologues promised in the 1960s at the height of the boom, we are living in a period of the extension of work hours – more working hours a week and, in some countries, more working years as the retirement age has been extended – an example being in the south of Ireland, courtesy of the Fine Gael-Labour government (one of the reasons that Labour was decimated by Sinn Fein in the local and Euro elections there last May).
I’d be happy to agree that the poorest workers are the most surveilled for time.
Also happy to agree that digital surveillance now enables this more finely.
But I’m not so sure of the proposed clean break between industrial and pre-industrial step change in time-oppression.
Those who are at the lowest rungs of society have always been at the whim of the master, day or night, rational or irrational, reasonable or unreasonable. Granted there are minor and brief historical exceptions. But that’s what they are.
Also, we are in the era of headphones, digital games, and other time-suspensory maenads that resist the force of analogue time with both time and space independent of hard reality. At minimum, they can have eight hours of my meat-time oppression, but now I can form new times and spaces until my next shift. Time becomes my game.
Workers are getting too little a share of national income and shareholders/corporates too much. And the unemployed sweet FA.
If workers were all getting a fair share of national income everybody would be on a living wage and not having to work more than 4 days a week if they didn’t want to.
And to solve the mess, the US again decided to act against the international law, building an anti-ISIS coalition that is “meaningless, apart from being illegal.”
“A law-abiding state would go to the Security Council, ask for a declaration by the Security Council of a threat to peace, and request the Security Council to organize direct response to it. And that could be done. The US could then participate in it, but so could Iran,” which is a major military force and would probably wipe out ISIS in no time, if it was allowed to join the fight on the ground, Chomsky believes.
+100…thanks for that….makes a lot of sense…a political solution through the UN is the only way to go
(I doubt however that the Israelis and the Saudis would agree….because they both have their own agendas in the Middle East and want to cripple Iran and Assad/Syria )
Wouldn’t it be good if even just one of the media outfits in NZ took our parliament seriously and livestreamed Question Time like they routinely do in Australia, Canada and the UK?
I kind of meant the way SMH/The Age, CBC in Canada and The Guardian often have the livestream of QT from their respective parliament tv channels on their online sites. It would help, I imagine to generate a larger audience for the undertakings of parliament. At any rate it turns out that TVNZ (whose interest in politics is usually zilch) ran the live feed of today’s QT on their site. Good on them.
Key looking tired, disinterested at Question time today. Not to mention distinctly uncomfortable when questioned about the Sky City fiasco. Both he and Joyce (confidence man extraordinaire) appeared to be backtracking when they weren’t downright evasive.
Agree entirely Wyndham about Key at question time. Just seem it on Prime News.
Key trying to crack jokes and not looking funny. And although I don’t approve as such of Peter’s mentioning Key dyes his hair, I think it is making him look ridiculous and pathetic (sometimes means justifies the ends????) And although two wrongs don’t make a right, Key has been a B…….doing this to others.
If you’re referring to Question time today ankerawshark, it was Key who brought it up not Peters. All Peters did was ask the perennial question “Does he have confidence in all his ministers”. He was planning to attack Steven Joyce and the Sky City shambles. Key anticipated as much so he diverted the question to his hair. The exchange that followed was actually very funny on both sides, so much so even the Speaker was laughing too much to intervene.
There’s nothing wrong with a bit of levity from time to time… and then it was back to serious business so nobody got off the hook.
I have never understood how he gets away with starting every question time trying to be the funny guy. You would think his own Party would mention it at least once. A quiet hand on the shoulder as they turn into the chamber ‘John, stop trying to be the funniest guy in the room, you’re good but no-one can be George Burns everyday. Look what that did to George Burns.
But seriously folks, when did you last see the Prime Minister, especially when answering a sombre question, simply stand and show respect for the House of Representatives, the central institution of our nation’s governance.
I was thinking of buildings that the UNACT government have taken an interest in, besides casinos, and one they didn’t like was Broadcasting House in Wellington and there was one they ‘lost’, referred to in the finance committee report, in Auckland.
And then there is the matter of what went on in the buildings, public broadcasting.
Some quotes and links:
Comment on public concern at last attack on public broadcasting: The difference this time is the public support for New Zealand’s last public service broadcaster – back in the 1990s, when there was a move to remove public broadcasting – massive campaigning by the station itself was needed to raise awareness.
NewsRoom business website founder and editor Peter Fowler led the 1996/1997 campaign against the demolition of Radio NZ’s home in Wellington.
“The destruction of Broadcasting House next to Parliament was scandalous and needless, but a good example of the regard Radio New Zealand has been held in by past National Governments,” he says.
When Broadcasting House was demolished in 1997 – after it mysteriously caught fire – Radio NZ not only lost its base, but also a symbol for public broadcasting.
“One major effect was the loss of some of the best studios in the Southern Hemisphere. I regard the attack on Broadcasting House as just another example of the attack on public broadcasting itself. What better way to demoralise someone than to evict them and demolish their home.”
Radio New Zealand lost the building, but saved broadcasting. http://www.newswire.co.nz/2010/03/can-a-mouse/
2003/04 FINANCIAL REVIEW – RADIO NEW ZEALAND Political coverage, balance and fairness
Some of us are concerned that Radio NZ is not maintaining an appropriate balance and fairness in its politi cal coverage, and believe that particular programmes with
substantial political content, such as Checkpoint have consistently under
represented some political parties in recent years. Radio NZ assured us that balance and fairness is maintained, if not on an individual programme basis, across programming as a whole….
Then on why Radionzs audience research should cost $145,000 yet not be able to be compared to those of commercial broadcasters. McCully was not happy with the explanation because as a stakeholder he thought he should be able to measure them (though completely different) together. McCully
Let’s get a couple of things straight here. You accept that Radio New
Zealand’s actually owned by the taxpayers of New Zealand – the citizens of
New Zealand – that we are stakeholders, and you’ve got some basic
obligation to report to us. You do agree with that?
Cavanagh
I do.
McCully
And you spend $145,000 of our money, if you like, collecting ratings
information. Right? That ratings information, in addition to the cume figures,
which I regard as meaningless but which you regard as meaningful, in
addition you collect the audience figures on a basis that is roughly
comparable to the commercial sector
John Roughan’s hagiography of John Key is going to be made into a movie “Fifty Fades of Key”. Some scenes involve holding people of a barrel while shafting and screwing them. The main character has a speech impediment, voluntary bouts of amnesia, and appears to be “relaxed and comfortable” with the suffering of others. In the movie several henchmen write blogs that are a worse insult to the human intellect than Vogon poetry. Casting has already started but many wannabies had to be hospitalised after reading the script. OSH is investigating but Steven Joyce thinks it is pretty legal.
TL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate news for Aotearoa-NZ this week, and a discussion above that was recorded yesterday afternoon above between and The Kākā’s climate correspondent : An independent review panel into the emergency response to Cyclone Gabrielle in Hawkes Bayconcluded “that ...
There are now only a few days left to give feedback on the Draft Government Policy Statement (GPS) on Land Transport 2024-34 (see our earlier post this week on GPS submission guides). As we’ve reported, the GPS is a disaster for Local Government, so we were particularly interested to hear ...
Willis has pledged to go ahead with the debt-funded tax cuts, despite growing opposition from her own supporters worried about appearing fiscally irresponsible. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for ...
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
Photo by Alvan Nee on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
Buzz from the Beehive One minister is talking tough while a colleague – whose ministry had acted tough and drawn a barrage of flak – has shown an official softening. Some ministers are doing what Labour was good at, which is distributing public funds to causes regarded as worthy or ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Keith Rankin, trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand. My earlier article – Can ‘Good’ be the Greater Evil? – looked at the issue of how wars should end, and how Good versus Evil ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 AMMA by Saraid de Silva (Moa Press, $38)A stunning debut novel reviewed by Brannavan ...
From Steve Martin to Ricky Stanicky, a pick’n’mix of things worth watching and listening to this long weekend. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. If you’re at a loss for something to occupy yourself with this Easter, don’t panic: The Spinoff’s got ...
Jesus had dinner with his 12 disciples right before he died. Noted historian Madeleine Chapman finds out who really deserved to be there.First published in 2018 but let’s be honest, the subject is timeless. As you sit on your couch this Easter Sunday, eating a chocolate egg you know ...
The newly-promoted Northern League club is on a mission to return to the National League for the first time in two decades. Plenty about domestic football in New Zealand has changed in that time – but the sense that this amateur competition is not an entirely level playing field remains. ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
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Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
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i am really looking forward to doing the commentary on q-time 2day…
..it promises to be interesting…
..also of interest is that sky casino post their annual-profits 2day…
..hopefully that will raise the condemnation of this latest scam/rort being played on us by these casino-bastards..(and key)..
..to fever-pitch..
Profits are easily manipulated with deferring income and creating provisions and write downs, wouldn’t surprise me if it’s ok but disappointing in some respects with reference made to costs of the new convention centre planning etc etc
All part of the neo lib con job NACT run via the MSM and the pathetic international joke that is the NZX.
I can see Peters pushing the envelop over the legality of being muzzled from speaking
under parliamentary privilege about we know what. I hope he pushes Carter to the point of booting him out of the house, now that will get the media excitable and the sheep nattering.
Really do hope he stands in Northland? If he does will organise a major public forum against the contenders.
97% oppose that hand-out to sky-city..
..and tvone wheels out a pimp for the deal..
..is that what you call ‘balance’..?
Apparently, what the MSM regard as balanced is them regurgitating what the rich tell them.
“i am really looking forward to doing the commentary on q-time 2day…”
– your commentary cannot be worse than the professional’s efforts yesterday
(no offence intended phillip 🙂 )
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/beehive-live/65982544/beehive-live-parliament-opens
Trying to find the list of questions for today, from the parliament link I could only find Dec 10 and all previous to this.
the questions get posted @ about midday usually…
http://whoar.co.nz/2015/new-zealand-parliament-list-of-questions-for-oral-answer-wednesday-11-february-2015/
(excerpt:..)
‘..key yells out to him that ‘there is no dye in these locks’..(referring to peters yesterday accusing him of dying his hair..)
..peters replied:..’so why don’t the curtains match the carpet..?’..’
So is it worth me watching when I get home from work, by reading your critique it sounds underwhelming?
it was underwhelming in the sense of no sabin-talk/holding to account….
..but it is worth watching for seeing key getting monstered over sky city..
..first by little..then by turei..
..i’ve watched/sat thru/endured far worse..in that forum..
..in the name of the public-record..
i gave turei performer-of-the-day-award…
..and goff gave the peace-sign..
..with his blood-stained fingers..
..it was quite the moment..
..and i had an irony-overdose @ the sight..
Most pathetic award: John Key for trying to hilariously pretend that the opposition not liking the idea of the taxpayer throwing cash at Sky City means that they suddenly really like the original Sky City deal.
that one had a kinda crosby-textor stench about it..
I just finished watching Question Time. It was clear SkyCity is a distraction to the real issue which is the sudden resignation of Sabin and all the murky details surrounding it.
It was a pity Peters had used up his allocated sups and lost the opportunity to jump in on the patsy question new Whangarei Nat MP Shane Reti asked Bridges.
The Northland By-Election ‘will’ expose to the New Zealand public the cover up and corruption being harboured by National. I can pretty much guarantee this personally.
and of course one of the biggest-lies told by key in that q-time..
..was the claim that he has ‘locks’ of hair..
..i looked real hard..
..but i cd see little signs of..
..’ tress – curl – or ringlet’..
I dimly recall speculation about a hairpiece, but maybe he’s using “Adveenced Hair, yeah yeah”
I’m guessing we will see an apology from Andrew Little over calling Key a liar about being advised by police in August.
Yes because the police are sooooo trustworthy and honest whatever they say must be correct and they always obey the laws…..what planet have you been on lately.
That’s not what Little said, Jester. No mention of August, just that the PM was lying when he said he didn’t know until December.
Looking forward to you apologising to Little, because you’re not a hypocrite, eh.
All the evidence appears that he was only informed in December. Unless you wish to progress another theory that goes against what Key, the Police, and the media are saying.
Apart from the evidence the NBR has: that Key has known since last April and National since before 2011.
Why does Sabin have so many cheerleaders? Are you still afraid of him?
What evidence? Key has provided none and the cops have said they followed the ‘no surprises’ policy.
Be nice if you apologised for claiming Little said August when he didn’t.
We won’t see any personal responsibility from a hypocrite.
It’s part of the characteristics of RWNJs. Despite demanding that people take personal responsibility for their actions they will never take responsibility for theirs unless they get some sort of benefit from it. On that latter point, they’re more than willing to take responsibility for someone else’s actions if they think that they can spin it to make it look like they did it. This is shown by National claiming success from what Labour led governments have done.
@ trp..
“..Be nice if you apologised ..”
bloody hell..!..
..like you do when u r proven wrong..?
..whoar..!
..goff has already snared todays’ hypocrite-award..
..so i’ll have to strike a special bare-arsed-cheek-award for u..
..it will be fast-couriered to you..
Phil, the relatively few times I’ve got something wrong here, I’ve always put my hand up. A couple of times I’ve even outed myself before anyone else saw the mistake. I know I often argue my corner staunchly, but that doesn’t mean I’m not beyond admitting my errors. I suspect your problem is you’d like to be the one to find one, but they don’t live at the bottom of the bong, dude.
got even one example of that..?
I turned the TV off upon hearing Lieutenant General Brownlee swat Goff’s (basically patsy) questions with ease.
Did Goff end with a crisp military salute to Gerry?
nah..! he stuck on a headband..
..and a ‘peace-sign’ t-shirt..
..then shearer whipped out his gee-tar..
..and they banged out a couple of verses of ‘masters of war’…
Shearer was shockingly disloyal to the team, he is no poker playein. nor the god botherer Nat whip showing his nervousness at Key getting grilled over the Shonkey Sky deal. Sitting there behind Davis looking sceptical at Kelvins line of questioning.
You know when you look at the hand Little has to play with, you really realise the opposition is fucked without Peters. Bit the bullet and run a few by elections, parachute some talent in.
u mean labour-whip..?
No I added the former christian heritage candidate Tim Mc Indoe’s rant in between bleating on about Shearer then edit elapsed. Sorry bout that.
I thought good comments on Radionz from Ron Marks about defence force personnel going to Iraq.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/20166752
Also Phil Goff was very good.
But Labour’s Defence spokesperson, Phil Goff, said the pretence that no Government decision has been made just was not honest.
“The reason the Prime Minister [has given] for taking that decision isn’t honest either.
“This isn’t about the need to protect human rights and fight evil. It’s about, as he admitted earlier, the price of ‘being in the club’ led by other countries such as Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States.”
Mr Goff questioned what the New Zealand Defence Force could do that the Iraqi Army could not do for itself.
“Over $25 billion has been invested by the United States over the past 10 years in training and equipping them, and that investment has made practically no difference.
“Our efforts can do very little to help with the real problems of persistent corruption, deep sectarian divisions and poor leadership which lie behind the incompetence of the Iraqi Army.”
Mr Goff says New Zealand would achieve more by providing humanitarian help to the millions of refugees caused by conflict in the region.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/20166761/govt-accused-of-dishonesty-over-nzdf-training-for-iraq
Just note that Phil Goff starts talking about 1.30 mins into the audio clip. Just in case you tire of listening to Key’s anguished rant about the awful things happening under ISIS. He is so tender hearted, and hasn’t heard of all the dreadful happenings that occur daily around the world. Really he’s too sensitive and unworldly to be PM. yek for gardening leave for the duration?
“All the evidence”? What evidence would that be you funny man?
“All the evidence …”
Tolley was told in August. She said the police did not tell her who the MP was but I would bet dollars to donuts she found out from other sources.
Your friend Cameron Slater said this a couple of weeks ago:
“What astonishes me is that National did almost nothing about this issue for months…despite knowing about it, all the way to the top.
They just let Mike Sabin blow smoke up their arses despite plenty of concern outside of the party.
When full details of what has transpired are revealed then there are going to be some serious questions asked of the leadership.”
And that well known left wing paper the NBR is convinced Key knew last April.
Time to open your eyes Jester.
NBR is “convinced”. Well that’s solid evidence Mickey.
And Slater’s comment? Or is that too inconvenient to address?
Slater has also gone on record stating that Matt McCarten was directly involved in the hack of his emails.
Yep, pretty credible that Slater.
I would pay no credence to anything Slater said about Labour but a lot of credence about anything he says about National. Besides rumours have been swirling around for a while.
“I would pay no credence to anything Slater said about Labour but a lot of credence about anything he says about National. Besides rumours have been swirling around for a while”
Anything negative Slater says about National must be true but anything negative he says about Labour isn’t true, Don’t you see how stupid that is. You cant have it both ways Mickey.
I don’t think Andrew Little exchanges texts with slater.
Apparently Key does, though.
That’s how it can happen both ways – one lot talk to him (to stab each other in the back, most likely), the other lot he makes shit up about.
@ naki man..
..no it’s not..
..the credibility comes from him criticising his own..
..what do u find so hard to understand about that..?
I wonder what percentage of Sabin apologists share his values, as opposed to simply suffering from Stockholm syndrome.
Yeah right. As I have said before. In my opinion Matt is a bit of a technophobe. He can use a cellphone.
A damn good thing really. He is a hell of a worker of people and people systems from what I have seen of him. Almost over-compensated in that respect….
Surely Cam Slater realises that? He should realise the effects of over-compensation. Cam appears to be vastly over compensated as being a hypocritical arsehole with delusions of grandeur and a reality of repeated incompetence.
maybe i should have added the “sarc” tag?
Sorry lPrent. you’re wrong.Cameron has delusions of mediocrity and justifiably so.
The problem with being deluded is that you’re impervious to facts and logic. Perhaps cognitive therapy may help our friend Cameron??
I suppose the NBR might suddenly have decided to alienate its entire client base by running with unverified information.
On the other hand perhaps they simply did what journalists do and got a couple of independent confirmations before they went to press.
I hope your loyalty to Sabin isn’t an indication that you share his values.
No jester, where is your evidence?
You made a claim about evidence – so where is it?
Have you not got any?
NBR a right wing publication.
Which has got to be another lie. There’s no point in the police telling the minister that an MP is under investigation under the ‘No Surprises’ policy if they don’t tell them who the MP is.
True. I very strongly doubt that she would have been informed without a name. How stupid do NAct think the electorate is? Stupid enough to vote Key in three times in a row?
Hmmm….oops.
Like she wouldn’t have demanded to know who and for what.
its a shame that JK gave two different dates then isnt it
which kinda does make him a liar
and for that to even work we have to believe that JK finds out about such issues via a tip off from their opponents before any internal party channels tell him – which is just simply not believable
No, all the evidence (when the police told the minister) shows that National have known since before the election. Everything else that we’ve heard is National Making Shit Up to try and hide the fact that they knew before the election.
National are just on borrowed time for now, due to the suppression order of January 30 2015. The prominent person was remanded by a district court to reappear on 19 February 2015.
Up to now national have not misled the house and this will continue until name suppression is lifted, (if lifted at all).
A lot more water to go under the bridge on this topic.
The House sits on 24 – 26 February 2015.
Jestirer the Police haven’t told media when they told Key.
But under no surprises Key would have been told about any serious prosecutions.
Key has kept a lid on it till after the election combined with dirty politics it would have been a disaster.
Now the perverbial has hit the fan not even Slater believes your pathetic attempt to smear little.
Hope you have posted on WO.
It seems only National MP’s can get blanket suppression orders even after the drafting of new laws reducing excuses for suppresion.
It was Ironic that a former National MP who posted a suppressed former MP’s name got name suppression himself.
Their needs to be an independent enquiry.
If it were anyone on the left it would be all over the headlines like Dominique Straus Kahn.
While Thatcher managed to cover up a spy associated to conseravative peer pedophile ring who managed to destroy evidence that would have prevented further predatory rampant abuse of victims.
Its time for an independent enquiry into police and Justice dept behaviour.
As these decisions lack of openess is essential so police Moral is not undermined.
Even an inquiry the Attorney General could embargo the full police or parliamentary evidence. This has been done before e.g. Colin Moyle incident 17 June 1975 (full police evidence is still locked up) and Sir Alfred North’s December 1976 inquiry was embargoed until mid April 1978. Prior to Christmas 1976 there was a partial release of information by the media, but the cop involved in the 17 June 1975 incident had name suppression until mid April 1978.
Moyle was not charged with an offence.
Actually, the evidence points to two possibilities: either Key knew before december, maybe even august, or both tolley and eagleson were informed of a serious situation and withheld that information from Key. I suspect the former, because the latter possibility means that Key is routinely kept out of the loop on matters of nation-wide importance and therefore effectively does nothing as prime minister.
I like to think that he actually does the job he was elected and paid to do. The fact that his sole responsibilities now consist of tourismand the prime minister’s office (with everyone else doing the heavy lifting) suggest that the role isn’t too onerous.
He’s still a pivotal lead operator in our nation’s revamped intelligence and surveillance apparatus.
lol right. With finlayson doing the heavy lifting.
Ministers knew unnamed MP was under investigation
Now, if you believe that various minister knew and that the PM didn’t and that they didn’t know who then I’ve got a bridge to sell you.
Ah so it’s a conspiracy TC.
The story keeps changing. That’s because it’s a lie.
Key has known since last April. Take it up with the NBR.
Jester you are dead right a conspiracy to keep bad news under wraps till after the election.
Unbridled power and corruption of the police and justice system by National and its cronies.
We need an NSW style enquiry to sort out any ambiguity.
And a completely seperate police complaints Authority.
The Police should be able to tell the Media within a maximum of 48 hrs of charging prominent people including politicians.
One law for the powerful(predators rely on power to operate).
One law for the rest.
The Sabin story has changed again. Apparently just before the election, the cops told two Ministers an MP was under investigation but did not name him. Then they apparently disclosed his name in November.
Sure, sure.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11399804
As I have stated before Key & Joyce treated Sabin like a leper at an election forum that Sabin organised. They were not comfortable being there, when Sabin mucked up by insisting Key to take questions from the floor, where someone nailed him over the Northland’s broken roads & wasted money on the holiday highway, team Key sneered
Sabin’s way, like your a liability, I laughed.
Now the way Tolley is refusing to answer questions really stinks of a cover up, a deliberate cover up orchestrated by Joyce and Key.
What was behind leaving this lap dog in place rather than cutting him is the question I’d like to know.
“Lap dog”?
How do upstanding members of the community usually strengthen their positions: through their support networks.
Sabin’s authoritarian support network in the National Party obviously wields considerable influence. You wouldn’t want to piss them off without a very good excuse.
can’t help but wonder if Fletcher’s sudden departure is associated in here somehow …. maybe he couldn’t stand the growing stench?
PM’s Office early August 2014.
Present : John Key, Anne Tolley, Wayne Eagleson, Steven Joyce.
Anne Tolley – The cops rang me yesterday. Apparently they’re investigating an MP.
John Key – Oh yeah? Did they say who it was?
Anne Tolley – No, didn’t mention it.
Wayne Eagleson – Would you like me to check out police sources John.
John Key – nah don’t bother. This is more interesting. I’ve got some designs for the new flag here. Have a look at them. Which one do you like the best?
Yeah right!!
“President Barack Obama says that Russia’s aggression in the Ukraine….”
Does Wendy Petrie ever think about what she reads out on air?
Television One 6 p.m. News, Tuesday 10 February 2015
Wendy Petrie first came to television viewers’ attention for a minor gaffe, caused by nervousness, on the very last evening of 1999. She was the weather presenter for TV3 at the time… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EBIj1L7KVc
After her stint at TV3, Petrie moved to TVNZ, where some pathetic old git in management obviously noticed that she was a good looking young blonde. She was eventually promoted to the position of main news co-anchor and a huge swathe of taxpayers’ money was soon being spent on a slickly produced campaign to promote her, ridiculously and demeaningly, as a sex object. TVNZ viewers were inflicted for several months with a series of toe-curlingly embarrassing station promos, showing sad middle-aged males taking a break from their work to leeringly yell at the camera: “Wendy, she’s HOT!”
In other words, TVNZ’s disgusting campaign treated her pretty much like the morons promoting the 2001 Heineken Open had treated Anna Kournikova. Eventually, however, someone—probably friends and family of Petrie’s—must have had a concerned word with someone in authority, because after a while the sex kitten thing was quietly retired, and Petrie was no longer the face of the future for the struggling channel.
Petrie escaped the axe at TVNZ, but her star had faded; by 2009 she was reduced to doing live crosses from the street—the television equivalent of being the No. 11 batsman in a very poor cricket team. Even in that humble position, she managed to upset many viewers by crassly signalling her approval of the Bain retrial verdict…. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M35WAmfPK68
These days, despite being a regular fill-in newsreader, she has pretty much managed to languish in obscurity—deservedly so, for she doesn’t seem to have a single thought in her head. Of course, that makes her not a lot worse than the likes of her colleagues Rawdon Christie, Peter Williams, Simon Dallow and Greg Boyed.
As any thoughtful and discriminating viewer is all too painfully aware, much of what is presented as “news” on television is nothing more than handouts from corporate PR firms, barely if at all modified, and extremely biased political cant. In spite of many years of watching television news, I’m still astonished when newsreaders manage to keep a straight face and read out some of the outrageous scripts they are given. Hearteningly, though, now and again these people DO register some kind of reaction, contriving to subtly undermine and cast doubt on the nonsense they are forced to mouth. Greg Boyed sometimes flinches and raises an eyebrow at the absurdity of the crap unrolling on his monitor, and Simon Dallow occasionally comes up with a troubled, conflicted look. I even saw Peter Williams frown last July, as he read out brutal and shameless canards, as if straight from the Israeli embassy, about the massacre in Gaza.
But Wendy Petrie? No, I have never detected that there’s a thoughtful or serious person underneath that carefully maintained, pleasant exterior. Tonight she read out, in the most serious tone she could muster, another of those pieces of nasty propaganda masquerading as a news item: “President Barack Obama says that Russia’s aggression in the Ukraine….”
What an honest and impartial news script would have said was: “President Barack Obama says that what he calls Russia’s aggression in the Ukraine….”
Wendy Petrie, however, didn’t register even a flash of discomfort at what she was reading. This is only an instance, of course, but it’s a telling example of the way that newsreaders play a vital part in campaigns of disinformation, whether they’re compliantly using National Government distortions such as “reform”, “changes” and “restructuring” instead of “government cuts”, or reading out equally cynical, but far more ominous and dangerous, statements saying it is Russia rather than the neo-Nazi junta that is the aggressor in the Ukraine.
You missed the obvious pun involving ‘Petrie’ and ‘dish’, in your gender focussed assessment, Moz. And you also missed the bit where newsreaders are paid to read the news not editorialise. Despite your sexist summary of Petrie’s alleged weaknesses, the essence of your complaint is that she is too professional. Weird, huh?
Yep, they are repeaters not reporters
You missed the obvious pun involving ‘Petrie’ and ‘dish’
DAMN! I completely missed that slam dunk. That’s why you’re the man, Te Reo—fair play to you.
in your gender focussed assessment
In what way was my analysis of Wendy Petrie’s seeming lack of consciousness a “gender focussed assessment”? I mentioned that four of her male colleagues were more or less just as bad as she was. You need to read what I wrote once again, my friend, and I’m sure you’ll realize that what I was attacking was her almost preternatural lack of awareness, not her gender.
newsreaders are paid to read the news not editorialise
They editorialise all the time—like Petrie did after the Bain verdict—about things that don’t matter at all. So most of them manage to say something censorious about the silly antics of Kim Kardashian or Kanye West or some petty criminal, but they are too frightened to comment on the crimes and seriously outrageous words of Barack Obama, David Cameron and, of course, John Key.
Despite your sexist summary of Petrie’s alleged weaknesses, the essence of your complaint is that she is too professional. Weird, huh?
Could you point out how what I wrote was “sexist”? I pointed out that some old fool at TVNZ obviously salivated over Petrie and set in train that risible–and mercifully short-lived—advertising campaign. Obviously TVNZ was—maybe still is—an organization riddled with sexism as well as racism: does pointing that out make me somehow, magically, become the same as them?
Petrie didn’t celebrate the Bain verdict, she was celebrating a successful live cross. And importantly, she turned from the viewers and celebrated with a single other person to her right, maybe her producer, having thought the camera was off. So clearly not editorialising as you claim.
Your review emphasised gender in a way you do not do when you critique males of the media. You suggest her entire early career at TVNZ was based on her looks not her ability. Without any evidence other than a single 30 spot among many supposed vox pops from the ad campaign for her and Dallow. You twice suggest she is empty headed and in one of those references you define her as being more empty headed than four male colleagues. You use phrases like “good looking young blonde” and “underneath that carefully maintained, pleasant exterior”.
I reckon you should have a good think about your own rhetoric and see if you aren’t the real salivating old fool.
Petrie didn’t celebrate the Bain verdict, she was celebrating a successful live cross.
Sure. By the way, Te Reo, I have a bridge in Whanganui you might be interested in buying.
You suggest her entire early career at TVNZ was based on her looks not her ability.
It was, just like the entire career of the great gorgeous emptiness that is Simon Dallow. Can you perhaps point the rest of us to an example of this “ability” you suggest she possesses?
I reckon you should have a good think about your own rhetoric
I explicated her failure to register any human emotion as she read out a frightful, preposterous piece of political propaganda. I did not use rhetoric, except to describe the old goats at TVNZ who treated her as little better than a porn star.
and see if you aren’t the real salivating old fool.
I assure you that I have never salivated over Wendy Petrie. I did nearly choke last night, however, during her dreadful performance.
Again with the sexism. It’s not “old goats” at TVNZ who see her as a porn star, it’s you. Why don’t you give up while you’re behind?
ps glad you’ve accepted that she wasn’t editorialising. That was only central to your argument, after all.
Some people would be upset, but I know you well enough now to simply be amused by how quickly you turn to personal abuse after failing to convince others that black is white and up is down.
I don’t know what’s funnier—your insisting that it’s me, instead of the people that marketed her with the “Wendy, she’s HOT” slogan that treated her like a porn star, or your bizarre interpretation of her triumphal fist-pumping after the Bain verdict.
It’s not personal abuse, it’s pointing out an aspect of your behaviour in print. Remember, it’s you who claims that there was a ‘Wendy, she’s HOT’ campaign, you who claim that TVNZ exec’s hired her for her looks and you who wrote the sexist descriptions of her. Own it mate, it’s entirely your invention.
and re: the fist pump, all I can suggest is that you actually watch the video. My explanation fits the evidence, yours is complete and utter bollocks.
It’s not personal abuse
You called my analysis of Petrie’s robotic news-reading “sexist” and “gender focussed”. If Petrie were Māori rather than Pākehā, I have no doubt you would have called me a racist.
Your behaviour on this occasion was abusive. Sadly for you, I do not get intimidated by that kind of nonsense, any more than I did by the desperate tactics of Messrs McFlock and Populuxe when they bayed that my criticism of a couple of incendiary hate comedians was anti-Semitic….
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-29122012/#comment-567893
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-24122012/#comment-566434
You’ll no doubt be encouraged to see that dear old McFlock has waddled up to support you. He’s a bit slow to the party, as always, but you need all the help you can get—even if it’s about as useful as mighty Tonga’s contribution to that surreally comical “Coalition of the Willing” in 2003.
I would only have called your analysis racist if you’d focussed on race. In this case your analysis (and fantasies about Petrie’s career) were sexist, so I called you on that.
Still, no matter, I’m sure no one thinks any less of you because of one thoughtless piece. And I’ve no doubt you’ll be even more skillful in your future skewerings of other talking heads as a result of this discussion 😉
And cheers to you too, Te Reo.
don’t let facts get involved.
Moz’s little line about Petrie “signalling her approval of the Bain retrial verdict” links to the “fist pump” clip that took place before she even knew what the verdict was. They just knew that the jury were coming in, as is evident from the clip.
Couldn’t agree more morrissey about the crap that newsreaders have to read out.
Of course it was the USA which overthrow the democratically elected government in the Ukraine.
Yes that’s right – the USA effectively invaded Ukraine and threw out a government put in place by elections and voting of the people, by the people and for the people.
The USA is the biggest rogue state in the world.
The USA is a liar and a traitor to the people.
The USA is out of control – of that there is no doubt. We must all be very very wary of such a state, particularly as our own leader is so in love with it.
+1. There is an interesting youtube video of a Ukrainian politician addressing the Rada prior to the Maidan protests about a coming civil war within Ukraine fomented by the US Embassy. What happened subsequently? You be the judge.
And the link if anyone is interested:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-ts=1422327029&x-yt-cl=84838260&v=y9hOl8TuBUM
So it wasn’t Russia who took over Crimea then? Damn Martians…
Don’t trust the Russkies any more than the Yanks mate.
Of course not, but so many New Zealanders, who have been swamped by massive anti-ruskie propaganda since WWI and before, seem to think the yanks are different and can be trusted more.
History and facts indicate bullshite
No it wasn’t. What happened there is that the Crimeans voted, under the UN guarantee of self-determination, to move back to being Russian. The US didn’t like this after they’d gone to a lot of effort to overthrow Ukraine’s elected government and thus bring the Ukraine into their sphere of influence.
Now it appears that East Ukraine doesn’t want to be a part of the Ukraine either and the US is even more upset that people just won’t do what they’re told.
+1 informative, cheers. I haven’t followed it closely.
Indeed. But Ukraine is not the US security neighbourhood. The Ruskies are naturally concerned about the USA wanting to put NATO missile bases in the Ukraine, just a few hundred kms from Moscow.
The US wouldn’t look kindly on Russia trying to put missiles back on Cuba now, would they.
The US does not have any intermediate range nuclear missiles in its operational arsenal. Neither does Russia, for that matter. Under the New START treaty, they are both limited to 1550 active warheads on ICBMs, SLBMs and heavy bombers. There is an in-depth verification process that both parties follow to ensure transparency.
Ukraine in 2015 is not Turkey in 1962.
Tactical nuclear warheads with yields of less than 10kt delivered by drones or nuclear tipped cruise missiles or various other delivery systems can take the place of intermediate range cruise missiles.
It’s not but the point remains – Moscow is not going to allow adversary nuclear forces to be stationed just hundreds of kilometres from it.
Sorry I meant Intermediate Range Nuclear Missiles.
I understand your point that the two situations are not analogous. Still you can guess what the US reaction to a new Russian airbase in Cuba would be.
That’s strange, saying the junta is the aggressor. I mean, Ukraine didn’t invade Crimea. Ukraine didn’t invade Donbass. I mean, yes, their government is unsavoury and the US is playing Xanatos Speed Chess manipulating in Ukraine, but Ukraine hasn’t invaded anywhere.
No, the EU and the US have. In the exact same way the EU and the US claim the Russians have
Russia gave Crimea to the Ukraine back in the 1950s when both were part of the USSR. The Crimeans didn’t like it then and have now decided to go back to being Russian.
Russia didn’t invade the Ukraine, Crimea, of their own free will, left the Ukraine.
I’m aware of the history. There’s no ‘free will’ when there’s Russian troops and tanks everywhere. Chechnya, Ossetia, Ingushetia and Dagestan show that. And Ukrainians and Crimean Tartars didn’t get much of a say in things did they?
And if Russia didn’t invade, did they give back to Ukraine the military equipment they stole in Sevastopol? Thought not.
The reports were that neither Russian nor her troops pressured the civilians.
Of course, the real question is: Did you say that when Iraq first went to the polls after the US invasion in 2003?
Most of that “Ukranian military equipment” was Soviet era Russian military equipment.
And who are you to deny a population the right to self determination? A vote was held and 96% of Crimeans under massive turn out voted to join the Russian Federation.
Are you trying to suggest that another Crimean election held now under independent UN supervision would show us that the populace would majority vote to go with the morally, politically and financially unstable Kiev government?
You simply cannot fairly hold a referendum in such a short interval after troops have piled into an area. The actually responsible, mature country thing to do for Russia and Crimea would be to pressure Ukraine to give Crimea a referendum on independence, rejoining Russia or autonomy.
The same could be worked towards in Donbass, Luhansk (both ~40% Russian, and ~70% native Russian speaking, though historically much less than this) and other eastern provinces of Ukraine.
But no, tanks and guns. Mess everything up so Putin can claim the wreckage. And the coal.
Regarding Iraq, I was thoroughly opposed to the US invasion. I was not following political affairs as closely in 2003, so I do not know the particulars of the vote you refer to.
But the troops “on leave” in the crimea were/are just sharing their goodwill. Rapidly. At 700m/s.
Couldn’t affect a referendum at all 🙂
Well it was Russian regular military who invaded Crimea.
It’s Russian troopers who are “on extended leave” who are hanging around in the Donbass…
Indeed. With so many rounds of goodwill.
If soldiers “on leave” but wearing “army surplus” uniforms and National party rosettes were hanging around election booths in otago, how free would you feel to vote left?
You’re right, they should hold the elections again, run and monitored by neutral international observers.
Given what a shite job Kiev has done of ruling Ukraine (and bringing it to the edge of financial and energy bankruptcy) in the last 12 months, I think the pro-Moscow vote will go up on last time.
lol
You’re as bad as fisi.
edit: I note you didn’t say that the first thing “they” should do is get their troops back to their side of the border
Well, Russia is never going to let Sevastapol become a NATO base, so at least I am being realistic.
By the way are you against re-running the referendum? Like I said, the pro-Moscow vote is likely to increase. No one is Crimea is going to want to subject themselves to Kiev’s suicide draft.
Actually, I am against rerunning the referendum. The Russians screwed the pooch. They should pull out and let things stabilize, refugees return, that sort of thing.
But as you say, not realistic. So I think that if Russia is prepared to escalate, Europe should as well. They’ve seen how appeasement just results in more territorial demands. Maybe the next one will be further down the caucuses. At least Chechnya gave them a bloody nose for a while.
The nato base line was funny. Russia losing Sevastopol was as much an issue as the US losing guantanamo.
But at least you’ve stopped hiding behind the sham legitimacy of a so-called referendum, pleading realpolitik instead. “Pro-moscow vote is likely to increase” – lol. I’m sure RT reckons so. /sarc
The “massive turnout” was 30-40% apparently. And that was in a referendum held at gunpoint in which the retaining the status quo was not even an option on the ballot paper. It was a crock.
“It was a crock”?
You mean in your opinion if a referendum was held under fairer conditions, the people of Crimea would choose to return to Kiev control?
“At gun point”
There were barely two or three casualties in the Russian takeover of Crimea. Totally minimal resistance at “gun point.” Shows you the pro-Russian mood of the people there.
No, I meant it was a crock. The option of staying in the Ukraine was not on the ballot, so it’s a completely moot point what might have happened in a fair referendum.
However you quibble, the vote was taken under the rule of the gun. It doesn’t matter if it was 3 deaths or 300, it was not democratic or legitimate.
As I said to McFlock above, maybe you are right and they should re-run the referendum. Given what a political and financial shit fight Ukraine has descended into over the last 12 months, I think the pro-Moscow vote will increase.
I see you’ve been drinking the Kool-aid again. Wikipedia:
With that sort of turnout and that result I’m pretty sure that the people of Crimea, if they held the referendum under the ideal conditions that you demand, would still vote to join Russia. As the saying goes: Quantity has a quality that’s hard to argue with.
Keep reading the wikipedia page, Draco. There’s more info there than just the Russian state sponsored Koolaid you’ve been swallowing. For a start, you need to factor in the thousands who fled the Russian advance who couldn’t vote, then the thousands still there who just denied the opportunity to vote, then those that were too scared to either register or vote.
Funny old world when someone like you goes into defence mode for an oppressive state invading its neighbors. I was pretty sure you stood against that sort of thing.
It’s a strange, strange world we live in, Te Reo Putake.
http://krytyka.com/en/community/blogs/left-or-russia-strange-case-foreign-pro-kremlin-radical-leftists
That’s an interesting article, Joe. It’s amazing what intellectual compromises people will make if they see an advantage in another area they have an interest in.
Yep, quite a lot including polls that indicate that the Crimeans are happy with the move back to being Russian. In fact, the only people who are upset with it seem to be the US and their lickspittles.
Operation Chokepoint is forcing US business to shut down by pressuring banks to close merchant accounts of businesses in certain industries. Among the targeted industries are dating services (??!), credit repair services and coin dealers.
We’re all so much safer now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=46Am7qFf16c
@ amirite.
So the cops inform two ministers that an “unamed” MP is under investigation and neither minister delved further into who it might be ? That’ll take some believing !
and they don’t tell key/colleagues..?
..and what was that deputation of national party luminaries to sabin..way before the election..
..w.t.f. was that all about..?
Re: National Party values:
Tolley just hung up on Ferguson. A stone wall.
Yes, Tolley not willing to answer a fair question on a topic of public interest.
Is this how journalists are going to fare with this government which has been stone walling, hanging up on the journalist, refusing to come onto radio where they may be questioned closely for some time?
This has become a technique of unplausible deniability. Can’t be caught lying if you say nothing. If you can’t remember. Much easier for a deceitful person to remember what they haven’t said.
Might the technique here to talk to a minister about ostensibly one aspect of his/her portfolio and then shift onto a more contentious area be a new tactic?
All signs of unease and pressure within the ranks perhaps?
The ship has developed a list
I can’t say I blame any of the vegetables for not wanting to discuss it openly. On the one hand, legal matters, on the other hand John Key has been lying very much, and on the other hand (three hands, yay!), Sabin’s National Party enablers haven’t gone anywhere.
“and on the other hand (three hands, yay!),”
The correct phrase is “on the gripping hand”.
three hands? Goes with theyr two faces.
you are on fire today, at least the ones i have read, making me chuckle, alot
What was the question? I was out walking the dog.
Along the lines of, “Since you were Minister of Police last year, when did you get told of the investigation into a certain MP?”
I bet Brownlee and Tolley both wish they were out walking their dogs this morning.
you mean key didnt replace brownlee with Wilkinson so he could make her resign for his poor oversight later?
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/20166768
relevant section at 03:00
Thanks 🙂
Anne Tolley has just had a hissy fit on Radio NZ. Touchy, touchy!
edit: snap, OAB!
She doesn’t like having to lie for Key of course she informed him Sabin was in the shit.
Key downplayed the issue to her and now she is the fall gal.
Does beg the question Skinny – how many can Key throw under the bus – before the backbenchers revolt?
Where are they going to get votes from though? Team English? The extremist authoritarian bully faction?
the national party is like a nasty-cake..
..baked using rotten-ingredients…
Yes Adam
Behind the scene the jockeying for the leadership has been bubbling away for some time.
Joyce and Collins have been undermining each other. While Joyce like Key is more a centralist compared to Judith who positions herself further Right. Key backs Joyce and has aided him by removing dead end MP’s like Henare and others who Collins could have counted on for support.
Sabin & son were called upon by Joyce to put the slipper into Collins while she appeared weak. Key was too frightened and gutless to remove JC when the milk company scandel broke, for fear of upsetting wealthy party backers that JC charmed and pulled to the party. Key was smart enough to be wary of Slater and his scheming with Collins. Look for him to be forced to bring Collins back on to the front bench as Nationals bench starts floundering under opposition and a turning media’s pressure. I do respect Collins for being the toughest Ministers the Tories have had.
Crusher Collins vs Cashier Key
A 10 year zoology degree and a successful radio station, what more do you need to run a country?
They only like lying for themselves? Like when she and Bennett were asked about Cabinet Club…
Paddy Gower seems a bit quiet this morning I wonder if it’s due to him having to spend 2 minutes talking about all that’s going wrong for the godkey at the mo.
Is that the wind of change blowing down the halls of power.
Defence Minister Brownlee on RNZ this morning responded to close Espiner questioning about how long he had been organising the armed forces into training for conflict with ISIS with a snarky “well you’d know much more than I do about that.” Not a good way to treat a journalist who do after all get the last word. As they say, never argue with the man with the microphone.
The government’s lackey ministers like Tolley and Brownlee have been so long protected by Key’s fronting National’s media front that they’ve forgotten how to deal with journalists who are starting to themselves remember how to question closely and perseveringly.
Key seems to be getting flustered more too- mocking, misquoting, misrepresenting other’s points of view seems to be more of his game now. How many times did he make fun of Little’s name in the speech yesterday on government’s intentions for 2015?
Beyond the limits of humour, anyway.
I’ve always thought of Brownlee as the village idiot of the National Party. Unbelievable that he was once deputy-leader, although once they got near power they dumped him pretty quickly for the ‘dream team’ of Bill and John.
Key doesn’t handle pressure well. When it’s all going his way he has a smarmy look; when it isn’t he has a kind of caught in the headlights look. I guess in the money markets he never had to front up to any sort of stiff questioning.
The wheels may well start to come off in the third term, just as they did for Helen Clark (who was a lot like Key in my view).
I don’t have any particular view of LIttle because the problem for anti-capitalists is not the leader of the Labour Party but the Labour Party *as an institution*. Whose side is it on?
Here’s one view that it is clearly not on the side of the working class and oppressed: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/the-truth-about-labour-a-bosses-party/
I’m just working on a piece in the next couple of days about the 1949 Auckland carpenters’ dispute; another indication of which class Labour is ultimately loyal to.
Phil
Brownlee knows where bodies are buried, that is the only plausible explanation from Nat party conference bouncer and bully boy to… to whatever he is today
Would any New Zealanders and MPs be involved in this?….just asking
International Banking Tax Evasion Scandal
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/09/hsbc-files-bank-swiss-arm-tax-international-response
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/10/mps-knew-of-hsbc-swiss-tax-evasion-claims-in-2011
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/09/hsbc-swiss-files-leading-australian-figures-held-offshore-bank-accounts
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/10/hsbc-us-prosecutors-criminal-charges-elizabeth-warren
I’m sure our heroic 0.01% captains of industry would never tarnish themselves with such a filthy display of naked greed and contempt for law.
what is the up-date status of Nicky Hager’s computer in police custody?
…in many countries this is a big scandal and investigations are happening…closer to home in Australia for example…shouldnt we be doing the same in New Zealand?…parliamentary questions?
There’s this report from just before Christmas:
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/national/legal-battle-over-police-raid-on-nicky-hagers-property/
Nicky is not keen for the fuzz to take copies of all his stuff, something about protecting sources, corrupt senior cops, journalistic integrity, blah blah
well super sleuth Chooky has just checked out the internet and there is a report yesterday from our very own Herald ….some New Zealanders are involved in this international scandal of tax evasion and tax avoidance!…who are they?….any MPs?…anyone we on The Standard should kinow about ?…any Nact MPs?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11399132
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11398974
where is Winnie… to ask questions in the House?
And I can only imagine what the poor Greeks must be thinking right now since it seems that the same governments that have shoved austerity down their throats as a punishment for being feckless, money borrowing, tax avoiding, southern European ne’er-do-wells were quite happy to turn a blind eye to the goings-on at HSBC Zurich on behalf of the wealthiest people on the planet. This is the sort of shit that started the French Revolution.
……. as did this:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/private-jets-luxury-castles-and-a-210000-statue-of-margaret-thatcher-welcome-to-the-tory-version-of-austerity-britain-10037028.html
That was a massive “let them eat cake” gig and still all those old Etonians in the Conservative Party can’t quite fathom why they aren’t more palatable to the average UK voter.
https://contribute-nzlabour.nationbuilder.com/forms/donations
This has probably been posted already, but no harm in putting it up again.
Glad to give some cash to this.
I’ve said it before and I ‘ll say it again why can’t labour put a account numder on payment page for those of us clever enough not to do credit cards.
“those of us clever enough not to do credit cards”
ha ha, well put. We are the authors of our own demise.
Best moves are towards stepping out of the current financial system, in the same way people go offline.
+1
gradually going off grid, or “going dark” as the FBI term it
i am partly doing that..’going dark’..
..no cellphone-connection..(just use phone to photograph documents..and the like…).
..no landline..
..can only be contacted by email…(and skype..)
..and i am fucken enjoying it..!
..and also increasingly noticing how everyone is slave to a little screen..
..if is frankly..fucken bizarre ..once you stop..and start looking/noticing..
..(and in more ‘strangely-gratifying’ old-skool ‘news’..)
..i have a daughter who lives in parts foreign..and we email/skype..
..but she sent me a post-card that i got the other day..
..and it is so cool..!..
..i can handle it/turn it over/hold it up in the air….
..i am/was surprised at how chuffed i was to get it..
..back to/for the future..!…(in parts..eh..?..)
+1 wags, CR. vto and phillip.
Didn’t know the FBI term was “going dark”.
Not sure if paranoid or just untrusting of comms technology in the hands of authorities but I have no need, want or the money for a smart phone. They can be easily tracked can’t they? And why develop a crook in your neck staring at useless bits of info when you can be observing your fellow humans, observing the fucked up edness, as well as the beauty of the changing seasons around you, and generally staying connected to the living world? How much electronic white noise to you need in your life?
I have an old skool pre pay phone and spend about $20 on it every 3 months as it’s hardly ever used. I use cash. A credit card is used about twice a year for absolute emergencies only. Not on fb, not on twitter.
I prefer it that way.
Use the post. Send birthday cards to your friends. It will bowl over those who are over reliant of technology. They love it, a card in the post.
Absolutely easily. If the telephone company’s computers can direct an incoming call or txt to your phone, then they know where you are in the network down to the nearest cell tower. If your smart phone is GPS enabled, they will have your location down to the nearest 5m.
Everything except the GPS applies to dumb phones, too.
And signal triangulation between towers is more precise than a simple radius around a particular tower.
“..How much electronic white noise to you need in your life?..”
..that is the nub of that conversation..
@ Rosie
Use the post. Send birthday cards to your friends. It will bowl over those who are over reliant of technology. They love it, a card in the post.
+1
I am going back to cash… shopkeepers seem very frightened of it…
That’s cos they have to do numbers in their heads. Scary stuff.
I just saw a piece on US grade schools only being required to teach handwriting to Grade 1 now. From then on schools can focus solely on keyboard and touchscreen entry.
It’s going to destroy the creativity and skills of the younger generation.
Nikki kaye was on tv the other day excited about heading us in the same direction. She was in a primary school where everyone had an i-pad…
That’s the NZ she and the Liar in Chief visit, the Sallies visit the NZ where not even the classroom has an i-pad, maybe a laptop for everyone to share…
And remember Labour had this flash education plan to give every kid a “digital device” to help their learning. Suckers.
Bloody hell I have enough problems writing stuff down these days. Too much keyboard/screen time. I can go for several days without touching a pen.
(and my writing is a mess, my primary school teacher would be dismayed)
Anne
the machine still does the maths BUT I think many don’t recognise it… 😉
Yeah but they still have to open the till and count out the change what the machine says is owing and that’s the scary bit.
good point!!
Anne & Tracey
I think you might enjoy this pic – sent to me today from Australia
https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xap1/v/t1.0-9/s720x720/10991380_806090206131119_3909414163215636366_n.jpg?oh=ca593b7c583c852b95b7b53d26aadb9f&oe=55943D1B&__gda__=1432473413_cc0c522e08c18362e15c43426dd01f00
Percentages seem so straightforward that they can confuse. Like GST used to be 10% added to the the cost price but 11% off the total price.
In that advert of course 20% off $4 is not $1. And the real joke about it is that 4 Croissants at 75c will amount to $3 anyway so it’s a blatant con. But the shop can rely on busy buyers not nutting all that out.
It reminds me of a joke I read – a doughnut seller had a sign –
Doughnuts each 60 cents, four for $3.00. A friend pointed this out and he explained. People put me right about the price and then buy four at the full price, feeling pleased they haven’t overpaid. I sell a lot more doughnuts because of that sign.
cash…..love it.
Indeed. They have the “pull” for credit cards or direct debit. But not a simple bank account.
However I suspect that the reasoning behind that has to do probably has something to do with collecting information about their supporters.
That strategy of getting info is costing donations I bet , I personally am not against giving my details but I bet some possible donors shy away from it.
I find it very amusing that we are supposedly superior enough in our military capabilities to be able to ‘train’ people in warfare who have been fighting wars since day dot. If anything I would have expected the middle east people to be training us.
Of course everybody knows it is a ruse to free up US resources for more frontline activity. We are effectively on the frontline.
Expect a Sydney-Ottawa-Boston-London event in NZ….
Then point the finger directly at John Key
The Peshmerga could train our infantry. They are considered as the best light infantry in the world. A shame that FJK considers many of them terrorists because of the PKK. A Kurdish taxi driver was very happy that I knew about them and told me stories of the Turkish Army pissing their pants and running when the Peshmerga turned up. I was careful not to tip him in case FJK withdrew my passport for supporting terrorism.
Have the Peshmerga train the Iraqi Army…yeah right, like that would ever happen.
And that is part of the problem of the Iraqi quagmire.
Labour and NZ First should work together and get that message out there, don’t vote National in the byelection!
Where was National when Northland Flooded?
Where was National when the PSA virus hit?
Where was National when rates and insurance premiums have skyrocketed?
Why are National selling off our power?
Why are National selling off our state houses?
Why are National selling off our farms?
Why are National selling off our country?
Why is National funding Real estate for Sky City?
Do you want to get National’s attention?
DON’T VOTE FOR THEM IN THE BY ELECTION!
All mention of Northland is in breach of standing orders.
Northland is pretty
Pretty with blue poo
Pretty with blue doo
Pretty with blanket bans
Pretty and out of hand
A ban on blankets in Northland is being blamed for a spate of “cold shoulder syndrome”.
Acting Chief Inspector Fiddler of the Dunedin Police, who are handling the situation, refused to comment, and then arrested himself.
“I know too much”, said Acting Chief Inspector Fiddler.
I hope someone puts up a billboard asking why the minister of Tourism only holidays in Hawaii and Omaha not Northland?
That’s not going to look good on Imgur: “Dad and I playing golf with [redacted] in [redacted]“
The convention centre can be called
Sky ‘Joyce’ City….
or maybe just the
SkyJoy which is a bit of a KillJoy
The grotesque convention centre will probably be empty and soul less, like the last National foray in real estate Shed 10 with the Cloud.
In the name of monuments to ego’s, there is also a convention centre planned for Christchurch too,,,,
The Brownlee
lol…killjoy and brownie…what floats to the top….key names for Nact convention centres
Led by Cashier Key and his Keystone Kops
lol
SKY CITY DEAL WAS JOHN KEY’S OWN OFFER!
“10:20 AM Wednesday Apr 18, 2012
Prime Minister John Key has confirmed he offered a deal to Sky City allowing the casino to have more pokie machines in return for building a multimillion-dollar convention centre. Mr Key, speaking from Indonesia, confirmed he made the offer to Sky City in his capacity as Minister of Tourism, Newstalk ZB reported…
… Mr Key was asked last July in a question for written answer from Green MP Sue Kedgley whether he or any of his ministers had met representatives from the casino to discuss changes to the Gambling Act.
He replied: “I attended a dinner with the Sky City board 4 November 2009 where we discussed a possible national convention centre and they raised issues relating to the Gambling Act 2003″. ”
– Source
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10799699
“WATCH MY LIPS” LIES:
* NO INCREASE IN GST—(From 12.5 to 15%..Fooled you!)
* NO MORE ASSET SALES—(We will sell state houses!..Gotcha!)
* NO TAX PAYER GOVT FUNDS TO SKY CITY, EVER!—(Ha, ha! Fooled you again, suckers!)
any shares available?
This has been interesting to follow over the past few days:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/feb/10/germany-greece-second-world-war-reparations
Lynn, I think Pat O’Dea’s comments at the dailyblog are insulting to other authors here at the standard. Especially Bill, and all the fine – well thought out, and written post he has done on man made climate change.
If you get ban people – read what Lynn sends you – read the rules around posts, and learn what the standard expects. Your the guest here – would you walk into a house and put you muddy shoes on someone’s couch? Or walk into someone’s house and change the TV channel on them?
Sorry – but, this pisses me off. If you get banned don’t complain about it. Adult up, and take responsibility for your own comments.
As someone who was banned – I accept my comment broke the standards and I deserved what happened. Please if you cop a ban – do the same, then come back and try to be constructive.
Why is it anarchists, get that people have their own standards and expectations, and we can respect them for it. We may disagree – but, and quite frankly – respect is a very simple concept.
Pat does appear to have an agenda. For all of his talk about the left working together, it appears that his actual (unthoughtful) view on it is effectively that everyone should think like him and listen to the font of his obsessions. He reads more like a poor evangelist than someone anyone could really work with. It is also a pity that his grasp of climate change issues reads a bit like that of an excitable adolescent or a climate change denier.
Anyway, I have been using the posts over there (when I have time) as an opportunity to carry on eliciting and widening the actual moderation policies at The Daily Blog. It is a bit of a moving target at present, and post-election I think that the uncertainty is contributing rather too much to their falling readership.
I haven’t been banned yet and don’t really want to be, but I’d prefer a truce between lprent and Bumbler. Anyone who starts a blog must have a healthy ego, and I think them for doing it, but the Romans are the real enemy. Aqueducts were OK, but their weird sex and convention centres are taking things a bit far.
As for Pat, he’s been a bit uncompromising ever since I’ve known him. I probably am too, but it’s more important to me to inspire thinking than having people agree with me. Just as well, I suppose.
Some very good points my friend,but (Adult up) come on.For the love of Adult kind. 😉
From DPF @ Kiwiblog: “Greens host GE deniers conference at Parliament”
“89% of scientists think GM food is safe, a slightly higher percentage (88%) who think humans are mostly responsible for climate change.”
Given that 48% of Meteorologists are skeptics and survey after survey shows that two-thirds of geoscientists and engineers are skeptics, the 87% figure “across the sciences” seems hard to believe. 3748 members of AAAS took the survey — and as A.Scott points out on WUWT in comments, only 7% of the respondents were from the Earth Sciences, and nearly half were “biomedical”.
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/01/public-are-not-buying-science-experts-opinions-aaas-survey-shows-30-50-gap/
Engdahl carefully documents how the intellectual foundations of ‘eugenics,’ mass culling of the sick, coloured, and otherwise disposable races, were actually first established, and even legally approved, in the United States. Eugenics research was financially supported by the Rockefeller and other elite families and first tested on Jews under Nazi Germany.
…
He describes how the Rockefellers guided the US agriculture policy, used their powerful tax-free foundations worldwide to train an army of bright young scientists in hitherto unknown field of microbiology. He traces how the field of Eugenics was renamed “genetics” to make it more acceptable and also to hide the real purpose.
http://www.rense.com/general82/hid.htm
It gets even worse than that:
Francis Galton (the Englishman who developed the term “eugenics”) was also a pioneer in meteorology, so meteorologists are unreliable, and they named the field after an astrological method of predicting meteor impacts (according to someone on the interwebz). /sarc
Q. Does it occur that by responding to such posts in the manner and frequency you do is an exposé of your self proclaimed ‘exceptionalism’ ?
when did I self-proclaim “exceptionalism”? Got a link for that?
… I guess your were just making shit up in a fire-and-forget piece of pretentiousness.
Q. Launchpad McDuck surely you recall claiming to be ‘an exception’ regarding the flying aircraft ?
Lack of take off and landing abilities seemingly no obstacle to your self proclaimed ‘exceptionalism’
Woops 2
links or it didn’t happen, liar.
When did I call myself exceptional, you pretentious idiot?
Q. Have you genuinely forgotten the conversation ?
I believe I recall the conversation to which you claim to be referring, but the conversation I recall is so distant from what you seem to now be recollecting that maybe you are referring to another conversation which I have since forgotten.
Even if the conversation in question went as you remembered it (which seems to be pretty doubtful), I never called myself anything like “exceptional”. In fact, the idea that I am fairly unexceptional was intrinsic to the point I recall making.
So how about you link to it, just so everyone can see how fucking deluded you are? Is your ego so fragile that you are incapable of even that?
If you are anything other than a liar or delusional blow-hard, linking to a conversation where I explicitly or implicitly stated that I was “exceptional” should be pretty simple.
“But given that I’m an exception to your “qualified, licensed“……
You are exceptional McFlock
You’re really going with that, are you?
Me saying that I’m “an exception” to a bullshit delusion you have does not mean I’m “exceptional“. Indeed, if my abilities were unusually good as well as contradicting your general[ly stupid] rule, then that would have defeated my own point. The fact that I am unexceptional means that pretty much anyone can do it once they know where the important switches are.
Now I’m glad that Ure is unintelligible for the most part – he’s easy to skip over without reading, where as your comments are just as facile and egotistical as his, but initially tend towards the vaguely possible. And then we drill down to what you’re actually saying, and you turn out to be a fucking idiot with more ego than braincells.
I notice he doesn’t give the percentage of dairy farmers who do not think GE swedes are safe, after last year’s cases of mass cattle fatalities.
Rawshark…
I looked at those fatalities. And there are more factors to consider than GE. How much of the deaths were connected with GE? Could you give a link? I would have to look back through my stuff to find what I put up.
Definitely worth checking other possible causes, but much of what I’ve read on the subject indicates that the stock losses are closely linked to GE swedes – “a strong link” as quoted in this article.
Genoreinhart propaganda site.
Ulgy truth.
Cherry picking spurious facts.
You should not stop watching Fox news.
Otherwise you might have to live up to your name!
Where did our time go to?
There was a time when capitalism was able to substantially reduce the working week, albeit not without workers having to struggle to achieve the 40-hour week.
Nevertheless there was a very substantial reduction. Whereas in the decades following the Industrial revolution, workers in Britain were working 60 or 70 hours a week, this was progressively reduced. In NZ, the 40-hour week was won without massive battles.
A century on, then, shouldn’t we be down to a 20-hour week?
Keynes in 1930 suggested that before the end of the twentieth century this would be the case. Instead there was the Great Depression and WW2. However, after WW2 came the long postwar economic boom, from late 1940s to early 1970s.
Since the end of that boom there has been nothing comparable. Capitalist economies have returned to a shorter boom and bust cycle, with the booms increasingly being short and centred in the artificial economy (or around individual sectors) and the busts have been deeper and more protracted, eg the fallout from the GFC.
Far from shortening, and us now enjoying the benefits of living in a leisure society, as capitalist ideologues promised in the 1960s at the height of the boom, we are living in a period of the extension of work hours – more working hours a week and, in some countries, more working years as the retirement age has been extended – an example being in the south of Ireland, courtesy of the Fine Gael-Labour government (one of the reasons that Labour was decimated by Sinn Fein in the local and Euro elections there last May).
Here’s a really interesting article we reprinted on Redline from Socialist Alternative in Australia about capitalism and the tyranny of time: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/03/capitalism-and-the-tyranny-of-time/
And here’s some reflections/analysis on whatever happened to the leisure society: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2012/04/03/whatever-happened-to-the-leisure-society/
Phil
I’d be happy to agree that the poorest workers are the most surveilled for time.
Also happy to agree that digital surveillance now enables this more finely.
But I’m not so sure of the proposed clean break between industrial and pre-industrial step change in time-oppression.
Those who are at the lowest rungs of society have always been at the whim of the master, day or night, rational or irrational, reasonable or unreasonable. Granted there are minor and brief historical exceptions. But that’s what they are.
Also, we are in the era of headphones, digital games, and other time-suspensory maenads that resist the force of analogue time with both time and space independent of hard reality. At minimum, they can have eight hours of my meat-time oppression, but now I can form new times and spaces until my next shift. Time becomes my game.
Workers are getting too little a share of national income and shareholders/corporates too much. And the unemployed sweet FA.
If workers were all getting a fair share of national income everybody would be on a living wage and not having to work more than 4 days a week if they didn’t want to.
Oops
Eminem taking National Party to court next week
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11400109
I wonder how much that could cost them?
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/John-Oliver-mocks-NZ–Steven-Joyce-over-Eminem-National-Party-copyright-dispute/tabid/504/articleID/55348/Default.aspx
“pretty legal” 🙂
might affect their campaign expenditure a touch.
If they have to pay a ‘fine’ does that go on the election expenditure?
no idea, but even their legal fees might be an interesting topic to raise after the case is over and done with. 🙂
Noam Chompsky Solution to ISIS…..
And to solve the mess, the US again decided to act against the international law, building an anti-ISIS coalition that is “meaningless, apart from being illegal.”
“A law-abiding state would go to the Security Council, ask for a declaration by the Security Council of a threat to peace, and request the Security Council to organize direct response to it. And that could be done. The US could then participate in it, but so could Iran,” which is a major military force and would probably wipe out ISIS in no time, if it was allowed to join the fight on the ground, Chomsky believes.
http://rt.com/news/203055-us-russia-war-chomsky/
+100…thanks for that….makes a lot of sense…a political solution through the UN is the only way to go
(I doubt however that the Israelis and the Saudis would agree….because they both have their own agendas in the Middle East and want to cripple Iran and Assad/Syria )
Wouldn’t it be good if even just one of the media outfits in NZ took our parliament seriously and livestreamed Question Time like they routinely do in Australia, Canada and the UK?
Good idea.
Already happening …you can get it live and free on TV or via your computer or phone from live parliament tv … or do you mean something else ??
I kind of meant the way SMH/The Age, CBC in Canada and The Guardian often have the livestream of QT from their respective parliament tv channels on their online sites. It would help, I imagine to generate a larger audience for the undertakings of parliament. At any rate it turns out that TVNZ (whose interest in politics is usually zilch) ran the live feed of today’s QT on their site. Good on them.
It is right there on the homepage
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/about-parliament/see-hear/ptv
Key looking tired, disinterested at Question time today. Not to mention distinctly uncomfortable when questioned about the Sky City fiasco. Both he and Joyce (confidence man extraordinaire) appeared to be backtracking when they weren’t downright evasive.
Agree entirely Wyndham about Key at question time. Just seem it on Prime News.
Key trying to crack jokes and not looking funny. And although I don’t approve as such of Peter’s mentioning Key dyes his hair, I think it is making him look ridiculous and pathetic (sometimes means justifies the ends????) And although two wrongs don’t make a right, Key has been a B…….doing this to others.
If you’re referring to Question time today ankerawshark, it was Key who brought it up not Peters. All Peters did was ask the perennial question “Does he have confidence in all his ministers”. He was planning to attack Steven Joyce and the Sky City shambles. Key anticipated as much so he diverted the question to his hair. The exchange that followed was actually very funny on both sides, so much so even the Speaker was laughing too much to intervene.
There’s nothing wrong with a bit of levity from time to time… and then it was back to serious business so nobody got off the hook.
Thanks Anne, Only saw the snippert on Prime. Sounds like I got the wrong end of the stick.
Still think it makes Key look a bit of a dick that he (clearly does) dye his hair.
I have never understood how he gets away with starting every question time trying to be the funny guy. You would think his own Party would mention it at least once. A quiet hand on the shoulder as they turn into the chamber ‘John, stop trying to be the funniest guy in the room, you’re good but no-one can be George Burns everyday. Look what that did to George Burns.
But seriously folks, when did you last see the Prime Minister, especially when answering a sombre question, simply stand and show respect for the House of Representatives, the central institution of our nation’s governance.
yeah but that’s part of his vibe – avoid responsibility
Don’t bring up George Burns as an example. He lasted well into very old age. We don’t want to have yek around that long.
I was thinking of buildings that the UNACT government have taken an interest in, besides casinos, and one they didn’t like was Broadcasting House in Wellington and there was one they ‘lost’, referred to in the finance committee report, in Auckland.
And then there is the matter of what went on in the buildings, public broadcasting.
Some quotes and links:
Comment on public concern at last attack on public broadcasting:
The difference this time is the public support for New Zealand’s last public service broadcaster – back in the 1990s, when there was a move to remove public broadcasting – massive campaigning by the station itself was needed to raise awareness.
NewsRoom business website founder and editor Peter Fowler led the 1996/1997 campaign against the demolition of Radio NZ’s home in Wellington.
“The destruction of Broadcasting House next to Parliament was scandalous and needless, but a good example of the regard Radio New Zealand has been held in by past National Governments,” he says.
When Broadcasting House was demolished in 1997 – after it mysteriously caught fire – Radio NZ not only lost its base, but also a symbol for public broadcasting.
“One major effect was the loss of some of the best studios in the Southern Hemisphere. I regard the attack on Broadcasting House as just another example of the attack on public broadcasting itself. What better way to demoralise someone than to evict them and demolish their home.”
Radio New Zealand lost the building, but saved broadcasting.
http://www.newswire.co.nz/2010/03/can-a-mouse/
This is an interesting report from 2003-4 from the government committee looking at the finances and running of Radionz. Murray McCully and Kathryn Rich gave them a thorough hammering.
http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-nz/47DBSCH_SCR2960_1/e48b239ad71f1887e13c3425cc7b0b72b3c2dabb
2003/04 FINANCIAL REVIEW – RADIO NEW ZEALAND
Political coverage, balance and fairness
Some of us are concerned that Radio NZ is not maintaining an appropriate balance and fairness in its politi cal coverage, and believe that particular programmes with
substantial political content, such as Checkpoint have consistently under
represented some political parties in recent years. Radio NZ assured us that balance and fairness is maintained, if not on an individual programme basis, across programming as a whole….
Then on why Radionzs audience research should cost $145,000 yet not be able to be compared to those of commercial broadcasters. McCully was not happy with the explanation because as a stakeholder he thought he should be able to measure them (though completely different) together.
McCully
Let’s get a couple of things straight here. You accept that Radio New
Zealand’s actually owned by the taxpayers of New Zealand – the citizens of
New Zealand – that we are stakeholders, and you’ve got some basic
obligation to report to us. You do agree with that?
Cavanagh
I do.
McCully
And you spend $145,000 of our money, if you like, collecting ratings
information. Right? That ratings information, in addition to the cume figures,
which I regard as meaningless but which you regard as meaningful, in
addition you collect the audience figures on a basis that is roughly
comparable to the commercial sector
lprent
Thanks for all your work. But I just noticed that this post is dated 11/1/2015 – January instead of February
Nobel Peace Laureates Slam Human Rights Watch’s Refusal to Cut Ties to U.S. Government
Human Rights Watch’s affiliation with ex-CIA and NATO officials generates perverse incentives and undermine its reputation for independence.
Read more….
http://www.alternet.org/world/nobel-peace-laureates-slam-human-rights-watchs-refusal-cut-ties-us-government
Ken Roth Confronted on HRW’s Revolving Door to U.S. Government
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7AJAQrpqPk
Jon gone!
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/feb/11/jon-stewart-to-leave-daily-show
which led me to this question
John Roughan’s hagiography of John Key is going to be made into a movie “Fifty Fades of Key”. Some scenes involve holding people of a barrel while shafting and screwing them. The main character has a speech impediment, voluntary bouts of amnesia, and appears to be “relaxed and comfortable” with the suffering of others. In the movie several henchmen write blogs that are a worse insult to the human intellect than Vogon poetry. Casting has already started but many wannabies had to be hospitalised after reading the script. OSH is investigating but Steven Joyce thinks it is pretty legal.
😆 😆 😆