We need immigrants to work here cause Kiwi’s are either too stoned, lazy or sitting on the other side of the road begging while immigrant workers rebuild Christchurch (total misquote but the essence of Hides Bull feces NBR).
I call Bull shit cause once again we have yet another immigrant being exploited by a Kiwi company that won’t employ Kiwi’s – not because of pot, not because of lack of work ethic but cause $$$$.
Judge Inglis said this sort of case was all too common in New Zealand.
“The position Mr Domingo has found himself in is not unique.
“It is clear that it has taken a degree of personal endurance to pursue matters to this point.
“Mr Domingo said that he had felt like ‘giving up’ in terms of seeking compliance with the authority’s awards. These are observations which the Employment Court frequently hears in cases such as this.”
Bill will be here shortly to label you and RNZ xenophobic in due course.
How on earth is anyone allowed to justify importing low skilled labour here, permanent or temporary? Allow the wages to rise to a level that is sustainable for kiwis , expensive kiwi cost of living but international third world wages being payed.
[Mischaracterisation riding the back of smear…or is that the other way around? No matter – it’s really, really stupid to attack the site’s authors. One week ban.] – Bill
What a dreadful place this government has lead us to when it comes to housing. New Zealand now has the most unaffordable housing across a range of measures. New Zealand, once admired for the housing of its citizens, has a government which has watched over a division in society on housing which may never be repaired.
Across five different measures, New Zealand has come out on top of three of the five measures for the most expensive global housing market.
New Zealand has had the highest rise in house prices, costs the most against the average person’s income and now has the biggest difference between house prices and renting prices.
The Economist puts this trend down to “a growing horde of rich foreigners” coming to New Zealand because they see it as a “safe haven”.
High time ownership ( or an equitable interest) in a property in NZ gave you compulsory tax residence-(offshore group) in NZ and you are taxed on your worldwide tax income & assets against which you may offset any taxes paid as a tax resident – (onshore group).
That should tax care of the super problem & a few others too.
What a dreadful place this government has lead us to when it comes to housing.
This government like it that way because it means a few rich people can become even bigger bludgers. If we had equality then people may actually become independent of rich people and then the rich wouldn’t be able to bludge off of everyone else.
I’ve just been over to Frank Macskasy’s page to read his immigration article.
Now I know that John key didn’t take responsibility for anything but there is a picture montage there of newspaper headlines and it’s like “wow” I found the visual impact pretty strong.
Don’t know who owns it or who did it but felt it would make an excellent poster etc and deserves widespread distribution. One picture a thousand words.
and BTW not sure if it can be fixed -but when I click on the usual spot on the feed I normally get Frank’s picture not the article. I’m sure Frank’s good lookin’ but?
For sale: the $5m slum Steve Braunias wanders through the grim …
m.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11815645
18 months ago I approached the head tenant of where I pay $250.00 per week for a run down shithole that has a lose tap, poor drainage /guttering issues , and a shower that does not drain properly.
It also has faulty wiring that has pooled at some stage and shorted( blown ) the ceiling light socket.
Several other wall sockets are faulty.
As a result of this weather bomb we are having – I found water pouring in from the wall in the bathroom/toilet area at about half way up the wall.
This pooled into the open plan area where the carpet now is .
I would estimate 1-2 cm’s or more in depth.
The place is a potential electrical deathtrap with water back- pooling in the walls.
I also note as a past painter and decorator the dilapidated paint job and the amateur attempts to fill all the punch holes in the walls and doors.
Two weeks ago I suffered my first heart attack and received a stent in a heart artery. I am still breathless and sometimes exhausted as a result. And I am furious.
It is obvious that the landlord has bought this property as a part of a cheap investment portfolio and intends to pay as little as possible ( nothing ) toward either its livability or its maintenance. It obviously has had NO money spent on bringing it up to standard . It would be around early 1980’s vintage.
Reading the above article in the NZ Herald today has made me feel almost vigilante towards this National govt that has enabled this type of criminal element to get away with this sort of blatant racketeering.
I will approach the head tenant and if he doesn’t grow some balls ASAP I will go to the Tenancy Tribunal on Monday , and force the issue. Another recourse is social media.
A message to both Bill English and Andrew Little.
To Bill English, – I AM NOT SOME ANIMAL OR DOG TO BE TREATED LIKE SHIT.
To Andrew Little. I believe you and Jacinda Adern have it in your power to do something about this sort of state of affairs that has been legitimized by this National govt up and down this country to so many of their fellow countrymen and women.
Stop standing at the gateway umming and ahhing. Get bold and do something.
You have EVERY moral right to do so.
Do that ?… and the people will carry you through the next election and on into govt for the years to come . And you will have the peoples MANDATE to rectify this viscous govts avarice and self serving agenda.
Do nothing?
Then you amply deserve the wrath and the cursing of the voters for your timid inaction.
The place is a potential electrical deathtrap with water back- pooling in the walls.
No, from what you’re saying, it is a death trap – and that’s without the water. The water increases the probability of death.
Reading the above article in the NZ Herald today has made me feel almost vigilante towards this National govt that has enabled this type of criminal element to get away with this sort of blatant racketeering.
This type of stuff has been building up for some time. Decades in fact as the rentiers have realised that being immoral arseholes that endanger peoples lives has no consequences.
The problem with National is that they’ll keep it that way.
The article neglected to mention the army of cockroaches that scuttle round the floors and up the walls at night. Refrigerators (privately owned and kept in tenants’ rooms to keep food safe) are soon invaded by the cockroaches. The place is a hell hole but is better than nothing. A few fortunate tenants have managed to escape and move into HNZ flats. Auckland needs far more flats for single people on low incomes but HNZ do not seem interested in this group.
Yes, I’m aware of that. However, that was recently, this has been going on for 18 months apparently. Thus, there was ample opportunity to move out beforehand.
Moreover, why move into such a dive in the first place?
To make room for my son to complete a certificate and so he could use the room I had to vacate when I was staying at my sisters and brother in- laws after relocating to Auckland to get a security job.
That’s why.
And as for moving into the dive?
Do you have your head up your arse as well?
It may be one step better than sleeping in a fucking car but not much bud.
And why the fucking hell should I have to give you my bloody life story online in full public just to educate a moron like you anyway?
Both your previous comments came across as accusatory. Like WK shouldn’t have rented there in the first place, and should have moved out. Like I said, it’s not hard to imagine circumstances where that’s not easy, or even possible.
Your comments are bizarre actually given there is a well known housing crisis going on.
I’ve lived in millionaires homes when I was younger and I’ve lived a year up in the mountains in the middle of winter in a stone shack outside of Queenstown when I was goldmining in the rivers with a pump , floating dredge and wet- suit and another year in a mountain tent .
Been self employed and owned a half mil dollar property of my own – then lost it all during 2008.
And I reckon I’ve lived more of a life than half these far right wing wannabe pseudo intellectual neo liberal fanatics who comment on this blog site .
And when I saw that article in the NZ Herald this morning , in light of whats been happening to so many New Zealander family’s having to sleep in cars and the like over the past few years – I thought ”FUCK IT !!”… Im going to say something.
Because now this govt and their neo liberal perversions have just got personal.
I’m fortunate that I’ve only got me to worry about.
But at least when you live in the boon docks in a tent or an old abandoned stone shack its free. And you can accept a primitive lifestyle.
But to get shafted and ripped off each and every bloody week just for the privilege of living in a shitty run down dogbox so some blighted little parasitic scum bag can live in comfort and climb up on your shoulders galls me to the bone.
And the fact that pricks like this are being enabled to do so by this shitty, do nothing , hands off incumbent non govt should fill every decent and honest bastard full of rage.
Oh, so you just wanted to make sure that WK didn’t move into a dangerous shelter just so they could bitch about it? 🙄
Your second sentence perfectly describes the point that you still seem to have managed to miss: if the housing system means that some people can only afford to live in dwellings that are hazardous to their health or have no dwelling whatsoever, then that system is broken. And people are trapped living in hovels.
No, I was trying to establish what the actual facts in this case are.
I wasn’t putting their story under a microscope. I merely asked two simple questions.
The point of this was to establish if fiscal constraints was/is the problem preventing WK from moving out.
I’ve seen a number of people complain about the state of their rented dwellings and advocating for a rental warrant while failing to consider that improvements to their dwellings would most likely lead to rent increases, thus forcing/pricing them out. Hence it’s not really the solution.
I find it completely fucked up. I find your faux concern fucked up. I find it nuts that you think the take-home message is “don’t complain, because things might end up worse-off for you if you do”. I find it fucked up that you think people would be anything other than forced to live in circumstances that make them concerned for their lives and feel like they’re treated like animals. I think it’s fucked up that you need to know every fucking detail in order to avoid facing the obvious reasons as to why someone even moved into a place in the first place. I think it’s fucked up that you believe that just one more detail might suddenly make it all WK’s fault and a completely avoidable and solvable situation.
“Actual facts”??? Do you think WK was misleading you in some way? For fuck’s sake.
I wasn’t implying not to complain, I was highlighting why a rental warrant isn’t the best solution.
In WK’s case, being impacted by a rent increase as a result is a potential outcome, it’s not my take-home message for not complaining, it’s merely the reality which comes back to our broken system. And it’s not a system I support. So it’s not my rationale that’s fucked up.
Wk could have moved into the place for numerous reasons, location being one. I didn’t require to know every fucking detail as you put it. In fact WK told me far more than I needed to know, but failed to tell me what I wanted to know.
I’m not blaming WK for their current predicament, just trying to better understand it And no, I don’t think WK was misleading me, however my questions were not answered, therefore we can only speculate on why WK initially moved in, hasn’t moved out and has put up with it for so long.
Moreover, considering what he’s put out there, my questions were reasonable and to be expected.
“To Andrew Little. I believe you and Jacinda Adern have it in your power to do something about this sort of state of affairs that has been legitimized by this National govt up and down this country to so many of their fellow countrymen and women.”
If they are elected into power, they will then have the power to do something.
WILD KATIPO as it is in the bathroom, you have rights.
Phone around find the most expensive plumber you can find. THE MOST Expensive. Then find a sparky in the same camp. Explain to them the situation – the bill goes to the landlord. If you are in Auckland, some of these trades people are only to happy to help.
Book them in to turn up in 24 hours, then inform the landlord what you have done on the ground of health and safety. And that in 24 hours this will be happening. As you will not let the property be damaged on your watch. Only a idiot landlord will not act at this point.
All perfectly legal. And compliant to the residential tenancy act.
This particular landlord would not pay the bill. He has been aware of the conditions for years and makes no effort to improve them. Wants the rent on time though. In Auckland plumbers don’t start the job until they are guaranteed payment.
That why I said try some of the expensive places, and tell them what is going on. You will be quietly surprised. They will get paid, as per the act – via the disputes tribunal and putting debt collectors on them. The big expensive outfits are the only option left, because they know the law, and will get their money.
Small places can’t afford to not get payed. Or fight to get their money. Hence why they won’t do the job.
You don think the govt has a role in safety compliance for housing? Wow.
WK already said what they’re going to do, despite having been seriously ill, did you even read the comment? Got any social conscience or intelligence at all?
And just what can the tenancy tribunal actually do?
Can it charge his landlord with attempted murder?
Can it even fine him?
Can it force him to refurbish the place to a liveable standard?
Or is it like many of these government entities that have been set up over the decades that people are supposed to complain to but have no teeth to force anything?
“I didn’t see the Tenancy Tribuna bit in his post/rant it was all a bit jumbled and hard to read.”
Nice try, but I managed it on a phone while unwell. I think more likely you just rushed through on your way to trolling.
“The point though is unless you raise issues with the appropriate authorities nothing will ever change,.”
Quite. When you have mass problems across the country, the governing party is the appropriate authority. Basically what you are saying is that all responsibility lies with the tenant, irrespective of their ability to go to the Tenancy Tribunal. In which case landlords are free to be as fuckwitted as they like until they caught by a private citizen. Nice.
“And this has been going on for at least 18 months, why hasn’t he been to the tenancy tribunal already.”
Landlords are running a business and selling a service, what they sell should be up to scratch.
The problem is at the moment, there’s a shortage of rentals, a rental WOF would probably remove at least 10% of the rental stock from the market as well as push up already over inflated rental prices.
Once we get the housing situation under control then introduce a rental WOF at the moment I think it will cause more harm than good.
Mouldy walls are covered by weather tightness and ventilation.
Cracked floorBoards? how big is the crack? you just need to duck down to any building supply and get some caulk, fixed for under $10.00
What sort of heating do you expect the landlord to cover?
“Mouldy walls are covered by weather tightness and ventilation.”
I’ve seen rooms that have mould that would pass a weather tight and ventilation test. Are you saying that it should be a weather tightness, ventilation, and mould check? Seems odd, I would put addressing mould as a separate category, especially given it’s potentially such a health risk.
“Cracked floorBoards? how big is the crack?”
Big enough to cause damage to your foot from the rough edge. My point was that you had excluded general repairs, or otherwise dangerous shit.
“What sort of heating do you expect the landlord to cover?”
Fixed heating. So a wood burner or heat pump or other form of electric heating that goes with the house (may as well ban gas on upgrades because of CC).
I’ve seen rooms that have mould that would pass a weather tight and ventilation test. Are you saying that it should be a weather tightness, ventilation, and mould check? Seems odd, I would put addressing mould as a separate category, especially given it’s potentially such a health risk.
What’s causing the mould?
If the walls or roof is leaking no amount of ventilation is going to make a difference, you’re going to have mould issues.
Anything else can be fixed with decent ventilation or educating the tenants.
Fixed heating. So a wood burner or heat pump or another form of electric heating that goes with the house.
To heat a whole house (100-150 m2) with heat pumps you’re looking at 10-15k
The’s the problem if you start to get too overzealous you reach a point where the landlord says fuck it, kicks out the tenants, sells up and there’s one less rental.
Previous occupiers not opening the bathroom window. So the ventilation and weathertightness would pass, but there is existing mould. Mould prevention isn’t the same as mould removal.
“The’s the problem if you start to get too overzealous you reach a point where the landlord says fuck it, kicks out the tenants, sells up and there’s one less rental.”
It’s only a problem if you think the housing market is more important than people’s health and wellbeing. The government can buy houses, get them up to scratch and add them to their HNZ managed rentals.
However I suspect that your point is based on the need to defend landlord profits rather than whether lots of landlords will really get out of the business. If a someone can’t install fixed heating in a house for far less than $15,000 they’re probably not competent to be a landlord.
Maybe the ideal solution would be to get the crap that needs doing up out of the rental / investor market and either demolished or sold off cheaply to first home buyers as a do-up.
This is how a lot of us got our foot on the property ladder in past generations but openings are limited now.
However I suspect that your point is based on the need to defend landlord profits rather than whether lots of landlords will really get out of the business. If a someone can’t install fixed heating in a house for far less than $15,000 they’re probably not competent to be a landlord.
If you’re installing fixed heating to a WOF standard and want to use heat pumps it will cost you 10-15k.
The only other form of electric heating you could use is resistance heating which is just your bar heaters so all you really need to do is provide a power point.
You could install a wood burner for 5k but a lot of tenants don’t want the hassle of having to chop wood also you’ll need a shed to store the wood.
“Maybe the ideal solution would be to get the crap that needs doing up out of the rental / investor market and either demolished or sold off cheaply to first home buyers as a do-up.
This is how a lot of us got our foot on the property ladder in past generations but openings are limited now.”
I think so too. The whole “landlords can’t afford it and will sell” line, apart from basically saying that some people should live in hovels, also misses the opportunity to sort this out once and for all and that it can be sorted out.
Imagine if we applied the same principle to a car WOF 🙄 People can’t afford to get the repairs done in their cars so we let’s not do a WOF system.
He is a past painter and decorator living by himself with a heart condition, probably aggravated by the stress of getting nowhere with the head tenant.
He has earned and deserves respect for the life he gave to his trade and the restraint and patience he has shown.
My guess is he hasn’t been to the Tenancy Tribunal because he is stoical and has the dignity and expectation of good faith in others to try to fix it by a personal approach to the head tenant.
ATM… just feeling a little bit like my blood pressures going through my head. The head tenants been out overnight, I’ll approach him when he returns. If he contacts the landlord and action is taken to avoid bringing in the Tribunal , well and good. If not , I’ll push the issue. Starting Monday. I should be fine by myself and thank you.
I live by myself but family is not too far away , so I’m fortunate.
Always was a tradie outdoors type worker , pretty physically strong but this heart business has been a real confidence knocker… so just a bit sort of weepy atm… Id like to say thank you for the moral support from both Draco and weka and yourself. Ive spoken enough about housing here before but now Im REALLY feeling part of it.
Take care matey! Three weeks isn’t very long to recover. Stress if a funny thing, sometimes it’s easier to do something stressful than do nothing about another stressor, but can you also take some time with this?
I’m wondering if there are pathways through the Tribunal process that mean its expedited on the grounds of health or danger.
I dunno , but atm Im taking a back seat and just going to relax… that head pounding feeling isn’t pleasant… so Ill kick back for the rest of the day ,get some sleep then have another go.
@ Wild Katipo … been following your sad situation through this blog. Makes for pretty shocking reading, that circumstances such as yours being allowed to prevail in NZ in the first place to decent Kiwis!
More publicity needs to be drawn to issues such as yours, with some serious scrutiny being done on your living conditions, along with the obscene profits gained from scurrilous landlords, preying on good people such as yourself in need of accommodation! From what you have written, your plight seems pretty appalling to say the least, sub human in fact! You and others like you need advocates to act on your behalf.
I wish you all the best in getting some positive action here. Take very good care of yourself my friend and look after that good heart of yours.
Cheers
Mary
You can not stop paying the rent, you will be evicted.
As it is a breach of the Tenancy act, you give an automatic win in any tribunal hearing to a land lord. NO matter the circumstances which drove you to not pay rent.
You have to pay rent, to even the worst scum sucking leech. Tenants have no power, no matter how reality shows try to tell the lie otherwise.
Ok but that was not my actual experience as a student when landlord made non consented additions and prevented us getting quite enjoyment of flat. But if your the expert I will go with that
It you go to the Tenancy Tribunal, then there is a risk of getting a retaliatory eviction. Plain and simple. If a landlord wants to get rid of you, he will find a way. Despite what landlords moan about, it is actually quite easy to evict a tenant.
Professor James Renwick has been in Northland this week to help raise funds for a climate change sculpture in Kerikeri by the artist Chris Booth.
Professor Renwick said that was increasingly the trend as the climate changes.
“Looking further afield California is a classic example. They’ve had years of severe drought and hardly any snow on the mountains.
“And now, this winter that is just gone, they’ve been absolutely pounded … the dams are bursting and all the rest of it.
“And that’s exactly the picture, you get long periods of severe drought and then when it starts to rain it really hammers down.
Can’t be a great week to be living in NZ’s north – whether it be people living in the open, on streets, in garages, in cars, or with families sharing to small a living space.
She cuts through all the BS that the redevelopment is benefiting local HNZ tenants.
Niki represents a community of people who feel that they have been shunted around as if they are of little consequence. They have stayed defiant because they can see through the rhetoric that the redevelopment of their neighbourhood is about helping the locals and doing up old houses. In fact, the redevelopment is benefitting wealthy developers and property investors who get to dally around with a small bit of social housing on the side so they can justify their land grab.
The plan to redevelop Tāmaki does not have the support of the very people it is supposed to be helping….
…
The National government did not just let the housing crisis happen. Their policy settings have designed the shortage of affordable, state, and social housing. Through its tax policy, this government has encouraged the use of houses for business investment instead of for living in as homes. This has helped put both rents and mortgages out of reach for too many people, in a way this country has not seen before. This is the housing crisis.
This reminds me of another National Party hypocrisy. Bolger’s support for the idea of social capital as somehow linked to the preservation of strong market incentives ie. vote National and you will be enabled to get ahead at the expense of the community.
“For Bolger (1998), social capital does not draw on “old fashioned, discredited socialism” but rather his conviction of the “strength, goodness and commonsense of communities”. He speaks of a change of emphasis from economic capital to social capital: recent economic reforms will preserve strong market incentives, now, apparently, all we need to develop a new approach to social policy which will empower communities to deal with the many social problems facing them.”
There is nothing I can say here…its simply a link to a very interesting point of view about the effects and reality of imprisonment. Though also interesting from a legal point of view, yet to be fully played out in the courts.
Elon Musk sets the cat among the pigeons with an open offer to South Australia for grid scale batteries to cover intermittency problems with South Australia’s high proportion of wind and solar generation. That’s a real in-your-face challenge to the fossil-heads in Canberra.
This role is in a team of proactive and positive staff who enjoy leveraging current and emerging technologies for mission outcomes. The team is a growth area for GCSB with a roadmap of interesting and diverse technical projects for the right applicant to enjoy. The GCSB offers a competitive salary, health insurance and flexible working hours. If you are interested in putting your technical skills towards keeping New Zealand safe and prosperous in an innovative and unconventional technical domain, this is the role you are looking for.
We are looking for someone with experience in Linux systems administration at the RHCSA level or equivalent and one or more of the following areas is required:
Virtualisation administration at the VCP/RHCVA level or equivalent.
Infrastructure provisioning tools such as Puppet, Chef or Ansible.
Network administration at the CCNA level or equivalent.
ICT systems design.
ICT systems security experience.
Not my kind of thing. I prefer to write code rather than running systems.
The only reason that I run this system is because of a favor asked long long ago by some people on the original crew, and because I can treat it as a semi interesting hobby rather than real work. I have always detested it when I have wound up doing the IT department’s work rather than development.
I suspect that whoever they are after is just a flunky to run some of their infrastructure rather than something I’d ever find interesting.
The wonderful Testers who find my bugs for me before the customers do. They are some of my favorite people.
And for the record, and because I have been known to indulge in it on the odd occassion, there was no irony at all on those statements.
Being able to test integrated systems systematically and repeatably is a skill that so few people lack that it rates for me as a talent. I can (and often do) write unit-tests and functional tests pr perform bench testing all day and never find some of the integration flaws and outright bugs these people do.
When you’re putting dozens of hardware and software units together in an integrated system over a wireless system, being able to work on flaws long enough to describe a reproducible condition is freaking hard. Yet some people (unlike me) can do it. That means that I can find and kill the damn thing.
Very interesting Iprent As a mech engineer computer technology to me is really mind blowing. especially the advancement in the design and draughting area’s. From drawing boards and slide rules and modern day 3D drawing programmes.
I have always admired you guys because as an engineer mechanical problems are easy to find. If it rattles, it is too loose, if it gets too hot it’s too tight and if it squeaks it needs a little lubricant. Dead easy not like you guys especially some of the ones I have met who have built programmes so all the mechanical bits work in the right sequence. In your game when you turn the switch on and nothing happens. you always seem to know where to look. without getting zapped or causing major problems, with no indication or signs of the problem.
weka, and your list is why this limited form of democracy is a sick joke.
Bugger the democrats, seriously they put up a hard right conservative, and we are suppose to think that is better?
Seriously trump is bad, but to be frightened to vote conservative is just as evil. This was, and is the whole issue, why vote for the lesser evil, when all you get served is evil? Demand better.
Gosh, I really hope that one day I will feel sufficiently privileged and disconnected from other humans that when it comes to the moment of actually voting, I can opt out of the unpalatable task of choosing the least bad realistic option for the future while adopting a sneering morally superior tone about my cop-out.
Your approach fucks over everybody affected by the appointment of Scott Pruitt to the EPA – ie everyone on this planet.
Your approach fucks over all the people suffering from the increase in hate in the US over the last six months.
Your approach fucks over … the list is very long.
My approach was to support Bernie all the way to the point where he no longer had any chance of winning the nomination. Then I swallowed hard and changed my support to the next least bad realistic alternative. Here in New Zealand, the Greens are the party likely to get into government that is least bad from my perspective. So my approach is I’ll support them, even though I have serious problems with some of their positions.
Who are you going to fuck over in September because no party with a chance of getting into Parliament in New Zealand is pure and moral enough for you?
And will he expect them to thank him for his exemplary display of moral purity? Will they – and it’s always ‘they’ or ‘them’, always someone else – willingly sacrifice their welfare and lives because he tells them it’s for a higher cause?
There’s a point where moral purity becomes sanctimony, and that is the vice of hypocrisy that accommodates other people’s suffering as a mark of one’s supposed virtue.
I’ve friends directly affected by Trump’s actions and they can certainly tell the difference between Clinton and Trump. For at least one friend of mine in the States, it’s no delicate discussion about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin or whether its sinful to whistle on a Tuesday, it’s literally life and death for her with her health coverage disappearing and the spike in hate crimes against her community. She’s made it abundantly clear that she’d take great pleasure in making balloon animals with the intestines of people like Adam who refused to vote or wasted their vote on Stein because they wanted to strike a pose.
Yeah, I’ve just had my sister-in-law and niece visiting.
One of them works for a church in a Trump county. She’s got some really sad stories to tell, that have got a lot worse since November.
The other is a doctor whose last several positions were in Trump counties where there were severe opioid addiction problems. She’s currently doctoring in an impoverished area here in NZ, and has decided to lengthen her time here for several years beyond her original plans. Although the fact that she’s spending most of her time being a doctor instead of administering paperwork for insurance purposes has something to do with that.
Who is pure? I’ve never asked for purity, you seem obsessed by it rhinocrates, oddly enough. I’m asking for people to be moral, and act on it.
That aside did you miss that the Democrats lost everything, THEY LOST EVERYTHING! The house, the senate, and the presidency. So the Stein argument is a lie. Try watching somthing other MSNBC.
But sure live in lala land, where people who actually make moral choices are the enemy.
Yeah. Okay, that’s basically endorsing always putting others in charge. And those people that voters put in charge then determine what health policy or other social welfare policy will be brought forward, or not brought forward, or rolled back, or never discussed, based on their approach to and degree of accommodation towards capitalist markets.
Their rule is illegitimate – ie, they can’t justify it. And they always in representative democracies, in parliamentary systems, serve and never fundamentally question financial and business interests – interests that run on deliberate systems of trade and production and distribution that (in case you’ve missed it) have brought us screaming right on up to a cliff edge at a great rate of knots. (resources fucked, peoples’ lives fucked, the climate fucked, eco-systems fucked)
And yet still most advocate that we continue voting until the cows come home in some vain hope that there will one day be worthy leaders determined to do what is right. (There will an occasional exception that will serve to prove the rule, who will be swiftly stomped on and removed to the dead lands beyond the far fringes)
Not voting while seeking to develop parallel organsiational structures for society is entirely legitimate – and certainly more mature than just voting once every three, four or five years and going home ‘to the telly’ after the two minutes of participation as most people are apt to do.
And there are dozens of other legitimate routes of agency implied by those positions sketched out above.
But. How long now before we see the tired old mantra wheeled out? The one that claims that those who do not vote have no right to complain? Talk about defining politics and possibilities in the narrowest and most disempowering (not to mention downright dangerous) terms….
Allowing millions to be fucked over, often with fatal consequences, while knowing that it will happen as a consequence of your position is not a moral choice, it is a narcissistic one.
The people who suffer as a result will not thank you for sacrificing them.
That’s not living in lala land, la la land is a place where there are no consequences and hurt doesn’t matter. Living in reality means realising that there are more important things than keeping your hands lily white.
The opposition of voting versus joining a co-op is nonsensical – some of us can walk and chew gum at the same time.
It is also nonsensical to assume that if one ignores the state of the world as it is like a petulant child, it will magically go away and be replaced by exactly what you wish for. Power abhors a vacuum and if somehow representative democracy could be suddenly swept away, history has shown that what replaces it is usually much, much worse.
… and don’t presume to know what anybody does IRL away from a keyboard.
“… and don’t presume to know what anybody does IRL away from a keyboard.”
Ditto.
rhinocrates I’m not ignoring the world, as in the fact this was a hypothetical question, so I gave a answer to it.
You have point blankly refused to look at reality, the democrat’s have failed across the board. Why? They have failed, and you are ignoring it. It is becasue they are corrupt. That the whole so called establishment left in the USA have given up on working people, any chance you can see that?
Look I’ve got friends who will kill themselves when their health insurance runs out. That is reality, a harsh one. And you going to blame me, for a democratic party with no back bone, and no trust left with working people. You are going to have a go, becasue I say the system is broken. And say we should forget the ballot and fight for our rights. Well. It’s good to know where you stand.
Because here is the hypocrisy – If you buy into democracy, the right win, and they get to do what they want to do. People are going to suffer, that what happens in the system you are defending.
If you don’t get I’m fighting against evil, them you missing the point. and I can’t say too much more.
Adam, ‘fighting against evil’ is good, I don’t deny that you’re doing it, but you’ve become so obsessed with it as a Manichaean battle that you’ve ignored the collateral damage. If you are ‘good’, or label yourself as such, it does not necessarily follow that the consequences of what you do or fail to do are good.
I don’t give a toss about how virtuous you are. I care about the consequences of the kinds of actions or avoidance of action you promote. Right now I see people suffering because people who could have voted against Trump didn’t.
Trump’s win could have been prevented – a third of the electorate stayed at home, being too cool for school. There are direct consequences that were not part of the Democratic platform. Trump campaigned on anti-environmentalism, anti-semitism, islamophobia, homophobia, racism, misogyny and lo and behold, since his election, there has been a sharp rise in hate crimes that he inspired. These were not part of the Democratic Party campaign or policy.
Capitalism may be evil, but it is not the only evil in the world.
I agree that the Democratic party is corrupted, as are left parties worldwide that sold their souls to neoliberalism and called it the ‘centre’ (and don’t falsely assume that I’ve I’ve failed to see that – I’ve been very critical here about the state of the Labour Party). However, Sanders’ incursion at least showed that people aren’t chicken and changes were possible. In the aftermath they may get the kick up the arse that they need. One positive has been the spike in women now intending to run for office. Hopefully they will instigate change. Slowly, yes, but that’s life.
The left parties around the world are in a crisis of identity and integrity. In NZ at least we are able to cast protest votes for potential coalition partners or to at least get a voice in parliament. To hand a victory to the far right by saying they were always going to win is abdication and cowardice dressed up in sanctimony.
That is reality, a harsh one. And you going to blame me, for a democratic party with no back bone
With a disaster of this magnitude, there’s a lot of blame to go around and certainly plenty to spend on both. So what if you don’t get exactly what you want, completely and immediately? That’s no reason to throw your toys out of the cot; that’s a reason to work long and hard.
Two quotes from Voltaire: The perfect is the enemy of the good and The greatest crime is to do nothing because we can only do a little
My approach does not do any fornicating as you put it, it demands action. Not giving away sovereignty blindly to evil people.
You need to answer that question yourself, and you have, you are are willing to forsake morals for political power.
Yeah, not a choice I’m willing to make. Nor am I willing to stand aside, and let us keep falling into the abyss. Morality drives me to say, and act for the better world, not accept evil lithely.
Is it shocking to you that a stark evil is on display? Because you can help change that, and voting is only one part. I’d argue a very very small part, you can, and should do more. A lot more. Rather than get worked up by voting, which at the end of the day in a world dominated by corporations, is fast becoming the public illusion it always was. Try joining with others to improve your local community. Maybe sell your car, do some gardening, or join a Co-Op.
Nope. Voting people into positions of power whereby they could essentially ‘lord it over’ others fucked…well, much more than anything that’s just limited to Standing Rock.
Uh, Bill, there’s the minor matter of a thing called reality. Reality says we’re stuck with operating within the system we have now and for the foreseeable future.
Kidding ourselves that we can ignore or opt out of that simply cedes power to the nastier arseholes. Whereas engaging with reality at least gives us the chance to cede power to the not-quite-as-nasty arseholes that have at least a vague interest in our views and a chance of some overlap of vision for the future.
If that ugly reality of the system we have to work within ever changes, then we’ll have to make our decisions and take actions within that new framework. But it will still be in everyone’s interest to engage with it as it is, rather than pretending that opting out is a better choice.
Sheesh Andre, why don’t you just admit you are a conservative and give up.
Seriously if people thought and acted like you we would not have any democracy, we would not have a end to slavery, we would not have women participating, no rights, nothing, all we’d have is the right to bow our heads, and say “Yes MASSA”
Uh, Bill, there’s the minor matter of a thing called reality. Reality says …
Our current systems of governance persist precisely for as long as we lend them credence. And not a moment longer. They have no life of their own and there is no immutable reality or law of nature determining how we govern that means we have no option but acquiescence.
Actually, it might be better if there was. Thinking CC here and how we seem to imagine basic laws of physics can be ignored…
Anyway, where did anyone suggest we ignore or opt out of stuff related to governance?
I could vote. And I could simultaneously undermine some very basic assumptions and expectations attached to ‘from on high’ governance by dint of how I arrange my society with others. Or I could not vote.
Adam, slavery ended because people voted for a president that was against slavery, and was willing to go to war over it.
Women’s suffrage happened because people voted in legislators that supported it.
MMP happened because people voted for it.
The common factor in all these things? People voted for it, and won.
Yes, those votes were preceded by lots of hard work by activists that were subject to derision and worse in building the movement. And building the movement is essential. But voting for legislators sympathetic to the movement, or at least less hostile, is equally essential. At least until we move to a system that does away with the legislators.
Sorry about filling your replies tab, Bill. But as far as opting out of governance, in the case of an election like the recent US one, refusing to consider one of the two candidate with a chance of winning and instead going for an option with absolutely no chance, as adam apparently would have done had he been eligible, is effectively opting out.
One Two, all the history and evidence I’ve ever come across suggests that yes, slavery was a big part of what the US Civil War was about. But feel free to tell us what it was about in your alternative history. Probably best to start a fresh comment, though, rather than fill Bill’s replies tab.
Your approach fucks over everybody affected by the appointment of Scott Pruitt to the EPA – ie everyone on this planet.
Your approach fucks over all the people suffering from the increase in hate in the US over the last six months.
Your approach fucks over … the list is very long.
Fuck, yes. “I won’t vote for the lesser of two evils because I have morals” is why the USA is currently enjoying the dubious benefits of a descent into authoritarianism. If your morals involve assisting that process, it’s time to review your morals.
LOL, don’t ever stop Psycho Milt. Your muddled thinking is always good for a laugh.
[lprent: Translated loosely and almost sympathetically: I agree to disagree. ]
Does that mean you wouldn’t vote? Which in this case would be an affirmative for Tr*mp. I understand where you are coming from ethically, I’m just pointing out the pragmatics.
As we have had that choice for some time, and all it brings us is worse and worse people in politics. Pragmatics be damned, why support a steady slow crippling corruption?
So yeah I would not vote, and do what I normally do – get organised.
In our case New Zealand has great laws around Co-Operatives. Why are not people doing this more?
But to rely on the tired old political parties is beyond a sad joke. That is why I’m glad we have MMP, but even that has done far to little to improve the morality of our politicians, as this current government has put on display so often.
“But to rely on the tired old political parties is beyond a sad joke.”
Bill made similar commentary. Problem with that line is that it assumes that voting for the lesser evil (or in my case, the pragmatic choice), equates to relying on them.
Myself, I’ve been pretty up front that I think parliamentary politics is pretty much only good for holding the line while the real work gets done elsewhere. But I (and you) shouldn’t minimise it that much, because they still do some useful things, and that holding the line is the difference between super nasty and less nasty. You seem to believe we still have a choice for not nasty. In CC terms I think we are past that point. Which doesn’t mean we are without hope, but that whatever happens next it’s unlikely to be the revolution.
“In our case New Zealand has great laws around Co-Operatives. Why are not people doing this more?”
When people like yourself, Bill and me can’t work together, it’s probably not reasonable to expect others to who aren’t naturally interesting in that kind of co-operation.
Myself, I’ve been pretty up front that I think parliamentary politics is pretty much only good for holding the line
The status quo constraint,where real democratic contrarian debate is extinguished at all cost.
The illusion of democratic participation is well known,where the minority controls what is debated,where and when.
Galam (2004) for example showed in contrarian dynamics interesting properties arise.
“Applying our results to the European Union leads to the conclusion that it would be rather misleading to initiate large
public debates in most of the involved countries. Indeed, even starting from a huge initial majority of people in favor of the European Union, an open and free debate would lead to the creation of huge majority hostile to the European Union. This provides a strong ground to legitimize the on-going reluctance of most Europe an governments to hold referendum on associated issues.”
The full article is behind a paywall, but the abstract and your excerpt seem to suggest that “contrarian debate” is actually not democratic, as it changes the opinions of the populace rather than merely reporting them.
First point weka, I do work with Bill, mainly in picking his brain stuff. But as I’m a work locally type, and he is down the other end of the country, better to work the way we do.
As for working with you, I’d be happy to do that. I would not say I could not work with you.
What worries me, is so many here have got upset by a hypothetical question. Indeed a couple have gone into the realms of personal attack on a hypothetical not realising that we don’t actually live in the USA.
As I said and people have been deliberately obtuse about the NZ situation, and really don’t like being questioned on their morals.
I just don’t see the point in talking in circles with people who don’t want to listen to new ideas, or ideas which differ from theirs.
Amazon announced this week that it was launching Resistance Radio as a companion program for The Man in the High Castle, an alt-history drama loosely adapted from the Philip K. Dick novel. The pre-recorded radio program is basically a bunch of people talking about how the Third Reich is bad and does bad things. For some, they thought that applied to America’s current president (and/or they didn’t bother actually listening to it). In response, several irate opposers flocked to Amazon’s sponsored #ResistanceRadio hashtag to complain about the station’s “liberal agenda.”
Think about it, as one commenter puts it,
Trump supporter finds radio station talking about how terrible the Reich is, and how they should be opposed, and immediately starts defending the Nazi’s. What in the actual fuck?
Headlined AGAINST MERYL STREEP, the indictment declared, “Meryl Streep’s speechifying at the Golden Globes was the worst thing to happen since Trump’s election.” Hoo-kay.
3.9 Reserve Powers for NZ Council
3.9.1 NZ Council shall be authorised to suspend or cancel a leadership election in exceptional circumstances including, without limitation, the following:
• The death of a candidate;
• The calling of a General Election;
• Where NZ Council considers that the democratic integrity of the election process has been seriously undermined.
According to the Labour Party rules quoted above there does not need to be a leadership election when a general election has been called. This is understandable given that the process takes several weeks. Grant Robertson knows this. He has an opportunity to become leader by a simple majority vote in Caucus. If Labour keep polling badly and Chicken is behind Jacinda in preferred PM I’d predict he would make his move after June 23rd.That would be disastrous for Labour and given that Grant’s ambitions are insatiable he would put his own ambitions above those of Labour. You have been warned.
“Sponsored by Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-North Carolina, the bill known as HR 1313 would allow for employers participating in “workplace wellness” programs to require their employees go through genetic testing, or risk taking a financial hit.”
Thanks to Private Eye for reminding us that post-truth politics existed in 1710. Back then, it was referred to as 'lying'. pic.twitter.com/KaAzDLAhyR— James Melville (@JamesMelville) March 10, 2017
Looks like I might have to cut statcounter (one of our trackers) out of the site. It looks like they may be having some problems.
For a start, we’ve been getting some delays from statcounter over the last month not responding and slowing the page loads down. Something that is frigging irritating bearing in mind that only reason for having a visible tracker is to provide the Open Parachute ranking.
But I also just analyzed their tracking against the back end logs. That was because there was a major discrepancy between google analytics and their measurements. About 35k page views in February. It looks like google is right and statcounter close to 10% down.
I think that either a server dropped off or they started missing something like the mobiles.
But I’ve looked at what has been happening since, and there is still a significiant daily discrepancy between the three measures. Stat counter is down by several thousand page views per day.
There is always a variation on sessions because each tracking site uses different algorithms. Which is why sessions are pretty useless to measure on.
But the human page views have been generally conformant between trackers. There are variations on the page view counting, but that is mainly dependent on the timezone of measurement for a day and if the tracker is executed at the top of the page or at the end. Usually a variation of just a few hundred human page views over a week. Nothing visible anywhere on the statcounter site about a problem. In fact the site seems a bit dead. They have been happy to take our money each month.
That does kind of mean that there are getting to be a dearth of reliable trackers with a public face that something like Open Parachute can use. Sitemeter has completely screwed up several times in the past few years. There are a couple of others, but as each needs considerable testing before I can trust it on a high volume site. And I don’t have the time.
I’ll watch statcounter to the end of the month. If they continue to screw up then I’ll remove their drag on the site. Google analytics does a good job and is what I actually use for most analysis. I can take the money from statcounter and go and buy some services from them, or just look for a couple of paid plugins to enhance the site.
Several of us were having problems with statcounter slowing down page loading so we ended up installing a blocker suggested by BM (uBlock Origin). Dunno if that will cause a discrepancy between the different counters.
However it would have taken an awful lot of you to doing it to cause that level of discrepancy. It also doesn’t explain that whacking great pile of added page views on the 27th.
But yeah, statcounter has been a bit of a nuisance for speed lagging for a while now. Not as bad as sitemeter was before I got rid of it off the site years ago. I’d prefer to just use analytics which is very fast, non-intrusive and gives better stats as well. It is also pretty interesting watching it dodge blockers 🙂
However I decided a while ago that it was a good idea to leave a public track. It gives something for sites to aspire to 😈 What I should do is find out how to give some public access to the stats off that to Ken at Open Parachute. Analytics allows for specific logins to be able to access specific data. Maybe he’d leave off tormenting the flouridephobes for a while and code something to do that.
That report you linked to by AI has been well and truly debunked. They were quite literally making things up, but still, almost every major western outlet ran with uncritical “Oh My Gosh!” headlines for a day or two…mission accomplished.
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PRC and its proxies in Solomons have been preparing for these elections for a long time.A lot of money, effort and intelligence have gone into ensuring an outcome that won’t compromise Beijing’s plans. Cleo Paskall writes – On April 17th the Solomon Islands, a country of ...
Is speeding up the trip to and from Wellington airport by 12 minutes worth spending up more than $10 billion? Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The six news items that stood out to me in the last day to 8:26 am today are:The Lead: Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced ...
You're a fraud, and you know itBut it's too good to throw it all awayAnyone would do the sameYou've got 'em goingAnd you're careful not to show itSometimes you even fool yourself a bitIt's like magicBut it's always been a smoke and mirrors gameAnyone would do the sameForty six billion ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections The June general election in Mexico could mark a turning point in ensuring that the country’s climate policies better reflect the desire of its citizens to address the climate crisis, with both leading presidential candidates expressing support for renewable energy. Mexico is the ...
2024, it feels, keeps presenting us with ever more challenges, ever more dismay.Do you give up yet? It seems to ask.No? How about this? Or this?How about this?When I say 2024 I really mean the state of humanity in 2024.Saturday night, we watched Civil War because that is one terrifying cliff we've ...
Buzz from the Beehive A pet project and governmental tunnel vision jump out from the latest batch of ministerial announcements. The government is keen to assure us of its concern for the wellbeing of our pets. It will be introducing pet bonds in a change to the Residential Tenancies Act ...
A recent report generated from a Growing Up in New Zealand (GUiNZ) survey of 1,224 rangatahi Māori aged 11-12 found: Cultural connectedness was associated with fewer depression symptoms, anxiety symptoms and better quality of life. That sounds cut and dry. But further into the report the following appears: Cultural connectedness is ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: From the gory details of job-cuts news, you’d think the public service was being eviscerated. While the media’s view of the cuts is incomplete, it’s also true that departments have been leaking the particulars faster than a Wellington ...
Remember the good old days, back when New Zealand had a PM who could think and speak calmly and intelligently in whole sentences without blustering? Even while Iran’s drones and missiles were still being launched, Helen Clark was live on TVNZ expertly summing up the latest crisis in the Middle ...
Costello did not pass on analysis of the benefits of the smokefree reforms to Cabinet, emphasising instead the extra tax revenues of repealing them. Photo: Hagen Hopkins, Getty Images TL;DR: The six news items that stood out to me at 7:26 am today are:The Lead: Casey Costello never passed on ...
True loveYou're the one I'm dreaming ofYour heart fits me like a gloveAnd I'm gonna be true blueBaby, I love youI’ve written about the job cuts in our news media last week. The impact on individuals, and the loss to Aotearoa of voices covering our news from different angles.That by ...
While commentators, including former Prime Minister Helen Clark, are noting a subtle shift in New Zealand’s foreign policy, which now places more emphasis on the United States, many have missed a key element of the shift. What National said before the election is not what the government is doing now. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Government’s newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealand’s urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey and his Government colleagues have made a meal of their mental health commitments, showing how flimsy their efforts to champion the issue truly are, says Labour Mental Health spokesperson Ingrid Leary. ...
Māori are yet to see anything from this Government except cuts, reversals and taking our people backwards, Māori Development spokesperson Willie Jackson said. ...
The Coalition Government’s refusal to commit to ongoing funding for social housing is seeing the sector pull back on developments and families watch their dreams of securing a home fade away, says Labour Housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty. ...
Changes to minimum wage and benefit indexation means many New Zealanders will get less this year, as the Government gives a big tax break to landlords instead. ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has made further appointments to the Board of Antarctica New Zealand as part of a continued effort to ensure the Scott Base Redevelopment project is delivered in a cost-effective and efficient manner. The Minister has appointed Neville Harris as a new member of the Board. Mr ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis will travel to the United States on Tuesday to attend a meeting of the Five Finance Ministers group, with counterparts from Australia, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. “I am looking forward to meeting with our Five Finance partners on how we can work ...
The coalition Government has today announced purrfect and pawsitive changes to the Residential Tenancies Act to give tenants with pets greater choice when looking for a rental property, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Pets are important members of many Kiwi families. It’s estimated that around 64 per cent of New ...
State Highway 1 (SH1) through Wellington City is heavily congested at peak times and while planning continues on the duplicate Mt Victoria Tunnel and Basin Reserve project, the Government has also asked NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) to consider and provide advice on a Long Tunnel option, Transport Minister Simeon Brown ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters have condemned Iran’s shocking and illegal strikes against Israel. “These attacks are a major challenge to peace and stability in a region already under enormous pressure," Mr Luxon says. "We are deeply concerned that miscalculation on any side could ...
Hundreds of people in little over a week have turned out in Northland to hear Regional Development Minister Shane Jones speak about plans for boosting the regional economy through infrastructure. About 200 people from the infrastructure and associated sectors attended an event headlined by Mr Jones in Whangarei today. Last ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti has today thanked outgoing Health New Zealand – Te Whatu Ora Chair Dame Karen Poutasi for her service on the Board. “Dame Karen tendered her resignation as Chair and as a member of the Board today,” says Dr Reti. “I have asked her to ...
The NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has signalled their proposed delivery approach for the Government’s 15 Roads of National Significance (RoNS), with the release of the State Highway Investment Proposal (SHIP) today, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Boosting economic growth and productivity is a key part of the Government’s plan to ...
New Zealand is renewing its connections with a world facing urgent challenges by pursuing an active, energetic foreign policy, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “Our country faces the most unstable global environment in decades,” Mr Peters says at the conclusion of two weeks of engagements in Egypt, Europe and the United States. “We cannot afford to sit back in splendid ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has announced the Australian Governor-General, His Excellency General The Honourable David Hurley and his wife Her Excellency Mrs Linda Hurley, will make a State visit to New Zealand from Tuesday 16 April to Thursday 18 April. The visit reciprocates the State visit of former Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced that Medsafe has approved 11 cold and flu medicines containing pseudoephedrine. Pharmaceutical suppliers have indicated they may be able to supply the first products in June. “This is much earlier than the original expectation of medicines being available by 2025. The Government recognised ...
New Zealand and the United States have recommitted to their strategic partnership in Washington DC today, pledging to work ever more closely together in support of shared values and interests, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The strategic environment that New Zealand and the United States face is considerably more ...
April 11, 2024 Joint Declaration by United States Secretary of State the Honorable Antony J. Blinken and New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs the Right Honourable Winston Peters We met today in Washington, D.C. to recommit to the historic partnership between our two countries and the principles that underpin it—rule ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced further New Zealand cooperation with the United States in the Pacific Islands region through $16.4 million in funding for initiatives in digital connectivity and oceans and fisheries research. “New Zealand can achieve more in the Pacific if we work together more urgently and ...
Kia Ora Gaza A passionate haka reverberated through Auckland International Airport as a medical team of three New Zealand doctors received an emotional farewell from a big crowd of supporters before flying to Turkey to join the international Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. The doctors, who left Auckland yesterday, hope to ...
With submissions closing today, Macassey-Pickard says groups around the country have been supporting a huge range of people to make their submissions. ...
Our response to the new legislation is informed by targeted conversations with practitioners working in the system and through an implementation lens. ...
The new ‘Fast-track Approvals Bill’ would give just three Ministers the power to approve or deny development projects. They would avoid the usual checks and balances that are in place to protect rivers, land, the ocean, and communities. ...
COMMENTARY:By Eugene Doyle Helen Clark, how I miss you. The former New Zealand Prime Minister — the safest pair of hands this country has had in living memory — gave a masterclass on the importance of maintaining an independent foreign policy when she spoke at an AUKUS symposium held ...
The government's released the list of organisations provided with information on how to apply - just hours before public submissions on the bill close. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milton Speer, Visiting Fellow, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney Before climate change really got going, eastern Australia’s flash floods tended to concentrate on our coastal regions, east of the Great Dividing Range. But that’s changing. Now ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elizabeth Finkel, Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow, La Trobe University Sia Duff / South Australian Museum In February, the South Australian Museum “re-imagined” itself. In the face of rising costs and inadequate government funds, CEO David Gaimster, who took the reins last June, declared ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, School of Allied Heath, Human Services & Sport, La Trobe University, La Trobe University This week, Collingwood AFL player Nathan Murphy announced his retirement, brought on by his concussion history and ongoing issues. The 24-year-old’s seemingly sudden retirement, ...
The Mental Health Foundation provides support and resources for those facing the loss of their job, so it’s wrong in the very week the Government adds another 1000 jobs to its tally of cuts, that this is happening. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Howard, Senior Lecturer, Discipline of English and Writing, University of Sydney Daniel Boud/Sydney Theatre Company Decay, terror, revulsion. These are three of the central themes of Thomas Bernhard’s rarely performed play The President. The Austrian is one of the greatest ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ye In (Jane) Hwang, Postdoctoral Research Associate at School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney Shutterstock You’d be hard pressed to find any aspect of daily life that doesn’t require some form of digital literacy. We need only to look back ten ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says threats by ministers Shane Jones and David Seymour to reform or close down the Waitangi Tribunal were “ill-considered”, as legal experts say the ministers may have breached Cabinet Manual conventions. “I think those comments are ill-considered and we expect all ministers to actually exercise good ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Newton, Professor of Exercise Medicine, Edith Cowan University Pexels/RDNE stock project You’re not in your 20s or 30s anymore and you know regular health checks are important. So you go to your GP. During the appointment they measure your waist. ...
A new poem by Evangeline Riddiford Graham. Mitochondrial Problem I. It was long drive to Kansas for the man and his dog but you have to understand he said She doesn’t fly. Which calls to mind not carsick shitting barking or whining but a dog who chooses not to as ...
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 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)Hot off the press, this debut ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Wajnryb McDonald, PhD candidate in Criminology, University of Sydney Less than 24 hours after Ashlee Good was murdered in Bondi Junction, her family released a statement requesting the media take down photographs they had reproduced of Ashlee and her family without ...
Chief executive Shaun Robinson said it has not had any government funding cut, but government-funded contracts have not kept pace with rising costs. ...
The Ministry of Health has delayed the release of its evidence brief on the safety, reversibility and mental health and wellbeing outcomes for puberty blockers. While we wait, Julia de Bres speaks to those with firsthand experience. Best practice gender-affirming healthcare is based on trans people’s self-determination and agency. The ...
Barcelona’s city streets have gone from traffic-clogged to pedestrian-friendly. How? Superblocks. Ellen Rykers explains. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week I read a great interview with renowned urbanist Janette Sadik-Khan by The Spinoff’s Wellington editor Joel MacManus: “You can reimagine streets, ...
Student groups ‘Climate Action VUW’, Schools Strike 4 Climate and VUWSA will be on the street in Wellington today, the last day for submissions on the Fast-track Approvals Bill, with a message that the fight against the Government’s ‘War on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sofia Ammassari, Research Fellow, Griffith University Since 2014, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity has grown exponentially – and so has the formidable organisational machine of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). These two factors will be key to delivering the BJP a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Associate Professor of Education (Adjunct) & Senior Manager (BCE), Charles Sturt University During COVID almost all Australian students and their families experienced online learning. But while schools have long since gone back to in-person teaching, online learning has not gone ...
Yes, they’re better for the environment. No, that’s not a good enough reason for me to use them. Once every 26 days or so, my period arrives, and if struck by an act of God, I am caught red-crotched without products. How, after 17 years of this, do I still ...
“It will cause significant harm to our environment and communities. It is completely at odds with New Zealanders’ relationship with nature and our need for a low-carbon, sustainable economic future." ...
The Chair of the National Maori Authority, Matthew Tukaki, has warned a Parliamentary Select Committee that fast-tracking legislation is a perilous practice that undermines the core tenets of democracy, transparency, and accountability. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Tenbensel, Associate Professor, Health Policy, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Getty Images Since coming into power, the coalition government has adopted a simple but shrewd see-how-fast-we-can-move political strategy. However, in the health sector this need for speed entails ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Hronis, Clinical Psychologist, University of Technology Sydney Darya Sannikova/Pexels Whether you’re watching TV, attending a footy game, or eating a meal at your local pub, gambling is hard to escape. Although the rise of gambling is not unique to Australia, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Wong, Forrest Fellow, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Western Australia Have you ever wondered if there are more insects out at night than during the day? We set out to answer this question by combing through the scientific ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carol T Kulik, Research Professor, University of South Australia IR Stone/Shutterstock In Australia, it’s not the done thing to know – let alone ask – what our colleagues are paid. Yet, it’s easy to see how pay transparency can make pay ...
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) is sounding a warning to migrants, that running foul of the law may see them leaving the country prematurely. ...
The government’s plan to get 50,000 people off jobseeker support by 2030 has had a rocky start, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. Beneficiary numbers are up – and so are ...
Raglan Roast is a staple of Wellington coffee culture. But with five branches across the capital, which one is the best? I am a die-hard Raglan Roast fan. It’s consistently the most affordable cafe in Wellington, and one of the only places you can get a coffee after 3pm. So, ...
Residents of University of Auckland halls are being urged to withhold their accommodation fees from May 1, in a bid to force the university to take student concerns over rent hikes seriously.The University of Auckland is facing a strike from students over the cost of on-campus accommodation. The Students ...
Opinion: The famed American architect and urban designer Daniel Burnham once said, “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood!” Burnham wouldn’t have been referring to the transport plans in Aotearoa New Zealand over the past five years; projects so big they hadn’t the credibility to ...
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Opinion: With maths understanding at 42 percent for Year 8 students, there’s no doubt something has to be done. But how? The post Financial literacy should be on all of us appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Hineaupounamu ‘Missy’ Nuku has been scaling mountains in Canada for her college basketball team, the Lakeland Rustlers. Alberta is currently home for the 20-year-old point guard, who is in her first year of a scholarship at Lakeland College, where she is studying for a business degree. She has certainly made ...
New Zealand and the Philippines have signed a new maritime security agreement and stated their concerns over activity in the South China Sea, as Chinese vessels continue to flout international law. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Philippines President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos committed to signing a Mutual Logistics Supporting Arrangement by ...
The thousands of government “back-office” job cuts are causing widespread pain in the capital city. In today’s episode of The Detail, we speak to three journalists and a think tank researcher, looking at the larger picture around the cuts and what effect it will have on Wellington, a city that’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra When ASIO boss Mike Burgess delivered his annual threat assessment earlier this year, he stressed the rising danger posed by espionage and foreign interference. “In 2024, threats to our way of life have surpassed ...
The Tribunal had called on Minister for Children Karen Chhour to provide evidence at an urgent inquiry into the repeal of Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By T.J. Thomson, Senior Lecturer in Visual Communication & Digital Media, RMIT University Midjourney image by T.J. Thomson As more than half of Australian office workers report using generative artificial intelligence (AI) for work, we’re starting to see this technology affect every ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa Nicole Sharwood, Injury epidemiologist | Expert Witness, UNSW Sydney Sergey Novikov/Shutterstock Injuries are the leading cause of disability and death among Australian children and adolescents. At least a quarter of all emergency department presentations during childhood are injury-related. Injuries can ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Di Winkler, Adjunct Associate Professor, Living with Disability Research Centre, La Trobe University Shutterstock/Ground PictureMany Australians with disability feel on the edge of a precipice right now. Recommendations from the disability royal commission and the NDIS review were released late ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Salman Shooshtarian, Senior Lecturer, School of Property, Construction and Project Management, RMIT University Salman Shooshtarian Asbestos has been found in mulch used for playgrounds, schools, parks and gardens across Sydney and Melbourne. Local communities naturally fear for the health of their ...
Family First says that the latest abortion statistics make grim and upsetting reading, with a 25% increase in abortions since the decriminalisation of abortion in March 2020. According to an Official Information Act request received by Right to Life ...
Ipsos New Zealand's inaugural participation in a global study on populism reveals a pervasive sense of societal and economic decline among New Zealanders. MORE DETAILS AND FULL REPORT HERE Ipsos New Zealand's inaugural participation in a global study ...
We need immigrants to work here cause Kiwi’s are either too stoned, lazy or sitting on the other side of the road begging while immigrant workers rebuild Christchurch (total misquote but the essence of Hides Bull feces NBR).
I call Bull shit cause once again we have yet another immigrant being exploited by a Kiwi company that won’t employ Kiwi’s – not because of pot, not because of lack of work ethic but cause $$$$.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/326339/food-company-fined-a-further-$11k-over-immigrant's-wages
Judge Inglis said this sort of case was all too common in New Zealand.
“The position Mr Domingo has found himself in is not unique.
“It is clear that it has taken a degree of personal endurance to pursue matters to this point.
“Mr Domingo said that he had felt like ‘giving up’ in terms of seeking compliance with the authority’s awards. These are observations which the Employment Court frequently hears in cases such as this.”
Our journey to the bottom continues
Bill will be here shortly to label you and RNZ xenophobic in due course.
How on earth is anyone allowed to justify importing low skilled labour here, permanent or temporary? Allow the wages to rise to a level that is sustainable for kiwis , expensive kiwi cost of living but international third world wages being payed.
[Mischaracterisation riding the back of smear…or is that the other way around? No matter – it’s really, really stupid to attack the site’s authors. One week ban.] – Bill
What a dreadful place this government has lead us to when it comes to housing. New Zealand now has the most unaffordable housing across a range of measures. New Zealand, once admired for the housing of its citizens, has a government which has watched over a division in society on housing which may never be repaired.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2017/03/new-zealand-housing-most-unaffordable-in-the-world-the-economist.html
High time ownership ( or an equitable interest) in a property in NZ gave you compulsory tax residence-(offshore group) in NZ and you are taxed on your worldwide tax income & assets against which you may offset any taxes paid as a tax resident – (onshore group).
That should tax care of the super problem & a few others too.
This government like it that way because it means a few rich people can become even bigger bludgers. If we had equality then people may actually become independent of rich people and then the rich wouldn’t be able to bludge off of everyone else.
Good thought’s – I think we should all do some serious bludging off the rich to get to the equality model.
I’ve just been over to Frank Macskasy’s page to read his immigration article.
Now I know that John key didn’t take responsibility for anything but there is a picture montage there of newspaper headlines and it’s like “wow” I found the visual impact pretty strong.
Don’t know who owns it or who did it but felt it would make an excellent poster etc and deserves widespread distribution. One picture a thousand words.
and BTW not sure if it can be fixed -but when I click on the usual spot on the feed I normally get Frank’s picture not the article. I’m sure Frank’s good lookin’ but?
Tenants pay $200-plus to share ‘slum’ with rats – Business – NZ Herald …
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11815660
For sale: the $5m slum Steve Braunias wanders through the grim …
m.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11815645
18 months ago I approached the head tenant of where I pay $250.00 per week for a run down shithole that has a lose tap, poor drainage /guttering issues , and a shower that does not drain properly.
It also has faulty wiring that has pooled at some stage and shorted( blown ) the ceiling light socket.
Several other wall sockets are faulty.
As a result of this weather bomb we are having – I found water pouring in from the wall in the bathroom/toilet area at about half way up the wall.
This pooled into the open plan area where the carpet now is .
I would estimate 1-2 cm’s or more in depth.
The place is a potential electrical deathtrap with water back- pooling in the walls.
I also note as a past painter and decorator the dilapidated paint job and the amateur attempts to fill all the punch holes in the walls and doors.
Two weeks ago I suffered my first heart attack and received a stent in a heart artery. I am still breathless and sometimes exhausted as a result. And I am furious.
It is obvious that the landlord has bought this property as a part of a cheap investment portfolio and intends to pay as little as possible ( nothing ) toward either its livability or its maintenance. It obviously has had NO money spent on bringing it up to standard . It would be around early 1980’s vintage.
Reading the above article in the NZ Herald today has made me feel almost vigilante towards this National govt that has enabled this type of criminal element to get away with this sort of blatant racketeering.
I will approach the head tenant and if he doesn’t grow some balls ASAP I will go to the Tenancy Tribunal on Monday , and force the issue. Another recourse is social media.
A message to both Bill English and Andrew Little.
To Bill English, – I AM NOT SOME ANIMAL OR DOG TO BE TREATED LIKE SHIT.
To Andrew Little. I believe you and Jacinda Adern have it in your power to do something about this sort of state of affairs that has been legitimized by this National govt up and down this country to so many of their fellow countrymen and women.
Stop standing at the gateway umming and ahhing. Get bold and do something.
You have EVERY moral right to do so.
Do that ?… and the people will carry you through the next election and on into govt for the years to come . And you will have the peoples MANDATE to rectify this viscous govts avarice and self serving agenda.
Do nothing?
Then you amply deserve the wrath and the cursing of the voters for your timid inaction.
No, from what you’re saying, it is a death trap – and that’s without the water. The water increases the probability of death.
This type of stuff has been building up for some time. Decades in fact as the rentiers have realised that being immoral arseholes that endanger peoples lives has no consequences.
The problem with National is that they’ll keep it that way.
The article neglected to mention the army of cockroaches that scuttle round the floors and up the walls at night. Refrigerators (privately owned and kept in tenants’ rooms to keep food safe) are soon invaded by the cockroaches. The place is a hell hole but is better than nothing. A few fortunate tenants have managed to escape and move into HNZ flats. Auckland needs far more flats for single people on low incomes but HNZ do not seem interested in this group.
@ WILD KATIPO
Here’s a thought, if the place is such a dive, why not move out?
They’ve just had a heart attack, the stress and effort of moving house is probably not a good idea.
But even if they hadn’t, I can think of plenty of circumstances that make moving hard.
Yes, I’m aware of that. However, that was recently, this has been going on for 18 months apparently. Thus, there was ample opportunity to move out beforehand.
Moreover, why move into such a dive in the first place?
To make room for my son to complete a certificate and so he could use the room I had to vacate when I was staying at my sisters and brother in- laws after relocating to Auckland to get a security job.
That’s why.
And as for moving into the dive?
Do you have your head up your arse as well?
It may be one step better than sleeping in a fucking car but not much bud.
And why the fucking hell should I have to give you my bloody life story online in full public just to educate a moron like you anyway?
I have no need to hear your life story, thanks.
I was merely trying to ascertain why you initially moved into such a dive and why you haven’t moved out?
People generally move into dives because they are far cheaper to rent. And rents tend to reflect the standard and location of the property.
Both your previous comments came across as accusatory. Like WK shouldn’t have rented there in the first place, and should have moved out. Like I said, it’s not hard to imagine circumstances where that’s not easy, or even possible.
Your comments are bizarre actually given there is a well known housing crisis going on.
We can all speculate on their situation. I was merely trying to ascertain the facts in this case. Nothing bizarre or accusatory about it.
WK – Do you mind if I put your original comment up as a guest post tomorrow?
Go for your life.
I’ve lived in millionaires homes when I was younger and I’ve lived a year up in the mountains in the middle of winter in a stone shack outside of Queenstown when I was goldmining in the rivers with a pump , floating dredge and wet- suit and another year in a mountain tent .
Been self employed and owned a half mil dollar property of my own – then lost it all during 2008.
And I reckon I’ve lived more of a life than half these far right wing wannabe pseudo intellectual neo liberal fanatics who comment on this blog site .
And when I saw that article in the NZ Herald this morning , in light of whats been happening to so many New Zealander family’s having to sleep in cars and the like over the past few years – I thought ”FUCK IT !!”… Im going to say something.
Because now this govt and their neo liberal perversions have just got personal.
I’m fortunate that I’ve only got me to worry about.
But at least when you live in the boon docks in a tent or an old abandoned stone shack its free. And you can accept a primitive lifestyle.
But to get shafted and ripped off each and every bloody week just for the privilege of living in a shitty run down dogbox so some blighted little parasitic scum bag can live in comfort and climb up on your shoulders galls me to the bone.
And the fact that pricks like this are being enabled to do so by this shitty, do nothing , hands off incumbent non govt should fill every decent and honest bastard full of rage.
But then we’d all need bloody stents. 🙁
Hope your luck turns for the better soon.
Already got mine. Keeps me alive.
An individual’s ability to choose is proportionate to their net worth.
That’s a rule that applies to far too many things in society, and you obviously have no idea just how fundamental it is.
I understand that. I was merely trying to establish if this was a factor in this case.
If WK moved into this flat because of fiscal constraints, having it repaired may result in a rent increase. Which may force/price WK out.
Oh, so you just wanted to make sure that WK didn’t move into a dangerous shelter just so they could bitch about it? 🙄
Your second sentence perfectly describes the point that you still seem to have managed to miss: if the housing system means that some people can only afford to live in dwellings that are hazardous to their health or have no dwelling whatsoever, then that system is broken. And people are trapped living in hovels.
“Your second sentence perfectly describes the point that you still seem to have managed to miss”
Not at all. I agree the current system is failing some.
So you were merely trying to establish that the system was failing WK, as opposed to what?
What benefit do you or anyone get putting WK’s story under a microscope? What’s your point?
No, I was trying to establish what the actual facts in this case are.
I wasn’t putting their story under a microscope. I merely asked two simple questions.
The point of this was to establish if fiscal constraints was/is the problem preventing WK from moving out.
I’ve seen a number of people complain about the state of their rented dwellings and advocating for a rental warrant while failing to consider that improvements to their dwellings would most likely lead to rent increases, thus forcing/pricing them out. Hence it’s not really the solution.
What the actual facts are? As opposed to what you’ve already been told?
Your concern about possible future increases in rent is touching /sarc
“What the actual facts are? As opposed to what you’ve already been told?”
Yes, that’s correct. WK didn’t divulge why they didn’t just move out.
“Your concern about possible future increases in rent is touching /sarc”
You may find it funny and something to mock, but it’s a potential reality, thus a genuine concern.
No, I don’t find it funny.
I find it completely fucked up. I find your faux concern fucked up. I find it nuts that you think the take-home message is “don’t complain, because things might end up worse-off for you if you do”. I find it fucked up that you think people would be anything other than forced to live in circumstances that make them concerned for their lives and feel like they’re treated like animals. I think it’s fucked up that you need to know every fucking detail in order to avoid facing the obvious reasons as to why someone even moved into a place in the first place. I think it’s fucked up that you believe that just one more detail might suddenly make it all WK’s fault and a completely avoidable and solvable situation.
“Actual facts”??? Do you think WK was misleading you in some way? For fuck’s sake.
Certainly doesn’t seem likely. In fact it simply seems likely.
Once again, my concern is genuine.
Clearly you’ve misunderstood my comment above.
I wasn’t implying not to complain, I was highlighting why a rental warrant isn’t the best solution.
In WK’s case, being impacted by a rent increase as a result is a potential outcome, it’s not my take-home message for not complaining, it’s merely the reality which comes back to our broken system. And it’s not a system I support. So it’s not my rationale that’s fucked up.
Wk could have moved into the place for numerous reasons, location being one. I didn’t require to know every fucking detail as you put it. In fact WK told me far more than I needed to know, but failed to tell me what I wanted to know.
I’m not blaming WK for their current predicament, just trying to better understand it And no, I don’t think WK was misleading me, however my questions were not answered, therefore we can only speculate on why WK initially moved in, hasn’t moved out and has put up with it for so long.
Moreover, considering what he’s put out there, my questions were reasonable and to be expected.
List three reasons that someone would stay for a year and a half in a shit-hole that puts them in fear of their health. Other than money.
“To Andrew Little. I believe you and Jacinda Adern have it in your power to do something about this sort of state of affairs that has been legitimized by this National govt up and down this country to so many of their fellow countrymen and women.”
If they are elected into power, they will then have the power to do something.
What do you want Little to do about it?
WILD KATIPO as it is in the bathroom, you have rights.
Phone around find the most expensive plumber you can find. THE MOST Expensive. Then find a sparky in the same camp. Explain to them the situation – the bill goes to the landlord. If you are in Auckland, some of these trades people are only to happy to help.
Book them in to turn up in 24 hours, then inform the landlord what you have done on the ground of health and safety. And that in 24 hours this will be happening. As you will not let the property be damaged on your watch. Only a idiot landlord will not act at this point.
All perfectly legal. And compliant to the residential tenancy act.
This particular landlord would not pay the bill. He has been aware of the conditions for years and makes no effort to improve them. Wants the rent on time though. In Auckland plumbers don’t start the job until they are guaranteed payment.
That why I said try some of the expensive places, and tell them what is going on. You will be quietly surprised. They will get paid, as per the act – via the disputes tribunal and putting debt collectors on them. The big expensive outfits are the only option left, because they know the law, and will get their money.
Small places can’t afford to not get payed. Or fight to get their money. Hence why they won’t do the job.
Hey WK.
If you need an assist in whatever you want to do I’d be happy to provide some.
As you may have noticed, I really don’t like lazy dipshits, and deficient and grasping landlords are high in that list.
Besides, we bearers of the stent could do to help our new brethren.
Emailing is in the contact page. Happy to make time.
it sounds like your landlord is breaking all sorts of rules, Unless YOU get off your arse and complain, though, nothing will change,
It’s up to YOU , not Bill English or anyone else.
https://tenancy.govt.nz/maintenance-and-inspections/
You don think the govt has a role in safety compliance for housing? Wow.
WK already said what they’re going to do, despite having been seriously ill, did you even read the comment? Got any social conscience or intelligence at all?
I didn’t see the Tenancy Tribuna bit in his post/rant it was all a bit jumbled and hard to read.
The point though is unless you raise issues with the appropriate authorities nothing will ever change,.
And this has been going on for at least 18 months, why hasn’t he been to the tenancy tribunal already.
Your snide flamebait reveals your character.
And just what can the tenancy tribunal actually do?
Can it charge his landlord with attempted murder?
Can it even fine him?
Can it force him to refurbish the place to a liveable standard?
Or is it like many of these government entities that have been set up over the decades that people are supposed to complain to but have no teeth to force anything?
“I didn’t see the Tenancy Tribuna bit in his post/rant it was all a bit jumbled and hard to read.”
Nice try, but I managed it on a phone while unwell. I think more likely you just rushed through on your way to trolling.
“The point though is unless you raise issues with the appropriate authorities nothing will ever change,.”
Quite. When you have mass problems across the country, the governing party is the appropriate authority. Basically what you are saying is that all responsibility lies with the tenant, irrespective of their ability to go to the Tenancy Tribunal. In which case landlords are free to be as fuckwitted as they like until they caught by a private citizen. Nice.
“And this has been going on for at least 18 months, why hasn’t he been to the tenancy tribunal already.”
Have you ever been to the Tribunal BM?
I’m actually all for a rental WOF.
Landlords are running a business and selling a service, what they sell should be up to scratch.
The problem is at the moment, there’s a shortage of rentals, a rental WOF would probably remove at least 10% of the rental stock from the market as well as push up already over inflated rental prices.
Once we get the housing situation under control then introduce a rental WOF at the moment I think it will cause more harm than good.
Ok, so not actually the fault of the person who just had a heart attack.
“Once we get the housing situation under control”
Oh good, you’re voting on the left this year then. Because National have admitted they don’t know what to do.
+1
Any rental WOF needs to be well designed and implemented though
I wasn’t much impressed by the one previously proposed
You mean the one that was already trialled? What was wrong with it?
From memory, it went too far beyond health and safety issues.
A.
Such as?
WOF should cover
– Electrics
– Water quality.
– Insulation ceilings/floor
– Weather tightness
– Waste water/toilets
– Locks
– Extraction fans kitchen/Bathroom
– Smoke alarms.
– Stairs and railings if multistory
Maybe heating.
Everything else is excessive
maybe heating, lol. You don’t live in the SI do you.
Ok, so cracks in the floorboards, mouldy walls, that sort of thing are not to be covered because that would be excessive?
Mouldy walls are covered by weather tightness and ventilation.
Cracked floorBoards? how big is the crack? you just need to duck down to any building supply and get some caulk, fixed for under $10.00
What sort of heating do you expect the landlord to cover?
“Mouldy walls are covered by weather tightness and ventilation.”
I’ve seen rooms that have mould that would pass a weather tight and ventilation test. Are you saying that it should be a weather tightness, ventilation, and mould check? Seems odd, I would put addressing mould as a separate category, especially given it’s potentially such a health risk.
“Cracked floorBoards? how big is the crack?”
Big enough to cause damage to your foot from the rough edge. My point was that you had excluded general repairs, or otherwise dangerous shit.
“What sort of heating do you expect the landlord to cover?”
Fixed heating. So a wood burner or heat pump or other form of electric heating that goes with the house (may as well ban gas on upgrades because of CC).
I’ve seen rooms that have mould that would pass a weather tight and ventilation test. Are you saying that it should be a weather tightness, ventilation, and mould check? Seems odd, I would put addressing mould as a separate category, especially given it’s potentially such a health risk.
What’s causing the mould?
If the walls or roof is leaking no amount of ventilation is going to make a difference, you’re going to have mould issues.
Anything else can be fixed with decent ventilation or educating the tenants.
Fixed heating. So a wood burner or heat pump or another form of electric heating that goes with the house.
To heat a whole house (100-150 m2) with heat pumps you’re looking at 10-15k
The’s the problem if you start to get too overzealous you reach a point where the landlord says fuck it, kicks out the tenants, sells up and there’s one less rental.
Previous occupiers not opening the bathroom window. So the ventilation and weathertightness would pass, but there is existing mould. Mould prevention isn’t the same as mould removal.
“The’s the problem if you start to get too overzealous you reach a point where the landlord says fuck it, kicks out the tenants, sells up and there’s one less rental.”
It’s only a problem if you think the housing market is more important than people’s health and wellbeing. The government can buy houses, get them up to scratch and add them to their HNZ managed rentals.
However I suspect that your point is based on the need to defend landlord profits rather than whether lots of landlords will really get out of the business. If a someone can’t install fixed heating in a house for far less than $15,000 they’re probably not competent to be a landlord.
Maybe the ideal solution would be to get the crap that needs doing up out of the rental / investor market and either demolished or sold off cheaply to first home buyers as a do-up.
This is how a lot of us got our foot on the property ladder in past generations but openings are limited now.
However I suspect that your point is based on the need to defend landlord profits rather than whether lots of landlords will really get out of the business. If a someone can’t install fixed heating in a house for far less than $15,000 they’re probably not competent to be a landlord.
If you’re installing fixed heating to a WOF standard and want to use heat pumps it will cost you 10-15k.
The only other form of electric heating you could use is resistance heating which is just your bar heaters so all you really need to do is provide a power point.
You could install a wood burner for 5k but a lot of tenants don’t want the hassle of having to chop wood also you’ll need a shed to store the wood.
“If you’re installing fixed heating to a WOF standard and want to use heat pumps it will cost you 10-15k.”
What’s the standard?
“You could install a wood burner for 5k but a lot of tenants don’t want the hassle of having to chop wood also you’ll need a shed to store the wood”
Most firewood merchants cut wood to size now, no need for chopping. I’ve stored firewood under a tarp many times.
“Maybe the ideal solution would be to get the crap that needs doing up out of the rental / investor market and either demolished or sold off cheaply to first home buyers as a do-up.
This is how a lot of us got our foot on the property ladder in past generations but openings are limited now.”
I think so too. The whole “landlords can’t afford it and will sell” line, apart from basically saying that some people should live in hovels, also misses the opportunity to sort this out once and for all and that it can be sorted out.
Imagine if we applied the same principle to a car WOF 🙄 People can’t afford to get the repairs done in their cars so we let’s not do a WOF system.
Crook today Weka? Sympathies
He is a past painter and decorator living by himself with a heart condition, probably aggravated by the stress of getting nowhere with the head tenant.
He has earned and deserves respect for the life he gave to his trade and the restraint and patience he has shown.
My guess is he hasn’t been to the Tenancy Tribunal because he is stoical and has the dignity and expectation of good faith in others to try to fix it by a personal approach to the head tenant.
And once he goes to the Tenancy Tribunal he’ll be kicked out for some trumped up reason or other. Boarders don’t have many rights.
it sounds like your landlord is breaking all sorts of rules,
That’s right. He is.
And has been enabled by the same sort greedy governance that created the exploitative housing crisis in the first place.
Is there a WARRANT OF FITNESS for New Zealand housing ?
No.
Have I gotten ‘OFF MY BACKSIDE ‘ ?
Yes. I have mentioned this 18 months ago.
Is the accommodation dangerous?
Yes.
Should I have had to ‘ GET OFF MY BACKSIDE’ in the first place?
No.
If there were adequate laws and safety standards in place in this country governing rental accommodation – this should never have had to happen.
And do I have current health issues that might prevent me form ‘ GETTING OFF MY BACKSIDE’ and being Mr Fucking Action Man ?
Yes.
Especially if you regard a heart attack and hospitalization two weeks ago as a health issue.
So stick it up your arse BM , you odious bastard.
Im in no mood for ignorant pricks like you just currently.
+111
+1000 WK
BM takes the dickhead of the day award, and so early in the morning.
Katipo
Do you need help from someone on here in your approach to the Tenancy Tribunal?
A.
ATM… just feeling a little bit like my blood pressures going through my head. The head tenants been out overnight, I’ll approach him when he returns. If he contacts the landlord and action is taken to avoid bringing in the Tribunal , well and good. If not , I’ll push the issue. Starting Monday. I should be fine by myself and thank you.
I live by myself but family is not too far away , so I’m fortunate.
Always was a tradie outdoors type worker , pretty physically strong but this heart business has been a real confidence knocker… so just a bit sort of weepy atm… Id like to say thank you for the moral support from both Draco and weka and yourself. Ive spoken enough about housing here before but now Im REALLY feeling part of it.
So ironic L0L !
Cheers people
🙂
Take care matey! Three weeks isn’t very long to recover. Stress if a funny thing, sometimes it’s easier to do something stressful than do nothing about another stressor, but can you also take some time with this?
I’m wondering if there are pathways through the Tribunal process that mean its expedited on the grounds of health or danger.
I dunno , but atm Im taking a back seat and just going to relax… that head pounding feeling isn’t pleasant… so Ill kick back for the rest of the day ,get some sleep then have another go.
cheers.
Sorry to read this. Wishing you a good recovery.
@ Wild Katipo … been following your sad situation through this blog. Makes for pretty shocking reading, that circumstances such as yours being allowed to prevail in NZ in the first place to decent Kiwis!
More publicity needs to be drawn to issues such as yours, with some serious scrutiny being done on your living conditions, along with the obscene profits gained from scurrilous landlords, preying on good people such as yourself in need of accommodation! From what you have written, your plight seems pretty appalling to say the least, sub human in fact! You and others like you need advocates to act on your behalf.
I wish you all the best in getting some positive action here. Take very good care of yourself my friend and look after that good heart of yours.
Cheers
Mary
well said.
so very well said.
Sorry to hear your plight
If your not getting what your paying for stop paying your rent or partial pay , let him do all the work re getting you to tenancy tribunal
Red, stop offering advise that breaks the law.
You can not stop paying the rent, you will be evicted.
As it is a breach of the Tenancy act, you give an automatic win in any tribunal hearing to a land lord. NO matter the circumstances which drove you to not pay rent.
You have to pay rent, to even the worst scum sucking leech. Tenants have no power, no matter how reality shows try to tell the lie otherwise.
Ok but that was not my actual experience as a student when landlord made non consented additions and prevented us getting quite enjoyment of flat. But if your the expert I will go with that
How long ago were you a student? The law has changed. You can read the act and regulation if you like, but this is a better explanation.
https://tenancy.govt.nz/starting-a-tenancy/new-to-tenancy/key-rights-and-responsibilities/
It you go to the Tenancy Tribunal, then there is a risk of getting a retaliatory eviction. Plain and simple. If a landlord wants to get rid of you, he will find a way. Despite what landlords moan about, it is actually quite easy to evict a tenant.
On RNZ website: “Northern storm due in part to climate change – professor”
Can’t be a great week to be living in NZ’s north – whether it be people living in the open, on streets, in garages, in cars, or with families sharing to small a living space.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZPHFiJjwJY
Marama Davidson on the privatisation of state housing in Glen Innes:
She cuts through all the BS that the redevelopment is benefiting local HNZ tenants.
This reminds me of another National Party hypocrisy. Bolger’s support for the idea of social capital as somehow linked to the preservation of strong market incentives ie. vote National and you will be enabled to get ahead at the expense of the community.
“For Bolger (1998), social capital does not draw on “old fashioned, discredited socialism” but rather his conviction of the “strength, goodness and commonsense of communities”. He speaks of a change of emphasis from economic capital to social capital: recent economic reforms will preserve strong market incentives, now, apparently, all we need to develop a new approach to social policy which will empower communities to deal with the many social problems facing them.”
http://www.amat.org.nz/Neoliberalism.pdf
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/90189659/witness-jailed-for-refusing-to-answer-questions-gets-new-insights-in-prison
There is nothing I can say here…its simply a link to a very interesting point of view about the effects and reality of imprisonment. Though also interesting from a legal point of view, yet to be fully played out in the courts.
Elon Musk sets the cat among the pigeons with an open offer to South Australia for grid scale batteries to cover intermittency problems with South Australia’s high proportion of wind and solar generation. That’s a real in-your-face challenge to the fossil-heads in Canberra.
https://arstechnica.com/business/2017/03/elon-musk-on-batteries-for-australia-installed-in-100-days-or-it-is-free/
I’m curious as to what the named IT tools are in this advert for a Linux admin person at NZ’s 5Eyes operation (applications close 31 March 2017):
What about it Lpent.
Could be interesting.
Not my kind of thing. I prefer to write code rather than running systems.
The only reason that I run this system is because of a favor asked long long ago by some people on the original crew, and because I can treat it as a semi interesting hobby rather than real work. I have always detested it when I have wound up doing the IT department’s work rather than development.
I suspect that whoever they are after is just a flunky to run some of their infrastructure rather than something I’d ever find interesting.
It is a generic role listing for an administrator/systems/network engineer
The tools listed are ‘out of the box’, and the level indicated for the role would be lower intermediate to intermediate
Face value
Indeed. I find it bad enough running a vSphere cluster for the testing crew. And at least I have skin in that. They’re often testing my code.
Thanks, Lynn and One Two.
They’re often testing my code.
You mean intermediate level admin people at your work? Not GCSB admin people?
Nope – definitely not. Nor the IT people.
The wonderful Testers who find my bugs for me before the customers do. They are some of my favorite people.
And for the record, and because I have been known to indulge in it on the odd occassion, there was no irony at all on those statements.
Being able to test integrated systems systematically and repeatably is a skill that so few people lack that it rates for me as a talent. I can (and often do) write unit-tests and functional tests pr perform bench testing all day and never find some of the integration flaws and outright bugs these people do.
When you’re putting dozens of hardware and software units together in an integrated system over a wireless system, being able to work on flaws long enough to describe a reproducible condition is freaking hard. Yet some people (unlike me) can do it. That means that I can find and kill the damn thing.
Very interesting Iprent As a mech engineer computer technology to me is really mind blowing. especially the advancement in the design and draughting area’s. From drawing boards and slide rules and modern day 3D drawing programmes.
I have always admired you guys because as an engineer mechanical problems are easy to find. If it rattles, it is too loose, if it gets too hot it’s too tight and if it squeaks it needs a little lubricant. Dead easy not like you guys especially some of the ones I have met who have built programmes so all the mechanical bits work in the right sequence. In your game when you turn the switch on and nothing happens. you always seem to know where to look. without getting zapped or causing major problems, with no indication or signs of the problem.
Amazon bestsellers list,led by Reasons To Vote For Democrats: A Comprehensive Guide
https://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/books/ref=sv_b_2
Someone should sell stamps and stamping pads with various words that people can print into the book themselves. Old school, but retro, very trendy.
Fascism
Tr*mp
President Bannon
weka, and your list is why this limited form of democracy is a sick joke.
Bugger the democrats, seriously they put up a hard right conservative, and we are suppose to think that is better?
Seriously trump is bad, but to be frightened to vote conservative is just as evil. This was, and is the whole issue, why vote for the lesser evil, when all you get served is evil? Demand better.
Of course.
If the election were to be held over, and you had a vote, and the choice was Tr*mp and co, or Clinton, who would you vote for?
I don’t vote for evil.
To vote for evil, is morally bankrupt.
h.r.c and trump are both evil, different faces of it, but both are equally lacking in a moral compass, and a innate sense of goodness.
It’s like asking someone if they want their leg cut off at the knee, or at the hip, it is just degrees of nasty.
Gosh, I really hope that one day I will feel sufficiently privileged and disconnected from other humans that when it comes to the moment of actually voting, I can opt out of the unpalatable task of choosing the least bad realistic option for the future while adopting a sneering morally superior tone about my cop-out.
You could try morals Andre. It’s not about sneering, it’s about demanding better.
I’d point out your approach got us to trump.
Your approach fucks over the Standing Rock tribe.
Your approach fucks over everybody affected by the appointment of Scott Pruitt to the EPA – ie everyone on this planet.
Your approach fucks over all the people suffering from the increase in hate in the US over the last six months.
Your approach fucks over … the list is very long.
My approach was to support Bernie all the way to the point where he no longer had any chance of winning the nomination. Then I swallowed hard and changed my support to the next least bad realistic alternative. Here in New Zealand, the Greens are the party likely to get into government that is least bad from my perspective. So my approach is I’ll support them, even though I have serious problems with some of their positions.
Who are you going to fuck over in September because no party with a chance of getting into Parliament in New Zealand is pure and moral enough for you?
And will he expect them to thank him for his exemplary display of moral purity? Will they – and it’s always ‘they’ or ‘them’, always someone else – willingly sacrifice their welfare and lives because he tells them it’s for a higher cause?
There’s a point where moral purity becomes sanctimony, and that is the vice of hypocrisy that accommodates other people’s suffering as a mark of one’s supposed virtue.
I’ve friends directly affected by Trump’s actions and they can certainly tell the difference between Clinton and Trump. For at least one friend of mine in the States, it’s no delicate discussion about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin or whether its sinful to whistle on a Tuesday, it’s literally life and death for her with her health coverage disappearing and the spike in hate crimes against her community. She’s made it abundantly clear that she’d take great pleasure in making balloon animals with the intestines of people like Adam who refused to vote or wasted their vote on Stein because they wanted to strike a pose.
Yeah, I’ve just had my sister-in-law and niece visiting.
One of them works for a church in a Trump county. She’s got some really sad stories to tell, that have got a lot worse since November.
The other is a doctor whose last several positions were in Trump counties where there were severe opioid addiction problems. She’s currently doctoring in an impoverished area here in NZ, and has decided to lengthen her time here for several years beyond her original plans. Although the fact that she’s spending most of her time being a doctor instead of administering paperwork for insurance purposes has something to do with that.
Who is pure? I’ve never asked for purity, you seem obsessed by it rhinocrates, oddly enough. I’m asking for people to be moral, and act on it.
That aside did you miss that the Democrats lost everything, THEY LOST EVERYTHING! The house, the senate, and the presidency. So the Stein argument is a lie. Try watching somthing other MSNBC.
But sure live in lala land, where people who actually make moral choices are the enemy.
Yeah. Okay, that’s basically endorsing always putting others in charge. And those people that voters put in charge then determine what health policy or other social welfare policy will be brought forward, or not brought forward, or rolled back, or never discussed, based on their approach to and degree of accommodation towards capitalist markets.
Their rule is illegitimate – ie, they can’t justify it. And they always in representative democracies, in parliamentary systems, serve and never fundamentally question financial and business interests – interests that run on deliberate systems of trade and production and distribution that (in case you’ve missed it) have brought us screaming right on up to a cliff edge at a great rate of knots. (resources fucked, peoples’ lives fucked, the climate fucked, eco-systems fucked)
And yet still most advocate that we continue voting until the cows come home in some vain hope that there will one day be worthy leaders determined to do what is right. (There will an occasional exception that will serve to prove the rule, who will be swiftly stomped on and removed to the dead lands beyond the far fringes)
Not voting while seeking to develop parallel organsiational structures for society is entirely legitimate – and certainly more mature than just voting once every three, four or five years and going home ‘to the telly’ after the two minutes of participation as most people are apt to do.
And there are dozens of other legitimate routes of agency implied by those positions sketched out above.
But. How long now before we see the tired old mantra wheeled out? The one that claims that those who do not vote have no right to complain? Talk about defining politics and possibilities in the narrowest and most disempowering (not to mention downright dangerous) terms….
Allowing millions to be fucked over, often with fatal consequences, while knowing that it will happen as a consequence of your position is not a moral choice, it is a narcissistic one.
The people who suffer as a result will not thank you for sacrificing them.
That’s not living in lala land, la la land is a place where there are no consequences and hurt doesn’t matter. Living in reality means realising that there are more important things than keeping your hands lily white.
The opposition of voting versus joining a co-op is nonsensical – some of us can walk and chew gum at the same time.
It is also nonsensical to assume that if one ignores the state of the world as it is like a petulant child, it will magically go away and be replaced by exactly what you wish for. Power abhors a vacuum and if somehow representative democracy could be suddenly swept away, history has shown that what replaces it is usually much, much worse.
… and don’t presume to know what anybody does IRL away from a keyboard.
“… and don’t presume to know what anybody does IRL away from a keyboard.”
Ditto.
rhinocrates I’m not ignoring the world, as in the fact this was a hypothetical question, so I gave a answer to it.
You have point blankly refused to look at reality, the democrat’s have failed across the board. Why? They have failed, and you are ignoring it. It is becasue they are corrupt. That the whole so called establishment left in the USA have given up on working people, any chance you can see that?
Look I’ve got friends who will kill themselves when their health insurance runs out. That is reality, a harsh one. And you going to blame me, for a democratic party with no back bone, and no trust left with working people. You are going to have a go, becasue I say the system is broken. And say we should forget the ballot and fight for our rights. Well. It’s good to know where you stand.
Because here is the hypocrisy – If you buy into democracy, the right win, and they get to do what they want to do. People are going to suffer, that what happens in the system you are defending.
If you don’t get I’m fighting against evil, them you missing the point. and I can’t say too much more.
Adam, ‘fighting against evil’ is good, I don’t deny that you’re doing it, but you’ve become so obsessed with it as a Manichaean battle that you’ve ignored the collateral damage. If you are ‘good’, or label yourself as such, it does not necessarily follow that the consequences of what you do or fail to do are good.
I don’t give a toss about how virtuous you are. I care about the consequences of the kinds of actions or avoidance of action you promote. Right now I see people suffering because people who could have voted against Trump didn’t.
Trump’s win could have been prevented – a third of the electorate stayed at home, being too cool for school. There are direct consequences that were not part of the Democratic platform. Trump campaigned on anti-environmentalism, anti-semitism, islamophobia, homophobia, racism, misogyny and lo and behold, since his election, there has been a sharp rise in hate crimes that he inspired. These were not part of the Democratic Party campaign or policy.
Capitalism may be evil, but it is not the only evil in the world.
I agree that the Democratic party is corrupted, as are left parties worldwide that sold their souls to neoliberalism and called it the ‘centre’ (and don’t falsely assume that I’ve I’ve failed to see that – I’ve been very critical here about the state of the Labour Party). However, Sanders’ incursion at least showed that people aren’t chicken and changes were possible. In the aftermath they may get the kick up the arse that they need. One positive has been the spike in women now intending to run for office. Hopefully they will instigate change. Slowly, yes, but that’s life.
The left parties around the world are in a crisis of identity and integrity. In NZ at least we are able to cast protest votes for potential coalition partners or to at least get a voice in parliament. To hand a victory to the far right by saying they were always going to win is abdication and cowardice dressed up in sanctimony.
That is reality, a harsh one. And you going to blame me, for a democratic party with no back bone
With a disaster of this magnitude, there’s a lot of blame to go around and certainly plenty to spend on both. So what if you don’t get exactly what you want, completely and immediately? That’s no reason to throw your toys out of the cot; that’s a reason to work long and hard.
Two quotes from Voltaire: The perfect is the enemy of the good and The greatest crime is to do nothing because we can only do a little
My approach does not do any fornicating as you put it, it demands action. Not giving away sovereignty blindly to evil people.
You need to answer that question yourself, and you have, you are are willing to forsake morals for political power.
Yeah, not a choice I’m willing to make. Nor am I willing to stand aside, and let us keep falling into the abyss. Morality drives me to say, and act for the better world, not accept evil lithely.
Is it shocking to you that a stark evil is on display? Because you can help change that, and voting is only one part. I’d argue a very very small part, you can, and should do more. A lot more. Rather than get worked up by voting, which at the end of the day in a world dominated by corporations, is fast becoming the public illusion it always was. Try joining with others to improve your local community. Maybe sell your car, do some gardening, or join a Co-Op.
Your approach fucks over the Standing Rock tribe
Nope. Voting people into positions of power whereby they could essentially ‘lord it over’ others fucked…well, much more than anything that’s just limited to Standing Rock.
Uh, Bill, there’s the minor matter of a thing called reality. Reality says we’re stuck with operating within the system we have now and for the foreseeable future.
Kidding ourselves that we can ignore or opt out of that simply cedes power to the nastier arseholes. Whereas engaging with reality at least gives us the chance to cede power to the not-quite-as-nasty arseholes that have at least a vague interest in our views and a chance of some overlap of vision for the future.
If that ugly reality of the system we have to work within ever changes, then we’ll have to make our decisions and take actions within that new framework. But it will still be in everyone’s interest to engage with it as it is, rather than pretending that opting out is a better choice.
Sheesh Andre, why don’t you just admit you are a conservative and give up.
Seriously if people thought and acted like you we would not have any democracy, we would not have a end to slavery, we would not have women participating, no rights, nothing, all we’d have is the right to bow our heads, and say “Yes MASSA”
Uh, Bill, there’s the minor matter of a thing called reality. Reality says …
Our current systems of governance persist precisely for as long as we lend them credence. And not a moment longer. They have no life of their own and there is no immutable reality or law of nature determining how we govern that means we have no option but acquiescence.
Actually, it might be better if there was. Thinking CC here and how we seem to imagine basic laws of physics can be ignored…
Anyway, where did anyone suggest we ignore or opt out of stuff related to governance?
I could vote. And I could simultaneously undermine some very basic assumptions and expectations attached to ‘from on high’ governance by dint of how I arrange my society with others. Or I could not vote.
Adam, slavery ended because people voted for a president that was against slavery, and was willing to go to war over it.
Women’s suffrage happened because people voted in legislators that supported it.
MMP happened because people voted for it.
The common factor in all these things? People voted for it, and won.
Yes, those votes were preceded by lots of hard work by activists that were subject to derision and worse in building the movement. And building the movement is essential. But voting for legislators sympathetic to the movement, or at least less hostile, is equally essential. At least until we move to a system that does away with the legislators.
Sorry about filling your replies tab, Bill. But as far as opting out of governance, in the case of an election like the recent US one, refusing to consider one of the two candidate with a chance of winning and instead going for an option with absolutely no chance, as adam apparently would have done had he been eligible, is effectively opting out.
Do you believe the civil war was about slavery, Andre?
One Two, all the history and evidence I’ve ever come across suggests that yes, slavery was a big part of what the US Civil War was about. But feel free to tell us what it was about in your alternative history. Probably best to start a fresh comment, though, rather than fill Bill’s replies tab.
Wow Andre you just didn’t read what I said.
Just a couple of points.
One I did not say women suffrage, so where you dragged that from I’m not sure.
And two, how did we get the vote? Do you know, how did we win rights?
I think you need to stop assuming Andre, and start reading – just a suggestion.
Being wedded to belief systems leads to actions spawned, which paint individuals and groups into boxes…
Ego then ensures the box remain closed, and emotion takes over by lashing out at others with differing opinions
Non-judgment is beyond infinite sensations
Your approach fucks over the Standing Rock tribe.
Your approach fucks over everybody affected by the appointment of Scott Pruitt to the EPA – ie everyone on this planet.
Your approach fucks over all the people suffering from the increase in hate in the US over the last six months.
Your approach fucks over … the list is very long.
Fuck, yes. “I won’t vote for the lesser of two evils because I have morals” is why the USA is currently enjoying the dubious benefits of a descent into authoritarianism. If your morals involve assisting that process, it’s time to review your morals.
LOL, don’t ever stop Psycho Milt. Your muddled thinking is always good for a laugh.
[lprent: Translated loosely and almost sympathetically: I agree to disagree. ]
Does that mean you wouldn’t vote? Which in this case would be an affirmative for Tr*mp. I understand where you are coming from ethically, I’m just pointing out the pragmatics.
As we have had that choice for some time, and all it brings us is worse and worse people in politics. Pragmatics be damned, why support a steady slow crippling corruption?
So yeah I would not vote, and do what I normally do – get organised.
In our case New Zealand has great laws around Co-Operatives. Why are not people doing this more?
But to rely on the tired old political parties is beyond a sad joke. That is why I’m glad we have MMP, but even that has done far to little to improve the morality of our politicians, as this current government has put on display so often.
“But to rely on the tired old political parties is beyond a sad joke.”
Bill made similar commentary. Problem with that line is that it assumes that voting for the lesser evil (or in my case, the pragmatic choice), equates to relying on them.
Myself, I’ve been pretty up front that I think parliamentary politics is pretty much only good for holding the line while the real work gets done elsewhere. But I (and you) shouldn’t minimise it that much, because they still do some useful things, and that holding the line is the difference between super nasty and less nasty. You seem to believe we still have a choice for not nasty. In CC terms I think we are past that point. Which doesn’t mean we are without hope, but that whatever happens next it’s unlikely to be the revolution.
“In our case New Zealand has great laws around Co-Operatives. Why are not people doing this more?”
When people like yourself, Bill and me can’t work together, it’s probably not reasonable to expect others to who aren’t naturally interesting in that kind of co-operation.
Myself, I’ve been pretty up front that I think parliamentary politics is pretty much only good for holding the line
The status quo constraint,where real democratic contrarian debate is extinguished at all cost.
The illusion of democratic participation is well known,where the minority controls what is debated,where and when.
Galam (2004) for example showed in contrarian dynamics interesting properties arise.
“Applying our results to the European Union leads to the conclusion that it would be rather misleading to initiate large
public debates in most of the involved countries. Indeed, even starting from a huge initial majority of people in favor of the European Union, an open and free debate would lead to the creation of huge majority hostile to the European Union. This provides a strong ground to legitimize the on-going reluctance of most Europe an governments to hold referendum on associated issues.”
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378437103009695
The full article is behind a paywall, but the abstract and your excerpt seem to suggest that “contrarian debate” is actually not democratic, as it changes the opinions of the populace rather than merely reporting them.
Sorry I linked to the companion paper rather then the one quoted from.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378437104000330
http://home.iscte-iul.pt/~jmal/mcc/SergeGalam/Serge_Galam_Physica_A.pdf
Counter intuitive paradoxes prevail.
First point weka, I do work with Bill, mainly in picking his brain stuff. But as I’m a work locally type, and he is down the other end of the country, better to work the way we do.
As for working with you, I’d be happy to do that. I would not say I could not work with you.
What worries me, is so many here have got upset by a hypothetical question. Indeed a couple have gone into the realms of personal attack on a hypothetical not realising that we don’t actually live in the USA.
As I said and people have been deliberately obtuse about the NZ situation, and really don’t like being questioned on their morals.
I just don’t see the point in talking in circles with people who don’t want to listen to new ideas, or ideas which differ from theirs.
There’s ‘stupid’, ‘fucking idiot’ and then there’s ‘Trump supporter,’ which adds an extra slice of odiousness.
http://io9.gizmodo.com/trump-supporters-get-mad-because-they-think-the-man-in-1793159888?utm_campaign=socialflow_io9_facebook&utm_source=io9_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow
Amazon announced this week that it was launching Resistance Radio as a companion program for The Man in the High Castle, an alt-history drama loosely adapted from the Philip K. Dick novel. The pre-recorded radio program is basically a bunch of people talking about how the Third Reich is bad and does bad things. For some, they thought that applied to America’s current president (and/or they didn’t bother actually listening to it). In response, several irate opposers flocked to Amazon’s sponsored #ResistanceRadio hashtag to complain about the station’s “liberal agenda.”
Think about it, as one commenter puts it,
Trump supporter finds radio station talking about how terrible the Reich is, and how they should be opposed, and immediately starts defending the Nazi’s. What in the actual fuck?
FFS: If that wasn’t so pathetic, it’d be scary.
There there’s this brand of pathetic that enables Trump too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPKRKsQiI6o
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/03/why-the-alt-left-is-a-problem
Headlined AGAINST MERYL STREEP, the indictment declared, “Meryl Streep’s speechifying at the Golden Globes was the worst thing to happen since Trump’s election.” Hoo-kay.
https://medium.com/@sammystyle77/the-nihilistic-purity-of-the-far-left-will-kill-us-all-54169b25e3a8#.nvt4434in
Has there been a pandemic of stupid self-absorption?
Hard on the heels of yesterday’s I don’t remember what I was doing inside that building…..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCQMg2_O9v8&feature=youtu.be
3.9 Reserve Powers for NZ Council
3.9.1 NZ Council shall be authorised to suspend or cancel a leadership election in exceptional circumstances including, without limitation, the following:
• The death of a candidate;
• The calling of a General Election;
• Where NZ Council considers that the democratic integrity of the election process has been seriously undermined.
According to the Labour Party rules quoted above there does not need to be a leadership election when a general election has been called. This is understandable given that the process takes several weeks. Grant Robertson knows this. He has an opportunity to become leader by a simple majority vote in Caucus. If Labour keep polling badly and Chicken is behind Jacinda in preferred PM I’d predict he would make his move after June 23rd.That would be disastrous for Labour and given that Grant’s ambitions are insatiable he would put his own ambitions above those of Labour. You have been warned.
Gattaca, here we come.
“Sponsored by Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-North Carolina, the bill known as HR 1313 would allow for employers participating in “workplace wellness” programs to require their employees go through genetic testing, or risk taking a financial hit.”
http://www.salon.com/2017/03/10/house-committee-passes-bill-that-could-allow-employers-to-require-genetic-testing/
heh
https://twitter.com/JamesMelville/status/840092450119073792
Umm musing…
Looks like I might have to cut statcounter (one of our trackers) out of the site. It looks like they may be having some problems.
For a start, we’ve been getting some delays from statcounter over the last month not responding and slowing the page loads down. Something that is frigging irritating bearing in mind that only reason for having a visible tracker is to provide the Open Parachute ranking.
But I also just analyzed their tracking against the back end logs. That was because there was a major discrepancy between google analytics and their measurements. About 35k page views in February. It looks like google is right and statcounter close to 10% down.
And that was after statcounter dropped 43k page views into the count on Feb 27 – something that looks like a database scan and fix job.
They did something similar to The Daily Blog earlier in the month.
I think that either a server dropped off or they started missing something like the mobiles.
But I’ve looked at what has been happening since, and there is still a significiant daily discrepancy between the three measures. Stat counter is down by several thousand page views per day.
There is always a variation on sessions because each tracking site uses different algorithms. Which is why sessions are pretty useless to measure on.
But the human page views have been generally conformant between trackers. There are variations on the page view counting, but that is mainly dependent on the timezone of measurement for a day and if the tracker is executed at the top of the page or at the end. Usually a variation of just a few hundred human page views over a week. Nothing visible anywhere on the statcounter site about a problem. In fact the site seems a bit dead. They have been happy to take our money each month.
That does kind of mean that there are getting to be a dearth of reliable trackers with a public face that something like Open Parachute can use. Sitemeter has completely screwed up several times in the past few years. There are a couple of others, but as each needs considerable testing before I can trust it on a high volume site. And I don’t have the time.
I’ll watch statcounter to the end of the month. If they continue to screw up then I’ll remove their drag on the site. Google analytics does a good job and is what I actually use for most analysis. I can take the money from statcounter and go and buy some services from them, or just look for a couple of paid plugins to enhance the site.
Several of us were having problems with statcounter slowing down page loading so we ended up installing a blocker suggested by BM (uBlock Origin). Dunno if that will cause a discrepancy between the different counters.
It would 🙂
However it would have taken an awful lot of you to doing it to cause that level of discrepancy. It also doesn’t explain that whacking great pile of added page views on the 27th.
But yeah, statcounter has been a bit of a nuisance for speed lagging for a while now. Not as bad as sitemeter was before I got rid of it off the site years ago. I’d prefer to just use analytics which is very fast, non-intrusive and gives better stats as well. It is also pretty interesting watching it dodge blockers 🙂
However I decided a while ago that it was a good idea to leave a public track. It gives something for sites to aspire to 😈 What I should do is find out how to give some public access to the stats off that to Ken at Open Parachute. Analytics allows for specific logins to be able to access specific data. Maybe he’d leave off tormenting the flouridephobes for a while and code something to do that.
at the risk of interupting the adults while they are talking…i also started blocking stat counter too.
Okay… You are rapidly convincing me that I shouldn’t maintain statcounter.
It’s coming up to Saturday morning east coast USA time. Brace yourselves for another twitter eruption.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/trump-tweets-saturday-jared-kushner-ivanka-shabbat-235902
Solved.
http://api.theweek.com/sites/default/files/twittercollar.jpg?resize=600×600
OMG. Mr Bradbury must have had a Damascus moment!
Suddenly it’s no longer boomers that are responsible for all our ills or for inter-generation warfare. It’s neoliberalism!
LOL.
Funny how the Kurds are just ignored, Turkey is loving our looking the other way.
https://washingtonhatti.com/2017/02/25/korukoy-a-kurdish-city-in-turkeys-seast-has-been-under-siege-for-14-days/
http://stockholmcf.org/hdps-baydemir-takes-military-blockade-in-korukoy-to-parliaments-agenda/
https://libcom.org/news/turkey-torture-murder-state-kurdish-village-koruk%C3%B6y-09032017
So not only are we accepting torture as normal, which it is not. It is morally bankrupt.
We seem to now accept without much question the labeling of ordinary citizens as terrorists, and terrorising them.
But not half as much as Bashar.
/
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-07022017/#comment-1296790
Who are these people ignoring Syria?
I’d say you just making stuff up.
Here the Trorygraph since the 28th of Feb, on Syria.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/syria/
Al Jazeera is pretty much the same in amount of content. Actually probably a bit more.
That report you linked to by AI has been well and truly debunked. They were quite literally making things up, but still, almost every major western outlet ran with uncritical “Oh My Gosh!” headlines for a day or two…mission accomplished.
…Turkey is loving our looking the other way.
There isn’t much the NZ Army could do anyway, but there is one great power still willing to help out: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/09/us-troops-arrival-syria-intensifies-struggle-for-influence.
TL;DW – the more polarised the electorate gets the greater the chance frog is boiled and the baby goes out with the bath water.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyTu21_CErs&feature=youtu.be