So let me get this right. Paual Rebstock, a total hired gun government stooge, is allowed to comer out and accuse people of leaking on no evidence whatsoever beyond the fact that (in one case) they once worked for the Labour party)?
What an outrageous slur! How come she is allowed to do that?
All a red herring focusing on the political affiliation of the leaker.
Brenda Pilot (PSA secretary), has done a selection of tweets on it. Public servants are allowed political affiliations. They should be neutral n expressing advice on policy matters. The issue in question was a restructuring of a department. Public servants should be able to have opinions on that, but increasingly dissent is being suppressed.
Witch-hunts rarely work. The expensive search for the leakers of the Government’s botched plan to revamp Foreign Affairs is no exception. The State Services Commission’s inquiry cost a staggering $500,000 and more than 18 months’ work. It named nobody, although two of the three it casts “strong doubt” on have since been identified as former High Commissioner to the United Kingdom Derek Leask, now retired, and New Zealand’s top trade negotiator Nigel Fyfe. The commission built a brewery which produced a pint of beer.
None of this is convincing.
The trouble with the “proper channels” argument is that it ignores the reality of power. The plan to upend the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade was a stupid one which would have sacrificed 300 jobs.
[…]
This sort of “consultation” is cant. The judge in the case is also the executioner. It suits his purposes to have the discussion and the executions behind closed doors. It doesn’t suit the victims. And in this case it would clearly have harmed New Zealand’s diplomatic effort as well. So the ministry promptly leaked like a sieve. Why should these decisions, after all, be made in the dark without the public knowing anything?
That is why the leakers could argue they had a wider duty than their narrow duty of loyalty to the Government. Of course bureaucrats should not and must not leak willy-nilly. A broadly impartial public service should be able to be trusted with certain kinds of information.
[…]
In this case there was a wider public duty and therefore the leak was justified. No government has the right to demand silence from the victims of a misbegotten purge. No government should expect the “debate” to be confined to the victims and their executioners. No government should seriously expect this sort of thing not to leak.
I suspect it had to do with being paid half a million dollars and not coming up with a result. The money would have probably been better spent on evaluating why a decision was made to cut trade staff at a time when businesses really needed more effort overseas.
It is to late to tget rid of the neolib in Labour for 2014. With Parker calling the shots on Finance in election year we have to assume Labour is committed to continuing the same failed policies that we have been following since 1984.
There is only one option to ensure the Neolibs are pushed out or at least silenced.
Party Vote Green.
They must have a strong presence around the cabinet table to keep Parker and his dated policies quiet.
Yep, and as more of the Cunliffe converts to the RED Labour Party become disallusioned with business as usual from the party that brought us the Neo-Liberal cluster-f**k in the first place and swing their votes to the Green Party, i can happily vote tactically for the Mana Party to try and bolster their numbers in the next Parliament…
Cunliffe will struggle throughout next year, against a confident John Key, who will mount a pretty convincing scare campaign, while Labour will be, again wishy washy.
It doesnt look like Labour is going to swing left anytime soon anyway. Not while Parker has his way anyway. News of public sector workers getting their pensions slashed in Detroit should have inspired Labour to showcase why our pension system is superior. And any privatisation of retirement income provision will result in pensioners getting bugger all. While Trotters report that Labour doesnt appear to have any enthusasim for fixing the issue of poverty (the blame of while can lie directly at the feet of the Fourth National government, who begun the process of dismantling of our welfare state) should disturb.
A National win next year will have the obvious ramifications for those at the bottom, who will find their incomes held down for the sake of keeping inflation to between 1 and 2% and keeping middle class interest rates low (and delivering National truckloads of votes), the sick, who will bear the brunt of a possible attempt to resurrect the Upton health reforms, union members, who will find their right to join a union in jeapordy, and our environment, which will be choked up with even more crap.
I’ll be doing my damndest to make sure that it doesn’t happen like that, mate. If they show the necessary moral courage and alternative vision, Labour and Greens will take next year, and by a margin too.
There’s been this idea that Labour needs to clear out some old wood. How would that work? Is it something that Cunliffe can do? Or is it a membership issue during the selection process before the next election? Or what?
Weka – its an MP and membership process before selection, and if the dead wood doesn’t want to go, then Labour is stuck with that ! Its very difficult to unseat a current MP who doesn’t want to go.
i wonder if these neo-lib driftwood mp’s are playing the ageism/age-brings-wisdom-card..?
..and normally i wd agree..age is not a reason for them to go..
..the reason for them to go is that these are the faces/mouths who sold that neo-lib/uncaring bullshit from that clark govt for all those years..
..that is why they must go…
..and what compounds this case for their exit..
..is that they not only have not resiled from/apologised for their past errors..
..they are still pushing the same t.i.n.a.-bullshit/lies…
..and reinforcing that tweedle-dee/tweedledum labour/national comparison..
..this is why they must go..
..and as an aside..
..isn’t mallard..up there in his new seat right next to the exit..
..isn’t he so much resembling muldoon in his final days..?
..as he sits up there..with his unkempt hair..
.furiously punching/swiping at his i-pad-screen..
..pretending to be relevant..
..occaisonally having to suppress a roar..
..and just to show how far labour still has to go to become relevant on issues such as poverty..(remember they have their uncaring-history to still overcome..)
..who can forget the sighs of relief from the paganis..and their ilk..
..at the shelving of that ‘radical’-policy of including beneficiary-families in working for families..by 2018..
It’s very necessary but also very hard. For electorates the ball is in the court of each local membership, with Wellington only having a partial say. Cunliffe has minimal or no say in that process. Often times a dozen established members in the local organisation will have the majority of the sway at a selection, and they tend to be loyal to their incumbent through thick and thin. For list candidates the list ranking process is more fluid and Wellington has more influence.
One major problem is that Labour can’t pension MPs off to comfy corporate board jobs in the way that National can.
The Rogernome weeds need a dose of herbicide and the LECs are the ones that can do it.
If say they engage local support in numbers like in Auckland Central days when ‘Mad Dog’ Prebble was ACTing up, hundreds used to turn up at meetings.
The spirit of the more democratic selection rules that enabled the humiliated demoted DC to rise to party leader months later with member and affiliate support, should be grasped by LECs with half a brain or links to lefties in their community. This is a fight to the death for NZ which without a stronger Labour Party will be lost. The Greens can only grow so much further?
Selection should be denied to anyone that does not support a list of basic left policy, which I hope I do not need to list. I would like to see half the caucus with looks on their faces like those candidly photographed in a corridor after David Cunliffe’s election as leader.
The trouble with that assertion Tiger Mountain is that it did not get rid of Prebble. In the end the voters of Auckland Central decided that Sandra Lee was more Labour than Prebble was. Also, Labour activists left his electorate organisation in droves. I chaired the Kingsland branch of the Mt Albert electorate at the time, and of our 105 members, 60 were domiciled across the motorway in Auckland Central. They were not going to work for Prebble and they didn’t vote for him either.
In the final campaign, he had bugger all of an electorate organisation. The TV coverage of election night when he lost Auckland Central showed a dozen or so, mostly older people rattling around in the supper room at Trades Hall.
Yes, people turned out to try and get rid of him, but it was the lack of people to run the campaign that did him in the end when he had no way to counter Sandra Lee’s message or her organisation.
Thanks for responding Lindsey,
Not saying that the large attendance’s removed Richard Prebble, but it certainly indicated interest in the situation. My general view is the more people that get involved in politics the better.
Lindsey implies a very important point. In the Labour system of doing things a shit MP, or shit right wing MP tends to drive away all the good members, leaving a tiny core of loyalists who will keep re-selecting that MP as the next candidate every single time.
Until, as Lindsey points out, the remaining electorate organisation gets so weak, that the Labour MP gets shoved out – by Labour losing the seat.
Seriously, the NATs have this process under far better management.
Ok, but presumably, technically, Cunliffe can remove certain MPs from positions of power within caucus? Or is that power more distrubuted amongst the whole caucus (formally? Informally). What are the ramifications of that?
Numbers. He’s caught up in a numbers game. Trotter did one of his more reasonable pieces on Cunliffe’s situation/predicament the other day. the link if you haven’t read it….
Yeah, good article. I hope he comes back and answers some of the questions about solutions.
Numbers… ok, so Cunliffe requires a certain level of support to function as leader within caucus… does that mean Labour is screwed until the neoliberal faction die out?
Personally I think all this angst over Parker/retirement age is overblown.
As far as I can tell, the subject didn’t get much traction in the media at all.
I’m not that it’s not important, just that folks around this blog have gotten a massive bee in their bonnet about it, and are imagining that it’s something the general public have caught onto and are punishing Labour in the polls for.
Now, certainly, next year when they actually have to address it as part of their election campaign, it definitely will get attention. I just don’t think it is yet.
Yes +1, always so much ado about nothing, it becomes staid; does the ‘intellectual left’ have to think for everybody , or lead them.For goodness sake, wonder what the ‘objectivists’ make of the apparent facts; “thank you very much” not likely.
That inflation is kept low is the prayer of all retired who have to wait a full twelve months for adjustments. The only good thing about inflation is that it makes repayment of debt easier assuming the intake of money matches inflation …. but pensions are slow to do that.
We haven’t had a full year but we have had 5 quarterly drops in the CPI in the last 10 years, at least that is the number I see in a cursory glance at the Stats website.
Q4 in each of 2006, 2008, 2009, 2011 and 2012. The drops were very minor and I don’t think anyone was going to note a vast rise in their standard of living.
I imagine every economist would agree that deflation is a very serious problem in terms of its economic results. Inflation can be catered for but deflation of any magnitude over an extended period is a disaster.
I am getting very nervous about the 2014 prospects.
At the beginning of 1999 and 2008, Labour and National respectivley had taken control of the MSM’s narrative of how the election year would play out. In both cases they were in opposition but were generally viewed on as Government in Waiting and were enjoying massive popular support in the polls.
The left block is marginally ahead at the moment. But the MSM does not realise that we live in a MMP world and as such report it as a National v Labour race. In that race there is only one player.
The media is powerful. For the majority of people their only exposure to Wellington is what Paddy and Corrin tell them each night at 6pm.
In 1999 and 2008 we were being told the incumbets were dog tucker. As 2014 dawns we don’t have that message.
Weird stuff happening when I click on comments in the right sidebar today. Sometimes I get taken to the Post heading, not the commenter’s remarks. And the next time I look, the commenter’s disappeared, then reappeared with other more recent commenters, then disappeared again…gremlins?
Not sure. But there was a security upgrade to wordpress last night (which took 2 hours to run through our database by the look of it), and a new version of wordpress installed this morning.
Nothing showed up when testing the betas\. But I’ll have a look at it.
Yeah my tests show the same. Rather than being a server generated error it could just be something local on your browser as well.
Have to say that the new backend is really nice so far. I also took the opportunity to change the color pattern to “coffee”. I think I was craving caffeine at the time.
Outrage after impostor hijacks Mandela memorial service
11 December 2013
“He was moving his hands around, but there was no meaning”; “What happened at the memorial service is truly a disgraceful thing to see”; “Disgusting”; “Shameful hypocrisy” and “It should not happen at all.”
Those are just a few of the angry comments following an outrageous performance by an impostor at the memorial service for Nelson Mandela.
I was being slightly ironic due to the likelihood of embarrassment to the establishment of that fact being known, you know, cos of the funeral and eulogies and stuff.
This bit (unfortunately glossing over a momentous fuck up on the part of the ANC during negotiations on the hand-over of power, but pertinent nonetheless)…a lesson for everyone on why political freedom should never be pursued separately from economic freedom.
There have been important social advances since the democratic transformation of the early 1990s, from water and power supply to housing and education. And in the global climate of the early 90s, it’s perhaps not surprising that the ANC bent to the neoliberal flood tide, putting its Freedom Charter calls for public ownership and redistribution of land on the back burner. But the price has been to entrench racial economic division, unemployment and corruption, while failing to attract the expected direct foreign investment.
Great read Morrissey. Of course the hypocrisy exercised by our PM and past National leaders is galling as well. Suppose they would class it as being pragmatic in a dynamic world that politicians inhabit.
Speaking of sickening displays of hypocrisy, Hoots was oozing over Public Address, saying how he admired Nelson Mandela because he was a champion of freedom, just like Reagand and Thatcher.
That’s how the right typically works: call them a terrorist or a lunatic, then if they win and eventualy die, appropriate and sanitize their memory and then use it as a stick to beat their successors.
On a smaller scale, arsewipes like Hoots were continually attacking Rod Donald and when they’d hounded him to his grave, imediately they were calling his successors dangerous and unreasonable, not like that lovely chap Donald.
Yeah I read that sick shit too, what a load of 3rd form dribble. The praise from other commentators has been illuminating and increased the feeling of nausea, but I’m pleased he’s found a home.
How do people like Hooton wake up in the morning?
He is intelligent and must know what he is doing. He must know that the policies he proposes harm the weak and the vulnerable.
Is it vanity? His career? A desire to feather his own nest no matter what the consequences to otherwise? A game?
Appreciate that no honest answer will eventuate but it does make me think.
Not only do you cut and paste, you do it a full 24hrs behind everybody else.
Look carefully, my friend: it’s not a cut and paste. It’s my own work.
But let’s return to your original, in this case unjustified, complaint: even if it were simply a cut-and-paste, that would have been very fast for me, Dumrse. There are no time limits on classy writing. And, come to think of it, there are no time limits even on writing by the likes of Paul Thomas, Jack Tame or Kerre ohoWmad.
Not a good week for satire—not that Kathryn Ryan would know that
Radio NZ National, Friday 13 December 2013
Very interesting interview with Civilian proprietor and panda-bother Ben Uffindell this morning. He’s a bright and funny guy, and had some interesting things to say.
However, I’m not convinced that Kathryn Ryan is quite up to the task of interviewing him. She’s an Obama-cultist, like her braindead U.S. correspondent Louisa Savage, Bruce Springsteen, Oprah Winfrey and (most notoriously) that hapless high priest of Obama-worship, Jim Mora. That means that she has voluntarily—or was it unwittingly?—removed a key section of her brain, namely that bit responsible for critical thinking and the recognition of irony, murderous hypocrisy and rancid insincerity.
And true enough, just as I suspected, in an ill-advised attempt to make intelligent conversation, Ms. Ryan dived in and made a really stupid statement. Speaking slowly and carefully in a low voice, to indicate how assiduously she had been thinking, she said: “New Zealand doesn’t have a rich tradition of satire like other countries do. Why do you think that is?”
In a week of Stalin-style worship of the self-appointed chief mourner at the “memorial service” for a real hero, this is perhaps the worst time ever to claim that “other countries” have a “rich tradition of satire.”
Shocked and concerned at Kathryn Ryan’s lack of any sense of irony, I flicked her the following email….
Dear Kathryn,
During your interview with Ben Uffindell, you claimed that New Zealand does not have “a rich tradition of satire like other countries do”.
In a week where the sanctimonious oratory in Johannesburg by a major impostor has been slavishly praised by mainstream commentators, and a minor signing-impostor has been showered with hectoring opprobrium, it is quite clear that satire is dead in South Africa, Britain and the United States as well as in New Zealand.
Even though he clearly didn’t want to open up that can of worms, Ben Uffindell is no doubt aware of the absurdity of the Obama cult; I wonder if you and your colleagues at Radio NZ National are.
Yours sincerely,
Morrissey Breen
Northcote Point
Keep listening, guys. She might read it out. Maybe….
The only time worth listening to n2n or afternoons Rhino, is when a locum is in place – a Lynne Freeman or a Brennan – both superior to the comfortably off.
The only good thing about Ryan is that she seems to have negotiated a HUGE amount of annual leave, OR she has some dreadful illness such that RNZ management feel sorry for her and tolerate her frequent absences.
Roll on ‘silly season’ afternoons. This ‘hater’ is anxious to see the nicest man on Earth get a well deserved break when he can spend some quality time with his nicest woman on Earth wife.
(Silence, and the sound of birds in the trees is often worthwhile, especially as I cast my eyes across Wgtn city towards RNZ House where that regular gal tries to pretend she abides by BBC style values of ‘journalistic integrity’).
Plastic. Anti-septic. Comfortable. Unchallenging. Nice. Super-nice. Intellectual bubblegum for the ears. Mundane. Faux empathy. In-touch with the people. Egotistical Linguistic Gymnastics. “Issssssyoos’. Diction. Wanna beed wannabees that wanna came and wanna cconquered. The bestest bestEST ever song ever FORever written – ALL of them supposedly the bEST. Experts in all things – from where Mavis from the Catlins to comfy Pete from Otorahanga come from. Familiarity. Did I mention the niceness?
How the two of them EVER managed to negotiate their comfy little pozzies in our ‘public service’ radio broadcaster is beyond me – especially when their frequent locums outshine them everytime
Thank Christ for the off switch though eh? Only slightly better than the other noise on the AM/FM spectrum
The trouble is that this short-term neurological arousal has long-term consequences. Firstly, it can cause desensitisation to the same erotic simuli that turned you on recently and, over the longer term, it can cause a greater likelihood of sexual dysfunction.
And not all porn is equal. Like Wolf, Cindy Gallop talks about how easy access to hardcore porn has changed many men’s ideas about what sex is (and not for the better).
The problem seems to be to do with the commodification of porn, the ease of distributing it online, and the addictive nature of images and videos that intensify sensation arousal.
And, yes, I imagine that similar processes work in advertising, and a lot of popular culture that aims to maximise audience share.
It takes one to know one. true or not.
I know Camille Nakhid even though I have never met her. she wants special privileges for herself and friends and what she wants is not democracy but oriental potentate style decison making on a friends and friends basis. another naked grab for power.
News of the New Zealand Customs stealing seizing all electronic equipment from returning Kiwi Sam Blackman has made its way into the headlines over at The Guardian:
. . . A New Zealand man returning home from London for Christmas has claimed he had all his electronic items confiscated at Auckland airport because he attended a debate on mass surveillance at which Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger spoke about the Snowden revelations . . .
The European parliament has voted to formally invite Edward Snowden to give testimony on NSA spying, despite opposition from conservative MEPs. If the US whistleblower provides answers to the questions compiled by parliamentarians in time, a hearing via video link could take place in early January.
It had looked on Wednesday as if European conservatives were trying to kick the hearing into the long grass. The European People’s party (EPP), the alliance of centre-right parties, had raised a number of concerns about inviting Snowden for a hearing, noting that it could endanger the transatlantic trade agreement with the US.
For a big picture view of the goings on, digby riffs off an interview with Glenn Greenwald exploring the how the USA Surveillance State reflects the panoptican model:
. . . The Panopticon is a type of institutional building designed by English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the late 18th century. The concept of the design is to allow a single watchman to observe (-opticon) all (pan-) inmates of an institution without them being able to tell whether they are being watched or not. Although it is physically impossible for the single watchman to observe all cells at once, the fact that the inmates cannot know when they are being watched means that all inmates must act as though they are watched at all times, effectively controlling their own behavior constantly . . .
whitewashing of what? Brown found not to have misused council resources in conducting his 2 year affair with Bevan Chuang, and not to have issued references etc inappropriately.
No he won’t. Brown’s press release in response to the report. He does an apology, but clearly doesn’t aim to resign.
“The report notes that over a three-year period I, and my family, stayed privately in hotels in central Auckland on a number of occasions. The arrangements for these hotels were made privately in most cases, and in all cases payment was made privately.
“My reason for staying in the central city is that I often work until late in the evening – attending meetings, functions or civic events – and I start work early the next morning, often for media interviews or breakfast events. A significant number of these rooms were also booked and used privately by me and my family.
“I was not charged for nine of these hotel rooms, including one occasion in relation to Ms Chuang.
“As the report notes, I never used council resources for private accommodation or in relation to Ms Chuang, and I do not hold a council credit card.
“However, I accept that as Mayor I am subject to a higher standard of public accountability, and in this context I should not have accepted the free rooms offered to me, and should have disclosed this fact when I was asked about it in October.
“This was an error of judgement and I apologise to the people of Auckland.
“I remain totally focussed on the issues that matter most to Aucklanders, including improving our transport system, tackling Auckland’s housing crisis and continuing to invest in our future.”
Hopefully this sets up the possibility for a new left wing candidate, whenever the next Auckland Council election is held. More importantly, Brown let us down over Ports of Auckland. He tends to bow to the neoliberal agenda too often. The search for a new left candidate should start now.
tinfoilhat, if we apply your logic to our politicians in general then 90% of them are scum.
You really need to open your eyes a bit fella/felless. It’s been going on since NZ’s first parliamentary precinct. The walls of the current precinct – including the Beehive – could tell a thousand stories worse than Len Brown.
As I commented the other day, all Brown has to do is copy John Banks, who has set the precedent for heroic “resignations” … i.e not resigning at all, just saying “I won’t bother standing next time”. (Of course, unlike actual resignations, such a promise can be reversed at any time).
Having said that, I’m now (drumroll …) withdrawing my defence of Brown. (Shock news – reporters will be banging on my door shortly, pictures at six!).
I was strongly opposed to the idea that he should be “guilty” of having sex outside marriage, because then there would have to be mass resignations from Parliament and the country would be run by eunuchs in hair-shirts.
But he’s abused his position re- the hotel rooms (the phone stuff doesn’t matter so much, almost everyone uses a work phone or computer for private use).
So he’s been an idiot and less than honest, he’s made his (hotel room) bed and can lie in it. I won’t be shouting “Resign!”, but if he does, so be it.
He may not lose his job. But he has lost my respect.
Duh, you can’t own up to gifts of luxury hotel room stays if you want to have a secret affair on the sly 😈
The main question mark over Brown’s competence is – how the hell can you traipse in and out of 5 star hotels at random times of day and night and then not expect anyone to find out??? Literally dozens of people, many of them hotel staff, must have known something was up.
It’s very interesting that this was kept under the radar for as long as it did – did journos sit on the story?
not good at all. Never been a supporter of the man, just a critic of the political subterfuge against him. Been a rapid-fire year politically; the speed of ‘progress’.
Len brown has received free hotel rooms and room upgrades from SkyCity valued at $6150 and made more than 1000 private calls to Miss Chuang from his council phone.
I agree he has to go now. That’s corruption.
But I also think that there should be an investigation into what sort of freebies have John Keys and his Tory cronies received from Sky City in return for changing the nation’s gambling laws and giving preferential treatment to one company competing with others for building the Convention centre.
Has anyone ever looked into that? I have more than once seen pictures of smiling Key and Missus at the Sky City centre.
Slater would have served democracy better by focusing on the gifts, hotel rooms etc,instead of wallowing in the sleaze of sexual affairs. He has muddied the waters.
He broke story, if he’d done nothing Len would still be there…not that I expect Len to resign because like any good leftie hes got it to good to want to leave voluntarily
That tendency has nothing to do with whether one’s a rightie or a leftie – it has to do with salary, ego, and lack of personal integrity. Something we tolerate as a nation, so it continues.
Yes. But all he’s done is open the way for a new, fresh left wing candidate. Slater’s objective looked to be to stop Brown being returned as Mayor and/or to get his preferred candidate elected mayor. On that he has failed. And he’s weakened his position for using any further smear campaigns.
“This was an error of judgement and I apologise to the people of Auckland.
“I remain totally focussed on the issues that matter most to Aucklanders, including improving our transport system, tackling Auckland’s housing crisis and continuing to invest in our future.”
This afternoon, someone drew my attention to Hooton’s post. Shocked by not only Hooton’s cynicism, but the drippily supportive responses for his cant by the likes of Hebe [1] and Craig Ranapia [2] I decided it was time to make my Public Address debut. This is what I wrote….
Some time soon, I’ll post a more thorough parsing of this bizarre concoction of sentimental posturing and cynical falsehoods, but right now I’ll deal with two statements that stand out above all the rest….
1.) “….he was alongside Reagan, Thatcher and Gorbachev in the sense of bringing tyranny to an end….”
That is not true. I’ll put Gorbachev to one side here, as I know as much about him as Barack Obama knows about irony.
Let’s just deal with Reagan and Thatcher: they were the polar opposites of Mandela, who was a democrat and a champion of human rights and justice. Reagan and Thatcher openly sneered at such notions. Reagan’s scofflaw regime backed and organized a brutal terrorist campaign in Nicaragua, for which it was found guilty in the International Criminal Court in 1986, and was an active backer of Saddam Hussein, the apartheid South African regime that imprisoned Mandela, Chile, Indonesia and Israel, as well as many other brutal anti-democratic governments and dictatorships. Thatcher supported all of the above, and even managed to go one better, when she announced her endorsement of the Khmer Rouge. Even Reagan wasn’t that shameless, or that foolish.
2.) “Mandela was a guy who would do attack ads with the best (or worst!) of them.”
Clearly, the implication Hooton wants us to draw here is that because Mandela was a robust and lively politician, that somehow makes him comparable to the likes of Hooton’s scurrilous friend John Ansell, the director of National’s attack ad campaigns and the genius behind National’s race-baiting “Iwi/Kiwi” campaign in 2005. Ansell is a notorious antagonist and hater of all things Māori (he was and no doubt still is a supporter of Alan Titford)—and Mandela has nothing in common with him.
Good on you Morrissey, the luvvies at PA will be pleased to welcome you aboard am sure. Rusty’s attack poodle Mr Ranapia will be snapping at your heels shortly.
Hooten is certainly a piece of work. “Gorby” was a Soviet sellout who basically greased the path for oligarchs that appropriated the state property that was worth having.
“They can do that, they have absolutely no reason not to. I can assure Mr Cunliffe the books are in tip top condition – that is the polar opposite position to what they were in when we became the Government.
I want to stress that New Zealand starts from a reasonable position in dealing with the uncertainty of our economic outlook…. In New Zealand we have room to respond. This is the rainy day that Government has been saving up for…
I have just been reading the Anadarko emergency response plan.
Tier 1- Anadarko cleans it up
Tier 2- Regional councils clean it up
Tier 3- Maritime NZ in charge of clean up,
The new rules giving beefed up powers to local body Mayors in New Zealand is really working well in Hamilton at the expense of democracy. It’s a recipe for disaster and a sad day for ratepayers, as they are the losers in all of this. The Mayor can now choose the Deputy Mayor, determine committee structure and appoint members. In the past the will of voters as expressed at the ballot box saw the highest polling councillor appointed deputy mayor and high polling councillors being appointed to chairmanships of significant committees. Sadly, this seems to have all gone out the window in Hamilton and no account has been taken of the poll results in these appointments. This is a real slap in the face for ratepayers and we now have an excellent example of empire building going on at City Hall.
In today’s Waikato Times we read that the Mayor is now to have five staff members costing ratepayers $365,000 a year. http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/news/9511892/Hardaker-spends-up-big-on-spin-doctor
Despite having a significant Public Relations team already in place in the council organisation, she wants her own “spin doctor”. Is this to massage the truth perhaps?
This all comes with a background of Hamilton City Council having a massive debt ($440 million), caused by the frivolous spend up by a previous council on the V8 racing fiasco and an event centre. There have also been many staff made redundant and budgets have been slashed, services have been severely curtailed and service fees increased, all in the quest to “balance the books”.
Added to this, only a small percentage of eligible voters chose to exercise their voting right. They have no room for complaint. It’s the likes of us who did bother to vote that have to live with the consequences.
Good stuff here by Gareth Hughes – this report should open some eyes and solidify resolve.
Interestingly Anadarko itself models a higher flow rate for an oil spill than Greenpeace did in their report and it shows the Government were wrong to attack Greenpeace as ‘scaremongering,’ when in fact they were being conservative with their numbers. Even the Texan cowboys Anadarko say if there is a deep sea well blowout there is a 2/3 chance we could see oil wash up on our beaches!
I can’t help thinking there is a headline out there somewhere that looks a bit like…..Phil Goff teaches public servants how to behave in a treacherous manner.
As you say, the electorate vote breakdowns are telling with only Epsom and Tamaki Yes votes exceeding No votes – but not by much.
Epsom 54.6% Yes; 45.0% No
Tamaki 53.2% Yes; 46.4% No
The Maori electorates are amazing with all seven recording No votes in the 90% ranging from 91.0% to 94.7% – although turnout was slightly lower than the overall rate, ranging from 28.9% to 33.5%.
Yes, but I felt forced.
With the Greens abusing the citizens initiated referendum I felt that I had no choice but to wallow in shit and participate in this whole charade.
Once again, Boooo to you Greens, you disgraceful excuse of a political party.
Apparently Anadarko considers Greenpeace’s level of risk assessment as valid, despite the PM calling them extreme case scenarios/alarmist.
The information being released on a Friday. I suppose leaving this to next week or early in the New Year was rejected as being too obvious a low publicity disclosure.
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
Open access notablesImproving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society:To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
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Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
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The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
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Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
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So let me get this right. Paual Rebstock, a total hired gun government stooge, is allowed to comer out and accuse people of leaking on no evidence whatsoever beyond the fact that (in one case) they once worked for the Labour party)?
What an outrageous slur! How come she is allowed to do that?
From what I read the labour party chappie looks pretty guilty.
All the circumstantial evidence points directly at him.
If you are interested Kiwi blog did a post on it outlining what was in the report.
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2013/12/the_rebstock_report-2.html
All a red herring focusing on the political affiliation of the leaker.
Brenda Pilot (PSA secretary), has done a selection of tweets on it. Public servants are allowed political affiliations. They should be neutral n expressing advice on policy matters. The issue in question was a restructuring of a department. Public servants should be able to have opinions on that, but increasingly dissent is being suppressed.
Now Pilot has just linked to this Dom Post editorial:
Just read the full editorial. Well done Dom Post. That’s the wisest commentary I’ve seen on the matter.
I suspect it had to do with being paid half a million dollars and not coming up with a result. The money would have probably been better spent on evaluating why a decision was made to cut trade staff at a time when businesses really needed more effort overseas.
In 2014 I am going to help get rid of this government.
I want my country back.
Yep.
In 2014 I am going to help get rid of the neolibs and TINAs in Labour and get rid of this government.
I want my party and my country back.
It is to late to tget rid of the neolib in Labour for 2014. With Parker calling the shots on Finance in election year we have to assume Labour is committed to continuing the same failed policies that we have been following since 1984.
There is only one option to ensure the Neolibs are pushed out or at least silenced.
Party Vote Green.
They must have a strong presence around the cabinet table to keep Parker and his dated policies quiet.
+1
Yep, and as more of the Cunliffe converts to the RED Labour Party become disallusioned with business as usual from the party that brought us the Neo-Liberal cluster-f**k in the first place and swing their votes to the Green Party, i can happily vote tactically for the Mana Party to try and bolster their numbers in the next Parliament…
+1 for Mana
Party vote Mana. Electorate vote probably Green, unless Goff, Mallard, Jones, and Parker resign.
In 2014 I am going to help get rid of this government.
I want my country back.
PM wants to know how much you’re prepared to pay for it. He has other overseas customers expressing the same interest.
National will win next year’s election.
That is my sole prediction for 2014.
Cunliffe will struggle throughout next year, against a confident John Key, who will mount a pretty convincing scare campaign, while Labour will be, again wishy washy.
It doesnt look like Labour is going to swing left anytime soon anyway. Not while Parker has his way anyway. News of public sector workers getting their pensions slashed in Detroit should have inspired Labour to showcase why our pension system is superior. And any privatisation of retirement income provision will result in pensioners getting bugger all. While Trotters report that Labour doesnt appear to have any enthusasim for fixing the issue of poverty (the blame of while can lie directly at the feet of the Fourth National government, who begun the process of dismantling of our welfare state) should disturb.
A National win next year will have the obvious ramifications for those at the bottom, who will find their incomes held down for the sake of keeping inflation to between 1 and 2% and keeping middle class interest rates low (and delivering National truckloads of votes), the sick, who will bear the brunt of a possible attempt to resurrect the Upton health reforms, union members, who will find their right to join a union in jeapordy, and our environment, which will be choked up with even more crap.
I’ll be doing my damndest to make sure that it doesn’t happen like that, mate. If they show the necessary moral courage and alternative vision, Labour and Greens will take next year, and by a margin too.
There’s been this idea that Labour needs to clear out some old wood. How would that work? Is it something that Cunliffe can do? Or is it a membership issue during the selection process before the next election? Or what?
Weka – its an MP and membership process before selection, and if the dead wood doesn’t want to go, then Labour is stuck with that ! Its very difficult to unseat a current MP who doesn’t want to go.
i wonder if these neo-lib driftwood mp’s are playing the ageism/age-brings-wisdom-card..?
..and normally i wd agree..age is not a reason for them to go..
..the reason for them to go is that these are the faces/mouths who sold that neo-lib/uncaring bullshit from that clark govt for all those years..
..that is why they must go…
..and what compounds this case for their exit..
..is that they not only have not resiled from/apologised for their past errors..
..they are still pushing the same t.i.n.a.-bullshit/lies…
..and reinforcing that tweedle-dee/tweedledum labour/national comparison..
..this is why they must go..
..and as an aside..
..isn’t mallard..up there in his new seat right next to the exit..
..isn’t he so much resembling muldoon in his final days..?
..as he sits up there..with his unkempt hair..
.furiously punching/swiping at his i-pad-screen..
..pretending to be relevant..
..occaisonally having to suppress a roar..
..and just to show how far labour still has to go to become relevant on issues such as poverty..(remember they have their uncaring-history to still overcome..)
..who can forget the sighs of relief from the paganis..and their ilk..
..at the shelving of that ‘radical’-policy of including beneficiary-families in working for families..by 2018..
..eh..?
..phillip ure..
It’s very necessary but also very hard. For electorates the ball is in the court of each local membership, with Wellington only having a partial say. Cunliffe has minimal or no say in that process. Often times a dozen established members in the local organisation will have the majority of the sway at a selection, and they tend to be loyal to their incumbent through thick and thin. For list candidates the list ranking process is more fluid and Wellington has more influence.
One major problem is that Labour can’t pension MPs off to comfy corporate board jobs in the way that National can.
The Rogernome weeds need a dose of herbicide and the LECs are the ones that can do it.
If say they engage local support in numbers like in Auckland Central days when ‘Mad Dog’ Prebble was ACTing up, hundreds used to turn up at meetings.
The spirit of the more democratic selection rules that enabled the humiliated demoted DC to rise to party leader months later with member and affiliate support, should be grasped by LECs with half a brain or links to lefties in their community. This is a fight to the death for NZ which without a stronger Labour Party will be lost. The Greens can only grow so much further?
Selection should be denied to anyone that does not support a list of basic left policy, which I hope I do not need to list. I would like to see half the caucus with looks on their faces like those candidly photographed in a corridor after David Cunliffe’s election as leader.
The trouble with that assertion Tiger Mountain is that it did not get rid of Prebble. In the end the voters of Auckland Central decided that Sandra Lee was more Labour than Prebble was. Also, Labour activists left his electorate organisation in droves. I chaired the Kingsland branch of the Mt Albert electorate at the time, and of our 105 members, 60 were domiciled across the motorway in Auckland Central. They were not going to work for Prebble and they didn’t vote for him either.
In the final campaign, he had bugger all of an electorate organisation. The TV coverage of election night when he lost Auckland Central showed a dozen or so, mostly older people rattling around in the supper room at Trades Hall.
Yes, people turned out to try and get rid of him, but it was the lack of people to run the campaign that did him in the end when he had no way to counter Sandra Lee’s message or her organisation.
Thanks for responding Lindsey,
Not saying that the large attendance’s removed Richard Prebble, but it certainly indicated interest in the situation. My general view is the more people that get involved in politics the better.
Lindsey implies a very important point. In the Labour system of doing things a shit MP, or shit right wing MP tends to drive away all the good members, leaving a tiny core of loyalists who will keep re-selecting that MP as the next candidate every single time.
Until, as Lindsey points out, the remaining electorate organisation gets so weak, that the Labour MP gets shoved out – by Labour losing the seat.
Seriously, the NATs have this process under far better management.
Ok, but presumably, technically, Cunliffe can remove certain MPs from positions of power within caucus? Or is that power more distrubuted amongst the whole caucus (formally? Informally). What are the ramifications of that?
Numbers. He’s caught up in a numbers game. Trotter did one of his more reasonable pieces on Cunliffe’s situation/predicament the other day. the link if you haven’t read it….
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/12/12/a-sort-of-victory-is-labours-old-guard-undermining-cunliffes-lurch-to-the-left/
Yeah, good article. I hope he comes back and answers some of the questions about solutions.
Numbers… ok, so Cunliffe requires a certain level of support to function as leader within caucus… does that mean Labour is screwed until the neoliberal faction die out?
Personally I think all this angst over Parker/retirement age is overblown.
As far as I can tell, the subject didn’t get much traction in the media at all.
I’m not that it’s not important, just that folks around this blog have gotten a massive bee in their bonnet about it, and are imagining that it’s something the general public have caught onto and are punishing Labour in the polls for.
Now, certainly, next year when they actually have to address it as part of their election campaign, it definitely will get attention. I just don’t think it is yet.
Yes +1, always so much ado about nothing, it becomes staid; does the ‘intellectual left’ have to think for everybody , or lead them.For goodness sake, wonder what the ‘objectivists’ make of the apparent facts; “thank you very much” not likely.
That inflation is kept low is the prayer of all retired who have to wait a full twelve months for adjustments. The only good thing about inflation is that it makes repayment of debt easier assuming the intake of money matches inflation …. but pensions are slow to do that.
But in times of deflation, those who are on pensions similarly gain an advantage over those 12 months.
I don’t know if we’ve had a full year of deflation at any time recently, but we certainly have had the odd quarter here and there.
We haven’t had a full year but we have had 5 quarterly drops in the CPI in the last 10 years, at least that is the number I see in a cursory glance at the Stats website.
Q4 in each of 2006, 2008, 2009, 2011 and 2012. The drops were very minor and I don’t think anyone was going to note a vast rise in their standard of living.
I imagine every economist would agree that deflation is a very serious problem in terms of its economic results. Inflation can be catered for but deflation of any magnitude over an extended period is a disaster.
I am getting very nervous about the 2014 prospects.
At the beginning of 1999 and 2008, Labour and National respectivley had taken control of the MSM’s narrative of how the election year would play out. In both cases they were in opposition but were generally viewed on as Government in Waiting and were enjoying massive popular support in the polls.
The left block is marginally ahead at the moment. But the MSM does not realise that we live in a MMP world and as such report it as a National v Labour race. In that race there is only one player.
The media is powerful. For the majority of people their only exposure to Wellington is what Paddy and Corrin tell them each night at 6pm.
In 1999 and 2008 we were being told the incumbets were dog tucker. As 2014 dawns we don’t have that message.
Weird stuff happening when I click on comments in the right sidebar today. Sometimes I get taken to the Post heading, not the commenter’s remarks. And the next time I look, the commenter’s disappeared, then reappeared with other more recent commenters, then disappeared again…gremlins?
Not sure. But there was a security upgrade to wordpress last night (which took 2 hours to run through our database by the look of it), and a new version of wordpress installed this morning.
Nothing showed up when testing the betas\. But I’ll have a look at it.
Thanks for that lprent. Whatever it was, the sidebar comments links all seem to be working ok now.
Yeah my tests show the same. Rather than being a server generated error it could just be something local on your browser as well.
Have to say that the new backend is really nice so far. I also took the opportunity to change the color pattern to “coffee”. I think I was craving caffeine at the time.
Outrage after impostor hijacks Mandela memorial service
11 December 2013
“He was moving his hands around, but there was no meaning”; “What happened at the memorial service is truly a disgraceful thing to see”; “Disgusting”; “Shameful hypocrisy” and “It should not happen at all.”
Those are just a few of the angry comments following an outrageous performance by an impostor at the memorial service for Nelson Mandela.
Here’s a photo of the fraudster, waving his arm in the air….
http://cdn1.independent.ie/world-news/article29829821.ece/ALTERNATES/h342/PANews_bfce2d94-f4ec-4d75-b069-6d5218eab9d2_I1.jpg
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/11/mandela-sanitised-hypocrites-apologists-apartheid
Brilliant article-everyone should read it.
+ 1 Yeah I enjoyed it too.
“and Mandela wasn’t removed from the US terrorism watch list until 2008.” – surprised that wasn’t removed from the official record.
Why are you surprised? Do you think the United States is on the side of those who struggle liberation, like Mandela did?
I was being slightly ironic due to the likelihood of embarrassment to the establishment of that fact being known, you know, cos of the funeral and eulogies and stuff.
I know you know that marty. I wasn’t having a go at you personally, I was just re-stating a point.
This bit (unfortunately glossing over a momentous fuck up on the part of the ANC during negotiations on the hand-over of power, but pertinent nonetheless)…a lesson for everyone on why political freedom should never be pursued separately from economic freedom.
Happened here. Patted ourselves on the back about nuclear free legislation and took eyes off the economy.
Great read Morrissey. Of course the hypocrisy exercised by our PM and past National leaders is galling as well. Suppose they would class it as being pragmatic in a dynamic world that politicians inhabit.
Speaking of sickening displays of hypocrisy, Hoots was oozing over Public Address, saying how he admired Nelson Mandela because he was a champion of freedom, just like Reagand and Thatcher.
That’s how the right typically works: call them a terrorist or a lunatic, then if they win and eventualy die, appropriate and sanitize their memory and then use it as a stick to beat their successors.
On a smaller scale, arsewipes like Hoots were continually attacking Rod Donald and when they’d hounded him to his grave, imediately they were calling his successors dangerous and unreasonable, not like that lovely chap Donald.
Yeah I read that sick shit too, what a load of 3rd form dribble. The praise from other commentators has been illuminating and increased the feeling of nausea, but I’m pleased he’s found a home.
a comfort-zone
Where “I” can rest my head….
How do people like Hooton wake up in the morning?
He is intelligent and must know what he is doing. He must know that the policies he proposes harm the weak and the vulnerable.
Is it vanity? His career? A desire to feather his own nest no matter what the consequences to otherwise? A game?
Appreciate that no honest answer will eventuate but it does make me think.
Not only do you cut and paste, you do it a full 24hrs behind everybody else.
Makes me wonder why you even come here.
Not only do you cut and paste, you do it a full 24hrs behind everybody else.
Look carefully, my friend: it’s not a cut and paste. It’s my own work.
But let’s return to your original, in this case unjustified, complaint: even if it were simply a cut-and-paste, that would have been very fast for me, Dumrse. There are no time limits on classy writing. And, come to think of it, there are no time limits even on writing by the likes of Paul Thomas, Jack Tame or Kerre ohoWmad.
Not a good week for satire—not that Kathryn Ryan would know that
Radio NZ National, Friday 13 December 2013
Very interesting interview with Civilian proprietor and panda-bother Ben Uffindell this morning. He’s a bright and funny guy, and had some interesting things to say.
However, I’m not convinced that Kathryn Ryan is quite up to the task of interviewing him. She’s an Obama-cultist, like her braindead U.S. correspondent Louisa Savage, Bruce Springsteen, Oprah Winfrey and (most notoriously) that hapless high priest of Obama-worship, Jim Mora. That means that she has voluntarily—or was it unwittingly?—removed a key section of her brain, namely that bit responsible for critical thinking and the recognition of irony, murderous hypocrisy and rancid insincerity.
And true enough, just as I suspected, in an ill-advised attempt to make intelligent conversation, Ms. Ryan dived in and made a really stupid statement. Speaking slowly and carefully in a low voice, to indicate how assiduously she had been thinking, she said: “New Zealand doesn’t have a rich tradition of satire like other countries do. Why do you think that is?”
In a week of Stalin-style worship of the self-appointed chief mourner at the “memorial service” for a real hero, this is perhaps the worst time ever to claim that “other countries” have a “rich tradition of satire.”
Shocked and concerned at Kathryn Ryan’s lack of any sense of irony, I flicked her the following email….
Dear Kathryn,
During your interview with Ben Uffindell, you claimed that New Zealand does not have “a rich tradition of satire like other countries do”.
In a week where the sanctimonious oratory in Johannesburg by a major impostor has been slavishly praised by mainstream commentators, and a minor signing-impostor has been showered with hectoring opprobrium, it is quite clear that satire is dead in South Africa, Britain and the United States as well as in New Zealand.
Even though he clearly didn’t want to open up that can of worms, Ben Uffindell is no doubt aware of the absurdity of the Obama cult; I wonder if you and your colleagues at Radio NZ National are.
Yours sincerely,
Morrissey Breen
Northcote Point
Keep listening, guys. She might read it out. Maybe….
The only time worth listening to n2n or afternoons Rhino, is when a locum is in place – a Lynne Freeman or a Brennan – both superior to the comfortably off.
The only good thing about Ryan is that she seems to have negotiated a HUGE amount of annual leave, OR she has some dreadful illness such that RNZ management feel sorry for her and tolerate her frequent absences.
Roll on ‘silly season’ afternoons. This ‘hater’ is anxious to see the nicest man on Earth get a well deserved break when he can spend some quality time with his nicest woman on Earth wife.
(Silence, and the sound of birds in the trees is often worthwhile, especially as I cast my eyes across Wgtn city towards RNZ House where that regular gal tries to pretend she abides by BBC style values of ‘journalistic integrity’).
Plastic. Anti-septic. Comfortable. Unchallenging. Nice. Super-nice. Intellectual bubblegum for the ears. Mundane. Faux empathy. In-touch with the people. Egotistical Linguistic Gymnastics. “Issssssyoos’. Diction. Wanna beed wannabees that wanna came and wanna cconquered. The bestest bestEST ever song ever FORever written – ALL of them supposedly the bEST. Experts in all things – from where Mavis from the Catlins to comfy Pete from Otorahanga come from. Familiarity. Did I mention the niceness?
How the two of them EVER managed to negotiate their comfy little pozzies in our ‘public service’ radio broadcaster is beyond me – especially when their frequent locums outshine them everytime
Thank Christ for the off switch though eh? Only slightly better than the other noise on the AM/FM spectrum
How porn is destroying modern sex lives:
Ok, fine, porn is bad.
Still, gives another reason to ban advertising.
And not all porn is equal. Like Wolf, Cindy Gallop talks about how easy access to hardcore porn has changed many men’s ideas about what sex is (and not for the better).
http://blog.ted.com/2009/12/02/cindy_gallop_ma/
The problem seems to be to do with the commodification of porn, the ease of distributing it online, and the addictive nature of images and videos that intensify sensation arousal.
And, yes, I imagine that similar processes work in advertising, and a lot of popular culture that aims to maximise audience share.
It’s also an issue of who makes porn, and who they think they are making it for.
It takes one to know one. true or not.
I know Camille Nakhid even though I have never met her. she wants special privileges for herself and friends and what she wants is not democracy but oriental potentate style decison making on a friends and friends basis. another naked grab for power.
Does that mean she is going to join the Mana party?
Nope, that would be more National’s style.
‘
News of the New Zealand Customs
stealingseizing all electronic equipment from returning Kiwi Sam Blackman has made its way into the headlines over at The Guardian:Meanwhile, the European Parliament clears the way for Edward Snowden to appear before it early next year to answer questions:
For a big picture view of the goings on, digby riffs off an interview with Glenn Greenwald exploring the how the USA Surveillance State reflects the panoptican model:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11172021
– Looks like whitewashing is rife at the moment
whitewashing of what? Brown found not to have misused council resources in conducting his 2 year affair with Bevan Chuang, and not to have issued references etc inappropriately.
He has been found to have had free use of hotel rooms for council business that he didn’t declare, plus some other gifts. This last revelation is wounding to Brown. I despair. He has disappointed those of us who voted for him.
He is a lying piece of scum he should resign………. but won’t.
No he won’t. Brown’s press release in response to the report. He does an apology, but clearly doesn’t aim to resign.
Hopefully this sets up the possibility for a new left wing candidate, whenever the next Auckland Council election is held. More importantly, Brown let us down over Ports of Auckland. He tends to bow to the neoliberal agenda too often. The search for a new left candidate should start now.
Brown really is scum anyone who voted for him should be furious with his behaviour.
tinfoilhat, if we apply your logic to our politicians in general then 90% of them are scum.
You really need to open your eyes a bit fella/felless. It’s been going on since NZ’s first parliamentary precinct. The walls of the current precinct – including the Beehive – could tell a thousand stories worse than Len Brown.
+1
these politicians are men and women, not angels.
As I commented the other day, all Brown has to do is copy John Banks, who has set the precedent for heroic “resignations” … i.e not resigning at all, just saying “I won’t bother standing next time”. (Of course, unlike actual resignations, such a promise can be reversed at any time).
Having said that, I’m now (drumroll …) withdrawing my defence of Brown. (Shock news – reporters will be banging on my door shortly, pictures at six!).
I was strongly opposed to the idea that he should be “guilty” of having sex outside marriage, because then there would have to be mass resignations from Parliament and the country would be run by eunuchs in hair-shirts.
But he’s abused his position re- the hotel rooms (the phone stuff doesn’t matter so much, almost everyone uses a work phone or computer for private use).
So he’s been an idiot and less than honest, he’s made his (hotel room) bed and can lie in it. I won’t be shouting “Resign!”, but if he does, so be it.
He may not lose his job. But he has lost my respect.
Duh, you can’t own up to gifts of luxury hotel room stays if you want to have a secret affair on the sly 😈
The main question mark over Brown’s competence is – how the hell can you traipse in and out of 5 star hotels at random times of day and night and then not expect anyone to find out??? Literally dozens of people, many of them hotel staff, must have known something was up.
It’s very interesting that this was kept under the radar for as long as it did – did journos sit on the story?
not good at all. Never been a supporter of the man, just a critic of the political subterfuge against him. Been a rapid-fire year politically; the speed of ‘progress’.
Is that an attempt to defame Ernst & Young…
More like Len refusing to allow Sky city to divulge what they know
Really? You seem to know everything , could you find time to submit a post
Len brown has received free hotel rooms and room upgrades from SkyCity valued at $6150 and made more than 1000 private calls to Miss Chuang from his council phone.
I agree he has to go now. That’s corruption.
But I also think that there should be an investigation into what sort of freebies have John Keys and his Tory cronies received from Sky City in return for changing the nation’s gambling laws and giving preferential treatment to one company competing with others for building the Convention centre.
Has anyone ever looked into that? I have more than once seen pictures of smiling Key and Missus at the Sky City centre.
Well Cameron Slater broke the story so maybe someone on the left could investigate
Slater would have served democracy better by focusing on the gifts, hotel rooms etc,instead of wallowing in the sleaze of sexual affairs. He has muddied the waters.
He broke story, if he’d done nothing Len would still be there…not that I expect Len to resign because like any good leftie hes got it to good to want to leave voluntarily
John Banks is a leftie now?
Well Banks is facing charges while Lens digging in for the long haul so not really applicable
Take a prosecution against him then PR. All the best mate.
Unlike certain bankrupts I have a job and other considerations on my time
hey, you don’t need to spend your time posting here, I’m sure we’d all understand and sadly accept the absence of your comments for a few months…
😀
Bankrupt? There’s identification again.
But Banks hasn’t resigned.
Do you think a conviction is necessary, before he should? And the same for Brown?
That tendency has nothing to do with whether one’s a rightie or a leftie – it has to do with salary, ego, and lack of personal integrity. Something we tolerate as a nation, so it continues.
Yes. But all he’s done is open the way for a new, fresh left wing candidate. Slater’s objective looked to be to stop Brown being returned as Mayor and/or to get his preferred candidate elected mayor. On that he has failed. And he’s weakened his position for using any further smear campaigns.
Maybe the new, young candidate won’t be a corrupt, lying sleazebag in which case its a win-win for everyone
And we can say the same about National but all indications are they’ll be just as unethical as John Key.
Slater broke wind and fed you fools with hot air.
Slater has damaged his public image, and delivered the left the potential of a new left candidate for mayor in the future.
“This was an error of judgement and I apologise to the people of Auckland.
“I remain totally focussed on the issues that matter most to Aucklanders, including improving our transport system, tackling Auckland’s housing crisis and continuing to invest in our future.”
– Yeah Lens not going anywhere
A reply to Matthew Hooton’s vapourings about Mandela
After Nelson Mandela died, Matthew Hooton took out an onion and posted this masterpiece of gall and hypocrisy…
http://publicaddress.net/system/cafe/hard-news-mandela/?p=302690#post302690
This afternoon, someone drew my attention to Hooton’s post. Shocked by not only Hooton’s cynicism, but the drippily supportive responses for his cant by the likes of Hebe [1] and Craig Ranapia [2] I decided it was time to make my Public Address debut. This is what I wrote….
Some time soon, I’ll post a more thorough parsing of this bizarre concoction of sentimental posturing and cynical falsehoods, but right now I’ll deal with two statements that stand out above all the rest….
1.) “….he was alongside Reagan, Thatcher and Gorbachev in the sense of bringing tyranny to an end….”
That is not true. I’ll put Gorbachev to one side here, as I know as much about him as Barack Obama knows about irony.
Let’s just deal with Reagan and Thatcher: they were the polar opposites of Mandela, who was a democrat and a champion of human rights and justice. Reagan and Thatcher openly sneered at such notions. Reagan’s scofflaw regime backed and organized a brutal terrorist campaign in Nicaragua, for which it was found guilty in the International Criminal Court in 1986, and was an active backer of Saddam Hussein, the apartheid South African regime that imprisoned Mandela, Chile, Indonesia and Israel, as well as many other brutal anti-democratic governments and dictatorships. Thatcher supported all of the above, and even managed to go one better, when she announced her endorsement of the Khmer Rouge. Even Reagan wasn’t that shameless, or that foolish.
2.) “Mandela was a guy who would do attack ads with the best (or worst!) of them.”
Clearly, the implication Hooton wants us to draw here is that because Mandela was a robust and lively politician, that somehow makes him comparable to the likes of Hooton’s scurrilous friend John Ansell, the director of National’s attack ad campaigns and the genius behind National’s race-baiting “Iwi/Kiwi” campaign in 2005. Ansell is a notorious antagonist and hater of all things Māori (he was and no doubt still is a supporter of Alan Titford)—and Mandela has nothing in common with him.
http://publicaddress.net/system/profile?id=136755
[1] http://publicaddress.net/system/cafe/hard-news-mandela/?p=302693#post302693
[2] http://publicaddress.net/system/cafe/hard-news-mandela/?p=303083#post303083
Good on you Morrissey, the luvvies at PA will be pleased to welcome you aboard am sure. Rusty’s attack poodle Mr Ranapia will be snapping at your heels shortly.
Hooten is certainly a piece of work. “Gorby” was a Soviet sellout who basically greased the path for oligarchs that appropriated the state property that was worth having.
Rusty’s attack poodle Mr Ranapia will be snapping at your heels shortly.
https://i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/6589003264/hC8BF5189/
John Key, lying again:
John Key, today (http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9515170/PM-playing-down-voter-turnout)
vs
Bill English, 2008 (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501219&objectid=10548753&ref=imthis)
Someone should introduce those two, they could compare notes.
I have just been reading the Anadarko emergency response plan.
Tier 1- Anadarko cleans it up
Tier 2- Regional councils clean it up
Tier 3- Maritime NZ in charge of clean up,
http://img.scoop.co.nz/media/pdfs/1312/AnnexEEmergencyResponsePlan.pdf
The new rules giving beefed up powers to local body Mayors in New Zealand is really working well in Hamilton at the expense of democracy. It’s a recipe for disaster and a sad day for ratepayers, as they are the losers in all of this. The Mayor can now choose the Deputy Mayor, determine committee structure and appoint members. In the past the will of voters as expressed at the ballot box saw the highest polling councillor appointed deputy mayor and high polling councillors being appointed to chairmanships of significant committees. Sadly, this seems to have all gone out the window in Hamilton and no account has been taken of the poll results in these appointments. This is a real slap in the face for ratepayers and we now have an excellent example of empire building going on at City Hall.
In today’s Waikato Times we read that the Mayor is now to have five staff members costing ratepayers $365,000 a year. http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/news/9511892/Hardaker-spends-up-big-on-spin-doctor
Despite having a significant Public Relations team already in place in the council organisation, she wants her own “spin doctor”. Is this to massage the truth perhaps?
This all comes with a background of Hamilton City Council having a massive debt ($440 million), caused by the frivolous spend up by a previous council on the V8 racing fiasco and an event centre. There have also been many staff made redundant and budgets have been slashed, services have been severely curtailed and service fees increased, all in the quest to “balance the books”.
Added to this, only a small percentage of eligible voters chose to exercise their voting right. They have no room for complaint. It’s the likes of us who did bother to vote that have to live with the consequences.
Good stuff here by Gareth Hughes – this report should open some eyes and solidify resolve.
http://blog.greens.org.nz/2013/12/13/anadarkos-deep-sea-oil-drilling-information-blowout/
len brown will be interviewed on campbell live 2nite..
..i went to the mandela service in ak..and brown spoke..
..i so so wanted to heckle ..
..phillip ure..
I can’t help thinking there is a headline out there somewhere that looks a bit like…..Phil Goff teaches public servants how to behave in a treacherous manner.
Results in …
http://www.electionresults.govt.nz/2013_citizens_referendum/
Minority vote high enough to legitimise referendum. Turnout good.
2 electorates voted “Yes” – Epsom and Tamaki. All others “No”, including Key’s own, Helensville.
Maori electorates highest “No” votes (yep, the maori party are finished).
As you say, the electorate vote breakdowns are telling with only Epsom and Tamaki Yes votes exceeding No votes – but not by much.
Epsom 54.6% Yes; 45.0% No
Tamaki 53.2% Yes; 46.4% No
The Maori electorates are amazing with all seven recording No votes in the 90% ranging from 91.0% to 94.7% – although turnout was slightly lower than the overall rate, ranging from 28.9% to 33.5%.
Less than 1/2 of eligible voters.
What a waste of money, money that could have been spent on the poor but instead blown of this waste of time.
Shame on you Greens, Shame.
But you voted.
Yes, but I felt forced.
With the Greens abusing the citizens initiated referendum I felt that I had no choice but to wallow in shit and participate in this whole charade.
Once again, Boooo to you Greens, you disgraceful excuse of a political party.
Garn. Admit it. You love wallowing in shit. Your posts here drip it profusely.
he loves wallowing in his own shit.
And the money would NOT have been spent on the poor.
Apparently Anadarko considers Greenpeace’s level of risk assessment as valid, despite the PM calling them extreme case scenarios/alarmist.
The information being released on a Friday. I suppose leaving this to next week or early in the New Year was rejected as being too obvious a low publicity disclosure.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1312/S00212/anadarko-discharge-management-plan-available.htm
http://norightturn.blogspot.co.nz/2013/12/whos-scaremongering-now.html
Coober Pedy, South Australia = a shale oil find at 700 metres. Potential 233B barrels. Over 10% of current world reserves.
A find of geo-political significance.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-25/linc-energy-in-shale-talks-with-oil-services-company-in-u-s-1-.html
http://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Australia-Next-Petro-Superstate.html
http://oilandenergyinvestor.com/ext/arckaringa/articles/20-million-oil-find-to-unleash-energy-war.php?src=taboola&ad=ad7
.
With the existing oil reserves in SA/Iraq/Iran/Libya/Russia/Kazakhstan/Nigeria/Venezuela, OPEC has problems now with resumed flow from Iraq,Iran and Libya and the development of shale oil exploitation capacity in North America without such huge finds as this.
How economic is deep sea oil exploration in this environment, even if there is a discovery?
The NOAA Arctic report card update and James Hansen addresses the American Geophysical Union fall meeting.
http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/
http://cdnapisec.kaltura.com/index.php/kwidget/wid/_922621/uiconf_id/21384601/entry_id/1_o17ip0if
and then there’s This , officer.
A drop in pressure.
and you joe, are among the best of the last , Now it’s our turn to Dream about Tomorrow’s lies yet, no need to be anybody’s Winter . Night All: expended, almost 😉
Interesting current Keiser Report.
Homozygosity – the phenomenon that keeps the National Party and the banker’s class alive (and oure, and entitled)