Open mike 14/05/2023

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, May 14th, 2023 - 32 comments
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32 comments on “Open mike 14/05/2023 ”

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  1. lprent 1
    14 May 2023 at 8:13 am

    There are a few messed up cache pages at present due to some cache option flipping. They should clean themselves out over the next hour.

  2. tsmithfield 2
    14 May 2023 at 9:08 am

    There is going to be an interesting item tonight on "Sunday" about the Gore Council and Ben Bell.

    Sounds like quite a terrible work culture there. And some of the behaviour of the CEO sounds down-right creepy. Apparently the CEO tracked down the former CFO in London and made him an uninvited visit, which was very stressful for the former CEO.

    But the council made headlines not too long after that report, when in late 2007 Parry made a surprise visit to the London home of one of the complainants, former chief financial officer Doug Walker. It resulted in Walker seeking a restraining order against Parry for threatening behaviour.

    To me, it is sounding like an old boys club who resent a young mayor and are trying to get rid of him.

    Disgraceful behaviour. If the other councillors and CEO aren't happy then they should do the right thing and resign.

    • weka 2.1
      14 May 2023 at 9:20 am

      I wonder where he thinks he's going to work after he gets voted out at the next election.

      • tsmithfield 2.1.1
        14 May 2023 at 9:35 am

        Do you mean Bell? I don't know if he will get voted out if the doco shows there has been a bullying culture in the council that Bell has been a victim of.

        People tend to take the side of the victim, and may stick with him.

        For someone to get elected to a council at that age suggests he has something going for him as a politician. I remember Nick Smith (a personal friend back then) getting elected to Rangiora Council while still at High School. I remember that caused a bit of a stir back then.

        I realise he is on the other side of the fence to you. But, history shows he went a long way as a politician.

        • Anne 2.1.1.1
          14 May 2023 at 10:28 am

          "… there has been a bullying culture in the council that Bell has been a victim of."

          If it proves to be correct then it would have started the moment the vote count was complete. The old boomers would have gaslighted him, set him up to take the blame for misdemeanors they were responsible for committing and made other false claims against him.

          The young mayor is on record saying he doesn't know what he is supposed to have done wrong. That suggests to me he's the victim not the perpetrator.

          I've seen that scenario play out more once over the years and the tactics never change.

        • Jilly Bee 2.1.1.2
          14 May 2023 at 4:19 pm

          I would have liked Weka to clarify her assertion 'I wonder where he thinks he's going to work after he gets voted out at the next election.' I trust she wasn't referring to Ben Bell.

        • tWiggle 2.1.1.3
          14 May 2023 at 8:40 pm

          I though what Bell had going for him was his mum, apparently recently high up in Gore Council's city executive.

    • Joe90 2.2
      14 May 2023 at 9:33 am

      Parry and Hicks certainly come across as odious pieces of work.

      https://www.newsroom.co.nz/gore-allegations-pre-date-new-mayor

      • PsyclingLeft.Always 2.2.1
        14 May 2023 at 10:16 am

        For sure. Also IMO….bullying scumbags. And, when there are bullying problems in a Company…Council, or whatever…its nearly always, Top Down. I.E. bullying "management"..leads to a complete toxic culture. And the "managers" remain, embedded….while good employees leave……

        • joe90 2.2.1.1
          14 May 2023 at 11:15 am

          And invariably the bullies, replete with MBA, lawyer up and use the obscenely generous employment agreements they've wrangled themselves to make it nigh on impossible to remove them without substantial cost to rate payers.

          • tsmithfield 2.2.1.1.1
            14 May 2023 at 12:42 pm

            to make it nigh on impossible to remove them without substantial cost to rate payers.

            Given what is being spent on PGs now, it might be a cheap option to remove the CEO even given the cost of that.

      • Acting up 2.2.2
        14 May 2023 at 6:48 pm

        Indeed. Back in 2006, Parry indefinitely locked out union workers pushing for a new collective agreement. The union (PSA) threatened to blacklist the council, which is the only time the PSA has done that in the past 30 years. This was due to anti-union and anti-employees behaviour, that was exceptionally bad, even after the 9 years of the Employment Contracts Act.

        Blacklisting was basically advising all PSA members to not seek jobs there, and to advise all other union affiliates (here and overseas) of the issues with the employer.

        An exceptional step, and indicative of the very poor workplace relations at that time.

    • gsays 2.3
      14 May 2023 at 11:14 am

      My uninformed, casual observer 2cents says, if there is an issue with an elected official and the likes of a senior employee, then the one with 'the will of the people' stands on firmer ground.

    • Ngungukai 2.4
      18 May 2023 at 5:16 am

      I smell a rat. I think there should probably be some forensic accounting done on the Gore District Council's Accounts for the past 10-20 years ???

  3. Joe90 3
    14 May 2023 at 9:18 am

    Minutes before Ukrainian duo Tvorchi performed in the Eurovision final Russia's Black Sea fleet launched a cruise missle attack against their home town Ternopil, in Ukraine's far-west.

    • Coventrie 3.1
      15 May 2023 at 12:07 pm

      Not exactly subtle, was it, and also did nothing to support any supposedly high-minded reason for the invasion (even if that was still possible).

  4. Mike the Lefty 4
    14 May 2023 at 9:40 am

    It was a puzzle to me how a youngster got elected to mayor of such a conservative area in the first place. People must have REALLY been p…..d off with the existing council hierarchy.

  5. aj 5
    14 May 2023 at 11:25 am

    Very interesting Q @ A this morning, with Andrew Hoggard, Cambridge University professor Jonnie Penn talking about AI, and Helen Robinson, CEO Auckland City Missioner. Helen Robinson very on point and if labour doesn't address her concerns in this week's budget, they are dead in this election.

    Can't link yet.

    • bwaghorn 5.1
      14 May 2023 at 5:42 pm

      Andrew Hoggard stated that he doesn't know the difference between different parties ag policies!!!

      Fucker should have been sacked from the feds for that,

  6. joe90 6
    14 May 2023 at 1:48 pm

    Yup, a free speech absolutist.

    /

    Twitter announced late Friday that it’s blocking some content in Turkey ahead of Sunday’s presidential election in the country. The social media company did not explain which tweets would be blocked, nor who made the request, but current president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has previously blocked Twitter across all of Turkey.

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/mattnovak/2023/05/13/twitter-blocks-content-in-turkey-one-day-before-national-election/?

  7. higherstandard 7
    14 May 2023 at 5:17 pm

    Burn the witch !

    [TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]

  8. alwyn 8
    14 May 2023 at 6:37 pm

    I'll bet that your pet lamb loved you though Phillip.

    [TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]

  9. Ad 9
    14 May 2023 at 8:55 pm

    If China pulls off any minor diplomatic success from its recent big diplomatic engagements around Ukraine, Russia, Turkey, Germany – as well as Saudi Arabia and Iran – watch out UN and USA.

    It needs a post by itself, but imagine if China really did broker a set of talks between Russia nd Ukraine. That's a tilt in who has the power to make peace.

    What awaits is a multipolar world like we used to have before 1989.

    • RedLogix 9.1
      14 May 2023 at 10:30 pm

      It is an interesting line of thought.

      But a lot hinges on exactly what kind of deal Xi Xinping could broker. It's apparent Ukraine is not in the mood to compromise, nor does it look like they should for the moment. The critical moment that can be foreseen coming down the track is what happens if Ukraine manages to cut off Crimea? That is when Putin is most likely to realise that some sort of operational pause is highly desirable.

      But Zelensky is not going to settle for a frozen conflict regardless of how the borders are shaped. The big issues are going to be; the return of stolen children and deported citizens, accountability for the unending list of now fulsomely documented war crimes, reparations for the mass destruction and loss of life – and finally it is now a given that Ukraine will have to become a member of NATO in order to ensure any sort of security guarantee. All as a minimum.

      It is not clear how Beijing could deliver any of this.

  10. roblogic 10
    14 May 2023 at 9:06 pm

    Some hopeful news from Ukraine

    Just to summarize the most important developments of the last 48h:

    – Russian lines at Bakhmut crumbling
    – Losing 2 jets and 3 choppers
    – Rear bases in Russian-occupied Luhansk getting eliminated
    – Russians deploying T-54/55
    – Panic and chaos among Russian pilots/troops
    – Prigozhin calling for rebellion

    And the Ukrainian counteroffensive hasn't even started, yet.

    https://twitter.com/tendar/status/1657441305784467457?s=61&t=4nyjBVbo16PbRZPJZdlgag

    • tsmithfield 10.1
      14 May 2023 at 9:42 pm

      Yeah, I have always thought Bakhmut was a good place to start for a number of reasons. Firstly, because the Russians are not set up so well defensively there due to being on attack. Secondly, it would be a huge political statement, given that Russia has banged its head against the Bakhmut wall for months now without success.

      But, I think it is still in the shaping phase. So, too early to draw any conclusions.