Experts found defects including superficial patching of earthquake cracks running through foundation walls, the use of inappropriate building materials and poorly installed exterior brickwork or solid plaster repairs.
How can homeowners be sure a builder who did shoddy foundation work did other repairs on a house properly?
Insurers were also part of the MBIE investigation – 14 over-cap repairs were checked and sources have said that many failed the test.
Will the Government ask them to audit their own work?
If the builders are to blame and to bear the cost of fixing this mess, many will go bankrupt.
And is it fair to blame the builders?
Experts and industry leaders say EQC and Fletcher EQR need to take responsibility for selecting bad builders, scoping work inappropriately, giving tight budgets and failing to identify faulty work.
For years, foundation experts have raised concerns about the MBIE repair guidelines.
YET
However, Brownlee said it was a poor workmanship issue and that EQC and EQR’s processes were good.
This is appalling – and hugely bad for NZ’s international reputation as being good workers and expert at what NZers do, to say the least – and lousy for the homeowners. Will they have any financial comeback to get shoddy work re-done ?
This is an extraordinarily good result for people opposed to GMOs in NZ forests – there wasn’t much time to put in submissions.
Surely the Govt will start to take a bit of notice of people’s objections to genetically modified organisms being introduced – one lives in hope !!
Press Release: GE Free NZ 13 Aug 2015 Scoop NZ
The Ministry of Primary Industries has received over 16,550 submissions and petitions on the National Environment Standards for Plantation Forestry (NES-PF). All 16,000 submissions recommended the deletion of the clauses, inserted at the 11 hour, on genetically engineered trees being the sole responsibility of the Environmental Protection Agency.
“This is amazing, it must be the largest opposition ever recorded on an issue open for submissions. The Ministry must now take these submissions seriously” said Claire Bleakley president of GE Free NZ “They are not holding a hearing and we hope that these views are not ignored.”
Will they eventually need a checking account for daily purposes? Sure. Nevertheless, I want to teach them the real reasons why saving money in a bank makes sense in a normal world, namely a combination of capital preservation and compound interest. The American status quo has killed the innocence and logic of simply walking into a bank and depositing money by offering a near-zero-percent interest rate return for depositors.
Meanwhile we have seen the precedent for bail-ins set in Cyprus, and even just last month, Greek banks simply shut down, denying access and limiting withdrawals.
In Australia, a deposit tax could be coming in the near future. You’d think the banks and consumers would be raising hell, but ING Direct Treasury Head Michael Witts had this to say about Australia’s deposit tax:
“So I think it’s generally a move in the right direction and so, therefore, I think from a consumer’s viewpoint the additional stability that this potentially will bring I think is very good.”
Notice that this isn’t a tax on bank profits, but a tax on citizens’ money in the banks.
The American status quo has killed the innocence and logic of simply walking into a bank and depositing money by offering a near-zero-percent interest rate return for depositors.
Putting money aside so that it begets more money is delusional as it doesn’t actually do anything because the banks just create more money when they make a loan. It’s this concept of money for nothing that makes our entire financial system unstable and prone to collapse.
Another F – U to the people of Auckland – by the company the ratepayers are supposed to ‘own’ and who the council and CEO can’t and won’t control.
Michael talks with RadioLIVE about Auckland’s new big ‘breast’
Silo blocking harbour views erected without notification
Sean talks with Michael Goldwater from Stop Stealing Our Harbour about the latest outrage concerning the Auckland port company.
Yeah, that was a real piss off that one. Really, they should actually be looking to close the Ports of Auckland as it is no longer a suitable place for a commercial terminal.
Edward Snowden wins Swedish human rights award for NSA revelations
Whistleblower receives several standing ovations in Swedish parliament as he wins Right Livelihood award
John Oliver: How many of those documents have you actually read?
Edward Snowden: I’ve evaluated all of the documents that are in the archive.
Oliver: You’ve read every single one?
Snowden: I do understand what I turned over.
Oliver: There’s a difference between understanding what’s in the documents and reading what’s in the documents.
Snowden: I recognize the concern.
Oliver (cuts in sarcastically): Right, because when you’re handing over thousands of NSA documents, the last thing you want to do is read them. (laughter)
Snowden: I think it’s fair to be concerned – did this person do enough, were they careful enough?
Oliver (cuts in): Especially when you’re handling material like we know you’re handling.
Snowden: In my defence I’m not handling anything any more. That’s been passed to the journalists and they’re using extraordinary security measures to make sure this is being reported in the most responsible way.
Oliver: But those are journalists with a lower technical skill set than you.
Snowden: That’s true but they do understand like you and I do just how important it is to get this right.
Oliver: The New York Times took a slide, it didn’t redact it properly and in the end it was possible to see that something was being used in Mosul on Al Qaeda.
Snowden: That is a problem.
Oliver: Well, that’s a ****-up.
Snowden: It is a ****-up and these things do happen in reporting. In journalism we have to accept that some mistakes will be made. This is a fundamental concept of liberty.
Oliver: Right, but you have to own that then. You’re giving documents with information that you know could be harmful which could get out there.
Snowden: Yes, if people act in bad faith.
Oliver (cuts in): We’re not even talking about bad faith, we’re talking about incompetence.
Snowden: We are, but you will never be completely free from risk if you’re free. The only time you can be free from risk is when you’re in prison.
Like all activities, we live in a world of risks. Is the return worth the risks? That appears to be the question that you are sloppily and incompetently avoiding to deal with in your comment.
One of the risks is the risk of doing nothing and letting the paranoid idiots in the US congress, NSA and other similar ‘security’ organisations try the impossible task of making the US ‘safe’ from foreigners. In doing so they make their citizens and everyone else worldwide less safe because they routinely screw up in how they use that information. There are enough public instances of that that I’m not going to mention more than one – the colossal misinterpretation / wishful thinking screwup by Bush Jnr’s administration in Iraq and its downstream effects of the millions killed and maimed which was exactly that.
What Snowden revealed about the way that organisations like the NSA, GCSB, etc were collecting and using data (industrial espionage on Merkel’s phone?) has changed the whole political landscape about surveillance. More importantly, that the way they were collecting and using that data was (to say the least) highly susceptible to error and misinterpretation.
Sure there are the risks of individual casualties from that when people screw up. But the risk of having fuckwits like George W Bush launch wars based on screwed up information is a much higher risk. Opening those processes, and in particular the outright lying by many of the people in those agencies to their oversight committees, up to public scrutiny is an extremely valuable contribution to public debate.
Return vs risk so far has been extremely high for us.
In doing so they make their citizens and everyone else worldwide less safe because they routinely screw up in how they use that information.
And its worse than that. These “security” agencies have now proven time and again that they cannot even competently safeguard the information that they collect from illegal, inappropriate or political use.
There is a MUCH bigger picture to consider, details you have explained are collateral damage unfortunately.
Choice of two routes, you chose to take the route where people are under the illusion that “someone can look over us and keep us safe” with catastrophic collateral damage, the loss of all freedom to think for ourselves, ever.
I choose the route that although it appears more risky, will allow us to continue to participate and think for ourselves, and thrive, despite the inability to control everything.
Good God, people who want the Labour Party to be the Labour Party are joining the Labour Party!
Just a reminder that Labour’s old guard in the UK are aghast that new supporters won’t fuck up things as thoroughly as they have and are therefore pre-emptively trying desperately to fuck things up even more.
I see by another of Mark Steel’s pieces that Blairites must have got control of the membership applications as some left wingers have been told they don’t fit in with Labour’s values. War criminal Tony Blair is just fine, however.
The fervour around Jeremy Corbyn is extraordinary, but it wouldn’t be fair to suggest he’s the only Labour politician who can bring large crowds on to the streets to greet him. Tony Blair is just as capable. In his case the crowds are there to scream that he should be arrested for war crimes and to throw things at him, but that’s being pernickety; he can certainly draw an audience.
Yeah Blair’s the biggest scab in the world really. Not counting Douglas Moore Prebble Bassett et al. As a youngster in 70s Wellington I used to cruise the corridors of Parliament, getting drunk, wanking, fraternising with, licking-up to those punks whom at the time I thought contained ‘All Wonder’. My God ! Guess I can rightly say that whatever a blithering wanker I was at the time my being knew no artifice.
“The fact that WikiLeaks is offering €100,000 for documents that reveal thedetails of the secretive TTIP shows that the US and EU are attempting to block anybody that has any sort of real information regarding this treaty, Matteo Bergamini, director of Shout Out UK told RT.
WikLleaks has launched a bounty hunt for the secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership documents. The terms of the trade deals, including the loss of sovereignty for participating countries, have been kept away from the public….
…and on another issue:
Assange can’t leave embassy as UK wants to arrest him, no matter what – attorney to RT
“Toilet flushing accounts for up to 90 per cent of water consumption in commercial buildings,” he said. “Changing to a more sustainable and water-efficient technology can pay both cost and environmental dividends. This system reduces the water used but does not compromise on the action. In fact, it significantly improves flushing and hygiene performance.”
Now that has got to be a plus. Water is more precious than gold and supplies of fresh potable water are declining around the world so using less water is a Good Thing. Wonder if there’s a political party with enough gumption to make toilets this efficient as mandatory on new instals.
Of course, we should also be working to stop the destruction of fresh water supplies in the first place.
Its more interesting what UMRs mood of the nation has come up with and remember UMR is Labours pollers of choice but better you don’t read it, you might not like to read that unions are the least trusted organisation in NZ, even less trusted then the media
Can’t be that Key……way too articulate – no ‘pissy’ babble. Could be that Mutton/Lamb thing Hosking……glib, hubristic, patronising. Eckshilly, not a bad physical resemblance to that Sir-Loony-Bob-Lower-Hutt-Hills number come to think of it. Less ill-tempered, less “One Foot in the Grave”, but redolent.
Thanks Adam. Please keep putting up these John Clarke “shows” ….. he’s an extraordinarily astute political commentator. Just brilliant this one – and especially the “warning” at the end re infrastructure.
More western media propaganda on how the Russians were behind MH17 being shot down with a Buk missile. Still no word from the Dutch Safety Board, who are running the actual investigation to give us the real answers on what happened.
Guyon Espiner interviews Blinglish today on the imminent demise of Solid Energy, and at 2.30mins starts to rip into him calling him out on his asset stripping of Solid Energy… http://podcast.radionz.co.nz/mnr/mnr-20150814-0817-english_defends_govts_record_over_solid_energy-00.ogg
An extraordinary statement from English:
“If you leave the cash in there they waste it!”
Having driven Solid Energy to borrow heavily and taken cash out of the SOE at an ever increasing rate, it is clear English is as much to blame for the sorry state of the SOE as the equally incompetent Elder.
One of Guyon’s best interviews I have heard. Well done.
Article re Murray’s being found guilty of murder…….there’s a message there if you read it closely (perhaps not even closely)…….certainly hope there was no interference in the reaching of the verdict by the ghost of the onetime putative ‘Father Of The Entitled Nation’.
Why do we trust financiers with the nations money and assets ? is it that they have professional integrity, are beyond reproach, infallible, sit on the the right hand of god, commanded by the Pope, the Queen, the President of the USA etc
Nah they are opportunist scumbags with a B Com degree or should that be just a B Con degree and very little else
It’s the way of ‘The World’ now unfortunately……utter inhuman shit from the media controlling/owning mouths of the slavers……it rules. For myself I have trouble seeing but pitchforks in answer. Lusty greed way beyond need knows no limits. That is their ethos – “Way Beyond My Needs Forever !”
We must, must find a charismatic leader capable of constructing theism in opposition. Otherwise countless babies, our nation, our future, will be born into the service of the gloating, the entitled, the pampered, the fetid, greedy !
It’s a hoot isn’t it ? The Establishment of UK Labour and The Establishment of US Republicans on the horns of the same dilemma at the same time. UK Labour because Corbyn’s actually Left while they’re not – US Republicans because Trump’s actually Mad while they’re not (to be generous).
“You talking about me?”The neoliberal denigration of the past was nowhere more unrelenting than in its depiction of the public service. The Post Office and the Railways were held up as being both irremediably inefficient and scandalously over-manned. Playwright Roger Hall’s “Glide Time” caricatures were presented as accurate depictions of ...
Roger Partridge writes – When the Coalition Government took office last October, it inherited a country on a precipice. With persistent inflation, decades of insipid productivity growth and crises in healthcare, education, housing and law and order, it is no exaggeration to suggest New Zealand’s first-world status was ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – In 2022, the Curriculum Centre at the Ministry of Education employed 308 staff, according to an Official Information Request. Earlier this week it was announced 202 of those staff were being cut. When you look up “The New Zealand Curriculum” on the Ministry of ...
Chris Bishop’s bill has stirred up a hornets nest of opposition. Photo: Lynn Grieveson for The KākāTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate from the last day included:A crescendo of opposition to the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill is ...
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Determining the hardest sport in the world is a subjective matter, as the difficulty level can vary depending on individual abilities, physical attributes, and experience. However, based on various factors including physical demands, technical skills, mental fortitude, and overall accomplishment, here is an exploration of some of the most challenging ...
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Graham Adams writes about the $55m media fund — When Patrick Gower was asked by Mike Hosking last week what he would say to the many Newstalk ZB callers who allege the Labour government bribed media with $55 million of taxpayers’ money via the Public Interest Journalism Fund — and ...
Note: this blog post has been put together over the course of the week I followed the happenings at the conference virtually. Should recordings of the Great Debates and possibly Union Symposia mentioned below, be released sometime after the conference ends, I'll include links to the ones I participated in. ...
The following was my submission made on the “Fast Track Approvals Bill”. This potential law will give three Ministers unchecked powers, un-paralled since the days of Robert Muldoon’s “Think Big” projects.The submission is written a bit tongue-in-cheek. But it’s irreverent because the FTAB is in itself not worthy of respect. ...
One Could Reduce Child Poverty At No Fiscal CostFollowing the Richardson/Shipley 1990 ‘redesign of the welfare state’ – which eliminated the universal Family Benefit and doubled the rate of child poverty – various income supplements for families have been added, the best known being ‘Working for Families’, introduced in 2005. ...
Buzz from the Beehive A few days ago, Point of Order suggested the media must be musing “on why Melissa is mute”. Our article reported that people working in the beleaguered media industry have cause to yearn for a minister as busy as Melissa Lee’s ministerial colleagues and we drew ...
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Jack Vowles writes – New Zealand is said to be suffering from ‘serious populist discontent’. An IPSOS MORI survey has reported that we have an increasing preference for strong leaders, think that the economy is rigged toward the rich and powerful, and political elites are ignoring ‘hard-working people’. ...
Chris Trotter writes – MELISSA LEE should be deprived of her ministerial warrant. Her handling – or non-handling – of the crisis engulfing the New Zealand news media has been woeful. The fate of New Zealand’s two linear television networks, a question which the Minister of Broadcasting, Communications ...
TL;DR: The podcast above features co-hosts and , along with regular guests Robert Patman on Gaza and AUKUS II, and on climate change.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the ...
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TL;DR: The global economy will be one fifth smaller than it would have otherwise been in 2050 as a result of climate damage, according to a new study by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and published in the journal Nature. (See more detail and analysis below, and ...
New Zealand is said to be suffering from ‘serious populist discontent’. An IPSOS MORI survey has reported that we have an increasing preference for strong leaders, think that the economy is rigged toward the rich and powerful, and political elites are ignoring ‘hard-working people’. The data is from February this ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters is understood to be planning a major speech within the next fortnight to clear up the confusion over whether or not New Zealand might join the AUKUS submarine project. So far, there have been conflicting signals from the Government. RNZ reported the Prime Minister yesterday in ...
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Buzz from the Beehive Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones relishes spatting and eagerly takes issue with environmentalists who criticise his enthusiasm for resource development. He relishes helping the fishing industry too. And so today, while the media are making much of the latest culling in the public service to ...
Having written, taught and worked for the US government on issues involving unconventional warfare and terrorism for 30-odd years, two things irritate me the most when the subject is discussed in public. The first is the Johnny-come-lately academics-turned-media commentators who … Continue reading → ...
Eric Crampton writes – Kainga Ora is the government’s house building agency. It’s been building a lot of social housing. Kainga Ora has its own (but independent) consenting authority, Consentium. It’s a neat idea. Rather than have to deal with building consents across each different territorial authority, Kainga Ora ...
Muriel Newman writes – The Coalition Government says it is moving with speed to deliver campaign promises and reverse the damage done by Labour. One of their key commitments is to “defend the principle that New Zealanders are equal before the law.” To achieve this, they have pledged they “will not advance ...
Chris Trotter writes – The absence of anything resembling a fightback from the public servants currently losing their jobs is interesting. State-sector workers’ collective fatalism in the face of Coalition cutbacks indicates a surprisingly broad acceptance of impermanence in the workplace. Fifty years ago, lay-offs in the thousands ...
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Hi,A friend had their 40th over the weekend and decided to theme it after Curb Your Enthusiasm fashion icon Susie Greene. Captured in my tiny kitchen before I left the house, I ending up evoking a mix of old lesbian and Hillary Clinton — both unintentional.Me vs Hillary ClintonIf you’re ...
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Turning what Labour called the “holiday highway” into a four-lane expressway from Auckland to Whangarei could bring at least an economic benefit of nearly two billion a year for Northland each year. And it could help bring an end to poverty in one of New Zealand’s most deprived regions. The ...
Tonight’s six-stack includes: launching his substack with a bunch of his previous documentaries, including this 1992 interview with Dame Whina Cooper. and here crew give climate activists plenty to do, including this call to submit against the Fast Track Approvals bill. writes brilliantly here on his substack ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
You're in the mall when you hear it: some kind of popping sound in the distance, kids with fireworks, maybe. But then a moment of eerie stillness is followed by more of the fireworks sound and there’s also screaming and shrieking and now here come people running for their lives.Does ...
Karl du Fresne writes – There’s a crisis in the news media and the media are blaming it on everyone except themselves. Culpability is being deflected elsewhere – mainly to the hapless Minister of Communications, Melissa Lee, and the big social media platforms that are accused of hoovering ...
I don’t normally send out two newsletters in a day but I figured I’d say something about… the news. If two newsletters is a bit much then maybe just skip one, I don’t want to overload people. Alternatively if you’d be interested in sometimes receiving multiple, smaller updates from me, ...
Buzz from the Beehive David Seymour and Winston Peters today signalled that at least two ministers of the Crown might be in Wellington today. Seymour (as Associate Minister of Education) announced the removal of more red tape, this time to make it easier for new early learning services to be ...
Politicians across the political spectrum are implicated in the New Zealand media’s failing health. Either through neglect or incompetent interventions, successive governments have failed to regulate, foster, and allow a healthy Fourth Estate that can adequately hold politicians and the powerful to account. Our political system is suffering from the ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Government’s newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealand’s urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey and his Government colleagues have made a meal of their mental health commitments, showing how flimsy their efforts to champion the issue truly are, says Labour Mental Health spokesperson Ingrid Leary. ...
Māori are yet to see anything from this Government except cuts, reversals and taking our people backwards, Māori Development spokesperson Willie Jackson said. ...
The Coalition Government’s refusal to commit to ongoing funding for social housing is seeing the sector pull back on developments and families watch their dreams of securing a home fade away, says Labour Housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has made further appointments to the Board of Antarctica New Zealand as part of a continued effort to ensure the Scott Base Redevelopment project is delivered in a cost-effective and efficient manner. The Minister has appointed Neville Harris as a new member of the Board. Mr ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis will travel to the United States on Tuesday to attend a meeting of the Five Finance Ministers group, with counterparts from Australia, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. “I am looking forward to meeting with our Five Finance partners on how we can work ...
The coalition Government has today announced purrfect and pawsitive changes to the Residential Tenancies Act to give tenants with pets greater choice when looking for a rental property, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Pets are important members of many Kiwi families. It’s estimated that around 64 per cent of New ...
State Highway 1 (SH1) through Wellington City is heavily congested at peak times and while planning continues on the duplicate Mt Victoria Tunnel and Basin Reserve project, the Government has also asked NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) to consider and provide advice on a Long Tunnel option, Transport Minister Simeon Brown ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters have condemned Iran’s shocking and illegal strikes against Israel. “These attacks are a major challenge to peace and stability in a region already under enormous pressure," Mr Luxon says. "We are deeply concerned that miscalculation on any side could ...
Hundreds of people in little over a week have turned out in Northland to hear Regional Development Minister Shane Jones speak about plans for boosting the regional economy through infrastructure. About 200 people from the infrastructure and associated sectors attended an event headlined by Mr Jones in Whangarei today. Last ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti has today thanked outgoing Health New Zealand – Te Whatu Ora Chair Dame Karen Poutasi for her service on the Board. “Dame Karen tendered her resignation as Chair and as a member of the Board today,” says Dr Reti. “I have asked her to ...
The NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has signalled their proposed delivery approach for the Government’s 15 Roads of National Significance (RoNS), with the release of the State Highway Investment Proposal (SHIP) today, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Boosting economic growth and productivity is a key part of the Government’s plan to ...
New Zealand is renewing its connections with a world facing urgent challenges by pursuing an active, energetic foreign policy, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “Our country faces the most unstable global environment in decades,” Mr Peters says at the conclusion of two weeks of engagements in Egypt, Europe and the United States. “We cannot afford to sit back in splendid ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has announced the Australian Governor-General, His Excellency General The Honourable David Hurley and his wife Her Excellency Mrs Linda Hurley, will make a State visit to New Zealand from Tuesday 16 April to Thursday 18 April. The visit reciprocates the State visit of former Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced that Medsafe has approved 11 cold and flu medicines containing pseudoephedrine. Pharmaceutical suppliers have indicated they may be able to supply the first products in June. “This is much earlier than the original expectation of medicines being available by 2025. The Government recognised ...
New Zealand and the United States have recommitted to their strategic partnership in Washington DC today, pledging to work ever more closely together in support of shared values and interests, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The strategic environment that New Zealand and the United States face is considerably more ...
April 11, 2024 Joint Declaration by United States Secretary of State the Honorable Antony J. Blinken and New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs the Right Honourable Winston Peters We met today in Washington, D.C. to recommit to the historic partnership between our two countries and the principles that underpin it—rule ...
The Fast-track Bill, if passed, would allow three Ministers, unchallenged and unchecked, to approve the immediate extraction and exhaustion of one-off resources. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Duckett, Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne iamharin/Shutterstock For many people, the term “bulk billed” refers to a GP visit they don’t have to pay ...
Emmas Hislop, Sidnam and Wehipeihana discuss what’s in a name. Emma Sidnam: Hello Emmas! Thank you so much for agreeing to do this with me. My first question for you is related to what’s been on my mind for a while. It’s very important. You see we’ve recently had some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Sievers, Research Fellow, Global Wetlands Project, Australia Rivers Institute, Griffith University Chris Brown Humans love the coast. But we love it to death, so much so we’ve destroyed valuable coastal habitat – in the case of some types of habitat, ...
Josh Thomson on the 80s milk ad jingle he can’t stop singing, the beauty of The Simpsons, why Jersey Shore is as good as Shakespeare and more. For someone who spends a lot of time on our screens, popping up in everything from 7 Days to Taskmaster, Educators to Good ...
In apparent defiance of the Biden administration, the Netanyahu government has now initiated missile strikes against Iran. Last Saturday night (Sunday morning in New Zealand) Iran launched more than 300 drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles against Israeli military targets. With the assistance of US, UK and possibly French forces, ...
Māori representation brings a perspective that encompasses not only the interests of Māori communities but also a broader, holistic approach to environmental stewardship and community well-being, principles deeply embedded in Te Ao Māori (the Māori ...
This week in Auckland, a group of young people took over the microphone at a ministerial press conference, to explain why they oppose the Fast-Track Approvals Bill. One young woman said, ‘We’re here because we love Aotearoa New Zealand. We want to raise our children in an environment that’s thriving, ...
The summer was wonderful. Evie was wonderful, too; finally a teenager, finally worthy of long, hot days. She shaved her legs for the first time and bought cut-off shorts from the op-shop that made them look long. She got a Warehouse singlet so tight on her new shape that her ...
When Thomas James was on his solo camp as part of Outward Bound, the keen outdoorsman didn’t find it too challenging, as others often do. In what might just be the perfect illustration of his character, he saw it as a great opportunity to solve a few problems. “I thought, ...
From the unstable and drippy to the hi-tech and pretty, here’s our ranking of all the tunnels you can drive through in this country. The first tunnel seems to have been built in 2200BC in Babylonia, kicking off a global phenomenon for digging holes in order to get places more ...
Lucinda Bennett on the art of being greedy but resourceful. This is an excerpt from our weekly food newsletter, The Boil Up. When I picture the market, it is always this time of year. Crisp air, dripping nose, counting coins with cold fingers. Sunlight pale, filtered through specks of dew still ...
Zoë Colling’s favourite piece in the ‘That’s So Last Century’ collection is a lubrication chart for a sewing machine from the ’60s. It’s about the size of a postcard, and carefully maintained. “I like it that this piece of ephemera highlights that manual and technical side of the skill involved ...
Kia Ora Gaza A passionate haka reverberated through Auckland International Airport as a medical team of three New Zealand doctors received an emotional farewell from a big crowd of supporters before flying to Turkey to join the international Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. The doctors, who left Auckland yesterday, hope to ...
With submissions closing today, Macassey-Pickard says groups around the country have been supporting a huge range of people to make their submissions. ...
Our response to the new legislation is informed by targeted conversations with practitioners working in the system and through an implementation lens. ...
The new ‘Fast-track Approvals Bill’ would give just three Ministers the power to approve or deny development projects. They would avoid the usual checks and balances that are in place to protect rivers, land, the ocean, and communities. ...
COMMENTARY:By Eugene Doyle Helen Clark, how I miss you. The former New Zealand Prime Minister — the safest pair of hands this country has had in living memory — gave a masterclass on the importance of maintaining an independent foreign policy when she spoke at an AUKUS symposium held ...
The government's released the list of organisations provided with information on how to apply - just hours before public submissions on the bill close. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milton Speer, Visiting Fellow, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney Before climate change really got going, eastern Australia’s flash floods tended to concentrate on our coastal regions, east of the Great Dividing Range. But that’s changing. Now ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elizabeth Finkel, Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow, La Trobe University Sia Duff / South Australian Museum In February, the South Australian Museum “re-imagined” itself. In the face of rising costs and inadequate government funds, CEO David Gaimster, who took the reins last June, declared ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, School of Allied Heath, Human Services & Sport, La Trobe University, La Trobe University This week, Collingwood AFL player Nathan Murphy announced his retirement, brought on by his concussion history and ongoing issues. The 24-year-old’s seemingly sudden retirement, ...
The Mental Health Foundation provides support and resources for those facing the loss of their job, so it’s wrong in the very week the Government adds another 1000 jobs to its tally of cuts, that this is happening. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Howard, Senior Lecturer, Discipline of English and Writing, University of Sydney Daniel Boud/Sydney Theatre Company Decay, terror, revulsion. These are three of the central themes of Thomas Bernhard’s rarely performed play The President. The Austrian is one of the greatest ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ye In (Jane) Hwang, Postdoctoral Research Associate at School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney Shutterstock You’d be hard pressed to find any aspect of daily life that doesn’t require some form of digital literacy. We need only to look back ten ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says threats by ministers Shane Jones and David Seymour to reform or close down the Waitangi Tribunal were “ill-considered”, as legal experts say the ministers may have breached Cabinet Manual conventions. “I think those comments are ill-considered and we expect all ministers to actually exercise good ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Newton, Professor of Exercise Medicine, Edith Cowan University Pexels/RDNE stock project You’re not in your 20s or 30s anymore and you know regular health checks are important. So you go to your GP. During the appointment they measure your waist. ...
A new poem by Evangeline Riddiford Graham. Mitochondrial Problem I. It was long drive to Kansas for the man and his dog but you have to understand he said She doesn’t fly. Which calls to mind not carsick shitting barking or whining but a dog who chooses not to as ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)Hot off the press, this debut ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Wajnryb McDonald, PhD candidate in Criminology, University of Sydney Less than 24 hours after Ashlee Good was murdered in Bondi Junction, her family released a statement requesting the media take down photographs they had reproduced of Ashlee and her family without ...
Chief executive Shaun Robinson said it has not had any government funding cut, but government-funded contracts have not kept pace with rising costs. ...
The Ministry of Health has delayed the release of its evidence brief on the safety, reversibility and mental health and wellbeing outcomes for puberty blockers. While we wait, Julia de Bres speaks to those with firsthand experience. Best practice gender-affirming healthcare is based on trans people’s self-determination and agency. The ...
Barcelona’s city streets have gone from traffic-clogged to pedestrian-friendly. How? Superblocks. Ellen Rykers explains. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week I read a great interview with renowned urbanist Janette Sadik-Khan by The Spinoff’s Wellington editor Joel MacManus: “You can reimagine streets, ...
Student groups ‘Climate Action VUW’, Schools Strike 4 Climate and VUWSA will be on the street in Wellington today, the last day for submissions on the Fast-track Approvals Bill, with a message that the fight against the Government’s ‘War on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sofia Ammassari, Research Fellow, Griffith University Since 2014, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity has grown exponentially – and so has the formidable organisational machine of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). These two factors will be key to delivering the BJP a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Associate Professor of Education (Adjunct) & Senior Manager (BCE), Charles Sturt University During COVID almost all Australian students and their families experienced online learning. But while schools have long since gone back to in-person teaching, online learning has not gone ...
Yes, they’re better for the environment. No, that’s not a good enough reason for me to use them. Once every 26 days or so, my period arrives, and if struck by an act of God, I am caught red-crotched without products. How, after 17 years of this, do I still ...
“It will cause significant harm to our environment and communities. It is completely at odds with New Zealanders’ relationship with nature and our need for a low-carbon, sustainable economic future." ...
The Chair of the National Maori Authority, Matthew Tukaki, has warned a Parliamentary Select Committee that fast-tracking legislation is a perilous practice that undermines the core tenets of democracy, transparency, and accountability. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Tenbensel, Associate Professor, Health Policy, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Getty Images Since coming into power, the coalition government has adopted a simple but shrewd see-how-fast-we-can-move political strategy. However, in the health sector this need for speed entails ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Hronis, Clinical Psychologist, University of Technology Sydney Darya Sannikova/Pexels Whether you’re watching TV, attending a footy game, or eating a meal at your local pub, gambling is hard to escape. Although the rise of gambling is not unique to Australia, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Wong, Forrest Fellow, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Western Australia Have you ever wondered if there are more insects out at night than during the day? We set out to answer this question by combing through the scientific ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carol T Kulik, Research Professor, University of South Australia IR Stone/Shutterstock In Australia, it’s not the done thing to know – let alone ask – what our colleagues are paid. Yet, it’s easy to see how pay transparency can make pay ...
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) is sounding a warning to migrants, that running foul of the law may see them leaving the country prematurely. ...
The government’s plan to get 50,000 people off jobseeker support by 2030 has had a rocky start, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. Beneficiary numbers are up – and so are ...
Raglan Roast is a staple of Wellington coffee culture. But with five branches across the capital, which one is the best? I am a die-hard Raglan Roast fan. It’s consistently the most affordable cafe in Wellington, and one of the only places you can get a coffee after 3pm. So, ...
Residents of University of Auckland halls are being urged to withhold their accommodation fees from May 1, in a bid to force the university to take student concerns over rent hikes seriously.The University of Auckland is facing a strike from students over the cost of on-campus accommodation. The Students ...
New Zealand and the Philippines have signed a new maritime security agreement and stated their concerns over activity in the South China Sea, as Chinese vessels continue to flout international law. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Philippines President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos committed to signing a Mutual Logistics Supporting Arrangement by ...
The thousands of government “back-office” job cuts are causing widespread pain in the capital city. In today’s episode of The Detail, we speak to three journalists and a think tank researcher, looking at the larger picture around the cuts and what effect it will have on Wellington, a city that’s ...
Opinion: The famed American architect and urban designer Daniel Burnham once said, “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood!” Burnham wouldn’t have been referring to the transport plans in Aotearoa New Zealand over the past five years; projects so big they hadn’t the credibility to ...
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Opinion: With maths understanding at 42 percent for Year 8 students, there’s no doubt something has to be done. But how? The post Financial literacy should be on all of us appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Hineaupounamu ‘Missy’ Nuku has been scaling mountains in Canada for her college basketball team, the Lakeland Rustlers. Alberta is currently home for the 20-year-old point guard, who is in her first year of a scholarship at Lakeland College, where she is studying for a business degree. She has certainly made ...
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/business/the-rebuild/71093579/brownlees-bombshell-leaves-cantabrians-in-the-dark
This is appalling – and hugely bad for NZ’s international reputation as being good workers and expert at what NZers do, to say the least – and lousy for the homeowners. Will they have any financial comeback to get shoddy work re-done ?
How can it be good if they were selecting people to do that work that obviously didn’t know what they were doing?
The thing about builders is that they’re not structural engineers.
Yes I thought that was really bizarre.
Surely the GOOD processes would have picked up the faulty workmanship on inspections of the work!!!
This is an extraordinarily good result for people opposed to GMOs in NZ forests – there wasn’t much time to put in submissions.
Surely the Govt will start to take a bit of notice of people’s objections to genetically modified organisms being introduced – one lives in hope !!
Press Release: GE Free NZ 13 Aug 2015 Scoop NZ
The Ministry of Primary Industries has received over 16,550 submissions and petitions on the National Environment Standards for Plantation Forestry (NES-PF). All 16,000 submissions recommended the deletion of the clauses, inserted at the 11 hour, on genetically engineered trees being the sole responsibility of the Environmental Protection Agency.
“This is amazing, it must be the largest opposition ever recorded on an issue open for submissions. The Ministry must now take these submissions seriously” said Claire Bleakley president of GE Free NZ “They are not holding a hearing and we hope that these views are not ignored.”
thanks Jenny, great to have good news about activism.
Hmmm…food for thought
http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2015/08/13/the-dissident-dad-teaching-children-how-to-save-in-a-0-world/
Will they eventually need a checking account for daily purposes? Sure. Nevertheless, I want to teach them the real reasons why saving money in a bank makes sense in a normal world, namely a combination of capital preservation and compound interest. The American status quo has killed the innocence and logic of simply walking into a bank and depositing money by offering a near-zero-percent interest rate return for depositors.
Meanwhile we have seen the precedent for bail-ins set in Cyprus, and even just last month, Greek banks simply shut down, denying access and limiting withdrawals.
In Australia, a deposit tax could be coming in the near future. You’d think the banks and consumers would be raising hell, but ING Direct Treasury Head Michael Witts had this to say about Australia’s deposit tax:
“So I think it’s generally a move in the right direction and so, therefore, I think from a consumer’s viewpoint the additional stability that this potentially will bring I think is very good.”
Notice that this isn’t a tax on bank profits, but a tax on citizens’ money in the banks.
Putting money aside so that it begets more money is delusional as it doesn’t actually do anything because the banks just create more money when they make a loan. It’s this concept of money for nothing that makes our entire financial system unstable and prone to collapse.
It wouldn’t happen in Wellington.
Auckland’s ‘big breast’ courtesy of Ports of Auckland – it has to be seen to be believed. Click on link.
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/Silo-blocking-harbour-views-erected-without-notification/tabid/506/articleID/94031/Default.aspx
Another F – U to the people of Auckland – by the company the ratepayers are supposed to ‘own’ and who the council and CEO can’t and won’t control.
Michael talks with RadioLIVE about Auckland’s new big ‘breast’
Silo blocking harbour views erected without notification
Sean talks with Michael Goldwater from Stop Stealing Our Harbour about the latest outrage concerning the Auckland port company.
Yeah, that was a real piss off that one. Really, they should actually be looking to close the Ports of Auckland as it is no longer a suitable place for a commercial terminal.
Edward Snowden wins Swedish human rights award for NSA revelations
Whistleblower receives several standing ovations in Swedish parliament as he wins Right Livelihood award
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/dec/01/nsa-whistlebloewer-edward-snowden-wins-swedish-human-rights-award?CMP=share_btn_tw
good to know not everyone joins in with the childish schoolyard narrative of “lets get him”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEVlyP4_11M
John Oliver: How many of those documents have you actually read?
Edward Snowden: I’ve evaluated all of the documents that are in the archive.
Oliver: You’ve read every single one?
Snowden: I do understand what I turned over.
Oliver: There’s a difference between understanding what’s in the documents and reading what’s in the documents.
Snowden: I recognize the concern.
Oliver (cuts in sarcastically): Right, because when you’re handing over thousands of NSA documents, the last thing you want to do is read them. (laughter)
Snowden: I think it’s fair to be concerned – did this person do enough, were they careful enough?
Oliver (cuts in): Especially when you’re handling material like we know you’re handling.
Snowden: In my defence I’m not handling anything any more. That’s been passed to the journalists and they’re using extraordinary security measures to make sure this is being reported in the most responsible way.
Oliver: But those are journalists with a lower technical skill set than you.
Snowden: That’s true but they do understand like you and I do just how important it is to get this right.
Oliver: The New York Times took a slide, it didn’t redact it properly and in the end it was possible to see that something was being used in Mosul on Al Qaeda.
Snowden: That is a problem.
Oliver: Well, that’s a ****-up.
Snowden: It is a ****-up and these things do happen in reporting. In journalism we have to accept that some mistakes will be made. This is a fundamental concept of liberty.
Oliver: Right, but you have to own that then. You’re giving documents with information that you know could be harmful which could get out there.
Snowden: Yes, if people act in bad faith.
Oliver (cuts in): We’re not even talking about bad faith, we’re talking about incompetence.
Snowden: We are, but you will never be completely free from risk if you’re free. The only time you can be free from risk is when you’re in prison.
Sloppy at best, incompetent at worst
Like all activities, we live in a world of risks. Is the return worth the risks? That appears to be the question that you are sloppily and incompetently avoiding to deal with in your comment.
One of the risks is the risk of doing nothing and letting the paranoid idiots in the US congress, NSA and other similar ‘security’ organisations try the impossible task of making the US ‘safe’ from foreigners. In doing so they make their citizens and everyone else worldwide less safe because they routinely screw up in how they use that information. There are enough public instances of that that I’m not going to mention more than one – the colossal misinterpretation / wishful thinking screwup by Bush Jnr’s administration in Iraq and its downstream effects of the millions killed and maimed which was exactly that.
What Snowden revealed about the way that organisations like the NSA, GCSB, etc were collecting and using data (industrial espionage on Merkel’s phone?) has changed the whole political landscape about surveillance. More importantly, that the way they were collecting and using that data was (to say the least) highly susceptible to error and misinterpretation.
Sure there are the risks of individual casualties from that when people screw up. But the risk of having fuckwits like George W Bush launch wars based on screwed up information is a much higher risk. Opening those processes, and in particular the outright lying by many of the people in those agencies to their oversight committees, up to public scrutiny is an extremely valuable contribution to public debate.
Return vs risk so far has been extremely high for us.
And its worse than that. These “security” agencies have now proven time and again that they cannot even competently safeguard the information that they collect from illegal, inappropriate or political use.
There is a MUCH bigger picture to consider, details you have explained are collateral damage unfortunately.
Choice of two routes, you chose to take the route where people are under the illusion that “someone can look over us and keep us safe” with catastrophic collateral damage, the loss of all freedom to think for ourselves, ever.
I choose the route that although it appears more risky, will allow us to continue to participate and think for ourselves, and thrive, despite the inability to control everything.
Gee puckish we await your concern for all the innocent victims of the U.s.a drone murder program …..
Or all the Palestinian woman, children and other civilians regularly murdered by the Israelis with american weapons ……….
Incompetent at best ……….. murderous but unconcerned in practise.
Good God, people who want the Labour Party to be the Labour Party are joining the Labour Party!
Just a reminder that Labour’s old guard in the UK are aghast that new supporters won’t fuck up things as thoroughly as they have and are therefore pre-emptively trying desperately to fuck things up even more.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/with-hundreds-of-thousands-of-new-supporters-labour-is-on-the-verge-of-something-big–what-a-complete-disaster-10454504.html
I’m sure Goff, Mumblefuck and Robertson have their notepads out (though in Robertson’s case, he’ll just do a cut and paste).
😈
Thanks for the link Rhinocrates.
I see by another of Mark Steel’s pieces that Blairites must have got control of the membership applications as some left wingers have been told they don’t fit in with Labour’s values. War criminal Tony Blair is just fine, however.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-leadership-contest-mark-steel-becomes-latest-leftwinger-to-be-barred-from-voting-10452628.html
😈 😆
+1 @ Draco
+100 Draco….LOL
Yeah Blair’s the biggest scab in the world really. Not counting Douglas Moore Prebble Bassett et al. As a youngster in 70s Wellington I used to cruise the corridors of Parliament, getting drunk, wanking, fraternising with, licking-up to those punks whom at the time I thought contained ‘All Wonder’. My God ! Guess I can rightly say that whatever a blithering wanker I was at the time my being knew no artifice.
‘Campaigners are key to getting secret TPP and TTIP trade deals published’
http://www.rt.com/op-edge/312362-ttip-eu-us-wikileaks/
“The fact that WikiLeaks is offering €100,000 for documents that reveal thedetails of the secretive TTIP shows that the US and EU are attempting to block anybody that has any sort of real information regarding this treaty, Matteo Bergamini, director of Shout Out UK told RT.
WikLleaks has launched a bounty hunt for the secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership documents. The terms of the trade deals, including the loss of sovereignty for participating countries, have been kept away from the public….
…and on another issue:
Assange can’t leave embassy as UK wants to arrest him, no matter what – attorney to RT
https://www.rt.com/news/312385-assange-attorney-uk-arrest/
Is this the world’s greenest toilet? Minimise Water unveils new system for flushing away carbon emissions
Now that has got to be a plus. Water is more precious than gold and supplies of fresh potable water are declining around the world so using less water is a Good Thing. Wonder if there’s a political party with enough gumption to make toilets this efficient as mandatory on new instals.
Of course, we should also be working to stop the destruction of fresh water supplies in the first place.
Four times as many dairy farmers than normal crying out for help
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/dairy/71028700/dairy-farmers-crying-out-for-help-in-wake-of-falling-fonterra-payout
http://www.whaleoil.co.nz/2015/03/why-labour-needs-to-distance-themselves-from-the-unions/
Theres a link to UMRs mood of a nation which makes for interesting reading
What, the one released in February?
Linkwhore.
Oh Boy! Thanks!. a link to whaleoil to read the Slutter’s advice to Labour. Can’t resist..on second thoughts– yes I can.
Its more interesting what UMRs mood of the nation has come up with and remember UMR is Labours pollers of choice but better you don’t read it, you might not like to read that unions are the least trusted organisation in NZ, even less trusted then the media
And the effect of the drop will be for next season as they finish this one still on the higher payout.
Wow, this does a great summing up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ue9ek9tTSg
+1111
The last bit was brilliant.
Thank you – *brilliant, indeed.
* weeps
Can’t be that Key……way too articulate – no ‘pissy’ babble. Could be that Mutton/Lamb thing Hosking……glib, hubristic, patronising. Eckshilly, not a bad physical resemblance to that Sir-Loony-Bob-Lower-Hutt-Hills number come to think of it. Less ill-tempered, less “One Foot in the Grave”, but redolent.
I like the “Grexit” “explanation” too – so very true.
Thanks Adam. Please keep putting up these John Clarke “shows” ….. he’s an extraordinarily astute political commentator. Just brilliant this one – and especially the “warning” at the end re infrastructure.
And so very pertinent re NZ.
Thank YOU very much.
More western media propaganda on how the Russians were behind MH17 being shot down with a Buk missile. Still no word from the Dutch Safety Board, who are running the actual investigation to give us the real answers on what happened.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/asia/71132150/mh17-dastardly-cia-plot-to-shoot-down-plane-revealed-in-russia
Guyon Espiner interviews Blinglish today on the imminent demise of Solid Energy, and at 2.30mins starts to rip into him calling him out on his asset stripping of Solid Energy…
http://podcast.radionz.co.nz/mnr/mnr-20150814-0817-english_defends_govts_record_over_solid_energy-00.ogg
An extraordinary statement from English:
“If you leave the cash in there they waste it!”
Having driven Solid Energy to borrow heavily and taken cash out of the SOE at an ever increasing rate, it is clear English is as much to blame for the sorry state of the SOE as the equally incompetent Elder.
One of Guyon’s best interviews I have heard. Well done.
Well said Macro Guyon was really on target and the dipton boy was dithering.
Article re Murray’s being found guilty of murder…….there’s a message there if you read it closely (perhaps not even closely)…….certainly hope there was no interference in the reaching of the verdict by the ghost of the onetime putative ‘Father Of The Entitled Nation’.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11497335
Why do we trust financiers with the nations money and assets ? is it that they have professional integrity, are beyond reproach, infallible, sit on the the right hand of god, commanded by the Pope, the Queen, the President of the USA etc
Nah they are opportunist scumbags with a B Com degree or should that be just a B Con degree and very little else
It’s the way of ‘The World’ now unfortunately……utter inhuman shit from the media controlling/owning mouths of the slavers……it rules. For myself I have trouble seeing but pitchforks in answer. Lusty greed way beyond need knows no limits. That is their ethos – “Way Beyond My Needs Forever !”
We must, must find a charismatic leader capable of constructing theism in opposition. Otherwise countless babies, our nation, our future, will be born into the service of the gloating, the entitled, the pampered, the fetid, greedy !
Well well well
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/71145106/auckland-housing-market-fears-lead-to-standard–poors-bank-credit-rating-cuts
Auckland house prices
Oops
It’s a hoot isn’t it ? The Establishment of UK Labour and The Establishment of US Republicans on the horns of the same dilemma at the same time. UK Labour because Corbyn’s actually Left while they’re not – US Republicans because Trump’s actually Mad while they’re not (to be generous).