This sort of article should be headline news.
Every day.
Monbiot nails it.
“It was a moment of the kind that changes lives. At a press conference held by climate activists Extinction Rebellion last week, two of us journalists pressed the organisers on whether their aims were realistic. They have called, for example, for UK carbon emissions to be reduced to net zero by 2025. Wouldn’t it be better, we asked, to pursue some intermediate aims?
A young woman called Lizia Woolf stepped forward. She hadn’t spoken before, but the passion, grief and fury of her response was utterly compelling. “What is it that you are asking me as a 20-year-old to face and to accept about my future and my life? … This is an emergency. We are facing extinction. When you ask questions like that, what is it you want me to feel?” We had no answer.
Softer aims might be politically realistic, but they are physically unrealistic. Only shifts commensurate with the scale of our existential crises have any prospect of averting them. Hopeless realism, tinkering at the edges of the problem, got us into this mess. It will not get us out………
…….Two tasks need to be performed simultaneously: throwing ourselves at the possibility of averting collapse, as Extinction Rebellion is doing, slight though this possibility may appear; and preparing ourselves for the likely failure of these efforts, terrifying as this prospect is. Both tasks require a complete revision of our relationship with the living planet.”
The problem is political. A fascinating analysis by the social science professor Kevin MacKay contends that oligarchy has been a more fundamental cause of the collapse of civilisations than social complexity or energy demand. Control by oligarchs, he argues, thwarts rational decision-making, because the short-term interests of the elite are radically different to the long-term interests of society. This explains why past civilisations have collapsed “despite possessing the cultural and technological know-how needed to resolve their crises”. Economic elites, which benefit from social dysfunction, block the necessary solutions.
Capitalism always destroys the society that it arises in.
If we want to survive we need to get rid of the capitalists.
Even the bodies that claim to be addressing our predicament remain locked within destructive frameworks. Last Wednesday I attended a meeting about environmental breakdown at the Institute for Public Policy Research. Many people in the room seemed to understand that continued economic growth is incompatible with sustaining the Earth’s systems.
“…continued economic growth is incompatible with sustaining the Earth’s systems.”
Something we agree on. Though I’d word it slightly differently nonetheless a system of increasing economic growth based on a system that still uses fuels that are unable to be used in perpetuity is crazy.
So it looks like the venality and political paralysis of the Oxbridge British political elites over Brexit are coming to a head.
If Theresa May’s Brexit deal is rejected by the Tory hardliners, she will have to try and resign. I say try, because no one will want to replace her – a moderate will inherit exactly the same problems she has inherited and a hard line Brexiteer will not have the required support. Boris Johnson’s overweening ambition means he desperately wants to lead the Tories but he would be a disaster – he is incompetent and the remainers in his party hate him. Anyway, the hardliners don’t want a deal – they would be happy with a no deal hard Brexit. Their irresponsibility knows no bounds. The trouble is, it is difficult to trigger a new election under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 without at least some Turkeys voting for an early Xmas.
Assuming there is another election before Xmas, don’t assume Labour (who would inevitably win) would be any better at fixing the problem. Internally, the Labour party under Corbyn has managed to pretty much deal with “New Labour” PLP faction now, who have become isolated within the party, will dwindle considerably in number after the next general election and have no major constituency outside it (which is why they haven’t yet flounced off to form a new party of the radical centre). But that doesn’t mean the hardline neoliberal remainers of the Labour right. Such is the venality of the Labour’s Blairite Oxbridge political elites that they will wait until after the next general election, then they’ll just use the fixed-term Parliaments Act to cover their forming a new party of the radical centre (possibly with a few Tories and some Lib-dems) and then settle down to paralyse the new Corbyn government on everything from re-nationalisation to Brexit.
The British Oxbridge recruited political class has been a total clusterfuck for 150 years. Short of a major revolution, expect the fight desperately to retain their own political primacy (which is why so many of them really hate Brexit – it was a full-on punch on the nose for them and a direct challenge to their authority) and not much else.
“You may not have heard of the Legatum Institute; I hadn’t either, except for Legatum’s partnership with First Look Media billionaire Pierre Omidyar in a gruesome microfinance investment in India a few years back, SKS Microfinance. Omidyar and Legatum co-invested in Unitus Equity, which then invested in SKS Microfinance ostensibly to help the world’s poorest people in rural India. Instead, a few wealthy insiders cashed out to the tune of mega-millions for themselves, while ruthless SKS debt collectors bullied hundreds of rural Indian villagers into committing suicide by drowning, drinking jars of pesticide, and other horrific means. ”
“bridging the interests of global vulture capitalists like his boss Christopher Chandler with the interests of neocon regime-change groups like the National Endowment for Democracy, and more familiar neocon pro-war lobbyists like Michael Weiss.”
I’ll probably be wrong, but I think 2020 is too early for her. Even purely out of, it would be a dumb move for anyone running against Trump for Republican candidacy.
I have little doubt if anyone is going to be the first female US Prez’ it will probably be her though
@ Chris T,
Yes you might well be right, it does seem early for a run, but then again who know what will happen with Trump between now and then, his presidency to have the air of something that could implode messily at any moment.
@ adam
You are exactly right, and worryingly, it seems more and more like this ridiculous Trump ‘fetish’ along with the equally inane ‘Russiagate conspiracy’ has and still is derailing any serious opposition to his insane narrative.
“Bob Woodward: No Evidence Of Trump-Russia Collusion, I Searched For Two Years”
And finally stopped pretending it’s about travel to and from the CBD and the airport instead of the real opposition which is nimbyism around the planned TOD intensification along the Dominion Road corridor.
I agree with Mike Lee. His reference to ‘experts’ is a timely reminder, considering that many high profile – but low benefit – projects seem to go ahead because of marketing skills rather than true cost benefit analysis.
There was a recent article on the Auckland Cycleway that showed the disconnect between projections and actual use – as well as financial overruns.
Experts are just people who came from privilege who got an education. They struggle to realise it’s their connections which make their opinions count – not some innate sense of understanding.
Experts also often seem to be those who have excelled at self-promotion and have a high visibility and familiarity with the public. Auckland transport and planning have suffered from that reliance.
What frustrates me in particularly, is that those most in need are missing out because they have no profile, and are given none when it counts.
Gotta disagree on the value of an education, there.
The problem is when business consultancies provide “expertise” – are they experts who are also good at marketing, or are they excellent marketers who know fuckall? And will they provide you with an expert solution, or expertly persuade you that you need more of their solutions?
Yep, private enterprise expertise has to be seriously questioned about their actual expertise and about their motivations.
I do recall many roading contractors got really upset when the last Labour government started building rail rather than roads while all declaiming rail.
Reminds me of the thinking that McLuhan did years ago as to where to get the best solution, ideas. The thinking was that you ask a builder and he things of infrastructure, a taxi company thinks of vehicles, a teacher would probably say more education.l All would be partly right. So does one ask a business consultancy that probably is operating from a bunch of theories from business school – and where did that get its ideas and what practical experience in all the fields of business have they had?
“The medium is the message” is a phrase coined by Marshall McLuhan meaning that the form of a medium embeds itself in any message it would transmit or convey, creating a symbiotic relationship by which the medium influences how the message is perceived. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message
Also – an organisation I was involved with for a while asked a corporate services outfit to do a systems audit. Recommended outsourcing some management services.
Twenty years later apparently the same outfit is still providing management services to the organisation. Smartest way to go, or self-serving advice? Who knows? No apparent improvement to the organisation.
His reference to the lack of experts in NZ to design Light Rail was a bloody pathetic excuse for an argument. AT and the NZTA are the experts – Mike Lee just doesn’t agree with them.
And the Orsman article in the Herald was just more axe grinding from him and was pretty easily debunked by this https://www.greaterauckland.org.nz/2018/11/13/the-heralds-latest-cycling-smear/
Mike Lee was on the board for Auckland Transport, until Goff dismantled that elector representation. He understands how the system works, and I suspect you don’t.
Our community got access to public transport because of our high-response level to an AT survey, not because it was a community determined in need of it. (Personally advised of this by a Local Board rep, who was upset by the fact his neighbouring community did not respond as fully, and so missed out.) If you understand this – then you have the realisation that it is the vocal – and not the needy – who benefit from this method of resource and planning allocation. Which is why we see those without voices or adequate representation lose out time and time again.
There are experts at fact finding that supports their lobbying. To me, Greater Transport is an example. It’s failure is a lack of comprehensive voices that encompass all of Auckland, and it’s closer relationship with Auckland Transport has removed it’s claim to independence. Auckland Transport has supported it when it aligns, because of it’s influence. That cosy relationship comes at a cost.
The push for light rail is supported by well chosen analytics and presumptions – much like the cycleway project. I support the development of cycleways, but I believe the priority of projects and the feasiblity should be based on independently based evidence, and more accurate projections of both financial and social benefits. From that perspective, I believe the electric train connection to the airport is better on both counts.
How is a heavy rail express service between Britomart and the airport a better social benefit than expansion of public transport to the (currently poorly served) south western suburbs via LRT?
If you noticed I also added priorities to my comment. There is a dearth of adequate affordable public transport in South Auckland, that would also not be improved by the proposed LRT option.
The constant return to a proposed stadium on the waterfront is an example of consistent lobbying gaining traction without evidential requirement for priority spending. As time passes, the public assumes a need has been identified by independent analysis, not the tabled projections by interested parties.
Should we really be looking at airport expansion and consequential airport travellers as a priority, or should we – as you point out – be looking at those in areas of Auckland already poorly served, and be improving their current and future options? Given the growing awareness of climate change, and the failure of any feasible commercial alternative to aviation fuel, this seems a strange consideration. Or alternatively, ‘improving’ the services to Dominion Road residents is hardly improving options for those in South Auckland.
I’m not really sure what you’re trying to say with this comment? The waterfront stadium and the aviation industry’s adverse contribution to climate change are worthy subjects in their own right but not really pertinent to this conversation.
The gist of your argument seems to be that South Auckland’s public transport network is shit and while that’s so everybody else’s should be too?
The South-WESTERN (geddit?) LRT is designed to improve service to that part of Auckland and to alleviate the severe road congestion that’s projected for southern entry points into the CBD if the bus network is to keep up with growing demand.
I am saying that you are making the presumption that projects are being prioritised due to some sort of internal process that identifies both need, short-term and long-term benefits. From observation, this is not what happens.
The aviation’s adverse contribution to climate change is pertinent to the large financial investment – and appropriation of land – for airport expansion, and proposals to facilitate the faster movement of airport travellers.
“…and to alleviate the severe road congestion that’s projected for southern entry points into the CBD if the bus network is to keep up with growing demand…”. There are many Aucklanders that don’t travel into the CBD, that have not had their needs identified. If they don’t get identified, then they aren’t even in the running for prioritisation.
I am unequivocally saying that I agree with Mike Lee. That employment at Auckland Transport does not automatically ensure a balanced, objective view for spending and priorities is presented.
And Mike Lee has dived to the bottom of the pond and survived all that fetid pond water. A strong head and constitution and hopefully with brain cells still in tip top order. We need the wise like him and not the fast thinking then disappearing man.
By whom? Can you link, as far as I know it only came out a couple of days ago, but I haven’t really been watching. I also don’t refer to Greater Auckland as an authority, because I think their perspective is too narrow, but I know that many take what they say as independent and comprehensive analysis.
Further spending is expected to happen in the CBD, and inner Auckland while other areas struggle for alternative transport infrastructure like walking and cycling. The division of Auckland Transport from Auckland Council, means that the way people live and move are treated separately and often have outcomes that are detrimental those that live in those communities.
I am in favour of – and have advocated for – better alternative and public transport planning and implementation. But I also don’t think that a particular cycleway project is necessarily money well spent – unless the need was identified and it provides the best cost/benefit analysis, in terms of other areas where it may be needed.
he figures seemed damning, but one important detail was obscured: the projections the cycleways were failing to live up to were for 2026, which is at last count, eight years in the future. The paper version of the story never mentioned that arguably important fact, while the online version tacked the detail 20 paragraphs down in a quote from the New Zealand Transport Authority. According to Matt Lowrie at Greater Auckland the report leaked to Orsman had been discarded at draft stage because it was so inaccurate. Orsman’s story was, at best, misleading.
Bold mine.
So, we can assume that the reason why that particular report was leaked was because someone within the organisation was working for a political end. He was probably also the person who wrote it.
There is a grain of truth to the trio’s idea that our transport authorities are getting it wrong though. There really are some wasteful, underused, prohibitively expensive transport projects being funded in New Zealand. Even if the worst horror stories about cycleways were all true, these projects’ overruns would still make them pale into economic insignificance. Hosking, Orsman, and Smith should check out some of the stuff that’s happening with roads.
Yeah, roads are actually the real problem but those three dinosaurs won’t accept that reality.
EDIT:
Maybe it’s because these things represent change, and change is scary. Maybe it’s just more interesting and newsworthy to heap scorn on new ways of doing things than to properly examine our existing system.
That’s understandable. But the truth is we’ve institutionalised an often prohibitively expensive, inefficient, unsafe transport model that’s literally killing us. Cycleways are at least a feint in a different direction. They might cost us a few million and a little extra time in our cars, but keeping things the way they are may cost the Earth.
Greater Auckland was also a great advocate of the cycleway from the beginning. They should acknowledge that in any posts.
Matt Lowrie at Greater Auckland, has his own perspective, and the time and audience to present to. This does not mean that all perspectives are included in their analysis and data which is collected to justify their views.
And the pertinent point that Mike Lee made is not a discussion is not about roads vs cycleways. It is about that particular cycleway project, not providing the level of benefit that was used to secure funding.
Did you read the bit about the report being dumped because it was inaccurate?
The level of benefit was estimated as being 926 in 2026. In other words, in eight years from now and present growth in use shown by the same report indicates that that will actually be seriously under.
I didn’t make it otherwise. The article I linked addressed your concerns and pointed out that the dinosaurs attacking cycleways don’t do the same for roads. In other words, it pointed out both the inaccuracies used to produce a false impression (lies) and the hypocrisy of those lying.
“According to Matt Lowrie at Greater Auckland the report leaked to Orsman had been discarded at draft stage because it was so inaccurate. Orsman’s story was, at best, misleading.”
Matt Lowrie does more than that – he discredits Orsman’s objectivity in all his reporting:
” But I had also noticed the article was authored by Bernard Orsman, who has gained quite a history in recent years of articles that try to generate some sort of outrage, usually related to the council and/or housing. I’ve also noticed there is a tendency in these types of articles for the real story to be somewhere in the last few paragraphs, a point by which many people have stopped reading. Sure enough, this ‘beat up’ fit the pattern perfectly. The key point is in this sentence.
“In undertaking this review, the audit and assurance team was informed that Auckland Transport forecast cyclist user numbers were based on cyclist user estimates forecast in 2026,” a spokesman said.
So Orsman, or the internal report he’s obtained that he’s basing this article on, compares cycling numbers in January-17 with projections for 2026 after we’ve completed an entire city centre networks.
1. When you look at Orsman’s filed stories they are typical council reporting – full with the facts etc that have been presented during meetings, and from my point of view, it seems disingenous to discredit all his work – as a method of discussing this topic.
2. Matt is right, the key point is in this sentence: ” “In undertaking this review, the audit and assurance team was informed that Auckland Transport forecast cyclist user numbers were based on cyclist user estimates forecast in 2026,” a spokesman said.”
Why did were they informed only during the review process? Surely this information should have been clearly given at the time the decision to allocate funds was given? If that was the case, the audit team should have had access to it for the draft report and would not have to be belatedly ‘informed’. Does that not give you pause for thought?
“You’re still trying to believe the lies.”
There is a lack of robust process and transparency going on there. Processes should stand up to scrutiny, and this project while beneficial to many – may not have been the most beneficial – including projects that were designed to provide access to alternative transport modes for those who already are badly served by public transport or are transport poor.
“21. The modelling of the cycle network near the City Centre indicates that by 2026 4500 people a day will cycle to the City Centre, which is the equivalent to approximately four lanes of traffic on the arterial road network during the peak period. Investment in cycling therefore presents a potentially cost effective means of adding additional capacity to the network.”
I’m assuming that this is similar to the figure used for the initial assessment for the cycleway, but despite GA and other articles saying that the inference made by Orsman is misleading, there are no links showing the original figures or report used for decision making. That would go some way to clearing up the confusion, and would provide accessible evidence for those seeking the facts.
Would like to see the Cost Benefit Analysis of Light Rail (Trams) to the Airport vs Heavy Rail via Puhinui. I have little faith in AT. Hopefully the decision is peer reviewed by some professional overseas experts.
I also have little faith in AT, and often still they let me down. 😀
I would like to see some analysis of the benefit of Heavy Rails for long-term provision of passenger network, freight movement, maintenance and service costs, but also whether either option is the best use of transport funds at the moment.
Just had a look at the Greater Auckland latest blog on the topic, and the post and comments seem to move towards a discussion on the benefits of cycleways in general, and a disregard for roads.
Which is a way of going off topic, when you are talking about particular projects, and discussing the merits, costs and benefits of them in regards to alternative spending on other cycling projects.
Two projects – Nelson St and Grafton Gully – went over budget, performed worse than expected and may not have been economically viable, said the report.
That describes every single RON.
And the cycleways are still going to be a better investment.
The business case for Nelson St predicted 986 cyclists would use the cycleway daily, but in January last year the count was 333 when the report was written. The latest figures from AT at the end of September this year show 448 cyclists a day using the cycleway.
Ah, so use is still building.
I suspect that this report will be conveniently lost and forgotten when it reaches and then exceeds the estimated number.
I suspect that this report will be conveniently lost and forgotten when it reaches and then exceeds the estimated number.”
I am in favour of cycleways. But consider if this project was chosen over another – more accurately – but less positively presented project, and it makes a difference to how well our transport spending is being allocated in terms of priority.
Yes, the use is still building. But that was not the criteria that provided the decision makers with the information they needed to responsibly allocate resources.
(Also, I think many smaller projects that would have really good outcomes don’t even make it to the discussion table because they don’t have visible advocates.)
This project is part of an ongoing series of projects that will build up a network of cycle paths across Auckland. When that network reaches across more of Auckland than it does now then we will see explosive growth in cycle use.
This project is a necessary part of that network and without it the network won’t be as good as it should be.
“This project is part of an ongoing series of projects that will build up a network of cycle paths across Auckland. When that network reaches across more of Auckland than it does now then we will see explosive growth in cycle use.”
Great. But where is the analysis that says that this was the priority – not because it was central Auckland – but because it provided the most benefit. As far as I know, analysis on other areas of Auckland has not been done to any high degree of detail – other than self-filled surveys.
This lack of analysis right at the start, makes the allocation and prioritisation of funding lop-sided. Not necessarily the best outcome for all Aucklanders.
“BTW, surveys are about the best democracy we can get ATM.”
Surveys will always then favour the time rich and already provided for. They have the time and resources to participate. That is not a high standard to aim for.
A stocktake of options available to communities of people doesn’t really require surveys, just good robust data. Further research – which may or may not include surveys – can be undertaken to identify areas where investment delivers big returns for community while still putting pieces in place towards an integrated transport system.
“Why don’t you do an OIA and ask?”
Not my cup of tea at the moment. But I did go to many council meetings etc for a few years, and have spent enough time on it – I’ve moved on. I don’t see any significant change in processes though. And I remain concerned about the lack of focus for communities throughout Auckland that don’t have advocacy.
I am a supporter of alternative transport modes, and of increasing public transport options for Aucklanders. I’m not convinced that the ever rising cost of the proposed LRT for the airport link is the best use of transport funds.
The unfolding constitutional crisis in Sri Lanka, a fellow Commonwealth country, is huge news too Cinny but I doubt our parochial media in NZ will be covering that story anytime soon even though there is a sizeable Sri Lankan minority in Auckland.
As the postal ballots slowly get counted in California that state looks to be a rolling bloodbath for Republicans. Nationwide Dems may pick up as many as 40 seats, the third biggest Midterms gain in the last 40 years.
Its looking more like the Democrats will pick up 37 Scott….but that really is an excellent result that has been very poorly reported by the media which (as in NZ) concentrates on early results and not the final result.
The Dems picking up Arizona in the senate yesterday-previously called for the Republicans-was great news.
You’re probably right at 37/38 but possibly as many as 40 if the outstanding races go the Dems way, and most have been.
It seems the tv networks 10 pm election night prognosis was the narrative that got “baked in” as they say in America. Republicans built their spin around that and it’s taken a week to unravel.
The Arizona win is significant for Democrats, even though Sinema (originally a Green Party staffer) recast herself as a very right/centrist Democrat to win and Martha McSally was a pretty bad candidate. It points to some sort of pathway for the Democrats towards majority in the Senate via the shifting demographics in the sunbelt states.
Scott I may be wrong here and you right…Democrats seem to be picking up enough House seats to get to +39 and even +40.
Its a bit weird in my defence-I was relying on realclearpolitics figures that showed that House races had been 100% counted with the Dems behind where in fact the figures have continued to change towards the Dem after this.
Nick Smith has just finished throwing tantrum on Morning Report because Susie Ferguson had the temerity to ask him about the Pike River re-entry rather than let him drone on about government use of consultants.
Dreadful as it may sound, my perceptions/thoughts over recent months have become that Nick Smith is actually now coming across as one of National’s “better and more experienced”* MPs – compared to Bridges, Bennett and co.
* Yes, I did say that! Even I find myself querying myself for saying it. LOL.
However, out of the limelight of Question Time, he has actually been the one leading the Opposition’s questioning and challenging the Government’s position on various bits of legislation during their passage through the House for 1st Readings, 2nd Readings, Committee stages, and final 3rd Readings. This has included the waka jumping amendment legislation but also many other bits of legislation not of such prominence.
This is not meant to be a defense of Smith because he certainly is not someone I like or respect (with the one exception of many years ago when he was Minister for Conservation where he did not too bad a job). IMO he is simply “better’ than the vast majority (all?) members of the current National front bench when measured against a very low benchmark. The fact that I now think that is simply an indication of how far down that benchmark has now dropped, IMO.
For example, his interview this morning was certainly not good, but at least he seemed to be trying to mount an opposition/challenge re the use of consultants – but I was pleased to hear Suzie not giving him a clear run and challenging him.
Smith was at least coherent in what he said re Suzie diverting her questions onto the Pike River re-entry – IMO Bridges in similar situations just throws his toys in a much less mature, coherent manner.
What it really demonstrates is the second class status of the current National Party caucus and their lack of experience, nous and maturity. We may not have liked or agreed with Key, Joyce and co. who fled the sinking Nat ship in advance (or are about to) but at least they carried out their functions in a (mostly) competent manner. It is going to take the Nats quite a few years to grow another caucus that is ready to again take the reins of power.
In the meantime, Dirty Politics is all they have.
Labour – when it went through its ritual growing pains brought on by public rejection – had to be content with fighting and squabbling with one another and, much to my eternal shame, I was one of the participants. 🙁
Thanks Anne. Good to know I am not losing the plot yet, LOL.
Totally agree with your last para, also – and I was also part of that. It is quite interesting watching it now happening with the now Opposition., albeit in a slightly different less open/public manner. Well, up to a point. JLR has put a bit of dent in the behind closed doors scenario. Long may it last.
Many years back I attended a Tararua Tramping Club meeting where Nick spoke on conservation issues. I still recall it quite well; it seemed to me at the time that spoke competently, sincerely and had an extensive, passionate grasp of his subject. He’s certainly served his Party well for many decades, and undertaken much work for the nation.
Others will leap to disagree I realise, but even if my political values are different to his, I can respect his substantial contribution over the decades.
Federated Mountain Club’s, Fish and Game and Forest and Bird all thought he was full of shit:
Federated Mountain Club’s withdrawal from the Land and Water Forum shows how Environment Minister Nick Smith’s water policy is dissolving around him, the Green Party said today.
Environmental groups have been abandoning the Land and Water Forum (LAWF); Fish and Game left last year, while Forest and Bird left just three days ago.
“The Forum is supposed to represent all those with an interest in water in this country, from industry to environmentalists. But the balance is tipped too much in favour of industry and the Minister cherry-picks its recommendations to suit his pro-pollution agenda. It’s become untenable for environmental groups to stay in the Forum,” said Green Party water spokesperson Catherine Delahunty.
“The Green Party has been questioning Nick Smith all week on the failures of his Clean Water package, in which the goal posts have been moved to classify dirty rivers as clean.
Yes … that is the entire purpose of politics; thrashing out competing interests and desires. I’d be shocked if the Greens and FMC were not opposed to at least some of his policy work, and I never said I aligned with Nick’s position, but that I could respect the way he has gone about it.
Two different things, and a distinction many here seem to struggle with.
If you asked Nick in his personal capacity how he’d like our rivers, I bet he’d give the same answer you or I would give, crystal clear and wonderful (as I remember them from decades past).
But that’s politics for you. You don’t always get what you want and you have to make the best of what you get. You can’t make a stand on everything you disagree with, otherwise you get kicked out of the game fast. Call that dishonest if you like, but it’s how the system works.
The thing that was dishonest was changing the definition of “swimmable” to include that which clearly isn’t. That is a separate thing to Nact deciding that water quality should not be significantly improved.
I’m not at all familiar with this story so, but it’s likely a good example of how the system works. If we looked closely at the policy involved we would likely see that in the long-term it creates a reasonable framework for improving river water quality.
But initially it’s going to get opposition from interests that it’s going to impose costs on, ie the farmers. So what you do is put in place an overarching legislation that can have it’s detailed settings altered over time, but accept that the first pass isn’t going to be everything you want.
Yeah I know, it’s boring and incremental, but it’s the way you get things done without too many unintended consequences. I’m not at all unsympathetic to what your saying here; as you can deduce my single biggest passion in life has been tramping in the backcountry of these amazingly beautiful islands; assume I care about the rivers as you do.
But politics isn’t a natural playground for idealists like us; understanding how to get things done requires competence and pragmatism.
Smith was Minister of Conservation from 1996 – 1999 after Denis Marshall resigned post Cave Creek. I worked for the Dept of Conservation for three years after the final Cave Creek report as part of the restructuring of the Dept as a result of the report. Smith was a good Minister during his time and became well respected by Conservation staff, both old and new. My type of work meant I had direct contact with him, and I found him good to deal with on the complex issues pertaining to the restructure etc.
Some of his other and later ‘history’*, some of which is covered by legal suppression orders, not so much. But c’est la vie – we are all a mix of good and bad.
* including his clean water package in 2017 as per Solkta’s comment above.
Yes … like many politicians meeting or working with them in person is a different experience to their media projection. Your comment is interesting, clearly Nick Smith was at his best in the Conservation portfolio, and his record in other roles has been …. let’s say workmanlike, but sometimes scratchy.
Exactly – well said. From all accounts, Conservation was probably his Ministerial high point.
I also agree with what you have said above to solkta.
I don’t mean this as a criticism, but for those who have not worked in the parliamentary environment and/or in govt in roles that interact with the parliamentary system, things can be very black or white and idealistic; whereas the reality of our system of government is one of shades of grey including (acceptable levels of) compromise, deferred/staged implementation etc, etc.
This, of course, is also true for many other areas of work, business etc – for example, the type of work you appear to be in.
As you said, two different things, and a distinction many here seem to struggle with.
I know one politician who says of Nick Smith that he is the biggest liar they have ever met, and that includes John Key. It was an opinion expressed to me as we drove over to a conference in Hamilton in 2014 on Climate Change and NZ’s commitment, or otherwise.
I don’t think anything I, or possibly others, have said necessarily excludes that as a possibility. We humans are complex beings, and that possibility is not necessarily out of line with my brief mention of legally suppressed matters of many years ago. Will say no more.
Nick Smith married a woman he was assisting when she was a constituant thats akin to a Doctor sleeping with patients, a big no no, likely to get any other professional struck off from their registration body. Then again polititians have no understanding of ethical behaviour.
Sorry Psych nurse but that is silly. There are no parallels with a doctor tending to a patient. That is a deeply personal situation at all levels (even if its only to syringe a dammed pesky ear every few months 🙁 ) whereas a constituent is only requiring advice or wanting to reference some local concern that may be bothering them. There is no reason why after such an encounter with an MP that they don’t discover (maybe) they have friends and associates in common and ultimately choose to extend their relationship.
Good grief, does that mean you can’t strike up a friendship with your local chemist or computer technician (if you’re a pc dummy like me) or anyone you may hire to do a job for you?
Ooops – not meant that way at all, especially as I have just worked out the difference in age between him and I. ROFL.
But I do think that he needs to move on, and find something else for his remaining working years. Or perhaps, he still has designs on being Leader? …………………………..
Leader…
Putting a tory hat on, I couldnt think of three better candidates in the party.
I am being sincere here.
Although IMO the best candidate for leader is someone the likes of O’Sullivan, GP in the far north, and chopper him in to Botany.
A la key, that went well for them.
I’m no fan of the Waka Jumping Legislation but I’m not really inclined to be lectured on its many flaws by Nick Smith, who was part of the National government that completely ignored the recommendations of the MMP Review in 2012 for no better reason than those recommendations (abolishing of coattails rule and resulting overhang and lowering the threshold to 4% etc), if implemented, would have disadvantaged National’s client parties.
I will never trust a word he ever says again after the way he lied about the National Party’s devious RMA reforms (and the Special Housing Areas) that are a developers charter and a disaster for NZ’s landscapes.
The Maori Party got its just deserts for supporting the RMA reforms.
What I was trying to get through in my comment that you have replied to was that while I do not have any great love, trust or anything else for Smith, using him as a form of measure, he actually shows up many/most/all (?) of the rest of the Nat frontbench as being possibly worse.
In other words, I think the quality of the current Nats MPs is at a major low. (I am trying to keep a bit of an open mind re some of the latest additions but suspect that they are just other chips off the same block.)
I certainly do not have any respect for Smith or trust him – with the one exception of the short period when Smith was Minister of Conservation and I discussed that further down the thread with Red Logix.
As I also replied to Macro who also reported that he had been referred to as the biggest liar another politician had ever met, I certainly don’t exclude that as well.
ScottGN also made good points re Smith and the waka jumping legislation.
We all see things from slightly different perspectives and it would be a dull old world if we didn’t.
Miss almost 14 was bullied badly at school earlier in the year, I got involved, the boys concerned were punished by the school, the bullying has pretty much stopped.
She meet a brother of one of the bullies at the bike track, turns out both him and his brother get beaten by their father. When the father was contacted by the school to advise him that his son was bullying my daughter, the father beat up his son with a stick, threw a chair at him etc.
Myself and Miss almost 14 are deeply troubled that these boys are getting beaten by their father. We only know one of the boys first names.
We need to do something to protect these boys, what should we do or who should we approach?
Should we go to the school and tell them or the police?
I’m really lost on who to approach and how to go about it, I don’t want these kids to get another beating.
KAhaI agree with the advice above.
By all means help how you see fit, also set some boundaries for yourself and yours.
It is important to keep yourself safe. Safe physically, mentally and emotionally.
It is quite possible you may not achieve concrete results in this case.
You may be able to help in other kids lives.
By this I mean perhaps help out with another group. Youthline, Big Brother Big Sister, after school groups etc.
It may not be on the front line, all these groups need help running.
All this according to your time and resources.
IMO it depends on your relationship with your school principal. I recall that you have mentioned him/her on here once or twice. If you have a good trusting relationship where you feel confident in the principal’s integrity, confidentiality etc, then I would start there.
If not, I would suggest either the police (they usually have specific officers especially trained in these areas) and/or Oranga Tamariki.
Oranga Tamariki has a specific section on their website on this very issue with who to contact, contact numbers etc. They seem to be doing a lot better under the guidance of Tracey Martin as their Minister.
EDIT – Actually, I would suggest talking to OT first as they will/should know the best/right(legal) procedures in such cases. There were some changes to the law on this recently IIRC.
Approach the school / principal. Hopefully they can investigate or get police involved if needed which separates yourself. Good luck…horrible situation.
I contacted Oranga Tamariki, cheers for the links VV very much appreciated. Because I don’t know the last name or address of the children unfortunately they are unable to progress it.
But they were ever so helpful, and suggested to go to the school and advise them, and ask the school to contact O.T. Glad the staff at the school and the principal are so very approachable, makes a massive difference.
Social worker on the phone said that because the parent used a stick to beat their children and threw a chair at them that it could well end up being a police matter.
Will have to tread very carefully as the last thing I want is those boys to get another beating because they disclosed their situation to someone.
Once again thanks everyone for the info and advice.
I thought that OT would know the legalities etc. The principal and school will be able to “disclose” the personal details to OT and/or the Police, which they cannot do to you or other people.
It also keeps you and your daughters out of the picture, as the school, OT etc must all keep your details confidential. (Also See below for Section 16 protections.)
———-
Here are a few more links on reporting child abuse for anyone interested:
Sections 15 – 19 of the Children, Young Persons and Their Families Act (1989) cover the reporting of suspected child abuse (including the roles of OT and NZ Police).
Section 16 protects people who notify concerns of abuse in good faith from civil and criminal proceedings.
This Ministry of Education pdf, while older (eg refers to CYF not OT) is useful for the flow charts showing how schools etc report child abuse and the different roles, obligations etc of school principals, Boards of Trustees, OT, Police etc
VV, have just got off the phone to the schools DP. She’s received an email from Oranga Tamariki about my call, so is following it all up confidentially. Hope it all works out for those boys.
That herald article was interesting, thanks again for the links.
So pleased, Cinny – and well done, both you and daughter.
The fact that the brother felt he could disclose to your daughter speaks heaps about her, and your parenting.
If I recall you are in the Tasman Bay area. If so, I am not surprised that the school is on to it. Had excellent experiences with schools, social service authorities, foster family etc in that area a decade or so ago with a “godchild” who was fostered in the area for some years after some bad parental experiences.
EDIT – Just seen your reply to DTB and it clicked as to what was nagging at me re the CAB link I gave above. Look at the bottom of that page, and the second to bottom link. A thought re sharing experiences. You’ll understand.
It’s certainly not something that would have worked when I was living with my father after my mother died 36 years ago. I tried after I ran away because the fuckwit was beating me most days for things that I hadn’t even done and got caught by the police. Their only response was that my father could actually force me to stay at home until I was twenty.
But things have changed since then and going to the police can actually work. Especially after the repeal of s59 which gave abusers an out.
Exclusive: Serious concern over preschool checks as conditions not picked-up
“Many children were starting at a language development age of 3-4 years. More than 30 per cent had a language proficiency in the bottom 2.5 per cent of the population.
The study, sent to ministers of health and education, concludes: “our current model of delivering health, education and social services equally is increasing inequity. We need to realign the current health and education systems”.”
“But it took a comprehensive check of new entrants at schools in the Tamaki area as part of the Welcome to School study to reveal the true picture.
By the time they were five-and-a-half, a quarter of new entrants either had or needed tooth extractions under general anaesthetic.
Burt said in a middle class family such a procedure would be considered extremely significant.
The fact it was so common in his school’s area but not well understood showed how disadvantage “normalises things that ought not to be normal”.
Other study findings included 36 per cent of new entrants being obese and a similar proportion overweight.
“It is normal in this community to be an unhealthy weight,” the study’s executive summary noted. “Many of these children are actually malnourished kids in big bodies.”
Revealed: Hundreds declined specialist care for painful skin conditions
“Half of South Auckland children sent for specialist care for serious skin conditions are declined an appointment, a Herald investigation has found.
The picture is similar at some other district health boards (DHBs), as the public system struggles with specialist-to-population ratios called “third world” by the NZ Dermatological Society.
Health Minister David Clark has now asked for advice on the problem.
In Canterbury, hundreds of referrals (mostly for adults) have been sent back, despite meeting the usual clinical threshold for an appointment.”
In the wake of the ‘compassion’ and amount Karel Sroubek has cost the taxpayers, maybe the government could reprioritise their spending onto kids born here, who seem to be receiving a third world health service.
Likewise there is so much government money being spent on private housing, and the hundreds of thousands of new migrants and work permits being given out, but where are the new hospitals and the doctors and schools that should be put in BEFORE the migrants and work permits are given out. Or the prison gets another drug smuggler needing hundreds of thousands of tax payer money for their prison stay and our government fights for their rights out of ‘compassion” while the priorities of kids born here that have little to nothing, are having worse and worse outcomes.
NZ is a small country with a set amount to be spent, the big issue seems to be that our government seem more interested in overseas drug smuggler’s rights than making sure the human rights of their own kids are a priority and don’t want for anything.
What we need to ask ourselves is who is paying for the hospital and schools and congestion, because more houses don’t create wealth, well paid secure jobs do, and to keep the same standard of living with more houses and people we need to also AT THE SAME TIME, build more hospitals and schools and have the money to fund the doctors and teachers who teach in them ready and accounted for.
Instead of giving more money to big construction interests through housing, maybe the government should look at where the well paid secure jobs being created in Auckland are, (truck drivers and baristas are not exactly well paid jobs) the educational and health levels of the next generation who seem to be going backwards, otherwise the government are diverting public money and resources to the world’s wealthy and privileged new home owners and away from NZ poor and middle classes who have to ‘share’ the dwindling hospitals and schools, and roads/public transport and polluted beaches with more and more of the world’s privileged with money earned outside of NZ and people who qualify for free super, health care and even public transport with the gold card, but may have only been in NZ for a fraction of their life time.
I have wondered for some time about the skin reaction to the strength of the ‘soap’ powders on offer and whether the clothes get properly rinsed by modern washing machine programs. In my machine the idea seems to be to save water and energy with seemingly lower rinse levels than for wash period, and only one full rinse. If the machine is very full of washing, as it probably would be for poor households who are also time poor, then there could be a considerable amount of washing solution left in the clothes which could be irritating and sensitise the skin.
I have the same thoughts about the new washing machines. I purchased a new front loading machine when we shifted house in 2015 – the older top loader was too wide for the space, and have despaired at times at the rinsing programme, even with the extra rinse option. I often then put the load through a rinse cycle again, which takes extra time. This certain could have detrimental effects on some people who have sensitive skin – I just get a bit p****d off at the towels drying like sheets of plywood.
Natzi’s undermined the Health System and imported 500k fresh Asian Immigrants with no improvements to the country’s infrastructure have a think about the consequences ?
It is brilliant the boys have started the dialogue.
It is a cry for help.
James is correct, as an adult you need to report the possible abuse, in as far as you know it.
The police will speak with the Principal, who has the right to speak with the boys and trigger protection.
Cinny, you will be taken seriously. Even a phone call to the police would elicit a response.
For those members, old and new, who oppose Pelosi from the left, the #FiveWhiteGuys are offering a sucker’s bet. The #FiveWhiteGuys are of the school that believes that the Democratic Party’s needs are best served winning back all those disgruntled folks at diners in the Mahoning Valley, a theory fairly well demolished last Tuesday. It is very unlikely that a Green New Deal or Medicare For All is high on their list of priorities. The only argument that the #FiveWhiteGuys have that might resonate with their new progressive colleagues is that Pelosi is old and has been in Congress for a long time. Period. That’s not enough to dispense with the party’s most effective legislative leader since Lyndon Johnson.
These #FiveWhiteGuys are Blue Dog Dems trying to what Blue Dog Dems do, drag the party to the right.
Progressives are going to be in trouble if they go along with them.
1. Something happened at the Capitol Tuesday to reaffirm my long-held view that liberals should stop believing what conservatives say liberals believe.— (((John Stoehr))) (@johnastoehr) November 14, 2018
This interview with her from Abby Martin the Empire Files is just fantastic. Talking about mass killing and white nationalism. Her analysis of trump is illuminating.
Young families are leaving Central Otago and Queenstown Lakes due to the losing battle with housing affordability.
The inevitable result of allowing offshore ownership.
I note two things:
1. The council is ignoring the fact that it’s the rich outsiders that are the problem.
2. The council is concerned with losing workers thus we see that rich people can’t actually support themselves or the economy.
That reminds me of The Admirable Crichton a play which was made as a film in 1957. Based on the James Barrie classic, THE ADMIRABLE CRICHTON tells the story of an English butler who, shipwrecked with his employers, resourcefully leads them in their attempts to survive.
I can’t give a clip of it because Columbia Pictures, although it is 60 years od, won’t allow it to be shown with a soundtrack). It’s available in audio voiced by a machine, or can be seen as a nearly mute soundtrack (just the faintest tape rustle or something to be heard).
Perhaps we need to be resourceful and lead ourselves out of this mess that the export-oriented, anti-domestic, money-mad business people have landed us in.
Thanks so much for that link. I did not see it at the time (too young) but recall seeing it many years later and it has always stuck in my memory. Great to see it again.
It’s more the normal cyclical behaviour of the Queenstown and Central Otago property and employment markets. I’ve seen four or five cycles now and the same thing happens every time.
Queenstown’s a funny place, there’s lots of glitz and glamour, and it’s all premium property, think the very top suburbs of Auckland or Sydney, but most of the residents are really pretty modest, along with most of the jobs. You probably wouldn’t see them trying to live in the top suburbs in auckland or Sydney. Unfortunately the closest we have to Ranui is Lumsden, and that’s 100 km away.
But people come to town and see the glamour, the stunning landscape and “lifestyle” and think the streets are paved with gold. And just have to be part of it. Generally this turns out to be a cashflow negative undertaking and after a few years they realise that the streets are truly paved with gold, but it’s, or was, their gold. This realisation can have a profound effect on attitudes and there can be some spectacular spitting of the dummy. The Queenstown’s ruined rant is at the lower end of the spectrum.
Talkback has had it’s day, replaced with social media and the like. Hopefully at least we will get to see Magic come to Taranaki, with Radio Live’s frequency being take over.
Mike Williams continues to agree with everything Michelle Boag says;
This is cringe-inducing radio, on a level with Newstalk ZzzzzB. The Panel, RNZ National, Wednesday 14 November 2018
Jim Mora, Michelle Boag, Mike “I Agree With Michelle” Williams, Emil Donovan
We’ve studied many times over the last few years the less than stellar performances of the late Paul Holmes’s former classmate Mike Williams. While he has the ability to speak clearly and intelligently, Williams too often chooses to abase himself in order to curry favor with the likes of Matthew Hooton [1] and, as we heard today, the notorious democracy-hater Michelle Boag. In Williams she has secured another perfect stooge, or sycophant, now that Brian “I agree entirely with Michelle” Edwards is no longer available. [2]
First major “discussion” this afternoon concerned the teacher pay dispute. As would have surprised nobody at all, Boag launched into an extended rant against the teacher unions, with Williams adding the odd supportive “yeah” and “mmmm” every now and again. Then, after several minutes, mercifully, she came to a halt. Mike Williams now had a chance to respond. This is what he said:
“I agree with Michelle.”
Next topic was the Karel Sroubek “saga”. Boag again took the opportunity to launch into another extended, partisan rant. At the end of it, Mike Williams again had a chance to say something intelligent. He said:
“Look I, I agree with Michelle very largely here.”
The third-last item for consideration by these thoroughly thoughtful thinkers was previewed as follows:
Spying drones
Following our drones discussion over the last few days, we look into the problem of drones being used to spy on people and to scout out properties for thieves to burgle. We ask New Zealand Police if they’ve had any cases, as have been seen in other countries.
Now, The Panel has discussed drones many, many times. It’s a topic that they’ve chatted lightly about almost as often as they’ve chatted about coffee, or diet research, or the frustrations of buying rock concert tickets online. [3] Never once during these frivolous talkfests have I heard them even mention the use of drones to kill thousands of people, mainly civilians and children, in Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen, Gaza, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Previewing this discussion at 3:45 p.m., Jim Mora read out, without a trace of irony in his voice: “Could drones be used for crime?”
I know it’s all politics but god, how could Ardern stand to be seated next to (or near to given Pence doesn’t want any woman closer to him than his wife – weird little religious zealot he is) Mike Pence. A Christian nut with some very strange ideas about homosexuality, climate change, evolution etc etc etc.
I couldn’t spend 5 mins with him without getting into an argument
Kia ora The Am Show
judy trying to the flip flop on the Pike River Mine disaster tipal neo polly itwasent me.
shonky was pulling all the strings come on .
May the word’s that come out of the waha don’t match her body language.
I tau toko respecting the Wahine and treating them Equally but I say those stat’s about Aotearoa being the worst in the world is full of stats were country’s are manipulating there data to make there image look good hence a honest country sit at the top .
A Star Is Born is A awesome movie some in our MSM have been kicking it a bit?????????.
If one does not talk about a problem there are no solutions found to solve the suicide problem with our Stars .Fame Alcohol hard drugs can = suicide people are passing on way to early because of that fact not being talked about hence no reduction in this problem.
Re setting driver’s licences test is not a bright Idea who thought of this bright Idea I say no more.
Ka kite ano . P.S have a good weekend
The Norton based dimp worked I just managed to save this computer .
I went to Auckland to see our MOKO’s and you should have seen the sandfly’s marked ones everywhere .
I remember in the 90ts some trying to launch super rugby/league comp and it FLOPPED just like this one the positive out come from that attempt is we now have professorial Rugby . some people don’t know how to be original they are copy cats.
A new rugby competition involving teams from Australia and smaller nations has been conditionally sanctioned by the World Rugby Council.
Rapid Rugby, the brainchild of Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest, will include the Perth-based Western Force as well as teams from Samoa, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Fiji, plus another backed by a private consortium based in a country yet to be revealed.
The teams would contest 56 games over 14 rounds, prior to four finals over three weeks, with the winners taking a $1 million first prize.
The competition will run during a similar period to Super Rugby, with Forrest indicating a start in late February, with a three-week finals series culminating in a June grand final.
Ka kite ano link below P.S this guy should use his money to support Australian rugby
Kia ora Newshub looks like a good circus.
Lloyd Britexit in a nother move by the wealthy for the wealthy the commoners are the people who are going to pay for the wealthy like trump is steam rolling Americans it all about the rich oil barron to them.
It was cool that the conjoined twins have been separated by operation in Australia.
The Bill Clinton saga the Republins new he is a stick man they used Monaca Lewnsky to set him up and played the media and Bill like a violin.
That Panda is so gorgeous.
Ka kite ano P.S I have been busy using dimp
The Crowd goes Wild apologies I have been tied up with the mokos.
Because the sandflys are playing with them selves so much these days I am using sign language a lot as of late ki kaha to the Crowd goes Wild crew.
Ka kite ano P.S I will have to be more careful who I post about
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Buzz from the Beehive Reactions to news of the government’s readiness to make urgent changes to “the resource management system” through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes don’t go far enough. Greenpeace says ...
I’m starting to wonder if Anna Burns-Francis might be the best political interviewer we’ve got. That might sound unlikely to you, it came as a bit of a surprise to me.Jack Tame can be excellent, but has some pretty average days. I like Rebecca Wright on Newshub, she asks good ...
Chris Trotter writes – Willie Jackson is said to be planning a “media summit” to discuss “the state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalism”. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes – This morning [April 21], the Wellington High Court is hearing a judicial review brought by Hon. Karen Chhour, the Minister for Children, against a decision of the Waitangi Tribunal. This is unusual, judicial reviews are much more likely to brought against ministers, rather than ...
Both of Parliament’s watchdogs have now ripped into the Government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s political economy and beyond on the morning of Tuesday, April 23 are:The Lead: The Auditor General,John Ryan, has joined the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Sarah SpengemanPeople wait to board an electric bus in Pune, India. (Image credit: courtesy of ITDP) Public transportation riders in Pune, India, love the city’s new electric buses so much they will actually skip an older diesel bus that ...
The infrastructure industry yesterday issued a “hurry up” message to the Government, telling it to get cracking on developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects.The hiatus around the change of Government has seen some major projects cancelled and others delayed, and there is uncertainty about what will happen with the new ...
Hi,Over the weekend I revisited a podcast I really adore, Dead Eyes. It’s about a guy who got fired from Band of Brothers over two decades ago because Tom Hanks said he had “dead eyes”.If you don’t recall — 2001’s Band of Brothers was part of the emerging trend of ...
Buzz from the Beehive The 180 or so recipients of letters from the Government telling them how to submit infrastructure projects for “fast track” consideration includes some whose project applications previously have been rejected by the courts. News media were quick to feature these in their reports after RMA Reform Minister Chris ...
It would not be a desirable way to start your holiday by breaking your back, your head, or your wrist, but on our first hour in Singapore I gave it a try.We were chatting, last week, before we started a meeting of Hazel’s Enviro Trust, about the things that can ...
Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure that the new Fast-Track Approvals Bill – currently being pushed through by the ...
Feel worried. Shane Jones and a couple of his Cabinet colleagues are about to be granted the power to override any and all objections to projects like dams, mines, roads etc even if: said projects will harm biodiversity, increase global warming and cause other environmental harms, and even if ...
Bryce Edwards writes- The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. ...
Michael Bassett writes – If you think there is a move afoot by the radical Maori fringe of New Zealand society to create a parallel system of government to the one that we elect at our triennial elections, you aren’t wrong. Over the last few days we have ...
Without a corresponding drop in interest rates, it’s doubtful any changes to the CCCFA will unleash a massive rush of home buyers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, April 22 included:The Government making a ...
Sunday was a lazy day. I started watching Jack Tame on Q&A, the interviews are usually good for something to write about. Saying the things that the politicians won’t, but are quite possibly thinking. Things that are true and need to be extracted from between the lines.As you might know ...
In our Weekly Roundup last week we covered news from Auckland Transport that the WX1 Western Express is going to get an upgrade next year with double decker electric buses. As part of the announcement, AT also said “Since we introduced the WX1 Western Express last November we have seen ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 29 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Stats NZ releases its statutory report on Census 2023 tomorrow.Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivers a pre-Budget speech at ...
A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 14, 2024 thru Sat, April 20, 2024. Story of the week Our story of the week hinges on these words from the abstract of a fresh academic ...
The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. The Government says this will ...
This is a column to say thank you. So many of have been in touch since Mum died to say so many kind and thoughtful things. You’re wonderful, all of you. You’ve asked how we’re doing, how Dad’s doing. A little more realisation each day, of the irretrievable finality of ...
Identifying the engine type in your car is crucial for various reasons, including maintenance, repairs, and performance upgrades. Knowing the specific engine model allows you to access detailed technical information, locate compatible parts, and make informed decisions about modifications. This comprehensive guide will provide you with a step-by-step approach to ...
Introduction: The allure of racing is undeniable. The thrill of speed, the roar of engines, and the exhilaration of competition all contribute to the allure of this adrenaline-driven sport. For those who yearn to experience the pinnacle of racing, becoming a race car driver is the ultimate dream. However, the ...
Introduction Automobiles have become ubiquitous in modern society, serving as a primary mode of transportation and a symbol of economic growth and personal mobility. With countless vehicles traversing roads and highways worldwide, it begs the question: how many cars are there in the world? Determining the precise number is a ...
Maintaining a safe and reliable vehicle requires regular inspections. Whether it’s a routine maintenance checkup or a safety inspection, knowing how long the process will take can help you plan your day accordingly. This article delves into the factors that influence the duration of a car inspection and provides an ...
Mazda Motor Corporation, commonly known as Mazda, is a Japanese multinational automaker headquartered in Fuchu, Aki District, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan. The company was founded in 1920 as the Toyo Cork Kogyo Co., Ltd., and began producing vehicles in 1931. Mazda is primarily known for its production of passenger cars, but ...
Your car battery is an essential component that provides power to start your engine, operate your electrical systems, and store energy. Over time, batteries can weaken and lose their ability to hold a charge, which can lead to starting problems, power failures, and other issues. Replacing your battery before it ...
In most states, you cannot register a car without a valid driver’s license. However, there are a few exceptions to this rule. Exceptions to the RuleIf you are under 18 years old: In some states, you can register a car in your name even if you do not ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
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. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
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. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
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. ...
Hon Paula Bennett has been appointed as member and chair of the Pharmac board, Associate Health Minister David Seymour announced today. "Pharmac is a critical part of New Zealand's health system and plays a significant role in ensuring that Kiwis have the best possible access to medicines,” says Mr Seymour. ...
Hundreds of New Zealand families affected by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) will benefit from a new Government focus on prevention and treatment, says Health Minister Dr Shane Reti. “We know FASD is a leading cause of preventable intellectual and neurodevelopmental disability in New Zealand,” Dr Reti says. “Every day, ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones today attended the official opening of Kaikohe’s new $14.7 million sports complex. “The completion of the Kaikohe Multi Sports Complex is a fantastic achievement for the Far North,” Mr Jones says. “This facility not only fulfils a long-held dream for local athletes, but also creates ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
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 ...
The protest outside the White House correspondents’ dinner hotel. Image: Anatolu video screenshot APR More than two dozen Palestinian journalists had called for a boycott of the dinner, writing an open letter urging their American colleagues not to attend. “You have a unique responsibility to speak truth to power and ...
“Our exporters should, therefore, be deeply concerned that the Fast-track Approvals Bill was not assessed for consistency with any of our free trade commitments prior to being introduced to the House,” says Gary Taylor, Chief Executive of the Environmental ...
NZCTU President Richard Wagstaff is calling on all political parties to support the new Member’s Bill from Labour’s workplace relations and safety spokesperson Camilla Belich MP that would ensure negligent companies are held accountable when their employees ...
A historian with an uncanny track record of predicting US election winners tells RNZ's Sunday Morning that President Biden looks to be on track for another term, but things could still go very wrong for him. ...
A historian with a track record of predicting US election winners tells RNZ's Sunday Morning that President Biden looks to be on track for another term, but things could still go wrong for him. ...
Ngaio Marsh House is one of Christchurch’s best kept secrets – and contains more than a few mysteries of its own.Trust Ngaio Marsh to leave more than a few mysteries scattered through her house long after her departure. For a start, there’s the curious concrete portal in the garden, ...
Appointment viewing has been lost to the mists of time, but memories of Montana Sunday Theatre can still be conjured by hitting play on a particular piece of classical music. “You’re not going to be able to sell it.” Over 30 years on, Karen Bieleski still recalls how the task ...
Performance Review King Luxon sat behind His massive polished oak desk. It is Performance Review time. There is a knock on the door. “Enter!” says the King. In steps Minister of Disabilities and Carer Pedicures, Penny Simmonds. “I can explain everything …” she begins. “Fine,” says King Luxon, pressing the ...
The pair opened their first fully collaborative exhibition, Nina for Flowers, last Saturday. Gabi Lardies visited their studio to find out who Nina is and what working together was like.‘It didn’t start out like, ‘This is a show about Nina,’” says Josephine Jelicich, gripping a thermos of peppermint tea. ...
Thank you, Dr Maximilian Oskar Bircher-Benner, for your brilliant invention. I’m another mid-20s Kiwi who had an OE last year. I hopped on my bicycle where France meets the Atlantic and cycled east. I pedalled through the Loire Valley, down rivers lined with willows and ancient wisteria-draped chateaus. I relished ...
Asia Pacific Report From France to Australia, university pro-Palestine protests in the United States have now spread to several countries with students pitching on-campus camps. And students at Columbia and other US universities remain defiant as campuses have witnessed the biggest protests since the anti-Vietnam war and anti-apartheid eras in ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)New Zealand Government’s Fast Track legislation. Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government ...
Tara Ward talks to presenter Naomi Toilalo about the new TV show that turns food waste into a three course feast. Naomi Toilalo is standing in the warehouse at Good Neighbour Tauranga, helping unpack the two-and-a-half tonnes of rejected food that will arrive at the community support hub that day. ...
Scout is our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Scout’s human, Avril, for her support. Dog name: Scout (named after the little girl in To Kill a Mockingbird – she inherited the independent spirit ...
Megan Alatini takes us through her life in TV, including ‘terrible’ daytime TV, the class of Carol Hirschfeld and her most embarrassing TrueBliss moment. When she responded to a vague newspaper ad asking “do you have what it takes to be a popstar?” 25 years ago, Megan Alatini never guessed ...
A new exhibition in Wellington showcases the faces behind your local goods and services. Back in 1977, when I was a fine arts student at the University of Canterbury, I took a series of photographs of Christchurch shopkeepers. The photos were for a calendar – a project for my end ...
Toomaj and his resistance to tyranny through his songs have become an icon for the youth of Iran, so his sentence has hit the nation hard. Toomaj Salehi is not the first artist to pay the price for standing with the people. ...
My cousin Dylan and I spotted these big eels under the bridge that summer. We watched them lounging under the dark weed, facing into the flow of water, their mouths frozen open. Dylan and I couldn’t stop thinking about those eels. The night we went down to the creek, we ...
Newsroom, home of satire. My long-running weekly satirical series The Secret Diary has moved to Newsroom and will appear every Saturday, with Victor Billot’s wildly popular satirical Odes continuing to appear every Sunday. Diaries, Odes – while serious political columnists toil at meaningful opinions and stroke their chins to an ...
Tara Ward unravels the many nuanced layers of a cartoon about talking dogs.This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. It’s not often an episode of a children’s cartoon has adults sobbing into their sleeves, but that’s exactly what happened this week when ...
Working as a doctor in developing countries to help communities achieve better health outcomes is nothing short of a life goal for Jessica Tater. The University of Otago medical student has her sights firmly set on joining the international humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) when she qualifies ...
There’s an island in the far reaches of Auckland’s territory, sitting off the tip of the Coromandel Peninsula, 30 minutes by air from the city or four hours on the slow boat. Aotea Great Barrier is off-grid, it has a population of fewer than a thousand people … and most ...
Asia Pacific Report An Australian author and advocate, Jim Aubrey, today led a national symbolic one minute’s silence to mark the “blood debt” owed to Papuan allies during the Second World War indigenous resistance against the invading Japanese forces. “A promise to most people is a promise,” Aubrey said in ...
Asia Pacific Report The Freedom Flotilla is ready to sail to Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. All the required paperwork has been submitted to the port authority, and the cargo has been loaded and prepared for the humanitarian trip to the besieged enclave. However, organisers received word of an “administrative ...
Pacific Media Watch Palestine solidarity protesters today demonstrated at the Auckland headquarters of Television New Zealand, accusing the country’s major TV network of broadcasting “propaganda” backing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. About 50 protesters targeted the main entrance to the TVNZ building near Sky Tower and also picketed a side ...
Opinion by Lynley Hood. Forty years on from my 1985 Fulbright Grant, my disquiet over the war in Gaza evoked some troubling questions. The answer to my first question – What is the primary purpose of the Fulbright Programme? – was on the Fulbright NZ website. It says: US Senator, ...
The ministers responsible for green-lighting major projects need to be open about potential conflicts of interest, says Transparency International. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Powell, Professor, Family and Sexual Violence, RMIT University It has been a particularly distressing start to the year. There is little that can ease the current grief of individuals, families and communities who have needlessly lost a loved one to men’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Lichen, the first described example of symbiosis.AdeJ Artventure/Shutterstock Once known only to those studying biology, the word symbiosis is now widely used. Symbiosis is the intimate ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kim Hemsley, Head, Childhood Dementia Research Group, Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute, College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University Olena Ivanova/Shutterstock “Childhood” and “dementia” are two words we wish we didn’t have to use together. But sadly, around 1,400 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University The government’s Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee has just published its second report. It was set up by Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Minister for Social Services Amanda Rishworth in 2022 to provide: ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Queensland state election will be held in October. A YouGov poll for The Courier Mail, conducted April 9–17 from a sample ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Naeni, PhD candidate at Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University There’s been much talk in recent months about what a possible second Donald Trump presidency in the United States could mean for Europe, Russia’s war in Ukraine, the ...
A brief round-up of submissions on the controversial proposed law. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week, submissions on the controversial Fast-track Approvals Bill closed just hours after the government released a list of stakeholder organisations who were sent letters advising how they could ...
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This sort of article should be headline news.
Every day.
Monbiot nails it.
“It was a moment of the kind that changes lives. At a press conference held by climate activists Extinction Rebellion last week, two of us journalists pressed the organisers on whether their aims were realistic. They have called, for example, for UK carbon emissions to be reduced to net zero by 2025. Wouldn’t it be better, we asked, to pursue some intermediate aims?
A young woman called Lizia Woolf stepped forward. She hadn’t spoken before, but the passion, grief and fury of her response was utterly compelling. “What is it that you are asking me as a 20-year-old to face and to accept about my future and my life? … This is an emergency. We are facing extinction. When you ask questions like that, what is it you want me to feel?” We had no answer.
Softer aims might be politically realistic, but they are physically unrealistic. Only shifts commensurate with the scale of our existential crises have any prospect of averting them. Hopeless realism, tinkering at the edges of the problem, got us into this mess. It will not get us out………
…….Two tasks need to be performed simultaneously: throwing ourselves at the possibility of averting collapse, as Extinction Rebellion is doing, slight though this possibility may appear; and preparing ourselves for the likely failure of these efforts, terrifying as this prospect is. Both tasks require a complete revision of our relationship with the living planet.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/14/earth-death-spiral-radical-action-climate-breakdown
Capitalism always destroys the society that it arises in.
If we want to survive we need to get rid of the capitalists.
My bold.
In other words, economic growth is uneconomic.
“…continued economic growth is incompatible with sustaining the Earth’s systems.”
Something we agree on. Though I’d word it slightly differently nonetheless a system of increasing economic growth based on a system that still uses fuels that are unable to be used in perpetuity is crazy.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2018/nov/14/brexit-deal-theresa-may-conservatives-meet-decide-cabinet-politics-live
So it looks like the venality and political paralysis of the Oxbridge British political elites over Brexit are coming to a head.
If Theresa May’s Brexit deal is rejected by the Tory hardliners, she will have to try and resign. I say try, because no one will want to replace her – a moderate will inherit exactly the same problems she has inherited and a hard line Brexiteer will not have the required support. Boris Johnson’s overweening ambition means he desperately wants to lead the Tories but he would be a disaster – he is incompetent and the remainers in his party hate him. Anyway, the hardliners don’t want a deal – they would be happy with a no deal hard Brexit. Their irresponsibility knows no bounds. The trouble is, it is difficult to trigger a new election under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 without at least some Turkeys voting for an early Xmas.
Assuming there is another election before Xmas, don’t assume Labour (who would inevitably win) would be any better at fixing the problem. Internally, the Labour party under Corbyn has managed to pretty much deal with “New Labour” PLP faction now, who have become isolated within the party, will dwindle considerably in number after the next general election and have no major constituency outside it (which is why they haven’t yet flounced off to form a new party of the radical centre). But that doesn’t mean the hardline neoliberal remainers of the Labour right. Such is the venality of the Labour’s Blairite Oxbridge political elites that they will wait until after the next general election, then they’ll just use the fixed-term Parliaments Act to cover their forming a new party of the radical centre (possibly with a few Tories and some Lib-dems) and then settle down to paralyse the new Corbyn government on everything from re-nationalisation to Brexit.
The British Oxbridge recruited political class has been a total clusterfuck for 150 years. Short of a major revolution, expect the fight desperately to retain their own political primacy (which is why so many of them really hate Brexit – it was a full-on punch on the nose for them and a direct challenge to their authority) and not much else.
Its passed Cabinet.
She’s doing well so far.
Probably because any other option would open the door for Corbyn to come to power.
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/brexit-ttip-conservative-us-deal-tory-party-cato-legatum-institute-trade-a8252216.html
“You may not have heard of the Legatum Institute; I hadn’t either, except for Legatum’s partnership with First Look Media billionaire Pierre Omidyar in a gruesome microfinance investment in India a few years back, SKS Microfinance. Omidyar and Legatum co-invested in Unitus Equity, which then invested in SKS Microfinance ostensibly to help the world’s poorest people in rural India. Instead, a few wealthy insiders cashed out to the tune of mega-millions for themselves, while ruthless SKS debt collectors bullied hundreds of rural Indian villagers into committing suicide by drowning, drinking jars of pesticide, and other horrific means. ”
“bridging the interests of global vulture capitalists like his boss Christopher Chandler with the interests of neocon regime-change groups like the National Endowment for Democracy, and more familiar neocon pro-war lobbyists like Michael Weiss.”
https://pando.com/2015/05/17/neocons-2-0-the-problem-with-peter-pomerantsev/
Here is a good interview with Max Blumenthal on the appalling Nikki Haley, possibly a very real contender for 2020.
Max Blumenthal: Natsec Elites Welcome Nikki Haley
I’ll probably be wrong, but I think 2020 is too early for her. Even purely out of, it would be a dumb move for anyone running against Trump for Republican candidacy.
I have little doubt if anyone is going to be the first female US Prez’ it will probably be her though
@ Chris T,
Yes you might well be right, it does seem early for a run, but then again who know what will happen with Trump between now and then, his presidency to have the air of something that could implode messily at any moment.
Good point
Lol
The President is said to be in a deep funk about the Republicans dismal showing in the midterms.
The problem with trump, is that there are hundreds in the wings just like him. And this fetish to ‘stop’ trump conveniently side steps this point.
@ adam
You are exactly right, and worryingly, it seems more and more like this ridiculous Trump ‘fetish’ along with the equally inane ‘Russiagate conspiracy’ has and still is derailing any serious opposition to his insane narrative.
“Bob Woodward: No Evidence Of Trump-Russia Collusion, I Searched For Two Years”
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2018/09/14/woodward_no_evidence_of_collusion_between_trump_and_russia_i_searched_for_two_years.html
oh and old man waves fist at cloud –
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=12159819
And finally stopped pretending it’s about travel to and from the CBD and the airport instead of the real opposition which is nimbyism around the planned TOD intensification along the Dominion Road corridor.
I agree with Mike Lee. His reference to ‘experts’ is a timely reminder, considering that many high profile – but low benefit – projects seem to go ahead because of marketing skills rather than true cost benefit analysis.
There was a recent article on the Auckland Cycleway that showed the disconnect between projections and actual use – as well as financial overruns.
Experts are just people who came from privilege who got an education. They struggle to realise it’s their connections which make their opinions count – not some innate sense of understanding.
Experts also often seem to be those who have excelled at self-promotion and have a high visibility and familiarity with the public. Auckland transport and planning have suffered from that reliance.
What frustrates me in particularly, is that those most in need are missing out because they have no profile, and are given none when it counts.
That’s not always true and you also have to prove that they’re doing worse than a bunch of ignoramuses who couldn’t even do the maths.
Gotta disagree on the value of an education, there.
The problem is when business consultancies provide “expertise” – are they experts who are also good at marketing, or are they excellent marketers who know fuckall? And will they provide you with an expert solution, or expertly persuade you that you need more of their solutions?
Yep, private enterprise expertise has to be seriously questioned about their actual expertise and about their motivations.
I do recall many roading contractors got really upset when the last Labour government started building rail rather than roads while all declaiming rail.
Reminds me of the thinking that McLuhan did years ago as to where to get the best solution, ideas. The thinking was that you ask a builder and he things of infrastructure, a taxi company thinks of vehicles, a teacher would probably say more education.l All would be partly right. So does one ask a business consultancy that probably is operating from a bunch of theories from business school – and where did that get its ideas and what practical experience in all the fields of business have they had?
“The medium is the message” is a phrase coined by Marshall McLuhan meaning that the form of a medium embeds itself in any message it would transmit or convey, creating a symbiotic relationship by which the medium influences how the message is perceived.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message
Also – an organisation I was involved with for a while asked a corporate services outfit to do a systems audit. Recommended outsourcing some management services.
Twenty years later apparently the same outfit is still providing management services to the organisation. Smartest way to go, or self-serving advice? Who knows? No apparent improvement to the organisation.
This cartoon from Alex by Peattie and Taylor in Telegraph is on the perils of calling in knowledgable experts:
Alex
Hope it comes up surrounded in black for you.
lol worked fine, thanks
Often have little practical experience or track records.
His reference to the lack of experts in NZ to design Light Rail was a bloody pathetic excuse for an argument. AT and the NZTA are the experts – Mike Lee just doesn’t agree with them.
And the Orsman article in the Herald was just more axe grinding from him and was pretty easily debunked by this https://www.greaterauckland.org.nz/2018/11/13/the-heralds-latest-cycling-smear/
Mike Lee was on the board for Auckland Transport, until Goff dismantled that elector representation. He understands how the system works, and I suspect you don’t.
Our community got access to public transport because of our high-response level to an AT survey, not because it was a community determined in need of it. (Personally advised of this by a Local Board rep, who was upset by the fact his neighbouring community did not respond as fully, and so missed out.) If you understand this – then you have the realisation that it is the vocal – and not the needy – who benefit from this method of resource and planning allocation. Which is why we see those without voices or adequate representation lose out time and time again.
There are experts at fact finding that supports their lobbying. To me, Greater Transport is an example. It’s failure is a lack of comprehensive voices that encompass all of Auckland, and it’s closer relationship with Auckland Transport has removed it’s claim to independence. Auckland Transport has supported it when it aligns, because of it’s influence. That cosy relationship comes at a cost.
The push for light rail is supported by well chosen analytics and presumptions – much like the cycleway project. I support the development of cycleways, but I believe the priority of projects and the feasiblity should be based on independently based evidence, and more accurate projections of both financial and social benefits. From that perspective, I believe the electric train connection to the airport is better on both counts.
How is a heavy rail express service between Britomart and the airport a better social benefit than expansion of public transport to the (currently poorly served) south western suburbs via LRT?
If you noticed I also added priorities to my comment. There is a dearth of adequate affordable public transport in South Auckland, that would also not be improved by the proposed LRT option.
The constant return to a proposed stadium on the waterfront is an example of consistent lobbying gaining traction without evidential requirement for priority spending. As time passes, the public assumes a need has been identified by independent analysis, not the tabled projections by interested parties.
Should we really be looking at airport expansion and consequential airport travellers as a priority, or should we – as you point out – be looking at those in areas of Auckland already poorly served, and be improving their current and future options? Given the growing awareness of climate change, and the failure of any feasible commercial alternative to aviation fuel, this seems a strange consideration. Or alternatively, ‘improving’ the services to Dominion Road residents is hardly improving options for those in South Auckland.
I’m not really sure what you’re trying to say with this comment? The waterfront stadium and the aviation industry’s adverse contribution to climate change are worthy subjects in their own right but not really pertinent to this conversation.
The gist of your argument seems to be that South Auckland’s public transport network is shit and while that’s so everybody else’s should be too?
The South-WESTERN (geddit?) LRT is designed to improve service to that part of Auckland and to alleviate the severe road congestion that’s projected for southern entry points into the CBD if the bus network is to keep up with growing demand.
I am saying that you are making the presumption that projects are being prioritised due to some sort of internal process that identifies both need, short-term and long-term benefits. From observation, this is not what happens.
The aviation’s adverse contribution to climate change is pertinent to the large financial investment – and appropriation of land – for airport expansion, and proposals to facilitate the faster movement of airport travellers.
“…and to alleviate the severe road congestion that’s projected for southern entry points into the CBD if the bus network is to keep up with growing demand…”. There are many Aucklanders that don’t travel into the CBD, that have not had their needs identified. If they don’t get identified, then they aren’t even in the running for prioritisation.
I am unequivocally saying that I agree with Mike Lee. That employment at Auckland Transport does not automatically ensure a balanced, objective view for spending and priorities is presented.
And Mike Lee has dived to the bottom of the pond and survived all that fetid pond water. A strong head and constitution and hopefully with brain cells still in tip top order. We need the wise like him and not the fast thinking then disappearing man.
Molly that article has been debunked repeatedly.
By whom? Can you link, as far as I know it only came out a couple of days ago, but I haven’t really been watching. I also don’t refer to Greater Auckland as an authority, because I think their perspective is too narrow, but I know that many take what they say as independent and comprehensive analysis.
Further spending is expected to happen in the CBD, and inner Auckland while other areas struggle for alternative transport infrastructure like walking and cycling. The division of Auckland Transport from Auckland Council, means that the way people live and move are treated separately and often have outcomes that are detrimental those that live in those communities.
I am in favour of – and have advocated for – better alternative and public transport planning and implementation. But I also don’t think that a particular cycleway project is necessarily money well spent – unless the need was identified and it provides the best cost/benefit analysis, in terms of other areas where it may be needed.
Yes, I can:
Bold mine.
So, we can assume that the reason why that particular report was leaked was because someone within the organisation was working for a political end. He was probably also the person who wrote it.
Yeah, roads are actually the real problem but those three dinosaurs won’t accept that reality.
EDIT:
Greater Auckland was also a great advocate of the cycleway from the beginning. They should acknowledge that in any posts.
Matt Lowrie at Greater Auckland, has his own perspective, and the time and audience to present to. This does not mean that all perspectives are included in their analysis and data which is collected to justify their views.
And the pertinent point that Mike Lee made is not a discussion is not about roads vs cycleways. It is about that particular cycleway project, not providing the level of benefit that was used to secure funding.
It is a derailment 😀 to make it otherwise.
Did you read the bit about the report being dumped because it was inaccurate?
The level of benefit was estimated as being 926 in 2026. In other words, in eight years from now and present growth in use shown by the same report indicates that that will actually be seriously under.
I didn’t make it otherwise. The article I linked addressed your concerns and pointed out that the dinosaurs attacking cycleways don’t do the same for roads. In other words, it pointed out both the inaccuracies used to produce a false impression (lies) and the hypocrisy of those lying.
You’re still trying to believe the lies.
“According to Matt Lowrie at Greater Auckland the report leaked to Orsman had been discarded at draft stage because it was so inaccurate. Orsman’s story was, at best, misleading.”
Matt Lowrie does more than that – he discredits Orsman’s objectivity in all his reporting:
” But I had also noticed the article was authored by Bernard Orsman, who has gained quite a history in recent years of articles that try to generate some sort of outrage, usually related to the council and/or housing. I’ve also noticed there is a tendency in these types of articles for the real story to be somewhere in the last few paragraphs, a point by which many people have stopped reading. Sure enough, this ‘beat up’ fit the pattern perfectly. The key point is in this sentence.
“In undertaking this review, the audit and assurance team was informed that Auckland Transport forecast cyclist user numbers were based on cyclist user estimates forecast in 2026,” a spokesman said.
So Orsman, or the internal report he’s obtained that he’s basing this article on, compares cycling numbers in January-17 with projections for 2026 after we’ve completed an entire city centre networks.
1. When you look at Orsman’s filed stories they are typical council reporting – full with the facts etc that have been presented during meetings, and from my point of view, it seems disingenous to discredit all his work – as a method of discussing this topic.
2. Matt is right, the key point is in this sentence: ” “In undertaking this review, the audit and assurance team was informed that Auckland Transport forecast cyclist user numbers were based on cyclist user estimates forecast in 2026,” a spokesman said.”
Why did were they informed only during the review process? Surely this information should have been clearly given at the time the decision to allocate funds was given? If that was the case, the audit team should have had access to it for the draft report and would not have to be belatedly ‘informed’. Does that not give you pause for thought?
“You’re still trying to believe the lies.”
There is a lack of robust process and transparency going on there. Processes should stand up to scrutiny, and this project while beneficial to many – may not have been the most beneficial – including projects that were designed to provide access to alternative transport modes for those who already are badly served by public transport or are transport poor.
A very quick search delivers a Auckland Transport Business Case study published in 2017, that shows on Page 4 the following:
“21. The modelling of the cycle network near the City Centre indicates that by 2026 4500 people a day will cycle to the City Centre, which is the equivalent to approximately four lanes of traffic on the arterial road network during the peak period. Investment in cycling therefore presents a potentially cost effective means of adding additional capacity to the network.”
I’m assuming that this is similar to the figure used for the initial assessment for the cycleway, but despite GA and other articles saying that the inference made by Orsman is misleading, there are no links showing the original figures or report used for decision making. That would go some way to clearing up the confusion, and would provide accessible evidence for those seeking the facts.
Would like to see the Cost Benefit Analysis of Light Rail (Trams) to the Airport vs Heavy Rail via Puhinui. I have little faith in AT. Hopefully the decision is peer reviewed by some professional overseas experts.
I also have little faith in AT, and often still they let me down. 😀
I would like to see some analysis of the benefit of Heavy Rails for long-term provision of passenger network, freight movement, maintenance and service costs, but also whether either option is the best use of transport funds at the moment.
Just had a look at the Greater Auckland latest blog on the topic, and the post and comments seem to move towards a discussion on the benefits of cycleways in general, and a disregard for roads.
Which is a way of going off topic, when you are talking about particular projects, and discussing the merits, costs and benefits of them in regards to alternative spending on other cycling projects.
That describes every single RON.
And the cycleways are still going to be a better investment.
Ah, so use is still building.
I suspect that this report will be conveniently lost and forgotten when it reaches and then exceeds the estimated number.
“Ah, so use is still building.
I suspect that this report will be conveniently lost and forgotten when it reaches and then exceeds the estimated number.”
I am in favour of cycleways. But consider if this project was chosen over another – more accurately – but less positively presented project, and it makes a difference to how well our transport spending is being allocated in terms of priority.
Yes, the use is still building. But that was not the criteria that provided the decision makers with the information they needed to responsibly allocate resources.
(Also, I think many smaller projects that would have really good outcomes don’t even make it to the discussion table because they don’t have visible advocates.)
This project is part of an ongoing series of projects that will build up a network of cycle paths across Auckland. When that network reaches across more of Auckland than it does now then we will see explosive growth in cycle use.
This project is a necessary part of that network and without it the network won’t be as good as it should be.
“This project is part of an ongoing series of projects that will build up a network of cycle paths across Auckland. When that network reaches across more of Auckland than it does now then we will see explosive growth in cycle use.”
Great. But where is the analysis that says that this was the priority – not because it was central Auckland – but because it provided the most benefit. As far as I know, analysis on other areas of Auckland has not been done to any high degree of detail – other than self-filled surveys.
This lack of analysis right at the start, makes the allocation and prioritisation of funding lop-sided. Not necessarily the best outcome for all Aucklanders.
Thanks for adding thought and analysis Molly.
Why don’t you do an OIA and ask?
BTW, surveys are about the best democracy we can get ATM.
“BTW, surveys are about the best democracy we can get ATM.”
Surveys will always then favour the time rich and already provided for. They have the time and resources to participate. That is not a high standard to aim for.
A stocktake of options available to communities of people doesn’t really require surveys, just good robust data. Further research – which may or may not include surveys – can be undertaken to identify areas where investment delivers big returns for community while still putting pieces in place towards an integrated transport system.
“Why don’t you do an OIA and ask?”
Not my cup of tea at the moment. But I did go to many council meetings etc for a few years, and have spent enough time on it – I’ve moved on. I don’t see any significant change in processes though. And I remain concerned about the lack of focus for communities throughout Auckland that don’t have advocacy.
I am a supporter of alternative transport modes, and of increasing public transport options for Aucklanders. I’m not convinced that the ever rising cost of the proposed LRT for the airport link is the best use of transport funds.
Cease fire between Israel and Palestine results in the Israeli Defence Minister resigning.
Personally I think lieberman resigning is huge news, come on NZ media, catch up please.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/11/israel-defence-minister-lieberman-resigns-gaza-ceasefire-181114111137338.html
The unfolding constitutional crisis in Sri Lanka, a fellow Commonwealth country, is huge news too Cinny but I doubt our parochial media in NZ will be covering that story anytime soon even though there is a sizeable Sri Lankan minority in Auckland.
We tend to get a more balanced viewpoint from Al Jazeera compared the US news networks. Hopefully they can sort this shit out once and for all ?
As the postal ballots slowly get counted in California that state looks to be a rolling bloodbath for Republicans. Nationwide Dems may pick up as many as 40 seats, the third biggest Midterms gain in the last 40 years.
Its looking more like the Democrats will pick up 37 Scott….but that really is an excellent result that has been very poorly reported by the media which (as in NZ) concentrates on early results and not the final result.
The Dems picking up Arizona in the senate yesterday-previously called for the Republicans-was great news.
You’re probably right at 37/38 but possibly as many as 40 if the outstanding races go the Dems way, and most have been.
It seems the tv networks 10 pm election night prognosis was the narrative that got “baked in” as they say in America. Republicans built their spin around that and it’s taken a week to unravel.
The Arizona win is significant for Democrats, even though Sinema (originally a Green Party staffer) recast herself as a very right/centrist Democrat to win and Martha McSally was a pretty bad candidate. It points to some sort of pathway for the Democrats towards majority in the Senate via the shifting demographics in the sunbelt states.
agree totally…Trump said he won so he must have won!
That must be why he was so cheerful on his Europe trip. 🙂
the helicopter couldn’t fly in the rain. That’s it. Not that the president of the USA is a fucking three year old throwing a week-long tantrum.
Helicopters don’t work in the rain and you need voter ID to buy cereal.
Jesus man, this is basic stuff.
Scott I may be wrong here and you right…Democrats seem to be picking up enough House seats to get to +39 and even +40.
Its a bit weird in my defence-I was relying on realclearpolitics figures that showed that House races had been 100% counted with the Dems behind where in fact the figures have continued to change towards the Dem after this.
Nick Smith has just finished throwing tantrum on Morning Report because Susie Ferguson had the temerity to ask him about the Pike River re-entry rather than let him drone on about government use of consultants.
He misses that cabinet limo….time he hung up his spurs.
He still pontificates like he’s a cabinet minister.
Dreadful as it may sound, my perceptions/thoughts over recent months have become that Nick Smith is actually now coming across as one of National’s “better and more experienced”* MPs – compared to Bridges, Bennett and co.
* Yes, I did say that! Even I find myself querying myself for saying it. LOL.
However, out of the limelight of Question Time, he has actually been the one leading the Opposition’s questioning and challenging the Government’s position on various bits of legislation during their passage through the House for 1st Readings, 2nd Readings, Committee stages, and final 3rd Readings. This has included the waka jumping amendment legislation but also many other bits of legislation not of such prominence.
This is not meant to be a defense of Smith because he certainly is not someone I like or respect (with the one exception of many years ago when he was Minister for Conservation where he did not too bad a job). IMO he is simply “better’ than the vast majority (all?) members of the current National front bench when measured against a very low benchmark. The fact that I now think that is simply an indication of how far down that benchmark has now dropped, IMO.
For example, his interview this morning was certainly not good, but at least he seemed to be trying to mount an opposition/challenge re the use of consultants – but I was pleased to hear Suzie not giving him a clear run and challenging him.
Smith was at least coherent in what he said re Suzie diverting her questions onto the Pike River re-entry – IMO Bridges in similar situations just throws his toys in a much less mature, coherent manner.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018671303/nick-smith-criticises-govt-over-contractor-spending
I agree with you vv about Nick Smith.
What it really demonstrates is the second class status of the current National Party caucus and their lack of experience, nous and maturity. We may not have liked or agreed with Key, Joyce and co. who fled the sinking Nat ship in advance (or are about to) but at least they carried out their functions in a (mostly) competent manner. It is going to take the Nats quite a few years to grow another caucus that is ready to again take the reins of power.
In the meantime, Dirty Politics is all they have.
Labour – when it went through its ritual growing pains brought on by public rejection – had to be content with fighting and squabbling with one another and, much to my eternal shame, I was one of the participants. 🙁
Thanks Anne. Good to know I am not losing the plot yet, LOL.
Totally agree with your last para, also – and I was also part of that. It is quite interesting watching it now happening with the now Opposition., albeit in a slightly different less open/public manner. Well, up to a point. JLR has put a bit of dent in the behind closed doors scenario. Long may it last.
> What it really demonstrates is the second class status of the current National Party caucus and their lack of experience, nous and maturity
100% agree – though in my view the Labour Party caucus is not in a much better state – I think both parties had much more talent in the mid 2000s.
A.
Many years back I attended a Tararua Tramping Club meeting where Nick spoke on conservation issues. I still recall it quite well; it seemed to me at the time that spoke competently, sincerely and had an extensive, passionate grasp of his subject. He’s certainly served his Party well for many decades, and undertaken much work for the nation.
Others will leap to disagree I realise, but even if my political values are different to his, I can respect his substantial contribution over the decades.
He was certainly not being sincere with all the lies and bullshit he spoke about fresh water quality.
Federated Mountain Club’s, Fish and Game and Forest and Bird all thought he was full of shit:
https://www.greens.org.nz/news/press-release/nick-smith%E2%80%99s-water-policy-dissolving-another-environmental-group-walks-away-land
Yes … that is the entire purpose of politics; thrashing out competing interests and desires. I’d be shocked if the Greens and FMC were not opposed to at least some of his policy work, and I never said I aligned with Nick’s position, but that I could respect the way he has gone about it.
Two different things, and a distinction many here seem to struggle with.
So you think that changing the definition of “swimmable” to include that which clearly is not is an honest way of going about this?
It’s probably what he could get past Cabinet.
Oh OK, so it is OK for him to be dishonest as long as he has got the best he can out of Cabinet? Now you are talking about a different thing.
If you asked Nick in his personal capacity how he’d like our rivers, I bet he’d give the same answer you or I would give, crystal clear and wonderful (as I remember them from decades past).
But that’s politics for you. You don’t always get what you want and you have to make the best of what you get. You can’t make a stand on everything you disagree with, otherwise you get kicked out of the game fast. Call that dishonest if you like, but it’s how the system works.
The thing that was dishonest was changing the definition of “swimmable” to include that which clearly isn’t. That is a separate thing to Nact deciding that water quality should not be significantly improved.
I’m not at all familiar with this story so, but it’s likely a good example of how the system works. If we looked closely at the policy involved we would likely see that in the long-term it creates a reasonable framework for improving river water quality.
But initially it’s going to get opposition from interests that it’s going to impose costs on, ie the farmers. So what you do is put in place an overarching legislation that can have it’s detailed settings altered over time, but accept that the first pass isn’t going to be everything you want.
Yeah I know, it’s boring and incremental, but it’s the way you get things done without too many unintended consequences. I’m not at all unsympathetic to what your saying here; as you can deduce my single biggest passion in life has been tramping in the backcountry of these amazingly beautiful islands; assume I care about the rivers as you do.
But politics isn’t a natural playground for idealists like us; understanding how to get things done requires competence and pragmatism.
Smoke and mirrors Red Logix?
Smith was Minister of Conservation from 1996 – 1999 after Denis Marshall resigned post Cave Creek. I worked for the Dept of Conservation for three years after the final Cave Creek report as part of the restructuring of the Dept as a result of the report. Smith was a good Minister during his time and became well respected by Conservation staff, both old and new. My type of work meant I had direct contact with him, and I found him good to deal with on the complex issues pertaining to the restructure etc.
Some of his other and later ‘history’*, some of which is covered by legal suppression orders, not so much. But c’est la vie – we are all a mix of good and bad.
* including his clean water package in 2017 as per Solkta’s comment above.
Yes … like many politicians meeting or working with them in person is a different experience to their media projection. Your comment is interesting, clearly Nick Smith was at his best in the Conservation portfolio, and his record in other roles has been …. let’s say workmanlike, but sometimes scratchy.
Exactly – well said. From all accounts, Conservation was probably his Ministerial high point.
I also agree with what you have said above to solkta.
I don’t mean this as a criticism, but for those who have not worked in the parliamentary environment and/or in govt in roles that interact with the parliamentary system, things can be very black or white and idealistic; whereas the reality of our system of government is one of shades of grey including (acceptable levels of) compromise, deferred/staged implementation etc, etc.
This, of course, is also true for many other areas of work, business etc – for example, the type of work you appear to be in.
As you said, two different things, and a distinction many here seem to struggle with.
I know one politician who says of Nick Smith that he is the biggest liar they have ever met, and that includes John Key. It was an opinion expressed to me as we drove over to a conference in Hamilton in 2014 on Climate Change and NZ’s commitment, or otherwise.
I don’t think anything I, or possibly others, have said necessarily excludes that as a possibility. We humans are complex beings, and that possibility is not necessarily out of line with my brief mention of legally suppressed matters of many years ago. Will say no more.
Nick Smith married a woman he was assisting when she was a constituant thats akin to a Doctor sleeping with patients, a big no no, likely to get any other professional struck off from their registration body. Then again polititians have no understanding of ethical behaviour.
Sorry Psych nurse but that is silly. There are no parallels with a doctor tending to a patient. That is a deeply personal situation at all levels (even if its only to syringe a dammed pesky ear every few months 🙁 ) whereas a constituent is only requiring advice or wanting to reference some local concern that may be bothering them. There is no reason why after such an encounter with an MP that they don’t discover (maybe) they have friends and associates in common and ultimately choose to extend their relationship.
Good grief, does that mean you can’t strike up a friendship with your local chemist or computer technician (if you’re a pc dummy like me) or anyone you may hire to do a job for you?
Is it regarded as unethical to try to marry a computer technician if you are a needy computer klutz?
Jingos VV, this is sounding more like an obituary.
(Not wishing ill on the man).
Ooops – not meant that way at all, especially as I have just worked out the difference in age between him and I. ROFL.
But I do think that he needs to move on, and find something else for his remaining working years. Or perhaps, he still has designs on being Leader? …………………………..
Leader…
Putting a tory hat on, I couldnt think of three better candidates in the party.
I am being sincere here.
Although IMO the best candidate for leader is someone the likes of O’Sullivan, GP in the far north, and chopper him in to Botany.
A la key, that went well for them.
What he did and the lies he told re ACC remain painful for many.
I’m no fan of the Waka Jumping Legislation but I’m not really inclined to be lectured on its many flaws by Nick Smith, who was part of the National government that completely ignored the recommendations of the MMP Review in 2012 for no better reason than those recommendations (abolishing of coattails rule and resulting overhang and lowering the threshold to 4% etc), if implemented, would have disadvantaged National’s client parties.
JLR has done the country a service exposing the grubby workings of the Natzi Party
I will never trust a word he ever says again after the way he lied about the National Party’s devious RMA reforms (and the Special Housing Areas) that are a developers charter and a disaster for NZ’s landscapes.
The Maori Party got its just deserts for supporting the RMA reforms.
Fair enough. And that is a biggie.
What I was trying to get through in my comment that you have replied to was that while I do not have any great love, trust or anything else for Smith, using him as a form of measure, he actually shows up many/most/all (?) of the rest of the Nat frontbench as being possibly worse.
In other words, I think the quality of the current Nats MPs is at a major low. (I am trying to keep a bit of an open mind re some of the latest additions but suspect that they are just other chips off the same block.)
I certainly do not have any respect for Smith or trust him – with the one exception of the short period when Smith was Minister of Conservation and I discussed that further down the thread with Red Logix.
As I also replied to Macro who also reported that he had been referred to as the biggest liar another politician had ever met, I certainly don’t exclude that as well.
ScottGN also made good points re Smith and the waka jumping legislation.
We all see things from slightly different perspectives and it would be a dull old world if we didn’t.
Time to put his slippers on and have another whisky perhaps.
I need some advice please…..
Miss almost 14 was bullied badly at school earlier in the year, I got involved, the boys concerned were punished by the school, the bullying has pretty much stopped.
She meet a brother of one of the bullies at the bike track, turns out both him and his brother get beaten by their father. When the father was contacted by the school to advise him that his son was bullying my daughter, the father beat up his son with a stick, threw a chair at him etc.
Myself and Miss almost 14 are deeply troubled that these boys are getting beaten by their father. We only know one of the boys first names.
We need to do something to protect these boys, what should we do or who should we approach?
Should we go to the school and tell them or the police?
I’m really lost on who to approach and how to go about it, I don’t want these kids to get another beating.
STart with your school principal and be clear you are speaking in confidence?
A.
Agree.
I would recommend going directly to the police.
Telll then the school has the full names of the boys.
That separates you and your daughter from the school (so less chance of blow back on you) and better change of it being acted on quickly.
Not a fun position. Good luck.
I agree with James. It is a criminal offence and rightly so. The boys and their father need help. Or you could
KAhaI agree with the advice above.
By all means help how you see fit, also set some boundaries for yourself and yours.
It is important to keep yourself safe. Safe physically, mentally and emotionally.
It is quite possible you may not achieve concrete results in this case.
You may be able to help in other kids lives.
By this I mean perhaps help out with another group. Youthline, Big Brother Big Sister, after school groups etc.
It may not be on the front line, all these groups need help running.
All this according to your time and resources.
Good luck and stay safe.
A difficult situation, Cinny.
IMO it depends on your relationship with your school principal. I recall that you have mentioned him/her on here once or twice. If you have a good trusting relationship where you feel confident in the principal’s integrity, confidentiality etc, then I would start there.
If not, I would suggest either the police (they usually have specific officers especially trained in these areas) and/or Oranga Tamariki.
Oranga Tamariki has a specific section on their website on this very issue with who to contact, contact numbers etc. They seem to be doing a lot better under the guidance of Tracey Martin as their Minister.
https://www.orangatamariki.govt.nz/worried-about-a-child-tell-us/
Full site https://www.orangatamariki.govt.nz/
Kia kaha
EDIT – Actually, I would suggest talking to OT first as they will/should know the best/right(legal) procedures in such cases. There were some changes to the law on this recently IIRC.
Approach the school / principal. Hopefully they can investigate or get police involved if needed which separates yourself. Good luck…horrible situation.
Thanks so much everyone.
I contacted Oranga Tamariki, cheers for the links VV very much appreciated. Because I don’t know the last name or address of the children unfortunately they are unable to progress it.
But they were ever so helpful, and suggested to go to the school and advise them, and ask the school to contact O.T. Glad the staff at the school and the principal are so very approachable, makes a massive difference.
Social worker on the phone said that because the parent used a stick to beat their children and threw a chair at them that it could well end up being a police matter.
Will have to tread very carefully as the last thing I want is those boys to get another beating because they disclosed their situation to someone.
Once again thanks everyone for the info and advice.
You are very welcome, Cinny.
I thought that OT would know the legalities etc. The principal and school will be able to “disclose” the personal details to OT and/or the Police, which they cannot do to you or other people.
It also keeps you and your daughters out of the picture, as the school, OT etc must all keep your details confidential. (Also See below for Section 16 protections.)
———-
Here are a few more links on reporting child abuse for anyone interested:
http://www.police.govt.nz/faq/i-suspect-a-child-is-being-abused-what-should-i-do
This explains the relationship and interaction between Oranga Tamariki and the NZ Police
Sections 15 – 19 of the Children, Young Persons and Their Families Act (1989) cover the reporting of suspected child abuse (including the roles of OT and NZ Police).
Section 16 protects people who notify concerns of abuse in good faith from civil and criminal proceedings.
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1989/0024/latest/whole.html#DLM149466
Community Law has a page that covers legal questions about Section 16 protections etc for people reporting suspected abuse
http://communitylaw.org.nz/community-law-manual/chapter-12-dealing-with-oranga-tamariki-ministry-for-children/reporting-child-abuse/
Citizen Advice Bureau (CAB) also has some more detailed FAQs on reporting suspected child abuse (and elder abuse).
http://www.cab.org.nz/vat/fp/va/pages/reportingabuse.aspx
As does the Ministry of Health from a slightly different perspective (and includes partner abuse).
https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/preventative-health-wellness/family-violence/family-violence-questions-and-answers
This Ministry of Education pdf, while older (eg refers to CYF not OT) is useful for the flow charts showing how schools etc report child abuse and the different roles, obligations etc of school principals, Boards of Trustees, OT, Police etc
https://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/School/Traumatic-incidents-and-emergencies/MoE-STA-CYFProtocolForReportingActualOrSuspectedChildAbuseNov09Amendment-3-2015.pdf
Lots more links are available through a generic Google search using “reporting child abuse nz”.
——————–
This is not directly related to this particular situation but I was pleased to see this article on the new 2018 requirements for reporting of abuse of children in state care.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12114959
VV, have just got off the phone to the schools DP. She’s received an email from Oranga Tamariki about my call, so is following it all up confidentially. Hope it all works out for those boys.
That herald article was interesting, thanks again for the links.
So pleased, Cinny – and well done, both you and daughter.
The fact that the brother felt he could disclose to your daughter speaks heaps about her, and your parenting.
If I recall you are in the Tasman Bay area. If so, I am not surprised that the school is on to it. Had excellent experiences with schools, social service authorities, foster family etc in that area a decade or so ago with a “godchild” who was fostered in the area for some years after some bad parental experiences.
EDIT – Just seen your reply to DTB and it clicked as to what was nagging at me re the CAB link I gave above. Look at the bottom of that page, and the second to bottom link. A thought re sharing experiences. You’ll understand.
I’d go to the police. That’s not just smacking but outright assault.
I wish it was that easy Draco, but having been a in violent relationship I know it’s not.
It’s certainly not something that would have worked when I was living with my father after my mother died 36 years ago. I tried after I ran away because the fuckwit was beating me most days for things that I hadn’t even done and got caught by the police. Their only response was that my father could actually force me to stay at home until I was twenty.
But things have changed since then and going to the police can actually work. Especially after the repeal of s59 which gave abusers an out.
Exclusive: Serious concern over preschool checks as conditions not picked-up
“Many children were starting at a language development age of 3-4 years. More than 30 per cent had a language proficiency in the bottom 2.5 per cent of the population.
The study, sent to ministers of health and education, concludes: “our current model of delivering health, education and social services equally is increasing inequity. We need to realign the current health and education systems”.”
“But it took a comprehensive check of new entrants at schools in the Tamaki area as part of the Welcome to School study to reveal the true picture.
By the time they were five-and-a-half, a quarter of new entrants either had or needed tooth extractions under general anaesthetic.
Burt said in a middle class family such a procedure would be considered extremely significant.
The fact it was so common in his school’s area but not well understood showed how disadvantage “normalises things that ought not to be normal”.
Other study findings included 36 per cent of new entrants being obese and a similar proportion overweight.
“It is normal in this community to be an unhealthy weight,” the study’s executive summary noted. “Many of these children are actually malnourished kids in big bodies.”
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12159206
Revealed: Hundreds declined specialist care for painful skin conditions
“Half of South Auckland children sent for specialist care for serious skin conditions are declined an appointment, a Herald investigation has found.
The picture is similar at some other district health boards (DHBs), as the public system struggles with specialist-to-population ratios called “third world” by the NZ Dermatological Society.
Health Minister David Clark has now asked for advice on the problem.
In Canterbury, hundreds of referrals (mostly for adults) have been sent back, despite meeting the usual clinical threshold for an appointment.”
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12150553
In the wake of the ‘compassion’ and amount Karel Sroubek has cost the taxpayers, maybe the government could reprioritise their spending onto kids born here, who seem to be receiving a third world health service.
Likewise there is so much government money being spent on private housing, and the hundreds of thousands of new migrants and work permits being given out, but where are the new hospitals and the doctors and schools that should be put in BEFORE the migrants and work permits are given out. Or the prison gets another drug smuggler needing hundreds of thousands of tax payer money for their prison stay and our government fights for their rights out of ‘compassion” while the priorities of kids born here that have little to nothing, are having worse and worse outcomes.
NZ is a small country with a set amount to be spent, the big issue seems to be that our government seem more interested in overseas drug smuggler’s rights than making sure the human rights of their own kids are a priority and don’t want for anything.
Major infrastructure partnership for North Auckland
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1811/S00135/major-infrastructure-partnership-for-north-auckland.htm
What we need to ask ourselves is who is paying for the hospital and schools and congestion, because more houses don’t create wealth, well paid secure jobs do, and to keep the same standard of living with more houses and people we need to also AT THE SAME TIME, build more hospitals and schools and have the money to fund the doctors and teachers who teach in them ready and accounted for.
Instead of giving more money to big construction interests through housing, maybe the government should look at where the well paid secure jobs being created in Auckland are, (truck drivers and baristas are not exactly well paid jobs) the educational and health levels of the next generation who seem to be going backwards, otherwise the government are diverting public money and resources to the world’s wealthy and privileged new home owners and away from NZ poor and middle classes who have to ‘share’ the dwindling hospitals and schools, and roads/public transport and polluted beaches with more and more of the world’s privileged with money earned outside of NZ and people who qualify for free super, health care and even public transport with the gold card, but may have only been in NZ for a fraction of their life time.
Maybe Karel can rustle up some under the counter skin cream savvy.
Sad about skin conditions lack of help.
I have wondered for some time about the skin reaction to the strength of the ‘soap’ powders on offer and whether the clothes get properly rinsed by modern washing machine programs. In my machine the idea seems to be to save water and energy with seemingly lower rinse levels than for wash period, and only one full rinse. If the machine is very full of washing, as it probably would be for poor households who are also time poor, then there could be a considerable amount of washing solution left in the clothes which could be irritating and sensitise the skin.
I have the same thoughts about the new washing machines. I purchased a new front loading machine when we shifted house in 2015 – the older top loader was too wide for the space, and have despaired at times at the rinsing programme, even with the extra rinse option. I often then put the load through a rinse cycle again, which takes extra time. This certain could have detrimental effects on some people who have sensitive skin – I just get a bit p****d off at the towels drying like sheets of plywood.
Jilly Bee, try baking soda in the water. It helps.
Natzi’s undermined the Health System and imported 500k fresh Asian Immigrants with no improvements to the country’s infrastructure have a think about the consequences ?
Tells you everything
https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/17b7f4c81f0722f4e0af64d96598ee9947dc5404/0_0_2473_3014/master/2473.jpg?width=700&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=b201186ff7b7d0a055b304e7c3949377
Ooh, look, the Dems even have a token few old pale males amongst their noobs.
The dems are lacking a pirate.
It is brilliant the boys have started the dialogue.
It is a cry for help.
James is correct, as an adult you need to report the possible abuse, in as far as you know it.
The police will speak with the Principal, who has the right to speak with the boys and trigger protection.
Cinny, you will be taken seriously. Even a phone call to the police would elicit a response.
don’t know why his failed to link Cinny.
Thanks Patricia much appreciated
#FiveWhiteGuys think the menz should be running the shop.
(1/7)
https://twitter.com/frodofied/status/1062463577532055557
For those members, old and new, who oppose Pelosi from the left, the #FiveWhiteGuys are offering a sucker’s bet. The #FiveWhiteGuys are of the school that believes that the Democratic Party’s needs are best served winning back all those disgruntled folks at diners in the Mahoning Valley, a theory fairly well demolished last Tuesday. It is very unlikely that a Green New Deal or Medicare For All is high on their list of priorities. The only argument that the #FiveWhiteGuys have that might resonate with their new progressive colleagues is that Pelosi is old and has been in Congress for a long time. Period. That’s not enough to dispense with the party’s most effective legislative leader since Lyndon Johnson.
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a25093451/nancy-pelosi-speaker-democrat-opposition-tim-ryan-seth-moulton/?
They’d be more interesting if they had an alternative candidate. Without one, the progressives will roast them alive as sellouts.
These #FiveWhiteGuys are Blue Dog Dems trying to what Blue Dog Dems do, drag the party to the right.
Progressives are going to be in trouble if they go along with them.
(1/26)
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1062761886796668934.html
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortizhas has always been an historian I really respect.
http://reddirtsite.com/
This interview with her from Abby Martin the Empire Files is just fantastic. Talking about mass killing and white nationalism. Her analysis of trump is illuminating.
Housing crisis in Central Otago and Queenstown Lakes forces young families out of region
The inevitable result of allowing offshore ownership.
I note two things:
1. The council is ignoring the fact that it’s the rich outsiders that are the problem.
2. The council is concerned with losing workers thus we see that rich people can’t actually support themselves or the economy.
That reminds me of The Admirable Crichton a play which was made as a film in 1957.
Based on the James Barrie classic, THE ADMIRABLE CRICHTON tells the story of an English butler who, shipwrecked with his employers, resourcefully leads them in their attempts to survive.
I can’t give a clip of it because Columbia Pictures, although it is 60 years od, won’t allow it to be shown with a soundtrack). It’s available in audio voiced by a machine, or can be seen as a nearly mute soundtrack (just the faintest tape rustle or something to be heard).
Perhaps we need to be resourceful and lead ourselves out of this mess that the export-oriented, anti-domestic, money-mad business people have landed us in.
that was a lovely movie.
Hi grey, is this it on Youtube?
Hi Molly, that is it but on my computer I don’t get any sound. Do you?
Hi grey, yes I do.
Thanks so much for that link. I did not see it at the time (too young) but recall seeing it many years later and it has always stuck in my memory. Great to see it again.
Qtown might lose its appeal to the richpricks if there’s nobody there to clean their pools even for redy money.
It’s more the normal cyclical behaviour of the Queenstown and Central Otago property and employment markets. I’ve seen four or five cycles now and the same thing happens every time.
Queenstown’s a funny place, there’s lots of glitz and glamour, and it’s all premium property, think the very top suburbs of Auckland or Sydney, but most of the residents are really pretty modest, along with most of the jobs. You probably wouldn’t see them trying to live in the top suburbs in auckland or Sydney. Unfortunately the closest we have to Ranui is Lumsden, and that’s 100 km away.
But people come to town and see the glamour, the stunning landscape and “lifestyle” and think the streets are paved with gold. And just have to be part of it. Generally this turns out to be a cashflow negative undertaking and after a few years they realise that the streets are truly paved with gold, but it’s, or was, their gold. This realisation can have a profound effect on attitudes and there can be some spectacular spitting of the dummy. The Queenstown’s ruined rant is at the lower end of the spectrum.
World boutique, who appear to be doing very well at making our streets glitter, were in the paper again this morning for some provocative displays. https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/queenstown/shop-window-display-signs-removed-after-complaint Our first reaction was, oh, they’re on their way…
Was the sign fabrique en nouvelle zelande?
Probably just the price sticker, maybe
Oh dear, how sad.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/entertainment-top-stories/108622921/mediaworks-radio-arm-radio-live-to-be-merged-with-magic-network
Another lot licking at RNZ door’s threshold hoping for mercy. (They’re becoming increasingly merciful towards the commercially oriented)
In the meantime, I ‘spose a spot or two on the Panel with Jum (not TS’ Jum) will pay for the groceries.
Talkback has had it’s day, replaced with social media and the like. Hopefully at least we will get to see Magic come to Taranaki, with Radio Live’s frequency being take over.
Mike Williams continues to agree with everything Michelle Boag says;
This is cringe-inducing radio, on a level with Newstalk ZzzzzB.
The Panel, RNZ National, Wednesday 14 November 2018
Jim Mora, Michelle Boag, Mike “I Agree With Michelle” Williams, Emil Donovan
We’ve studied many times over the last few years the less than stellar performances of the late Paul Holmes’s former classmate Mike Williams. While he has the ability to speak clearly and intelligently, Williams too often chooses to abase himself in order to curry favor with the likes of Matthew Hooton [1] and, as we heard today, the notorious democracy-hater Michelle Boag. In Williams she has secured another perfect stooge, or sycophant, now that Brian “I agree entirely with Michelle” Edwards is no longer available. [2]
First major “discussion” this afternoon concerned the teacher pay dispute. As would have surprised nobody at all, Boag launched into an extended rant against the teacher unions, with Williams adding the odd supportive “yeah” and “mmmm” every now and again. Then, after several minutes, mercifully, she came to a halt. Mike Williams now had a chance to respond. This is what he said:
Next topic was the Karel Sroubek “saga”. Boag again took the opportunity to launch into another extended, partisan rant. At the end of it, Mike Williams again had a chance to say something intelligent. He said:
The third-last item for consideration by these thoroughly thoughtful thinkers was previewed as follows:
Now, The Panel has discussed drones many, many times. It’s a topic that they’ve chatted lightly about almost as often as they’ve chatted about coffee, or diet research, or the frustrations of buying rock concert tickets online. [3] Never once during these frivolous talkfests have I heard them even mention the use of drones to kill thousands of people, mainly civilians and children, in Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen, Gaza, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Previewing this discussion at 3:45 p.m., Jim Mora read out, without a trace of irony in his voice: “Could drones be used for crime?”
[1] https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-21092015/#comment-1072911
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-06102015/#comment-1078888
[2] https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-08102014/#comment-906562
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-22072012/#comment-496531
[3] https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-10062014/#comment-828881
Jimoara does seem a wee bit drone obsessed morry. I guess he ‘gets’ drones. Best laugh was Boagy growling ‘I’m rilly empatheddic’.
He certainly has a great number of drones on his program. Boag is not even the worst of them.
Who could ever forget Deborah Hill Cone?
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2018/01/how-did-panel-handle-woolwich-killings.html
…or Spiro Zavos?
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2018/01/doddery-spiro-zavos-makes-fool-of.html
…or Rosemary McLeod, Andrew Clay, and Stephen Franks?
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2018/01/why-is-stephen-franks-being-interviewed.html
BTW, and perhaps à propos of something, “drones” is an anagram of “snored.”
Franks is the worst.
I switch off if I hear he is on.
I know it’s all politics but god, how could Ardern stand to be seated next to (or near to given Pence doesn’t want any woman closer to him than his wife – weird little religious zealot he is) Mike Pence. A Christian nut with some very strange ideas about homosexuality, climate change, evolution etc etc etc.
I couldn’t spend 5 mins with him without getting into an argument
Worst of all, he’s a warmonger, as anyone who has listened to his ranting about North Korea and, especially, Iran, will know.
Perhaps he’s Queer …. I’d enjoy the discussion ..
Kia ora The Am Show
judy trying to the flip flop on the Pike River Mine disaster tipal neo polly itwasent me.
shonky was pulling all the strings come on .
May the word’s that come out of the waha don’t match her body language.
I tau toko respecting the Wahine and treating them Equally but I say those stat’s about Aotearoa being the worst in the world is full of stats were country’s are manipulating there data to make there image look good hence a honest country sit at the top .
A Star Is Born is A awesome movie some in our MSM have been kicking it a bit?????????.
If one does not talk about a problem there are no solutions found to solve the suicide problem with our Stars .Fame Alcohol hard drugs can = suicide people are passing on way to early because of that fact not being talked about hence no reduction in this problem.
Re setting driver’s licences test is not a bright Idea who thought of this bright Idea I say no more.
Ka kite ano . P.S have a good weekend
The Norton based dimp worked I just managed to save this computer .
I went to Auckland to see our MOKO’s and you should have seen the sandfly’s marked ones everywhere .
These beautiful Creatures deserve a future we are there Guardians
Ka kite ano link below
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2018/nov/15/the-empire-of-the-eagle-book-mike-unwin-david-tiplin
I remember in the 90ts some trying to launch super rugby/league comp and it FLOPPED just like this one the positive out come from that attempt is we now have professorial Rugby . some people don’t know how to be original they are copy cats.
A new rugby competition involving teams from Australia and smaller nations has been conditionally sanctioned by the World Rugby Council.
Rapid Rugby, the brainchild of Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest, will include the Perth-based Western Force as well as teams from Samoa, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Fiji, plus another backed by a private consortium based in a country yet to be revealed.
The teams would contest 56 games over 14 rounds, prior to four finals over three weeks, with the winners taking a $1 million first prize.
The competition will run during a similar period to Super Rugby, with Forrest indicating a start in late February, with a three-week finals series culminating in a June grand final.
Ka kite ano link below P.S this guy should use his money to support Australian rugby
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=12161083
Kia ora Newshub looks like a good circus.
Lloyd Britexit in a nother move by the wealthy for the wealthy the commoners are the people who are going to pay for the wealthy like trump is steam rolling Americans it all about the rich oil barron to them.
It was cool that the conjoined twins have been separated by operation in Australia.
The Bill Clinton saga the Republins new he is a stick man they used Monaca Lewnsky to set him up and played the media and Bill like a violin.
That Panda is so gorgeous.
Ka kite ano P.S I have been busy using dimp
The Crowd goes Wild apologies I have been tied up with the mokos.
Because the sandflys are playing with them selves so much these days I am using sign language a lot as of late ki kaha to the Crowd goes Wild crew.
Ka kite ano P.S I will have to be more careful who I post about