i think to apply for a kiwi build home you must be on the electoral roll and have voted in the 2017 election because why should none voters get on the ballet ahead of those who got off there backsides and voted
You are clearly a believer in the Tammany Hall system of political corruption. Rather like the Labour Party here I suppose.
They did a lot of good in the first half century. After that they became notoriously corrupt and were finally destroyed. https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-tammany-hall-1774023
I see you have put this in twice.
I is equally as silly the second time as it was the first.
There is no connection between what I have said and what you are rambling on about.
How to get young people to enroll? Along with the carrots, a little bit of stick. Prosecute a dozen or so and fine them for not enrolling (it is a legal requirement), pour encourager les autres.
In my extended family is a person in their late 50s who’s not on the roll. Never has been. Doesn’t stop them posting, and commenting on, enthusiastically, most of National’s more extreme bullshit about Labour on their Facebook page. Irony is that their spouse, also rabid Nat, is an electoral officer.
Agree. We also know rabid politically engaged people who have never voted (democracy is for idiots), but who buy their economic framework by making massive donations to National.
come on labour pick this up , but make the farms lease only so they provide more than one young farmer a stepping stone,
oh and the greens appear to favour corporate farming Hmmmmm insert grumpy emogi
When I heard that thought it was a bit back to the future.
That’s how Landcorp / Lands and Survey used to operate. Farms were developed on pioneer / marginal land and then leased and sold to young farmers. I think a lot of Western Southland was developed like this.
Leasing only would be the way to go now. In today’s world it would just be very difficult for young farmers, without family support, to move into a Landcorp type farm at market price, due to the price pressure put on the market by overseas buyers.
Do you mean Landcorp buys marginal land and then leases it out? Or do you mean that the existing Landcorp farms get given out on permanent lease?
Having Landcorp involved in supporting young farmers into farming would be great especially where it was sustainable or climate change prep. Lots of potential for overlap with the Greens climate and ag policies.
oops i miss read it they favour the land staying in landcorp ownership , which i’m good with but it still could be leased out with rules around looking after the land .
they would be a stepping stone as a young farmer could leese till they own all the stock then move into ownership
come on labour pick this up , but make the farms lease only so they provide more than one young farmer a stepping stone
You do understand that there’s nowhere for the young farmers to step to don’t you? All the farming land has been used up and is owned by old farmers and city ‘farmers’.
That’s why National has decided to sell all the Landcore land – and it won’t be going to young farmers but those old and city ‘farmers’. The ones that can afford to buy it.
It will be like fishing quota.
In a few short years will be in the hands of corporates and the wealthy sqatters next door. “Tenure review” all over again.
Leasehold to beginning youngsters only would genuinely help young farmers who cannot afford the next step.
Every time national comes out with a new policy it has two sides (truth & lies) to it dressed up as a “progressive policy” for a group of ‘intersted parties’ and this time it is young farmers eh!!!
Not in your nellie’
it will be featered off to their mates in large packages not for the 10 acre farming block you can bet.
My dear departed mum was very wise when she told me “If it sounds to good to be true then it is a lie”.
National are good at lies, and this is another one.
Draco you are so right here, (meant 100 acre mininum farm not 10 acres, that’s only what I’ve got. ( toy farm.)
Every time national comes out with a new policy it has two sides to it dressed up as a “progressive policy” for a group of ‘intersted parties’ and this time it is young farmers eh!!!
Not in your nellie’
it will be featered off to their mates in large packages not for the 100 acre farming block you can bet.
My dear departed mum was very wise when she told me “If it sounds to good to be true then it is a lie”.
National are good at lies, and this is another one.
That is incorrect, there is a well established system for young dairy farmers to get into a farm, the sharemilking system has been working for over 50 years.
Starting off as contract Miller’s and finishing up owning the herd and getting 50% of the milk receipts, huilding up to a 1000 cows on a single large farm or multiple farms, selling off a large portion of their herd gives a deposite on first farm purchase.
Other than the few that may take over the family farm (but still have to buy out their sibblings) nearly every dairy farming family has used this route to farm ownership. The system operates as strongly today as it every has. You may be aware of the term gypsie day which is used to describe the mass movement of sharemilkers moving between farms on 1st June each year as they move up to bigger farms or into their first own farm
That is incorrect, there is a well established system for young dairy farmers to get into a farm, the sharemilking system has been working for over 50 years.
And this well established process creates land how?
Or, to put it other words: ZOMG, I didn’t know we had God working for us.
Everything else you say can be safety ignore until you prove we actually do have God on our payroll.
/open-mike-15092017/#comment-1384925on Not ready yet
Plenty of sharemilkers say they haven’t a chance of getting their own place.
They can’t catch up with prices. A quiet word to sharemilkers today on gypsy day may not get them talking about their reality. But away from the group I think the facts would be that for each one that is managing on his own behalf, there are five who have had to borrow excessively, or step back for another couple of years and some have given up because the present day system has killed off that 50 year opportunity.
And I haven’t forgotten the sharemilker struggling to keep up with his plan who found that the farmer he worked with just kept overstocking with his own beasts. The sharemilkers plan was to work the place up and introduce his own cows but every time there was the opportunity to do that the owner took the opportunity to boost his own herd. His wife said he got into the pattern of pushing himself and collapsed from overwork.
I can;t give you any sources for what I have said. I try to keep up with what is happening in the rural sector. I think I would know more about it than the rural sector knows about the non-primary sector.
There’s also a lot of “amalgamations” that could end up in the hands of liquidators once their capital is exhausted. I have a feeling it’s these syndicated operations that are leading the fight against resource charging. there’s probably not that many of them, but they were pushing the boundaries of viability from the start and 30 – 50K per annum for water is the least of their problems.
This is quite interesting to and points to the above
it is not so much the deal (appealing as it was0…it is the barefaced lies, and cover up including support from supposedly non political public servants and public oversight that National have maintained ….a party of moral and ethical bankrupts who have to go before they corrupt our systems beyond repair.
I think that’s because having your leaders lie somehow legitimises your own lying. I’ve noticed a huge increase in lying behaviour among rural and construction people in the last 10 years. It’s now almost accepted. The same people are beside themselves at the prospect of a change in government.
New Zealand is poorly informed about the scam being inflicted upon us ….If Labour will not speak up about the elephant in the room then the the Greens should highlight this tax injustice,….. it would probably help if they cooperate and network with their Aussie compatriots, who have done good work in this area ……. https://greens.org.au/tax-avoidance
Nationals tax policy is apprently for the ‘creative’ …..
John Key: …. “, if they want to be creative and work hard, to significantly reduce their tax liability but in a lawful way.” ….
“, Mr Rozvany said just because something is legal does not mean it is ethical.
“It’s an interesting thing, ‘within the law’,” Mr Rozvany said.
“Many things were once legal. Rape and paedophilia were once legal.
“If you set up a sham transaction in a tax haven with a view to shifting profits from a high tax jurisdiction to a low tax jurisdiction that should be considered unacceptable to the international community.” ……
The amounts of money looted by ‘creative’ accountants’ are huge … sly politicians make it all loophole legal … “In the three years to 2015, Shell had racked up around $60 billion in revenue (when it owned the petrol stations and the upstream business) and appeared to pay zero tax.” …. https://www.michaelwest.com.au/shell-tax-ripped-out-as-in-house-deals-double/
Creative accounting ??? ….. “Ebay Australia and New Zealand does it all: Tax Avoidance 101 – don’t recognise revenue with customers in Australia, and then, Tax Avoidance 102 – minimise the profits on any revenues you do happen to recognise.” …. https://www.michaelwest.com.au/ebay-scores-own-goal-on-tax/
The overseas company CKI, who brought Wellingtons electricity lines network/infrastructure …. and has run at a fictitious loss ( with a underinvestment in maintenance ) ever since …. “Of course, those losses are not real and CKI did not pay $785m for a duffer………Wellington Network is in fact highly profitable, with an earnings margin consistently around 30 per cent before interest and tax.”…..
And then we have ‘legal shell companies and ‘Trusts’……“Working hard at” buying up our land and homes ….
”owner of the former Crafar and Synlait farms in Waikato and Canterbury. Milk New Zealand Holding is wholly owned not by Shanghai Pengxin, but by Milk New Zealand Investment, a company registered in the British Virgin Islands. The ownership was disclosed to the Companies Office on August 13……….Chalkie reckons owning New Zealand farms through a Caribbean tax haven may have tax advantages “-
The big four accounting firms have been branded as aggressive, unethical, and accused of “perpetrating the greatest tax crimes in history” by a leading corporate tax authority.
If you gut the public service and slash regulation, that’s what you get from right wing governments. Looting the common wealth, privatising profits, and evading tax. Jail the white collar crooks.
Thanks Muttonbird & ropata ….. National are audacious liars to be attacking anyone over tax …..
The Greens should announce they will push for George Rozvany to be part of the tax review ….. They need to quickly raise awareness and illuminate the simple truth.
Being that We do not need new or more taxes ….. just collection of what is due from the richest company s and people in the world.
The greens are the natural party to make some noise about this injustice … the rest seem compromised …..
Not too hard to fix though as it’s closing loopholes, making retrospective changes which comes from 2 main drivers IMO.
1. The right people plugging the laws i.e. hire the architects of these schemes to take them down. They’re hired guns who will happily swap sides if the price is right.
2. Government with a will to tax the top end effectively and not be swayed by the expected PR howls of ‘the sky is falling’.
Lets not forget the banks in particular are dwindling employers with offshore profits, ownership and technology racing toward a fully self service model.
Harmful regulations created our tax segregation and revenue black hole…. Good regulations can fix it.
But it needs to be co-ordination with others i … and globally the Greens are the best political movement …… genuinely working against injustice and exploitation ……
Almost like a vast right wing conspiracy …..there has been a uniformity in the building of networks which has allowed enormous corrupt money flows …… with corresponding harms of homelessness and exploitation of ordinary citizens everywhere …
Its more than just corporate tax evasion …. they have also helped money laundering.
Canada ……. “An agency report suggested there is a close relationship between money laundering in real estate and the services provided by lawyers, such as placing wire transfers in legal trusts and creating investment vehicles that can shield true ownership of property.” http://vancouversun.com/storyline/ottawa-will-attempt-to-close-money-laundering-loophole
You hit the nail on the head reason.
That was the main objective of money puppet john key to create heaps of tax loopholes for his M8 that is the only way to explain wh ffat has happened to our tax systems.
One can donate any amount into a trust and avoid many taxes and there are lots more loopholes to what a sham. !!!!!!!😬
It’s is ridiculous that a person under the bridge will pay more tax than a multi million dollar company and don’t mention gst because the buyer pays that tax the seller is just the collector of gst.
It just shows how unfair OUR society is and this needs to change.
And if the answer is ‘yes’ then you should now subject to the Proceeds of Crime Act and lose everything. After all, using a tax haven should be a crime.
I agree there defiantly needs to be some consequences for the creative types who work hard building the getaway ‘vehicles ‘ …. that make off with billions … and those who use them of course.
Its all reward and no risk at the moment …
Accountants and bankers make normal criminals or welfare fraud look like small chump change amateurs …..
“At least $US1 trillion in tax revenue is lost worldwide, and $50 billion in Australia, as a result of aggressive tax minimisation schemes established by the four giant firms who audit the books of nearly all the world’s major companies, said George Rozvany, a 32-year veteran of the corporate tax industry.”
“And I’m a conservative man, I think the figure is actually much higher,” he told the ABC.”
It is far from a victim-less crime…… “The people who are most affected are the most underprivileged in our society, those without a voice. The homeless, foreign aid programs.”
Where was the father. The rest of us fathers support our children so not sure why he should skip his duties
[You don’t get to interrogate people on their family situations. You want to attempt “doing a Metiria” on this poster and you’ll cop a permanent ban ] – Bill
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
Although your comment was removed I would like to answer to help you understand.
The father got in trouble with the law and ended up in jail, after getting out he unfortunately got addicted to meth and is only recently clean and starting to rebuild his relationship with his son.
A relationship I feel is important and that I try to foster despite putting up with years of abuse from him while in his drug addled state.
Bill’s got that guy’s number. The only answer that would satisfy Notreadyet is “Yes, your implied accusation is absolutely correct, it’s my fault I’m living in poverty, I brought it on myself, I deserve it and the government bears no obligation towards me as a citizen to help me out of it.” Much better to leave people like that with an answer that satisfies you rather than them, something like “Fuck you,” perhaps.
Thankyou for filling in a gap in the story. Agree we definetly need safety nets to cover your situation. 5-10 years ago the country had to borrow billions so that the we could continue to give support to those like yourself that needed it. The squeeze you experienced came on because at the time it was all borrowed and precious/scarce $. A lot of people conveniently overlook or fail to remember the situation the whole world was in after 08 and we have generally(obviously not in your case) been better off than most
The amount by which “we” have been better off could easily have been directed to those who needed it most: the reason it wasn’t was a sadistic bad choice you made.
Greedy right wing idiots took bribes and let greedy right wing thieves destroy the global economy.
The squeeze you experienced came on because at the time it was all borrowed and precious/scarce $.
And that would be a load of BS as well. I seem to recall that National gave lots of tax cuts to the rich while increasing taxes upon the poor resulting in a lower tax take.
A lot of people conveniently overlook or fail to remember the situation the whole world was in after 08 and we have generally(obviously not in your case) been better off than most
Actually, we’re worse off because of all the same things that crashed the global economy – we just haven’t realised it yet. That’s the problem that happens when the incumbent government props up a housing bubble pushing a massive increase in private debt as their only economic idea of prosperity.
“…5-10 years ago the country had to borrow billions so that the we could continue to give support to those like yourself that needed it…..”
Oh my gawd! you are a special kind of stupid, aren’t you?
For your little brain, let me try to educate you….Billions were borrowed to BAIL OUT BANKS AND FINANCIAL ORGANIZATIONS, who CAUSED THE FINANCIAL CRASH.
THEY WERE BAILED OUT AT THE EXPENSE OF THE POOR, those who could LEAST afford to cu costs…JUST SO THE FILTHY, GREEDY *U*TS COULD KEEP THEIR BANK ACCOUNTS FAT!
If only IMO Labour had continued with the 2014 line, that any tax changes will not be implemented until after the next election. Then many who want a change of govt. but feel their personal wealth could be threatened by uncertainty (Nats scare tactics) could see that most of the scare mongering was unfounded, and that we have had 3 years that the Lab govt had build up trust in the voter. Then the Nats could have been thrown in disarray as they implode. And that Lab would have kept their integrity, instead of being seen by some as moving to with the mood of the polls.
No Herodotus – your ethical approach would not have worked – you seem to forget that National is a party of liars without memories. How much of a fuss was there when the GST was raised after Key’s assurance that it wouldn’t happen? A solution: Labour need to make sure the Greens get into Government with them then implement a ‘Captain’s call’ using the National line as a precedent – “we had to accommodate the policies of our support party in the coalition”. ACT were credited with Charter Schools on that basis, even though National clearly intended going down that track as they had employed the infamous Lesley Longstone on her UK implementation experience before the election.
Labour leader Jacinda Ardern has been greeted with a massive crowd at University of Otago this morning.
About 700 staff and students turned up to see her speak and pose for selfies on the university’s Union Lawn.
With room at a premium people packed on to the balconies above the University Union.
Any signs that Jacindamania had dimmed were not apparent as she was given rapturous applause and people posed for selfies and stopped to hug Ms Ardern.
and she had a huge reception on the Coast as well Marty, so I ear, I would love our electorate to swing the party vote back to Labour.
And Marty, do you get “The Leader” over your way?
If so check out the back pages for Maureens ad, at the bottom of it is the national “N” with a ticked circled placed next to it, looks like the word “NO” she’s had that ad running for 5 weeks now, cracks me up everytime I see it.
this piece from a writer who everytime he puts finger to keyboard in recent years has raised my blood pressure or had me shaking my head in disbelief at his wilful blindness …a proud supporter (and to me , one eyed) of our current administration appears to had an epithany while out mixing with ‘the common folk’ ….and he senses the winds of change….better late than never is all I will add
(In less than 2 days – this video has had over 45,000 views…)
NZ WHISTLE-BLOWER ALERT!
The TRUTH about the Tamaki ‘Regeneration’ – GENTRIFICATION $CAM!
“Penny Bright has been shining a light into the murky recesses of public/private partnerships in the Tamaki Regeneration scheme and revealed some disturbing details…”
When are mainstream media going to ‘pick up the ball’ on this apparently CENSORED story?
In FIVE years of this Tamaki ‘Regeneration’ project – there are more houses that have come down than gone up.
237 Tamaki State houses removed.
213 New houses built.
92 ‘social’ houses.
39 ‘affordable’ private sale houses for first home buyers.
82 private sale houses (high-end).
In an OIA reply from Tamaki Regeneration Ltd, dated 21 August 2017, information about the exact prices paid by private property developers for each and every former Housing NZ property was refused because of ‘commercial confidentiality’.
How disgraceful is that?
This is / was PUBLIC property!
Is the apparent ‘CENSORSHIP’ of this story, by mainstream media, because the paper trail goes straight to Bill English, Nick Smith and Steven Joyce?
Past and present Crown Shareholding Ministers in Tamaki Regeneration Ltd, to which 2,867 former Housing NZ properties were transferred on 31 March 2016?
Which, IMO, makes this Tamaki SCAM story – political dynamite?
Penny Bright
2017 Independent candidate for Tamaki.
We are now in deep shit as CO2 levels have now stubbornly stayed above the critical 400ppm level now for over the last four years.
Increased CO2 levels now are scientifically confirmed as reducing our plant growth and their nutrient uptake levels causing our loss of minerals/vitamins avalable to us all during consumption. – Here are the facts;
“protein concentrations in grains of wheat, rice and barley, and in potato tubers, are decreased by 5–14% under elevated CO2 (Taub et al. 2008). Crop concentrations of nutritionally important minerals including calcium, magnesium and phosphorus may also be decreased under elevated CO2 (Loladze 2002; Taub & Wang 2008).”
Earth’s CO2 Home Page
Atmospheric CO2
2014 July 401.61ppm.
2015 july 404.50ppm.
2016 July 407.25ppm.
2017 Aug’405.07ppm.
August 2017
405.07
parts per million (ppm)
Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii (NOAA-ESRL)
Preliminary data released September 11, 2017
We know that atmospheric CO2 has ranged between 172 and 300 part per million (ppm) for the past 1 million years. The earth cycled through cold glacial and warm inter-glacial periods without atmospheric CO2 exceeding 300 ppm.
The first time in human history that atmospheric CO2 exceeded 300 ppm was about the time the Titanic sank in the North Atlantic Ocean in 1912.
Now, the crossover to concentrations that stay above 400 ppm CO2 is nearly complete.
The other day on RNZ Phil Twyford told Susie Ferguson that under Labour rents would stabilise or go down, yet he wouldn’t guarantee it.
Do you think Phil will have to eat his words?
It was a bold and risky claim for Phil to make.
And while he didn’t guarantee it, if he’s wrong, not only will his credibility be damaged for asserting it, it will also damage the credibility of the Labour Party as it’s their policies and he is their housing spokesperson.
There’s been speculation that a number of landlords would sell up, thus freeing up more homes for sale and in turn reducing rental demand.
However, as landlords sell off their rentals and tenants move into home ownership, that will reduce the supply of rentals, thus merely offsetting the corresponding drop in rental demand. Hence, there would be no net difference in rental supply and demand from this shift.
Moreover, another aspect being overlooked is the growing trend of taking property off the rental market and setting them up as serviced apartments or Air BnB. Cashing in on our high tourist numbers and the shortage of hotel rooms whilst reaping a far higher nightly yield. Therefore, coming down too hard on landlords may result in further encouraging this shift. Resulting in reducing rental supply.
As for Phil’s claim that Labour will increase the housing supply, he’s overlooking it will take years for Labour’s Kiwibuild to meet current demand let alone get on top of it. Thus, in the meantime, Labour’s policies coupled with the overheated rental market will provide the scope landlords require to further increase rents.
Surely you’re not implying one has to critique National to be allowed to critique Labour?
Being from the left I don’t expect National to represent my left leaning views, hence I seldom waste my time pointing out their many flaws. I waste enough of my time dealing with the right within the left.
not a bad summation…couple of points…you have answered your own question re why he didnt guarantee it and as to eating his own words you will note as an experienced politician he never gave a timeframe so in effect it is neither bold nor risky and there will be no words consumed….however i suspect in their heart of hearts Labour expect the market to fall (not crash) due to a number of their announced policies and this is occurring on top of a faltering market already, so it is entirely possible there will be a rent reduction in the near term even if some investors quit the market , remembering that an investment property sold doesn’t disappear and still has function within the market.
In her attempt to secure a guarantee, Susie did set a time-frame when challenging him. And although he managed to talk his way out of committing to a guarantee (reasserting his reasoning and claim) he didn’t question the time-frame. Nor did he use it as an excuse for not committing when he had the opportunity too. Thus, the opportunity to lower first term voter expectation.
Therefore, he (through his continued assertion) has somewhat painted himself and the Party into a bit of a corner.
While Labour plan to introduce most of their housing policies rather smartly, their impact on house prices (if any at all) will take some time to eventuate, thus it will be market fundamentals and perhaps further Reserve Bank interventions that are more likely to cause a correction/fall.
And a fall in house prices doesn’t necessarily mean their will be a quick and widespread fall in rents. Some simply won’t sell in a depressed market and may decide to increase rents instead. Especially if rental demand remains strong.
beg to differ…the mere prospect or notice of their policies will impact the market …investors will not wait around and so the impact will precede the act….same with the building programme…as to how fast and widespread the impact is, well thats an unknown but the direction is not…and it aint upwards
As a number of their policies largely fall short, the impact you’re expecting may differ from the reality.
Take their so-called ban on offshore investors. The impact may initially result in a flurry (adding upward pressure) with offshore investors getting in before they are shutout.
Therefore, while they may act quickly, it’s not the in the manner you seem to be foreseeing.
Moreover, the ban doesn’t prevent offshore investors from buying new builds. Thus, prevent offshore demand driving upward pressure on land prices, building materials, etc… adding to the overall cost of a new home. Which, in turn, tends to pump up the price of older homes.
again i differ….the tenor and direction is increased restrictions and costs plus a reduction in demand (via migration )and the timing has been stated to be urgent(indeed the tendency may be to quit the market with the knowledge of the existing costs as opposed to the unknown, after all we are only one of many)….any last minute attempt to enter the market will be short lived…..all compounded by nervous banks reluctant to lend at current levels.
A reduction in immigration is not a total halt. And when you have a market that is already struggling to cope with current housing demand, any additional immigration is upward pressure.
Cost are generally passed on. Again, adding upward price pressure on rents. And restrictions (such as ring fencing losses) won’t impact all investors. And those impacted may restructure their affairs and increase rents to offset it.
A number of offshore investors don’t require the backing of our banks to purchase. And banks themselves are walking a fine line.
‘A number of offshore investors don’t require the backing of our banks to purchase. And banks themselves are walking a fine line.’
no they don’t, however those purchasing from them are likely to…part of the reason the banks are self imposing restrictions (over and above RBNZ requirements) is because existing rents are already unsustainable in the local market…as investors are aware any rent rise will simply increase defaults …on portfolios banks are already winding back.Costs cannot be passed on ad infinitum.
worst case most likely outcome would be that it competes with or otherwise extinguishes life forms that we could have learned from.
Like bacterial cane toads or rats.
Worst least likely outcome is that the bacteria is viewed as a declaration of war by an advanced society we hadn’t detected because they were all subspace fields and teleporting, and the species goes all Independence Day on us.
I’m reasonably certain that if there was life there we would have recognised it when Cassini first flew by. The lander would definitely have shown it up.
I’ll make it easy for you. An octopus is weird especially when compared to humans now imagine that weirdness multiplied by a million. A million, not 100 , not 1000, not 10000, and so on. Do you actually think your brain could conceive let alone recognise alien life. I know you do and I blame fucken star trek and their hunamoid aliens.
Do you actually think your brain could conceive let alone recognise alien life.
Yes, it can.
Or, to put in other words: Do you believe pakeha are human?
It’s really easy to recognise life:
1. They’re born
2. They move
3. They breed
4. They die.
All that’s been detected upon Titan id the possible precursor to life. IMO, there isn’t enough energy to go beyond that else it would already exist.
I know you do and I blame fucken star trek and their hunamoid aliens.
I’d say Fuck the humanoid aliens except that logic tells us that humanoid lifeforms are most likely what you’re going to get from an evolutionary process for an intelligent species.
If it is an intelligent being, and uses climate and interactions between organisms to form thoughts like we have neurons, then what thoughts would it have? And is humanity a planetary alzheimers?
Yeah, running back to a doom slogan kind of underlines the fact that you suggested on of humanity’s last acts should be barely a step removed from dumping cowshit in the streams of Titan just to see how bad the contamination will be.
the other point being is that your 5-point criteria that make it “really easy” to recognise life doen’t rule out Earth, which meets none of those points.
Mate your human centric view of the universe is quaint and illogical based on size alone – you cant even conceive how big it is or what is in it, yet your ego can write checks you cant cash and can’t even consider cashing – silly hu man.
And your plan is to leave a smear on a moon to see what happens – ffs come on.
Unless they end up like the dodo because our earth bacteria ate them all when we followed your plan.
And then we maybe never gain some revolutionary knowledge or medicine. Because we dumped a tonne of bacteria on a planet or moon we knew nothing about.
And that’s just the we’d be better off doing real science rather than assuming the universe is ours to shit all over argument, it’s not even the what if an entire ecosystem, of simple organisms maybe so, but an entire ecosystem grew and evolved over billions of years, creating an environment unique in the universe, right up until we came along – what does that say about us question.
Unless they end up like the dodo because our earth bacteria ate them all when we followed your plan.
Life’s a bitch and the you die.
And then we maybe never gain some revolutionary knowledge or medicine.
Extreme possibilities aren’t what makes life work.
hey, did you know that Mars had spent the last few billion years losing its magnetosphere and its atmosphere (in that order) and that the chances for life to survive that is between slim and none?
BTW, I suspect that the first Mars landing failed to have such restrictions in place. I doubt if the Soviets, or the USians immediately after them, had such concerns as you seem to have. Same as the first Europeans who visited NZ had such concerns.
I think you’ll find that even in the 1960s interplanetary probes were developed and constructed in clean rooms. Chances of taking extremophile bacteria to mars are therefore minimal. If only because bacteria would fuck up their chromatograph readings.
Hey, did you know that getting a few metres under Mars surface would provide thermal insulation, protection from cosmic rays, and maybe even water?
In 1991, as Apollo 12 Commander Pete Conrad reviewed the transcripts of his conversations relayed from the moon back to Earth, the significance of the only known microbial survivor of harsh interplanetary travel struck him as profound:
“I always thought the most significant thing that we ever found on the whole…Moon was that little bacteria who came back and lived and nobody ever said [anything] about it.”
“I always thought the most significant thing that we ever found on the whole…Moon was that little bacteria who came back and lived and nobody ever said [anything] about it.”
An interesting point about War of The Worlds was that it was the microbes that ‘won’ the war.
Voted Labour/Greens today and persuaded my friend to do the same, she was going to vote National….only one vote taken away from them, but it still felt good.
Who in their own sanity would vote for this National Party train wreck?
They are ending up selling everything in their next term if elected.
Also the National party will sign us up to corporte controlled trade deals that will control our Government and our lives from overseas for the next 75 yrs and we will loose our country along with our freedoms and democracy.
You mean Advance Voting is up 80k on the same time last election. Which the Electoral Commission was forecasting and doesn’t give anybody a steer on anything really.
Stuff.co is running a very unscientific poll that shows national ahead.
I gave my click to Labour but it looks like a few more clicks wouldn’t go astray to change this flawed poll.
I suppose everyone has commented on this but on the news about Oz the other day was that they had wiped their controls on every possible bit of media? sounds like, being able to be owned by one entity: Corporation Australia Ink I think. Inky dinky di etc. Wind back to flogging convicts on its way (sstart with NZs for practice).
Jian Yang will review his citizenship declaration! That’s nice.
Having listened to Yang speak in Parliament, in my opinion, he doesn’t seem to have a good grasp of the English language at all. Very hard to understand, even when I’m wearing my hearing aids! So now I’m wondering how was he able to teach the English language in the first place?
The police are still hanging around my ass I no that the police and national are blaming me for making them look like idiots well no they are doing fine fucking up there image with there own actions thanks very much.
Big upps for the number one song of the Worlds biggest count down of 1500 rock songs that is a awesome winning song.
Killing in the name
Rage Against The Machine.
Now my main message Fonterra Theo don’t you think It is time you clean up that mess in Mango. It would be wise if you did this because it would stain your image if I have to clean it up. Ka pai
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh This article aims to answer a simple question, whether the conflict is only a rural one or whether it is also urban. The verb ‘to be’ is conjugated in the present tense as ,despite what some ...
Yesterday the government released its discussion document on action on agricultural emissions. As sadly usual, it proposed enormous subsidies for farm emissions, including for nitrogen-based fertiliser. This is a huge mistake. In addition to being one of the chief drivers ...
Earlier this year, the Ministry of Justice conducted a public consultation exercise on whether to hold a review of the Official Information Act (this replaced their previous plans to hold a secret consultation with handpicked people). 285 people submitted on ...
Always Playing Catch-Up: Throughout the 1970s, the purchasing power of the ordinary worker’s pay packet – the only meaningful measure of his or her wealth – was being eaten away every passing year by seemingly inexorable rises in the cost-of-living. ...
The Interim Climate Change Committee's report on Action on agricultural emissions: Evidence, analysis and recommendations was finally released today, and as you might guess from the title, it is recommending that we actually act, rather than let farmers keep ...
On Sunday July 7, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter announced their intention to review the Ministry of Health’s Funded Family Care policy and repeal Part 4Aof the 2000 NZ Public Health and Disability Act. These are festering injustices ...
Agriculture is our biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions, responsible for 48% of the total. It follows that meeting any credible emissions reduction target requires cutting agricultural emissions, most likely by having fewer cows. But National thinks people shouldn't be ...
How scummy is the UK Home Office? This scummy:The Home Office lied to EU member states to remove victims of human trafficking and modern slavery in breach of European law, according to whistleblowers. Legal experts have said the practice is ...
Belle is a lovely fifteen year-old border collie who belongs to our friends and neighbours at Bryan’s Beach, Michael and Judy Corboy. Belle, in her old age, can hardly see or hear, but – as a constant participant at social ...
“We wuz robbed!” is the classic cry of the disappointed losers of a closely contested sporting contest – it is very much to the credit of the Black Caps that we heard no such sentiment from them following the stunning ...
The Youth Parliament is being held this week, and some of the youth MPs are campaigning for a lower voting age:Molly Doyle, 17, is one Youth MP who wants this to change. She is part of a non-partisan campaign run ...
Up till now, Australia has made its living by digging up coal and exporting it to other countries, destroying the global climate in the process. But now they have a new option: exporting solar power:The desert outside Tennant Creek, deep ...
Later this month, thousands of people are expected to march to parliament as part of the #HandsOffOurTamaraki movement. At its heart, the movement is about preserving whānau and demanding that the state stop removing children from their whānau, hapū and iwi. ...
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh The recent statements made by the former FARC commander, Carlos Lozada (legal name Julian Gallo), where, from his seat in Congress, he praised the Colombian Army demonstrate how low the farianos have sunk. Lozada began by ...
A Woman’s Place is on the Podium was a public meeting in London on 10 July to discuss women’s sports and the impact of transwomen competing against women. The venue was sold out with a packed hall of 750 people. ...
Last month I talked about the no-fly movement: people who refuse to fly or limit it to absolute necessity to avoid destroying the climate. Now, that movement has a somewhat surprising new member: Dutch airline KLM:Dutch airline KLM has launched ...
In the 1960's, humanity faced a terrible threat: global thermonuclear war. Nuclear weapons were uniquely destructive and dangerous, and if more countries got them, the logic of MAD and the pre-emptive strike would put us on a hair-trigger to destruction. ...
An occasional series where I will ponder allegations of anti-Semitism directed at the British Labour Party and its members.In this case, we are thinking about an allegedly anti-Semitic image shared by a Labour Party member. Its origins appear to be ...
Matariki has been and gone, but this year we saw a couple of op-eds arguing that it should be a public holiday, replacing the foreign monarch's fake birthday. And now, New Zealand Republic - a group which campaigns for an ...
The discussion on the quality of economic advice, which we reported last week, has spilled over into a discussion about whether so many senior appointments should be of non-New Zealanders. Recall I discussed the failure to develop career paths within ...
When Nicky Hager revealed US footage of the Operation Burnham raid, obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act, one of the obvious questions was whether Ministers had seen it - and in particular, whether they'd been told that it ...
Northern Ireland is the Alabama of the UK: a backwards region where women and gay people are denied fundamental rights. But Westminster has just decided to fix that:MPs have voted resoundingly to extend same-sex marriage and access to abortion to ...
There's a problem with "synthetic cannabis", and not just the one you think. It's the name.We're in the midst of a wave of news stories that link synthetic drugs to serious harm, through deadly road accidents and accidental overdoses (which ...
Ranjit Kauri, The Dancing Maharani and Other Stories, Swansea, Head and Heart, 2019, £6.99; reviewed by Don Franks Working people are not the same country to country. Our struggles for a better life take place in surroundings of very different ...
Let's Do Them! All Jacinda Ardern has to do to clinch the 2020 General Election is frighten the bejesus out of the electorate by describing in the most graphic terms imaginable what will happen to all the positive beginnings her ...
It may be that we have all misinterpreted the somewhat surprising “bromance” between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un. It has been all too easy to assume that it is Kim who is cosying up to Trump rather than the ...
by Michael Roberts So the full circle is completed. The corrupt pro-business conservative New Democracy party in Greece that was ousted by the anti-capitalist Syriza party in 2015 has been returned to office in yesterday’s general election, with an outright ...
When the Australian government passed a series of new spy laws over the last few years, they pinky-promised that they wouldn't use them to spy on journalists and subvert freedom of the press. They lied:The anti-encryption laws passed by the ...
From 1975 to 1989, the spy agencies of South America's right-wing military dictatorships cooperated in Operation Condor, a joint campaign of extermination against the continent's left. Roughly 400,000 people were imprisoned, 30,000 disappeared, and 60,000 murdered - kidnapped, tortured, executed, ...
When she was standing for office, Jacinda Ardern promised she would take abortion out of the Crimes Act. And to be fair, there was some early action on that, with an immediate referral of the issue to the Law Commission ...
When the government introduced the Zero Carbon Bill, people rightly asked what they planned to do to reduce transport emissions, which basicly had no policy at all other than the ETS. Today, they responded, announcing a "feebate" system which would ...
At almost every level, the problem with medicinal cannabis is a lack of good information. In the US, FDA regulations make it hard to research. Most doctors aren't familiar with what research there is and most patients don't know either. ...
Redline is critical of Corbyn for his political weaknesses, but he’s no anti-Semite. There is no substance to the McCarthyist witch-hunt being run by the right wing, and the pro-Israel lobby inside and outside the Labour Party in the UK. ...
The government's billion trees program is the sort of policy which could make a real difference to our emissions and the fight against climate change. But climate scientist Jim Salinger isn't convinced:The Forestry Minister Shane Jones' one billion trees won't ...
Last month the government was celebrating another surplus. Meanwhile, children are starving:One in five children are living in households where putting food on the table is a struggle, according to a new report from the Ministry of Health. It found ...
Show Me The Money! The alternative to state funding of infrastructure is, of course, to fund it by taking on massive amounts of private debt. On this issue, at least, Auckland mayoral challenger, Tamihere, has some solid points to make. ...
If we are to avoid making the earth uninhabitable, we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to practically nothing over the next decade. But that will still leave us with the problem of the carbon we have already emitted, which ...
Former Waikato DHB CEO Nigel Murray allegedly misused public funds, spending more than $120,000 of public money on unjustified travel. He was forced to resign and the Serious Fraud Office began an investigation. But despite the SFO finding that the ...
Jeremy Corbyn, we are told, is being advised – not least by his deputy (as well as by some of his would-be successors) – that he must come “off the fence” on the Brexit issue if he wants to bolster ...
The End of Life bill has been read a second time and is now heading for the House for further debate. Personally, I support the proposal. I don't ever epect to take advantage of the Bill's provisions myself, but as ...
Before the substantive issue which this column is about – whether there has been a deterioration in the economic advice given to the government – a paragraph about the budget leaks.read more ...
Below is a translation of the editorial in the June 24 round of weekly workplace bulletins issued all over France by the revolutionary workers’ organisation Lutte Ouvriere. Last Saturday, 8,000 people took to the streets of Belfort (eastern France) to ...
Why hasn't Parliament followed the lead set by our local authorities and declared a climate emergency? The answer is the National Party:The Prime Minister’s admission that she is open to the idea of declaring a climate change emergency is nothing ...
Back in May the government released its Zero Carbon Bill. While much of the bill was welcome, there was one big exception: it contained a secrecy clause, requiring the Climate Change Commission to maintain secrecy over practically everything it does. ...
by Phil Duncan This past week has marked the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Stonewall Inn riots in Christopher Street, New York, the event generally regarded as kicking off the gay liberation movement. Quite a few articles have ...
Southland - land of coal-burning dairy farmers - has become the first region in the country to explicitly vote against declaring a climate emergency. Their reason? They didn't want to "devalue" the word "emergency". Its an argument addressed powerfully in ...
New Zealand has a problem with police chases: officers going after fleeing drivers like rabid dogs, without any consideration for proportionality or public safety, often with fatal results. And according to an in-depth article in the Guardian today, the UK ...
Welcome to another heaping helping of research publications related to climate change drivers and mechanisms, the effects of climate change and how we might yet grope our way into systems approaches to dealing with the mess we're making, despite ourselves. ...
Holly Lawford-Smith is a senior lecturer in political philosophy at the University of Melbourne. She’s currently writing a book about radical feminism. This article appeared on Feminist Current Academics should be standing together in defence of universities’ fundamental values: the ...
The Otago Daily Times has an in-depth article about the future of wind energy in New Zealand, and it is looking bright:The news that wind will play the leading role in New Zealand’s energy future was put up in lights ...
If the sight of schoolkids striking for a future has been filling you with hope, good news: they want you to join them on September 27:Students will take to the streets again demanding action on climate change, and this time ...
The People's "Friend": In this masterpiece of revolutionary propaganda, the homicidal political psychopath, Jean-Paul Marat, has been transformed by Jacques-Louis David, the French Revolution's most accomplished artist, into a martyred hero of the ordinary people of Paris. Thanks to Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook, ...
The principle of one person, one vote doesn’t apply for local elections. In fact, you don’t even need to be a person to have voting rights. Welcome to the ratepayer roll. While the ratepayer roll accounts for less than 1% ...
I have been working my way through a 47,000 document tranche of declassified US government communications related to Argentina and the “Dirty War” of 1976-83. I grew up in Argentina in the period leading up to the March 24, 1976 ...
To express concern about foreign ownership and control in New Zealand is often to invite accusations of xenophobia and economic illiteracy. It is worthwhile, therefore, to rehearse the grounds for that concern, and to explore the various forms it can ...
It must be a day ending in Y because the Guardian - remember when it used to be a good paper1 - is running another spurious story about Corbyn's leadership being threatened over anti-Semitism.The headline the Guardian runs is: "MPs tell ...
A chronological listing of news articles posted on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Jun 23 through Sat, June 29, 2019 Editor's Pick When Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez met Greta Thunberg: 'Hope is contagious'Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and ...
When people slate the current Government for taking too long on certain issues, or not getting everything right, just check the outrage and quit helping National manufacture consent for their decade of Disaster Economics and much more. Bill couldn’t ...
Robots could soon replace many low-skill jobs, such as President of the United States. US Presidential hopeful and doomsday prophet Andrew Yang went to extreme lengths to make a point in the first round of Democratic primary debates today, replacing ...
More people have died in the shower this year than will die in a KiwiBuild home. KiwiBuild home owners are experiencing a surprise windfall this month, as the price of their houses have begun to rise dramatically, due to growing ...
First way – the state, Keynesian demand management, the working class as the base of support. Second way – free-market, reduce the scope of the state and cut taxes, relative indifference to social justice. Third Way – well that's the ...
E15 is a London-based housing campaign that arose from the eviction of a group of young working-class mothers from a homeless hostel in 2013. Cat Wiener, through her work with the Revolutionary Communist Group, helped get Focus E15 up and ...
Going Upstairs: If we accept the LGBTQI+ community’s untrammelled right to advance their understanding of love, then we must also accept Israel Folau’s right to articulate his own simplistic and inadequate interpretation of the Christian religion.ONE OF THE FIRST things ...
So, some Labour MPs and peers have written Corbyn a letter complaining about the re-admission of loudmouth MP Chris Williamson, who had been suspended over allegations he made anti-Semitic comments.Never mind the Guardian's typically biased headline that Corbyn is facing ...
A new digital platform aims to make it easier for small businesses to access services from multiple government agencies, leaving them more time to focus on their own priorities. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Minister for Small Business Stuart Nash ...
Million-dollar start to gun collection eventsPolice Minister Stuart Nash says a solid start has been made to the gun buyback and amnesty after the first weekend of community collection events. “Gun owners will walk away with more than ...
Police Minister Stuart Nash has praised Police and gun owners after the first firearms collection event saw a busy turnout at Riccarton Racecourse in Christchurch. “Police officers and staff have put a tremendous effort into planning and logistics for the ...
Seventy-eight new Police constables are heading out to the regions following today’s graduation of a new recruit wing from the Royal New Zealand Police College. Police Minister Stuart Nash says the record high number of new Police officers being recruited, ...
NZEI Te Riu Roa will take legal action over the lengthy delay in implementing pay increases for teachers. Novopay announced yesterday that teachers would have to wait until 11 September to see pay increases that they won when they settled ...
EDS has filed its submission on the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Bill. The Bill sets targets for greenhouse gas reductions, provides for the government to set a series of carbon budgets, and sets up a new, independent, Climate ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union has identified an absurd case of mission creep at Wellington City Council: the decision to spend $21,750 on two Consumer NZ investigations into different brands of bike lights. ...
The Motor Trade Association is welcoming the release of the Government’s new draft road safety strategy. MTA Chief Executive Craig Pomare says the association is pleased to see vehicle safety has been made a priority in the Road to Zero ...
The Department of Conservation continue to repeat the same old story about attacks on staff and how it is affecting their role in protecting our precious wildlife. NZ herald https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12249704 ...
The government's silence on the fact that the country's second-largest milk processor is on the brink of becoming 25% Chinese Government owned has been deafening. ...
School Strike 4 Climate NZ welcomes the coalition Government’s endeavour to take action on reducing agricultural emissions but is disappointed at the weak stance that the Government has taken on the issue. ...
The Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) has issued a formal warning under the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009 (AML/CFT Act) to seven reporting entities within the Regus Management Limited (RNZML) designated business ...
The Northland Regional Council (NRC) has voted to exclude all GM/GE precautionary provisions in its regional plan, despite years of community engagement showing support for such protection. There is a sense of betrayal following the way the NRC Chairman ...
New Zealand’s ‘mission-driven’ charities working in international aid are showing early signs of changing the way they work, in particular prioritising building the capacity and resilience of local communities to do their own development. ...
Teachers will have to wait until 11 September for pay increases won as part of their collective agreement negotiations settled in June, according to an update sent to schools today from Novopay. ...
July 16 (BusinessDesk) - Energy Minister Megan Woods says the government “won’t die in a ditch” if its goal of 100 percent renewable electricity generation isn't reached by 2035. ...
The Electricity Networks Association (ENA) is welcoming the Government’s response to the Interim Climate Change Committee (ICCC) Report released today. Graeme Peters, chief executive of the ENA, said one of the key recommendations, endorsed by the ...
An article* published this month in the Journal of Health Organization and Management raises questions over the way health board members are elected and whether the boards are even needed. ...
NZEI Te Riu Roa's kindergarten teacher members will vote on a proposed settlement to their collective agreement after four days of negotiations with the Ministry of Education and kindergarten employers. ...
Vector has today welcomed the ICCC’s report on Accelerated Electrification . Vector agrees that accelerating the electrification of transport and process heat will play a major role in reducing the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. Initiatives to ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is calling on the Porirua City Council to cancel its underwriting of a proposed Canadian-led privately owned adventure park slated for public land after a similar project created a huge liability for Christchurch ...
Youth climate change campaigners Generation Zero welcome the Interim Climate Change Committee’s (ICCC’s) reports: Accelerated Electrification and Action on agricultural emissions ; which were finally released by the Government today, almost three months ...
Fish & Game New Zealand notes the announcement today that the Government and the intensive agriculture leadership have reached a ‘historic consensus’ and are exploring using a formal sector-government agreement instead of bringing agriculture ...
The independent Interim Climate Change Committee’s report on Accelerated Electrification was released today by the Minister for Energy and Resources, Hon Dr Megan Woods. ...
The independent Interim Climate Change Committee’s report Action on agricultural emissions was released today by the Minister for Climate Change, Hon James Shaw and the Minister of Agriculture, Hon Damien O’Connor. ...
Please find attached embargoed copies of two media statements from the Interim Climate Change Committee http://img.scoop.co.nz/media/pdfs/1907/Embargoed_Interim_Climate_Change_Committee_Accelerated_electrification_MEDIA_STATEMENT.pdf ...
Greenpeace Executive Director, Dr Russel Norman, has reacted with disbelief that the Government’s latest climate proposal includes an option for dairy to voluntarily deal with their emissions over the next six years. ...
This week’s “Youth Parliament” is an expensive waste of time that promotes taxpayer-funded junketeering, says the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union . “We shouldn’t be training kids on the joys of the trough,” says Taxpayers’ Union spokesperson ...
Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones admitted on Q+A tonight that the state of New Zealand’s infrastructure planning is “dismal” and the government needs to get on with building “rather than writing more reports about it.” ...
DairyNZ has released its submission on the Zero Carbon Bill and is calling on the Government to revise the methane target in the Bill to one that does not put at risk New Zealand’s world-leading dairy sector. Farm profit could ...
July 15 (BusinessDesk) - Foreign Minister Winston Peters will have bi-lateral meetings with two of US president Donald Trump's most hawkish defence and security advisers in a five day trip to Washington D.C. ...
Youth climate change campaigners Generation Zero are calling for Members of Parliament to show political courage as the Zero Carbon Bill goes through the crucial Select Committee process. ...
Annual net migration was provisionally estimated at 50,200 (± 800) in the year ended December 2018 compared with 52,600 in the previous year, Stats NZ said today. ...
New Zealanders have the opportunity to contribute to the government’s Review of Retirement Income Policies, including questions around Superannuation and KiwiSaver. Submissions are now open for the Review, being run by the Commission for Financial ...
Yesterday at Mataatua Marae the Tamaki Makaurau Electorate of the Māori party congratulated Rangi Mclean who was appointed to the Vice president Tāne role of the party nation-wide executive. ...
The funding crisis facing the disability sector has become more urgent following the disturbing news that the Ministry of Health will not increase contract prices for providers this year, the New Zealand Disability Support Network said today. ...
The growing number of working poor is an alarming indicator that the regulatory Minimum Wage does not cut it said Closing the Gap spokesperson Peter Malcolm. ...
Historic hui gives overwhelming agreement for a Māori Inquiry The inquiry into state run Oranga Tamariki will be led by whanau, kaimahi and Māori leaders. ...
Drug infiltration into our maximum security prisons is putting prisoners and staff at unnecessary risk, and one tool that would be of huge benefit is a full body scanner. ...
The Socialist Equality Group is hosting a protest rally in Cuba Street, Wellington (at the intersection with Left Bank) on Sunday 14 July at 2:30pm to oppose the persecution of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and whistleblower Chelsea Manning, and to ...
Simon Shepherd: The National Party proposed its own medicinal cannabis scheme last year. Its Health Spokesperson, Michael Woodhouse, says it shouldn’t have been ignored. So I began by asking him what his problem is with the government’s proposed regime. ...
Countries around the world are also dealing with medicinal cannabis. Britain legalised it last year, but the uptake has been slow. Neurologist Professor Mike Barnes wrote the report that convinced UK lawmakers it was a good idea. He's coming here ...
Simon Shepherd: Green MP Chloe Swarbrick’s name has become synonymous with drug reform, so following years of campaigning for safe, public access to medicinal cannabis, what does she think of the government’s new plan? Well, Chloe Swarbrick joins me ...
Social Credit is calling for a Government enquiry into the Nelson Marlborough District Health Board over it's handling of the Sarah Preece attack in 2017 and its subsequent report. ...
An overwhelming response sees Māori from across the country pouring into Māngere today. The call for action came from Māori leadership concerned with the practice of tamariki removals by the state. Whānau, experts, and highly skilled Māori from ...
Responding the announcement of a $2.37 million loan from the Provincial Growth Fund to a Northland berry farm, New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke says: “Why couldn’t this business get a loan from the bank? If no bank was ...
Multicultural NZ is delighted to congratulate former Gisborne Mayor, Meng Foon, who has been appointed as New Zealand’s Race Relations Commissioner. ...
Award-winning broadcaster, Waatea has been selected by North Island Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency to exclusively livestream the historic Māori-led Inquiry on Oranga Tamariki. ...
“The Peace Movement sends an urgent call to Winston Peters to reject any US demands for New Zealand participation in patrolling the Persian Gulf and Straits of Hormuz. New Zealand should have nothing to do with any war on the ...
For generations, women have done the heavy lifting in the fight for social change. What will it take to get more men to give a fuck about their children’s future?At every question and answer session I attend, I get a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Melissa Kang, Associate professor, University of Technology Sydney I Need to Know is an ongoing series for teens in search of reliable, confidential advice about life’s tricky questions. If you’re a teen, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katarina Miljkovic, ARC DECRA fellow, Curtin University Look up on a clear night and you can see some circular formations on the face of our lunar neighbour. These are impact craters, circular ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bruce Wolpe, Non-resident senior fellow, United States Study Centre, University of Sydney The past three days in US politics have been very difficult – and ugly. President Donald Trump chosen to exploit ...
Today is the 5oth anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11, the first spaceflight to land humans on the Moon. Astronomer Richard Easther looks back. One of my earliest memories is standing with my father on the ...
In a world of racist tweeting presidents, climate crisis and cricketing travesty, what you need in your life is this palliative conversation about Dunedin’s Baldwin Street losing its crown as world’s steepest street to Ffordd Pen Llech in WalesThe slope ...
Last night on The Block NZ, something incredible happened: James Reid from The Feelers showed up. Every now and again, something completely unexpected happens on reality television that shakes you awake from your slack-jawed couch coma. It’s that jolt of electricity ...
Sam Brooks, lifelong gamer, lost himself on a virtual battlefield in the days after his mother’s death. Here, he reviews a book by a kindred spirit: Lost in A Good Game: Why We Play Video Games and What They Can ...
Laura Vincent reviews Golden Boy, a new sitcom from Three skewering small town New Zealand and the colourful characters who populate it.From Twin Peaks to all the shows that copied Twin Peaks, small towns have long been fertile ground for television ...
Bernard Hickey explains why New Zealand's housing market bubble has become armour plated and why it is proving almost impossible to burst, despite the predictions of overseas experts. ...
The government’s reluctance to front up about support for mentally traumatised mosque shooting survivors has shined a spotlight on the limitations of ACC, writes RNZ’s Veronica Schmidt.The difficulty with being held up as a symbol of empathy and compassion is ...
Pacific Media Centre Newsdesk Two school girls from East Java, Aeshnina Azzahra (alias Nina), 12, and Zahira Zade, 11, have sent hand-written protest letters to US President Donald Trump over the dumping of toxic plastic waste in Indonesia. The ...
Jacinda Ardern needs to make a stand for the things she says her Government believes in, despite the public preference for strong, dominant and often otherwise repugnant politicians. ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s contentClimate change Zane Small (Newshub): Jacinda Ardern defends ‘laughable’ ...
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Options for getting agriculture into ETS unveiled, leading academic savages billion trees programme, and OIO approves Westland Milk sale. A historic day for climate change policy in New Zealand, with agriculture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sumeet Walia, Senior Lecturer and Vice Chancellor’s Fellow, RMIT University What better way to build smarter computer chips than to mimic nature’s most perfect computer – the human brain? Being able to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anne Twomey, Professor of Constitutional Law, University of Sydney Debates about constitutional change in Australia inevitably raise the poor success rate of referendums. Only eight out of 44 attempts have ever succeeded ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Whitehouse, Bennett Chair of Autism, Telethon Kids Institute, Univeristy of Western Australia, University of Western Australia Therapies given to infants before they receive a diagnosis of autism may lead to important ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emily Fobert, Research Associate, Flinders University Clownfish achieved worldwide fame following Finding Nemo, but it turns out these fish don’t do so well in the spotlight. Our research, published in Biology Letters, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julien Pollack, Associate Professor, University of Sydney Someone we know recently told us about a team-building event that proved anything but. The chief executive who arranged it loved mountain biking. So he ...
Oskar Howell travels to Otorohanga to interview Danielle Hawkins, author of When It All Turns to Custard, over a delicious two-course home-cooked lunch. ...
Dreamed of traveling long term, but at a loss about how to afford it? Here’s how Kristin Hall and her partner managed it (spoiler: involves a lot of brown rice and cabbage).*Scroll to the end for an important note about ...
Daniel Ziffer’s rollicking account of Australia’s Royal Commission into banking is a jaw-dropping laundry list of scandals, heartbreaking stories, and ‘gotcha’ moments.The Haynes Commission was set up in 2017 to inquire into and report on misconduct in the Australian banking ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Harry Hobbs, Lecturer, University of Technology Sydney Queensland Deputy Premier Jackie Trad has announced that the state will begin a conversation about a pathway to treaty with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mair Underwood, Lecturer in Anthropology and Sociology, The University of Queensland Months after a public breakup with her husband, the politician Barnaby Joyce, Natalie Joyce made news when she displayed her “new” ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brittany Huber, Postdoctoral researcher, Swinburne University of Technology Most (80%) Australian parents worry children spend too much time with screens. But what children are doing on and off screen matters more than ...
A local photographer has posted emails from Warner Brothers NZ requesting they work “unpaid” on Married At First Sight NZ. A wedding photographer has posted emails from Warner Brothers NZ on Reddit after the production company requested that they work for ...
How ANZ Bank fought for more than three years to keep its role in New Zealand’s biggest Ponzi scheme quiet and stop a regulator telling out-of-pocket investors the details. ...
Sam Brooks reviews Mean Mums, the new sitcom from Three that manages to make putting a great show together look easy.When it premiered as part of Three’s Pilot Week last year, I called Mean Mums the winner of the bunch. Nearly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Last week on this podcast we talked to Ken Wyatt about the government’s plan for a referendum – hopefully this parliamentary term – to recognise ...
Imagine if we treated our native birds with as little care as we do our precious fish stocks, writes ecologist Stella McQueen.Earlier this year, 900 at-risk native mudfish were relocated to make way for a wastewater development. But despite a ...
For when toast or cereal just doesn’t cut it, but you don’t have the time or inclination to do any actual cooking, try this. If I ever cook rice (or grains of any kind) for dinner, I often make extra to ...
For their latest ageing episode, Hilary Barry joins the On the Rag team to talk wrinkle creams, menopause and why people still think she is Jeremy Wells’ mum. This month’s episode of On the Rag is all about ageing. Time ravages ...
The Auditor-General's investigators are to look into the National Party's complaints about taxpayer funding being used to underwrite KiwiBuild homes. ...
Open Mike 15/09/2017 
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh This article aims to answer a simple question, whether the conflict is only a rural one or whether it is also urban. The verb ‘to be’ is conjugated in the present tense as ,despite what some ...1 hour ago
Yesterday the government released its discussion document on action on agricultural emissions. As sadly usual, it proposed enormous subsidies for farm emissions, including for nitrogen-based fertiliser. This is a huge mistake. In addition to being one of the chief drivers ...1 hour ago
6 hours ago
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i think to apply for a kiwi build home you must be on the electoral roll and have voted in the 2017 election because why should none voters get on the ballet ahead of those who got off there backsides and voted
Shouldn’t be eligible if you voted National either!
You are clearly a believer in the Tammany Hall system of political corruption. Rather like the Labour Party here I suppose.
They did a lot of good in the first half century. After that they became notoriously corrupt and were finally destroyed.
https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-tammany-hall-1774023
If you voted National then you obviously do not agree with State housing.
Sticking to your principles, you would not accept one.
But, I note, like Ayn Rand, right wingers are quick to accept anything provided by those of us that pay taxes.
If you voted National then you obviously do not agree with State housing.
Sticking to your principles, you would not accept one.
But, I note, like Ayn Rand, right wingers are quick to accept anything provided by those of us that pay taxes. While dodging them, themselves.
I see you have put this in twice.
I is equally as silly the second time as it was the first.
There is no connection between what I have said and what you are rambling on about.
Forgot everything has to be explained to right wingers in words of less than one syllable. Sorry.
‘I is equally silly’… Chuckle chuckle.
Yes, he forgot to leave out the t in it too within that sentence. ☺
And i see that you’ve failed to comprehend it both times.
*Ballot*
How to get young people to enroll? Along with the carrots, a little bit of stick. Prosecute a dozen or so and fine them for not enrolling (it is a legal requirement), pour encourager les autres.
Change the law once in power.
Don’t prosecute those intending to vote lab/gr.
Don’t panic too much. The problem goes both ways.
In my extended family is a person in their late 50s who’s not on the roll. Never has been. Doesn’t stop them posting, and commenting on, enthusiastically, most of National’s more extreme bullshit about Labour on their Facebook page. Irony is that their spouse, also rabid Nat, is an electoral officer.
I just smile….
Agree. We also know rabid politically engaged people who have never voted (democracy is for idiots), but who buy their economic framework by making massive donations to National.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/96834696/national-to-offer-young-farmers-to-buy-landcorp-farms
come on labour pick this up , but make the farms lease only so they provide more than one young farmer a stepping stone,
oh and the greens appear to favour corporate farming Hmmmmm insert grumpy emogi
When I heard that thought it was a bit back to the future.
That’s how Landcorp / Lands and Survey used to operate. Farms were developed on pioneer / marginal land and then leased and sold to young farmers. I think a lot of Western Southland was developed like this.
Leasing only would be the way to go now. In today’s world it would just be very difficult for young farmers, without family support, to move into a Landcorp type farm at market price, due to the price pressure put on the market by overseas buyers.
Do you mean Landcorp buys marginal land and then leases it out? Or do you mean that the existing Landcorp farms get given out on permanent lease?
Having Landcorp involved in supporting young farmers into farming would be great especially where it was sustainable or climate change prep. Lots of potential for overlap with the Greens climate and ag policies.
How would leasing be a stepping stone?
“oh and the greens appear to favour corporate farming”
What does that mean?
oops i miss read it they favour the land staying in landcorp ownership , which i’m good with but it still could be leased out with rules around looking after the land .
they would be a stepping stone as a young farmer could leese till they own all the stock then move into ownership
Cheers, I didn’t realise the stock ownership would make the difference, that’s a good idea.
I put up a news post the other day but might do another one about the potential for Landcorp to do good without selling land,
You do understand that there’s nowhere for the young farmers to step to don’t you? All the farming land has been used up and is owned by old farmers and city ‘farmers’.
That’s why National has decided to sell all the Landcore land – and it won’t be going to young farmers but those old and city ‘farmers’. The ones that can afford to buy it.
It will be like fishing quota.
In a few short years will be in the hands of corporates and the wealthy sqatters next door. “Tenure review” all over again.
Leasehold to beginning youngsters only would genuinely help young farmers who cannot afford the next step.
Draco you are so right here,
Every time national comes out with a new policy it has two sides (truth & lies) to it dressed up as a “progressive policy” for a group of ‘intersted parties’ and this time it is young farmers eh!!!
Not in your nellie’
it will be featered off to their mates in large packages not for the 10 acre farming block you can bet.
My dear departed mum was very wise when she told me “If it sounds to good to be true then it is a lie”.
National are good at lies, and this is another one.
Draco you are so right here, (meant 100 acre mininum farm not 10 acres, that’s only what I’ve got. ( toy farm.)
Every time national comes out with a new policy it has two sides to it dressed up as a “progressive policy” for a group of ‘intersted parties’ and this time it is young farmers eh!!!
Not in your nellie’
it will be featered off to their mates in large packages not for the 100 acre farming block you can bet.
My dear departed mum was very wise when she told me “If it sounds to good to be true then it is a lie”.
National are good at lies, and this is another one.
That is incorrect, there is a well established system for young dairy farmers to get into a farm, the sharemilking system has been working for over 50 years.
Starting off as contract Miller’s and finishing up owning the herd and getting 50% of the milk receipts, huilding up to a 1000 cows on a single large farm or multiple farms, selling off a large portion of their herd gives a deposite on first farm purchase.
Other than the few that may take over the family farm (but still have to buy out their sibblings) nearly every dairy farming family has used this route to farm ownership. The system operates as strongly today as it every has. You may be aware of the term gypsie day which is used to describe the mass movement of sharemilkers moving between farms on 1st June each year as they move up to bigger farms or into their first own farm
And this well established process creates land how?
Or, to put it other words: ZOMG, I didn’t know we had God working for us.
Everything else you say can be safety ignore until you prove we actually do have God on our payroll.
/open-mike-15092017/#comment-1384925on Not ready yet
Plenty of sharemilkers say they haven’t a chance of getting their own place.
They can’t catch up with prices. A quiet word to sharemilkers today on gypsy day may not get them talking about their reality. But away from the group I think the facts would be that for each one that is managing on his own behalf, there are five who have had to borrow excessively, or step back for another couple of years and some have given up because the present day system has killed off that 50 year opportunity.
And I haven’t forgotten the sharemilker struggling to keep up with his plan who found that the farmer he worked with just kept overstocking with his own beasts. The sharemilkers plan was to work the place up and introduce his own cows but every time there was the opportunity to do that the owner took the opportunity to boost his own herd. His wife said he got into the pattern of pushing himself and collapsed from overwork.
I can;t give you any sources for what I have said. I try to keep up with what is happening in the rural sector. I think I would know more about it than the rural sector knows about the non-primary sector.
there are still smaller farms in reach and as with all things 1 action won’t solve everything but it will help
There’s also a lot of “amalgamations” that could end up in the hands of liquidators once their capital is exhausted. I have a feeling it’s these syndicated operations that are leading the fight against resource charging. there’s probably not that many of them, but they were pushing the boundaries of viability from the start and 30 – 50K per annum for water is the least of their problems.
This is quite interesting to and points to the above
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/election-2017/339524/water-tax-negligible-for-most-dairy-farms-industry-figures
hmm kind of proves my feeling that the water tax is just wedge politics , i may still vote labour but i will have to hold my nose to do i.
imagine if landcorp had of secured the crafer farms and put young kiwis on as a 10 year leasee ,
A flat-out straight-up lie from McCully and the government. And 2 years of trying to keep it out of the news.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/339438/saudi-sheep-deal-no-mfat-legal-advice-on-lawsuit-risk
Not as prominent as others within national it seems. Yet another dodgy deal the sheeple need reminding about.
it is not so much the deal (appealing as it was0…it is the barefaced lies, and cover up including support from supposedly non political public servants and public oversight that National have maintained ….a party of moral and ethical bankrupts who have to go before they corrupt our systems beyond repair.
sad thing is for good ole NZ is the electorate doesn’t seem to mind their lies based on the last fews GE’s.
I think that’s because having your leaders lie somehow legitimises your own lying. I’ve noticed a huge increase in lying behaviour among rural and construction people in the last 10 years. It’s now almost accepted. The same people are beside themselves at the prospect of a change in government.
lol..crap , just realised it reads ‘appealing’…..edit to ‘appalling’
For some reason Labour has chosen not to point out the enormous black hole in our Governments accounts and book keeping ….. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-11/corporate-tax-minimisation-costs-governments-1-trillion/7587092
New Zealand is poorly informed about the scam being inflicted upon us ….If Labour will not speak up about the elephant in the room then the the Greens should highlight this tax injustice,….. it would probably help if they cooperate and network with their Aussie compatriots, who have done good work in this area ……. https://greens.org.au/tax-avoidance
Nationals tax policy is apprently for the ‘creative’ …..
John Key: …. “, if they want to be creative and work hard, to significantly reduce their tax liability but in a lawful way.” ….
“, Mr Rozvany said just because something is legal does not mean it is ethical.
“It’s an interesting thing, ‘within the law’,” Mr Rozvany said.
“Many things were once legal. Rape and paedophilia were once legal.
“If you set up a sham transaction in a tax haven with a view to shifting profits from a high tax jurisdiction to a low tax jurisdiction that should be considered unacceptable to the international community.” ……
The amounts of money looted by ‘creative’ accountants’ are huge … sly politicians make it all loophole legal … “In the three years to 2015, Shell had racked up around $60 billion in revenue (when it owned the petrol stations and the upstream business) and appeared to pay zero tax.” …. https://www.michaelwest.com.au/shell-tax-ripped-out-as-in-house-deals-double/
Creative accounting ??? ….. “Ebay Australia and New Zealand does it all: Tax Avoidance 101 – don’t recognise revenue with customers in Australia, and then, Tax Avoidance 102 – minimise the profits on any revenues you do happen to recognise.” …. https://www.michaelwest.com.au/ebay-scores-own-goal-on-tax/
More Local examples of Hard and creative work as defined by John key and the Nacts …., “Five big banks face about $2.4 billion of disputed tax assessments for 22 structured finance transactions.” http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/2946334/Westpac-expected-to-appeal-961m-tax-ruling ……
Or
The overseas company CKI, who brought Wellingtons electricity lines network/infrastructure …. and has run at a fictitious loss ( with a underinvestment in maintenance ) ever since …. “Of course, those losses are not real and CKI did not pay $785m for a duffer………Wellington Network is in fact highly profitable, with an earnings margin consistently around 30 per cent before interest and tax.”…..
“Wellington Network is owned by an entity in the Bahamas, where, like BVI, the tax system is a warm bath for companies to float in the dark and listen to the sound of money – no company tax, no withholding tax, no capital gains tax, nothing.” http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/opinion-analysis/10400785/We-need-to-talk-about-that-red-carpet-rollout
And then we have ‘legal shell companies and ‘Trusts’……“Working hard at” buying up our land and homes ….
”owner of the former Crafar and Synlait farms in Waikato and Canterbury. Milk New Zealand Holding is wholly owned not by Shanghai Pengxin, but by Milk New Zealand Investment, a company registered in the British Virgin Islands. The ownership was disclosed to the Companies Office on August 13……….Chalkie reckons owning New Zealand farms through a Caribbean tax haven may have tax advantages “-
Fixing our broken tax system and stopping corrupt money flows will benefit all taxpayers who are not using tax havens…. http://ctj.org/pdf/offshoreshellgames2016.pdf
Its a pretty simple message …….
Do you use a tax haven ?, …..If the answer is no …… then you will be better off under a fair tax system …….
Stopping the legal cheating of loop-holes would not qualify as a new tax either …. would it ???
If that doesn’t make you angry there is something wrong with you.
+100 great comment and links.
If you gut the public service and slash regulation, that’s what you get from right wing governments. Looting the common wealth, privatising profits, and evading tax. Jail the white collar crooks.
Thanks Muttonbird & ropata ….. National are audacious liars to be attacking anyone over tax …..
The Greens should announce they will push for George Rozvany to be part of the tax review ….. They need to quickly raise awareness and illuminate the simple truth.
Being that We do not need new or more taxes ….. just collection of what is due from the richest company s and people in the world.
The greens are the natural party to make some noise about this injustice … the rest seem compromised …..
Not too hard to fix though as it’s closing loopholes, making retrospective changes which comes from 2 main drivers IMO.
1. The right people plugging the laws i.e. hire the architects of these schemes to take them down. They’re hired guns who will happily swap sides if the price is right.
2. Government with a will to tax the top end effectively and not be swayed by the expected PR howls of ‘the sky is falling’.
Lets not forget the banks in particular are dwindling employers with offshore profits, ownership and technology racing toward a fully self service model.
Agreed…. tc & Eco maori
Harmful regulations created our tax segregation and revenue black hole…. Good regulations can fix it.
But it needs to be co-ordination with others i … and globally the Greens are the best political movement …… genuinely working against injustice and exploitation ……
Almost like a vast right wing conspiracy …..there has been a uniformity in the building of networks which has allowed enormous corrupt money flows …… with corresponding harms of homelessness and exploitation of ordinary citizens everywhere …
Its more than just corporate tax evasion …. they have also helped money laundering.
New Zealand …. “a contentious exemption of professional services firms – mostly lawyers, accountants and real estate agents – from being covered by anti-money laundering laws passed in 2009.” http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11706741
Austrailia …“Australia’s anti-money laundering law does not cover real estate agents, lawyers and accountants, despite promises when the law was enacted in 2006 that the legislation would be widened.” http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-07-13/should-australias-anti-money-laundering-laws-be-extended/8703354
Canada ……. “An agency report suggested there is a close relationship between money laundering in real estate and the services provided by lawyers, such as placing wire transfers in legal trusts and creating investment vehicles that can shield true ownership of property.” http://vancouversun.com/storyline/ottawa-will-attempt-to-close-money-laundering-loophole
U.s.a Funny money’
In Miami, secretive buyers often purchase expensive homes using opaque legal entities such as offshore companies, trusts and limited liability corporations.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/real-estate-news/article69248462.html#storylink=cpy
Britain …”Foreign investors are using illicit wealth to buy up property in luxury developments across London, out-pricing locals, according to a new anti-corruption report.”… “”This has resulted in an oversupply of prime property whilst Londoners are in desperate need of affordable homes,” https://www.dezeen.com/2017/04/25/overseas-investors-london-housing-market-crisis-faulty-towers-report-property-transparency-international-uk/
Its time to reverse the race to the bottom National have us on ……it’s a harmful world wide failure.
You hit the nail on the head reason.
That was the main objective of money puppet john key to create heaps of tax loopholes for his M8 that is the only way to explain wh ffat has happened to our tax systems.
One can donate any amount into a trust and avoid many taxes and there are lots more loopholes to what a sham. !!!!!!!😬
It’s is ridiculous that a person under the bridge will pay more tax than a multi million dollar company and don’t mention gst because the buyer pays that tax the seller is just the collector of gst.
It just shows how unfair OUR society is and this needs to change.
And if the answer is ‘yes’ then you should now subject to the Proceeds of Crime Act and lose everything. After all, using a tax haven should be a crime.
I agree there defiantly needs to be some consequences for the creative types who work hard building the getaway ‘vehicles ‘ …. that make off with billions … and those who use them of course.
Its all reward and no risk at the moment …
Accountants and bankers make normal criminals or welfare fraud look like small chump change amateurs …..
“At least $US1 trillion in tax revenue is lost worldwide, and $50 billion in Australia, as a result of aggressive tax minimisation schemes established by the four giant firms who audit the books of nearly all the world’s major companies, said George Rozvany, a 32-year veteran of the corporate tax industry.”
“And I’m a conservative man, I think the figure is actually much higher,” he told the ABC.”
It is far from a victim-less crime…… “The people who are most affected are the most underprivileged in our society, those without a voice. The homeless, foreign aid programs.”
found this
https://battletothebeehive.co.nz/
a good thing?
bad thing?
Where was the father. The rest of us fathers support our children so not sure why he should skip his duties
[You don’t get to interrogate people on their family situations. You want to attempt “doing a Metiria” on this poster and you’ll cop a permanent ban ] – Bill
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
Was he managing the Reserve Bank of America, and deregulating banking, perhaps.
Or maybe he was the one who cancelled the training incentive allowance.
No, I get it, he must’ve been the one who defunded mental health services.
Or perhaps he’s the one who fostered the poisonous misogynist idea that women should be reliant on men in the first place. No, wait, that was you.
That’s your policy? Blame someone, case closed.
Should the National Party be allowed to breed?
No.
Their children grow up to use much more common resources than ours.
And try and take even more off the rest of us.
“The rich are so envious of the poor, they take what little the poor have left”.
Although your comment was removed I would like to answer to help you understand.
The father got in trouble with the law and ended up in jail, after getting out he unfortunately got addicted to meth and is only recently clean and starting to rebuild his relationship with his son.
A relationship I feel is important and that I try to foster despite putting up with years of abuse from him while in his drug addled state.
Bill’s got that guy’s number. The only answer that would satisfy Notreadyet is “Yes, your implied accusation is absolutely correct, it’s my fault I’m living in poverty, I brought it on myself, I deserve it and the government bears no obligation towards me as a citizen to help me out of it.” Much better to leave people like that with an answer that satisfies you rather than them, something like “Fuck you,” perhaps.
Thankyou for filling in a gap in the story. Agree we definetly need safety nets to cover your situation. 5-10 years ago the country had to borrow billions so that the we could continue to give support to those like yourself that needed it. The squeeze you experienced came on because at the time it was all borrowed and precious/scarce $. A lot of people conveniently overlook or fail to remember the situation the whole world was in after 08 and we have generally(obviously not in your case) been better off than most
How magnanimous of you to give Michelle your approval.
What kindly wank you are.
The amount by which “we” have been better off could easily have been directed to those who needed it most: the reason it wasn’t was a sadistic bad choice you made.
Greedy right wing idiots took bribes and let greedy right wing thieves destroy the global economy.
What’s your excuse?
Disgusting that your brain is stuck in the late 19th century, with your vile self-serving “deserving poor” rhetoric.
What’s your excuse for your disgusting behaviour? Your amygdala got too large?
There’s only one gap in the story that ever needed filling – the gap between what the benefit grants and what is needed to live in dignity.
No we didn’t. The government doesn’t have to borrow – ever. And, in fact, it shouldn’t.
And that would be a load of BS as well. I seem to recall that National gave lots of tax cuts to the rich while increasing taxes upon the poor resulting in a lower tax take.
Actually, we’re worse off because of all the same things that crashed the global economy – we just haven’t realised it yet. That’s the problem that happens when the incumbent government props up a housing bubble pushing a massive increase in private debt as their only economic idea of prosperity.
“The country had to borrow billions”. To give tax cuts to those who didn’t need them! So National could bribe their way into power.
Fixed it for you.
We have to borrow billions to pay landlords. How about you spend your time fixing that rather than attempted to stuff a child back into the womb.
“…5-10 years ago the country had to borrow billions so that the we could continue to give support to those like yourself that needed it…..”
Oh my gawd! you are a special kind of stupid, aren’t you?
For your little brain, let me try to educate you….Billions were borrowed to BAIL OUT BANKS AND FINANCIAL ORGANIZATIONS, who CAUSED THE FINANCIAL CRASH.
THEY WERE BAILED OUT AT THE EXPENSE OF THE POOR, those who could LEAST afford to cu costs…JUST SO THE FILTHY, GREEDY *U*TS COULD KEEP THEIR BANK ACCOUNTS FAT!
Thank you for telling us your story Michelle.
People like you are an inspiration, and your child can grow up, justly proud, of their mother.
Kia kaha Michelle, we did not have these problems in earlier times. Good wishes to you all. Remember to get yourself a little treat now and then xx
Perhaps this was run out of Chris Bishop’s office?
I note he hasn’t condemned the tweets nor denied involvement.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/election/2017/09/hutt-valley-chamber-of-commerce-gets-facts-wrong-in-twitter-attack-on-jacinda-ardern.html
Grant hart, of husker du has died.
He was 56 and had liver cancer.
Amazing to me that the Media has made very little fuss about the Labour “U-turn” over taxes. That is a relief!
Splashed across the front page of the DomPost today so not quite.
OK Grey but Stuff online have “Editorial: Labour’s tax clarity is welcome” so not condemning anyway.
If only IMO Labour had continued with the 2014 line, that any tax changes will not be implemented until after the next election. Then many who want a change of govt. but feel their personal wealth could be threatened by uncertainty (Nats scare tactics) could see that most of the scare mongering was unfounded, and that we have had 3 years that the Lab govt had build up trust in the voter. Then the Nats could have been thrown in disarray as they implode. And that Lab would have kept their integrity, instead of being seen by some as moving to with the mood of the polls.
No Herodotus – your ethical approach would not have worked – you seem to forget that National is a party of liars without memories. How much of a fuss was there when the GST was raised after Key’s assurance that it wouldn’t happen? A solution: Labour need to make sure the Greens get into Government with them then implement a ‘Captain’s call’ using the National line as a precedent – “we had to accommodate the policies of our support party in the coalition”. ACT were credited with Charter Schools on that basis, even though National clearly intended going down that track as they had employed the infamous Lesley Longstone on her UK implementation experience before the election.
Identity theft shows that “National Party criminal” is a tautology.
nice
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/massive-crowd-greets-ardern-otago-uni
we WILL change this government and kick the gnats out and we will ALL be better off on that day.
and she had a huge reception on the Coast as well Marty, so I ear, I would love our electorate to swing the party vote back to Labour.
And Marty, do you get “The Leader” over your way?
If so check out the back pages for Maureens ad, at the bottom of it is the national “N” with a ticked circled placed next to it, looks like the word “NO” she’s had that ad running for 5 weeks now, cracks me up everytime I see it.
yeah we do – I’ll have a look and a laugh
Thank you Marty Mars. Great post. The labradoodle? knows a great human!!
OMG. Even the woolly wee dog was smitten. 🙂
Just had a coffee at Muffin Break in the Central ChCh Bus Station, and, of course, popped my bean in one of the columns.
Green column had slightly more beans than the Red column, with the Blue column third.
All looking good!
What’s the story with the Eminem case seems to have vanished?
this piece from a writer who everytime he puts finger to keyboard in recent years has raised my blood pressure or had me shaking my head in disbelief at his wilful blindness …a proud supporter (and to me , one eyed) of our current administration appears to had an epithany while out mixing with ‘the common folk’ ….and he senses the winds of change….better late than never is all I will add
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/96824698/martin-van-beynen-a-changing-of-the-guard-is-on-the-way
Amazing for a dreadful Nat man Pat. He must be getting out and about and out of his protective shell. Good eh!
might have been the trip up north…Christchurch has been somewhat internally focused in recent times
(In less than 2 days – this video has had over 45,000 views…)
NZ WHISTLE-BLOWER ALERT!
The TRUTH about the Tamaki ‘Regeneration’ – GENTRIFICATION $CAM!
“Penny Bright has been shining a light into the murky recesses of public/private partnerships in the Tamaki Regeneration scheme and revealed some disturbing details…”
When are mainstream media going to ‘pick up the ball’ on this apparently CENSORED story?
In FIVE years of this Tamaki ‘Regeneration’ project – there are more houses that have come down than gone up.
237 Tamaki State houses removed.
213 New houses built.
92 ‘social’ houses.
39 ‘affordable’ private sale houses for first home buyers.
82 private sale houses (high-end).
In an OIA reply from Tamaki Regeneration Ltd, dated 21 August 2017, information about the exact prices paid by private property developers for each and every former Housing NZ property was refused because of ‘commercial confidentiality’.
How disgraceful is that?
This is / was PUBLIC property!
Is the apparent ‘CENSORSHIP’ of this story, by mainstream media, because the paper trail goes straight to Bill English, Nick Smith and Steven Joyce?
Past and present Crown Shareholding Ministers in Tamaki Regeneration Ltd, to which 2,867 former Housing NZ properties were transferred on 31 March 2016?
Which, IMO, makes this Tamaki SCAM story – political dynamite?
Penny Bright
2017 Independent candidate for Tamaki.
We are now in deep shit as CO2 levels have now stubbornly stayed above the critical 400ppm level now for over the last four years.
Increased CO2 levels now are scientifically confirmed as reducing our plant growth and their nutrient uptake levels causing our loss of minerals/vitamins avalable to us all during consumption. – Here are the facts;
https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/effects-of-rising-atmospheric-concentrations-of-carbon-13254108
“protein concentrations in grains of wheat, rice and barley, and in potato tubers, are decreased by 5–14% under elevated CO2 (Taub et al. 2008). Crop concentrations of nutritionally important minerals including calcium, magnesium and phosphorus may also be decreased under elevated CO2 (Loladze 2002; Taub & Wang 2008).”
https://www.co2.earth/
Earth’s CO2 Home Page
Atmospheric CO2
2014 July 401.61ppm.
2015 july 404.50ppm.
2016 July 407.25ppm.
2017 Aug’405.07ppm.
August 2017
405.07
parts per million (ppm)
Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii (NOAA-ESRL)
Preliminary data released September 11, 2017
We know that atmospheric CO2 has ranged between 172 and 300 part per million (ppm) for the past 1 million years. The earth cycled through cold glacial and warm inter-glacial periods without atmospheric CO2 exceeding 300 ppm.
The first time in human history that atmospheric CO2 exceeded 300 ppm was about the time the Titanic sank in the North Atlantic Ocean in 1912.
Now, the crossover to concentrations that stay above 400 ppm CO2 is nearly complete.
https://www.co2.earth/co2-past-present-future-article
The other day on RNZ Phil Twyford told Susie Ferguson that under Labour rents would stabilise or go down, yet he wouldn’t guarantee it.
Do you think Phil will have to eat his words?
It was a bold and risky claim for Phil to make.
And while he didn’t guarantee it, if he’s wrong, not only will his credibility be damaged for asserting it, it will also damage the credibility of the Labour Party as it’s their policies and he is their housing spokesperson.
There’s been speculation that a number of landlords would sell up, thus freeing up more homes for sale and in turn reducing rental demand.
However, as landlords sell off their rentals and tenants move into home ownership, that will reduce the supply of rentals, thus merely offsetting the corresponding drop in rental demand. Hence, there would be no net difference in rental supply and demand from this shift.
Moreover, another aspect being overlooked is the growing trend of taking property off the rental market and setting them up as serviced apartments or Air BnB. Cashing in on our high tourist numbers and the shortage of hotel rooms whilst reaping a far higher nightly yield. Therefore, coming down too hard on landlords may result in further encouraging this shift. Resulting in reducing rental supply.
As for Phil’s claim that Labour will increase the housing supply, he’s overlooking it will take years for Labour’s Kiwibuild to meet current demand let alone get on top of it. Thus, in the meantime, Labour’s policies coupled with the overheated rental market will provide the scope landlords require to further increase rents.
The Chairman
I am looking for how many National Ministers statements that you have held to such a high standard as this.
Can you advise me please?
I just want examples of the National Ministers mistakes by example as this, (like mcCully for example) just to log into our data base please.
Surely you’re not implying one has to critique National to be allowed to critique Labour?
Being from the left I don’t expect National to represent my left leaning views, hence I seldom waste my time pointing out their many flaws. I waste enough of my time dealing with the right within the left.
Easy sleazy out: You are not from the left – you fake that rubbish.
not a bad summation…couple of points…you have answered your own question re why he didnt guarantee it and as to eating his own words you will note as an experienced politician he never gave a timeframe so in effect it is neither bold nor risky and there will be no words consumed….however i suspect in their heart of hearts Labour expect the market to fall (not crash) due to a number of their announced policies and this is occurring on top of a faltering market already, so it is entirely possible there will be a rent reduction in the near term even if some investors quit the market , remembering that an investment property sold doesn’t disappear and still has function within the market.
In her attempt to secure a guarantee, Susie did set a time-frame when challenging him. And although he managed to talk his way out of committing to a guarantee (reasserting his reasoning and claim) he didn’t question the time-frame. Nor did he use it as an excuse for not committing when he had the opportunity too. Thus, the opportunity to lower first term voter expectation.
Therefore, he (through his continued assertion) has somewhat painted himself and the Party into a bit of a corner.
While Labour plan to introduce most of their housing policies rather smartly, their impact on house prices (if any at all) will take some time to eventuate, thus it will be market fundamentals and perhaps further Reserve Bank interventions that are more likely to cause a correction/fall.
And a fall in house prices doesn’t necessarily mean their will be a quick and widespread fall in rents. Some simply won’t sell in a depressed market and may decide to increase rents instead. Especially if rental demand remains strong.
beg to differ…the mere prospect or notice of their policies will impact the market …investors will not wait around and so the impact will precede the act….same with the building programme…as to how fast and widespread the impact is, well thats an unknown but the direction is not…and it aint upwards
As a number of their policies largely fall short, the impact you’re expecting may differ from the reality.
Take their so-called ban on offshore investors. The impact may initially result in a flurry (adding upward pressure) with offshore investors getting in before they are shutout.
Therefore, while they may act quickly, it’s not the in the manner you seem to be foreseeing.
Moreover, the ban doesn’t prevent offshore investors from buying new builds. Thus, prevent offshore demand driving upward pressure on land prices, building materials, etc… adding to the overall cost of a new home. Which, in turn, tends to pump up the price of older homes.
again i differ….the tenor and direction is increased restrictions and costs plus a reduction in demand (via migration )and the timing has been stated to be urgent(indeed the tendency may be to quit the market with the knowledge of the existing costs as opposed to the unknown, after all we are only one of many)….any last minute attempt to enter the market will be short lived…..all compounded by nervous banks reluctant to lend at current levels.
A reduction in immigration is not a total halt. And when you have a market that is already struggling to cope with current housing demand, any additional immigration is upward pressure.
Cost are generally passed on. Again, adding upward price pressure on rents. And restrictions (such as ring fencing losses) won’t impact all investors. And those impacted may restructure their affairs and increase rents to offset it.
A number of offshore investors don’t require the backing of our banks to purchase. And banks themselves are walking a fine line.
‘A number of offshore investors don’t require the backing of our banks to purchase. And banks themselves are walking a fine line.’
no they don’t, however those purchasing from them are likely to…part of the reason the banks are self imposing restrictions (over and above RBNZ requirements) is because existing rents are already unsustainable in the local market…as investors are aware any rent rise will simply increase defaults …on portfolios banks are already winding back.Costs cannot be passed on ad infinitum.
I see your red door, I want it painted black, no colors any more, I want them to turn black…
Best response, Marty!
A major builder has just announced his intentions to exit the residential building industry… So an already under strained industry is about to lose some of its capacity. And this after ONLY 7,200 homes last year were built in Auckland.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1709/S00468/horncastle-downsizes-as-retirement-looms.htm
Horncastle Homes is taking a new business direction and exiting the volume home building business in both Auckland and Christchurch.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1709/S00468/horncastle-downsizes-as-retirement-looms.htm
https://www.nbr.co.nz/article/horncastle-shuts-down-owner-eyes-retirement-vy-207731
If you need a laugh, still political, but a laugh. 14.17 length
So it wasn’t the IRD, it wasn’t the MSD.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11922751
Paula, Anne, Wayne …. we’re looking at ya!
So, if it wasn’t the staff at MSD or IRD then it must have been the minster.
Simple process of deduction really. Holmes would have been horrified that we didn’t get it.
Stuff poll has Natz way ahead!
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/96897026/were-curious-who-are-you-going-to-vote-for
#letsdothis
Bogus as, can vote multiple times by opening up a new window on your browser, also depends on who reads Stuff #nzpol
Opening it up in a new window on my browser didn’t allow me to vote twice.
Not that I wanted too. Merely testing your assertion.
It’s Stuff – no surprises there, if you’ve looked a the usual tone of the comments that appear on that site.
goodbye friend – you have shown us so much, I’m going to miss you, your photos, your insights, safe travels to the end
https://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/grand-finale/overview/
For sure, it seems unfair after all Cassini has done. Couldn’t they have let it hurtle off into space to keep doing what it does?
No, not enough fuel.
To escape Saturn’s gravity well you mean?
Yep. It was going to crash eventually. Better to have that in a time and place where we could watch.
Integration with the planet is such a human action, I wonder what Cassini would want, to fly free forever would surely be high on the list.
And here’s me thinking that the best thing we could do is dump a thousand kilos or so of bacteria across Titan and see WTF happens.
I dunno that seems pretty irresponsible sorta like interplanetary littering.
worst case most likely outcome would be that it competes with or otherwise extinguishes life forms that we could have learned from.
Like bacterial cane toads or rats.
Worst least likely outcome is that the bacteria is viewed as a declaration of war by an advanced society we hadn’t detected because they were all subspace fields and teleporting, and the species goes all Independence Day on us.
I’m reasonably certain that if there was life there we would have recognised it when Cassini first flew by. The lander would definitely have shown it up.
Ever looked at an octopus? Well times that by a million – you’d recognise it when it wanted you to.
Nope, NFI WTF you’re implying. An octopus is easily recognisable as living.
I’ll make it easy for you. An octopus is weird especially when compared to humans now imagine that weirdness multiplied by a million. A million, not 100 , not 1000, not 10000, and so on. Do you actually think your brain could conceive let alone recognise alien life. I know you do and I blame fucken star trek and their hunamoid aliens.
Yes, it can.
Or, to put in other words: Do you believe pakeha are human?
It’s really easy to recognise life:
1. They’re born
2. They move
3. They breed
4. They die.
All that’s been detected upon Titan id the possible precursor to life. IMO, there isn’t enough energy to go beyond that else it would already exist.
I’d say Fuck the humanoid aliens except that logic tells us that humanoid lifeforms are most likely what you’re going to get from an evolutionary process for an intelligent species.
Is the planet earth an intelligent being?
Still to be decided. The actions of the organisms, except humanity, do seem to act as a single organism though.
If it is an intelligent being, and uses climate and interactions between organisms to form thoughts like we have neurons, then what thoughts would it have? And is humanity a planetary alzheimers?
Humanity would be a disease that it needs to be rid of and is in the process of doing so by making the climate uninhabitable for it.
Yeah, running back to a doom slogan kind of underlines the fact that you suggested on of humanity’s last acts should be barely a step removed from dumping cowshit in the streams of Titan just to see how bad the contamination will be.
the other point being is that your 5-point criteria that make it “really easy” to recognise life doen’t rule out Earth, which meets none of those points.
Mate your human centric view of the universe is quaint and illogical based on size alone – you cant even conceive how big it is or what is in it, yet your ego can write checks you cant cash and can’t even consider cashing – silly hu man.
And your plan is to leave a smear on a moon to see what happens – ffs come on.
>95% of all life on Earth is now extinct.
I don’t have Human Centric view. My view is reality as it is and not how people would like it to be.
Sure ‘mr my view is reality’ – the funny thing is you are so silly and arrogant you can’t see the idiocy of your arrogance. I feel sorry for you.
really? Which instrument would have detected it?
We’re not even sure there’s no life on Mars yet.
And maybe complex life lives underground.
It’s doubtful there are Klingons living there, but nothing is certain from a pinprick of a single probe.
Well, so far indications are that it still only hosts the possibility of life.
If there ever was life on Mars, it’s been irradiated by now.
Some fungi eat radiation. Sure, it isn’t solar radiation, but subsurface extremophiles are definitely possible.
I’m going to have to point out that I’m not really concerned about fungi – they’ll adapt fast enough.
Unless they end up like the dodo because our earth bacteria ate them all when we followed your plan.
And then we maybe never gain some revolutionary knowledge or medicine. Because we dumped a tonne of bacteria on a planet or moon we knew nothing about.
And that’s just the we’d be better off doing real science rather than assuming the universe is ours to shit all over argument, it’s not even the what if an entire ecosystem, of simple organisms maybe so, but an entire ecosystem grew and evolved over billions of years, creating an environment unique in the universe, right up until we came along – what does that say about us question.
Life’s a bitch and the you die.
Extreme possibilities aren’t what makes life work.
hey, did you know that Mars had spent the last few billion years losing its magnetosphere and its atmosphere (in that order) and that the chances for life to survive that is between slim and none?
BTW, I suspect that the first Mars landing failed to have such restrictions in place. I doubt if the Soviets, or the USians immediately after them, had such concerns as you seem to have. Same as the first Europeans who visited NZ had such concerns.
I think you’ll find that even in the 1960s interplanetary probes were developed and constructed in clean rooms. Chances of taking extremophile bacteria to mars are therefore minimal. If only because bacteria would fuck up their chromatograph readings.
Hey, did you know that getting a few metres under Mars surface would provide thermal insulation, protection from cosmic rays, and maybe even water?
So?
Was that because they were concerned with pollution upon another world or because it was necessary for the electronics to continue to work?
I think you’ll find it as the latter.
[citation needed]
And what difference does that make to life there?
In 1991, as Apollo 12 Commander Pete Conrad reviewed the transcripts of his conversations relayed from the moon back to Earth, the significance of the only known microbial survivor of harsh interplanetary travel struck him as profound:
“I always thought the most significant thing that we ever found on the whole…Moon was that little bacteria who came back and lived and nobody ever said [anything] about it.”
https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/1998/ast01sep98_1
An interesting point about War of The Worlds was that it was the microbes that ‘won’ the war.
Limited contamination might have occurred, but NASA was looking at sterilization in 1963.
Martian life might exist in some form. Your confidence exceeds the available data.
As for War of the Worlds, that’s another reason to avoid just dropping a tonne of bacteria on every rock we manage to reach.
There’s reasonably strong support for extraterrestrial origins of life on earth – nothing cinematic – just protists in cometary ice.
Voted Labour/Greens today and persuaded my friend to do the same, she was going to vote National….only one vote taken away from them, but it still felt good.
Well done Nick,
Who in their own sanity would vote for this National Party train wreck?
They are ending up selling everything in their next term if elected.
Also the National party will sign us up to corporte controlled trade deals that will control our Government and our lives from overseas for the next 75 yrs and we will loose our country along with our freedoms and democracy.
Psychopaths and sociopaths do, as a matter of fact, think that they’re sane.
Nick, if she had voted National then she shouldn’t be your friend.
Great work!!
Voter turnout is 80,000 up according to RNZ news.
Bodes well.
OMG Ad !!! Don’t go there girlfriend …. It’s far too soon !
Let it go honey-child
Could be the ‘can’t wait til this shocker of an election is over so I’m getting it out of the way’ vote.
You mean Advance Voting is up 80k on the same time last election. Which the Electoral Commission was forecasting and doesn’t give anybody a steer on anything really.
Elections.org.nz advance voting stats.
Updated at 2pm weekdays and Saturdays.
Stuff.co is running a very unscientific poll that shows national ahead.
I gave my click to Labour but it looks like a few more clicks wouldn’t go astray to change this flawed poll.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/96897026/were-curious-who-are-you-going-to-vote-for
I gave mine to ACT 😀
But, I guess if Stuff are going to take it as an indicator maybe I should give another to Labour… and another to Greens.
I just voted 3 times on the Stuff poll. Once each on Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. I think they counted.
They chose the worst picture that they could find for Ardern.
Great work!!
I suppose everyone has commented on this but on the news about Oz the other day was that they had wiped their controls on every possible bit of media? sounds like, being able to be owned by one entity: Corporation Australia Ink I think. Inky dinky di etc. Wind back to flogging convicts on its way (sstart with NZs for practice).
Jian Yang will review his citizenship declaration! That’s nice.
Having listened to Yang speak in Parliament, in my opinion, he doesn’t seem to have a good grasp of the English language at all. Very hard to understand, even when I’m wearing my hearing aids! So now I’m wondering how was he able to teach the English language in the first place?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11922788
The police are still hanging around my ass I no that the police and national are blaming me for making them look like idiots well no they are doing fine fucking up there image with there own actions thanks very much.
Big upps for the number one song of the Worlds biggest count down of 1500 rock songs that is a awesome winning song.
Killing in the name
Rage Against The Machine.
Now my main message Fonterra Theo don’t you think It is time you clean up that mess in Mango. It would be wise if you did this because it would stain your image if I have to clean it up. Ka pai
All the Kings Horses and all the Kings men couldn’t put Humpty to gather again