The introduction of charter schools is not a new Kiwi idea of course. (Our ministry of education seems to develop most of its recent policy from what it reads on the internet). However, given Banks’ and other government MP’s “faiths” and the utterances that these schools will be free to deliver their own curriculum, will our government insist that sound science is taught, as in the apparent ruling in the UK, and withdraw funding if otherwise …
I don’t think that charter schools are necessarily evil except when being run exclusively as money-making corporate entities. In principle they aren’t that much different to experimental schools like Steiner or Montessori.
I somehow doubt it will ever get as bad as this, however: http://www.salon.com/2012/01/13/americas_dangerously_removed_elite/singleton/
The herald editorial comments on Josy Pagani’s thoughts on what went wrong for Labour, especially:
“The hardest week to door- knock,” she said, “was when we were telling people who had just come home from a day’s work earning the minimum wage, that it was a great idea to extend their Working for Families tax credit to beneficiaries.” She could see them thinking, ‘so what’s the point of working my guts out all week while someone sitting at home on the dole gets the same tax credit as me?’
That was probably the clincher for Labour’s lack of traction.
If it can tell people only that they are poor, deprived, under-valued, and obese, it will not give the Government a run for our money.
Which will mean same old another wasted three years in opposition.
If Labour can go to the next election with well-developed ideas for helping people who aspire to work hard, make sound choices, raise happy and healthy children, maybe start a business and invest their savings, it will strike a strong chord.
If.
It will take a major change in attitude in the party and amongst it’s vocal supporters.
One of United Future’s main problems was the public wasn’t very interested in listening to the party. That is partly due to a common problem experienced by small parties on coalition, and partly due to how the party presents itself. To an extent the party’s bubble has burst and needs to be re-established.
Labour’s problem was they weren’t good at listening to the public. Oblivious to outside reality inside it’s own bubble.
so why are you going on about labour instead of sorting out your own ambitions for your burstbubble party? things not going according to plan in dunners eh pete – occupypete a fizzer.
I go on about whatever I feel like on blogs. I think it’s important for New Zealand that Labour becomes a strong mostly positive government-in-waiting party.
Things are going very much to plan in Dunedin despite a few (only on blog) persistent negative attacks of no substance. Here the Labour MPs (and the Green and National MPs) are happy to talk and work co-operatively for the good of the city.
why was the question, why, when you can ‘go on about whatever you feel like on blogs’, are you going on about this issue – especially when you and your own party fared so poorly in the election. The blahblahgoodforNZblahblah is really weak and I think you have other motives – just like you had other motives with all the occupy stuff – how about fronting up for 2012 pete.
Seriously…did Josie Pagani use Labour’s extension of WFF to beneficiaries as an opening line when talking to working households that she door knocked.
Its what that quote makes it sound like. And if someone brought the topic up and she couldn’t explain to them convincingly why Labour had made that call (ie as a way to bolster families income above poverty during a time of high unemployment) …she shouldn’t be in PR or in politics.
Josie managed to substantially cut the majority in a blue ribbon rural Tory seat in an election that Labour lost heavily, CV. If I remember rightly, she and her team got the second best result of any electorate for the red team. I think that gives her more than enough credibility to speak about what worked and what didn’t, don’t you?
Where is Pagani bene bashing? Read the quote again, lefty, it’s the reaction of the working poor to the policy she is talking about and she does not bash beneficiaries in the least, nor condemn the policy itself.
Except that isn’t what she said, CV. The problem Pagani is identifying is that Labour failed to win support for the policy among the working poor, not that the policy was wrong.
The circumstances here are substantially different to those previously: the move is a move to combate child poverty- is Pagani saying it is ok to have child poverty if you are on a benefit? Or that an improvement in child poverty is a hard sell? Annette King did a fine job on Q and A with that one.
Why is Labour continuing to talk itself down? Is a move to improve child poverty gloomy?
This seems some odd communication from Labour allowing the Herald to define their party as this:
” Labour’s natural constituency is those who need some help.”
which I strongly, strenously and harshly disagree with.
It is frustrating that Labour allows this to happen. The constituency is those who dislike inequality in society and recognise that it is the best way to deal with a raft of expensive social problems. It is the constituency that doesn’t think we need people in working poverty to make us successful.
or continue the meme that we have chronic welfare dependency problems:
“Labour should devise welfare programmes that are targeted to temporary need and help people become self-supporting.” (like the ones that helped Paula Bennett and have been cut? FFS.)
Labour has come out of the blocks in the new year talking about welfare reform. It allows the Herald to say:
“If it can tell people only that they are poor, deprived, under-valued, and obese, it will not give the Government a run for our money.”
labour chose the wrong leader he only started making traction in the last month before the election after world cup and sucky msm non existent investigative journalism just overpaid glamorized reporters.
Labour need to expose the lie about welfare. Its a safety net not a holiday. Welfare is not there to support the low income, its there to support those in work, with a safety net, with disease control (meaning the poor children don’t give you kids disease), with clean street clear of bums (who are mentally ill), with lower prices because more people have access to Doctors, Dentists, etc and thus drive down the price by economies of scale. Essentially we have a welfare system because it supports the majority, its good economics. Sure when the world economy is run so damn badly then the numbers on unemployment will be too high but whose fault is that/ Parliament YES, crony capitalism, YES. The unemployed NO. Labour isn’t a party of the left because it buys into the big lie, that welfare is bad because the people on the benefit are evil. Simply the welfare system is how we become a much more efficient first world nation, instead of wasting generations who trawl the rubbish for a dollar to make ends meet. Just imagine that, some kid coming to your kids school whose mum and dad pick through the rubbish tip.
Welfare is also a em0loyment scheme, it keeps thousands in jobs, forces wages down, and even helps government load small business up with regulation tht protect you from poor food, poor working conditions, social discord, etc, etc.
Where welfare is a problem is at the top end of town.
“The hardest week to door- knock,” she said, “was when we were telling people who had just come home from a day’s work earning the minimum wage, that it was a great idea to extend their Working for Families tax credit to beneficiaries.” She could see them thinking, ‘so what’s the point of working my guts out all week while someone sitting at home on the dole gets the same tax credit as me?’
This is exactly what I thought would happen when I heard this policy. I support it for sure, but they were really incredibly stupid rolling it out the way they did. This was about the same time that they rolled out the eligibility changes for superannuation.
Up until that point we had seen Labour (and Goff as perferred PM) firming up and slowly rising in the polls, then after that point it appeared to slide back and went to the Greens, even though they had similar policies anyway. Probably it was really a combination of people thinking about Labour going back to National or NZFirst, while the Greens grabbed those that wanted more spine than Labour was showing.
IMO Labour just should have avoided the WFF stuff and not even mentioned it. National hardly had any policies to campaign on and not much in the way of details for the ones they did, so I don’t see why Labour thought they had to put absolutely everything on the table.
We’ll probably waste another decade before we get around to putting in a sorely needed CGT now. Unless there are significant economic disruptions in this current term that the left can put together the proposal again and win with it in 2014.
Yes Labour/Labour was amazingly successful electorially post 1949 wasn’t it. In the 35 years between that date and 1984 how many years was Labour/Labour in power for?
goose labour got more votes than National in just about every election other than the 1951 election because of gerrymandering of boundaries by vested interests.
Luckily the likes of Kiwi Keith new the mandate he had was tenuous and was a relatively pragmatic leader.
It’s not “funny” at all – UF have always claimed to be centrist, though there may be some confusion over what they mean by that. And as NAct currently demonstrates, the parties that capture and stay in power are centrist – although it creeps me out no end that for the majority of the electorate “centrist” has crept that far to the right. If disaffected voters have crept to the right in order to stay centre, what on earth makes you think a “Labour/Labour” – by which I assume you mean hard left, is going to attract them back?
“Well, in our country,” said Alice, still panting a little, “you’d generally get to somewhere else — if you run very fast for a long time, as we’ve been doing.”
“A slow sort of country!” said the Queen. “Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”
If disaffected voters have crept to the right in order to stay centre, what on earth makes you think a “Labour/Labour” – by which I assume you mean hard left, is going to attract them back?
Perhaps but you missed one point. The issue of participation.
As the latest election results show, a lot of people don’t give a rats ass about National or about Labour.
And each one of those million deserves a slap in the face for making the vote of all those who did count for less and effectively giving the NActs a mandate to do a whole bunch of stuff that the polls suggest they didn’t want to happen. So what DO they want? (though perhaps if they really are SO stupid as to not realise how important an election really is, maybe it would be better if they didn’t vote… Just joking)
The point is that a third of the population, or more, do not think that NACT or NACT lite(Labour) reflect their views or aspirations.
Many did vote. BUT. Not because they supported Labour or National, but simply for whichever one they thought was the lesser of 2 evils.
And of many other voters, their information was the Herald and TV, which, like our politicians, have totally abandoned any semblance of journalism to become unashamed pursuers of corporate crumbs from their puppetmasters…
I would suggest that a Labour, Labour would bring back many disaffected voters.
Well, I concede that it’s possible, but it also seems to me just as likely that a “Labour, Labour” party (and I would appreciate if you could define that a bit more clearly for me as there’s a big spectrum of Left there) might scare a big chunk of the less-committed centrist and more conservative elements of Labour running to the arms of that nice Mr Key. Again, I ask, what do the silent million want in terms of policy that they couldn’t find in any of the other “minor” (a word that really can’t be applied to the Greens anymore) parties – which again, KJT, is why I’d like you to more closely define this hypothetical “Labour, Labour” party. What do you think they want that no one else could give them?
People’s attitudes follow their behaviour which, in turn, follows the necessities of life imposed by broader social structures.
The political fight is over those structures.
The cynical approach (adopted by Roger Douglas) is that rapidly changing the structures within which people live their lives and then deflecting and disrupting resistance is the way to make ‘progress’ on a political agenda.
That is, it is based on the correct insight – as above – that people’s attitudes will conform once the pragmatics of their lives makes it necessary to change their attitudes in order to maintain some sort of cognitive and emotional comfort and coherence in their lives (in relation to what they find they have to do in order to survive).
A second approach is to stick to a straightforward attempt to persuade people that your agenda is best – for them and for society as a whole.
A third approach is simply to find out what people want and at least sound like that’s what you’re giving them. This is the approach of marketers. Like marketers, however, this usually descends into a softer, more surreptitious version of the first approach. I think this is Key’s approach.
For a number of reasons, I find the first and third approaches disreputable (which is why I also don’t like marketing – the pretence that one’s aim is to give people what they want when, in reality, your primary motive is to make your business profitable. While sometimes compatible, these goals inevitably diverge and, then, the primary motive asserts itself.).
I’m enough of a political pragmatist to compromise or concede on the occasional policy but I just can’t see the point in conceding on my analysis of the social and economic world in order to be more in tune with the ‘centre’.
The aim should be to convince the ‘centre’ (or anyone else) to shift towards your analysis. It should not be to shift your analysis – at least for any reason other than that you are convinced that your analysis is faulty.
Call me old-fashioned, but I can’t see the point of being politically active in order to institute something I don’t believe is true.
I read Steve Jobs biography over Christmas. It is a fascinating read. He is a complex character, obsessive, driven and flawed as a human being. Yet these qualities no doubt were instrumental in what he achieved.
His comments concerning Teacher Unions were eye opening.
Amongst other things he said that America’s education system was being “crippled by union work rules”. He also said “[u]ntil the teachers’ unions were broken, there was almost no hope for education reform.” Jobs proposed allowing principals to hire and fire teachers based on merit, that schools stay open until 6 p.m. and that they be open 11 months a year. These ideas and the teacher union bashing that accompanies them are percolating throughout the Western World.
I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union. But these American ideas are so clearly being applied to the New Zealand situation despite the clear differences.
It is really weird that we should be told that we need to follow trends in a country where the direction its education system is heading is clearly wrong. As was noted previously by Salsy we should look to Finland for where we should be taking out system.
“I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union.”
Considering last week a whole bunch of leftist posters here basically stated that teachers should indoctrinate children in leftist ideology I don’t think it is too hard to work that one out.
Not indoctrinate – merely teach the truth and how to think. That’s all that’s needed. That alone will bring people to the left as it highlights the delusion of the right.
Whatever DTB. But thanks for highlighting exactly why right wingers are wary of teacher unions. People who believe that there is a ‘correct’ way to think are potentially very dangerous.
Gosman, if anything turns me off from listening to another point of view (yours) it is the use of ‘whatever’ as a response as it indicates to me shallow, unconsidered and dismissive attitudes.
That is correct. I am extrapolating that he meant the correct way to think because teachers already teach children to think. Unless you think teachers in NZ are failing in this pretty basic piece of the learning process Felix. Do you really think NZ teachers are that incompetent that NZ children are not being taught to think?
Nicely avoiding the uncomfortable question there felix. So you disagree with the view that kids aren’t being taught to think in school at the moment do you?
With 1 child in Primary and 1 in intermediate, my opinion is yes Gosman, they are being failed in this fundamental way. Their teachers are all hard working and well meaning, but to teach critical thinking is not their mandate.
So Nz teachers are incompetent in your view Mcflock are they? They are failing to teach a large proportion of the population to think. Hmmmmm…. I wonder if the Labour party will take up the challenge and bring this national shame to light.
There’s a difference between teaching people to think and wrote learning. NAct seem to want to go back to wrote learning style of the 19th century whereas modern teachers want to teach people to think. Interestingly enough, it’s NAct and their supporters who are complaining about teachers and how they teach.
So you are now stating that teacher ARE teaching children to think are you? Well then no problem then. I’m sure within a very short period of time the schools will be churning out your socially conscious little comrades by the bucketful. I don’t know what you are worried about.
By the way who on the right is pushing for rote learning? I have yet to read or hear anyone on the right recently argue that we should change our education system to one involving rote learning. Perhaps you have some link to a right leaning educationalist in NZ who makes the case?
Testing, testing and more testing as required by National Standards which, due to then penalising teachers if they don’t teach to the test, results in rote learning.
No, he didn’t specifically say “anything about a correct way to think” but there are bizarre implications in what he said.
Coercing how to think based on left = truth sounds like religious (or political) fundamentalism rather than education. If our schools were based on those sorts of delusions it would be dangerous.
Bricks in the wall with the right and centre knocked off sounds a bit thick.
So why does DTB want teachers to teach children to think if they are already doing so. It would be like wanting my butcher to sell meat. Kind of pointless as that is what they already do.
There seems to be confusion over trying to teach children what to think or how to develop their thinking.
For example, should a teacher try and teach children “left good, right bad”, or should they help them develop critial thinking so they can make up their own minds?
It looks like DtB prefers trying to train everyone to be left clones, or expecting everyone will naturally become left clones if they are taught what he thinks as ‘truth’.
Pete, it’s the right who are coercing the teaching model and the model that they’re coercing is a model which fails to teach people to think. Instead it teaches people to believe what they’re told and not to ask questions.
Didn’t say anything about a correct way to think. What I said was that there is truth and there is what RWNJs believe. The two are completely different, the first is fact and the second is delusion.
No, just that that is what the teachers need to do.
Any proposed changes, such as National Standards and charter schools (run by any religious nutjob group), that make it difficult for teachers to teach children to think should be rejected on that basis.
Seems pretty obvious. Then again maybe I was taught to think.
Gosman, have you ever tried to ‘think’ without any content? It’s hard to do one without the other.
The whole point of ‘thinking’ (that common or garden word covers a huge range of cognitive activity – both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ thinking) is surely to provide a reasonable guide to action. Action – in a real world – requires some sense of what can be relied upon. That is, it requires some sense of what is ‘true’.
Of course, ‘truth’ is not necessarily forever but it amounts to what any ‘thinking person’ – who is able to put such truths to the test of thought and action – would go along with.
I’m not sure how you expect teachers to teach ‘thinking’ without also including a few ‘truths’ to think with. BTW, teaching thinking is not just teaching formal logic or some method of thought. All methods – even logic – come along with assumptions about what is true.
Without worrying about the difference between logical ‘truth’ and empirical ‘truth’, I think it’s safe to say that thinking requires some idea of what is true.
DTB’s point was that if you teach the truths from the relevant disciplines you’ll detect that it is more likely to conform to a general ‘left’ analysis (e.g., that those with power and wealth tend to distort social and economic systems in their favour). Presumably he’s thinking about the social and economic worlds here, and the relevant knowledge in those areas.
Interestingly, it is because of this perceived ‘left’ bias in the humanities and social sciences that many on the right complain about just these disciplines, often concocting conspiracy theories – The History Man notwithstanding – about them and the knowledge they generate (while blessing their cotton socks for the discipline of economics which is often touted – incorrectly – as the only truly empirical social science).
Finally,
“People who believe that there is a ‘correct’ way to think are potentially very dangerous”
(I presume, here, that you don’t actually mean ‘way’ – ie, method – but, rather, something like ‘thought’ or ‘thoughts’.)
People who believe there is no ‘correct’ way to think are also potentially dangerous – and simplistically misunderstand the normative notion of ‘correct’.
I’m not going to call you names, Gosman, but I interpreted that as “how to think critically”, not what to think. Any unbalanced ideological indoctrination at the school level is a fairly unpleasant prospect, but I do notice that more often than not the people who gravitate to the higher levels of academia are of a leftish bent – largely because those of a rightish bent would rather be out in the corporate sector.
What rot. You just need to read DTB’s reply above to see that he at least thinks people just need to be taught to think in the correct manner and they will suddenly have their eye’s opened to the wonders of the leftist world view.
So how come it is generally the lefties who resort to infantile name calling like you have just done Mcflock? Or is this really an example of your superior intellect whereby you don’t need to debate at all as your views are so obviously correct therefore leaving more time for mindless abuse of those who dare to express differing opinions?
Two reasons: Firstly, the complete failure and/or intractable unwillingness of folk like yourself to understand basic logic makes logical arguments futile. Secondly, I was just calling it how I saw it.
Please elucidate for me then. How about we use DTB’s argument that teachers should teach children to think as an example? Now to me logically this means that they are failing to teach children to think at the moment. Is that not the logical inference from that position. If not, then what is the logical inference about our current teaching system?
So far the only answer from DTB is that he does now think they are being taught to think at the moment. Yet if that is the case then there is no indication that I know of that the children are much more likely to be left leaning. Certainly the proportion of left and right voters has not been steadily being skewed in favour of the left over the last few decades. They can’t be doing their job very well if that is the case.
That probably follows logically from any number of your assumptions, but as you’ve misunderstood the entire discussion from the outset it’s neither here nor there to anyone else.
How about we use DTB’s argument that teachers should teach children to think as an example? Now to me logically this means that they are failing to teach children to think at the moment. Is that not the logical inference from that position.
You: “[quoting mickeysavage]“I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union.” Considering last week a whole bunch of leftist posters here basically stated that teachers should indoctrinate children in leftist ideology I don’t think it is too hard to work that one out.”
DTB: “Not indoctrinate – merely teach the truth and how to think. That’s all that’s needed. That alone will bring people to the left as it highlights the delusion of the right.”
So DTB’s statement is that “[teachers should ] merely teach the truth and how to think. That’s all that’s needed. That alone will bring people to the left as it highlights the delusion of the right.”
Is the left vote 0%? Are teachers 100% unionised? Are 100% of children taught by teachers? Is critical thinking a core component of the curriculum that all children have to achieve adequate skill in?
You go from a philosophical “should” to a generalised ” logically this means that they are failing to teach children to think at the moment.”.
Some teachers do fail – this is a fact. “They” as a group do not.
Most schoolchildren are not voters. Therefore evidence of a prior failure by some teachers (possibly as a result of systemic issues rather than individual shortcomings), i.e. Key’s election, does not logically imply a current failure.
By not recognising any of this, you reveal that you were failed by your teacher. Which tends to support the proposition that you, a regular tory advocate, lack critical thinking skills. As do a number of your compatriots, generally a higher percentage from what I can see than the left.
The left has nutty or stupid commenters here as well, but there are few of them and many commenters. There are fewer tory commenters here, yes, but many more of them as a proportion are nutty or stupid.
A society needs ideological and philosophical underpinnings. You teach them to your children directly, explicitly and consciously – or you leave it blank and wait for individualistic, commercial and political interests to fill their heads with crap.
Oh that’s barely the start of my character flaws. But regularly confusing “wishful thinking caused by personal bigotry” and “logical inference” isn’t one of them.
No, I just don’t buy into the leftist spin and intellectual arrogance that is behind the statement, Words of Gosman
Obviously from reading your regular gurgles you like the rightist spin and intellectual arrogance that accompanies it. What DTB is for is the ability to take an overview not trample education underfoot by contesters who might as well be on the opposing sides of a boxing ring.
I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union.
Slater hates anybody who doesn’t share his bigotries. Yesterday he was bullying a sixteen year old girl, Jazmine Heka for wanting an end to child poverty. What a scumbag!
Hopefully Slater is converting Jazmine into a hardened dedicated leftie through his complete lack of compassion or understanding.
If anyone would like to sign Jazmine’s petitions they are here. The themes are simple but clear. They have three simple idealistic goals which if achieved would go a long way to solving problems associateed with childhood poverty. The petitions wants the Government to:
1. Provide free healthcare for all children including prescription costs.
2. Introduce warrant of fitness’s for all rental houses.
3. Provide free healthy school lunches to all children attending schools.
New Zealand employers use similar tactics bonded labour farm workers.
Isolated farm workers are promised the earth free Accommodation, free meat,free milk, good income. a salary of $50,000 per annum. then they are made to work unholy hours one young fellow newly married working in Nth Canterbury made to from 3 am till 8 pm every day 1 day off a fortnight.No free meat no free milk no compensation for hours worked outside the 45 hours per week contracted this is common as in the dairy industry.
Frivolous litigation is the scourge of the United States, with some firms founded entirely on the destructive practice. Righthaven is one such lawsuit factory…
Okay then I am not one of these people who glare at other people’s kids in public when they are making a disturbance, in fact I hate those people who do that, having got younger relatives who get a bit crazy (like all kids) I wont judge someone else kids if they are misbehaving, in saying that their has to be a limit, and there has to be a time when a parent/caregiver starts to take control. I think kids should be able to be kids in public, even have meltdowns, or just generally act stupid.
Its the parents reaction that gets to me.
For example I was in this cafe, having a quiet meal, (the cafe was a normal run of the mill cafe, not way over the top posh, but it was nice) A mother had a couple of children there,
the oldest was probably nine the youngest around six or seven.
Well the kids started running around, the youngest had a toy car which he liked to bang on other peoples tables, while the oldest, screamed “lets play tag” they were hiding behind myself and other people at this cafe, behind the chairs etc etc, laughing, bumping into people, well the cafe manager came out and gave them a look that said “dont do that”
Well the mother was beside herself, she stood up and screamed “Dont have fun kids, remember dont have fun, your not allowed to laugh or be happy” then she started cracking up and giving people dirty looks while still saying “Oh your having to much fun, the police are going to come now” The lady she was with was cheering her on.
Like I said, Kids should be allowed to be kids, but was this too over the top, or am I being grumpy???? The place wasnt fastfood, it was a nice cafe, not sandwiches but meals.
Some people have no idea how to raise children.
If I was the cafe owner, I would have told the stupid bitch to fuck off and banned her from the premises.
I feel you there Brett(s). I’ve got a bit of a rep with some of the parents around town as being a grumpy bastard who doesn’t like kids, but nothing could be further from the truth.
It’s the parents who piss me off, the ones who think their little darlings are too special to have boundaries. Most of the kids I like just fine.
I’ve been in similar circumstances myself. Either me or my wife (usually her) will firmly tell such children to be considerate – the parents usually look shocked or embarrassed.
Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but I put it down to the overweening love affair modern society has with ‘privacy’, individualism and ‘property rights’. Parents seem to think that any reprimand from another adult, in public, of their children is some sort of invasion of their (the parents’) ‘privacy’ (now that is ironic) and ‘property rights’, insofar as they see children as their possessions.
For me, reprimanding these children is less about some poe-faced moralistic castigation as it is about giving children the respect to believe that they are ‘persons in process’ and need to be socialised. The kids often respond well – better than the parents.
I think the irritation other adults often feel in the presence of unruly children stems from the perception that the parents will get all indignant at ‘strangers’ telling their children what they should be doing.
Children should be able to express themselves in lively ways, and places such as cafes (and their patrons) should accept that. But, that expressiveness also needs to be challenged (not completely squashed) when it goes too far.
I think that, these days, there isn’t enough civilised argie-bargie between people in public places. We shouldn’t just silently keep our thoughts to ourselves and then bitch about others later. We should engage – civilly – at the time. Especially when it comes to socialising children.
Then, if we overstep the mark and reprimand a child unnecessarily or too harshly other adults can also step in and challenge us.
This is how we learn to get along – and live out our social nature.
Quite right – NZers internalise way too many things without expressing them in assertive yet productive and well intentioned ways. From this kids in a cafe scenario to be badly treated by a customer services rep on the phone or in a store.
Are we that afraid of meaningful communication and confrontation (your “meaningful argie bargy”)?
Insofar as people can say what they want, yes. Personally I would have thought that a little bit of respect for people’s personal space was in order, though.
But then I’m a fascist prick at heart, so need to consciously moderate my more totalitarian impulses 😉
Ask Pete George or Gosman, I’m sure they will explain that the mother is a DPB bludger getting overpaid and needs to sent into poverty big time as punishment.
There does seem to be a generation of mothers with a very strong sense of entitlement (dare I mention militant breast feeders as well?), but instinct tells me that you can’t really do anything unless (1) the child is about to hurt themselves, someone else, or property – and you have to act in loco parentis because mummy in question is some borderline narcissistic personality disorder for whom her children are an autonomous accessory of only limited interest, or (2) the kiddiwink in question is actually invading your space and interracting with you directly (chair kickers and other monsters etc).
She seemed quite well off, Not sure if she was on the DPB, all I know is that she didnt give a fuck about the people around her, or the business owner.
It’s quite common to see kids of the “quite well off” running riot as mummy and daddy teach them they own the world, and a select few will soon enough too.
I’m not entirely sure that this is a class issue, to the extent that it is an issue at all. I certainly don’t believe Brett was making that point. God knows I disagree with him enough, but the fact is that teaching kids a bit of consideration for other people is not out of order – especially as he isn’t talking about toddlers in this instance.
Tell you what. I know a few old fashioned Tories raising their children. Very methodical and very disciplined. End result – good kids with manners who know which end is up and which end is down, know how to manage their own bank accounts and know to avoid credit cards. The ones off farms can be immensely practical. As in, know how to lift engines out of old Holdens practical.
The other kind of Tory parents with more money than sense, and who think that spoiling little Johnny with expensive gifts will somehow make up for their guilt in not spending quality time and attention supervising him, not so much.
Methyl iodide is a pesticide that is sometimes used for fumigating soil before planting. In june 2010, the Environmental Risk Management Authority (ERMA) approved an application to import and manufacture Ripper, which contains methyl iodide, for the use in the strawberry industry. ERMA appears to have ignored various peer reviewed studies in making that decision.
The problem is that methyl iodide was initially misclassified by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation. It’s classification is now being questioned in a court of law, and it’s likely the legal challenge will win…
Saving the Rich, Losing the economy In Europe, as in the US, the driver of economic policy quickly became saving the private banks from losses on their portfolios. A deal was struck with the socialist government of Greece, which represented the banks and not the Greek people. The ECB would violate its charter and together with the IMF, which would also violate its charter, would lend enough money to the Greek government to avoid default on its sovereign bonds to the private banks that had purchased the bonds. In return for the ECB and IMF loans and in order to raise the money to repay them, the Greek government had to agree to sell to private investors the national lottery, Greece’s ports and municipal water systems, a string of islands that are a national preserve, and in addition to impose a brutal austerity on the Greek people by lowering wages, cutting social benefits and pensions, raising taxes, and laying off or firing government workers.
In other words, the Greek population is to be sacrificed to a small handful of foreign banks in Germany, France and the Netherlands. The Greek people, unlike “their” socialist government, did not regard this as a good deal. They have been in the streets ever since.
Jean-Claude Trichet, head of the ECB, said that the austerity imposed on Greece was a first step. If Greece did not deliver on the deal, the next step was for the EU to take over Greece’s political sovereignty, make its budget, decide its taxation, decide its expenditures and from this process squeeze out enough from Greeks to repay the ECB and IMF for lending Greece the money to pay the private banks.
In other words, Europe under the EU and Jean-Claude Trichet is a return to the most extreme form of feudalism in which a handful of rich are pampered at the expense of everyone else.
This is what economic policy in the West has become–a tool of the wealthy used to enrich themselves by spreading poverty among the rest of the population.
The Greeks can still default if they want. They will just be kicked out of the Euro and get no significant further cash to support their leftist policies. That is how Merkel and Sarkozy managed to reign in the previous Greek PM when he stated the austerity meassures would be subject to a referendum. They basically told him it was either Austerity or no money and no Euro. The Greeks seem to want to still get bail out money and be part of the Euro but without austerity. It isn’t happening.
Goose head the Greek economy is “spiroling”down the gurgler Austerity equals smaller economy less money to pay bills,Greek migration is huge leaving even less people to pick up the tab.
Greece under neo liberal austerity is fucked no possible cure.
Thats why Merkel and Sarkosy want a financial transaction tax to keep the fraudulent banks a float that lent these countries all this money fully knowing that they would default.
If Greece pulls out of the Euro it has many more options like devaluing, printing money, raising taxes on the rich etc.
German Swiss and French banks would go bankrupt doing more damage to the rest of Europe .
Its not a leftist policy to not pay tax at all like a lot of Greek tycoons do, now thats why they are based their corrupting officials to get their way right wing fascists more like it.
Greece is being forced to buy tens of millions in armaments from Germany and other countries as part of its bail out deal.
i.e. repatriating money leant from EU countries to back to those same EU countries in exchange for pointless munitions and more indebtedness. Greece is screwed.
Edit – I stand corrected. Its BILLIONS in weapon systems that Greece is buying. Austerity for you, Eurofighters for us!!!
Yet the Greek government still wants to be part of the Eurozone and still wants the bail out billions. Perhaps if they hadn’t got themselves into such a mess in the first place then they wouldn’t be in such a exploitable position as they are in now. Instead of having a bloated and over paid civil service and people retiring at 55 as well as paying no taxes they could have instead been more productive and law abiding and would be lending money to places like Italy and Spain rather than needing it from places like France and Germany.
Greece, if I’ve been reading it right, still expect the EU to get rid of the corruption that is endemic to their political system. It’s that corruption that caused Greek spending and it’s only the Greeks that can get rid of it. The banksters, being also corrupt, are using that corruption to give themselves Greek assets so that they get a permanent rentier income.
BS goose head Obviously you haven’t been watching the riots happening in Athens.
According to overseas reports I’ve been reading Greece is becoming a tinder box for revolt.
i.e, Arab spring I Predict full scale riots to come until Greece leaves the euro.
Greece does provide an interesting case study for those who argue that having a low retirement age reduces unemployment especially amongst the young though.
“Before the crisis Spain had low and declining debt. Italy had high debt inherited from the past, but it was steadily working that debt down relative to GDP. Neither country was being profligate — that’s just not what happened. Since the crisis debt has been rising relative to GDP, but that’s what happens when you have an economic crisis.
Yes, Greece. But Greece is now a tiny part of this story. As I said in today’s column, Greece (GDP of about $300 billion) is roughly Greater Miami ($270 billion). Italy and Spain are the big stories, and they were not, repeat not, fiscally profligate.”
Maybe it’s Germany who should and will leave the Euro..
Have the Greeks used fighter jets in suppressing the austerity protests previously? Has any Westernised country used fighter jets in this way in the past few decades?
Slippery Gos. “Armaments” is not restricted to “fighter jets”. Those are for if friction with Turkey flares up again.
The helicopter gunships will be particularly useful in riot control. Their camera systems alone will be useful. The cannon will be just a bonus. As will the tanks. And some westernised countries love to use heavy artillery in civilian built up areas – just not their own.
The fact that Syria is currently crawling with Russian military personnel, and Russia and China would veto any UN resolution supporting a no fly zone hugely complicates US/NATO plans.
I agree that the international response to the suggestion is cool at best. However, it simply reinforces the point that aircraft are being used to suppress protest, which explains why the Syrian opposition wants a no fly zone.
During his long summer hiatus in Hawaii, John Key has had an epiphany and decided to cast off his teflon coated suit along with other trappings of power and showmanship like his toupee…
I was just reading Key’s entry in Wikipedia – I knew his mother was an Austrian-Jew (and therefore might be expected to know something about suffering, oppression and marginalisation), but apparently his English father fought in the Spanish Civil War – one assumes not on the Fascist side. How the hell did they produce Johnny?
The Italian ship which ran into rocks and went down might have taken the wrong side of an island to get closer to the scenic shore. It sounds like the Mikhail Lermontov episode here, for the same reason.
paula beenit says the green paper will solve the mystery of infanticide in New Zealand.
there have been “160” submissions already.
most of those will be opinions.
by my count there are at least 6 universities in new zealand.
if they graduate 10 anthropolgy students per year then that is 60 qualified people that could be undertaking a proper scientific study instead of the usual bumble that we are getting now.
oh I forgot.
you would have to pay them but opinions are free.
We don’t need anthropology students we need social science/social work/psychology post grads contributing.
Although its pretty simple the answers around living conditions, poverty, substance abuse, anger management, parenting skills etc are already all very well known, its simply a case of operationalising them. Bennett is just wasting time with some kind of “need more research” bullshit.
CV Its just another excuse for doing nothing need more research
1987 ropa report on behalf of Roger Douglas
Poverty main causes of child poverty and violence toward children and why so many poor people end up in jail.
Poor housing
Poor access to health care
long term unemployment refer to two lines above
Being a relatively small Island nation in the Pacific means we’re somewhat isolated from what happens in the rest of the world. But that’s no excuse for New Zealand’s mainstream media ignoring many important stories.
Clearly they’re underreporting on many relevant topics. So in light of this censorship… here’s a small sample of the stories that we don’t get to see here in gods own…
The Key government’s asset sales agenda is derived from the Washington Consensus – a set of Wall Street-driven policies that were pronounced dead after the global financial meltdown in 2008.[1] The New Zealand government, however, remains loyal to this failed ideology.
[…]
The world on its present course cannot avoid fuel shortages, debt-deflation, fiscal austerity, increasing poverty, political and environmental conflicts over energy and essential commodities, unprecedented global protests against Wall Street financial injustice, political and legal challenges for full reserve monetary reform, climate and humanitarian disasters, further revolution and war.
We are facing the perfect economic storm, in which sacrificing long-term high performing income would guarantee poverty for the majority. Selling public assets amounts to economic suicide.
The sales related costs estimate of 3% or $180 million is probably a bit of the low side, but otherwise a very good read.
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
Photo by Alvan Nee on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
Buzz from the Beehive One minister is talking tough while a colleague – whose ministry had acted tough and drawn a barrage of flak – has shown an official softening. Some ministers are doing what Labour was good at, which is distributing public funds to causes regarded as worthy or ...
A ballot for 4 Member's Bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn: Insurance Contracts Bill (Duncan Webb) Income Tax (Clean Transport FBT Exclusion) Amendment Bill (Julie Anne Genter) Crimes (Increased Penalties for Slavery Offences) Amendment Bill (Greg Fleming) Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) ...
One of the strongest narratives about "our" spy agencies is that they are basically institutional traitors, working for foreign powers (or just themselves), without any control or oversight by the elected government. And today, we have yet another report from the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security which explicitly confirms this. ...
“It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April to meet the Prime Minister’s ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
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Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Hesp, Professor, Flinders University Patrick Hesp In some parts of Australia, coastal dunes are retreating from the ocean at an alarming rate, as waves carve up the beach and wind blows the sand inland. But coastal communities are largely ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Heemsbergen, Senior Lecturer, Digital, Political, Media, Deakin University With an impressive 60% of the US smartphone market, Apple is undeniably big, but not a clear monopoly. Yet, years of innovation by Apple have effectively given the company its own exclusive ...
Whether you’re facing layoffs or are just an emotional junior staffer, it’s always a good idea to scout out a good crying place before you need it. It’s an incredibly hard time for Wellington. Across the city, thousands of public servants are hearing tough news about redundancies and layoffs. Government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Miller-Jones, Professor, Curtin University Nuclear explosions on a neutron star feed its jets. Danielle Futselaar and Nathalie Degenaar, Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, CC BY-SA How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daryl Adair, Associate Professor of Sport Management, University of Technology Sydney Earlier this week, independent MP Andrew Wilkie accused the AFL of conducting “off the books” illicit drug testing to identify players using substances of abuse, then inappropriately withdrawing them from matches ...
The Government’s announcement that it will scrap plans for a vast marine sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands is ‘shameful’ and will make it impossible for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its international commitments, says the World Wide Fund for Nature ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Shutterstock The federal government has bowed to pressure from the car industry, announcing it will relax proposed emissions rules for utes and vans and delay enforcement of the new standards ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Rutland, Professor Emerita, University of Sydney In his latest book, Jewish Life in Medieval Spain, Jonathan Ray focuses on the tumult of the 14th century in Spain – a time of the plague, civil strife and war between the two largest ...
While creating a slate of world-class shows, Whakaata Māori also developed a generation of world-class creatives. Television is an odd word. It mixes the Ancient Greek and Latin languages, and its most literal meaning is “far-off sight”. In the contemporary and living language of te reo Māori, “whakaata” as a ...
Yesterday the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. This significant step and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza prompted an urgent debate in the New Zealand Parliament. Leader ...
The Government’s decision to reduce access to continuous glucose monitors (CGM) not only threatens the lives of children with type 1 diabetes and increases the potential for ‘Dead in Bed’ syndrome, but also threatens the health of their parents an ...
Apples are available year-round, but the wide variety on offer involves intensive scientific research – and large-scale commercialisation. What’s beautiful, red, sweet and crunchy? Tony Martin’s favourite kind of apple: Sassy. The CEO of apple and pear breeding organisation Prevar, Martin’s fondness for Sassy represents professional success as well as ...
Family violence specialist service Shine is calling on employers to stop asking for proof of domestic violence in order for employees to access domestic violence leave. The call comes five years after the introduction of the Domestic Violence ...
The Deputy Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is calling for public submissions on the Budget Policy Statement 2024. The Budget Policy Statement 2024 (BPS) sets out the Government's priorities for the 2024 Budget. It explains the approach ...
Brutal government spending cuts that will see the size of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples slashed by 40% will hit Pasifika communities hard, the PSA says. The Ministry has told staff that it is seeking voluntary redundancies, and to redeploy and reassign ...
I live with five people I mostly love, but our different ideas about generosity are starting to really irk me.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,This is a bit of a random one but here goes. I’m 22 and work an OK job (OK meaning I get paid ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maria Nicholas, Senior Lecturer in Language and Literacy Education, Deakin University Earlier this month, the New South Wales government announced it would roll out programs for gifted students in every public school in the state. This comes amid concerns gifted school ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Rudge, Law lecturer, University of Sydney Massachusetts General Hospital In a world first, we heard last week that US surgeons had transplanted a kidney from a gene-edited pig into a living human. News reports said the procedure was a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tombs, Howard Paterson Chair of Theology and Public Issues, University of Otago The 5th-century Maskell panel showing Jesus in a loincloth.British Museum, CC BY-NC-SA When Jesus is shown on the cross, he is almost always depicted wearing a loincloth around ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University Shutterstock When you think about a red object, you might picture a red carpet, or the massive ruby in the Queen’s crown. Indeed, Western monarchies and marketing from brands such ...
COMMENTARY:Jewish Voice for Peace The UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza on Monday — and for the first time since the beginning of the Israeli military’s genocide of Palestinians, the United States abstained rather than vetoing it. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, ...
Asia Pacific Report A New Zealand investigative journalist and author says the US spy system hosted by the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) appears to be a controversial intelligence system used in global capture-kill operations. Writing a commentary for RNZ News today, Nicky Hager, author of Secret Power, a 1996 ...
While Nicola Willis wouldn’t give any details on its size, she said a package of tax cuts is definitely still coming in this year’s budget, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the investigation into the Department of Internal Affairs after it was revealed that the Department’s Chief Executive personally reached out to expedite a DJs passport application. Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns ...
Finance minister Nicola Willis delivers her first budget statement, and unwittingly helps Joel MacManus save his relationship. Nicola Willis strode into the Beehive Theatrette. Around me, on the green foldout seats, were the country’s top business and political journalists. They were all here to see her announce the Budget Policy ...
Twenty years ago today, Māori Television launched after much controversy. Jamie Tahana looks back on its survival and impact across two decades. Chad Chambers stepped onto the stage, the brim of his cap casting a shadow across his face. His smile beamed as bright as his white freezing works gumboots, ...
Tauranga, Rotorua, Wellsford, Onehunga, Westhaven marina – Gavin Strawhan walks the meanish streets of New Zealand in his entertaining debut novel The Call, almost sure to roar into the number 1 position on the Nielsen bestseller chart, its front cover bearing a rave from somebody: “A really good and genuinely ...
On a Thursday in February, at Wellington’s Conservation House, the Conservation Authority, a statutory body advising the eponymous department and minister, Tama Potaka, opened its 195th meeting. Under consideration that afternoon was an agenda item written by Tim Bamford, chief advisor in the Department of Conservation’s biodiversity, heritage and visitors ...
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A lengthy response to the recently released draft Government policy statement on transport will soon be delivered from Auckland Council to Minister of Transport Simeon Brown. A submission raising concerns about funding distribution and the plan’s treatment of Auckland passed through the council’s transport committee on Wednesday, despite some councillors ...
The unidentified foreign intelligence operation discussed in a scathing report by New Zealand’s Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) last week appears to be a controversial United States intelligence system. The IGIS report said the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) decision to host a foreign system from 2012-2020 was “improper” ...
As a young gymnast, Aimee Didierjean was always conscious of making sure her underwear wasn’t showing on the competition floor. A peek of a bra strap, or briefs if a leotard rode up, would cost a gymnast points in her routines. “When I was growing and going through puberty, it ...
Jubi/West Papua Daily Repeated cases of Indonesian military (TNI) soldiers torturing civilians in Papua have been evident, as seen in the viral video depicting the torture of civilians in the Puncak Regency allegedly done by soldiers of Raider 300/Brajawijaya Infantry Battalion. There is a pressing need for stringent law enforcement ...
The introduction of charter schools is not a new Kiwi idea of course. (Our ministry of education seems to develop most of its recent policy from what it reads on the internet). However, given Banks’ and other government MP’s “faiths” and the utterances that these schools will be free to deliver their own curriculum, will our government insist that sound science is taught, as in the apparent ruling in the UK, and withdraw funding if otherwise …
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/jan/15/free-schools-creationism-intelligent-design
I don’t think that charter schools are necessarily evil except when being run exclusively as money-making corporate entities. In principle they aren’t that much different to experimental schools like Steiner or Montessori.
I somehow doubt it will ever get as bad as this, however:
http://www.salon.com/2012/01/13/americas_dangerously_removed_elite/singleton/
The herald editorial comments on Josy Pagani’s thoughts on what went wrong for Labour, especially:
That was probably the clincher for Labour’s lack of traction.
Which will mean same old another wasted three years in opposition.
If.
It will take a major change in attitude in the party and amongst it’s vocal supporters.
So Petey why did United Follicles not gain any traction? Whatsoever? Of any sort?
The parties have quite different problems.
One of United Future’s main problems was the public wasn’t very interested in listening to the party. That is partly due to a common problem experienced by small parties on coalition, and partly due to how the party presents itself. To an extent the party’s bubble has burst and needs to be re-established.
Labour’s problem was they weren’t good at listening to the public. Oblivious to outside reality inside it’s own bubble.
so why are you going on about labour instead of sorting out your own ambitions for your burstbubble party? things not going according to plan in dunners eh pete – occupypete a fizzer.
I go on about whatever I feel like on blogs. I think it’s important for New Zealand that Labour becomes a strong mostly positive government-in-waiting party.
Things are going very much to plan in Dunedin despite a few (only on blog) persistent negative attacks of no substance. Here the Labour MPs (and the Green and National MPs) are happy to talk and work co-operatively for the good of the city.
why was the question, why, when you can ‘go on about whatever you feel like on blogs’, are you going on about this issue – especially when you and your own party fared so poorly in the election. The blahblahgoodforNZblahblah is really weak and I think you have other motives – just like you had other motives with all the occupy stuff – how about fronting up for 2012 pete.
unbalanced follicles live in hope not having “to pay “the price of having more than one member
Seriously…did Josie Pagani use Labour’s extension of WFF to beneficiaries as an opening line when talking to working households that she door knocked.
Its what that quote makes it sound like. And if someone brought the topic up and she couldn’t explain to them convincingly why Labour had made that call (ie as a way to bolster families income above poverty during a time of high unemployment) …she shouldn’t be in PR or in politics.
Josie managed to substantially cut the majority in a blue ribbon rural Tory seat in an election that Labour lost heavily, CV. If I remember rightly, she and her team got the second best result of any electorate for the red team. I think that gives her more than enough credibility to speak about what worked and what didn’t, don’t you?
Yep, acting like a tory will get you votes in a tory area.
Pagani is beneficiary bashing and that is one way to get votes. But is that what Labour wants to stand for?
I
Where is Pagani bene bashing? Read the quote again, lefty, it’s the reaction of the working poor to the policy she is talking about and she does not bash beneficiaries in the least, nor condemn the policy itself.
spelling out that a policy of assisting beneficiary incomes is a sure vote loser is what then, in your view?
Except that isn’t what she said, CV. The problem Pagani is identifying is that Labour failed to win support for the policy among the working poor, not that the policy was wrong.
The circumstances here are substantially different to those previously: the move is a move to combate child poverty- is Pagani saying it is ok to have child poverty if you are on a benefit? Or that an improvement in child poverty is a hard sell? Annette King did a fine job on Q and A with that one.
Why is Labour continuing to talk itself down? Is a move to improve child poverty gloomy?
This seems some odd communication from Labour allowing the Herald to define their party as this:
” Labour’s natural constituency is those who need some help.”
which I strongly, strenously and harshly disagree with.
It is frustrating that Labour allows this to happen. The constituency is those who dislike inequality in society and recognise that it is the best way to deal with a raft of expensive social problems. It is the constituency that doesn’t think we need people in working poverty to make us successful.
or continue the meme that we have chronic welfare dependency problems:
“Labour should devise welfare programmes that are targeted to temporary need and help people become self-supporting.” (like the ones that helped Paula Bennett and have been cut? FFS.)
Labour has come out of the blocks in the new year talking about welfare reform. It allows the Herald to say:
“If it can tell people only that they are poor, deprived, under-valued, and obese, it will not give the Government a run for our money.”
Own goal. Not happy.
labour chose the wrong leader he only started making traction in the last month before the election after world cup and sucky msm non existent investigative journalism just overpaid glamorized reporters.
You know the New Year has started when the Herald does a concern troll editorial giving Labour ‘advice’.
lol
Labour need to expose the lie about welfare. Its a safety net not a holiday. Welfare is not there to support the low income, its there to support those in work, with a safety net, with disease control (meaning the poor children don’t give you kids disease), with clean street clear of bums (who are mentally ill), with lower prices because more people have access to Doctors, Dentists, etc and thus drive down the price by economies of scale. Essentially we have a welfare system because it supports the majority, its good economics. Sure when the world economy is run so damn badly then the numbers on unemployment will be too high but whose fault is that/ Parliament YES, crony capitalism, YES. The unemployed NO. Labour isn’t a party of the left because it buys into the big lie, that welfare is bad because the people on the benefit are evil. Simply the welfare system is how we become a much more efficient first world nation, instead of wasting generations who trawl the rubbish for a dollar to make ends meet. Just imagine that, some kid coming to your kids school whose mum and dad pick through the rubbish tip.
Welfare is also a em0loyment scheme, it keeps thousands in jobs, forces wages down, and even helps government load small business up with regulation tht protect you from poor food, poor working conditions, social discord, etc, etc.
Where welfare is a problem is at the top end of town.
“The hardest week to door- knock,” she said, “was when we were telling people who had just come home from a day’s work earning the minimum wage, that it was a great idea to extend their Working for Families tax credit to beneficiaries.” She could see them thinking, ‘so what’s the point of working my guts out all week while someone sitting at home on the dole gets the same tax credit as me?’
This is exactly what I thought would happen when I heard this policy. I support it for sure, but they were really incredibly stupid rolling it out the way they did. This was about the same time that they rolled out the eligibility changes for superannuation.
Up until that point we had seen Labour (and Goff as perferred PM) firming up and slowly rising in the polls, then after that point it appeared to slide back and went to the Greens, even though they had similar policies anyway. Probably it was really a combination of people thinking about Labour going back to National or NZFirst, while the Greens grabbed those that wanted more spine than Labour was showing.
IMO Labour just should have avoided the WFF stuff and not even mentioned it. National hardly had any policies to campaign on and not much in the way of details for the ones they did, so I don’t see why Labour thought they had to put absolutely everything on the table.
We’ll probably waste another decade before we get around to putting in a sorely needed CGT now. Unless there are significant economic disruptions in this current term that the left can put together the proposal again and win with it in 2014.
Funny how Pete George always support people who want Labour to remain National/ACT light.
Hasn’t he been reading about the failure of the last 30 years of policies of meanness and market dogma all around the world.
ACT/Labour was rejected in 1990 and National lite /Labour was rejected in 2008.
What is needed to get disaffected voters back is Labour/Labour. MIA since Norman Kirk.
Yes Labour/Labour was amazingly successful electorially post 1949 wasn’t it. In the 35 years between that date and 1984 how many years was Labour/Labour in power for?
goose labour got more votes than National in just about every election other than the 1951 election because of gerrymandering of boundaries by vested interests.
Luckily the likes of Kiwi Keith new the mandate he had was tenuous and was a relatively pragmatic leader.
It’s not “funny” at all – UF have always claimed to be centrist, though there may be some confusion over what they mean by that. And as NAct currently demonstrates, the parties that capture and stay in power are centrist – although it creeps me out no end that for the majority of the electorate “centrist” has crept that far to the right. If disaffected voters have crept to the right in order to stay centre, what on earth makes you think a “Labour/Labour” – by which I assume you mean hard left, is going to attract them back?
“Well, in our country,” said Alice, still panting a little, “you’d generally get to somewhere else — if you run very fast for a long time, as we’ve been doing.”
“A slow sort of country!” said the Queen. “Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”
Perhaps but you missed one point. The issue of participation.
As the latest election results show, a lot of people don’t give a rats ass about National or about Labour.
Roughly a million of them.
And each one of those million deserves a slap in the face for making the vote of all those who did count for less and effectively giving the NActs a mandate to do a whole bunch of stuff that the polls suggest they didn’t want to happen. So what DO they want? (though perhaps if they really are SO stupid as to not realise how important an election really is, maybe it would be better if they didn’t vote… Just joking)
The point is that a third of the population, or more, do not think that NACT or NACT lite(Labour) reflect their views or aspirations.
Many did vote. BUT. Not because they supported Labour or National, but simply for whichever one they thought was the lesser of 2 evils.
And of many other voters, their information was the Herald and TV, which, like our politicians, have totally abandoned any semblance of journalism to become unashamed pursuers of corporate crumbs from their puppetmasters…
I would suggest that a Labour, Labour would bring back many disaffected voters.
Well, I concede that it’s possible, but it also seems to me just as likely that a “Labour, Labour” party (and I would appreciate if you could define that a bit more clearly for me as there’s a big spectrum of Left there) might scare a big chunk of the less-committed centrist and more conservative elements of Labour running to the arms of that nice Mr Key. Again, I ask, what do the silent million want in terms of policy that they couldn’t find in any of the other “minor” (a word that really can’t be applied to the Greens anymore) parties – which again, KJT, is why I’d like you to more closely define this hypothetical “Labour, Labour” party. What do you think they want that no one else could give them?
People’s attitudes follow their behaviour which, in turn, follows the necessities of life imposed by broader social structures.
The political fight is over those structures.
The cynical approach (adopted by Roger Douglas) is that rapidly changing the structures within which people live their lives and then deflecting and disrupting resistance is the way to make ‘progress’ on a political agenda.
That is, it is based on the correct insight – as above – that people’s attitudes will conform once the pragmatics of their lives makes it necessary to change their attitudes in order to maintain some sort of cognitive and emotional comfort and coherence in their lives (in relation to what they find they have to do in order to survive).
A second approach is to stick to a straightforward attempt to persuade people that your agenda is best – for them and for society as a whole.
A third approach is simply to find out what people want and at least sound like that’s what you’re giving them. This is the approach of marketers. Like marketers, however, this usually descends into a softer, more surreptitious version of the first approach. I think this is Key’s approach.
For a number of reasons, I find the first and third approaches disreputable (which is why I also don’t like marketing – the pretence that one’s aim is to give people what they want when, in reality, your primary motive is to make your business profitable. While sometimes compatible, these goals inevitably diverge and, then, the primary motive asserts itself.).
I’m enough of a political pragmatist to compromise or concede on the occasional policy but I just can’t see the point in conceding on my analysis of the social and economic world in order to be more in tune with the ‘centre’.
The aim should be to convince the ‘centre’ (or anyone else) to shift towards your analysis. It should not be to shift your analysis – at least for any reason other than that you are convinced that your analysis is faulty.
Call me old-fashioned, but I can’t see the point of being politically active in order to institute something I don’t believe is true.
Pete wasn’t talking about his party he was talking about yours Greg. Another example of failing to listen.
+1
I read Steve Jobs biography over Christmas. It is a fascinating read. He is a complex character, obsessive, driven and flawed as a human being. Yet these qualities no doubt were instrumental in what he achieved.
His comments concerning Teacher Unions were eye opening.
Amongst other things he said that America’s education system was being “crippled by union work rules”. He also said “[u]ntil the teachers’ unions were broken, there was almost no hope for education reform.” Jobs proposed allowing principals to hire and fire teachers based on merit, that schools stay open until 6 p.m. and that they be open 11 months a year. These ideas and the teacher union bashing that accompanies them are percolating throughout the Western World.
I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union. But these American ideas are so clearly being applied to the New Zealand situation despite the clear differences.
It is really weird that we should be told that we need to follow trends in a country where the direction its education system is heading is clearly wrong. As was noted previously by Salsy we should look to Finland for where we should be taking out system.
“I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union.”
Considering last week a whole bunch of leftist posters here basically stated that teachers should indoctrinate children in leftist ideology I don’t think it is too hard to work that one out.
Not indoctrinate – merely teach the truth and how to think. That’s all that’s needed. That alone will bring people to the left as it highlights the delusion of the right.
Whatever DTB. But thanks for highlighting exactly why right wingers are wary of teacher unions. People who believe that there is a ‘correct’ way to think are potentially very dangerous.
Gosman, if anything turns me off from listening to another point of view (yours) it is the use of ‘whatever’ as a response as it indicates to me shallow, unconsidered and dismissive attitudes.
Draco didn’t say anything about a correct way to think, Gos.
Fascinating though. It’s almost always the borderline illiterate fucks like yourself with no comprehension skills who think education is the enemy.
That is correct. I am extrapolating that he meant the correct way to think because teachers already teach children to think. Unless you think teachers in NZ are failing in this pretty basic piece of the learning process Felix. Do you really think NZ teachers are that incompetent that NZ children are not being taught to think?
That’s not extrapolating, it’s a total rewrite. He didn’t say anything of the sort.
Exposes your own views on thinking rather nicely though.
Nicely avoiding the uncomfortable question there felix. So you disagree with the view that kids aren’t being taught to think in school at the moment do you?
I reject your inference entirely and have no time or inclination to argue about what you wish Draco had said.
With 1 child in Primary and 1 in intermediate, my opinion is yes Gosman, they are being failed in this fundamental way. Their teachers are all hard working and well meaning, but to teach critical thinking is not their mandate.
Do you really think NZ teachers are that incompetent that NZ children are not being taught to think?
Around 49% of the electorate have indicated that this is indeed the case. Fool me once, and all that.
So Nz teachers are incompetent in your view Mcflock are they? They are failing to teach a large proportion of the population to think. Hmmmmm…. I wonder if the Labour party will take up the challenge and bring this national shame to light.
lol. You are too easy.
There’s a difference between teaching people to think and wrote learning. NAct seem to want to go back to wrote learning style of the 19th century whereas modern teachers want to teach people to think. Interestingly enough, it’s NAct and their supporters who are complaining about teachers and how they teach.
So you are now stating that teacher ARE teaching children to think are you? Well then no problem then. I’m sure within a very short period of time the schools will be churning out your socially conscious little comrades by the bucketful. I don’t know what you are worried about.
By the way who on the right is pushing for rote learning? I have yet to read or hear anyone on the right recently argue that we should change our education system to one involving rote learning. Perhaps you have some link to a right leaning educationalist in NZ who makes the case?
It’s called NACT standards, Gosman.
Testing, testing and more testing as required by National Standards which, due to then penalising teachers if they don’t teach to the test, results in rote learning.
Hi DTB – Your mind was thinking rote but your fingers wrote wrote.
Yeah, sometimes I just want to strangle the English language 👿
No, he didn’t specifically say “anything about a correct way to think” but there are bizarre implications in what he said.
Coercing how to think based on left = truth sounds like religious (or political) fundamentalism rather than education. If our schools were based on those sorts of delusions it would be dangerous.
Bricks in the wall with the right and centre knocked off sounds a bit thick.
“Coercing how to think based on left = truth sounds like religious (or political) fundamentalism rather than education.”
And why do you bring that up, Pete? Draco certainly didn’t.
These bizarre interpretations of a very straightforward statement are saying a lot more about you and Gos than anything else. Quite enlightening.
So are you statng that teachers are currently failing in their role of teaching children how to think?
Only someone who never learned to think would make such an inference.
So why does DTB want teachers to teach children to think if they are already doing so. It would be like wanting my butcher to sell meat. Kind of pointless as that is what they already do.
Not really interested in your misinterpretations Gos, doesn’t seem like anyone else is either.
I wonder if 2012 will be the year that people on blogs stop taking idiots seriously.
Everyone learns to think.
There seems to be confusion over trying to teach children what to think or how to develop their thinking.
For example, should a teacher try and teach children “left good, right bad”, or should they help them develop critial thinking so they can make up their own minds?
It looks like DtB prefers trying to train everyone to be left clones, or expecting everyone will naturally become left clones if they are taught what he thinks as ‘truth’.
Nobody has said anything about teaching kids what to think.
The fact the you and Gos immediately inferred that speaks volumes.
Pete, it’s the right who are coercing the teaching model and the model that they’re coercing is a model which fails to teach people to think. Instead it teaches people to believe what they’re told and not to ask questions.
Are you insinuating those on the right, like UF, are as thick as a brick, by any chance.
Didn’t say anything about a correct way to think. What I said was that there is truth and there is what RWNJs believe. The two are completely different, the first is fact and the second is delusion.
Actually you stated the following “…teach the truth and how to think”.
So does this mean you think Teachers are currently failing to teach children to think?
No, just that that is what the teachers need to do.
Any proposed changes, such as National Standards and charter schools (run by any religious nutjob group), that make it difficult for teachers to teach children to think should be rejected on that basis.
Seems pretty obvious. Then again maybe I was taught to think.
You think?
“…teach the truth and how to think”
Gosman, have you ever tried to ‘think’ without any content? It’s hard to do one without the other.
The whole point of ‘thinking’ (that common or garden word covers a huge range of cognitive activity – both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ thinking) is surely to provide a reasonable guide to action. Action – in a real world – requires some sense of what can be relied upon. That is, it requires some sense of what is ‘true’.
Of course, ‘truth’ is not necessarily forever but it amounts to what any ‘thinking person’ – who is able to put such truths to the test of thought and action – would go along with.
I’m not sure how you expect teachers to teach ‘thinking’ without also including a few ‘truths’ to think with. BTW, teaching thinking is not just teaching formal logic or some method of thought. All methods – even logic – come along with assumptions about what is true.
Without worrying about the difference between logical ‘truth’ and empirical ‘truth’, I think it’s safe to say that thinking requires some idea of what is true.
DTB’s point was that if you teach the truths from the relevant disciplines you’ll detect that it is more likely to conform to a general ‘left’ analysis (e.g., that those with power and wealth tend to distort social and economic systems in their favour). Presumably he’s thinking about the social and economic worlds here, and the relevant knowledge in those areas.
Interestingly, it is because of this perceived ‘left’ bias in the humanities and social sciences that many on the right complain about just these disciplines, often concocting conspiracy theories – The History Man notwithstanding – about them and the knowledge they generate (while blessing their cotton socks for the discipline of economics which is often touted – incorrectly – as the only truly empirical social science).
Finally,
“People who believe that there is a ‘correct’ way to think are potentially very dangerous”
(I presume, here, that you don’t actually mean ‘way’ – ie, method – but, rather, something like ‘thought’ or ‘thoughts’.)
People who believe there is no ‘correct’ way to think are also potentially dangerous – and simplistically misunderstand the normative notion of ‘correct’.
I’m not going to call you names, Gosman, but I interpreted that as “how to think critically”, not what to think. Any unbalanced ideological indoctrination at the school level is a fairly unpleasant prospect, but I do notice that more often than not the people who gravitate to the higher levels of academia are of a leftish bent – largely because those of a rightish bent would rather be out in the corporate sector.
gooseman the only thinking the right want brainless consumerism, read Vaclav Havel.
MSM just pump out drivel that makes the ads look good
As usual you didn’t understand that discussion at all Gos.
It was about nothing of the sort.
What rot. You just need to read DTB’s reply above to see that he at least thinks people just need to be taught to think in the correct manner and they will suddenly have their eye’s opened to the wonders of the leftist world view.
Then you didn’t understand Draco’s comment above either.
No, I just don’t buy into the leftist spin and intellectual arrogance that is behind the statement,
Care to explain the reasoning for the view that children who are taught to think are going to be lefties?
Why bother? If you can’t show that you understood the comment then there’s nothing to debate.
Because most tories I’ve encountered have been fucking morons.
So how come it is generally the lefties who resort to infantile name calling like you have just done Mcflock? Or is this really an example of your superior intellect whereby you don’t need to debate at all as your views are so obviously correct therefore leaving more time for mindless abuse of those who dare to express differing opinions?
Two reasons: Firstly, the complete failure and/or intractable unwillingness of folk like yourself to understand basic logic makes logical arguments futile. Secondly, I was just calling it how I saw it.
Please elucidate for me then. How about we use DTB’s argument that teachers should teach children to think as an example? Now to me logically this means that they are failing to teach children to think at the moment. Is that not the logical inference from that position. If not, then what is the logical inference about our current teaching system?
“Now to me logically this means that they are failing to teach children to think at the moment.”
Which beautifully illustrates McF’s characterisation of you and your ilk being incapable of understanding logic.
How so felix?
So far the only answer from DTB is that he does now think they are being taught to think at the moment. Yet if that is the case then there is no indication that I know of that the children are much more likely to be left leaning. Certainly the proportion of left and right voters has not been steadily being skewed in favour of the left over the last few decades. They can’t be doing their job very well if that is the case.
That probably follows logically from any number of your assumptions, but as you’ve misunderstood the entire discussion from the outset it’s neither here nor there to anyone else.
You: “[quoting mickeysavage]“I have never understood why the right such as Slater should be so vehemently anti teacher union.”
Considering last week a whole bunch of leftist posters here basically stated that teachers should indoctrinate children in leftist ideology I don’t think it is too hard to work that one out.”
DTB: “Not indoctrinate – merely teach the truth and how to think. That’s all that’s needed. That alone will bring people to the left as it highlights the delusion of the right.”
So DTB’s statement is that “[teachers should ] merely teach the truth and how to think. That’s all that’s needed. That alone will bring people to the left as it highlights the delusion of the right.”
Is the left vote 0%? Are teachers 100% unionised? Are 100% of children taught by teachers? Is critical thinking a core component of the curriculum that all children have to achieve adequate skill in?
You go from a philosophical “should” to a generalised ” logically this means that they are failing to teach children to think at the moment.”.
Some teachers do fail – this is a fact. “They” as a group do not.
Most schoolchildren are not voters. Therefore evidence of a prior failure by some teachers (possibly as a result of systemic issues rather than individual shortcomings), i.e. Key’s election, does not logically imply a current failure.
By not recognising any of this, you reveal that you were failed by your teacher. Which tends to support the proposition that you, a regular tory advocate, lack critical thinking skills. As do a number of your compatriots, generally a higher percentage from what I can see than the left.
The left has nutty or stupid commenters here as well, but there are few of them and many commenters. There are fewer tory commenters here, yes, but many more of them as a proportion are nutty or stupid.
A society needs ideological and philosophical underpinnings. You teach them to your children directly, explicitly and consciously – or you leave it blank and wait for individualistic, commercial and political interests to fill their heads with crap.
What , as opposed to being a judgemental nasty little person, nice one McFlunk
Oh that’s barely the start of my character flaws. But regularly confusing “wishful thinking caused by personal bigotry” and “logical inference” isn’t one of them.
No, I just don’t buy into the leftist spin and intellectual arrogance that is behind the statement, Words of Gosman
Obviously from reading your regular gurgles you like the rightist spin and intellectual arrogance that accompanies it. What DTB is for is the ability to take an overview not trample education underfoot by contesters who might as well be on the opposing sides of a boxing ring.
mickysavage
Slater hates anybody who doesn’t share his bigotries. Yesterday he was bullying a sixteen year old girl, Jazmine Heka for wanting an end to child poverty. What a scumbag!
I saw that Jackel and I shook my head in awe.
Hopefully Slater is converting Jazmine into a hardened dedicated leftie through his complete lack of compassion or understanding.
If anyone would like to sign Jazmine’s petitions they are here. The themes are simple but clear. They have three simple idealistic goals which if achieved would go a long way to solving problems associateed with childhood poverty. The petitions wants the Government to:
1. Provide free healthcare for all children including prescription costs.
2. Introduce warrant of fitness’s for all rental houses.
3. Provide free healthy school lunches to all children attending schools.
There is also a facebook group “Children against Poverty“.
Perhaps the Standard could think about running a post supporting the petitions?
Cheap Chinese labour imported and paid less than the minimum wage
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10778932
New Zealand employers use similar tactics bonded labour farm workers.
Isolated farm workers are promised the earth free Accommodation, free meat,free milk, good income. a salary of $50,000 per annum. then they are made to work unholy hours one young fellow newly married working in Nth Canterbury made to from 3 am till 8 pm every day 1 day off a fortnight.No free meat no free milk no compensation for hours worked outside the 45 hours per week contracted this is common as in the dairy industry.
i see paganis’ exhortations for a continuation of that rightwing divide and rule (against the poor) experiment of the last decades…
..has been endorsed by both the herald..(in an editorial no less..)..and by farrar…
..(dosen’t that tell you something..?.)
..and a reality check on that inclusion of the poorest families in working for families policy from labour..
..it was promised ‘by 2018’…
..that’s about eight years away…
..and those two facts..the policy..and the timeframe..
..taken together..
…must make it eligible for an award of sorts..?
..surely…!
phil(whoar.co.nz)
..
(ahem,..!..basic math-fail..make that ‘six years away’..)
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Righthaven is a schmuck!
Frivolous litigation is the scourge of the United States, with some firms founded entirely on the destructive practice. Righthaven is one such lawsuit factory…
Okay then I am not one of these people who glare at other people’s kids in public when they are making a disturbance, in fact I hate those people who do that, having got younger relatives who get a bit crazy (like all kids) I wont judge someone else kids if they are misbehaving, in saying that their has to be a limit, and there has to be a time when a parent/caregiver starts to take control. I think kids should be able to be kids in public, even have meltdowns, or just generally act stupid.
Its the parents reaction that gets to me.
For example I was in this cafe, having a quiet meal, (the cafe was a normal run of the mill cafe, not way over the top posh, but it was nice) A mother had a couple of children there,
the oldest was probably nine the youngest around six or seven.
Well the kids started running around, the youngest had a toy car which he liked to bang on other peoples tables, while the oldest, screamed “lets play tag” they were hiding behind myself and other people at this cafe, behind the chairs etc etc, laughing, bumping into people, well the cafe manager came out and gave them a look that said “dont do that”
Well the mother was beside herself, she stood up and screamed “Dont have fun kids, remember dont have fun, your not allowed to laugh or be happy” then she started cracking up and giving people dirty looks while still saying “Oh your having to much fun, the police are going to come now” The lady she was with was cheering her on.
Like I said, Kids should be allowed to be kids, but was this too over the top, or am I being grumpy???? The place wasnt fastfood, it was a nice cafe, not sandwiches but meals.
Some people have no idea how to raise children.
If I was the cafe owner, I would have told the stupid bitch to fuck off and banned her from the premises.
I feel you there Brett(s). I’ve got a bit of a rep with some of the parents around town as being a grumpy bastard who doesn’t like kids, but nothing could be further from the truth.
It’s the parents who piss me off, the ones who think their little darlings are too special to have boundaries. Most of the kids I like just fine.
No, IMO you are, for perhaps the first time that I have ever seen, perfectly correct… 🙂
I’ve been in similar circumstances myself. Either me or my wife (usually her) will firmly tell such children to be considerate – the parents usually look shocked or embarrassed.
Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but I put it down to the overweening love affair modern society has with ‘privacy’, individualism and ‘property rights’. Parents seem to think that any reprimand from another adult, in public, of their children is some sort of invasion of their (the parents’) ‘privacy’ (now that is ironic) and ‘property rights’, insofar as they see children as their possessions.
For me, reprimanding these children is less about some poe-faced moralistic castigation as it is about giving children the respect to believe that they are ‘persons in process’ and need to be socialised. The kids often respond well – better than the parents.
I think the irritation other adults often feel in the presence of unruly children stems from the perception that the parents will get all indignant at ‘strangers’ telling their children what they should be doing.
Children should be able to express themselves in lively ways, and places such as cafes (and their patrons) should accept that. But, that expressiveness also needs to be challenged (not completely squashed) when it goes too far.
I think that, these days, there isn’t enough civilised argie-bargie between people in public places. We shouldn’t just silently keep our thoughts to ourselves and then bitch about others later. We should engage – civilly – at the time. Especially when it comes to socialising children.
Then, if we overstep the mark and reprimand a child unnecessarily or too harshly other adults can also step in and challenge us.
This is how we learn to get along – and live out our social nature.
Quite right – NZers internalise way too many things without expressing them in assertive yet productive and well intentioned ways. From this kids in a cafe scenario to be badly treated by a customer services rep on the phone or in a store.
Are we that afraid of meaningful communication and confrontation (your “meaningful argie bargy”)?
shit yeah and then gone round and nuked her house and spayed all her relatives.
mate and thats just for starters.
Seriously? Was I right just to say nothing? Was the mothers reaction okay?
Insofar as people can say what they want, yes. Personally I would have thought that a little bit of respect for people’s personal space was in order, though.
But then I’m a fascist prick at heart, so need to consciously moderate my more totalitarian impulses 😉
Ask Pete George or Gosman, I’m sure they will explain that the mother is a DPB bludger getting overpaid and needs to sent into poverty big time as punishment.
There does seem to be a generation of mothers with a very strong sense of entitlement (dare I mention militant breast feeders as well?), but instinct tells me that you can’t really do anything unless (1) the child is about to hurt themselves, someone else, or property – and you have to act in loco parentis because mummy in question is some borderline narcissistic personality disorder for whom her children are an autonomous accessory of only limited interest, or (2) the kiddiwink in question is actually invading your space and interracting with you directly (chair kickers and other monsters etc).
Fender:
She seemed quite well off, Not sure if she was on the DPB, all I know is that she didnt give a fuck about the people around her, or the business owner.
It’s quite common to see kids of the “quite well off” running riot as mummy and daddy teach them they own the world, and a select few will soon enough too.
I’m not entirely sure that this is a class issue, to the extent that it is an issue at all. I certainly don’t believe Brett was making that point. God knows I disagree with him enough, but the fact is that teaching kids a bit of consideration for other people is not out of order – especially as he isn’t talking about toddlers in this instance.
Tell you what. I know a few old fashioned Tories raising their children. Very methodical and very disciplined. End result – good kids with manners who know which end is up and which end is down, know how to manage their own bank accounts and know to avoid credit cards. The ones off farms can be immensely practical. As in, know how to lift engines out of old Holdens practical.
The other kind of Tory parents with more money than sense, and who think that spoiling little Johnny with expensive gifts will somehow make up for their guilt in not spending quality time and attention supervising him, not so much.
One of the few times I agree totally with everything you say. 🙂
Methyl iodide challenged
Methyl iodide is a pesticide that is sometimes used for fumigating soil before planting. In june 2010, the Environmental Risk Management Authority (ERMA) approved an application to import and manufacture Ripper, which contains methyl iodide, for the use in the strawberry industry. ERMA appears to have ignored various peer reviewed studies in making that decision.
The problem is that methyl iodide was initially misclassified by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation. It’s classification is now being questioned in a court of law, and it’s likely the legal challenge will win…
Saving the Rich, Losing the economy
In Europe, as in the US, the driver of economic policy quickly became saving the private banks from losses on their portfolios. A deal was struck with the socialist government of Greece, which represented the banks and not the Greek people. The ECB would violate its charter and together with the IMF, which would also violate its charter, would lend enough money to the Greek government to avoid default on its sovereign bonds to the private banks that had purchased the bonds. In return for the ECB and IMF loans and in order to raise the money to repay them, the Greek government had to agree to sell to private investors the national lottery, Greece’s ports and municipal water systems, a string of islands that are a national preserve, and in addition to impose a brutal austerity on the Greek people by lowering wages, cutting social benefits and pensions, raising taxes, and laying off or firing government workers.
In other words, the Greek population is to be sacrificed to a small handful of foreign banks in Germany, France and the Netherlands. The Greek people, unlike “their” socialist government, did not regard this as a good deal. They have been in the streets ever since.
Jean-Claude Trichet, head of the ECB, said that the austerity imposed on Greece was a first step. If Greece did not deliver on the deal, the next step was for the EU to take over Greece’s political sovereignty, make its budget, decide its taxation, decide its expenditures and from this process squeeze out enough from Greeks to repay the ECB and IMF for lending Greece the money to pay the private banks.
In other words, Europe under the EU and Jean-Claude Trichet is a return to the most extreme form of feudalism in which a handful of rich are pampered at the expense of everyone else.
This is what economic policy in the West has become–a tool of the wealthy used to enrich themselves by spreading poverty among the rest of the population.
The Greeks can still default if they want. They will just be kicked out of the Euro and get no significant further cash to support their leftist policies. That is how Merkel and Sarkozy managed to reign in the previous Greek PM when he stated the austerity meassures would be subject to a referendum. They basically told him it was either Austerity or no money and no Euro. The Greeks seem to want to still get bail out money and be part of the Euro but without austerity. It isn’t happening.
Goose head the Greek economy is “spiroling”down the gurgler Austerity equals smaller economy less money to pay bills,Greek migration is huge leaving even less people to pick up the tab.
Greece under neo liberal austerity is fucked no possible cure.
Thats why Merkel and Sarkosy want a financial transaction tax to keep the fraudulent banks a float that lent these countries all this money fully knowing that they would default.
If Greece pulls out of the Euro it has many more options like devaluing, printing money, raising taxes on the rich etc.
German Swiss and French banks would go bankrupt doing more damage to the rest of Europe .
Its not a leftist policy to not pay tax at all like a lot of Greek tycoons do, now thats why they are based their corrupting officials to get their way right wing fascists more like it.
Greece is being forced to buy tens of millions in armaments from Germany and other countries as part of its bail out deal.
i.e. repatriating money leant from EU countries to back to those same EU countries in exchange for pointless munitions and more indebtedness. Greece is screwed.
Edit – I stand corrected. Its BILLIONS in weapon systems that Greece is buying. Austerity for you, Eurofighters for us!!!
http://www.presseurop.eu/en/content/article/1383501-greece-still-splashes-out-billions-defence
Yet the Greek government still wants to be part of the Eurozone and still wants the bail out billions. Perhaps if they hadn’t got themselves into such a mess in the first place then they wouldn’t be in such a exploitable position as they are in now. Instead of having a bloated and over paid civil service and people retiring at 55 as well as paying no taxes they could have instead been more productive and law abiding and would be lending money to places like Italy and Spain rather than needing it from places like France and Germany.
nah what we have here is a Bankster Occupation.
The Greek Govt doesn’t actually work on behalf of the Greek people any more. Just on behalf of French and German banks.
Yet the Greeks on the whole aren’t calling for Greece to leave the Eurozone. Why is this CV?
Your statement is false.
Greece, if I’ve been reading it right, still expect the EU to get rid of the corruption that is endemic to their political system. It’s that corruption that caused Greek spending and it’s only the Greeks that can get rid of it. The banksters, being also corrupt, are using that corruption to give themselves Greek assets so that they get a permanent rentier income.
BS goose head Obviously you haven’t been watching the riots happening in Athens.
According to overseas reports I’ve been reading Greece is becoming a tinder box for revolt.
i.e, Arab spring I Predict full scale riots to come until Greece leaves the euro.
The Goldman Sachs finance minister want them to stay in the Euro while all Greek govt assets are stripped at fire sale prices.
Greece does provide an interesting case study for those who argue that having a low retirement age reduces unemployment especially amongst the young though.
On Europe.. 4 Gosman – But your a banker aren’t you Gos, so you’ll likely be more inclined towards Goldman Sacs narrative.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/05/no-its-not-the-welfare-state/
http://blogs.ft.com/martin-wolf-exchange/2011/12/28/what-has-the-ecb-done-in-the-crisis-the-role-of-target-balances/#axzz1jaQjoyya
http://blogs.ft.com/martin-wolf-exchange/2012/01/09/the-delicate-balance-of-fixing-the-eurozone/#axzz1jaQjoyya
And on Spanish & Italian debt before Wall St destroyed the global economy.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/02/profligate-zombies/
“Before the crisis Spain had low and declining debt. Italy had high debt inherited from the past, but it was steadily working that debt down relative to GDP. Neither country was being profligate — that’s just not what happened. Since the crisis debt has been rising relative to GDP, but that’s what happens when you have an economic crisis.
Yes, Greece. But Greece is now a tiny part of this story. As I said in today’s column, Greece (GDP of about $300 billion) is roughly Greater Miami ($270 billion). Italy and Spain are the big stories, and they were not, repeat not, fiscally profligate.”
Maybe it’s Germany who should and will leave the Euro..
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/german-anger-finally-coming-boil-even-local-ceos-say-time-exit-euro-may-have-arrived
“i.e. repatriating money leant from EU countries to back to those same EU countries in exchange for pointless munitions and more indebtedness.”
Not pointless. I am sure the armaments are going to be very handy for suppressing all the riots!! 🙂
Have the Greeks used fighter jets in suppressing the austerity protests previously? Has any Westernised country used fighter jets in this way in the past few decades?
Slippery Gos. “Armaments” is not restricted to “fighter jets”. Those are for if friction with Turkey flares up again.
The helicopter gunships will be particularly useful in riot control. Their camera systems alone will be useful. The cannon will be just a bonus. As will the tanks. And some westernised countries love to use heavy artillery in civilian built up areas – just not their own.
Your question and its phrasing reflects a very narrow perspective.
It also makes the rather stupid assumption that prior events can predict future events.
Fighter jets can be used to suppress populations of civilians, armed or unarmed, for any reason, political, social or economic.
That’s what western fighter jets did in Libya, that’s what they do in Afghanistan.
Now they are using (currently still unarmed) Predator drones and other formerly military UAVs in civilian law enforcement on US citizens in the US.
Those drones can be armed with Hellfire II missiles at any time, just like the military ones can.
I guess thats why a no fly zone is being called for over Syria at the moment.
Called for by whom, though?
The fact that Syria is currently crawling with Russian military personnel, and Russia and China would veto any UN resolution supporting a no fly zone hugely complicates US/NATO plans.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/russia-warns-of-syrian-nofly-zone-claim-6288966.html
“Called for by whom, though?”
That would be the Syrian opposition.
I agree that the international response to the suggestion is cool at best. However, it simply reinforces the point that aircraft are being used to suppress protest, which explains why the Syrian opposition wants a no fly zone.
TinTin just got a golden globe!
Lunch with John Key
During his long summer hiatus in Hawaii, John Key has had an epiphany and decided to cast off his teflon coated suit along with other trappings of power and showmanship like his toupee…
Devilish eyes noted!
I was just reading Key’s entry in Wikipedia – I knew his mother was an Austrian-Jew (and therefore might be expected to know something about suffering, oppression and marginalisation), but apparently his English father fought in the Spanish Civil War – one assumes not on the Fascist side. How the hell did they produce Johnny?
that can’t be right can it? It would mean that Key’s father was born pre WWI.
Granny Herald would appear to be the source http://www.nzherald.co.nz/john-key-the-unauthorised-biography/news/article.cfm?c_id=1502247&objectid=10522313 Draw your own conclusions.
his toupee must be on holiday to
Maybe it’s the toupee that’s running things.
The Italian ship which ran into rocks and went down might have taken the wrong side of an island to get closer to the scenic shore. It sounds like the Mikhail Lermontov episode here, for the same reason.
paula beenit says the green paper will solve the mystery of infanticide in New Zealand.
there have been “160” submissions already.
most of those will be opinions.
by my count there are at least 6 universities in new zealand.
if they graduate 10 anthropolgy students per year then that is 60 qualified people that could be undertaking a proper scientific study instead of the usual bumble that we are getting now.
oh I forgot.
you would have to pay them but opinions are free.
We don’t need anthropology students we need social science/social work/psychology post grads contributing.
Although its pretty simple the answers around living conditions, poverty, substance abuse, anger management, parenting skills etc are already all very well known, its simply a case of operationalising them. Bennett is just wasting time with some kind of “need more research” bullshit.
CV Its just another excuse for doing nothing need more research
1987 ropa report on behalf of Roger Douglas
Poverty main causes of child poverty and violence toward children and why so many poor people end up in jail.
Poor housing
Poor access to health care
long term unemployment refer to two lines above
Failed to report
Being a relatively small Island nation in the Pacific means we’re somewhat isolated from what happens in the rest of the world. But that’s no excuse for New Zealand’s mainstream media ignoring many important stories.
Clearly they’re underreporting on many relevant topics. So in light of this censorship… here’s a small sample of the stories that we don’t get to see here in gods own…
Lewis Verduyn – NZ Asset Sales Policy Began On Wall Street:
The sales related costs estimate of 3% or $180 million is probably a bit of the low side, but otherwise a very good read.