Jenny I agree this is a great thing for Fonterra to be going ahead with, I’ve known about their plans for a little while and believe what they have in mind will be a real benefit to schools, children and the community in general.
But to suggest that the government legislate that they have to do it is really bizarre.
higherstandard
Kia ora H.S. The following Labour Party news release is why Fonterra’s decision to provide free milk to primary schools, (that is, if it is to be more than just another short term anarchic public relatations stunt), must be regulated.
If this initiative is needed, (and it is), and it really makes a difference, (which it could), then it must be taken out of sphere of charity giving, which can be removed at any time at the whim of the donor.
The decision by Countdown to cancel its support for the Red Cross Breakfast in Schools programme is devastating news for vulnerable children whose parents are struggling to put food on the table.
“The programme depends on the sponsorship from Countdown to provide a basic breakfast of toast, hot drinks, milk and cereal to children attending 61 schools. It’s been a real lifeline for many families and has made an enormous difference to the lives of vulnerable children since its inception four years ago.”
Annette King, Labour Party Social Policy Spokesperson
Jenny I note that nowhere in that release does Annette suggest that countdown should be legislatively compelled to do anything.
I also find it disheartening that the day before NZs largest company announces a plan to supply milk free of charge for all primary school children in NZ that all many on this site can do is moan and bleat.
HS I would prefer the children of the poor received a proper breakfast than all children were given some free milk. And the “gesture” is funded by exorbitant prices charged by Fonterra. In the land of milk and honey something is so wrong that it should cost so much.
Still moaning and bleating about all and sundry Greg, take a big breath and suggest how all children receive a proper breakfast and in the meantime find it in your retarded activist brain to acknowledge that free milk in all primary schools is a good thing.
Tell you what here’s another few things I would like to see in relation to NZs children
1. 100% vaccination
2. A decline in the sickening child abuse stats
Probably for long enough that they get the best PR for the expense, but when it becomes just expense then the generosity ceases as well. Long term welfare programmes are unsung. Companies are not suited for the task.
You forgot to add that Westpac are giving payback for all the government banking business they receive and McDonald’s actually contribute more to the ill health of children via obesity and also only fund Ronald McDonald house, the accommodation for the parents. Most other civilised countries actually have inbuilt parental accommodation, without the need for a burger bar in the entry to the national childrens hospital!
Our family has been in the unfortunate position of having to rely on Ronald McDonald House for quite some time. I fully appreciate the facilities, and work put in by the wonderful volunteers. But MacDonalds doesn’t provide the service – volunteers do – the company just has naming rights for collecting the money. And in a sense it’s easy money because sick kids tug the heart strings. I’d love to see companies provide for the hard stuff – women’s refuges for instance, and leave essential health services* to the health system.
*Because the health system does not provide for rare, complex conditions outside of large urban centres this accommodation is essential and should be part of the health service IMO.
What, like the rescue helicopter (Westpac) , surf lifesaving (DHL) and the childrens hospital (MacDonalds) ?
All largely funded by public donation! Countdown was promoting surf lifesaving a few weeks back, at the same time as frontliners were outside our local, begging for $$ for the same charity!
higherstandard, noblesse oblige from an elite is not the way to solve social and economic issues (such as malnourished children) in a democratic society.
In feudal times, it is true that noblesse oblige provided some minimal relief but it always came with some pretty strong strings attached.
Corporate sponsorship is just updated feudal charity. And ‘noblesse oblige‘ is now just ‘corporate social responsibility‘.
I would legislate for that as we have a duopoly in the grocery sector and they are maximizing their profits at the expense of the connedsumer .England has far more competition in the food sector that’s why our lamb costs half the price it does here.
The free market is a wonderful thing when their is true competition but in many countries it has to be regulated to stop price gouging New Zealands Commerce Commission is a joke!
well woolworths online has racks of lamb at $31kg while Tescos UK has racks at about $43kg. Legs are about the same, chops about the same, steaks about $32 in the UK v $25 in NZ. Lamb’s seasonality maybe makes it not quite as simple as you think
“…The public affairs manager for Countdown owner Progressive Enterprises, Luke Schepen, said the chain stopped sponsoring the Red Cross programme at the end of last year “following a review of our community initiatives”.
“Our team has a terrific passion for supporting the communities we serve and this has not changed. We are currently exploring new opportunities to invest in initiatives that will benefit both our communities and our business,” he said.
He declined to comment on the contract with MasterChef, which was “an advertising sponsorship”.
Food and Grocery Council chief executive Katherine Rich said food companies were considering a coordinated national programme to supply foodbanks and breakfast programmes modelled on Foodbank Australia, which distributes food to welfare agencies feeding the hungry.
For once, Shelley Bridgeman’s experience is relevent to her story. Just like, say 100% vaccination, the free market doesn’t care about disease in children, or poverty. It wants profit, money for doing not much, and influence in our culture – whether that is a government subsidy or some long term brand recognition. Then when you work your way out to something like, say, “reducing child abuse stats”, the cultural influence become institutionalised racism, or to put it another way cultural war. Cultural war? Why that’s preposterous! All we want is for maori and immigrants to give up their gods and families obligations and traditions and come be a part of our aspirational ladder giving full deference to our values and culture and boosting our production and profit. They’ll be rich… well, umm, ok they’ll be allowed to compete among themselves for below living wages. But it’s not cultural war. Honest. And some will make it, for sure, after my son of course, and his children, and once I have a new house in Noosa.
But let’s get back to feeding starved kids. Poor children should not be fed, the right say, if rich children do not recieve the same food. Why? Because, one law for all. It wouldn’t be fair. But the real mentality is that to get ahead you need to take from someone, and if you aren’t taking or getting from someone, or worse, doing something for it’s own end, you are falling behind. It doesn’t matter if the rich kids on-sell their unneeded milk – they say – turn it into cheese and export it at a profit or waste it by tipping it on the ground. That is just the invisible hand, the free market. They could offer it to the poor children but that wouldn’t be right. They’d be falling behind. So the government would end up subsidising a theoretical rich child’s export cheese business. But that’s ok because it was “fair”. The rich kids had no advantage – except they weren’t hungry to start with and their parents weren’t exporters. The poor kids could have chosen not to drink their milk and do the same. As long as they built up an export business first, or paid the rich kids to take their milk – at a heaviliy discounted price of course. Shuffling paper doesn’t come cheap.
You see, the free market, the invisible hand, the Right in general, do not care about anything that is not them, or that can’t be made to be like them. Basic human dignity is not in their vocabulary – it has to be earned by being… you guessed it… like them. They are inherently and categorically incapable of doing what is right for it’s own end and withdrawing the concealed, invisible hand of control. Self interest and greed is good they say – without greed and self interest, no one would have cars, they say. What they forget is that greed is a choice; that humans are not wholey animals unless they choose to discard their conscience; that cars, for example, were never a predestined product of humanity; and that humans always find an altenative. It all leads back to self interest, and a born to rule mentality: we rule therefore we we always meant to rule; we exist as we are, therefore we were always meant to be this. If greed and self interest dies, they say, there will be nothing left in the world to do. No motivation to act.
I get tired of hearing the same rightwing principles drip fed by various people through every thread. They are cowards. They will not either come out and admit their greed and self interest and leave it at that, or discover their greed and self interest and develop their minds. It’s always about how greed and self interest can be made to be morally good through ethical sanitisation.
If the corporate bastards just paid their taxes at a reasonable rate without going through all the chicanery of avoidance schemes etc we would not need their “charity”.
Corporate tax is an affront to the individual. Everything happens in a vacuum. My efforts are my own. I raised myself. Fed myself when I could not even see, schooled myself. My birth was no accident. I am god. Everything is for me to take.
Corporate Executives were not born in hospitals built by people with foresight because they might be needed. Therefore they should not pay taxes to contribute to the collective foresight of others unless they get something from it.
“It’s always about how greed and self interest can be made to be morally good through ethical sanitisation.”
I am certainly not advocating a return to the Divine Right of Kings, but it had one advantage over the invisible hand: it conferred some conception of moral authority and hence moral duty on the socially dominant. It worked to a very limited degree of course, as such things do. But the invisible hand confers no such authority; its only justification is power. Hence the hunger for power has no limit, and rival conceptions of value eliminated or suborned, including ethical value. Note that the ethical value at play here is charity, which is often seen as supererogatory, and can more easily be withdrawn than justice.
The good people pull out their wallets to fund gaps in the welfare-health coverage.
A sensible country would spread the cost to the bad people who don’t pay a share.
Just because there are generous people in the world we should not reward those
who aren’t.
From the NBR
Hanover civil proceedings just the beginning – Hughes
Duncan Bridgeman | Thursday December 15, 2011
Intended civil proceedings against the Hanover group of finance companies could be a test case for further compensation action, the Financial Markets Authority says.
The FMA announced today it will file civil proceedings against directors and promoters of Hanover Finance, Hanover Capital, and United Finance next year.
So next year could we see BANKS and BRASH charged as directors of HULLICH?
David Shearer was fast tracked to Labour leadership because of his life experience, and because he comes across as an approachable honest sort of bloke. If his party – and it’s people – can convert to a similar image – in practice – it might start it’s recovery.
Greg, I know you’re not a Shearer supporter but you could learn a bit off him. He says he wants to be a uniter, and that he’s is prepared to listen to and learn from what people think and what they want. He doesn’t seem to be the sort of person who will abuse and bitch at anyone who doesn’t fit into some wee political pigeonhole.
Pete George. Nominal UF supporter. NACT government apologist.
Just because your I’ll-get-into-bed-with-who-ever-I-can-get-a-profile-and-ministerial-salary-from-electorate-MP has given confidence and supply to Key’s movement, does not mean that his minions have to defend him to the hilt. If you had found the Standard in the years from 1999 to 2008, presumably your comments here would have looked as if they were from the same song sheet as most other contributors. When did you change? Shit, by placing a question there, it might encourage further column inches of wasted space from you …
Perhaps you should rename your blog site to something closer to TheStandard and you may then get some random exposure that way. Seems you need this one to get any recognition.
News of a digital media start-up fusing politics, social networking and news – working title Cloud Tiger Media :
the aim of the venture is to “spread important, compelling ideas to hundreds of millions of people online and make being a progressive fun again…
Given that the people behind it are Chris Hughes, Facebook co-founder and Obama’s digital guru during the 2008 election, Eli Pariser from MoveOn and Peter Koechley from The Onion it might be worth keeping an eye on.
Just had a look at the TV3 website – it says that Richie McCaw has turned down a Knighthood. Richie, you have just gone up heaps in my estimation. He said that it was because it wouldn’t be right as he is still playing rugby, so I suppose it’s always on the cards that it will happen once he retires. I fear that most recipients of titular honours suffer from delusions of grandeur.
Oh, be nice. It’s lincoln – a university with gumboot scrapers outside the entrance to the library. He probably turned down their initial offers of honorary docs in sheep-shagging, waterways nitrate-saturation, and strip-mining. 🙂
In a dramatic illustration of the impact of income inequality on how children do in school, the achievement gap between children from high and low income families is far higher than the achievement gap between black and white students, a pathbreaking research report from Stanford University has shown.
The report by Sean Reardon, a Stanford professor of education and sociology, shows that the income achievement gap—the difference in the average standardized scores between children from families at the 10th percentile of income distribution and children at the 90th percentile—is now “nearly twice as large as the black-white achievement gap.”
[…]
While children at the bottom of the income scale are not doing worse academically than similar kids did decades ago—and in fact are doing better based on their test scores—the wider income achievement gap is a result of children at the top end of the income scale doing far better, he said.
When you look at poor 4th graders today they are doing better than poor 4th graders 30 years ago. But rich 4th graders are doing much, much better than rich 4th graders (over the same time period). Most of the growth has been because kids at the high end of the family income distribution level have pulled away from middle income kids, not because kids at the low end have fallen away from middle income kids.
Yes, that’s in line with the study reported in ‘Outliers’ by Malcolm Gladwell. The big shifts in SAT scores between children in schools of different SES areas happens over the summer break – not during school time.
It may not be palatable for those on the liberal left, but better formal education will not solve the problem of increasing inequality.
Only fundamental social and economic changes will achieve that.
Wheres the Labour, CTU, Len Brown or even National (Crusher Collins would have a few good ideas I’m sure). Someone needs to step in here and get this sorted (chance for shearer to score massive brownie points?)
These idiots are stuck in a time warp and are damaging every other trade union
“Instead the company had made a new offer of a 10 per cent increase in hourly rates in return for full operational flexibility and productivity increases. ”
That means effective pay cuts and redundancies as POAL intend to contract out some or all of its container terminal operations and support services to third party contractors. But Stuff just print the percentage, so readers can say, “Oh my 10% increase? How can they turn it down? That’s heaps!”.
Then POAL go on to whine about how those nasty strikers will effect those poor battling retailers just trying to make a living. Forgetting that it was POAL who locked the workers out and failed to turn up to negotiations.
POAL has generous wage and benefit packages for staff under the Collective Agreement. For the year ended 30 June 2011:
o Average wage for a full time stevedore at POAL was $91,480
o Average wage for a part time stevedore at POAL was $65,518
o 53% of full time stevedores (123 individuals) earned over $80,000
o 28% (43 individuals) earned over $100,000 with the highest earner making $122,000
POAL provides:
Southern Cross medical insurance for the employee and family
Sick leave of up to 15 days per annum accumulating to 45 days over three years
Fully paid in house training (no student loans required) to become a lasher, straddle and crane driver
Five weeks annual leave for shift workers
Embedded inflexibilities and old-fashioned work practices mean that labour utilisation at POAL is approx. 65% compared to approx. 80% at Port of Tauranga:
POAL’s crane drivers and deck foremen work on average 5.33 hours for every 8 paid
Straddle drivers work an average 6 hours out of every 8 paid
One recent example: stevedores worked 2 hours on an overtime shift but were paid for the whole 8 hour shift.
Oh yeah those poor, struggling workers, turns out most of them are “rich pricks”
Looks like pretty standard pay for a dangerous job and doesn’t take into account hours worked so is pretty meaningless, i know people who earn that much for reasonably un-skilled jobs due purely to overtime.
Rest of the “generous benefits” are pretty standard also.
Being that no one else on here (especially those with links to the union itself) isn’t questioning the figures should tell you something but its a hat tip to Cactus Kate for bringing this to light
Oh, great! You’re citing Cactus Kate as the source? D’oh! The source is the company. They are relying on the politics of envy to make the raw figures seem generous to the wider public and hoping to make their workers look greedy. It is propaganda designed to fool the naive, the gullible and the stupid. Camps you fit into well, chris.
Alternatively it is because you’re largely being ignored? I realize that you think it is important. However it appears that few others do.
In any case trying to use the “No answer means I am right” tactic is pretty dangerous here. When I’m in moderating mode I usually regard it as part of the pwned fallacy by whoever uses it and treat it like any other type of flame starter – maybe warn and likely ban. I don’t have time to deal with the flamewar outbreaks that result from the use of the tactic.
The ports of Auckland should not be operating from the downtown waterfront at all- the vast towering stacks of containers obscuring the view of the ocean are an eyesore.
The port company has had a sweet ride for so long it believes that it is entitled not only to this premium public space but it also believes that it is doing it’s employees a favor by demanding productivity increases, demanding ‘operational flexibility’ (HR speak for you will work whenever however and for as long as I want and thank me for it) with the only ‘concession’ being a miserly 10% increase in hourly rate that does not even begin to compensate workers for the changes in their conditions or deliverables, let alone inflation.
If someone needs their ass kicked it’s the Ports of Auckland – after all it’s not like they have 3 overlong movie versions of a fiction classic providing a justification for their bullying.
Exactly, it’s a high-risk job, any drop in conditions compromises the safety of the entire work force. Unions need to be staunch in these industries or workers end up dead under containers for their 10% increase.
“These idiots are stuck in a time warp and are damaging every other trade union” – #73
Spoken like a true anti unionist (#73, not the other commenters), e.g. unions have their place as long as it is compliant and ineffective.
The default official setting for government is hands off labour disputes, but behind the scenes they encourage the employer, and remind the cops what is expected of them–“maintain law’n ordah!” and help scab herd.
In the absence of any govt. committment to good faith bargaining, but plenty towards downgrading workers rights (attack ILO freedom of association, 90 Day Fire at Will) there are going to be more episodes of workers taking industrial action during this thin majority ShonKey administrations term.
Oh sure Chris, are you stuck in the time warp of 1951 when the shipowners and NATs collaborated with the right wing FOL leader Walsh to smash the wharfies over a few pennies so they could defeat the ‘communist’ threat to civilisation?
Shearer could take the Nash line of 1951 of being ‘neither for or against’ the union.
After all he is a ‘peacemaker’ not a fighter.
Shearer said Labour would fight privatisation in the streets. No statement from him over Mighty River only his Minister Cosgrove. Can we expect a statement promising to renationalise Mighty River?
Jones says Labour has lost the fight for privatisation, and will not oppose iwi buying shares. I can’t see Jones promising to renationalise iwi shareholdings.
Is this the Shearer ‘reconnection’ strategy of undoing the damage of the F$S by selling assets to corporate Maori to undercut the MP and win back support in Maori seats?
AMI was a Mutual – it had no Stockholders.
It was owned by the Policyholders, and nobody else.
The money received from IAG (Australian owned State and NZI) will go towards paying for their share of the Christchurch Earthquake.
The Government should have acquired the entirety of AMI, 100% of it. Instead of just the liabilities.
And used the section which has been sold off as a new profitable SOE adding to our nation’s bottom line for years to come, instead of detracting from our balance of payments to Australia.
What a bazaar world of political speak we live in …
“He said Labour had shed “most vestiges” of the Helen Clark government.” apparently said by Stuart Nash.
Bloody hell. Was 1999 to 2008 a period of tyranny and treason?
Why? Because we had an independent foreign policy. Reducing government debt. Pretty favourable employment figures … ummmm. Of course! That’s it! The community lost the right to beat its children with implements. Wait a minute, Key supported that measure – perhaps someone can explain.
I for one was proud of Helen Clark’s stewardship of New Zealand.
Helen Clark’s government was the only government I could feel proud of since rogernomics. Please, Labour, stop playing into the hands of right wing propagandists!
Helen Clark was the best leader I have had in 40years of adult hood on the planet. A remarkable woman. One we knew was on top of her job, who respected her citizens and especially their children. Who led a government under which one could feel they could develop, progress and achieve. Above all, Helen was a leader one could feel safe and supported under,one who did not attack her own people. A leader who united the people, not divided, derided and negated parts of the population. And finally a leader who tried to make sure all prospered -not just the few,whilst trying to enslave or starve all those in a low wage society, who did not earn over $30,000 or who made as many as possible involuntarily unemployed and then blamed them for being out of work.
When living under a government that respects and appreciates the talents and diversity and creativity of its people and supports them a country will flourish and become great,as we were doing until the hollow men came along with their spin and duplicity and false smiles..
Unfortunately, as we are seeing, if people are left to suffocate under a government who acts unjustly, hoards all the money, negates and undermines its citizens, cuts off all opportunity to progress and achieve, who lies, cheats and steals(assets) all in the name of money and profit, and all in the name of money for self interest for itself or its business masters and buddies, then that government is not only dishonourable, it is an abuser of power and its members will one day have to answer for their rather wicked behaviour. Not a good look for eternity!
At least I had the good fortune to experience one good leader in my lifetime. Thank you Helen. Now you were a real star.
So Labour has shed most vestiges of the Clark government and hurrah says Stuart Nash and National has shed, actually SFA of their old dodders: Brownlee, English, Ryall, Smith, McCully are still there- though I can’t remember actually hearing any of them apart from English say a damn thing. With Maurice Williamson outside cabinet.
Really? Is success measured by not having any institutional memory at all and having very little or no experience of actual government in your front ranks?
Does this cabinet also look like it will spend more time playing push me pull you with Pagani and Nash giving advice from the side? So much for the momentary optimism.
The ones who could win their electorates and party votes are mostly leaving or down the list. The ones who didn’t win their electorates are being promoted or given jobs.
sorry should probably put this in open mike….can this be resolved and with the “vestiges” removed what will the party be underneath??
sorry repost from another thread, and see this is already here.
Agree that the Clark-led government seemed full of talented people pulling together for the centre left and achieving things. I am VERY underwhelmed at the moment by the thinness of this possible front bench.
+ whatever number we are up to. Helen (and Cullen) will go down in NZ history as amongst the best we have had. I remember well the feeling of a large load of feeling uttely disenfranchised lifting when Helen first won and during her year. I have had that feeling again in the last 3 years and unfortunately know it will continue until the present lot go – the sooner the better.
It would seem like Labour wishes to move to the right a bit.
Would in a million years the Greens consider asking David Cunliffe to join them at the next election or resign and stand for them in a by-election and try and take more space on the left if Labour becomes less convincing as a party of the left?
Be an interesting proposition- would it be too unnatural?
Really from a left perspective, the Clark years were nothing to write home about.
Sure, there were some great things, such as Kiwibank, which was an Alliance inititaive, but in reality, the 5th Labour government never really went close to reversing the reforms of the Lange-Douglas-Richardson-Bolger administrations.
Employment statistics from that era are rather misleading IMO, given that a lot of jobs created were casual and part time work, and labour hire companies such as AWF found themselves booming. Wages grew at a snails pace, despite all the talk of a growing economy with Clark and Cullen falling over themselves to discourage workers from seeking huge wage increases.
Clark and Cullen still sold assets, with Terralink going on the block, not to mention forests, Landcorp farms, and gas/geothermal fields to name a few.
For all the talk about ‘economic transformation’, ‘carbon neutrality’, ‘sustainability’ and so on, Clark and Cullen never really took the steps that were really required to achive such goals, probably because doing so required government agencies and state/publicly owned entities to lead the way, with the private sector being fast followers, a step too politically incorrect for a government that oozed PC-ness.
I would have to agree that wiping student loan intrest was a bribe, but only insofar that shut up people who used to question as to why tuition fees werent coming down, unlike the number of hospitals closed under Labour. Yes, they stopped the large bulk of hopsital closures, a heartless act by the National party to pay for the huge tax cuts it intended to give to the rich in 1996 (people wonder why the left ‘hate’ the rich. Its because their tax cuts were paid for by massive cuts in services.), but Queen Mary hospital at Hamner Springs and the Kimberly Center at Levin are 2 examples.
There are more points I could make, but I have things to do..
IMO the Labour Party cannot make a break from the Clark era soon enough, the woman was essentially a female Tony Blair, cultivating a bland centerism and tinkering round the edges.
Yeah saw this, so we get all the high cost liablities, and sell all the profit making bits that hedge against high cost events. No wonder other insurance companies are interest because it looks like the most awesome deal ever.
Sounds like some clever and hard nosed negotiating, I wonder who could have been involved in this one.
How is spending 3 hours in traffic getting to work productive? Also, is providing services over a larger geographic area with lower population density less or more productive?
The commission called for urgent action to free up more land for housing…
What a surprise – a “productivity” commissioner out to make rates and living more expensive by increasing the sprawl. All those extra roads, which are going to become White Elephants in the near future, are expensive and so are the extra network services (sewerage, telecomms, electricity, etc etc) as well.
[lprent: better. However – my rewrite is a hell of lot more likely to have people reading it. For a start the links are clickable rather than word wrapped to incomprehension. I also hide all of the internet gobbledygook under anchors. Finally I dumped the last link for which you hadn’t provided any context and didn’t relate to the previous ones.
And the following is what you garbage is what you cut’n’pasted. Basically it is crap. Do better. ]
GLOBAL PEACE AND JUSTICE AUCKLAND NEWSLETTER No. 407, December 16, 2011
RALLY TODAY, (FRIDAY 16 DECEMBER 2011) 6.30PM
TO PROTEST THE CLOSURE OF RAPE CRISIS – QE2 SQUARE AUCKLAND
As sexual violence surges in New Zealand, thousands join last-ditch campaign to restore funding for Auckland’s 24/7 sexual violence help centre. https://docs.google.com/document
“Police officers investigating the theft of thousands of private emails between climate scientists from a University of East Anglia server in 2009″ — the source of the Climategate smear campaign timed to disrupt the Copenhagen climate summit — “have seized computer equipment” belonging to Roger Tattersall, who writes a climate denier blog under the pseudonym TallBloke.
In the United States, the Department of Justice sent a “formal request for preservation” to Tattersall and climate denier Patrick Condon, who runs the No Consensus blog under the pseudonym Jeff Id. The DOJ letter tells the conspiracy theorists to preserve “all stored communications, records, and other evidence in your possession” for their blogs and for Climate Audit, a denier blog run by Steve McIntyre, a Canadian mining consultant.
As it’s so close I think an election with just the two of them standing would be the better option. Of course, the best option is to move to proportional voting system in electorates.
I requested information about vote cheating from the Electoral Commission and Ministry of Justice the other day… will be interesting to see what they front up with.
I was just saying to someone yesterday how grumpy I have been feeling about the election results. Nothing has gone right, too many people not voting, then Dunne not stopping asset sales (must have known that Bennett would get back her seat), then the Maori Party being a coalition partner and Cunliffe not being elected as Labour leader.
Paula Bennett has just been declared the winner in Waitakere on the recount- by nine I think they said. What is going on.? I think the whole election should be recounted .Perhaps Labour could form a government???? Am feeling rather queasy at the mo.
Yes I would like to know if it involves miscounting, or the rejection of votes that were previously accepted – the tick not quite in the box indicating an “unclear intention” etc.
And if those 20 votes had gone the other way, would they smell so fishy to you? I suspect not. Vote counting is just like anything where humans are involved, mistakes will be made. You could keep recounting until you get the result you want or you could just accept the result and move on. I suggest the latter is the best course of action.
I personally have to question counting votes, transporting votes, storing votes and the scrutiny of ballot papers as Christchurch Central and Waitakere could have gone either way.
I’m not sure if you can do a recount of a recount – something to do with a three day period from memory, I think it has to be escalated to a judicial review/electoral petition at this stage if anyone wants to take it further.
Well Carmel should have just congratulated her opponent on a tough fight and thanked the people for voting her in, not take a couple of cheap shots (which has backfired)
Lefty author Christopher Hitchens has died. Cancer took him, aged a mere 62 years old. It’s ironic that he should die on the day of the American withdrawal from Iraq, as he was often criticised for writing in support of the invasion.
Lefty author? Not since the 1970s, afaik… He made a meal out of having once been a lefty, and pro-war people found it tremendously useful to claim he still was a lefty, but he himself was proud to proclaim that he wasn’t.
It takes a darn sight more than being a “famous atheist” to make someone a lefty..
Nah, he was left till the end, though he was definitely critical of the movement when he felt it was deserved. I don’t think he was much of a joiner, if you know what I mean, and I think he distrusted the organised left. He was also very pro-American which was confusing for some.
Sorry, that’s utter nonsense! He was proud to be a rightist, he was truly American to the point of gastropody, and he was very scathing of the left, especially the anti-war left. I first became aware of him through a profile in the Listener in about 2002, and was frustrated to see the pro-war right saying in the lead up to the destruction of Iraq – “See! Christopher Hitchens supports us and he’s a lefty!”
It was rather like trying to say to these fascist clowns that there were no WMD… (which we all know now that there weren’t… at least I hope you do! 🙂 )
No matter how many links to Hitchens’ own words proving his hatred of Islam, Christianity, (but not Judaism you note, as Zionism has a lot to do with the casus belli , and Bush’s crusade against Islam) or his hatred of the left, the pro-war nutmegs would just stick their fingers in their ear and go “la-la-la, I can’t hear you”!
Kweewee and his gang have already used up their goodwill.
once the left gets organised next year then he and his greedy little stockjobber mates are in for a big fright.
Yep, definitely drowning our sorrows in this household. Is there nothing further to be done, I recall in my dark dim past about Winston Peters taking it a step further when he was denied the Hunua seat, way back in [when?] against Roger Douglas’ brother and won it back. It would seem to be not a level playing field when considering what constitutes a valid vote.
While Carmel could have zipped her lip, she should take this all the way. It is highly suspicious and could verge on Hunua like “ticks and crosses” territory, “hanging chads” or some other jiggery pokery, such as part millimetres of tick placement to get Bennett across the line. It strains belief that the change in numbers comes down to pure counting straight after a recount involving special votes.
To the whingers that say what about when Carmel won by a small number on recount, think about it. Who has the ability to manipulate here-who has a tiny parliamentary majority, i.e who has motive and opportunity to rort.
presumably the same people who watched from the sidelines as Carmel won by 12 on the specials. If you are serious about this argument surely you must ascribe them the power to avert that little sideshow.
Pity. If the only party lawyers present were nats, it might indicate a cunning plan. Specifically, this cunning plan which relies on bennett winning the recount by a small margin (and 9 is as close as it gets), then labour to a petition for judicial review of the count. Bennett loses, but because the list seats have been finalised she is out of parliament and nactuf only have 60 seats.
It all just depends on the wider strategy, if one exists. With no lab lawyers in the room, 9 votes would be the best case scenario for bennett. And no real cost to labour.
Like I said don’t believe everything or come to think of it anything Slater tells you. I have read the cunning plan you talk about and I might start fundraising …
I don’t read slater. One the single-digit occasions commenters here have been adamant enough and I have read their links to wo, I’ve regretted it each and every time.
I’m much more interested in whether Edgeler’s analysis is spot on, or whether it misses a bit that brings the entire house of cards down. 9 votes can easily switch the other way. I assume that in that eventuality, the nats would go to the court of appeal, and then the supreme court. But then key/joyce would have to consider whether a prolonged legal argument would lose them more votes in the long run.
Not the slightest might about it I would hope Mick…at the very very least it keeps the razor-edge factor high in the public (and MP) mind and will rattle the Key ring like a dose of salts. Epsom salts. Tories don’t like it up em, no siree…
Must be some pretty oddly-marked ballot papers out Waitakere way.
I wonder what the usual level of inaccuracy is with this sort of thing. When someone has a majority in the thousands it’s not so important, but in such a closely-run contest, it’s a bit concerning.
More than a third of all states now allow borrowers who don’t pay their bills to be jailed, even when debtor’s prisons have been explicitly banned by state constitutions. A report by the American Civil Liberties Union found that people were imprisoned even when the cost of doing so exceeded the amount of debt they owed.
Wonder when they’ll bring back the ruling that the debtor has to pay back everything including the cost of being in prison before being released…
Some debtors are even forced to pay for their jail time themselves, adding to their financial troubles.
I guess it’s come as a shock to David Cunliffe to realise that his caucus colleagues don’t like him as much as he likes himself…
And will he throw his toys out of the cot to go and play somewhere else?
It’s sad to see the propaganda about rifts in Labour start with such a boring supposition… thoroughly yawn inducing. I would rather watch the grass grow than waste my time reading the trivial nonsense that spews out your ignoramus Toosense.
All Black captain turns down a knighthood.
What a disgraceful insult to the position of Prime Minister.
McCaw has no right to turn down such an honour if offered by the office of Prime Minister. Then again, maybe Key has insulted the office of Prime Minister, throwing knighthoods around at will.
And just how did we find this out anyway? We wouldn’t expect to know who has turned down the honours. Surely it wasn’t McCaw himself? That would counter the argument of his wonderful humility. So who leaked it… perhaps the office of Joky Hen or was it the PM?
Either way, it’s a disgrace. Disgraceful I say, damn it! Time we scrapped the dashed things what?
Hear, hear logie97.-love the sarc.,I shouldn;t ,but IIdo.
“He (Key) says an awful lot of New Zealanders will respect McCaw for that decision.”
ie.not to accept a knighthood. However, “He (Key)says there was no formal offer made in the end.”
Just a small publicity stunt then.
We occasionally have a laugh at the Penguin’s column in the Herald. So now Farrar wants to limit a government’s term. Headquarters obviously didn’t proof read this one before release.
Quote … dictators whose presumably noble original intentions have morphed into despotism as those in charge of a country conflate their personal best interests, with the country’s overall interest …
… The best of intentions often descend into a mixture of incompetence and even corruption when a political party, or a politician, rules for too long with no real chance of losing an election to the opposition… unquote
As I was only scanning his column, I had to do a double take. Was he talking about
Double Dipton? On closer reading I see he was referring to African states.
It always gets me about how the right expect the left always be gracious and respectful, but, as can be seen from the above, they expect to be able to slag off all and sundry and be nasty in general.
Rob MacCulloch writes – Can’t remember the last book by a Kiwi author you read? Think the NZ government should spend less on the arts in favor of helping the homeless? If so, as far as Newsroom is concerned, you probably deserve to be called a cultural ignoramus ...
Eric Crampton writes – Grudges are bad. Better to move on. But it can be fun to keep a couple of really trivial ones, so you’re not tempted to have other ones. For example, because of the rootkit fiasco of 2005, no Sony products in our household. ...
A new report warns an estimated third of the adult population have unmet need for health care.Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāHere’s the six key things I learned about Aotaroa’s political economy this week around housing, climate and poverty:Politics - Three opinion polls confirmed support for PM Christopher Luxon ...
Today is May the fourth. Which was just a regular day when my mother took me to see the newly released Star Wars at the Odeon in Rotorua. The queue was right around the corner. Some years later this day became known as Star Wars Day, the date being a ...
Buzz from the Beehive Much more media attention is being paid to something Winston Peters said about former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr than to a speech he delivered to the New Zealand China Council. One word is missing from the speech: AUKUS. But AUKUS loomed large in his considerations ...
Is the economy in another long stagnation? If so, why?This is about the time that the Treasury will be locking up its economic forecasts to be published in the 2024 Budget Economic and Fiscal Update (BEFU) on budget day, 30 May. I am not privy to what they will be ...
The annual list of who's been bribing our politicians is out, and journalists will no doubt be poring over it to find the juiciest and dirtiest bribes. The government's fast-track invite list is likely to be a particular focus, and we already know of one company on the list which ...
In the weeks after the October 7 Hamas attacks on Southern Israel I wrote about the possible 2nd, 3rd and even 4th order effects of the conflict. These included new fronts being opened in the West Bank (with Hamas), Golan … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – It is one of the oldest truisms that there is never a good time for MPs to get a pay rise. This week’s announcement of pay raises of around 2.8% backdated to last October could hardly have come at a worse time, with the ...
David Farrar writes – Newshub reports: Newshub can reveal a fresh allegation of intimidation against Green MP Julie-Anne Genter. Genter is subject to a disciplinary process for aggressively waving a book in the face of National Minister Matt Doocey in the House – but it’s not the first time ...
The Treasury has published a paper today on the global productivity slowdown and how it is playing out in New Zealand: The productivity slowdown: implications for the Treasury’s forecasts and projections. The Treasury Paper examines recent trends in productivity and the potential drivers of the slowdown. Productivity for the whole economy ...
Winston Peters’ comments about former Australian foreign minister look set to be an ongoing headache for both him and Luxon. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts and , along with regular guests on Gaza and ...
These puppet strings don't pull themselvesYou're thinking thoughts from someone elseHow much time do you think you have?Are you prepared for what comes next?The debating chamber can be a trying place for an opposition MP. What with the person in charge, the speaker, typically being an MP from the governing ...
The land around Lyme Regis, where Meryl Streep once stood, in a hood, on the Cobb, is falling into the sea.MerylThe land around Lyme Regis, around the Cobb that made it rich, has always been falling slowly but surely into the sea. Read more ...
Buzz from the Beehive Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters was bound to win headlines when he set out his thinking about AUKUS in his speech to the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. The headlines became bigger when – during an interview on RNZ’s Morning Report today – he criticised ...
The Post reports on how the government is refusing to release its advice on its corrupt Muldoonist fast-track law, instead using the "soon to be publicly available" refusal ground to hide it until after select committee submissions on the bill have closed. Fast-track Minister Chris Bishop's excuse? “It's not ...
As pressure on it grows, the livestock industry’s approach to the transition to Net Zero is increasingly being compared to that of fossil fuel interests. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / Getty ImagesTL;DR: Here’s the top five news items of note in climate news for Aotearoa-NZ this week, and a discussion above ...
The New Zealand Herald reports – Stats NZ has offered a voluntary redundancy scheme to all of its workers as a way to give staff some control over their “future” amidst widespread job losses in the public sector. In an update to staff this morning, seen by the Herald, Statistics New Zealand ...
On Werewolf/Scoop, I usually do two long form political columns a week. From now on, there will be an extra column each week about music and movies. But first, some late-breaking political events:The rise in unemployment numbers for the March quarter was bigger than expected – and especially sharp ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: TVNZ says it is dealing with about 50 formal complaints over its coverage of the latest 1News-Verian political poll, with some viewers – as well as the Prime Minister and a former senior Labour MP – critical of the tone of the 6pm report. ...
Muriel Newman writes – When Meridian Energy was seeking resource consents for a West Coast hydro dam proposal in 2010, local Maori “strenuously” objected, claiming their mana was inextricably linked to ‘their’ river and could be damaged. After receiving a financial payment from the company, however, the Ngai Tahu ...
Alwyn Poole writes – “An SEP,’ he said, ‘is something that we can’t see, or don’t see, or our brain doesn’t let us see, because we think that it’s somebody else’s problem. That’s what SEP means. Somebody Else’s Problem. The brain just edits it out, it’s like a ...
Our trust in our political institutions is fast eroding, according to a Maxim Institute discussion paper, Shaky Foundations: Why our democracy needs trust. The paper – released today – raises concerns about declining trust in New Zealand’s political institutions and democratic processes, and the role that the overuse of Parliamentary urgency ...
This article was prepared for publication yesterday. More ministerial announcements have been posted on the government’s official website since it was written. We will report on these later today …. Buzz from the BeehiveThere we were, thinking the environment is in trouble, when along came Jones. Shane Jones. ...
New Zealand now has the fourth most depressed construction sector in the world behind China, Qatar and Hong Kong. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 8:46am on Thursday, May 2:The Lead: ...
Hi,I am just going to state something very obvious: American police are fucking crazy.That was a photo gracing the New York Times this morning, showing New York City police “entering Columbia University last night after receiving a request from the school.”Apparently in America, protesting the deaths of tens of thousands ...
Winston Peters’ much anticipated foreign policy speech last night was a work of two halves. Much of it was a standard “boilerplate” Foreign Ministry overview of the state of the world. There was some hardening up of rhetoric with talk of “benign” becoming “malign” and old truths giving way to ...
Graham Adams assesses the fallout of the Cass Review — The press release last Thursday from the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls didn’t make the mainstream news in New Zealand but it really should have. The startling title of Reem Alsalem’s statement — “Implementation of ‘Cass ...
This open-for-business, under-new-management cliché-pockmarked government of Christopher Luxon is not the thing of beauty he imagines it to be. It is not the powerful expression of the will of the people that he asserts it to be. It is not a soaring eagle, it is a malodorous vulture. This newest poll should make ...
The latest labour market statistics, showing a rise in unemployment. There are now 134,000 unemployed - 14,000 more than when the National government took office. Which is I guess what happens when the Reserve Bank causes a recession in an effort to Keep Wages Low. The previous government saw a ...
Three opinion polls have been released in the last two days, all showing that the new government is failing to hold their popular support. The usual honeymoon experienced during the first year of a first term government is entirely absent. The political mood is still gloomy and discontented, mainly due ...
National's Finance Minister once met a poor person.A scornful interview with National's finance guru who knows next to nothing about economics or people.There might have been something a bit familiar if that was the headline I’d gone with today. It would of course have been in tribute to the article ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – Throughout the pandemic, the new Vice-Chancellor-of-Otago-University-on-$629,000 per annum-Can-you-believe-it-and-Former-Finance-Minister Grant Robertson repeated the mantra over and over that he saved “lives and livelihoods”.As we update how this claim is faring over the course of time, the facts are increasingly speaking differently. NZ ...
Chris Trotter writes – IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in acknowledgement of electoral victory: “We’ll govern for all New Zealanders.” On the face of it, the pledge is a strange one. Why would any political leader govern in ways that advantaged the huge ...
Bryce Edwards writes – The list of former National Party Ministers being given plum and important roles got longer this week with the appointment of former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett as the chair of Pharmac. The Christopher Luxon-led Government has now made key appointments to Bill ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 10:06am on Wednesday, May 1:The Lead: Business confidence fell across the board in April, falling in some areas to levels last seen during the lockdowns because of a collapse in ...
Over the past 36 hours, Christopher Luxon has been dong his best to portray the centre-right’s plummeting poll numbers as a mark of virtue. Allegedly, the negative verdicts are the result of hard economic times, and of a government bravely set out on a perilous rescue mission from which not ...
Auckland Transport have started rolling out new HOP card readers around the network and over the next three months, all of them on buses, at train stations and ferry wharves will be replaced. The change itself is not that remarkable, with the new readers looking similar to what is already ...
Completed reads for April: The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling Carnival of Saints, by George Herman The Snow Spider, by Jenny Nimmo Emlyn’s Moon, by Jenny Nimmo The Chestnut Soldier, by Jenny Nimmo Death Comes As the End, by Agatha Christie Lord of the Flies, by ...
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 ...
Have a story to share about St Paul’s, but today just picturesPopular novels written at this desk by a young man who managed to bootstrap himself out of father’s imprisonment and his own young life in a workhouse Read more ...
The list of former National Party Ministers being given plum and important roles got longer this week with the appointment of former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett as the chair of Pharmac. The Christopher Luxon-led Government has now made key appointments to Bill English, Simon Bridges, Steven Joyce, Roger Sowry, ...
Newsroom has a story today about National's (fortunately failed) effort to disestablish the newly-created Inspector-General of Defence. The creation of this agency was the key recommendation of the Inquiry into Operation Burnham, and a vital means of restoring credibility and social licence to an agency which had been caught lying ...
Holding On To The Present:The moment a political movement arises that attacks the whole idea of social progress, and announces its intention to wind back the hands of History’s clock, then democracy, along with its unwritten rules, is in mortal danger.IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in ...
Stuck In The Middle With You:As Christopher Luxon feels the hot breath of Act’s and NZ First’s extremists on the back of his neck and, as he reckons with the damage their policies are already inflicting upon a country he’s described as “fragile”, is there not some merit in reaching out ...
The unpopular coalition government is currently rushing to repeal section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act. The clause is Oranga Tamariki's Treaty clause, and was inserted after its systematic stealing of Māori children became a public scandal and resulted in physical resistance to further abductions. The clause created clear obligations ...
Buzz from the Beehive The government’s official website – which Point of Order monitors daily – not for the first time has nothing much to say today about political happenings that are grabbing media headlines. It makes no mention of the latest 1News-Verian poll, for example. This shows National down ...
It Takes A Train To Cry:Surely, there is nothing lonelier in all this world than the long wail of a distant steam locomotive on a cold Winter’s night.AS A CHILD, I would lie awake in my grandfather’s house and listen to the traffic. The big wooden house was only a ...
Packing A Punch: The election of the present government, including in its ranks politicians dedicated to reasserting the rights of the legislature in shaping and determining the future of Māori and Pakeha in New Zealand, should have alerted the judiciary – including its anomalous appendage, the Waitangi Tribunal – that its ...
Dead Woman Walking: New Zealand’s media industry had been moving steadily towards disaster for all the years Melissa Lee had been National’s media and communications policy spokesperson, and yet, when the crisis finally broke, on her watch, she had nothing intelligent to offer. Christopher Luxon is a patient man - but he’s not ...
Chris Trotter writes – New Zealand politics is remarkably easy-going: dangerously so, one might even say. With the notable exception of John Key’s flat ruling-out of the NZ First Party in 2008, all parties capable of clearing MMP’s five-percent threshold, or winning one or more electorate seats, tend ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is ...
Luxon will no doubt put a brave face on it, but there is no escaping the pressure this latest poll will put on him and the government. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political ...
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler In the wake of any unusual weather event, someone inevitably asks, “Did climate change cause this?” In the most literal sense, that answer is almost always no. Climate change is never the sole cause of hurricanes, heat waves, droughts, or ...
Something odd happened yesterday, and I’d love to know if there’s more to it. If there was something which preempted what happened, or if it was simply a throwaway line in response to a journalist.Yesterday David Seymour was asked at a press conference what the process would be if the ...
Hi,From time to time, I want to bring Webworm into the real world. We did it last year with the Jurassic Park event in New Zealand — which was a lot of fun!And so on Saturday May 11th, in Los Angeles, I am hosting a lil’ Webworm pop-up! I’ve been ...
Education Minister Erica Standford yesterday unveiled a fundamental reform of the way our school pupils are taught. She would not exactly say so, but she is all but dismantling the so-called “inquiry” “feel good” method of teaching, which has ruled in our classrooms since a major review of the New ...
Exactly where are we seriously going with this government and its policies? That is, apart from following what may as well be a Truss-Lite approach on the purported economic “plan“, and Victorian-era regression when it comes to social policy.Oh it’ll work this time of course, we’re basically assured, “the ...
Hey Uncle Dave, When the Poms joined the EEC, I wasn't one of those defeatists who said, Well, that’s it for the dairy job. And I was right, eh? The Chinese can’t get enough of our milk powder and eventually, the Poms came to their senses and backed up the ute ...
Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is higher than for any other mayor ...
Buzz from the Beehive Pharmac has been given a financial transfusion and a new chair to oversee its spending in the pharmaceutical business. Associate Health Minister David Seymour described the funding for Pharmac as “its largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff”. ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its ...
TL;DR: Here’s my top 10 ‘pick ‘n’ mix of links to news, analysis and opinion articles as of 10:10am on Monday, April 29:Scoop: The children's ward at Rotorua Hospital will be missing a third of its beds as winter hits because Te Whatu Ora halted an upgrade partway through to ...
span class=”dropcap”>As hideous as David Seymour can be, it is worth keeping in mind occasionally that there are even worse political figures (and regimes) out there. Iran for instance, is about to execute the country’s leading hip hop musician Toomaj Salehi, for writing and performing raps that “corrupt” the nation’s ...
Yesterday marked 10 years since the first electric train carried passengers in Auckland so it’s a good time to look back at it and the impact it has had. A brief history The first proposals for rail electrification in Auckland came in the 1920’s alongside the plans for earlier ...
Right now, in Aotearoa-NZ, our ‘animal spirits’ are darkening towards a winter of discontent, thanks at least partly to a chorus of negative comments and actions from the Government Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on ...
You make people evil to punish the paststuck inside a sequel with a rotating castThe following photos haven’t been generated with AI, or modified in any way. They are flesh and blood, human beings. On the left is Galatea Young, a young mum, and her daughter Fiadh who has Angelman ...
The Government is again adding to New Zealand’s growing unemployment, this time cutting jobs at the agencies responsible for urban development and growing much needed housing stock. ...
With Minister Karen Chhour indicating in the House today that she either doesn’t know or care about the frontline cuts she’s making to Oranga Tamariki, we risk seeing more and more of our children falling through the cracks. ...
The Labour Party is saddened to learn of the death of Sir Robert Martin, a globally renowned disability advocate who led the way for disability rights both in New Zealand and internationally. ...
Labour is calling for the Government to urgently rethink its coalition commitment to restart live animal exports, Labour animal welfare spokesperson Rachel Boyack said. ...
Today’s Financial Stability Report has once again highlighted that poverty and deep inequality are political choices - and this Government is choosing to make them worse. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to do more for our households in most need as unemployment rises and the cost of living crisis endures. ...
Unemployment is on the rise and it’s only going to get worse under this Government, Labour finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds said. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate grew to 4.3 percent in the March quarter from 4 percent in the December quarter. “This is the second rise in unemployment ...
The New Zealand Labour Party welcomes the entering into force of the European Union and New Zealand free trade agreement. This agreement opens the door for a huge increase in trade opportunities with a market of 450 million people who are high value discerning consumers of New Zealand goods and ...
The National-led Government continues its fiscal jiggery pokery with its Pharmac announcement today, Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall says. “The government has increased Pharmac funding but conceded it will only make minimal increases in access to medicine”, said Ayesha Verrall “This is far from the bold promises made to fund ...
This afternoon’s interim Waitangi Tribunal report must be taken seriously as it affects our most vulnerable children, Labour children’s spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime. ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters discussed the need for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and enhanced cooperation in the Pacific with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock during her first official visit to New Zealand today. "New Zealand and Germany enjoy shared interests and values, including the rule of law, democracy, respect for the international system ...
The Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop today released his decision on four recommendations referred to him by the Western Bay of Plenty District Council, opening the door to housing growth in the area. The Council’s Plan Change 92 allows more homes to be built in existing and new ...
Thank you, John McKinnon and the New Zealand China Council for the invitation to speak to you today. Thank you too, all members of the China Council. Your effort has played an essential role in helping to build, shape, and grow a balanced and resilient relationship between our two ...
The Government is modernising insurance law to better protect Kiwis and provide security in the event of a disaster, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly announced today. “These reforms are long overdue. New Zealand’s insurance law is complicated and dated, some of which is more than 100 years old. ...
The coalition Government is refreshing its approach to supporting pay equity claims as time-limited funding for the Pay Equity Taskforce comes to an end, Public Service Minister Nicola Willis says. “Three years ago, the then-government introduced changes to the Equal Pay Act to support pay equity bargaining. The changes were ...
Structured literacy will change the way New Zealand children learn to read - improving achievement and setting students up for success, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “Being able to read and write is a fundamental life skill that too many young people are missing out on. Recent data shows that ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay says Canada’s refusal to comply in full with a CPTPP trade dispute ruling in our favour over dairy trade is cynical and New Zealand has no intention of backing down. Mr McClay said he has asked for urgent legal advice in respect of our ‘next move’ ...
The rights of our children and young people will be enhanced by changes the coalition Government will make to strengthen oversight of the Oranga Tamariki system, including restoring a single Children’s Commissioner. “The Government is committed to delivering better public services that care for our most at-risk young people and ...
The Government is making it easier for minor changes to be made to a building consent so building a home is easier and more affordable, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on making it easier and cheaper to build homes so we can ...
New Zealand lost a true legend when internationally renowned disability advocate Sir Robert Martin (KNZM) passed away at his home in Whanganui last night, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. “Our Government’s thoughts are with his wife Lynda, family and community, those he has worked with, the disability community in ...
Good evening – Before discussing the challenges and opportunities facing New Zealand’s foreign policy, we’d like to first acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. You have contributed to debates about New Zealand foreign policy over a long period of time, and we thank you for hosting us. ...
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On yesterday’s news that Fonterra is to provide free milk to primary schools.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/6141553/Free-milk-coming-back-to-primary-schools
Kia ora H.S. The following Labour Party news release is why Fonterra’s decision to provide free milk to primary schools, (that is, if it is to be more than just another short term anarchic public relatations stunt), must be regulated.
If this initiative is needed, (and it is), and it really makes a difference, (which it could), then it must be taken out of sphere of charity giving, which can be removed at any time at the whim of the donor.
Labour Party Press release: Monday, 23 May, 2011
Jenny I note that nowhere in that release does Annette suggest that countdown should be legislatively compelled to do anything.
I also find it disheartening that the day before NZs largest company announces a plan to supply milk free of charge for all primary school children in NZ that all many on this site can do is moan and bleat.
HS I would prefer the children of the poor received a proper breakfast than all children were given some free milk. And the “gesture” is funded by exorbitant prices charged by Fonterra. In the land of milk and honey something is so wrong that it should cost so much.
Still moaning and bleating about all and sundry Greg, take a big breath and suggest how all children receive a proper breakfast and in the meantime find it in your retarded activist brain to acknowledge that free milk in all primary schools is a good thing.
Tell you what here’s another few things I would like to see in relation to NZs children
1. 100% vaccination
2. A decline in the sickening child abuse stats
A good thing – but for how long.
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-16122011/#comment-418077
Probably for long enough that they get the best PR for the expense, but when it becomes just expense then the generosity ceases as well. Long term welfare programmes are unsung. Companies are not suited for the task.
‘Long term welfare programmes are unsung. Companies are not suited for the task.’
What, like the rescue helicopter (Westpac) , surf lifesaving (DHL) and the childrens hospital (MacDonalds) ?
you forgot to add the never ending canvassing ie begging on street corners for peoples money 😛 , by so called said companies
You forgot to add that Westpac are giving payback for all the government banking business they receive and McDonald’s actually contribute more to the ill health of children via obesity and also only fund Ronald McDonald house, the accommodation for the parents. Most other civilised countries actually have inbuilt parental accommodation, without the need for a burger bar in the entry to the national childrens hospital!
Our family has been in the unfortunate position of having to rely on Ronald McDonald House for quite some time. I fully appreciate the facilities, and work put in by the wonderful volunteers. But MacDonalds doesn’t provide the service – volunteers do – the company just has naming rights for collecting the money. And in a sense it’s easy money because sick kids tug the heart strings. I’d love to see companies provide for the hard stuff – women’s refuges for instance, and leave essential health services* to the health system.
*Because the health system does not provide for rare, complex conditions outside of large urban centres this accommodation is essential and should be part of the health service IMO.
It’s still cheaper and far more efficient to fund such things through taxes and we don’t get the BS advertising that comes with corporate sponsorship.
All largely funded by public donation! Countdown was promoting surf lifesaving a few weeks back, at the same time as frontliners were outside our local, begging for $$ for the same charity!
The system of rescue helicopters should be funded from taxation and run by either the NZDF or the Fire Services.
Actually, turning the airforce into a coastguard would make a lot of sense. Both for S&R and territorial reasons.
Would’nt we all, plus a big breakfast. Hope Mum can afford the cut price loaf of bread now the rent has gone up……..
The free market will sort it all out, HS. No worries.
higherstandard, noblesse oblige from an elite is not the way to solve social and economic issues (such as malnourished children) in a democratic society.
In feudal times, it is true that noblesse oblige provided some minimal relief but it always came with some pretty strong strings attached.
Corporate sponsorship is just updated feudal charity. And ‘noblesse oblige‘ is now just ‘corporate social responsibility‘.
It is just an example about why companies are not suited to the task to providing long term welfare.
I would legislate for that as we have a duopoly in the grocery sector and they are maximizing their profits at the expense of the connedsumer .England has far more competition in the food sector that’s why our lamb costs half the price it does here.
The free market is a wonderful thing when their is true competition but in many countries it has to be regulated to stop price gouging New Zealands Commerce Commission is a joke!
well woolworths online has racks of lamb at $31kg while Tescos UK has racks at about $43kg. Legs are about the same, chops about the same, steaks about $32 in the UK v $25 in NZ. Lamb’s seasonality maybe makes it not quite as simple as you think
And given that UK incomes in NZD terms are far higher than ours, we are being cheated at home.
“…The public affairs manager for Countdown owner Progressive Enterprises, Luke Schepen, said the chain stopped sponsoring the Red Cross programme at the end of last year “following a review of our community initiatives”.
“Our team has a terrific passion for supporting the communities we serve and this has not changed. We are currently exploring new opportunities to invest in initiatives that will benefit both our communities and our business,” he said.
He declined to comment on the contract with MasterChef, which was “an advertising sponsorship”.
Food and Grocery Council chief executive Katherine Rich said food companies were considering a coordinated national programme to supply foodbanks and breakfast programmes modelled on Foodbank Australia, which distributes food to welfare agencies feeding the hungry.
Auckland City Missioner Diane Robertson said her mission had sent a consultant to look at the Australian scheme and was working on a proposal for the New Zealand industry…”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10727058
The beginning of privatised welfare. And the self interest of the invisible hand:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/news/article.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=10727745
For once, Shelley Bridgeman’s experience is relevent to her story. Just like, say 100% vaccination, the free market doesn’t care about disease in children, or poverty. It wants profit, money for doing not much, and influence in our culture – whether that is a government subsidy or some long term brand recognition. Then when you work your way out to something like, say, “reducing child abuse stats”, the cultural influence become institutionalised racism, or to put it another way cultural war. Cultural war? Why that’s preposterous! All we want is for maori and immigrants to give up their gods and families obligations and traditions and come be a part of our aspirational ladder giving full deference to our values and culture and boosting our production and profit. They’ll be rich… well, umm, ok they’ll be allowed to compete among themselves for below living wages. But it’s not cultural war. Honest. And some will make it, for sure, after my son of course, and his children, and once I have a new house in Noosa.
But let’s get back to feeding starved kids. Poor children should not be fed, the right say, if rich children do not recieve the same food. Why? Because, one law for all. It wouldn’t be fair. But the real mentality is that to get ahead you need to take from someone, and if you aren’t taking or getting from someone, or worse, doing something for it’s own end, you are falling behind. It doesn’t matter if the rich kids on-sell their unneeded milk – they say – turn it into cheese and export it at a profit or waste it by tipping it on the ground. That is just the invisible hand, the free market. They could offer it to the poor children but that wouldn’t be right. They’d be falling behind. So the government would end up subsidising a theoretical rich child’s export cheese business. But that’s ok because it was “fair”. The rich kids had no advantage – except they weren’t hungry to start with and their parents weren’t exporters. The poor kids could have chosen not to drink their milk and do the same. As long as they built up an export business first, or paid the rich kids to take their milk – at a heaviliy discounted price of course. Shuffling paper doesn’t come cheap.
You see, the free market, the invisible hand, the Right in general, do not care about anything that is not them, or that can’t be made to be like them. Basic human dignity is not in their vocabulary – it has to be earned by being… you guessed it… like them. They are inherently and categorically incapable of doing what is right for it’s own end and withdrawing the concealed, invisible hand of control. Self interest and greed is good they say – without greed and self interest, no one would have cars, they say. What they forget is that greed is a choice; that humans are not wholey animals unless they choose to discard their conscience; that cars, for example, were never a predestined product of humanity; and that humans always find an altenative. It all leads back to self interest, and a born to rule mentality: we rule therefore we we always meant to rule; we exist as we are, therefore we were always meant to be this. If greed and self interest dies, they say, there will be nothing left in the world to do. No motivation to act.
I get tired of hearing the same rightwing principles drip fed by various people through every thread. They are cowards. They will not either come out and admit their greed and self interest and leave it at that, or discover their greed and self interest and develop their minds. It’s always about how greed and self interest can be made to be morally good through ethical sanitisation.
If the corporate bastards just paid their taxes at a reasonable rate without going through all the chicanery of avoidance schemes etc we would not need their “charity”.
Corporate tax is an affront to the individual. Everything happens in a vacuum. My efforts are my own. I raised myself. Fed myself when I could not even see, schooled myself. My birth was no accident. I am god. Everything is for me to take.
Corporate Executives were not born in hospitals built by people with foresight because they might be needed. Therefore they should not pay taxes to contribute to the collective foresight of others unless they get something from it.
Welcome to the toddler mind.
“It’s always about how greed and self interest can be made to be morally good through ethical sanitisation.”
I am certainly not advocating a return to the Divine Right of Kings, but it had one advantage over the invisible hand: it conferred some conception of moral authority and hence moral duty on the socially dominant. It worked to a very limited degree of course, as such things do. But the invisible hand confers no such authority; its only justification is power. Hence the hunger for power has no limit, and rival conceptions of value eliminated or suborned, including ethical value. Note that the ethical value at play here is charity, which is often seen as supererogatory, and can more easily be withdrawn than justice.
… or the roads that their behemoths move their goods on.
The good people pull out their wallets to fund gaps in the welfare-health coverage.
A sensible country would spread the cost to the bad people who don’t pay a share.
Just because there are generous people in the world we should not reward those
who aren’t.
From the NBR
Hanover civil proceedings just the beginning – Hughes
Duncan Bridgeman | Thursday December 15, 2011
Intended civil proceedings against the Hanover group of finance companies could be a test case for further compensation action, the Financial Markets Authority says.
The FMA announced today it will file civil proceedings against directors and promoters of Hanover Finance, Hanover Capital, and United Finance next year.
So next year could we see BANKS and BRASH charged as directors of HULLICH?
David Shearer was fast tracked to Labour leadership because of his life experience, and because he comes across as an approachable honest sort of bloke. If his party – and it’s people – can convert to a similar image – in practice – it might start it’s recovery.
When Pete belongs to a party that shows it can get more than 0.6% of the popular vote I may think about giving some credence to what he says.
Greg, I know you’re not a Shearer supporter but you could learn a bit off him. He says he wants to be a uniter, and that he’s is prepared to listen to and learn from what people think and what they want. He doesn’t seem to be the sort of person who will abuse and bitch at anyone who doesn’t fit into some wee political pigeonhole.
Are you with him or against him?
Leave Lionel Hutz alone, hes probably feeling a bit down what with the recent selection and all
If UF can find a candidate with even boofier hair than The Hair, it might start it’s recovery.
Pete George. Nominal UF supporter. NACT government apologist.
Just because your I’ll-get-into-bed-with-who-ever-I-can-get-a-profile-and-ministerial-salary-from-electorate-MP has given confidence and supply to Key’s movement, does not mean that his minions have to defend him to the hilt. If you had found the Standard in the years from 1999 to 2008, presumably your comments here would have looked as if they were from the same song sheet as most other contributors. When did you change? Shit, by placing a question there, it might encourage further column inches of wasted space from you …
Perhaps you should rename your blog site to something closer to TheStandard and you may then get some random exposure that way. Seems you need this one to get any recognition.
News of a digital media start-up fusing politics, social networking and news – working title Cloud Tiger Media :
Given that the people behind it are Chris Hughes, Facebook co-founder and Obama’s digital guru during the 2008 election, Eli Pariser from MoveOn and Peter Koechley from The Onion it might be worth keeping an eye on.
Cloud Tiger Media — might have some potential, heh.
From stuff
THE JACKEL DENIES GUIT.
Ok jackel, what Have you been up too.
Just had a look at the TV3 website – it says that Richie McCaw has turned down a Knighthood. Richie, you have just gone up heaps in my estimation. He said that it was because it wouldn’t be right as he is still playing rugby, so I suppose it’s always on the cards that it will happen once he retires. I fear that most recipients of titular honours suffer from delusions of grandeur.
“Richie, you have just gone up heaps in my estimation”
My thought exactly
But he has accepted an honorary doctorate.
Quoting article:
And WTF does a doctorate of natural resources usually mean?
Oh, be nice. It’s lincoln – a university with gumboot scrapers outside the entrance to the library. He probably turned down their initial offers of honorary docs in sheep-shagging, waterways nitrate-saturation, and strip-mining. 🙂
The pols department is pretty good, though.
The view from the roof of the science block is stunning on a crisp winter’s day. And the cricket oval next door is magic in the summer, too.
Jacqui Dean, look out for your day job! Dr Richie McCaw is after it!
“Income achievement gap” almost double black-white achievement gap
In a dramatic illustration of the impact of income inequality on how children do in school, the achievement gap between children from high and low income families is far higher than the achievement gap between black and white students, a pathbreaking research report from Stanford University has shown.
The report by Sean Reardon, a Stanford professor of education and sociology, shows that the income achievement gap—the difference in the average standardized scores between children from families at the 10th percentile of income distribution and children at the 90th percentile—is now “nearly twice as large as the black-white achievement gap.”
[…]
While children at the bottom of the income scale are not doing worse academically than similar kids did decades ago—and in fact are doing better based on their test scores—the wider income achievement gap is a result of children at the top end of the income scale doing far better, he said.
Yes, that’s in line with the study reported in ‘Outliers’ by Malcolm Gladwell. The big shifts in SAT scores between children in schools of different SES areas happens over the summer break – not during school time.
It may not be palatable for those on the liberal left, but better formal education will not solve the problem of increasing inequality.
Only fundamental social and economic changes will achieve that.
PLenty of educated people around who cant get good jobs now. Young and old.
Ok seriously its beyond a joke now:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/6146215/Fourth-strike-notice-for-Ports-of-Auckland
Wheres the Labour, CTU, Len Brown or even National (Crusher Collins would have a few good ideas I’m sure). Someone needs to step in here and get this sorted (chance for shearer to score massive brownie points?)
These idiots are stuck in a time warp and are damaging every other trade union
LOL Maersk’s decision would have been made months before any strike action started.
“Instead the company had made a new offer of a 10 per cent increase in hourly rates in return for full operational flexibility and productivity increases. ”
That means effective pay cuts and redundancies as POAL intend to contract out some or all of its container terminal operations and support services to third party contractors. But Stuff just print the percentage, so readers can say, “Oh my 10% increase? How can they turn it down? That’s heaps!”.
Then POAL go on to whine about how those nasty strikers will effect those poor battling retailers just trying to make a living. Forgetting that it was POAL who locked the workers out and failed to turn up to negotiations.
POAL has generous wage and benefit packages for staff under the Collective Agreement. For the year ended 30 June 2011:
o Average wage for a full time stevedore at POAL was $91,480
o Average wage for a part time stevedore at POAL was $65,518
o 53% of full time stevedores (123 individuals) earned over $80,000
o 28% (43 individuals) earned over $100,000 with the highest earner making $122,000
POAL provides:
Southern Cross medical insurance for the employee and family
Sick leave of up to 15 days per annum accumulating to 45 days over three years
Fully paid in house training (no student loans required) to become a lasher, straddle and crane driver
Five weeks annual leave for shift workers
Embedded inflexibilities and old-fashioned work practices mean that labour utilisation at POAL is approx. 65% compared to approx. 80% at Port of Tauranga:
POAL’s crane drivers and deck foremen work on average 5.33 hours for every 8 paid
Straddle drivers work an average 6 hours out of every 8 paid
One recent example: stevedores worked 2 hours on an overtime shift but were paid for the whole 8 hour shift.
Oh yeah those poor, struggling workers, turns out most of them are “rich pricks”
Looks like pretty standard pay for a dangerous job and doesn’t take into account hours worked so is pretty meaningless, i know people who earn that much for reasonably un-skilled jobs due purely to overtime.
Rest of the “generous benefits” are pretty standard also.
Oh yeah I’m sure these guys are doing 70 hour weeks, I’m sure their union would have saomething to say about that
This is the problem with unions and their leaders, they start thinking they’re more important then anything else
Frak you, lets see a print out on what the senior managers and directors at the port company are getting first.
So where’s the link to the source of the figures you cite?.
Being that no one else on here (especially those with links to the union itself) isn’t questioning the figures should tell you something but its a hat tip to Cactus Kate for bringing this to light
Oh, great! You’re citing Cactus Kate as the source? D’oh! The source is the company. They are relying on the politics of envy to make the raw figures seem generous to the wider public and hoping to make their workers look greedy. It is propaganda designed to fool the naive, the gullible and the stupid. Camps you fit into well, chris.
Alternatively it is because you’re largely being ignored? I realize that you think it is important. However it appears that few others do.
In any case trying to use the “No answer means I am right” tactic is pretty dangerous here. When I’m in moderating mode I usually regard it as part of the pwned fallacy by whoever uses it and treat it like any other type of flame starter – maybe warn and likely ban. I don’t have time to deal with the flamewar outbreaks that result from the use of the tactic.
Find a better argument.
got a link for that? I want to see what their overtime rates etc are.
Yes, it shows how trade unions can catapult people into the middle class.
Tell me, would you just have them earning minumum wage? (which means they will have to get WFF and Accomodation supplements)
The only time warp here is for workers to get a fair share of national GDP.
The ports of Auckland should not be operating from the downtown waterfront at all- the vast towering stacks of containers obscuring the view of the ocean are an eyesore.
The port company has had a sweet ride for so long it believes that it is entitled not only to this premium public space but it also believes that it is doing it’s employees a favor by demanding productivity increases, demanding ‘operational flexibility’ (HR speak for you will work whenever however and for as long as I want and thank me for it) with the only ‘concession’ being a miserly 10% increase in hourly rate that does not even begin to compensate workers for the changes in their conditions or deliverables, let alone inflation.
If someone needs their ass kicked it’s the Ports of Auckland – after all it’s not like they have 3 overlong movie versions of a fiction classic providing a justification for their bullying.
Exactly, it’s a high-risk job, any drop in conditions compromises the safety of the entire work force. Unions need to be staunch in these industries or workers end up dead under containers for their 10% increase.
WTF is it any of your business that they choose to legally withdraw their labour ?.
“These idiots are stuck in a time warp and are damaging every other trade union” – #73
Spoken like a true anti unionist (#73, not the other commenters), e.g. unions have their place as long as it is compliant and ineffective.
The default official setting for government is hands off labour disputes, but behind the scenes they encourage the employer, and remind the cops what is expected of them–“maintain law’n ordah!” and help scab herd.
In the absence of any govt. committment to good faith bargaining, but plenty towards downgrading workers rights (attack ILO freedom of association, 90 Day Fire at Will) there are going to be more episodes of workers taking industrial action during this thin majority ShonKey administrations term.
Oh sure Chris, are you stuck in the time warp of 1951 when the shipowners and NATs collaborated with the right wing FOL leader Walsh to smash the wharfies over a few pennies so they could defeat the ‘communist’ threat to civilisation?
Shearer could take the Nash line of 1951 of being ‘neither for or against’ the union.
After all he is a ‘peacemaker’ not a fighter.
Shearer said Labour would fight privatisation in the streets. No statement from him over Mighty River only his Minister Cosgrove. Can we expect a statement promising to renationalise Mighty River?
Jones says Labour has lost the fight for privatisation, and will not oppose iwi buying shares. I can’t see Jones promising to renationalise iwi shareholdings.
Is this the Shearer ‘reconnection’ strategy of undoing the damage of the F$S by selling assets to corporate Maori to undercut the MP and win back support in Maori seats?
So AMI is sold but we take it’s current and future earthquake liabilities, sounds like a pretty good deal for IAG, not so good for us. 😐
Private insurance was never meant to be good for us – only for the stockholders.
AMI was a Mutual – it had no Stockholders.
It was owned by the Policyholders, and nobody else.
The money received from IAG (Australian owned State and NZI) will go towards paying for their share of the Christchurch Earthquake.
Bullshit
The Government should have acquired the entirety of AMI, 100% of it. Instead of just the liabilities.
And used the section which has been sold off as a new profitable SOE adding to our nation’s bottom line for years to come, instead of detracting from our balance of payments to Australia.
What a bazaar world of political speak we live in …
“He said Labour had shed “most vestiges” of the Helen Clark government.” apparently said by Stuart Nash.
Bloody hell. Was 1999 to 2008 a period of tyranny and treason?
Why? Because we had an independent foreign policy. Reducing government debt. Pretty favourable employment figures … ummmm. Of course! That’s it! The community lost the right to beat its children with implements. Wait a minute, Key supported that measure – perhaps someone can explain.
I for one was proud of Helen Clark’s stewardship of New Zealand.
Ditto.
Helen Clark’s government was the only government I could feel proud of since rogernomics. Please, Labour, stop playing into the hands of right wing propagandists!
Helen Clark was the best leader I have had in 40years of adult hood on the planet. A remarkable woman. One we knew was on top of her job, who respected her citizens and especially their children. Who led a government under which one could feel they could develop, progress and achieve. Above all, Helen was a leader one could feel safe and supported under,one who did not attack her own people. A leader who united the people, not divided, derided and negated parts of the population. And finally a leader who tried to make sure all prospered -not just the few,whilst trying to enslave or starve all those in a low wage society, who did not earn over $30,000 or who made as many as possible involuntarily unemployed and then blamed them for being out of work.
When living under a government that respects and appreciates the talents and diversity and creativity of its people and supports them a country will flourish and become great,as we were doing until the hollow men came along with their spin and duplicity and false smiles..
Unfortunately, as we are seeing, if people are left to suffocate under a government who acts unjustly, hoards all the money, negates and undermines its citizens, cuts off all opportunity to progress and achieve, who lies, cheats and steals(assets) all in the name of money and profit, and all in the name of money for self interest for itself or its business masters and buddies, then that government is not only dishonourable, it is an abuser of power and its members will one day have to answer for their rather wicked behaviour. Not a good look for eternity!
At least I had the good fortune to experience one good leader in my lifetime. Thank you Helen. Now you were a real star.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/6149387/Cunliffe-not-so-supportive-after-all
So Labour has shed most vestiges of the Clark government and hurrah says Stuart Nash and National has shed, actually SFA of their old dodders: Brownlee, English, Ryall, Smith, McCully are still there- though I can’t remember actually hearing any of them apart from English say a damn thing. With Maurice Williamson outside cabinet.
Really? Is success measured by not having any institutional memory at all and having very little or no experience of actual government in your front ranks?
Does this cabinet also look like it will spend more time playing push me pull you with Pagani and Nash giving advice from the side? So much for the momentary optimism.
The ones who could win their electorates and party votes are mostly leaving or down the list. The ones who didn’t win their electorates are being promoted or given jobs.
sorry should probably put this in open mike….can this be resolved and with the “vestiges” removed what will the party be underneath??
sorry repost from another thread, and see this is already here.
Agree that the Clark-led government seemed full of talented people pulling together for the centre left and achieving things. I am VERY underwhelmed at the moment by the thinness of this possible front bench.
Thirded!
Fourthed!
+ whatever number we are up to. Helen (and Cullen) will go down in NZ history as amongst the best we have had. I remember well the feeling of a large load of feeling uttely disenfranchised lifting when Helen first won and during her year. I have had that feeling again in the last 3 years and unfortunately know it will continue until the present lot go – the sooner the better.
It would seem like Labour wishes to move to the right a bit.
Would in a million years the Greens consider asking David Cunliffe to join them at the next election or resign and stand for them in a by-election and try and take more space on the left if Labour becomes less convincing as a party of the left?
Be an interesting proposition- would it be too unnatural?
Really from a left perspective, the Clark years were nothing to write home about.
Sure, there were some great things, such as Kiwibank, which was an Alliance inititaive, but in reality, the 5th Labour government never really went close to reversing the reforms of the Lange-Douglas-Richardson-Bolger administrations.
Employment statistics from that era are rather misleading IMO, given that a lot of jobs created were casual and part time work, and labour hire companies such as AWF found themselves booming. Wages grew at a snails pace, despite all the talk of a growing economy with Clark and Cullen falling over themselves to discourage workers from seeking huge wage increases.
Clark and Cullen still sold assets, with Terralink going on the block, not to mention forests, Landcorp farms, and gas/geothermal fields to name a few.
For all the talk about ‘economic transformation’, ‘carbon neutrality’, ‘sustainability’ and so on, Clark and Cullen never really took the steps that were really required to achive such goals, probably because doing so required government agencies and state/publicly owned entities to lead the way, with the private sector being fast followers, a step too politically incorrect for a government that oozed PC-ness.
I would have to agree that wiping student loan intrest was a bribe, but only insofar that shut up people who used to question as to why tuition fees werent coming down, unlike the number of hospitals closed under Labour. Yes, they stopped the large bulk of hopsital closures, a heartless act by the National party to pay for the huge tax cuts it intended to give to the rich in 1996 (people wonder why the left ‘hate’ the rich. Its because their tax cuts were paid for by massive cuts in services.), but Queen Mary hospital at Hamner Springs and the Kimberly Center at Levin are 2 examples.
There are more points I could make, but I have things to do..
IMO the Labour Party cannot make a break from the Clark era soon enough, the woman was essentially a female Tony Blair, cultivating a bland centerism and tinkering round the edges.
@ millsy
Don’t care if she was inside left, back to front, inside out or right up against it, Helen was an ace leader.
yep and little action on climate change…though that may have cost them an election who knows…
I think Clark was best when she and her government faced a strong and intellectually vibrant criticism from the left.
Government eats all AMI’s liabilities, Australians buy the cream
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10773584
Socialisation of hundreds of millions in Christchurch losses on to tax payers, while some Australian corporate gets the money making divisions.
The Government should have compulsorarily acquired the entire insurance company for nothing.
Yeah saw this, so we get all the high cost liablities, and sell all the profit making bits that hedge against high cost events. No wonder other insurance companies are interest because it looks like the most awesome deal ever.
Sounds like some clever and hard nosed negotiating, I wonder who could have been involved in this one.
Who sold State Insurance to the Poms, who onsold it to the Aussies ?
Who learned from that mistake, and who else is set to repeat it?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/6149387/Cunliffe-not-so-supportive-after-all
Dear oh dear, some things never change I guess…
Ah, The right-biased MSM trying to prove that someone thinking about his options is someone who’s not being supportive.
POLITICS NEWSFLASH!
New Zealand First’s new Social Welfare spokeswoman makes her public debut…
Winston Peters will shortly announce the appointment of this woman to the post of Social Welfare spokesperson….
Productivity commissioner knows nothing about productivity
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10773568
How is spending 3 hours in traffic getting to work productive? Also, is providing services over a larger geographic area with lower population density less or more productive?
What a surprise – a “productivity” commissioner out to make rates and living more expensive by increasing the sprawl. All those extra roads, which are going to become White Elephants in the near future, are expensive and so are the extra network services (sewerage, telecomms, electricity, etc etc) as well.
RALLY TODAY, (FRIDAY 16 DECEMBER 2011) 6.30PM
TO PROTEST THE CLOSURE OF RAPE CRISIS – QE2 SQUARE AUCKLAND
As sexual violence surges in New Zealand, thousands join last-ditch campaign to restore funding for Auckland’s 24/7 sexual violence help centre.
Petition: Stop the closure of Auckland’s 24/7 sexual violence crisis service
24/7 sexual abuse helpline faces closure
[lprent: better. However – my rewrite is a hell of lot more likely to have people reading it. For a start the links are clickable rather than word wrapped to incomprehension. I also hide all of the internet gobbledygook under anchors. Finally I dumped the last link for which you hadn’t provided any context and didn’t relate to the previous ones.
And the following is what you garbage is what you cut’n’pasted. Basically it is crap. Do better. ]
GLOBAL PEACE AND JUSTICE AUCKLAND NEWSLETTER No. 407, December 16, 2011
RALLY TODAY, (FRIDAY 16 DECEMBER 2011) 6.30PM
TO PROTEST THE CLOSURE OF RAPE CRISIS – QE2 SQUARE AUCKLAND
As sexual violence surges in New Zealand, thousands join last-ditch campaign to restore funding for Auckland’s 24/7 sexual violence help centre. https://docs.google.com/document
/d/1W_cNOe3mFNeUAA0wX6SYvCt0j8ad7p2vap3mB2QZTm8/edit?hl=en_US&pli=1
Petition: Stop the closure of Auckland’s 24/7 sexual violence crisis service http://www.change.org/petitions
/new-zealand-government-stop-the-closure-of-aucklands-247-sexual-violence-crisis-service
24/7 sexual abuse helpline faces closure http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/6144719/24-7-sexual-abuse-helpline-faces-closure http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/shock-as-retreat-of-arctic-sea-ice-releases-deadly-greenhouse-gas-6276134.html
______________________________________________________________________________
http://thinkprogress.org/green/2011/12/15/390511/climategate-swiftboaters-under-criminal-investigation-for-hacking/
“Police officers investigating the theft of thousands of private emails between climate scientists from a University of East Anglia server in 2009″ — the source of the Climategate smear campaign timed to disrupt the Copenhagen climate summit — “have seized computer equipment” belonging to Roger Tattersall, who writes a climate denier blog under the pseudonym TallBloke.
In the United States, the Department of Justice sent a “formal request for preservation” to Tattersall and climate denier Patrick Condon, who runs the No Consensus blog under the pseudonym Jeff Id. The DOJ letter tells the conspiracy theorists to preserve “all stored communications, records, and other evidence in your possession” for their blogs and for Climate Audit, a denier blog run by Steve McIntyre, a Canadian mining consultant.
Wow, Waitakere has been returned to Bennett on judicial recount. Majority of 9 for her now.
It must be a very anxious time for the MPs (or not MPs) having to wait through these recounts. Their whole future hinges on the outcome.
Troll alert
The Hair! What would The Hair! have done without his MP’s salary these last two decades? Riddle me that, Mr Pete George 🙂
I say there, chaps!
How are things out in Waitakere these days?
That will teach Miss Sepuloni to be a gracious winner in the future….! karma’s a bitch!
Ouch – that has to hurt!
Paula wins Waitakere back!
I guess that at the very end of the day, the voters have had the final word and given Paula the mandate she so richly deserves.
I suspect that this one will be going to court to look at those shifty votes.
As it’s so close I think an election with just the two of them standing would be the better option. Of course, the best option is to move to proportional voting system in electorates.
What does it take for a vote to be invalid? Truly interested.
I requested information about vote cheating from the Electoral Commission and Ministry of Justice the other day… will be interesting to see what they front up with.
[Nelson Muntz mode] Ha ha ! [/Nelson Muntz mode]
Sooooooo
Bennett is back in as an electorate MP and Sepuloni is out.
I was just saying to someone yesterday how grumpy I have been feeling about the election results. Nothing has gone right, too many people not voting, then Dunne not stopping asset sales (must have known that Bennett would get back her seat), then the Maori Party being a coalition partner and Cunliffe not being elected as Labour leader.
I suppose I should be lucky that I am not Carmel.
I am just hearing Hil’ry Berry having orgasms of joy because Petulant Bean has won Waitakere back again. How is this even possible?
Paula Bennett has just been declared the winner in Waitakere on the recount- by nine I think they said. What is going on.? I think the whole election should be recounted .Perhaps Labour could form a government???? Am feeling rather queasy at the mo.
That means they miscounted by 20 votes… which is a hell of a lot. Something is smelling decidedly fishy.
Yes I would like to know if it involves miscounting, or the rejection of votes that were previously accepted – the tick not quite in the box indicating an “unclear intention” etc.
And if those 20 votes had gone the other way, would they smell so fishy to you? I suspect not. Vote counting is just like anything where humans are involved, mistakes will be made. You could keep recounting until you get the result you want or you could just accept the result and move on. I suggest the latter is the best course of action.
It does seem a lot to be out by, especially since they are said to be very thorough before they release the results.
We just want the actual count Mehere. Not an approximation.
Nek minnit, Caramel is unemployed.
Latest bumper sticker from out west
“I am one of the NINE”
🙂
Is that some of the “graciously winning” thing you right winger’s have been talking about?
The kicker is they’ll print a couple of hundred of them 🙂
.Mehere you write
“…or you could just accept the result and move on. I suggest the latter is the best course of action.”
If only John Key and Paula Bennett had done that when Carmel won by 11 votes.
Miscount at Fruitvale School. Mistakes do happen …
I personally have to question counting votes, transporting votes, storing votes and the scrutiny of ballot papers as Christchurch Central and Waitakere could have gone either way.
And thats why you should always be a gracious winner
Like Paula you mean Chris? One word that definitely does not describe Miss P. Bennett is “gracious”. Another recount is called for I think.
This isn’t Zimbabwe.
And that’s why we can do a recount.
I’m not sure if you can do a recount of a recount – something to do with a three day period from memory, I think it has to be escalated to a judicial review/electoral petition at this stage if anyone wants to take it further.
Well Carmel should have just congratulated her opponent on a tough fight and thanked the people for voting her in, not take a couple of cheap shots (which has backfired)
Has anyone heard from Greg Presland I’m worried that this may push him over the edge.
Why was Carmel so low on the list – nothing against Raymond Huo but he’s not in the same class as Carmel/
hs you are a piece and a waste of space.
The recount was done impeccably and there was a mistake in Fruitvale School. The decision cannot be faulted.
But there is the possibility of a Electoral Petition and the possibility that this may affect National’s majority.
Have you impersonated any female staff members lately?
Greg – yes I often wear a dress to work, it winds the patients up no end.
I can’t seem to reconcile a count being done impeccably with a mistake in fruitvale school ?
Never mind have a good day the weathers fine and I’m off for some cricket.
The mistake at Fruitvale was part of the original count. I am referring to the Judicial recount, obviously …
Lefty author Christopher Hitchens has died. Cancer took him, aged a mere 62 years old. It’s ironic that he should die on the day of the American withdrawal from Iraq, as he was often criticised for writing in support of the invasion.
At least he made it to 62 poor Jason Richards lost to his family at 35.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=10773647
Yeah, that’s a shocker, HS. Very sad.
Lefty author? Not since the 1970s, afaik… He made a meal out of having once been a lefty, and pro-war people found it tremendously useful to claim he still was a lefty, but he himself was proud to proclaim that he wasn’t.
It takes a darn sight more than being a “famous atheist” to make someone a lefty..
Nah, he was left till the end, though he was definitely critical of the movement when he felt it was deserved. I don’t think he was much of a joiner, if you know what I mean, and I think he distrusted the organised left. He was also very pro-American which was confusing for some.
Sorry, that’s utter nonsense! He was proud to be a rightist, he was truly American to the point of gastropody, and he was very scathing of the left, especially the anti-war left. I first became aware of him through a profile in the Listener in about 2002, and was frustrated to see the pro-war right saying in the lead up to the destruction of Iraq – “See! Christopher Hitchens supports us and he’s a lefty!”
It was rather like trying to say to these fascist clowns that there were no WMD… (which we all know now that there weren’t… at least I hope you do! 🙂 )
No matter how many links to Hitchens’ own words proving his hatred of Islam, Christianity, (but not Judaism you note, as Zionism has a lot to do with the casus belli , and Bush’s crusade against Islam) or his hatred of the left, the pro-war nutmegs would just stick their fingers in their ear and go “la-la-la, I can’t hear you”!
Kweewee and his gang have already used up their goodwill.
once the left gets organised next year then he and his greedy little stockjobber mates are in for a big fright.
RE: Bennett winning the recount.
Lesson to all: GET OUT AND VOTE — SOMETIMES IT ACTUALLY COUNTS!!!
Yep, definitely drowning our sorrows in this household. Is there nothing further to be done, I recall in my dark dim past about Winston Peters taking it a step further when he was denied the Hunua seat, way back in [when?] against Roger Douglas’ brother and won it back. It would seem to be not a level playing field when considering what constitutes a valid vote.
While Carmel could have zipped her lip, she should take this all the way. It is highly suspicious and could verge on Hunua like “ticks and crosses” territory, “hanging chads” or some other jiggery pokery, such as part millimetres of tick placement to get Bennett across the line. It strains belief that the change in numbers comes down to pure counting straight after a recount involving special votes.
To the whingers that say what about when Carmel won by a small number on recount, think about it. Who has the ability to manipulate here-who has a tiny parliamentary majority, i.e who has motive and opportunity to rort.
Or maybe Bennet just got more votes
presumably the same people who watched from the sidelines as Carmel won by 12 on the specials. If you are serious about this argument surely you must ascribe them the power to avert that little sideshow.
Labour didn’t even bother to have a lawyer at the recount. Was Greg playing golf?
You should not believe everything that Slater tells you. In fact if you want to be safe you should not believe anything that Slater tells you.
Pity. If the only party lawyers present were nats, it might indicate a cunning plan. Specifically, this cunning plan which relies on bennett winning the recount by a small margin (and 9 is as close as it gets), then labour to a petition for judicial review of the count. Bennett loses, but because the list seats have been finalised she is out of parliament and nactuf only have 60 seats.
It all just depends on the wider strategy, if one exists. With no lab lawyers in the room, 9 votes would be the best case scenario for bennett. And no real cost to labour.
Some people have an inability to infer anything when reading. Your comment is proof.
Like the implied meaning of the one-word sentence “pity”.
McF
Like I said don’t believe everything or come to think of it anything Slater tells you. I have read the cunning plan you talk about and I might start fundraising …
I don’t read slater. One the single-digit occasions commenters here have been adamant enough and I have read their links to wo, I’ve regretted it each and every time.
I’m much more interested in whether Edgeler’s analysis is spot on, or whether it misses a bit that brings the entire house of cards down. 9 votes can easily switch the other way. I assume that in that eventuality, the nats would go to the court of appeal, and then the supreme court. But then key/joyce would have to consider whether a prolonged legal argument would lose them more votes in the long run.
Not the slightest might about it I would hope Mick…at the very very least it keeps the razor-edge factor high in the public (and MP) mind and will rattle the Key ring like a dose of salts. Epsom salts. Tories don’t like it up em, no siree…
Must be some pretty oddly-marked ballot papers out Waitakere way.
I wonder what the usual level of inaccuracy is with this sort of thing. When someone has a majority in the thousands it’s not so important, but in such a closely-run contest, it’s a bit concerning.
The Return Of Debtor’s Prisons: Thousands Of Americans Jailed For Not Paying Their Bills
Wonder when they’ll bring back the ruling that the debtor has to pay back everything including the cost of being in prison before being released…
Oh, well, that was quick.
I guess it’s come as a shock to David Cunliffe to realise that his caucus colleagues don’t like him as much as he likes himself…
And will he throw his toys out of the cot to go and play somewhere else?
It’s sad to see the propaganda about rifts in Labour start with such a boring supposition… thoroughly yawn inducing. I would rather watch the grass grow than waste my time reading the trivial nonsense that spews out your ignoramus Toosense.
All Black captain turns down a knighthood.
What a disgraceful insult to the position of Prime Minister.
McCaw has no right to turn down such an honour if offered by the office of Prime Minister. Then again, maybe Key has insulted the office of Prime Minister, throwing knighthoods around at will.
And just how did we find this out anyway? We wouldn’t expect to know who has turned down the honours. Surely it wasn’t McCaw himself? That would counter the argument of his wonderful humility. So who leaked it… perhaps the office of Joky Hen or was it the PM?
Either way, it’s a disgrace. Disgraceful I say, damn it! Time we scrapped the dashed things what?
Hear, hear logie97.-love the sarc.,I shouldn;t ,but IIdo.
“He (Key) says an awful lot of New Zealanders will respect McCaw for that decision.”
ie.not to accept a knighthood. However, “He (Key)says there was no formal offer made in the end.”
Just a small publicity stunt then.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10773537
We occasionally have a laugh at the Penguin’s column in the Herald. So now Farrar wants to limit a government’s term. Headquarters obviously didn’t proof read this one before release.
Quote … dictators whose presumably noble original intentions have morphed into despotism as those in charge of a country conflate their personal best interests, with the country’s overall interest …
… The best of intentions often descend into a mixture of incompetence and even corruption when a political party, or a politician, rules for too long with no real chance of losing an election to the opposition… unquote
As I was only scanning his column, I had to do a double take. Was he talking about
Double Dipton? On closer reading I see he was referring to African states.
It always gets me about how the right expect the left always be gracious and respectful, but, as can be seen from the above, they expect to be able to slag off all and sundry and be nasty in general.