I looked that up Reality. All well thought out and fits what we observe and feel. I particularly noticed something about National and Chris's opinion that their 'hazing' treatment is what drives Bridges.
“Jacinda’s” empathic political persona contrasts sharply with the less-than-sunny ways of her principal political opponent – the National Party Leader of the Opposition, Simon Bridges. As a fan of the band AC/DC, Bridges will be well acquainted with the concept of “dirty deeds done dirt cheap”. It is one of the darker features of National Party culture that, in order to succeed, their aspiring leaders must consent to being “blooded”. Generally speaking, this requires them to implement policies with which, at a personal level, they may profoundly disagree. The psychic injury inflicted by this requirement to prove oneself “a good soldier” is easily imagined. And the real tragedy is that, having done it once, it gets easier and easier to do it again, and again, and again. The inevitable result is a coarsening of character and an increased susceptibility to harsh and ruthless arguments.
Shallow waters ride over earthquake zones with swimming ease. If she really believes in the ideals of people-ism she'll make these few months a stepping stone to taking back control from the powerful. I think she believes in the ideals of easiness fundamentally. Her and Grant, like the rest of the middle class polies, have no real probs. The diff between a CV and the fight to survive of real demo-crats.
I think that the lack of empathy required to plot long-term revolutionary change in a time like this runs at odds with the requirements of managing the immediate problem.
The difference is between the UK response of letting the pandemic slide, vs the NZ response of trying to stamp it out from the start. One lot looked at percentages without empathy, the other lot looked at every possible death as a human life lost.
We've got the correct sort of government for this problem.
Looks like the middle class self-indulgence of taking overseas holidays will end up killing some of us who can't afford such things. I know we are meant to all be in this together, and we are, but the thought occurs.
Well we could do without having some people. But Winston is acting in accordance with the Party's name NZFirst, and encouraging those who want to return to come back to their homeland for the near future.
You’ll have to ask WRP. It is likely to become next to impossible to return to NZ in the near future. Kiwis may miss out on medical care if they’re overseas and the healthcare systems have to prioritise.
I’d imagine that many people would rather be home with friends & family to look or be looked after.
Sounds like you disapprove though of Kiwis returning home; should they be refused entry into their own country and be returned on the next flight back?
I most certainly do not disapprove of Kiwis returning home , in a managed way, but they should not have been waiting so long to come home.. I hope Kiwis don,t miss out on medical care because they are not prioritised over non residents.
It is hard to say what is best under the circumstances but as long as individuals still have a choice, they should make up their minds quickly. The interests of the general population outweigh individual concerns at present and this will tilt towards less personal freedom in the foreseeable future till things have stabilised IMO.
And the advice is pretty ambiguous. It's not at all clear what the status of the 500,000 or so kiwis living in Australia under the 'temporary' SCV444 visa is going to be. The ongoing problem with this visa is that it's officially termed a 'temporary' visa that allows kiwis to 'live and work in Australia indefinitely'. This is a bloody awful fudge that means we aren't really citizens in either country.
Taken at face value the NZ govt's advice that all citizen's living overseas temporarily should return to NZ asap, logically captures all kiwis in Australia too. Yet in practice it cannot mean this for all sorts of practical reasons.
On the other hand if Australia, like every other nation, gets to the point of rationing ICU beds, you can bet your sweet nelly that 'non-citizens' will be at the bottom of the list.
..and Russian loons default to racism, Soros and Gates.
There are many theories about the origin of coronavirus and the further development of events. The most popular one concerns the monstrous prediction of Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. Last year, he said that 33 million people could die from such a coronavirus in 250 days. The calculations are purely mathematical, but true, the IT tycoon is sure.
After such statements, adherents of conspiracy theories literally have no doubt that the virus is of artificial origin, and Bill Gates is one of its main sponsors. Another fact adds weight to this theory – a few months ago, the head of Microsoft held a conditional exercise called Event 201, which simulated an outbreak of a new virus that killed 65 million people in 18 months. The idea of the teachings is simple – globalization in the name of salvation.
It is noteworthy that the famous pharmaceutical giants and the Pentagon leadership participated in this theater of cruel cynicism.
The fact is that while the disease affects only representatives of the Mongoloid race, such suspicious selectivity raises questions from experts. No less extensive discussion was caused by the story around the laboratory for the study of dangerous viruses. It is located in Wuhan, 32 kilometers from the same market where the disease was first recorded.
However, there is another biolaboratory in Wuhan – until recently, nothing was known about it. Her address is like someone’s joke – Gaoxin, three sixes – the number mentioned in the Bible, under which the name of the beast of the Apocalypse is hidden. But it’s even more symbolic that it exists on the money of the famous banker Jorozh Soros, who shares the global ideas of Bill Gates. It would seem that nuclear conspiracy theology is completely different, but experts say that a tricky plan lies behind an absurd wrapper.
An Auckland woman in self-isolation has been left empty-handed after her online grocery order was cancelled without any warning.
The woman said her order at New World Stonefields comprised mostly of baby items and she was now working out how she would source her groceries
People have very individual needs, but we probably need to be talking more about community support right now. Someone in her street or wider area should be able to help with this.
Should Bernie drop out now? His only realistic path to the nomination now is Biden suffering an extreme adverse medical event. There simply aren’t enough votes left for him to win the nomination with actual votes.
There's a good argument it's time to pass the torch to a new generation of progressive leaders. Marie Newman's victory over establishment Dem machine favourite Dan Lipinski in solidly Dem Illinois 3rd, where Sanders lost to Biden by 41k votes to 63k votes strongly hints there's a big place for progressive ideas and people, but that Sanders is no longer the best person to front them.
There's a good public health argument the time is right for Bernie to step down and allow the remaining primaries to be the rubber-stamping exercise they were going to be anyway without needing large crowds to gather at polling places. And that by doing so, he actually increases his leverage to get progress on his priorities.
I haven't been following closely, but there's also the argument that a strong progressive/left wing voice is needed for its own sake and to keep those values and politics visible at a time when they are desperately needed. If Sanders pulls out and Bidens is it, this will demoralise the left and make the true system change harder. Will probably drop the vote too. This is true irrespective of how Bidens would then do in the main election, but hugely problematic if he loses (likely).
If the worst case scenario happens (45 wins), then what is the state of the left wing resistance at that point? That would be high on my priority list if I was in the US.
Seems to me the best way forward for progressive ideas is to focus on the contrast with Repug ideas, not to inflate the relatively small differences between the various Dem factions.
For instance, the Repug position is they are quite happy with people getting bankrupted, unnecessarily suffering, and dying early because they can't afford healthcare. In that context, the difference is trivial between Medicare-for-all-who-want-it that is available to everyone but still allows the half of Americans with employer provided health insurance to keep it if they prefer, and a purist Medicare-for-all which bans private health insurance and forces everyone into government health care.
In the context of trying to promote progressive ideas, it's entirely possible Sanders could do a lot more good lending his support to helping progressive challengers to crusty old forever-troughers in safe Dem seats, rather than continuing a doomed quest for his own presidential ambitions. If Sanders could make the difference in unseating the likes of Steny Hoyer and Richard Neal and replacing them with actual progressives, that would really be something.
Then there's the risk that if Bernie continues his campaign way beyond the point of no real hope, then it might inflate the Bernie-or-bust types, who would then go on to undermine Biden in the general election. Thereby depressing Dem vote, inflating third party vote, and widening Don the Con's path to re-election. As happened in 2016, likely contributing to the poor showing for House and Senate candidates as well as Hillary's surprise loss.
Biden needs to move on his VP pick pronto. He's already promised it will be a female.
Warren would be a useful choice to restructure and re-regulate the economy after this mess. Although unlikely since she’s not supporting him (or Sanders).
I reckon Warren would get a lot more done as Treasury Secretary.
This piece has a bunch of thumbnails of the probable top 12. It ranks Kamala Harris #1. Since there's a reasonable chance Biden would only go one term, that makes the VP pick this time around the most likely Dem nominee for 2024, and Harris strikes me as the most credible candidate for prez.
So how do y'all Jacinda-lovers reconcile the terrifying disconnection between her words "Toughest controls in the world" and the reality that travellers are finding as they enter New Zealand?
This is just one of many reports of what is (not) going on at our borders; there is no effective control to prevent entry of people even if they are symptomatic. There is absolutely NO control to prevent asymptomatic people entering the county just now. Effectively, our borders are wide open, and virus-laden travellers can be circulating wherever they choose – on public transport, domestic air and tourist and business destinations.
Until we see a tightening of the border – preferably close all incoming flights – the PM's words are frighteningly empty.
This is not a time for endless posidivity (words), it is a time to shut the gate (action)
The woman complaining, must have been totally isolated in her own bubble, not to have seen all the information the MOH, and border control have out there. Only a few clicks away.
Seems more like a National voter trying to play a Simon Bridges, gambit.
Seems more like a National voter trying to play a Simon Bridges, gambit.
Yes. My thoughts too.
From the thousands of travellers who have arrived in NZ in the past week or so (many of them NZers returning home), only a handful seem to have had this 'experience' and funnily enough they don't seem to come to public notice until Simon Bridges brings them up at QT time in the House.
I bet if she had to sit in a little cubicle for 8 hours while every arriving passenger was given the 3rd degree shed be moaning louder . Moaners gunna moan
Our borders aren't wide open. They weren't even that before covid. I think that rhetoric doesn't serve us either.
There are others who can speak to this more here, but this is about minimising risk within the constraints of a system. If we shut things down too fast or unprepared there are other consequences eg the call to shut down schools pretty quickly leads to a conversation about childcare and how that would work in covid terms. The state is instead working with what is most likely to work in the real world. Yes, mistakes will be made, we're all humans here. But I'm seeing a govt that is responsive and working very hard to get this right and mostly succeeding.Lots of what we do now will be not ideal, but still better than the other thing.
One consequence of shutting down all flights is if this is done before other supply chains are set up, what happens to essential goods like medical supplies, pharmaceuticals, that crucial part in the a power generation plant that suddenly failed unexpectedly. There will be many examples, and until we can replace those import systems we need some planes flying.
There's also some obligation to NZers trying to get back home.
I saw the woman's post yesterday. It needs fact checking.
She was on Morning Report this morning. Her description seemed to be self defeating. No information given but notices handed out and officials shouting instructions.
How would you do that? If you shut down the commercial people flights today, how do all the essential goods coming into the country over the next week get here? I'm betting there are materials for covid tests on some of those flights.
We can shut down flights, and I'd wager good money that the government is planning in case that becomes necessary, but it takes time for all the reasons I've explained already.
You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing. No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing.
In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible.
The cost of getting it wrong will be measured in the unnecessary premature deaths of New Zealand citizens.
A very expensive stupid mistake / deliberate trade off decision, that could have been prevented early February by shutting the borders then of OUR ISLAND NATION. Unlike a place like Switzerland where 170,000 people cross the border from Italy per day o work in Switzerland …..
"You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing"
I didn't ignore those, I'm sure there are those accounts, feel free to share some and we'll address those too.
The internet is full of reckons right now. We can't base emergency policy on that, although I'm sure that the relevant authorities will be checking their processes.
You however are conflating two things: the fails in an otherwise appropriate system, with the need to have completely closed borders. In your argument you are avoiding the issues that I raised, those of unintended consequences. Do you know the impact of shutting down all incoming flights and shipping this week? What happens if of the 80,000 NZers overseas 1,000 of them are nurses and doctors trying to get home? Or even 100.
"No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing."
I'm not shooting you, I'm making a cogent argument to address the points you raised. This is what we do here.
"In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible"
People who say told you so at that point are still largely ignorant of the points I raised above and there will be literally no way to know if shutting down the ports and airports this week would have been a better option. Points which lots of people are saying btw, including those with actual expertise.
I didn’t call for moderation btw, you seem to have misunderstood what I said.
Why has this uninformed reckon got so much coverage? Because she planned it. Check her FB page, she has done a full scale media release blitz. Maree Glading is a hard core National supporter who knows how to self-publicise, she got all sorts of soft interviews for pie business when she set it up – she is clearly well connected in the Auckland high-Tory circles (which includes most of the NZ Herald).
It should be no surprise to anyone that a well connected rich white women has no trouble getting an unverified reckon published uncritically in the Herald, that is how that paper works.
But next time Shayne Currie and Duncan Grieve and Toby Manhire ad neseum have a whine about the decline of journalism, this piece of stinking class biased fake news should be raised.
The same letter was read out by Duncan Garner on the AM show this morning. Ashley Bloomfield addressed it calmly.
Reducing the discussion to "Jacinda-lovers" isn't helping. This is a massive challenge and the work isn't being done by headlines and slogans – it's being done by well-qualified, overworked, tired people. Who are contributing far more to the common good than commentators with instant reckons.
If the DG of health and medical professionals told the PM to (e.g.) close the airports do you think she would casually ignore him? Do you think the staff would remain silent? It's not Chernobyl in the USSR.
It is certain that procedures will change as the situation evolves. It is (almost) certain that people will die. Even martial law and a curfew wouldn't prevent that.
I'm wondering what the analysis is around that, in terms of bigger picture issues. We can of course crash the economy, and I'm sure that if was the bubonic plague that was going to kill half the population we'd have done that already. But crashing the economy brings death too, especially if other countries follow suit.
Our best case scenario here is that we contain cv, but it's more likely that it will eventually be in the community and that we will have flattened the curve to significantly minimise deaths.
I don't read herald but RNZ has a similar story and the family said they felt safer in Thailand. In Thailand the heroin smuggling MP’s aide has been caught hoarding face masks for sale to China for personal gain,
Yep … a whole series of Countries are now closing their borders & it's becoming more & more evident that a major lockdown is the only way to defeat this virus. The earlier the better.
WHO Executive Director, Dr Michael Ryan:
You need to act quickly, you need to go after the virus. You need to stop the chains of transmission … the lessons I've learned after so many Ebola outbreaks in my career are be fast, have no regrets, you must be the first mover. The virus will always get you if you don't move quickly … if you need to be right before you move – you will never win. Perfection is the enemy of the good … speed trumps perfection. .And the problem we have at the moment is that everyone is afraid of making a mistake, everyone is afraid of the consequence of error. But the greatest error is not to move, the greatest error is to be paralysed by the fear of failure.
We need exhaustive testing & contact tracing … but. failing that, a complete lockdown.
So many Western Govts (including our own) have been just pissing around with COVID-19, this idea that you can roll out some sort of finely-tuned, wonderfully-nuanced, carefully calibrated plan in a series of discrete little stages … dangerously stupid people deluding themselves that they have some kind of control over Coronavirus. They soooo fucking don't.
People are apparently panicking – friends of mine report chaos at supermarkets.
This is a serious question – should we start considering censorship of the media? Is the panicking mongering click bait reckons of dickheads "news" or an irresponsible luxury we can't affford just now?
Went to a slack n slave in Hamilton last night and couldn't even buy a tin of baked beans, all brands, shelves cleared. Spent most of my time at the checkout asking people with loaded trolleys if they think they've horded enough yet or will they need to make another run at it.
What makes it worse, now I'm flying solo with the kid at uni and fortunate enough to always work alone, practising social distancing, the supermarket is my main entryway for covid 19. Sucks to increase my exposure at long queues while not even being able to get the one thing I really came in for.
Can't speak to regular office hours, but I have noticed large queues during off peak times over the past couple of weeks, though no bare shelves until yesterday.
Just went to the Lincoln Rd Pak'n'save coz around now is usually a quietish time. Holy fuck! I didn't even bother going in, there were cars circling the carpark looking for a space.
I might end up chewing through my emergency supplies and outdoor activity food waiting for the wave of panic buying to pass.
TBH I didn't even look as I went past on the way there since I've never shopped there, and I left the Pak'n'save by the shared road with Mitre10 and turned right so didn't see it on the way out.
After your fifth or sixth, you won’t taste let alone care about the tonic water. That said, the first few are going to be awful but all medicines taste like shit, by design, and then, after a while, make you (feel) better (or not).
I went down to my local supermarket today to buy a few items. The queues were unbelievable! This in a town of 8000+ people. I have never seen anything like the chaos. Not even during the christmas rush, when those travelling to the beach for the holidays call in for their supplies – . Almost all out of towners stocking up for god knows what reason. Apparently it has been like this all week. On the way out I met one of our practise nurses from the local medical centre about to go in to do her shopping and mentioned – "its just madness in there" "Yes" she said "You wonder why and what they think they are achieving when this is going to go on for months." Exactly.
I called in to the local butcher on the way home . She was saying that the shop had been inundated earlier with people buying up large. She was worried she would run out for her local customers.
Nope I would say most just here for the day – we are just over an hours drive from Hamilton, and Auckland, and an hour and a half from Tauranga. The bachs (cribs) are mostly empty this time of year. I had to drive north to Auckland this past week. The traffic travelling south down SH2 and SH25 was a steady stream. Not the normal flow.
From the number of cars in the car park which is usually half empty on a Thursday around 10am I would definitely say so – and see Joe's comment below as to similar activity in Australia.
Spoke to a Countdown manager about 2 hrs ago and told her it's time they rationed bread. Visited three local supermarkets and all of them were out of bread. Saw a woman leave a supermarket with a trolley overflowing with bread. The effing selfish &*^%. 👿
Glad to say a number of shoppers heard me talking to the manager. Every last one of them looked guilty. So they should. We're a country that produces food for the rest of the world. We are not going to run out.
This isn't like the chch earthquakes, where Dunedin supermarkets ran low on bread because the bread factory and the transport networks were physically damaged.
This is all about people overbuying and throwing bread in the freezer. Or worse, it goes to waste.
we don't need bread. We need carbs, protein, fat, vitamins/minerals etc. Even if we did end up with the shortage of bread, there are ample other ways for us to get the calories we need in a day. Anne's point is incredibly sound.
NZ has been growing wheat for years – I worked in my varsity summer hols on a combine harvester harvesting wheat. Some bakers preferred the Aussie wheat for baking, but there has always been NZ wheat. I remember attending a cabinet economic committee meeting once in the early '80's – Muldoon was PM – and price fixing was in vogue. One of the topics for discussion was to be the price of wheat.
SM. Gladdens my heart you can a) afford to shop at the costlier speciality stores rather than the supermarket and b) you deign to grace TS with your exalted presence. Don't you have investments go check or something?
The fruit and vegetables shops where i live are often better quality and cheaper than the supermarket as are the weekend markets.
The butchers are more expensive but much better quality and I eat far less meat these days so choose to support local business over the large supermarket chains.
If all that makes me a nutter and least I'm happy in my madness.
Can we agree we are all nutters then? Maybe consider that we could ease up a bit on each other too? The points being made seem sound, the poking at each other is probably not the best strategy for us at this time.
Of course, you are fully aware of my circumstances that you pass judgement, twice, for my disgraceful choices.
Being a Hamilton local you will be aware that both Pak n saves are at each end of city centre?
We're currently squatting with whanau in Nawton. I cannot get Peter from his wheelchair into the loaner vehicle we have, so made the call to make the quicker trip to Te Rapa NW rather than leave Peter alone for longer than absolutely necessary. Yes, cost a wee bit more, but cheap, in terms of safety.
And replenishing our hosts' cupboards is the least we can do in exchange for free board.
Calm down, it was just a light hearted response to your nasty above, though you sure Mill st isn't closer? But lucky you went earlier, my sources tell me te rapa new world has just closed because they've run out of food.
New World Te Rapa crowded this morning with non panicked shoppers of all ages.
I did the trolly waltz with an older woman who laughingly canceled my license….then she accepted my excuse that I have never shopped in that particular supermarket before so if I was looking lost it was because I was.
Had a couple of young fellows on because they had neglected to buy actual food food. Not even 2 minute noodles…🙄
All very polite, if focused on our respective quarry.
Best conversation was in the baby wipes section. Disability, housebus dwelling and baby wipes are an actual thing. The other shopper was near frantically rifling through the various brands looking for the baby unfriendly wipes…the ones not labeled "alcohol free'.
"Might be good for baby's bum, but no use for sterilizing surfaces…!"
I suggested dilute bleach and washable cloths…the sterilizing wipes having been snapped up days ago.
Big ups to the supermarket staff. Respect. Shelves being restocked in a civilised manner and the checkout staff unflappably polite, quietly packing our goodies.
Told them they were all kinds of awesome and I do believe it made their morning.
Told them they were all kinds of awesome and I do believe it made their morning.
Good on you. Our local operators have been amazing too. So on to it and doing a fantastic job calming angry, frustrated shoppers like me. It's taught me to appreciate their real worth – not that I didn't know it before – and make the effort to tell them.
I agree, the feelings are similar to yours in the UK.
'I have spent days and days trying to calm down nearest and dearest, especially my Mum, who is scared shitless that her days are numbered due to her age and the fact she has asthma and borderline COPD. I know precisely why – because every fucking five minutes on BBC news (which she watches every evening) they are banging on about the number of deaths, details about those who have died, speculation as to how many more will die…….doom, doom and more fucking doom.
They fucking drone on about panic buying and how the public are going bat shit crazy, but who is stoking that fire and creating that panic? Yeah, that is right, you F… a…. c….s – YOU!!!
It's probably time for the government to look at the issue of equal access to supermarkets to reassure people about provisions in future.
I would suggest something like allocating days of the week for shopping – in store, or on-line. Based around the first letter of the surname – proof of ID at checkout for this (they already have surnames for on-line).
1/7th, or so, for each of the days.
Just the idea of such a system being considered/developed might be enough to reduce panic buying now.
stores could actually do this without the state mandating it. They can do this to manage their supply lines. They can also prioritise goods for people with special needs. eg online shopping for people that shouldn't be exposed to cv, young mums, elderly, disabled and so on.
Maree Glading would probably shit herself if she knew how much was known about her condition and history before she got to the last door. The other night on TV news there was a shot over a techies shoulder of a monitor showing a black and white image of disembarking passengers. There is some pretty impressive gear there at Customs/Immigration. Also the intuition and experience of the staff is bloody amazing. She is a dopey bullshitter.
The number of people with C-19 arrival is a lot less than 1 in God knows how many thousands. And anybody with a temperature probably only has a cold. As long ago as 3 weeks ago a mate pulled aside a few people in the course of a day who had appeared to have a temperature, they were overdressed for an Auckland summer but OK for a cool aircraft cabin so the C/I staff let them rest in a room and dress lighter and retested them again, all were OK.
We are going to be alright, we are well looked after by people we don't even know we have to thank.
A factory manager I was talking to,gave me an example of one teen(they took on at Xmas 17 yr) was employed because he was to be the bread winner of a family of 6.He is taking home at present an xtra 500$.
The manager said that pricing differentials meant their products were now significantly cheaper,then overseas products.
I'd like to see an analysis of how bad it is. The Herald can go get fucked. What are the TV networks doing? RNZ? Commercial radio.
I think censorship is a step too far right now, but there could be public education plans.
Btw, for the convo upthread, know what would really send large part of the population into panic? Shutting the borders completely and too fast and having medical supply and other shortages as a result.
Without trying to sound arrogant, a number of comments don’t even sound ill-advised but as not thought through at all and based on ignorance and fear (possibly with some anger). It’s ok to vent IMO, but some here, at least, are skirting close to appointing blame for deaths, for example, that have not even occurred yet. All action so far has been aimed at containment, i.e. preventing the disease spreading and causing major mayhem.
Lots of people are super stressed for sure. I am, and I have decent enough skills around stress and survival issues, I can imagine that for people who aren't used to having to think about these things they're in a fair amount of chaos (hence panic buying, and blame*). There's a thing going on about whether the pandemic is bringing out the worst in people or the best. I'm aiming for the best for myself, but I am being tested on this for sure.
*I also think we have this in the culture anyway, including in political spaces.
"should we start considering censorship of the media?"
This question has been bothering me for some time now short answer is yes something must be done and not just because of covid19. (those of you who scream straw horses at me will be ignored we need a proper discussion on this!)
I have been thinking about this one for some time and the only solution I can see that (could) work without immediate descent into state censorship of unpopular views is some sort of external set of editorial standards
a couple of areas to start is clearly labeling NEWS as different analysis as different from opinion as different from attempted influencing. (an example here would be hoskings currently labeled as "opinion" it is not and should be clearly labeled "attempted influencing")
another area is press conferences if you ask a question in a press conference that is not intended to elicit some new piece of information you get a black mark. do it three times and you are not invited back.
these are just very basic ideas as a starting point that need collective work to become some sort of workable policy but one thing that is certain we cannot continue with the current media crap and if we dont sort it out in a reasonable and fair way we will end up with state censorship which will ultimately be worse.
Wot. Are you saying we should add to the already considerable list of things we are prohibited from honestly talking about in New Zealand after the Chch debacle? The thing that is required right now is the ability to vigorously discuss our predicament and how we deal with it. If we censor any perspective we risk missing essential views of other people who think differently from us which may save us from painting ourselves into a dangerous corner.
ahh but i am not suggesting prohibiting any subject of discussion just suggesting a set of editorial standards ie visible correct and accurate labeling and separation of News , analysis, opinion, or bullshit. If you want to be a "news" outlet with journalistic privilege you follow that standard. to be "journalism" it needs to be based on facts
Troll be b*ggered! I like this blog because I find contributors to be intelligent and relatively open to changing their minds if the evidence is sound, as am I. Like many, I am treading the fine line between panic at the social and economic horror and anger at the ineptitude of those in whom we place our trust to keep us safe. I welcome all points of view, as I hope my contributions are of service too
I don't know, we spent six weeks ignoring the logical consequences of what some people were trying to say in late January. Specifically that the silent transmission characteristic of this virus made it different to almost anything we've encountered before.
And now mid March I'm still hearing people downplaying this. It takes some people a full kick to the nuts to clear the wax from their ears.
So having frittered away the best opportunity to suppress this virus at relatively low cost, we now have to pay the higher price. Tough.
1. There needs to be spare medical equipment stored as part of planning for one.
2. There should be enough testing capacity for the tracking testing necessary to prevent community spread AND community spread sampling to reassure the public so that (they and) the government would know there was community spread soon after it occurred. The latter reduces fear, the former is the means to prevent community spread.
Lesson from China
It is easier to contain it if you have a central source area to contain it in. It is harder when it is coming at you from multiple places (business and personal travel)
Yes. I think those of us that can need to start now with the staying home (mostly) and making that cultural shift. It takes time to adjust to this and if some are starting now it will be easier for others to make that change too.
This Washington Post article by Beth Cameron is excellent, detailed and informative:
When President Trump took office in 2017, the White House's National Security Council Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense survived the transition intact. Its mission was the same as when I was asked to lead the office, established after the Ebola epidemic of 2014: to do everything possible within the vast powers and resources of the U.S. government to prepare for the next disease outbreak and prevent it from becoming an epidemic or pandemic.
One year later, I was mystified when the White House dissolved the office, leaving the country less prepared for pandemics like Covid-19.
The U.S. government's slow and inadequate response to the new coronavirus underscores the need for organised, accountable leadership to prepare for and respond to pandemic threats.
Not satire; the pricks who spent billions on stock buybacks and then rather than investing in building a new aircraft, recycled one from the sixties and it killed several hundred people. Now they want money.
Looks like Elizabeth Warren is onto it in the USA. An eight point plan for companies who receive taxpayer funds. Maintain payroll, pay minimum wage, maintain collective bargaining, chop executive bonuses, etc.
Hope plenty of strings are attached here. Collective bargaining to be the norm, worker seats on the board , executive compensation to be dropped, working hour reductions to be spread.
]And it would be even better if Air NZ stopped saying it needed to lose 30% of its jobs and said 30% of the hours worked. Still seems low – an 85% service reduction is mooted.
I am already reading reports of how quickly the environment is reacting ( fish returning to waterways) to the dramatic reduction of human activity.
One positive of our current situation will be to read what reduction of co2 and other gases and see how any reduction follows predictions/models. Perhaps we underestimate the eco system to rebound or recalibrate. But not to take any reduction as an excuse to continue on our destructive manner.
Similar thing happened with places that got closed off to prevent spread of Kauri rot. Wildlife in general and feral/wild pigs and goats have been running riot.
Interesting the reason given is that there is no "“The water now looks clearer because there is less traffic on the canals, allowing the sediment to stay at the bottom,” a spokesman"
I can't help notice that the regulars here who for years have implicitly argued that we had to 'smash capitalism' and 'hit the big reset button' on our modern industrial economy … are now all very worried for themselves now an actual event threatens to disrupt our world.
Sometimes you should be careful what you wish for.
There’s a subtle difference between a controlled burn off and an out-of-control large fire that threatens to engulf and destroy everything in its path.
Fair point, although as someone familiar with the insanely complex industrial systems on which the modern world is is built, I was always dubious that the left's ideology was sufficiently nuanced to accomplish the kind of 'controlled burn off' you have in mind.
If nothing else this should underline to us all the huge damage uncontrolled shocks can cause. Whacking complex systems with big hammers, never makes anything better.
If you could do it under experimental/lab conditions with a realistic empirical model (akin earthquake testing of buildings & structures) it could be informative. Alternatively, Kobayashi Maru 😉
With the Neo-liberal unbridled capitalism, hammer.
Certainly right wing ideology has been conclusively proven to be much worse than “insufficiently nuanced”.
But. That was a right wing revolution, so "it is fine" no matter how destructive it has proven to be.
All the deaths, poverty disease and destruction it is causing is ignored.
Until when when something like coronavirus, or financial meltdowns, happens. Then all the individual responsibility, give me freedom to rip everyone else off, capitalists, suddenly become keen on socialism and State control. But, only to protect themselves, you notice. The amount of people on Facebook wanting social welfare for their business, but "fuck beneficiaries" and the already disadvantaged, is embarrassing.
The Left are really very very mild, and are pushing for controled change.
The refusal to take that on at anything other than a snails pace..a snails pace made redundant by the rapidly evolving Climate Change and Money/Power grab of the Corporations and super rich (who come out of these crises very nicely) ..are what make real, violent Revolution and the ensuing chaos all the more inevitable down the line
The "left" at least in New Zealand are all for controlled change, democratically controlled and based on evidence.
I've seen very few arguing for a revolution. Most are after solutions that have been proven to work, already
It was the "right" who bought in disaster capitalism by stealth in the 80's and 90's. A violent revolution, that is killing people in much greater numbers than coronavirus, still.
As Andre suggests if Biden gets the nod and chooses someone like Kamala Harris as his running mate, Elizabeth Warren would be an excellent choice for the Treasury. She has a very good history of achievement in introducing valuable change particularly following the GFC.
The intro looks interesting, but sadly it's paywalled. I've no objection to detailed, organic plans that allow for nuance and complexity, plans that encourage and incentivise evolution.
It's the ideological 'take a big hammer to it all' types that irk me.
I'm sorry she has withdrawn from the race because if anyone could change what is now the American system she could. But hopefully with a new President and a shift in the composition of Senate, to allow change to occur, some of what she perceives will eventuate.
Not me I not worried, I still say, let the system fall.
But it's not going to – the best we can hope for is that people stop worshiping the elites/managerial/technocrat class like gods, and actually start to think and do for themselves.
Because just in case you missed it – the orange one started a bombing campaign in Iran last week which was huge.
And whilst the supply train is currently broken in China, it will be fixed. The fact that growth is not going to be world killing will be a good thing long term.
This is not the end of capitalism, far from it.
Just more step in the crap (shocks) and insanity (wreaking) we have to survive through whilst it dies.
As for blaming those with no power in this demise, is a really shitty case of punching down.
From Newshub:
All relate to overseas travel, which Director-General Dr Ashley Bloomfield says shows New Zealand does not yet have any recorded community transmission. Close contact tracing is underway.
Of the eight new cases, two are in Southland, two in Taranaki, one in Rotorua, two in Auckland and one in Northland.
All from international travel, and we're getting to the period where anyone who gets it from overseas should have gone straight into isolation, thus limiting the close contacts.
Really, the only slight misstep I can see the government making was the announcement of the isolation requirement a couple of days before it was implemented, leading to people rushing to get back before they "had to" go into isolation. Not as serious as the Lombardy lockdown plans being leaked so people fled throughout Italy, though.
Forward modelling isn't my field (but I can backward trend with the best of 'em 🙂 ), but it's largely a function of travel numbers and proportion of longer term stays in NZ.
Assuming no community outbreak, I'd expect increasing overseas-sourced cases daily over the next week or two, especially as testing abilities ramp up. The reverse-diaspora and longer term stays in NZ to allow symptoms to develop, reflecting a lag on the conditions that prevailed in the country they departed from.
As someone put it, in 6-8 weeks the world went from "we might have a problem" to "I might starve, but I refuse to die with an unwiped ass".
We might still be lucky. We'll see if the incoming cases peak soon.
While Italy is currently the "worst-case scenario" for the United States, the small Italian town of Vò has not reported any new cases of COVID-19 since last Friday and the spread of the illness has been completely stopped there.
Vò, a town of 3,300 just outside Venice, was part of an experiment that involved aggressive testing and quarantine measures. Every single resident was tested for coronavirus in late February when Northern Italy was first rocked by the outbreak, and three percent of inhabitants were found to be carrying the virus.
Andrea Crisanti, an infections expert at Imperial College London, was involved with the experiment and told news outlets that half of the carriers exhibited no symptoms.
“In the UK, there are a whole lot of infections that are completely ignored,” Crisanti told the Financial Times. “We were able to contain the outbreak here because we identified and eliminated the ‘submerged’ infections and isolated them. That is what makes the difference.”
Anyone who tested positive was placed under quarantine, as were individuals that came into recent contact with the infected. The town's residents were then tested again 10 days later, and just .3 percent of the population was found to be carrying the virus. However, at least six infected individuals were asymptomatic and would not have been tested in most other countries.
[''']
Crisanti also warned Sky News that, "for every patient that shows symptoms for COVID-19 there were about 10 who don't."
Yeah, we'll just pull 4 million testing kits and an appropriate number of lab techs and labs out of our arse, shall we?
In order to discover if there are 9 or so people in the country who are asymptomatic, because we're not getting symptomatic patients from the wider community yet?
The nice thing about contact tracing is that it works backwards, too – not just the people who get infected by the patient, but the person who infected them.
Of returnees like an acquaintance who arrived in the country last Thursday who's since been yuking it up around the town with not a thought about self isolation.
All the Logan Park (Dunedin) tests are in: all negative.
This is how the system works – resources are finite, while the population is infinite (literally, because you'd have to start again and re-check once the entire population had been tested).
Tests don't happen just by thinking of a number and doubling it. Real people, working overtime and under great stress, are carrying out these tests. They deserve our thanks.
I know it's millions of deaths but when it comes down to it it's c. 3 % of the population. But we haven't had such an upset since Polio, TB or WW 2. And don't we need it. We've begun to think complacent comfort is a right, and the climate change cliff so near. This new war govt should continue on. Comfort-comfort-comfort kills alertness for survival. And, yes, we've never encountered a certainty of complete doom preceded by a decade or two of increasing comfort. Like those birds fooled by cuckoos to raise their chicks we can't deal with that fiddling with our genetic programme.
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 ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.06pm on Tuesday, March 19:Kāinga Ora’s dry rot The Spinoff DailyBill McKibben on ‘Climate Superfunds’ making Big Oil pay for climate damage The Crucial YearsPreston Mui on returning to 1980s-style productivity growth NoahpinionAndy Boenau on NIMBYs needing unusual bedfellows Urbanism SpeakeasyNed Resnikoff's case ...
Negative yesterday, negative today. Negative all year, according to one departing reader telling me I’ve grown strident and predictable. Fair enough. If it’s any help, every time I go to write about a certain topic that begins with C and ends with arrrrs, I do brace myself and ask: Again? Are ...
Bryce Edwards writes – It’s been a tumultuous time in politics in recent months, as the new National-led Government has driven through its “First 100 Day programme”. During this period there’s been a handful of opinion polls, which overall just show a minimal amount of flux in public support ...
Inspirational: The Family of Man is a glorious hymn to human equality, but, more than that, it is a clarion call to human freedom. Because equality, unleavened by liberty, is a broken piano, an unstrung harp; upon which the songs of fraternity will never be played.“Somebody must have been telling lies about ...
Tax Lawyer Barbara Edmonds vs Emperor Justinian I- Nolo Contendere: False historical explanations of pivotal events are very far from being inconsequential.WHEN BARBARA EDMONDS made reference to the Roman Empire, my ears pricked up. It is, lamentably, very rare to hear a politician admit to any kind of familiarity ...
It’s been a tumultuous time in politics in recent months, as the new National-led Government has driven through its “First 100 Day programme”. During this period there’s been a handful of opinion polls, which overall just show a minimal amount of flux in public support for the various parties in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Housing Minister Chris Bishop delivered news – packed with the ingredients to enflame political passions – worthy of supplanting Winston Peters in headline writers’ priorities. He popped up at the post-Cabinet press conference to promise a crackdown on unruly and antisocial state housing tenants. His ...
Ele Ludemann writes – The Reserve Bank is advertising for a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion advisor. The Bank has one mandate – to keep inflation between one and three percent. It has failed in that and is only slowly getting inflation back down to the upper limit. Will it ...
Last week former National Party leader Simon Bridges was appointed by the Government as the new chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA). You can read about the appointment in Thomas Coughlan’s article, Simon Bridges to become chair of NZ Transport Agency Waka KotahiThe fact that a ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Last week former National Party leader Simon Bridges was appointed by the Government as the new chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA). You can read about the appointment in Thomas Coughlan’s article, Simon Bridges to become chair of NZ Transport Agency ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Gavin Jacobson talks to Thomas Piketty 10 years on from Capital in the 21st CenturyThe SalvoLocal scoop: Green MP’s business being investigated over migrant exploitation claims StuffSteve KilgallonLocal deep-dive: The commercial contractors making money from School ...
It’s a home - but Kāinga Ora tenants accused of “abusing the privilege” may lose it. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The Government announced a crackdown on Kāinga Ora tenants who were unruly and/or behind on their rent, with Housing Minister Chris Bishop saying a place in a state ...
This is a guest post by Connor Sharp of Surface Light Rail Light rail in Auckland: A way forward sooner than you think With the coup de grâce of Auckland Light Rail (ALR) earlier this year, and the shift of the government’s priorities to roads, roads, and more roads, it ...
Note: As a paid-up Webworm member, I’ve recorded this Webworm as a mini-podcast for you as well. Some of you said you liked this option - so I aim to provide it when I get a chance to record! Read more ...
TL;DR: In my ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.06pm on Monday, March 18:IKEA is accused of planting big forests in New Zealand to green-wash; REDD-MonitorA City for People takes a well-deserved victory lap over Wellington’s pro-YIMBY District Plan votes; A City for PeopleSteven Anastasiou takes a close look at the sticky ...
Buzz from the Beehive Here’s hoping for a lively post-cabinet press conference when the PM and – perhaps – some of his ministers tell us what was discussed at their meeting today. Until then, Point of Order has precious little Beehive news to report after its latest monitoring of the ...
David Farrar writes – We now have almost all 2023 data in, which has allowed me to update my annual table of how labour went against its promises. This is basically their final report card. The promiseThe result Build 100,000 affordable homes over 10 ...
I’m a bit worried that I’ve started a previous newsletter with the words “just when you think they couldn’t get any worse…” Seems lately that I could begin pretty much every issue with that opening. Such is the nature of our coalition government that they seem to be outdoing each ...
Geoffrey Miller writes – Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. ...
Depictions of Islam in Western popular culture have rarely been positive, even before 9/11. Five years on from the mosque shootings, this is one of the cultural headwinds that the Muslim community has to battle against. Whatever messages of tolerance and inclusion are offered in daylight, much of our culture ...
Last week Transport Minster Simeon Brown and Mayor Wayne Brown opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre. The new train control centre will see teams from KiwiRail, Auckland Transport and Auckland One Rail working more closely together to improve train services across the city. The Auckland Rail Operations Centre in ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson said in an exit interview with Q+A yesterday the Government can and should sustain more debt to invest in infrastructure for future generations. Elsewhere in the news in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 6:36am: Read more ...
Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. It is more than just a happy ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to March 18 include:China’s Foreign Minister visiting Wellington today;A post-cabinet news conference this afternoon; the resumption of Parliament on Tuesday for two weeks before Easter;retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson gives his valedictory speech in Parliament; ...
New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters’s state-of-the-nation speech on Sunday was really a state-of-Winston-First speech. He barely mentioned any of the Government’s key policies and could not even wholly endorse its signature income tax cuts. Instead, he rehearsed all of his complaints about the Ardern Government, including an extraordinary claim ...
A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
“I’ve been internalising a really complicated situation in my head.”When they kept telling us we should wait until we get to know him, were they taking the piss? Was it a case of, if you think this is bad, wait till you get to know the real Christopher, after the ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
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.“$10 and a target that bleeds” - Bleeding Targets for Under $10!.Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.This government appears hell-bent on either scrapping life-saving legislation or reintroducing things that - frustrated critics insist - will be dangerous and likely ...
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Subversive & Disruptive Technologies: Just as happened with that other great regulator of the masses, the Medieval Church, the advent of a new and hard-to-control technology – the Internet – is weakening the ties that bind. Then, and now, those who enjoy a monopoly on the dissemination of lies, cannot and will ...
Been Here Before: To find the precedents for what this Coalition Government is proposing, it is necessary to return to the “glory days” of Muldoonism.THE COALITION GOVERNMENT has celebrated its first 100 days in office by checking-off the last of its listed commitments. It remains, however, an angry government. It ...
Bob Edlin writes – And what is the world watching today…? The email newsletter from Associated Press which landed in our mailbox early this morning advised: In the news today: The father of a school shooter has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter; prosecutors in Trump’s hush-money case ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Is another Green MP on their way out? And are the Greens severely tarnished by another integrity scandal? For the second time in three months, the Green Party has secretly suspended an MP over integrity issues. Mystery is surrounding the party’s decision to ...
For the last few years, the Green Party has been the party that has managed to avoid the plague of multiple scandals that have beleaguered other political parties. It appears that their luck has run out with a second scandal which, unfortunately for them, coincided with Golraz Ghahraman, the focus ...
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What seemed a booming success a couple of years ago has collapsed into fraud convictions.I looked at the crash of FTX (short for ‘Futures Exchange’) in November 2022 to see whether it would impact on the financial system as a whole. Fortunately there was barely a ripple, probably because it ...
Anybody following the situation in Ukraine and Russia would probably have been amused by a recent Tweet on X NATO seems to be putting in an awful lot of effort to influence what is, at least according to them, a sham election in an autocracy.When do the Ukrainians go to ...
TL;DR:Shaun Baker on Wynyard Quarter's transformation. Magdalene Taylor on the problem with smart phones. How private equity are now all over reinsurance. Dylan Cleaver on rugby and CTE. Emily Atkin on ‘Big Meat’ looking like ‘Big Oil’.Bernard’s six-stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15Photo by Jeppe Hove Jensen ...
Buzz from the Beehive Finance Minister Nicola Willis had plenty to say when addressing the Auckland Business Chamber on the economic growth that (she tells us) is flagging more than we thought. But the government intends to put new life into it: We want our country to be a ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee has reported back on the Road User Charges (Light Electric RUC Vehicles) Amendment Bill, basicly rubberstamping it. While there was widespread support among submitters for the principle that EV and PHEV drivers should pay their fair share for the roads, they also overwhelmingly disagreed with ...
Peter Dunne writes – This week’s government bailout – the fifth in the last eighteen months – of the financially troubled Ruapehu Alpine Lifts company would have pleased many in the central North Island ski industry. The government’s stated rationale for the $7 million funding was that it ...
See if you can spot the difference. An Iranian born female MP from a progressive party is accused of serial shoplifting. Her name is leaked to the media, which goes into a pack frenzy even before the Police launch an … Continue reading → ...
Ele Ludemann writes – The government is omitting general Treaty references from legislation : The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last Government in a bid to get greater coherence in the public service on Treaty ...
What was that judge thinking?Peter Williams writes – That Golriz Ghahraman and District Court Judge Maria Pecotic were once lawyer colleagues is incontrovertible. There is published evidence that they took at least one case to the Court of Appeal together. There was a report on ...
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Buzz from the BeehiveThe text reproduced above appears on a page which records all the media statements and speeches posted on the government’s official website by Melissa Lee as Minister of Media and Communications and/or by Jenny Marcroft, her Parliamentary Under-secretary. It can be quickly analysed ...
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Questions need to be asked on both sides of the worldPeter Williams writes – The NRL Judiciary hands down an eight week suspension to Sydney Roosters forward Spencer Leniu , an Auckland-born Samoan, after he calls Ezra Mam, Sydney-orn but of Aboriginal and Torres Strait ...
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Michael Bassett writes – At first reading, a front-page story in the New Zealand Herald on 13 March was bizarre. A group of severely intellectually limited teenagers, with little understanding of the law, have been pleading to the Justice Select Committee not to pass a bill dealing with ram ...
How much political capital is Christopher Luxon willing to burn through in order to deliver his $2.9 billion gift to landlords? Evidently, Luxon is: (a) unable to cost the policy accurately. As Anna Burns-Francis pointed out to him on Breakfast TV, the original ”rock solid” $2.1 billion cost he was ...
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TL;DR:Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said yesterday tenants should be grateful for the reinstatement of interest deductibility because landlords would pass on their lower tax costs in the form of lower rents. That would be true if landlords were regulated monopolies such as Transpower or Auckland Airport1, but they’re not, ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Tom Toro Tom Toro is a cartoonist and author. He has published over 200 cartoons in The New Yorker since 2010. His cartoons appear in Playboy, the Paris Review, the New York Times, American Bystander, and elsewhere. Related: What 10 EV lovers ...
The business section of the NZ Herald is full of opinion. Among the more opinionated of all is the ex-Minister of Transport, ex-Minister of Railways, ex MP for Auckland Central (1975-93, Labour), Wellington Central (1996-99, ACT, then list-2005), ex-leader of the ACT Party, uncle to actor Antonia, the veritable granddaddy ...
Hi,Just quickly — I’m blown away by the stories you’ve shared with me over the last week since I put out the ‘Gary’ podcast, where I told you about the time my friend’s flatmate killed the neighbour.And you keep telling me stories — in the comments section, and in my ...
The first season of Rings of Power was not awful. It was thoroughly underwhelming, yes, and left a lingering sense of disappointment, but it was more expensive mediocrity than catastrophe. I wrote at length about the series as it came out (see the Review section of the blog, and go ...
Buzz from the Beehive Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden told Auckland Business Chamber members they were the first audience to hear her priorities as a minister in a government committed to cutting red tape and regulations. She brandished her liberalising credentials, saying Flexible labour markets are the ...
Chris Trotter writes – TO UNDERSTAND WHY NEWSHUB FAILED, it is necessary to understand how TVNZ changed. Up until 1989, the state broadcaster had been funded by a broadcasting licence fee, collected from every citizen in possession of a television set, supplemented by a relatively modest (compared ...
Bob Edlin writes – The Māori Party has been busy issuing a mix of warnings and threats as its expresses its opposition to interest deductibility for landlords and the plans of seabed miners. It remains to be seen whether they follow the example of indigenous litigants in Australia, ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
The New Zealand public voted for a change in direction at the 2023 general election and that is exactly what this coalition government has been delivering in its first 100 days. There was an immediate focus on the economy, easing the cost of living, cracking down on law and order ...
The Government has left the health system as an afterthought, announcing half-baked targets at the last minute of their 100-day plan, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
Kiwis are still waiting for their promised cost of living support after 100 days of a National Government that is taking us backwards, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The National Government has spent its first 100 days stopping, cutting and reversing. They have scrapped stuff for stuff for the sake of it, without putting up any solutions of their own – and it’s hardworking New Zealanders who will pay for it. ...
100 days of National taking NZ backwardsThe National Government has spent its first 100 days stopping, cutting and reversing. They have scrapped stuff for stuff for the sake of it, without putting up any solutions of their own – and it’s hardworking New Zealanders who will pay for it. ...
The Government must commit to funding free and healthy school lunches, as thousands of people sign the petition to keep them, education spokesperson Jan Tinetti says. ...
If the Government was serious about moving families into public housing, they would build more houses so there is actually somewhere for people to go. ...
The free and healthy school lunches programme feeds our kids, helps them to learn, and saves families money – but it is at risk under this Government, education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
The Government’s proposed changes to Firearms Prohibition Orders (FPO) add almost nothing new and are merely an attempt to distract from its plans to loosen gun laws, police spokesperson Ginny Andersen and justice spokesperson Dr Duncan Webb said. ...
The great Victorian era English politician Lord Macauley stood in the British House of Parliament and said, "The gallery in which the reporters sit has become a fourth estate of the realm".He understood and outlined even way back then, the significant role and influence media have in a democracy. ...
"The Government is moving quickly to realise an additional $46 million in tariff savings in the EU market this season for Kiwi exporters,” Minister for Trade and Agriculture, Todd McClay says. Parliament is set, this week, to complete the final legislative processes required to bring the New Zealand – European ...
New Zealand’s social workers are qualified, experienced, and more representative of the communities they serve, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “I want to acknowledge and applaud New Zealand’s social workers for the hard work they do, providing invaluable support for our most vulnerable. “To coincide with World ...
Cabinet has agreed to a reduced road user charge (RUC) rate for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. Owners of PHEVs will be eligible for a reduced rate of $38 per 1,000km once all light electric vehicles (EVs) move into the RUC system from 1 April. ...
Minister of Agriculture and Trade, Todd McClay, says that today’s opening of Riverland Foods manufacturing plant in Christchurch is a great example of how trade access to overseas markets creates jobs in New Zealand. Speaking at the official opening of this state-of-the-art pet food factory the Minister noted that exports ...
Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Wellington today. “It was a pleasure to host Foreign Minister Wang Yi during his first official visit to New Zealand since 2017. Our discussions were wide-ranging and enabled engagement on many facets of New Zealand’s relationship with China, including trade, ...
Kāinga Ora – Homes & Communities has been instructed to end the Sustaining Tenancies Framework and take stronger measures against persistent antisocial behaviour by tenants, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Earlier today Finance Minister Nicola Willis and I sent an interim Letter of Expectations to the Board of Kāinga Ora. ...
Tēna koutou katoa. Greetings everyone. Thank you to the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and the Honourable Simon Bridges for hosting this address today. I acknowledge the business leaders in this room, the leaders and governors, the employers, the entrepreneurs, the investors, and the wealth creators. The coalition Government shares your ...
Minister Winston Peters completed the final leg of his visit to South and South East Asia in Singapore today, where he focused on enhancing one of New Zealand’s indispensable strategic partnerships. “Singapore is our most important defence partner in South East Asia, our fourth-largest trading partner and a ...
Minister of Internal Affairs and Workplace Relations and Safety, Hon. Brooke van Velden, will travel to the Republic of Korea to represent New Zealand at the Third Summit for Democracy on 18 March. The summit, hosted by the Republic of Korea, was first convened by the United States in 2021, ...
ICNZ Speech 7 March 2024, Auckland Acknowledgements and opening Mōrena, ngā mihi nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Good morning, it’s a privilege to be here to open the ICNZ annual conference, thank you to Mark for the Mihi Whakatau My thanks to Tim Grafton for inviting me ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Lead Coordination Minister Judith Collins have expressed their deepest sympathy on the five-year anniversary of the Christchurch terror attacks. “March 15, 2019, was a day when families, communities and the country came together both in sorrow and solidarity,” Mr Luxon says. “Today we pay our respects to the 51 shuhada ...
Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024 Acknowledgements and opening Morena, Nga Mihi Nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Thanks Nate for your Mihi Whakatau Good morning. It’s a pleasure to formally open your conference this morning. What a lovely day in Wellington, What a great ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters held discussions in Jakarta today about the future of relations between New Zealand and South East Asia’s most populous country. “We are in Jakarta so early in our new government’s term to reflect the huge importance we place on our relationship with Indonesia and South ...
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters has announced that the Foreign Minister of China, Wang Yi, will visit New Zealand next week. “We look forward to re-engaging with Foreign Minister Wang Yi and discussing the full breadth of the bilateral relationship, which is one of New Zealand’s ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has today opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre, which will bring together KiwiRail, Auckland Transport, and Auckland One Rail to improve service reliability for Aucklanders. “The recent train disruptions in Auckland have highlighted how important it is KiwiRail and Auckland’s rail agencies work together to ...
The Government is proud to support the 10th edition of Crankworx Rotorua as the Crankworx World Tour returns to Rotorua from 16-24 March 2024, says Minister for Economic Development Melissa Lee. “Over the past 10 years as Crankworx Rotorua has grown, so too have the economic and social benefits that ...
Legislation implementing coalition Government tax commitments and addressing long-standing tax anomalies will be progressed in Parliament next week, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The legislation is contained in an Amendment Paper to the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill issued today. “The Amendment Paper represents ...
Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard has today announced that the Government has agreed to suspend the requirement for councils to comply with the Significant Natural Areas (SNA) provisions of the National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity for three years, while it replaces the Resource Management Act (RMA).“As it stands, SNAs ...
Agriculture Minister Todd McClay has classified the drought conditions in the Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts as a medium-scale adverse event, acknowledging the challenging conditions facing farmers and growers in the district. “Parts of Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts are in the grip of an intense dry spell. I know ...
The Government is helping farmers eradicate the significant impact of facial eczema (FE) in pastoral animals, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced. “A $20 million partnership jointly funded by Beef + Lamb NZ, the Government, and the primary sector will save farmers an estimated NZD$332 million per year, and aims to ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has completed a successful visit to India, saying it was an important step in taking the relationship between the two countries to the next level. “We have laid a strong foundation for the Coalition Government’s priority of enhancing New Zealand-India relations to generate significant future benefit for both countries,” says Mr Peters, ...
Cabinet has agreed to provide $7 million to ensure the 2024 ski season can go ahead on the Whakapapa ski field in the central North Island but has told the operator Ruapehu Alpine Lifts it is the last financial support it will receive from taxpayers. Cabinet also agreed to provide ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
Lower fruit and vegetable prices are welcome news for New Zealanders who have been doing it tough at the supermarket, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. Stats NZ reported today the price of fruit and vegetables has dropped 9.3 percent in the 12 months to February 2024. “Lower fruit and vege ...
Tēnā koutou katoa and greetings to you all. Chair, I am honoured to address the sixty-eighth session of the Commission on the Status of Women. I acknowledge the many crises impacting the rights of women and girls. Heightened global tensions, war, climate related and humanitarian disasters, and price inflation all ...
Tēnā koutou katoa and greetings to you all. Chair, I am honoured to address the 68th session of the Commission on the Status of Women. I acknowledge the many crises impacting the rights of women and girls. Heightened global tensions, war, climate related and humanitarian disasters, and price inflation all ...
The coalition Government is supporting farmers to enhance land management practices by investing $3.3 million in locally led catchment groups, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced. “Farmers and growers deliver significant prosperity for New Zealand and it’s vital their ongoing efforts to improve land management practices and water quality are supported,” ...
Good evening everyone and thank you for that lovely introduction. Thank you also to the Honourable Simon Bridges for the invitation to address your members. Since being sworn in, this coalition Government has hit the ground running with our 100-day plan, delivering the changes that New Zealanders expect of us. ...
Recommendations from the Climate Change Commission for New Zealand on the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) auction and unit limit settings for the next five years have been tabled in Parliament, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “The Commission provides advice on the ETS annually. This is the third time the ...
The coalition Government is beginning its fight to lower building costs and reduce red tape by exempting minor building work from paying the building levy, says Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk. “Currently, any building project worth $20,444 including GST or more is subject to the building levy which is ...
Proposed changes to tax legislation to prevent the over-taxation of low-earning trusts are welcome, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The changes have been recommended by Parliament’s Finance and Expenditure Committee following consideration of submissions on the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill. “One of the ...
Assalaamu alaikum. السَّلَام عليكم In light of the holy month of Ramadan, I want to extend my warmest wishes to our Muslim community in New Zealand. Ramadan is a time for spiritual reflection, renewed devotion, perseverance, generosity, and forgiveness. It’s a time to strengthen our bonds and appreciate the diversity ...
Former Transport Minister and CEO of the Auckland Business Chamber Hon Simon Bridges has been appointed as the new Board Chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) for a three-year term, Transport Minister Simeon Brown announced today. “Simon brings extensive experience and knowledge in transport policy and governance to the role. He will ...
Good morning all, it is a pleasure to be here as Minister of Science, Innovation and Technology. It is fantastic to see how connected and collaborative the life science and biotechnology industry is here in New Zealand. I would like to thank BioTechNZ and NZTech for the invitation to address ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says he is looking forward to the day when three key water projects in Northland are up and running, unlocking the full potential of land in the region. Mr Jones attended a community event at the site of the Otawere reservoir near Kerikeri on Friday. ...
Associate Finance Minister David Seymour has today announced that the Government has agreed to restore deductibility for mortgage interest on residential investment properties. “Help is on the way for landlords and renters alike. The Government’s restoration of interest deductibility will ease pressure on rents and simplify the tax code,” says ...
Sport and Recreation Minister Chris Bishop will travel to Switzerland today to attend an Executive Committee meeting and Symposium of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Mr Bishop will then travel on to London where he will attend a series of meetings in his capacity as Infrastructure Minister. “New Zealanders believe ...
Pacific Media Watch Earthwise hosts Lois and Martin Griffiths. Earthwise presenters Lois and Martin Griffiths on Plains FM 96.9 community radio talk to Dr David Robie, a New Zealand author, independent journalist and media educator with a passion for the Asia-Pacific region. David talks about the struggle to raise awareness ...
Pacific Media Watch Ismail al-Ghoul, an Al Jazeera Arabic correspondent who was held for 12 hours at Gaza’s al-Shifa hospital, says Israeli forces rounded up Palestinian journalists at the facility and made them kneel on the ground for hours, while naked and blindfolded. “The occupation forces handcuffed and blindfolded us ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Wood, Program Director, Energy, Grattan Institute chinasong, Shutterstock Electricity customers in four Australian states can breathe a sigh of relief. After two years in a row of 20% price increases, power prices have finally stabilised. In many places they’re ...
Chumbawamba have reportedly issued the deputy PM a cease-and-desist notice after he used their song 'Tubthumping' before his state of the nation speech. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deborah Lupton, SHARP Professor, Vitalities Lab, Centre for Social Research in Health and Social Policy Centre, and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society, UNSW Sydney kitzcorner/Shutterstock The assertion from Queensland’s chief health officer John Gerrard that ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Shutterstock Why are musicians so keen to get played on the radio? It can’t be because of the money. In Australia they are paid at rates so low they ...
"Farmers make a point not to tell our urban cousins how to live, yet Chlöe from central Auckland is hell-bent on having her say about farmers," says ACT Rural Communities spokesman Mark Cameron. “On her first day in the House as Green ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards – Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. It’s been a tumultuous time in politics in recent months, as the new National-led Government has driven through its “First 100 Day programme”. During this period there’s been a handful of opinion polls, which overall just ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Curran, Associate Professor of Ecology, Lincoln University, New Zealand Getty Images/Gerald Corsi In the latest move to reform environmental laws in New Zealand, the coalition government has introduced a bill to fast-track consenting processes for projects deemed to ...
Uber has argued it does not have as much control over drivers as the unions suggest, and wants a judgment ruling that drivers are employees and not contractors set aside and sent back to the Employment Court. The 2022 ruling followed a three-week hearing in which four drivers sought to ...
What can and can’t be purchased by disabled people or their carers has been slashed in an effort by the Ministry of Disabled People Whaikaha to save money. The purchasing guidelines, a set of rules that sets out what can be purchased using the various streams of Government disability funding, ...
The Treasury has published today a new Analytical Note by Tod Wright and Hien Nguyen, Fiscal incidence in New Zealand: The effects of taxes and benefits on household incomes in tax year 2018/19 . Analyses of the distributional impact of taxation and government ...
The Treasury has published today a new Analytical Note by Cory Davis, Boston Hart and Benjamin Stubbing, Household cost-of-living impacts from the Emissions Trading Scheme and using transfers to mitigate regressive outcomes . This Analytical Note ...
A coalition of public transport and climate organisations, united as ‘Transport for All’, is actively opposing the government’s transport proposals. The draft Government Policy Statement (GPS) includes plans for higher fares for public transport, ...
Greater Wellington is inviting feedback on proposed changes to its Revenue and Financing Policy. The Revenue and Financing Policy covers the Council’s various sources of funding, and how the cost of services is shared across the region. This includes ...
Labour has conceded it could have done more to deal with disruptive state housing tenants while in government but says the current coalition is going too far. ...
The band has asked their record label to issue a cease and desist to stop the NZ First leader using their 1997 hit to support his ‘misguided political views’. “I get knocked down, but I get up again,” blared through the speakers on Sunday as Winston Peters took the stage ...
By Lydia Lewis, RNZ Pacific journalist Food rationing is underway in remote areas in Papua New Guinea’s Highlands following torrential rain and flash flooding. More than 20 people have been reported dead in Chimbu Province. In nearby Enga Province, the centre of last month’s massacre, a 15-year-old boy has been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Hughes, Lecturer, Research School of Management, Australian National University After months of debate and intrigue, the AFL’s 19th and newest team, the Tasmania Devils, finally launched its jumper, logo and colours in Devonport this week. The Devils will wear green, ...
Brannavan Gnanalingam reviews the debut novel by Saraid de Silva.One of the most baffling things for children who move to a new country is what their parents’ (or grandparents’) lives were like prior to moving – for kids in particular, they’re too busy trying to fit in in their ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Gaunson, Associate Professor in Cinema Studies, RMIT University Narelle Portanier/Binge “If you don’t know who your mob are, you don’t know who you are,” Detective Andrea “Andie” Whitford (played by Leah Purcell) is told early into the new crime ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elise Klein, Associate professor, Australian National University It’s commonly accepted that women do the vast majority of caregiving in Australian society. But less appreciated is that Indigenous women do larger amounts of unpaid care than any other group. Working with the Aboriginal ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne Joe Biden and Donald Trump have both secured their parties’ nominations for the November 5 United States general election by winning a ...
Comment: There has been a striking contrast in trans-Tasman interest about Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi’s visit to New Zealand and Australia. While the Australian press has been full of articles about the visit – including his curious decision to meet with former prime minister and China booster Paul Keating ...
After years of pressuring banks and other institutions to stop investing in fossil fuels, climate campaigners are making some progress. So how does divestment work?For years, climate activists have been pushing banks and other big institutions to divest from fossil fuels. New research from climate advocacy group 350 Aotearoa ...
For Boba, Ethan and Ashley, K-pop is a place to belong, a way to express themselves, and a bridge to connect with others. The three young Polynesians are part of a K-pop fan community in Tāmaki Makaurau. It’s one of many that have sprung up worldwide as K-pop has gone ...
For Boba, Ethan and Ashley, K-pop is a place to belong, a way to express themselves, and a bridge to connect with others. This one-off documentary presents three intimate portraits of young Polynesians who are pulled into a Korean cultural phenomenon. K-POLYS is directed by Litia Tuiburelevu, Produced by Hex ...
There’s ample evidence demonstrating free school lunch programmes provide wide benefits across schools, households and communities according to public health researchers. ACT Minister David Seymour wants to reduce the spending on Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
By Wata Shaw in Suva Fiji is facing an exodus of Fijians as many are leaving for overseas seeking employment and education and others are migrating, says Opposition MP Viliame Naupoto. Speaking in Parliament, he said: “His Excellency’s speech (Ratu Wiliame Katonivere) comes after a little over one year of ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming comments from Christopher Luxon this morning recommitting to ‘no new taxes’ as part of Budget 2024. “Mr Luxon’s refusal at the Post-Cabinet press conference yesterday to repeat the ‘no new taxes’ promise ...
SAFE is urgently calling on the Environment Committee to reject the Government’s Fast-Track Approvals Bill, and is urging New Zealanders to rally behind the call. The proposed Bill, currently under consideration with the Environment select committee, ...
Teammates who spend all their time picking fights with spectators are only helpful for the other team, writes Madeleine Chapman. Anyone who has ever played a team sport competitively, particularly as a child and particularly, for some reason, basketball, will know that there’s a lot of politics involved. While there ...
The long-running Wellington music festival is too focused on the Jim Beam-ness and not enough on the Homegrown-ness.There is something about Homegrown that’s difficult to place. A barely perceptible-ness. Like feeling a ghost is watching you from the corner of the room but when you look, there’s nothing there. ...
The latest Ipsos New Zealand Issues Monitor reveals that fewer New Zealanders believe crime / law and order is one of the top issues facing our country. In 2018, Ipsos New Zealand started tracking the key issues facing New Zealand. In this wave ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Griffiths, Deputy Program Director, Budgets and Government, Grattan Institute Australia’s political donations rules are woefully inadequate, but donations reform is finally on the agenda. The federal government has signalled its interest in reform and will soon begin briefing MPs on its ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Patrick Taylor, Chief Environmental Scientist, EPA Victoria; Honorary Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University Naiyana Somchitkaeo/Shutterstock A recent study published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine has linked microplastics with risk to human health. The study ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Albert Van Dijk, Professor, Water and Landscape Dynamics, Fenner School of Environment & Society, Australian National University Global climate records were shattered in 2023, from air and sea temperatures to sea-level rise and sea-ice extent. Scores of countries recorded their hottest year ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a teacher explains why he and his partner are in frugal mode – and how they’re making it work. Gender: Male Age: 35Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: I am an intermediate school teacher and my partner is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Bendall, Senior Lecturer, Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences, Australian Catholic University Binge Mary & George, the new British television drama series, depicts the real-life story of Mary Villiers and her son George, and their social climbing at the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jason Nassios, Associate Professor, Centre of Policy Studies, Victoria University This article is part of The Conversation’s series examining the housing crisis. Read the other articles in the series here. Australian state and federal governments spend money in many ways to ...
The finance minister is denying that there’s a $5.6b shortfall in paying for the government’s campaign promises, including tax cuts. At his post-cabinet press conference yesterday, the PM refused to rule out new taxes to pay for the cuts, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s ...
Kāinga Ora tenants abused by their neighbours are doubting the government's crackdown on disruptive tenants will make a difference on their behaviour. ...
Kāinga Ora is New Zealand’s biggest residential landlord, housing more than 180,000 vulnerable people in more than 67,000 properties. Yesterday the government announced a crackdown on its tenants who fall behind on rent. One longtime Kāinga Ora tenant shares her experience.For 18 years I lived in a 1960s standalone ...
Why does this myth persist, and what’s the real reason our skin is suffering?It’s one of the biggest international grievances New Zealanders hold, up there with the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior and 1981’s underarm incident. We’re quick to tell international travellers that the world’s pollution led to the ...
Opinion: We are fast approaching a fundamental change in prisons. As the number of people on custodial remand looks set to overtake the number of sentenced prisoners, the main function of prisons in New Zealand may become incarcerating un-sentenced people who may not be guilty of offending. We have already ...
A huge seven months lies in store for the White Ferns, beginning this week with the visit of England and culminating with the T20 World Cup in Bangladesh in September and October. Starting on Tuesday in Dunedin, the world ranked No. 2 visitors will play five T20s and three ODIs, ...
Opinion: In a move that has shocked road safety advocates across the country, the new Minister of Transport, Simeon Brown, is poised to abandon the previous government’s speed limit reduction policy, particularly around schools. Even more alarmingly, he wants school speed limits to be variable rather than full-time, arguing ...
Auckland Council is opposing a fast-track development backed by Sir John Kirwan and Spark NZ, because it doesn’t meet stringent new climate adaptation requirements The post Surf-data centre faces new 3.8C climate warming rules appeared first on Newsroom. ...
When the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act was introduced in 2009 it was firmly targeted at gangs and drugs. The legislation means police no longer need a conviction to seize assets that criminals can’t prove were paid for legitimately, as long as their alleged offences are punishable by more than a ...
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Bob’s relationship with certain members of Lincoln’s academic staff continued to deteriorate in the 1990s. Others supported him publicly, though articles such as Roland Clark’s 1993 piece in Growing Today cannot have pleased the university management. Clark wrote that Bob was selling onions from the Biological Husbandry Unit to a ...
SailGP’s races feature in-your-face action, with agile, hydro-foiling catamarans tacking and jibing for the title over several days. However, public comments ahead of the global series’ return to New Zealand have left this past year’s controversy in the shadows, as a key appointment attracts criticism from dolphin advocates. A year ...
The letters, which were published last week, were addressed to Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) Chairperson Megawati Sukarnoputri, National Democrat Party (NasDem) Chairperson Surya Paloh, National Awakening Party (PKB) Chairperson Muhaimin Iskandar, Justice and Prosperity Party (PKS) President Ahmad Syaikhu and United Development Party (PPP) Chairperson Muhammad Mardiono. In ...
Evicting more people from state housing is ignorant to the consequences of poverty, the Greens say, but the Housing Minister says it's a privilege that can be taken away if abused. ...
Evicting more people from state housing is ignorant to the consequences of poverty, the Greens say, but the Housing Minister says it's a privilege that can be taken away if abused. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emerald L King, Lecturer in Humanities, University of Tasmania IMDB Between Netflix’s 2023 live-action version of One Piece, and its latest take on Avatar: The Last Airbender, fans are once again asking: why are live-action anime adaptations so tricky to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emerald L King, Lecturer in Humanities, University of Tasmania IMDB Between Netflix’s 2023 live-action version of One Piece, and its latest take on Avatar: The Last Airbender, fans are once again asking: why are live-action anime adaptations so tricky to ...
The government says it still intends to deliver tax cuts by July, but will not lock them in until they have got them past their coalition partners. ...
Chris Trotter’s best ever article in today’s Daily Blog. Read it and be ever thankful Jacinda is our Prime Minister and not Simon Bridges.
I give thanks for that every day at the moment.
I looked that up Reality. All well thought out and fits what we observe and feel. I particularly noticed something about National and Chris's opinion that their 'hazing' treatment is what drives Bridges.
[Fixed the tags into a block-quote – Incognito]
Shallow waters ride over earthquake zones with swimming ease. If she really believes in the ideals of people-ism she'll make these few months a stepping stone to taking back control from the powerful. I think she believes in the ideals of easiness fundamentally. Her and Grant, like the rest of the middle class polies, have no real probs. The diff between a CV and the fight to survive of real demo-crats.
I think that the lack of empathy required to plot long-term revolutionary change in a time like this runs at odds with the requirements of managing the immediate problem.
The difference is between the UK response of letting the pandemic slide, vs the NZ response of trying to stamp it out from the start. One lot looked at percentages without empathy, the other lot looked at every possible death as a human life lost.
We've got the correct sort of government for this problem.
Looks like the middle class self-indulgence of taking overseas holidays will end up killing some of us who can't afford such things. I know we are meant to all be in this together, and we are, but the thought occurs.
So why is Winston encouraging the last 80,000 home – bugs and all ? To kill off a few more pensioners ?
Well we could do without having some people. But Winston is acting in accordance with the Party's name NZFirst, and encouraging those who want to return to come back to their homeland for the near future.
You’ll have to ask WRP. It is likely to become next to impossible to return to NZ in the near future. Kiwis may miss out on medical care if they’re overseas and the healthcare systems have to prioritise.
I’d imagine that many people would rather be home with friends & family to look or be looked after.
Sounds like you disapprove though of Kiwis returning home; should they be refused entry into their own country and be returned on the next flight back?
I most certainly do not disapprove of Kiwis returning home , in a managed way, but they should not have been waiting so long to come home.. I hope Kiwis don,t miss out on medical care because they are not prioritised over non residents.
It is hard to say what is best under the circumstances but as long as individuals still have a choice, they should make up their minds quickly. The interests of the general population outweigh individual concerns at present and this will tilt towards less personal freedom in the foreseeable future till things have stabilised IMO.
And the advice is pretty ambiguous. It's not at all clear what the status of the 500,000 or so kiwis living in Australia under the 'temporary' SCV444 visa is going to be. The ongoing problem with this visa is that it's officially termed a 'temporary' visa that allows kiwis to 'live and work in Australia indefinitely'. This is a bloody awful fudge that means we aren't really citizens in either country.
Taken at face value the NZ govt's advice that all citizen's living overseas temporarily should return to NZ asap, logically captures all kiwis in Australia too. Yet in practice it cannot mean this for all sorts of practical reasons.
On the other hand if Australia, like every other nation, gets to the point of rationing ICU beds, you can bet your sweet nelly that 'non-citizens' will be at the bottom of the list.
Loon loons..
https://twitter.com/RightWingWatch/status/1240292946555162624
..and Russian loons default to racism, Soros and Gates.
There are many theories about the origin of coronavirus and the further development of events. The most popular one concerns the monstrous prediction of Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. Last year, he said that 33 million people could die from such a coronavirus in 250 days. The calculations are purely mathematical, but true, the IT tycoon is sure.
After such statements, adherents of conspiracy theories literally have no doubt that the virus is of artificial origin, and Bill Gates is one of its main sponsors. Another fact adds weight to this theory – a few months ago, the head of Microsoft held a conditional exercise called Event 201, which simulated an outbreak of a new virus that killed 65 million people in 18 months. The idea of the teachings is simple – globalization in the name of salvation.
It is noteworthy that the famous pharmaceutical giants and the Pentagon leadership participated in this theater of cruel cynicism.
The fact is that while the disease affects only representatives of the Mongoloid race, such suspicious selectivity raises questions from experts. No less extensive discussion was caused by the story around the laboratory for the study of dangerous viruses. It is located in Wuhan, 32 kilometers from the same market where the disease was first recorded.
However, there is another biolaboratory in Wuhan – until recently, nothing was known about it. Her address is like someone’s joke – Gaoxin, three sixes – the number mentioned in the Bible, under which the name of the beast of the Apocalypse is hidden. But it’s even more symbolic that it exists on the money of the famous banker Jorozh Soros, who shares the global ideas of Bill Gates. It would seem that nuclear conspiracy theology is completely different, but experts say that a tricky plan lies behind an absurd wrapper.
https://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/202023353-O9wUV.html
google translate
"adrenochrome is extracted from the pituitary glands of tortured children"
I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Either way, Liz Crokin probably needs counselling.
People have very individual needs, but we probably need to be talking more about community support right now. Someone in her street or wider area should be able to help with this.
Should Bernie drop out now? His only realistic path to the nomination now is Biden suffering an extreme adverse medical event. There simply aren’t enough votes left for him to win the nomination with actual votes.
There's a good argument it's time to pass the torch to a new generation of progressive leaders. Marie Newman's victory over establishment Dem machine favourite Dan Lipinski in solidly Dem Illinois 3rd, where Sanders lost to Biden by 41k votes to 63k votes strongly hints there's a big place for progressive ideas and people, but that Sanders is no longer the best person to front them.
https://www.salon.com/2020/03/18/bernie-needs-to-step-back-and-let-other-progressive-leaders-flourish–especially-women/
There's a good public health argument the time is right for Bernie to step down and allow the remaining primaries to be the rubber-stamping exercise they were going to be anyway without needing large crowds to gather at polling places. And that by doing so, he actually increases his leverage to get progress on his priorities.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/03/sanders-drop-out-primary-coronavirus.html
I haven't been following closely, but there's also the argument that a strong progressive/left wing voice is needed for its own sake and to keep those values and politics visible at a time when they are desperately needed. If Sanders pulls out and Bidens is it, this will demoralise the left and make the true system change harder. Will probably drop the vote too. This is true irrespective of how Bidens would then do in the main election, but hugely problematic if he loses (likely).
If the worst case scenario happens (45 wins), then what is the state of the left wing resistance at that point? That would be high on my priority list if I was in the US.
It is just like the Greens standing in all electorates.
Scares Labour into adopting Green policies, when they see enough voters splitting off what they regard as "their vote" to the Greens.
Nice one, good example.
That's more or less what happened in 2016, where Hillary's final platform moved a long way towards Bernie's. If you recall, it didn't end well.
Yes, I recall.
When Trump was promising even more leftward things than Hilary.
Like getting US rust belt workers, back to work!
Worked for him.
Seems to me the best way forward for progressive ideas is to focus on the contrast with Repug ideas, not to inflate the relatively small differences between the various Dem factions.
For instance, the Repug position is they are quite happy with people getting bankrupted, unnecessarily suffering, and dying early because they can't afford healthcare. In that context, the difference is trivial between Medicare-for-all-who-want-it that is available to everyone but still allows the half of Americans with employer provided health insurance to keep it if they prefer, and a purist Medicare-for-all which bans private health insurance and forces everyone into government health care.
In the context of trying to promote progressive ideas, it's entirely possible Sanders could do a lot more good lending his support to helping progressive challengers to crusty old forever-troughers in safe Dem seats, rather than continuing a doomed quest for his own presidential ambitions. If Sanders could make the difference in unseating the likes of Steny Hoyer and Richard Neal and replacing them with actual progressives, that would really be something.
Then there's the risk that if Bernie continues his campaign way beyond the point of no real hope, then it might inflate the Bernie-or-bust types, who would then go on to undermine Biden in the general election. Thereby depressing Dem vote, inflating third party vote, and widening Don the Con's path to re-election. As happened in 2016, likely contributing to the poor showing for House and Senate candidates as well as Hillary's surprise loss.
Biden needs to move on his VP pick pronto. He's already promised it will be a female.
Warren would be a useful choice to restructure and re-regulate the economy after this mess. Although unlikely since she’s not supporting him (or Sanders).
Catherine Cortez Mastro needs to be in the mix.
I reckon Warren would get a lot more done as Treasury Secretary.
This piece has a bunch of thumbnails of the probable top 12. It ranks Kamala Harris #1. Since there's a reasonable chance Biden would only go one term, that makes the VP pick this time around the most likely Dem nominee for 2024, and Harris strikes me as the most credible candidate for prez.
lol … it has to be Hillary
aww, now you're just shit-stirring.
You have to hope I am ….
Warren came third in her own State primaries..even Warren voters have seen through her..
Though I'm sure her lack of support for Sanders is more than enough to keep Biden happy.
I'd love it to be Warren, but … I suspect it will be Klobuchar. That pre-Super Tuesday endorsement.
So how do y'all Jacinda-lovers reconcile the terrifying disconnection between her words "Toughest controls in the world" and the reality that travellers are finding as they enter New Zealand?
Coronavirus: Auckland woman Maree Glading disappointed in checks at international arrivals
This is just one of many reports of what is (not) going on at our borders; there is no effective control to prevent entry of people even if they are symptomatic. There is absolutely NO control to prevent asymptomatic people entering the county just now. Effectively, our borders are wide open, and virus-laden travellers can be circulating wherever they choose – on public transport, domestic air and tourist and business destinations.
Until we see a tightening of the border – preferably close all incoming flights – the PM's words are frighteningly empty.
This is not a time for endless posidivity (words), it is a time to shut the gate (action)
The woman complaining, must have been totally isolated in her own bubble, not to have seen all the information the MOH, and border control have out there. Only a few clicks away.
Seems more like a National voter trying to play a Simon Bridges, gambit.
Yes. My thoughts too.
From the thousands of travellers who have arrived in NZ in the past week or so (many of them NZers returning home), only a handful seem to have had this 'experience' and funnily enough they don't seem to come to public notice until Simon Bridges brings them up at QT time in the House.
I bet if she had to sit in a little cubicle for 8 hours while every arriving passenger was given the 3rd degree shed be moaning louder . Moaners gunna moan
Our borders aren't wide open. They weren't even that before covid. I think that rhetoric doesn't serve us either.
There are others who can speak to this more here, but this is about minimising risk within the constraints of a system. If we shut things down too fast or unprepared there are other consequences eg the call to shut down schools pretty quickly leads to a conversation about childcare and how that would work in covid terms. The state is instead working with what is most likely to work in the real world. Yes, mistakes will be made, we're all humans here. But I'm seeing a govt that is responsive and working very hard to get this right and mostly succeeding.Lots of what we do now will be not ideal, but still better than the other thing.
One consequence of shutting down all flights is if this is done before other supply chains are set up, what happens to essential goods like medical supplies, pharmaceuticals, that crucial part in the a power generation plant that suddenly failed unexpectedly. There will be many examples, and until we can replace those import systems we need some planes flying.
There's also some obligation to NZers trying to get back home.
I saw the woman's post yesterday. It needs fact checking.
She was on Morning Report this morning. Her description seemed to be self defeating. No information given but notices handed out and officials shouting instructions.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=2018739156
Probably back at school she used to claim that teachers shouted at her and ignored her.
Wan,t thinking shut down freighting of goods. just freighting of people !
How would you do that? If you shut down the commercial people flights today, how do all the essential goods coming into the country over the next week get here? I'm betting there are materials for covid tests on some of those flights.
We can shut down flights, and I'd wager good money that the government is planning in case that becomes necessary, but it takes time for all the reasons I've explained already.
Freight could sit on seats too you know …. where there is a will there is a way. There seem to have been no will.
And if the flight hit some heavy turbulence – all hell could break loose. Yeah, nah.
This does need fact checking – this woman is a marketing professional, all her words are carefully chosen.
yep. If she'd come onto TS with that story people would have been all over it for the problems with what she said.
something RNZ should do before giving her the soapbox, but then it's a pathetic excuse for a broadcaster with gluon and susie still around.
I find it interesting that part of the bail out for Air NZ, is paying for security.
You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing. No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing.
In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible.
The cost of getting it wrong will be measured in the unnecessary premature deaths of New Zealand citizens.
If you want to bring about a change to the current protocols, and save lives, then obviously Open Mike on The Standard is the best place to do that.
A very expensive stupid mistake / deliberate trade off decision, that could have been prevented early February by shutting the borders then of OUR ISLAND NATION. Unlike a place like Switzerland where 170,000 people cross the border from Italy per day o work in Switzerland …..
"You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing"
I didn't ignore those, I'm sure there are those accounts, feel free to share some and we'll address those too.
The internet is full of reckons right now. We can't base emergency policy on that, although I'm sure that the relevant authorities will be checking their processes.
You however are conflating two things: the fails in an otherwise appropriate system, with the need to have completely closed borders. In your argument you are avoiding the issues that I raised, those of unintended consequences. Do you know the impact of shutting down all incoming flights and shipping this week? What happens if of the 80,000 NZers overseas 1,000 of them are nurses and doctors trying to get home? Or even 100.
"No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing."
I'm not shooting you, I'm making a cogent argument to address the points you raised. This is what we do here.
"In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible"
People who say told you so at that point are still largely ignorant of the points I raised above and there will be literally no way to know if shutting down the ports and airports this week would have been a better option. Points which lots of people are saying btw, including those with actual expertise.
I didn’t call for moderation btw, you seem to have misunderstood what I said.
Why has this uninformed reckon got so much coverage? Because she planned it. Check her FB page, she has done a full scale media release blitz. Maree Glading is a hard core National supporter who knows how to self-publicise, she got all sorts of soft interviews for pie business when she set it up – she is clearly well connected in the Auckland high-Tory circles (which includes most of the NZ Herald).
It should be no surprise to anyone that a well connected rich white women has no trouble getting an unverified reckon published uncritically in the Herald, that is how that paper works.
But next time Shayne Currie and Duncan Grieve and Toby Manhire ad neseum have a whine about the decline of journalism, this piece of stinking class biased fake news should be raised.
All of this ^
The same letter was read out by Duncan Garner on the AM show this morning. Ashley Bloomfield addressed it calmly.
Reducing the discussion to "Jacinda-lovers" isn't helping. This is a massive challenge and the work isn't being done by headlines and slogans – it's being done by well-qualified, overworked, tired people. Who are contributing far more to the common good than commentators with instant reckons.
If the DG of health and medical professionals told the PM to (e.g.) close the airports do you think she would casually ignore him? Do you think the staff would remain silent? It's not Chernobyl in the USSR.
It is certain that procedures will change as the situation evolves. It is (almost) certain that people will die. Even martial law and a curfew wouldn't prevent that.
"It is (almost) certain that people will die"
I'm wondering what the analysis is around that, in terms of bigger picture issues. We can of course crash the economy, and I'm sure that if was the bubonic plague that was going to kill half the population we'd have done that already. But crashing the economy brings death too, especially if other countries follow suit.
Our best case scenario here is that we contain cv, but it's more likely that it will eventually be in the community and that we will have flattened the curve to significantly minimise deaths.
I don't read herald but RNZ has a similar story and the family said they felt safer in Thailand. In Thailand the heroin smuggling MP’s aide has been caught hoarding face masks for sale to China for personal gain,
https://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/2020/03/12/masking/
Talk about keeping your head firmly in the sand,
Adam Ash
Yep … a whole series of Countries are now closing their borders & it's becoming more & more evident that a major lockdown is the only way to defeat this virus. The earlier the better.
WHO Executive Director, Dr Michael Ryan:
We need exhaustive testing & contact tracing … but. failing that, a complete lockdown.
So many Western Govts (including our own) have been just pissing around with COVID-19, this idea that you can roll out some sort of finely-tuned, wonderfully-nuanced, carefully calibrated plan in a series of discrete little stages … dangerously stupid people deluding themselves that they have some kind of control over Coronavirus. They soooo fucking don't.
Oh joy, self declared wartime president invoking wartime act[s] to fight a Chinese virus riffs on punishment with this shit going on in the background.
https://twitter.com/rulajebreal/status/1240332416092430337
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa-trump-act/trump-says-he-will-invoke-wartime-act-to-fight-enemy-coronavirus-idUSKBN2152XL
People are apparently panicking – friends of mine report chaos at supermarkets.
This is a serious question – should we start considering censorship of the media? Is the panicking mongering click bait reckons of dickheads "news" or an irresponsible luxury we can't affford just now?
Went to a slack n slave in Hamilton last night and couldn't even buy a tin of baked beans, all brands, shelves cleared. Spent most of my time at the checkout asking people with loaded trolleys if they think they've horded enough yet or will they need to make another run at it.
lol – I've taken to doing most of my shopping with the local butcher, fruit and vegetable shop, weekend markets etc supporting local.
The nutters at the supermarkets can get bent.
What makes it worse, now I'm flying solo with the kid at uni and fortunate enough to always work alone, practising social distancing, the supermarket is my main entryway for covid 19. Sucks to increase my exposure at long queues while not even being able to get the one thing I really came in for.
that does really suck. Are the supermarkets getting peaks and waves, or is it crowded all the time?
Can't speak to regular office hours, but I have noticed large queues during off peak times over the past couple of weeks, though no bare shelves until yesterday.
Just went to the Lincoln Rd Pak'n'save coz around now is usually a quietish time. Holy fuck! I didn't even bother going in, there were cars circling the carpark looking for a space.
I might end up chewing through my emergency supplies and outdoor activity food waiting for the wave of panic buying to pass.
What about Countdown on the other side of the road?
TBH I didn't even look as I went past on the way there since I've never shopped there, and I left the Pak'n'save by the shared road with Mitre10 and turned right so didn't see it on the way out.
Give it a try, next time.
They don't have any brands of tonic water that I like, everything they sell is too sugared up for my taste. Pam's goes down the best for me.
It’s going to be tough times ahead of you, I’m afraid.
Yeah. Especially if I'm going to have to get down 300 a day to get an effective dose like McFlock said yesterday.
After your fifth or sixth, you won’t taste let alone care about the tonic water. That said, the first few are going to be awful but all medicines taste like shit, by design, and then, after a while, make you (feel) better (or not).
Make mine a Gunners. Excellent after a round of golf in the Singapore sun
I went down to my local supermarket today to buy a few items. The queues were unbelievable! This in a town of 8000+ people. I have never seen anything like the chaos. Not even during the christmas rush, when those travelling to the beach for the holidays call in for their supplies – . Almost all out of towners stocking up for god knows what reason. Apparently it has been like this all week. On the way out I met one of our practise nurses from the local medical centre about to go in to do her shopping and mentioned – "its just madness in there" "Yes" she said "You wonder why and what they think they are achieving when this is going to go on for months." Exactly.
I called in to the local butcher on the way home . She was saying that the shop had been inundated earlier with people buying up large. She was worried she would run out for her local customers.
I think all these panic shoppers must be intending on an obesity epidemic …
Might be time to start rationing.
Are the out of towners in town to stay in cribs? Or?
Nope I would say most just here for the day – we are just over an hours drive from Hamilton, and Auckland, and an hour and a half from Tauranga. The bachs (cribs) are mostly empty this time of year. I had to drive north to Auckland this past week. The traffic travelling south down SH2 and SH25 was a steady stream. Not the normal flow.
Are they driving there specifically to buy supplies?
From the number of cars in the car park which is usually half empty on a Thursday around 10am I would definitely say so – and see Joe's comment below as to similar activity in Australia.
Same hysteria across the ditch.
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/city-vultures-are-slammed-after-travelling-to-rural-towns-by-the-busload-to-clear-out-regional-supermarkets-in-a-panic-buying-frenzy/ar-BB11hwmK
In countries that are locked down, people are still allowed to buy food though right?
I think food and medical are it, with penalties for non-compliance.
Greece’s infection total approached 230 with three deaths, and police there arrested 45 shopkeepers Saturday for violating a ban on operations.
https://time.com/5803206/france-spain-lockdown-coronavirus/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/18/italy-charges-more-than-40000-people-violating-lockdown-coronavirus
Spoke to a Countdown manager about 2 hrs ago and told her it's time they rationed bread. Visited three local supermarkets and all of them were out of bread. Saw a woman leave a supermarket with a trolley overflowing with bread. The effing selfish &*^%. 👿
Glad to say a number of shoppers heard me talking to the manager. Every last one of them looked guilty. So they should. We're a country that produces food for the rest of the world. We are not going to run out.
Your local bread is made with imported flour. Duh.
Not necessarily.
"Duh": classy way to enhance your point, so convincing …
Imported on ships, no? Has maritime cargo been halted? Doesn't seem to be.
This isn't like the chch earthquakes, where Dunedin supermarkets ran low on bread because the bread factory and the transport networks were physically damaged.
This is all about people overbuying and throwing bread in the freezer. Or worse, it goes to waste.
we don't need bread. We need carbs, protein, fat, vitamins/minerals etc. Even if we did end up with the shortage of bread, there are ample other ways for us to get the calories we need in a day. Anne's point is incredibly sound.
Nice link Alice, I didn't know that.
@weka
NZ has been growing wheat for years – I worked in my varsity summer hols on a combine harvester harvesting wheat. Some bakers preferred the Aussie wheat for baking, but there has always been NZ wheat. I remember attending a cabinet economic committee meeting once in the early '80's – Muldoon was PM – and price fixing was in vogue. One of the topics for discussion was to be the price of wheat.
"We're a country that produces food for the rest of the world. We are not going to run out."
Thank-you, this is such a good point.
SM. Gladdens my heart you can a) afford to shop at the costlier speciality stores rather than the supermarket and b) you deign to grace TS with your exalted presence. Don't you have investments go check or something?
All the best,
Nutter.
@ Rosemary
The fruit and vegetables shops where i live are often better quality and cheaper than the supermarket as are the weekend markets.
The butchers are more expensive but much better quality and I eat far less meat these days so choose to support local business over the large supermarket chains.
If all that makes me a nutter and least I'm happy in my madness.
SM. Have another read Possum.
I signed off as "Nutter" having just 'done' New World.
Nowhere did I call you a nutter…au contraire…you are the one casting aspersions on the sanity of others.
Sighs.
Rolls eyes.
Despairs of commenters who can't bleeding read.
Can we agree we are all nutters then? Maybe consider that we could ease up a bit on each other too? The points being made seem sound, the poking at each other is probably not the best strategy for us at this time.
@ Rosemary – apologies for misunderstanding your signoff.
Also I did not accuse you of being a nutter, just those who are in a frenzy of toilet roll and bottled water hoarding.
New World is much more expensive than pak n save.
You shop like you aren't even watching the pennies.
Hey, big spender, drop it like it's hot.
Some places, lots, don't have a Pak n Save 😉
Hamilton does, though, two of them.
Shame on me.
Of course, you are fully aware of my circumstances that you pass judgement, twice, for my disgraceful choices.
Being a Hamilton local you will be aware that both Pak n saves are at each end of city centre?
We're currently squatting with whanau in Nawton. I cannot get Peter from his wheelchair into the loaner vehicle we have, so made the call to make the quicker trip to Te Rapa NW rather than leave Peter alone for longer than absolutely necessary. Yes, cost a wee bit more, but cheap, in terms of safety.
And replenishing our hosts' cupboards is the least we can do in exchange for free board.
😉👍🙄
Calm down, it was just a light hearted response to your nasty above, though you sure Mill st isn't closer? But lucky you went earlier, my sources tell me te rapa new world has just closed because they've run out of food.
Got some funny looks yesterday.
But, in fact our normal two weekly for 6 adults and two children, with a half a dozen cans added.
The staff said big run on some things but restocked already.
New World Te Rapa crowded this morning with non panicked shoppers of all ages.
I did the trolly waltz with an older woman who laughingly canceled my license….then she accepted my excuse that I have never shopped in that particular supermarket before so if I was looking lost it was because I was.
Had a couple of young fellows on because they had neglected to buy actual food food. Not even 2 minute noodles…🙄
All very polite, if focused on our respective quarry.
Best conversation was in the baby wipes section. Disability, housebus dwelling and baby wipes are an actual thing. The other shopper was near frantically rifling through the various brands looking for the baby unfriendly wipes…the ones not labeled "alcohol free'.
"Might be good for baby's bum, but no use for sterilizing surfaces…!"
I suggested dilute bleach and washable cloths…the sterilizing wipes having been snapped up days ago.
Big ups to the supermarket staff. Respect. Shelves being restocked in a civilised manner and the checkout staff unflappably polite, quietly packing our goodies.
Told them they were all kinds of awesome and I do believe it made their morning.
Good on you. Our local operators have been amazing too. So on to it and doing a fantastic job calming angry, frustrated shoppers like me. It's taught me to appreciate their real worth – not that I didn't know it before – and make the effort to tell them.
I agree, the feelings are similar to yours in the UK.
'I have spent days and days trying to calm down nearest and dearest, especially my Mum, who is scared shitless that her days are numbered due to her age and the fact she has asthma and borderline COPD. I know precisely why – because every fucking five minutes on BBC news (which she watches every evening) they are banging on about the number of deaths, details about those who have died, speculation as to how many more will die…….doom, doom and more fucking doom.
They fucking drone on about panic buying and how the public are going bat shit crazy, but who is stoking that fire and creating that panic? Yeah, that is right, you F… a…. c….s – YOU!!!
Bastards. I can hardly bear to look at what is happening in the UK.
It's probably time for the government to look at the issue of equal access to supermarkets to reassure people about provisions in future.
I would suggest something like allocating days of the week for shopping – in store, or on-line. Based around the first letter of the surname – proof of ID at checkout for this (they already have surnames for on-line).
1/7th, or so, for each of the days.
Just the idea of such a system being considered/developed might be enough to reduce panic buying now.
good idea.
I live in the provinces and am not hearing of this in the smaller places.
I think some public education would be good too, but I'm guessing the govt is swamped with tasks at the moment. The MSM should be doing this.
"…It's probably time for the government to look at the issue of equal access to supermarkets to reassure people about provisions in future…"
You mean rationing?
stores could actually do this without the state mandating it. They can do this to manage their supply lines. They can also prioritise goods for people with special needs. eg online shopping for people that shouldn't be exposed to cv, young mums, elderly, disabled and so on.
Maree Glading would probably shit herself if she knew how much was known about her condition and history before she got to the last door. The other night on TV news there was a shot over a techies shoulder of a monitor showing a black and white image of disembarking passengers. There is some pretty impressive gear there at Customs/Immigration. Also the intuition and experience of the staff is bloody amazing. She is a dopey bullshitter.
The number of people with C-19 arrival is a lot less than 1 in God knows how many thousands. And anybody with a temperature probably only has a cold. As long ago as 3 weeks ago a mate pulled aside a few people in the course of a day who had appeared to have a temperature, they were overdressed for an Auckland summer but OK for a cool aircraft cabin so the C/I staff let them rest in a room and dress lighter and retested them again, all were OK.
We are going to be alright, we are well looked after by people we don't even know we have to thank.
"we are well looked after by people we don't even know we have to thank."
So mindful of this among all the criticism.
I was really impressed that they quarantined the two tourists who had no self isolation plan and then will just deport them. That's not mucking around
More like flattening the curve.
heh.
now I want to write a post about flattening the grocery curve.
I gave it a mention in a post just now, but it deserves wider exploration and attention.
In CHCH a number of factories are now working extended weekend shifts to meet both local and export demand for FMCG.
First time they have had overtime for two years (double bubble at weekends)
The significant depreciation of the NZ$ (and supply shocks) is having and effect (read localism)
this is good because it's extra work/income for people and keeping businesses in good shape?
A factory manager I was talking to,gave me an example of one teen(they took on at Xmas 17 yr) was employed because he was to be the bread winner of a family of 6.He is taking home at present an xtra 500$.
The manager said that pricing differentials meant their products were now significantly cheaper,then overseas products.
wow, this is a good story, thanks.
We will have rationing by the end of the week. Thank you glorious comrade Ardernsky.
what day does your week end? Sunday?
Probably Wibble.
https://twitter.com/CheckpointRNZ/status/1240456334207619073
Then we get headlines like this – they should be ashamed of themselves.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120334508/coronavirus-what-is-new-zealands-plan-if-mass-deaths-occur
On the contrary the MoH couldn't ask for a better social distancing campaign and they got it for free too.
I'd like to see an analysis of how bad it is. The Herald can go get fucked. What are the TV networks doing? RNZ? Commercial radio.
I think censorship is a step too far right now, but there could be public education plans.
Btw, for the convo upthread, know what would really send large part of the population into panic? Shutting the borders completely and too fast and having medical supply and other shortages as a result.
Without trying to sound arrogant, a number of comments don’t even sound ill-advised but as not thought through at all and based on ignorance and fear (possibly with some anger). It’s ok to vent IMO, but some here, at least, are skirting close to appointing blame for deaths, for example, that have not even occurred yet. All action so far has been aimed at containment, i.e. preventing the disease spreading and causing major mayhem.
Lots of people are super stressed for sure. I am, and I have decent enough skills around stress and survival issues, I can imagine that for people who aren't used to having to think about these things they're in a fair amount of chaos (hence panic buying, and blame*). There's a thing going on about whether the pandemic is bringing out the worst in people or the best. I'm aiming for the best for myself, but I am being tested on this for sure.
*I also think we have this in the culture anyway, including in political spaces.
I’ll respond in the back-end.
check your email too 🙂
I’ll dust it off later.
"should we start considering censorship of the media?"
This question has been bothering me for some time now short answer is yes something must be done and not just because of covid19. (those of you who scream straw horses at me will be ignored we need a proper discussion on this!)
I have been thinking about this one for some time and the only solution I can see that (could) work without immediate descent into state censorship of unpopular views is some sort of external set of editorial standards
a couple of areas to start is clearly labeling NEWS as different analysis as different from opinion as different from attempted influencing. (an example here would be hoskings currently labeled as "opinion" it is not and should be clearly labeled "attempted influencing")
another area is press conferences if you ask a question in a press conference that is not intended to elicit some new piece of information you get a black mark. do it three times and you are not invited back.
these are just very basic ideas as a starting point that need collective work to become some sort of workable policy but one thing that is certain we cannot continue with the current media crap and if we dont sort it out in a reasonable and fair way we will end up with state censorship which will ultimately be worse.
there is another option and we need to find it.
Wot. Are you saying we should add to the already considerable list of things we are prohibited from honestly talking about in New Zealand after the Chch debacle? The thing that is required right now is the ability to vigorously discuss our predicament and how we deal with it. If we censor any perspective we risk missing essential views of other people who think differently from us which may save us from painting ourselves into a dangerous corner.
ahh but i am not suggesting prohibiting any subject of discussion just suggesting a set of editorial standards ie visible correct and accurate labeling and separation of News , analysis, opinion, or bullshit. If you want to be a "news" outlet with journalistic privilege you follow that standard. to be "journalism" it needs to be based on facts
Adam Ash is transparent. He wants his right to troll.
Let’s assume he’s as anxious as anybody else now, please.
Troll be b*ggered! I like this blog because I find contributors to be intelligent and relatively open to changing their minds if the evidence is sound, as am I. Like many, I am treading the fine line between panic at the social and economic horror and anger at the ineptitude of those in whom we place our trust to keep us safe. I welcome all points of view, as I hope my contributions are of service too
I don't know, we spent six weeks ignoring the logical consequences of what some people were trying to say in late January. Specifically that the silent transmission characteristic of this virus made it different to almost anything we've encountered before.
And now mid March I'm still hearing people downplaying this. It takes some people a full kick to the nuts to clear the wax from their ears.
So having frittered away the best opportunity to suppress this virus at relatively low cost, we now have to pay the higher price. Tough.
Pandemic lessons learnt so far
1. There needs to be spare medical equipment stored as part of planning for one.
2. There should be enough testing capacity for the tracking testing necessary to prevent community spread AND community spread sampling to reassure the public so that (they and) the government would know there was community spread soon after it occurred. The latter reduces fear, the former is the means to prevent community spread.
Lesson from China
It is easier to contain it if you have a central source area to contain it in. It is harder when it is coming at you from multiple places (business and personal travel)
Yes. I think those of us that can need to start now with the staying home (mostly) and making that cultural shift. It takes time to adjust to this and if some are starting now it will be easier for others to make that change too.
This Washington Post article by Beth Cameron is excellent, detailed and informative:
All class.
/
https://twitter.com/TinaMorphis/status/1240337621621997568
.
I just hope Richard struggles through.
https://newsthump.com/2020/03/18/worried-nation-demands-reassurance-richard-branson-will-not-be-financially-impacted-by-coronavirus/?fbclid=IwAR1X1k4eYW2L1vTLakZ44fltQEJiFMJ2ZjM4fU67i2R1a3dunJ1UbMs1gpk
Not satire; the pricks who spent billions on stock buybacks and then rather than investing in building a new aircraft, recycled one from the sixties and it killed several hundred people. Now they want money.
https://twitter.com/jstein_wapo/status/1240053559137353732
And if there's any doubt about just how craven the fuckers are, a little more than 11 million people because 'bidness.
https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1240368940951506949
Looks like Elizabeth Warren is onto it in the USA. An eight point plan for companies who receive taxpayer funds. Maintain payroll, pay minimum wage, maintain collective bargaining, chop executive bonuses, etc.
Hope plenty of strings are attached here. Collective bargaining to be the norm, worker seats on the board , executive compensation to be dropped, working hour reductions to be spread.
]And it would be even better if Air NZ stopped saying it needed to lose 30% of its jobs and said 30% of the hours worked. Still seems low – an 85% service reduction is mooted.
I am already reading reports of how quickly the environment is reacting ( fish returning to waterways) to the dramatic reduction of human activity.
One positive of our current situation will be to read what reduction of co2 and other gases and see how any reduction follows predictions/models. Perhaps we underestimate the eco system to rebound or recalibrate. But not to take any reduction as an excuse to continue on our destructive manner.
Similar thing happened with places that got closed off to prevent spread of Kauri rot. Wildlife in general and feral/wild pigs and goats have been running riot.
Sadly I think the feral goats and pigs have been doing a fantastic job of spreading kauri rot…
.law of unintended consequences 1 people 0
I read somewhere about the quality of the water ways in Venice too
Interesting the reason given is that there is no "“The water now looks clearer because there is less traffic on the canals, allowing the sediment to stay at the bottom,” a spokesman"
https://abcnews.go.com/International/venice-canals-clear-fish-coronavirus-halts-tourism-city/story?id=69662690
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/18/photos-water-in-venice-italys-canals-clear-amid-covid-19-lockdown.html
Canals of Venice run crystal clear…with wee fish!
Literally brought a tear to my eye did that…
We simply don't deserve this Earth.
I can't help notice that the regulars here who for years have implicitly argued that we had to 'smash capitalism' and 'hit the big reset button' on our modern industrial economy … are now all very worried for themselves now an actual event threatens to disrupt our world.
Sometimes you should be careful what you wish for.
There’s a subtle difference between a controlled burn off and an out-of-control large fire that threatens to engulf and destroy everything in its path.
Fair point, although as someone familiar with the insanely complex industrial systems on which the modern world is is built, I was always dubious that the left's ideology was sufficiently nuanced to accomplish the kind of 'controlled burn off' you have in mind.
You should try Systems Biology 😉
I have no burn off in mind; I’m more of an evolutionary type 😉
As I am too; very much so.
If nothing else this should underline to us all the huge damage uncontrolled shocks can cause. Whacking complex systems with big hammers, never makes anything better.
If you could do it under experimental/lab conditions with a realistic empirical model (akin earthquake testing of buildings & structures) it could be informative. Alternatively, Kobayashi Maru 😉
We have already done that.
With the Neo-liberal unbridled capitalism, hammer.
Certainly right wing ideology has been conclusively proven to be much worse than “insufficiently nuanced”.
But. That was a right wing revolution, so "it is fine" no matter how destructive it has proven to be.
All the deaths, poverty disease and destruction it is causing is ignored.
Until when when something like coronavirus, or financial meltdowns, happens. Then all the individual responsibility, give me freedom to rip everyone else off, capitalists, suddenly become keen on socialism and State control. But, only to protect themselves, you notice. The amount of people on Facebook wanting social welfare for their business, but "fuck beneficiaries" and the already disadvantaged, is embarrassing.
With the Neo-liberal unbridled capitalism, hammer.
When you have only a hammer, all problems look like nails.
The Left are really very very mild, and are pushing for controled change.
The refusal to take that on at anything other than a snails pace..a snails pace made redundant by the rapidly evolving Climate Change and Money/Power grab of the Corporations and super rich (who come out of these crises very nicely) ..are what make real, violent Revolution and the ensuing chaos all the more inevitable down the line
The "left" at least in New Zealand are all for controlled change, democratically controlled and based on evidence.
I've seen very few arguing for a revolution. Most are after solutions that have been proven to work, already
It was the "right" who bought in disaster capitalism by stealth in the 80's and 90's. A violent revolution, that is killing people in much greater numbers than coronavirus, still.
Elizabeth Warren has a Plan For That.
As Andre suggests if Biden gets the nod and chooses someone like Kamala Harris as his running mate, Elizabeth Warren would be an excellent choice for the Treasury. She has a very good history of achievement in introducing valuable change particularly following the GFC.
The intro looks interesting, but sadly it's paywalled. I've no objection to detailed, organic plans that allow for nuance and complexity, plans that encourage and incentivise evolution.
It's the ideological 'take a big hammer to it all' types that irk me.
Here is a good summation of what she has in mind.
https://www.vox.com/2018/8/15/17683022/elizabeth-warren-accountable-capitalism-corporations
I'm sorry she has withdrawn from the race because if anyone could change what is now the American system she could. But hopefully with a new President and a shift in the composition of Senate, to allow change to occur, some of what she perceives will eventuate.
Not me I not worried, I still say, let the system fall.
But it's not going to – the best we can hope for is that people stop worshiping the elites/managerial/technocrat class like gods, and actually start to think and do for themselves.
Because just in case you missed it – the orange one started a bombing campaign in Iran last week which was huge.
And whilst the supply train is currently broken in China, it will be fixed. The fact that growth is not going to be world killing will be a good thing long term.
This is not the end of capitalism, far from it.
Just more step in the crap (shocks) and insanity (wreaking) we have to survive through whilst it dies.
As for blaming those with no power in this demise, is a really shitty case of punching down.
I know these guys are way too white and privileged to suit the ideology of many people here, but it's 8 minutes of good thinking:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9oULg-Kw_I
Eight new Covid-19 cases in NZ.
From Newshub:
All relate to overseas travel, which Director-General Dr Ashley Bloomfield says shows New Zealand does not yet have any recorded community transmission. Close contact tracing is underway.
Of the eight new cases, two are in Southland, two in Taranaki, one in Rotorua, two in Auckland and one in Northland.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/03/coronavirus-eight-new-cases-in-new-zealand1.html
All from international travel, and we're getting to the period where anyone who gets it from overseas should have gone straight into isolation, thus limiting the close contacts.
Really, the only slight misstep I can see the government making was the announcement of the isolation requirement a couple of days before it was implemented, leading to people rushing to get back before they "had to" go into isolation. Not as serious as the Lombardy lockdown plans being leaked so people fled throughout Italy, though.
would you expect infection rate to decrease soon then (assuming it's not in the community)?
Forward modelling isn't my field (but I can backward trend with the best of 'em 🙂 ), but it's largely a function of travel numbers and proportion of longer term stays in NZ.
Assuming no community outbreak, I'd expect increasing overseas-sourced cases daily over the next week or two, especially as testing abilities ramp up. The reverse-diaspora and longer term stays in NZ to allow symptoms to develop, reflecting a lag on the conditions that prevailed in the country they departed from.
As someone put it, in 6-8 weeks the world went from "we might have a problem" to "I might starve, but I refuse to die with an unwiped ass".
We might still be lucky. We'll see if the incoming cases peak soon.
Correction: Queenstown and Dunedin. Not 'Southland'
Four tweets, nailed it.
https://twitter.com/_snozzberry_/status/1240205251073830912
https://twitter.com/_snozzberry_/status/1240205966873743362
Large scale testing, please.
While Italy is currently the "worst-case scenario" for the United States, the small Italian town of Vò has not reported any new cases of COVID-19 since last Friday and the spread of the illness has been completely stopped there.
Vò, a town of 3,300 just outside Venice, was part of an experiment that involved aggressive testing and quarantine measures. Every single resident was tested for coronavirus in late February when Northern Italy was first rocked by the outbreak, and three percent of inhabitants were found to be carrying the virus.
Andrea Crisanti, an infections expert at Imperial College London, was involved with the experiment and told news outlets that half of the carriers exhibited no symptoms.
“In the UK, there are a whole lot of infections that are completely ignored,” Crisanti told the Financial Times. “We were able to contain the outbreak here because we identified and eliminated the ‘submerged’ infections and isolated them. That is what makes the difference.”
Anyone who tested positive was placed under quarantine, as were individuals that came into recent contact with the infected. The town's residents were then tested again 10 days later, and just .3 percent of the population was found to be carrying the virus. However, at least six infected individuals were asymptomatic and would not have been tested in most other countries.
[''']
Crisanti also warned Sky News that, "for every patient that shows symptoms for COVID-19 there were about 10 who don't."
https://www.sfgate.com/coronavirus/article/Italian-town-experiment-coronavirus-testing-Vo-15141033.php
Yeah, we'll just pull 4 million testing kits and an appropriate number of lab techs and labs out of our arse, shall we?
In order to discover if there are 9 or so people in the country who are asymptomatic, because we're not getting symptomatic patients from the wider community yet?
The nice thing about contact tracing is that it works backwards, too – not just the people who get infected by the patient, but the person who infected them.
Of returnees like an acquaintance who arrived in the country last Thursday who's since been yuking it up around the town with not a thought about self isolation.
Even if they supposedly beat the cutoff, say something.
We all have a responsibility to keep others and ourselves safe so do your duty!
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/03/coronavirus-how-you-can-dob-someone-in-for-breaking-self-isolation.html
All the Logan Park (Dunedin) tests are in: all negative.
This is how the system works – resources are finite, while the population is infinite (literally, because you'd have to start again and re-check once the entire population had been tested).
Tests don't happen just by thinking of a number and doubling it. Real people, working overtime and under great stress, are carrying out these tests. They deserve our thanks.
yus!
& space! They used the stadium to test these people.
I know it's millions of deaths but when it comes down to it it's c. 3 % of the population. But we haven't had such an upset since Polio, TB or WW 2. And don't we need it. We've begun to think complacent comfort is a right, and the climate change cliff so near. This new war govt should continue on. Comfort-comfort-comfort kills alertness for survival. And, yes, we've never encountered a certainty of complete doom preceded by a decade or two of increasing comfort. Like those birds fooled by cuckoos to raise their chicks we can't deal with that fiddling with our genetic programme.