‘The aviation fuel crisis caused by a ruptured pipeline has suddenly become a central issue in a tight election contest, forcing the National Government to scramble in a bid to limit impact to the travelling public and to its own vote.
With just four days to go, Opposition parties piled into National with Labour leader Jacinda Ardern claiming that the failure of the infrastructure was a failure of leadership.
The unexpected headache has the potential to undermine one of National’s longstanding claims to being better managers than Labour.
But it is also an opportunity for the Government to show it can handle a crisis competently – and a test for no-nonsense Energy Minister Judith Collins in controlling the Government response….’
The minister for kauris response will probably be a quasi test for the leaders role.
Will she help the cause or help herself as they’re vulnerable due to the gutting of regulators, resources and rules in their adoration of ‘market knows best’.
Wonder if a scapegoat is being lined up for the ‘look how tough we are’ bs.
Winston Peters just said on Garner’s show that the damage done to the pipe was by a foreign owned organisation, operating out of the Cayman Islands and paying no tax.
Hope the media digs further on this – but with more precision that the foreign owned swamp kauri extractors.
I actually mind Labour getting back into power if HC and MC were back, house prices rose quicker under Labour than they did National so be good to make some real money
[care to explain why there are multiple pseudonyms using this IP address, especially after one of them got warned to pick a single name and stick to it? I’ll check in with Lynn to make sure I’m not missing anything here, but I can’t see any reason why you shouldn’t cop a lengthy ban. If you don’t feel comfortable discussing this in the front end, then email Lynn – weka]
You are between a rock and a hard place weka with some moderation. But The Rock sounds awfully like a troll to me, or a flamer, amusing himself poking a stick in to the ant hill, pulling wings off flies etc. Have a good day weka, hope it’s not raining your way, and perhaps a nice cup of tea?
I asked him once where The Cayman Islands were. His reply, as far as could decipher it in the late night noise in the Green Parrot in Wellington, was something like.
“Listen Sunshine. I’ve been going there ever since I first went while working down a mine in Australia. I know everything about it and I’ll stop all those Chinese coming to New Zealand and buying up all our farms ………………”.
Dead drunk! How dare you Sir.
I am the last relic of the WCTU. The purest of the pure.
Depart. Get back to your dungeon before I take to you with my shillelagh.
I can’t speak for Winston though.
Ed dont get caught in the msm positioning on this. The gnats have let down a whole swathe of people and they are showing how useless they are. There is no good for them from this.
But it is also an opportunity for the Government to show it can handle a crisis competently
I’m pretty sure that the Rena stranding was as well – and they failed there. Seems that they’re maintaining the same failed policies for emergencies, a policy of simply not having anything in place to deal with it because it’s cheaper in the short term.
It might not be a good idea to mention the Rena wreck.
The Green Party are in favour of getting rid of pipelines and switching transport to coastal shipping. It probably isn’t a great thingt to remind people that there are vastly more accidents from shipping than there have been from pipelines.
[citation needed for that claim. It needs to be direct (e.g. not just a vague point at policy). You’ve got until the end of the day to produce that. I don’t know what the GP policy on this is, so maybe you can teach us something. – weka]
Sorry MSM your man got his ass kicked . And all those fake smiles you people come on you people are to easy to read yes I am defensive But like to see what you would do in my situation shit your pants and run .
Now trump he wants the United Nations to Pay america to pay for more for the dum ass war they are fighting and defense spend.
Lets look at this from my view most of the money would go to america the Americans
have all the army bases around the world and trump wants US to pay them for this what a load of crap we should give that idiot trump anything the rest of the World can see right through you the only trick trump has is bulling everyone that doesn’t agree
with his neo liberal bullshit Ideals and this idiot will fuck up the negotiations with North Korea . One needs more skills than being a bully to try and lead OUR WORLD .
The carrot works Better than the stick come on this is basic human Psychology not fucken rocket science . Or is it that trump is like all neo liberals and thinks Koreans or anyone not white is not human. It is obvious that the UN and trumps moves is not working. ALL THE PEOPLE OF THE WOURLD NEED TO BE PUTTING ALL OUR RESOURCES INTO FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE NOT DUM ASS WARS WHICH IDIOTS START trump wants us to pay for the US war machine .
It would be nice if Draco T Bastard would post that you tube video on what motivates PEOPLE. This will help get our point to these people.
Nice one eco.
I would just point out that the Americans do not, and will not, negotiate with Nth Korea, and therein lies much of the problem. This goes back to the Korean war ,which is still a huge problem ( much of which America can’t be proud of, like Vietnam).
I didn’t see it as being so bad. He obviously wasn’t as well-informed as he perhaps should have been on how complex some similar taxes are already. He was also pointlessly combative on certain well-publicised details (apparently) not being on the Labour website, and pressed hard for some details that would probably best be finalised once the party had gained access to the Treasury benches and the advisory machinery of government. Overall, though, he posed some serious questions, and Ardern gave some decent answers. I don’t think too many voters are going to be put off by a politician acquitting herself well in a mildly hostile interview. Quite the opposite, in fact.
Hanswurst
A nice measured critique. It sometimes is hard not to damn the interviewer. But to get anywhere they may have to probe. Otherwise it’s all the same every day.
I thought him a nasty, negative spinner. At one point Jacinda said about the water tax that they had given 2 figures in a small range. Espiner immediately interrupted, saying, “Yes, but one figure is double the other.” That makes it sound like a big increase, exactly the vagueness and unpredictability that National are trying to play upon.
I wanted Jacinda to respond: “No, one figure is half the other.” (Making it sound small, spinning it the other way, and pointing out Espiner’s bias.)
Espiner does this to left-wing victims (sorry, interviewees) far more often than he does it to right-wing ones in my experience.
Yes I have heard Espiner pick on a point that he repeats over and over as if he is seeking the answer to the site of the Holy Grail. He decides what is important and it is more like a battle to assert victory over his victim (I mean interviewee). I was trying to be less prejudiced towards him, and have caught him sometimes doing a good job and thought he was improving.
I’d hate to be involved with him and all these opinionated hacks privately, his attitude is not just a persona he adopts and it would be a case of if he gives way on anything, he would keep score for the times he kindly gave in, and demand later balance.
Any half decent broadcaster knows their best interviewer is Kim Hill who takes no shit and gets questions answered.
Espinner is a tool of the right and needs to be removed if nact get turfed, you should always let the polly speak which he seems to only allow nat pollies spinning their BS.
Rubbish, lurgee. Kim Hill interrupts sometimes, but at others she lets people hang themselves by their own petards. She also creates really good, positive, non-combative interviews.
Susie and Guyon are your constant interrupter/talkover artists with scant thought or knowledge.
Heard guyon interviewing himself while driving this morning. He is downright intolerable when he resorts to bad mannered, shouting down methods of asserting his will and trying to direct the narrative to his desired outcome. He just fixates on something and will not let it drop until he either wears his interviewee down or it becomes clear he is not going to get his own way. He is quite irrational at times. At least Jacinda holds her own. Must annoy him no end.
The building of another pipeline is not cost effective for a small country like New Zealand. The real problem is the need for rules and regulations, which today are conveniently side-stepped by many businesses, eg. those looking for swamp kauri, where the Collins clan have a vested interest. Will a robust investigation in the rupture of the pipe line occur, or will it be another so-so investigation similar to that of the Pike River Coal Mine?
What about a large fuel silo at Auckland airport as a backup? You would think our largest airport would have a contingency like that and it wouldn’t be a huge expense in the scheme of things. Who knows they might already have one but it’s not big enough to help much.
It’s why the Greens should be in Government to apply some common sense. After the Rena disaster they were calling for cleanup crews to be based at our major ports just in case something went wrong.
We took 20 years to get rid of the sewerage ponds on the Manukau Harbour, and a whole bunch of people would object to that volume of toxic material being stored on the edge of the Manukau Harbour again.
I would rather see a heavy rail line from Puhinui to the airport as a supplement feeder of jet fuel only when needed for instances like now.
That seems odd. An A380 takes up to 323 cu m, a 250mm pipeline has a cross-sectional area of 0.05 sqm. So 323 cu m in 18000 seconds means it’s flowing at about 0.35 m/s. The guideline for maximum flow velocity for kerosene, diesel etc seems to be about 3 m/s.
To take a hand-waving order of magnitude guess at the capacity question, if the airport is taking 1.1 billion litres of jet fuel per year through the pipe, and take a wild guess at another billion litres of petrol and a billion litres of diesel (aroundabout 1500 litres petrol/diesel per capita per year for Aucklanders doesn’t look too absurd), then the pipe is carrying around 350 cu m per hour 365/24, which is about half its capacity. But then there’s downtime for product changeovers and maintenance etc.
I’m not confident about that 3 m/s flow velocity, pipe flows aren’t my thing. It’s just what most engineering tips web pages spit out. But a few of them claim higher flow rates.
NZ is a small vulnerable economy that is being marginalised annually, by geographic isolation, low volume trading, low wages and a narrow income base.
Further weakened by an at-risk demographic, eg on any given day up to a third of high school kids in south Auckland are absent. Just look at the High School passes of this group. Rank 30 th in the OECD. Also the crime Stats’ 50% of these folk occupy our prisons.
Gvt benefits payouts are the highest in the first world (Maori & P.I.)
Australia sees all this & is slowly closing its borders to Kiwi’s. Then this [deleted] Adern, standing for the Countries leadership, wants the Primary sector ( which is half of our international income) to pay out additional huge taxes.
Her 3-6 cents a pound for butter fat equals about $50,000 for many NZ Dairy farms. The remedy is dont vote for Labour its backward & communist. This system of Gvt has proven not to work.
[seeing as how we’re most likely heading for 3 years of Ardern as PM, I’m going to start pushing back against the inevitable casual sexism now. It’s unnecessary for the political points you want to make – weka]
[also edited for formatting so I can make sense of what is being said – weka]
I didn’t see the sexist statements that were moderated out, but there is still a hell of a lot of casual racism left in SB’s comment. For example, “Gvt benefits payouts are the highest in the first world. ( Maori & P.I.)”, without providing any any links to support that assertion (which would be difficult as the majority of benefits paid are superannuation, and Māori tend to be a bit too dead by that age to collect much of that). Then there are; “south Auckland” & “these folk”.
But in any case, what little there is of an argument is nonsensical (in as much as it is decipherable from the imprecise grammar). The remedy to current problems is to not change what you are doing?
As Mr English’s staff looked increasingly uncomfortable, Ms Lane argued low-wage workers were not getting the benefits of the growing economy that Mr English kept talking about.
Mr English told her a National-led government would continue to raise the minimum wage, but she said that was simply not enough.
“$3.75 [increase] over nine years – now how would you like it if your hourly rate went up $3.75 over a period of nine years?”
Mr English said that would be a challenge for him.
Thanks for pointing that out Dspare. I’ve reread the comment and agree about the casual racism. This is something useful to think about in terms off moderation, where the line is between removing content that is likely to put commenters off (or cause flame wars) vs allowing robust debate even where some of the content is gross.
I think there’s a line between personal attacks on politicians (e.g. had it been about say Turei and the personal comments had been ethnicity based rather than gender, then I would have removed those bits), and people making political arguments (e.g. their belief about ethnicity stats and what it means).
Generally the latter are left for people to argue over, and I certainly think it’s reasonable to ask people to back up claims of fact (I keep an eye out as a moderator for that). I need to have a think about that tolerance though. I draw a lot on the part of the Policy that’s about tone or language that excludes others, and am still trying to find the balance on that. Am open to feedback on this.
Please keep pointing these things out too, because it can be easy to miss especially when there is a lot going on.
I too agree with Dspare. To Stan Blanch I would say that you need to express yourself much more clearly and precisely. That last effort made me think you a semi-articulate right-wing redneck. You deserve the criticism and the moderation comments.
Theres much to attack her with so there’s no need to make it about her looks or gender or anything like that
Attack her flip-flopping, her lack of experience, the amount of time she spends campaigning in schools, her “captains calls”, her town v country divisive tactics, her smile and wave, attack all that
But leave the personal attacks out of it we’re better than that…or we should be
Lol. Heard english gloating the other day about how he was getting mobbed in schools and malls and excitedly said “they are coming, wanting photos. I am going to win!” ..
… Never trust the ankle biters Bill. They will turn on you at the drop of a lollipop.
Attack her flip-flopping, her lack of experience, the amount of time she spends campaigning in schools, her “captains calls”, her town v country divisive tactics,…
1) Her flip flopping? Just because voters make it clear they want to have a final say on changes to the outdated tax regime. That’s not flip flopping, that’s being sensible and heeding their concerns.
2) She’s been in parliament 9 years mate. Far longer than John Key was before becoming PM. Oh, I get it. He’s a man so he doesn’t need as long… right?
3) Lack of experience. She’s only headed a large international youth organisation… worked as an adviser and consultant in the Blair Government and she’s done other admirable things as well. She’s amply qualified for the job.
4) the amount of time she spends campaigning in schools, her “captains calls”…,. English spends equally as much time in schools and cuddling babies and animals . It represents around 20% of their campaign activity but its how the news teams like to portray them – the warm, fuzzy thing that attracts viewers.
5) her town v country divisive tactics,… You are not very insightful then. Anyone with a half a brain should be able to see who is the party creating the divisive tactics for political gain. NATIONAL.
Thanks Weka. I am SO SICK of the sexism already and she hasn’t even been elected PM yet. You don’t have to scratch too far in this country for rampant sexism and misogynism to be revealed. It disgusted me through the Helen Clark years and I can feel the same angry revulsion kicking in through this campaign.
I think it will be easy enough to knock the more blatant stuff on the head. The more subtle, Hooton-esque* stuff will be harder, but then that should be being dealt with in comments anyway (fingers crossed).
*e.g. his current line is that Ardern is incompetent, but he’s very careful to avoid any suggestion that it’s because of her gender. It’s still sexist as though.
” Her 3-6 cents a pound for butter fat equals about $50,000 for many NZ Dairy farms. ” Only for huge Corporate Dairy Farms but nonetheless please post your souce.
Oh, look, it’s a butt-hurt palagi whining bitterly about having to share this country with icky, icky, non-white people. Perish the thought that it could act upon the courage of its convictions, get off its fat lily-white arse and high-tail it back to England…
So the poor fellow might have to pay $1500 a year if the water tax is levied. Cry me a river. that’s pretty much the definition of negligible impact. It almost seems as though the only tax that some farmers would find acceptable would be one that cost nothing and that nobody had to pay.
The National Party organiser for the protest was a very poor advocate on Morning Report. Just shows how effective is English scaremongering.
“Labour wants to tax us for everything except the air we breathe.” http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201859018
Yep that racist thick farmer is a good example of a farmer that lets us all down. Good the gnats have their shithead mates to push their dirty agenda. What a joke.
Yes, he just came across as uninformed and bigoted. Also, what was that supposed to be yesterday about a “positive message“? Was anything concrete at all said about “what farmers have done for the environment”? Certainly, all Lloyd Downing talked about in that interview was his not wanting other farmers to pay taxes real and imaginary. Not wanting to do something is negative in and of itself. It’s like they’ve thought up one PR line, “We want to make a positive statement about how awesome we are,” and one attack line, “Labour want to tax everything,” and not given a single thought to anything else.
“Lloyd Downing acknowledges farming is having an impact, but look how far we’ve come, he says. When asked for evidence, he tells the story of his old dad, back when Lloyd was a lad, taking the farm’s rubbish and chucking it in the river.
I used to shoot at the used light bulbs, he says, as they floated away! Nobody does that any more! ”
Good to see the redneck bigots falling back on McCarthyism! Time they looked ahead more than one season and started worrying about how their kids are going to survive.
Selling basic milk powder to the Chinese is economic stupidity as is intensive dairying on totally unsuitable terrain.
Their entrenched and narrow view of the changing world is very harmful for all of us.
And the Chinese are getting the hang of NZ dairy expertise at home. They at least have some idea of how to maintain their economy in their own interests.
‘The entrenched and narrow view of the changing world [by farmers] is very harmful for all of us.’ Indeed. And most of us including farmers who are over-leveraged, over any sort of precautionary controls on their overweening ambitions, will all go down together.
For those who like Tom Lehrer’s sarcasm seems to fit
The farmers will like his Pollution song as it has a go at cities, just up their street really.
Pollution
and it is followed by We will all go together when we go –
His song refers to the bomb but being hit by a collapsed economy and perhaps a hurricane will have a similar effect, and both are as possible as another strong earthquake.
notice that the article did not mention the size of his farm or his herds, no perspective in that story, $1500 is peanuts judging from what we can see in the picture/video of the size of his operation.
” …. water consumption of New Zealand dairy farms is equivalent to the residential use of 60 million people.
This is on top of the often quoted figure that New Zealand’s dairy herd has the environmental footprint equivalent to 90 million people.
“The implication is if a water royalty was imposed on irrigators then over 80 percent of dairy farmers will be unaffected”
However, this message is not getting through to farmers.
“As illustrated by the farmer protest (sic) in Morrinsville, it is clear many farmers are being unduly worried by baseless scaremongering – especially as Morrinsville is hardly ‘ground zero’ for irrigated dairying.”
If you shuffle income around the whanau up to each persons no tax threshold then max the farm expenses you can end up with a loss on the farm and everybody still gets cash to splash.
IIRC they get generous depreciation and write downs not available ouside the Ag sector unsure how the rebate picture is.
Well, let’s not get carried away here – the article says ‘locals’, but actually only quotes one person, who may have his own good reasons for telling porkies. A good percentage of Northland runs like a banana republic!
A pipe hit by a digger is going to show physical damage. I’m going to assume that they found that damage first (when they found the leak) and looked to the history of the area.
To MSM lets not create a divide between TOWN and COUNTRY we are all on this WAKA
called EARTH together. So when it starts sinking no one is going to think about that divide YOU are letting national impose on US there neo liberal bullshit ideals it is so primeval .
There are some todd mclay sign wavers in Rotorua they are not getting any support .
Because we all Know who his father is and what he got up to and that Trade Deal is bullshit if all agriculture is not included in it Europe dosen’t need our FOOD.
Well said Eco 😀
All of us wanting/needing clean water and less pollution so we can keep the planet alive is not divisive, it’s inclusive, survival of the planet and all the inhabitants depends on it.
Nat and media driven town v’s country division does nothing to solve any problem
Sharing ideas will help so much with solutions, that’s why I’m so very supportive of the water forum, because it brings all sectors etc together to find solutions which will unite NZ to improve life for all.
Why has the neo liberal Rotorua Lakes Council got no NITROGEN OR EFFLUENT mitigation plans in place Why have they got Lakes in there name and they are sitting on there assess and not even trying to fix that problem .
national have cut our science funding and this is one of the main tools we have to fight Climate Change and create a beautiful future for OUR grandchildren so fucken DUM.
If Jacinda and Labour really wanted to put the boot into dairy farmers in particular they would point out that in a report last year, I think, (sorry too busy or incompetent to find the reference ) that dairy farmers are tax negative by a long way.
On that note I would like to see in a new tax regime the inability of the buyer of a business to acquire simply for the tax losses associated with the target company.
When it’s sold the losses are wiped not credited to arseholes.
Chris Trotter sums up the Morrinsville farmer furore nicely:
“When Andrew McGiven and Lloyd Downing encouraged their rural brethren gather under Morrinsville’s giant cow yesterday, they were simply adding another chapter to an already very long story of rural antagonism towards the needs and aspirations of New Zealand’s urban majority. The latter looked on, appalled, at the selfishness and ignorance which unfailingly follow the country into town.”
The problem with that framing is that if we want to uplift the needs and aspirations of the majority then we will end up with Auckland running the place. There are distinct problems with most NZers living in cities, and one of them is that their ideas about nature are often once removed. People in cities also tend to see city life as normal and to then normalise that outwards. Hence the idea that part of the solution to the Auckland housing crisis is to send a whole bunch of people to the provinces, presumably to turn them into mini Aucklands. I’m appalled 😉
Besides, this country living person looked on appalled at the protest as well. No need to create a false divide.
The Feds and National have created the divide, imo. They couldn’t see that the optics would be so bad, because they’re in a bubble (methane mainly). I don’t hold with the idea that city-folk are more divorced from the real world than country people; in the country, the wild world is being actively suppressed and most farming action are aimed at suppressing the return of a natural environment. In the city, it’s largely over but city folk aren’t personally, in the main, poisoning stuff, burning stuff, chainsawing down stuff, as many in the farming community are.
true, but I think that’s lack of opportunity as much as anything. Otherwise we’d have had a Green-led govt by now. Look at the kaupapa of poisoning as part of conservation. Those are values held as much by city folk as anyone else. And the need to develop and improve things all the time to the detriment of the environment is a town as well as country value.
It’s not that I think city people are more divorced from the real world, it’s that I think the less time you spend in nature the more your thinking about and experience of it changes. That’s a generalisation, there are still many people in cities that give a shit about nature. But they tend to visit nature rather than seeing themselves as part of it. That’s a problem. Living in the country and seeing nature as something to be tamed is also a problem. Different problems, both need acknowledging and responding to.
weka in my experience of ten years dairyfaming I did not witness any farmers seeing their land as part of nature. They saw their land as a means of converting grass into milk and to hell with everything else.
I must confess that was also our aim when sharemilking.
We were told in the eighties of strict impending environmental laws and 3 year time frame was given. What did the industry do? sfa.
They can’t, garibaldi. Their cultural framing makes wildness invisible to them. They can though, just sense something threatening “over there”, but that can be Rounded-Up, no worries, mate.
If asked i think many city folk would love this idea. People living in cities with nature everywhere else, where the majority of the world would be a conservation estate – one that wouldn’t need looking after much but would be easy to visit.
Whether or not my uncle and his siblings were loaded onto a cattle wagon and transported to Siberia or they were on the very first TikiTour to Siberia is the subject of scientific debate, too. Pricks.
I guess the unpublished part of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, in which Germany and the USSR agreed to divide Poland up between them, must have been an invention of “the authors of biased historical narratives.”
“Four Auckland service stations ran out of 95 octane petrol yesterday – and more could run out today – as thousands of air passengers again face a day of cancelled flights.
Z Energy said it would be able to replenish the fuel today and told motorists there was no cause for concern.
Z’s corporate communications manager, Jonathan Hill, said in the first days after a pipeline from the Marsden Point Refinery ruptured, the company concentrated on delivering 91 octane petrol and diesel to Auckland.”
There is no cause for concern … except banner media headlines that freak voters out four days out from polling day.
Well. The locals do say there’s been no activity at the rupture site since it was built in 1981 and you’d think they would notice a digger pulling up Kauri, so…yeah.
I haven’t followed this side of it, but where I live it’s normal to have petrol supplied via tanker rather than a pipe. Is there some reason that isn’t happening enough? Is it simple physics (not enough tankers/time to meet demand)? Or am I missing something?
Auckland Airport say they supply 1.1 billion litres of jet fuel per year. That’s around 40,000 truckloads. That same pipe also delivers petrol and diesel to the Auckland region so local stations get supplied by truck from Wiri instead trucking it from Tauranga or Whangarei. At a guess that’s probably another couple billion litres of fuel down that pipe.
(that’s also around 1/270 of the world consumption of jet fuel at Auckland and NZ is 1/1600 of the world population)
The volume of fuel for auckland is somewhat high. It is about a third of the countries populaton. Similarly it is about 70% of the airplane fuel usage. It is also where most of the goods dispatched to the rest of nz come from. Auckland probably accounts for more than 40% of all fuelups.
The terrain between the refinery up north and auckland is difficult. They used to use coastal ships but it is likely that the unloading facility has been killed along with the tank farm at the harbour.
Truck tankers would fill an already full road and be pretty dangerous on some of the sharp corners in hill roads. Not to mention that we probably don’t have enough tanker trucks unless we use some milk tankers.
The State Services Commission has just put out a note to every single government Department that all flights by the public service into or out of Auckland are stopped until further notice.
I still haven’t had time to catch up properly, but it does seem very odd that people in general aren’t being advised to use less over the coming few weeks.
Would it be true that the rest of country is ok in terms of supply and supply chain?
Folks in Northland , Bay of Plenty & Waikato need to be aware that the primary focus of :
Ensuring the critical reduced volumes of Jet Fuel are delivered by Truck to Auckland
Ensuring that Diesel and 91 Octane petrol supply to Auckland is maintained
will result in negligible tanker deliveries in those regions.
Safe Gnat seats will get the least.
It’s unfortunate that the Pipeline outage occurred , even more unfortunate , IMO , that it didn’t occur a week earlier.
Wrong login. This pro-National post should have been under the light blue avatar.
[leave it alone please. Ad is an author, and anyone can comment from different devices and/or internet connections and end up with a different avatar. – weka]
No, we’ll take it up with you. You know that the avatar is created by Gravata via an algorithm shaped by the email address. Therefore the problem is you changing the email address.
But you must have changed/misspelled it on one of your devices so that it changes the avatar when you post on it. The one with the misspelling needs correcting.
There are approximately zero cars in New Zealand that need 95 octane petrol and won’t run perfectly happily on 91.
A large number of stations in Auckland don’t seem to have 95 anyway. Whenever I visit Auckland I seem to stop at stations that stock 91 and 98 instead.
I guess it is all the Ferraris and Porsches that seem to exist there.
91 and diesel supplies look like they will be fine for a while.
There will only be noticeable political impact if that changes by polling day.
Corin Dann will cover it on TVNZ news tonight – but it’s not yet a vote-turner.
Whenever one of my rellies mistakenly fills my Daihatsu Sirion 1.3 with 91, there’s nearly continual light knocking and fuel consumption noticeably increases.
Z don’t seem to try to foist overpriced 98 onto their customers, around here they all sell 95. Last time I checked into it, the 98 being sold had a lot of ethanol, so the energy content is low and fuel consumption would probably increase. So I avoid Gull, Mobil and BP.
Anyone who thinks policy analysis is the basis determining votes need only to listen to this interview to understand the base level at which the electorate determines what direction this country takes
It would also be pertinent to remind ourselves the history and origins of the National Party and we may then have a realistic expectation of the level of public discourse around rural issues
That interview was full of whining entitlement, the like of which you only ever hear from a certain sector of the farming community. Well done Peter Fraser for his rebuttal. Chris Trotter has a good post on the long history of farmer activism on his blog.
Has anyone else seen the full-page ad in today’s DomPost from the totally non-partisan (sarc) Taxpayers’ Union that claims that spending by a Labour/Greens/NZF government will cost every NZ household $229.41 per week over the next three years?
National/ACT at $22.05/week looks like a real bargain.
Kia Kaha Jacinda Ardern. Tough, tough time to lose a grandmother.
If there is poetic justice in this, it’s on Suffrage Day: 124 years after NZ led the world in granting women the vote. We are on the eve of electing a female Prime Minister for the second time….a time to remember we stand on the shoulder of giants and giantesses.
Always amazes me that people still think that National are telling the truth when they say that they manage the economy better. Decades of their mismanagement proves otherwise.
Could be msm isn’t pursuing the company which damaged the fuel pipeline at Ruakaka, while harvesting swamp kauri, because it might cause some embarrassment to Natz. If any issue needs some investigative journalism, this one certainly does! But to date, nothing at all!
NZ is definitely not being served by a free and open media, acting as a proxy for the people. Disgraceful!
Well for once in his career he has done the right thing – and about time – who would have believed it. Paddy has seen through their lies and corruption – am still shaking my head over it.
Now we no that the only thing that trump raised was a pile of cash and no mater how much shit that gets poured on money one can wash money clean.
My point is if he raised his children he would know that when you don’t give a child a healthy balanced diet they will get sick and in my view all living things are basically chemical factories and we have to make sure that the stock or vegetation and trees every living organism gets the right balanced diet to much of one chemical and the shit hits the fan.
OUR EARTH IS A LIVING ENTITY AND WE ARE PUT TO MUCH CARBON DIOXIDE INTO OUR LIVING MOTHER AND THE SHIT IS HITTING THE FAN THIS IS A FACT.
So I say fuck Dum ass Wars or money spent on war everyone on our EARTH has to work together to Heal OUR MOTHER EARTH OR WE ARE FUCKED Ka Pai.
Why not concentrate on our country. Trump is just part of the USA that looms and overshadows us all and makes our lives seem insignificant. Like a Hollywood sit com with big dark patches. NZ IS IMPORTANT. And we people here are important and our life here is important. We want to have one, and when we get it we want it to be better than just able to feed and house ourselves, just!
We have to watch the others but keep our eyes on us, and if we don’t no-one else will care. We need to care for all of us in our country 80% and 20% have kindness and interest in the rest of the world.
Trumpet can doodle out his own song in his own time, not take all of our time.
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Claim Review... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... Story of the Week... Iceberg twice the size of Washington, D.C., breaks off Pine Island glacier in Antarctica Story Highlights: The Pine Island ...
Prof Philippa Howden-ChapmanHousing policy is building up to be the key election issue again. In this blog I reflect on the importance of the role of the New Zealand Government in improving access to affordable housing. I look at what the Government has been doing to increase quality public housing ...
Writing on The Spinoff, Danyl Mclauchlan argues that we have a vacuum in our political system, in that there is no longer an anti-establishment party anymore:I think there’s a vacuum in our political system. There are obvious problems with the status quo but no real critics offering reform. It’s a ...
Stuff today has a piece about the government discovering it has been oversubsidising polluters for a decade under the Emissions Trading scheme:The Government is pledging to urgently fix an issue within the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), after it emerged some polluters are likely being over-compensated with taxpayer-funded carbon credits. [...] ...
The Marlborough District Council, tired of public scrutiny, wants to increase the amount it charges for LGOIMA requests:The cost of requesting official information from Marlborough's government agency could almost double after a jump in "fishing expeditions". Charges could be raised from $60 to $100 an hour for information supplied by ...
When Winston Peters was caught money laundering donations and stalking journalists, the Greens were conspicuous by their silence. It was another example of how getting along with their government partners was eroding their values and their own reputation. It was obviously unsustainable, and so now James Shaw has finally spoken ...
I am among the most pro-free speech people I know. I don’t doubt there are others more strident than me, but I’m certainly up there. And my support for freedom of expression isn’t limited to opposition to government-imposed restrictions. It extends to a belief that employers should have limited powers ...
With over 69,000 confirmed cases and 1,600 deaths, here’s your round-up of the latest coronavirus news. New disease and virus have now officially been named On the 11th February, the WHO Director General announced a new name for the disease: COVID-19 which is short for coronavirus disease 2019. The naming ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Feb 9, 2020 through Sat, Feb 15, 2020 Editor's Pick ANALYSIS-Climate change opens up 'frontier' farmland, but at what cost to the planet?Climate change could expand farmland globally by ...
After cross-examination Jones knew he would lose the defamation case he took against film maker Renae Maihi. That’s why he threw in the towel. The weight of evidence was clearly against the old tycoon with the defense presenting fifty articles to confirm Jones’ racist views.Being unable to harass somebody into ...
Sprung! Former NZ First president, Lester Gray, chats with RNZ's Guyon Espiner in the carpark of a Tauranga shopping centre.(Photo supplied anonymously to NZ First and The BFD.)IT’S CLEAR THAT an important aspect of Jacinda Ardern’s political success is her willingness to seek – and take – advice. This ...
Ruth Cunningham, Charlotte Paul, Andrew MoorePublic health responses to infectious diseases such as COVID-19 require us to draw on our common humanity and be explicit about our values. Recognising this will help us make good decisions in difficult situations so that, for example, the need to impose restrictive measures ...
The Helen Clark Foundation has released its report on the housing crisis, and found that house-hoarders are to blame for it:Property investors are to blame for New Zealand's high house prices, a new research paper published by the Helen Clark Foundation says. [...] McArthur said previous attempts to address housing ...
The Abortion Legislation Committee has reported back on the Abortion Legislation Bill and recommended that it be passed with some amendments. Unfortunately, the latter include even more hoops to jump through for those seeking abortions after 20 weeks, including a time-wasting requirement to consult a second doctor. No-one casually seeks ...
Brexit is likely to be a disaster for the UK (how sad, never mind). But now that they're out of the EU, the latter has finaly taken the opportunity to blacklist one of their key tax havens:The Cayman Islands, a British overseas territory, is to be put on an EU ...
I’m not quite sure of what to make of the new figures for COVID-19 (as we must now call the novel coronavirus – though I’m not sure the capitalisation is correct) from Hubei province:Image from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-51495484The spike yesterday is a consequence of a using a different way of ...
Bob Jones has dropped his defamation case against Renae Maihi. Good. But at the same time, it perfectly exposes what the case was all about: not protecting Jones' reputation, but punishing someone who had dared to criticise him, and deterring others from doing the same. This rich pompous asshat dragged ...
As I've done for the past few years, I'm curating and presenting The Listening Lounge, the talk programme at Splore. On the morning of Saturday the 22nd at the Living Lounge stage, the korero goes like this.Yes, we're talking about drugs again, not just because I'm professionally interested in drug ...
What Were They Thinking? RNZ's CEO Paul Thompson (left) and Jim Mather, Chairman of the RNZ Board of Governors, attempt to justify the debacle arising out of their attempt to downgrade RNZ Concert to the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Select Committee at Parliament on Thursday, 13 February 2020.WHAT IS ...
Dame Tariana Turia with former PM John KeyWhat is it about Tariana Turia’s grudge against the Labour Party? Not content with attacking the Government over Whānau Ora funding, which was increased by $80 million in 2019, she has now made it personal by saying that Jacinda Ardern is out of her ...
Back in 2017, right after being elected, Jacinda Ardern promised that there would be no new mines on conservation land. Since then, her government has done nothing to make that happen, and now the policy has been officially "parked" for the election:West Coast-Tasman MP Damien O'Connor says the "no new ...
So the guy who advocated for public burning and beheading feels offended because someone called him a racist!Perhaps Bob Jones hasn't heard of the very old saying; Live by the sword, die by the sword?I mean for someone who often writes opinionated nonsense about Maori; this is a ridiculous case ...
The government today announced a major support package aimed at reducing homelessness. A thousand new transitional housing places, more support for people to find homes (or not lose them in the first place), all good stuff. The one problem with it is that they're going to start charging people in ...
Courtroom Drama: There is no off-switch in a courtroom. Neither is it possible to turn the page in disgust. Ill-formed and ill-defended opinions will be exposed ruthlessly and unapologetically. As Shakespeare put it: “Reputation is an idle and most false imposition; oft got without merit, and lost without deserving.” Sometimes the ...
As of today, the novel coronavirus spreading in China is called COVID-19. Why does it matter? Around the office, we’ve had several conversations over the past few weeks about how 2019-nCoV needed its own name. First, it was getting annoying calling it by the above designation, and ‘novel coronavirus’ doesn’t ...
by Philip Ferguson Last month B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, reported: “In 2019, Israeli security forces killed 133 Palestinians, including 28 minors. Of the casualties, 104 were killed in the Gaza Strip, 26 in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and three within ...
A ballot for a single Member's Bill was held today, and the following bill was drawn: Arms (Firearms Prohibition Orders) Amendment Bill (No 2) (Brett Hudson)Its basicly more "tough on crime" nonsense (its already illegal for unlicensed people to own guns) designed to wedge NZ First against its arsehole base. ...
In 2015 the world agreed to the Paris Agreement to fight climate change. Each country would offer a Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) "that it intends to achieve", and "pursue domestic mitigation measures, with the aim of achieving [it]". And every five years, they'd improve on it, ratcheting up ambition until ...
In theory, the emissions trading scheme should reduce emissions. Making polluters pay for permits to pollute lets them save money by reducing pollution, giving them a financial incentive to do the right thing. But right from the start the ETS was broken with a system of free allocation, so polluters ...
Irish voters went to the polls on Saturday in parliamentary elections, and perhaps delivered a political revolution. Since independence, Irish politics has been dominated by two parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Basicly patronage networks with indistinguishable policies, their cleavage isn't ideology, but who killed whose father or grandfather in ...
Once again the Aotearoa Bike Challenge is on us, and once again I’m participating. In principle this is not hard because it does not represent a significant switch in behavior for me. I already bike nearly every day. The Bicycle The fascinating thing about cycling is the realisation that this ...
Lately there has been a great deal of misinformation regarding the origins and purpose of Skeptical Science. As John Cook wrote nearly a decade ago, Skeptical Science is primarily a website that debunks climate misinformation with peer-reviewed science. Despite the ever-worsening impacts from climate change, with record after record being broken in ...
Under Attack: By sacking not only RNZ Concert’s presenters, but also its producers and librarians, and reducing the station to an automated purveyor of classical music in-between parliamentary broadcasts, RNZ’s CEO, Paul Thompson, wasn’t simply announcing an operational shake-up, he was declaring war on one of the most important guardians of ...
Story of the Week... Editorial of the Week... Toon of the Week... Quote of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Reviews... SkS Week in Review... Poster of the Week... Story of the Week... Australian smoke plume sets recordsThe recent wildfires in Australia sent one of ...
The Global Protest to #FightInequality was powerful – thankyou and what next? Dear allies, We started the decade with a huge protest to #FightInequality that was heard around the world, including the 1% at Davos. Watch and share the highlights on facebook and twitter. A huge thank you. Together we ...
The Ministry of Health have announced a package that might ensure NZ will never experience another measles epidemic. While at the time of writing the details are still limited it appears that the important limitations in our current programme have been acknowledged and the intent is to address them. Great ...
Prof Nick Wilson, Prof Michael BakerIn this blog we briefly summarise our assessment of the highly uncertain new coronavirus threat. Given its potential to become a severe and prolonged global pandemic, a precautionary response now means activating all components of our pandemic plan, with a particular focus on ‘keep ...
When Labour was running for election, Jacinda Ardern famously said that climate change was "my generation's nuclear free moment". The implication was that her government would take the problem seriously, and act swiftly to reduce emissions. The reality:New Zealand will emit a million more tonnes of greenhouse gases in 2020 ...
James Renwick is Professor of Physical Geography at Victoria University of Wellington. He studied at Canterbury and the University of Washington and has worked on diverse aspects of climate science, including global atmospheric circulation and Antarctic sea ice. In December 2019 he was appointed to the New Zealand Climate Change ...
by Philip Ferguson Exit polls are showing a three-way virtual tie between the main parties in the south of Ireland. Sinn Fein, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael are all on just over 22%. FG on 22.4, SF on 22.3, FF on 22.2. Exit polls indicate that over 30% of 18-24 ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Feb 2, 2020 through Sat, Feb 8, 2020 Editor's Pick New Report Details How Fossil Fuel Industry's Climate Destruction Also Exacerbates Human Rights Abuses"Even in the face of the ...
In a previous post I described briefly when and how the Starlink satellite chains – recent launches by Space-X in a scheme to bring 5G internet connectivity to the whole globe – could be seen from New Zealand with the naked eye. Here I provide an update and predictions for ...
Keeping The Faith: This Government’s broad, new, heavily moderated, progressive faith does not require a prime minister with the powers of a medieval pope. Jacinda’s regime has no need of subterranean torture chambers to ensure compliance. A gift for diplomacy and the ability to inspire her fellow human-beings is all ...
Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian has penned a column which chastises the left wing of the Labour party for daring to retain principles and ideals, qualities - it seems - that should be jettisoned in pursuit of power.Never mind that Freedland was an ardent Remainer, that is to say, one ...
Tonight’s news suggests the coronavirus outbreak may have originated from pangolins. Details are very sketchy, almost nothing at all beyond a claim of high similarity. My impression is this claim comes from a press release by South China Agricultural University. Initial discussion online suggests this is a more likely candidate ...
by Susanne Kemp The Fire and Emergency service (FENZ) has recently asked firefighters in Auckland Areas 3, 4 and 5 to take on an additional duty that has rather ominous implications. Namely, to collect names and addresses of everyone on the premises of fires they attend. The firefighters’ union, the ...
Part of the story of the Nazis' rise to power in Germany was the willingness of mainstream right-wing parties to work with them to keep out the left. Because of this, one of the fundamental rules of postwar German politics has been "do not work with Nazis". As a result, ...
There has long been a truism in public broadcasting: don't mess with Concert FM. The theory was that although the station has been in a long-term audience decline, and that audience is steadily ageing out, it has powerful establishment support – and any threat to it would provoke a fury.As ...
This is a re-post from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists The heat absorbed in Earth’s oceans reached a new record in 2019, found a recent study published in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences. Despite the fact that this has been the case for almost every year over the past decade, this information ...
We are confronted with the spectre of Simon Bridges making clear he cannot, will not, trust Winston Peters – the oft-cited “King Maker” in New Zealand politics.Supporters are lauding it as a master stroke, naturally, because in their eyes, it prevents him being the tail that wags the dog. ...
by Don Franks Under a government claiming empathy with the fine arts, Radio New Zealand ( RNZ) is poised to cut back its classical music station, RNZ Concert. The plan is replacing it on FM radio with music “for a younger audience” as part of a new multimedia music brand. ...
More Thwaites This past week we heard disturbing news about Antarctica's Thwaites Glacier. Helping to fill in the longer term history of Thwaites' behavior and especially helpful in interpreting results of the recent drilling project and what it may say about the future of this unstable mass of ice is Revealing the ...
Inaccuracies are very common in scientific paper abstracts. Image credit:Science in the Abstract: Don’t Judge a Study by its Cover I have come to accept anti-fluoride campaigners will never stop cherry-picking research and findings ...
“The scene is set, the players met…”. And what players they are in this farce of an Election coming up in the United States this year. There is a multi-faceted anger in the broader situation the world finds itself in, in which the false promises of so-called “moderates” find themselves ...
A few years ago, a company lowballed a contract to dispose of toxic waste from the Tiwai Point aluminium smelter. So, they dumped it in a disused paper mill in Mataura, then went into liquidation - effectively dumping the problem on local councils. The waste is dangerous - it releases ...
Unhappy with the demonisation of Iran in Western media, I was fortunate to have the Australian Institute of International Affairs invite me to write an alternative analysis for their on-line journal Australian Outlook. I did, and they serialised it into two parts. The essays are short, so I did not ...
Over on The Good Society, Max Rashbrooke suggests that its time to start directly taxing wealth:A wealth tax would be levied on net wealth – that is, the value of people’s assets once their debts have been subtracted. Such a tax would be highly redistributive. Levied at 1% on wealth ...
The quarterly labour market statistics have been released, and unemployment has dropped to 4%. There are now 111,000 unemployed - 15,000 fewer than when Labour took office. Its not the performance we had under Clark (when unemployment was ~3.3%), but its still a reasonable improvement over prevailing conditions under National. ...
Prof Michael Baker, Prof Nick Wilson, Louise Delany, Prof Richard Edwards, Prof Philippa Howden-ChapmanThe current national measles epidemic in New Zealand is amongst the largest we have experienced in the last 40 years. It can be linked to the problems created by long-term erosion and fragmentation of national public health ...
I’m about to start teaching science communication to tertiary students, which is equally hilarious and terrifying to me. (Hi to my students who have Googled me and found this post.) I loved English at high school, but we spent most of our time reading The Outsiders, discussing the differences between metaphors and ...
Space-X has started launching its Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit with a plan to use some tens of thousands of these to deliver 5G wifi to the whole globe. Chains of these satellites can be seen in the evening or before-dawn skies, through the sunlight they scatter. Here I provide ...
New Zealand was the first country to decriminalise prostitution and it was promoted as a progressive move. Yet survivors of the sex trade say that pimps and johns are emboldened operating within the law, and that the women are treated more like a piece of property to be used and ...
An obscene 12 percent pay jump for already overpaid CEOs last year reveals a willful ignorance from much of corporate New Zealand to the on-going harm inequality is causing the very society they live in, said Peter Malcolm, spokesperson for the income equality project Closing the Gap. In its annual ...
One thing I remember about the interview I did with Rex Halliday for Planet magazine in 1992 was a couple of times being on the verge of tears.Rex was reflecting on the community effort that went into the second Hero party at the old Princes Wharf building – and the ...
Something you don't see: Malawi's constitutional court has annulled fraudulent elections and ordered new ones:Judges in Malawi have annulled last year’s elections and called for a new ballot within 150 days. In a landmark judgment that experts hailed as a step forward for democracy, the country’s constitutional court found that ...
Our Scibloggers have been providing updates on the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. This page will be updated as more posts are published. 3 February 2020 Coronavirus ‘infodemic’ The WHO has called the coronavirus outbreak an ‘infodemic’, with information spreading rapidly – and sometimes incorrectly – online. Sarah-Jane O’ConnorLately, in Science 2 ...
If you haven’t watched Newsroom’s video showing Oranga Tamariki staff attempting to uplift a newborn baby yet you should do so. Although it's not the worst case as far as interventions go, it’s certainly not a good look for the Government. Because of this controversy there’s been a plethora of ...
Darroch Ball, Spokesperson for Law and Order New Zealand First welcomes the deployment of an Eagle Police helicopter in Christchurch in what is a step towards fulfilling its long-standing goal to increase the use of police helicopters for the front line, particularly in addressing the scourge of fleeing drivers. Christchurch leads ...
It may have been the first sitting week of 2020, but our Government is already in full-swing - managing a strong economy, investing in infrastructure, and working to break the cycle of homelessness. Read below for all that, and more... ...
In a heated debate in Parliament, National's Deputy Leader Paula Bennett claimed that “nearly 1600 patched gang members have been added” since the Coalition Government took power. To illustrate her point, she altered a chart used by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern to show her government’s progress in housing to instead ...
Speech by the Rt Hon Winston Peters at Parliament’s Opening 2020 "We all need insurance" This year New Zealanders are going to have a clear choice to make That choice is between: Optimism versus pessimism; More progress versus back to the future; Investment versus divestment; Unity versus division. New Zealand ...
Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones has slammed the Board of Auckland Airport following the airport's runway closing twice within two weeks due to maintenance. Around 2,000 passengers were affected by last week’s runway closures, according to 1NEWS. Another maintenance closure on January 24 saw two international flights and three domestic flights ...
Jenny Marcroft, Spokesperson for Broadcasting New Zealand First supports the commissioning of a business case to assess the viability of a new public media entity. “A strong media environment is critical for a healthy democracy. New Zealand First is a strong supporter of a diverse, independent media,” New Zealand First broadcasting spokesperson ...
Pounamou and technology industries in the West Coast region are set to receive more than $2 million in Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) funding. This was announced by the Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau during Waitangi Day commemorations in Hokitika. He said $800,000 would be given to Development West ...
Clayton Mitchell MP, New Zealand First spokesperson for Labour and Industrial Relations Unemployment and wage growth numbers released by Stats NZ today demonstrate a labour market in good shape with unemployment falling to 4.0%, the underutilisation rate falling to an 11 year low, and wage growth at a 10-year high ...
Hon. Ron Mark, New Zealand First Spokesperson for Defence New Zealand First Spokesperson for Defence Ron Mark, welcomes the official opening of Te Rau Aroha, a new museum at Waitangi Treaty Grounds as part of our Coalition Agreement. “It is a great honour to be part of an effective Government ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime MinisterGood morning,Let us start with important acknowledgements.First, this special day, in remembrance of the 28th Maori Battalion, is also to honour all those men and women who have risked their lives in the service of our country.Second, special guest Robert ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters says New Zealand will look to build on its relationship with the United Kingdom and recommit to the European Union, after the country officially left the continental union recently. The Minister said New Zealand already cooperates closely with Britain on defence and security issues and has ...
Today, our Government announced the biggest infrastructure investment in a generation.We’re investing $12 billion to upgrade and build rail, roads, schools and hospitals across the country – modernising our infrastructure, preparing for climate change and helping to future-proof our economy.Find out everything you need to know about the ...
Today the Government is making progress on a fairer and more secure rental market for renters and landlords with the introduction of the Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill in Parliament. “This Bill includes a series of reforms to improve the wellbeing of the 609,700 households that live in rented homes, and ...
A Government programme to wipe out pea weevil has achieved a world first, with Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor today announcing the successful eradication of the noxious pest from Wairarapa. This means the nearly four-year ban on pea plants and pea straw was lifted today. Commercial and home gardeners can again grow ...
Southland residents hit by flooding caused by heavy rainfall can now access help finding temporary accommodation with the Government activating the Temporary Accommodation Service, Minister of Civil Defence Peeni Henare announced today. “The Temporary Accommodation Service (TAS) has been activated by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment to help ...
“Is that it?” That’s Finance Minister Grant Robertson’s response to Simon Bridges’ much-hyped economic speech today. “Simon Bridges just gave the most over-hyped and under-delivered speech that I can remember during my time in politics,” Grant Robertson said. “It’s not surprising. Simon Bridges literally said on the radio this morning ...
A trial deployment of the Police Eagle helicopter in Christchurch will test whether the aircraft would make a significant difference to crime prevention and community safety. “The Bell 429 helicopter will be based in Christchurch for five weeks, from 17 February to 20 March,” said Police Minister Stuart Nash. “The ...
The Government has kept up the pace of its work to promote New Zealand’s trade interests and diversify our export markets, with visits to Fiji and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) by Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker. Building momentum to bring the PACER Plus trade and development agreement ...
The Coalition Government’s investment in a strong border and disrupting transnational organised crime produced record results for stopping drugs in 2019, says Minister of Customs Jenny Salesa. The illegal drugs were seized at the New Zealand border by Customs, and overseas by Customs’ international border partners before the drugs could ...
Transport Minister Phil Twyford today kicked off construction of a separated cycleway alongside Tamaki Drive. A two-way separated cycleway will be built along the northern side of Tamaki Drive, between the Quay Street Cycleway extension and Ngapipi Road. There will be a separate walking path alongside. Phil Twyford said giving ...
Owner-occupiers of unit and apartments living in earthquake-prone buildings will have certainty about the financial support they’ll be eligible for with the release of criteria for an upcoming assistance scheme, Minister for Building and Construction Jenny Salesa says. The Residential Earthquake-Prone Building Financial Assistance Scheme will help unit owners facing ...
Temporary restrictions on travel from China will remain in place as a precautionary measure to protect against the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus. The restrictions which prevent foreign nationals travelling from, or transiting through, mainland China from entering New Zealand have been extended for a further 8 days. This position ...
Employment Minister Willie Jackson announced today that Tairāwhiti rangatahi will benefit from an investment made by the Government’s He Poutama Rangatahi (HPR) scheme. The funding will go to the Tautua Village, Kauneke programme and the Matapuna Supported Employment Programme which will fund 120 rangatahi over two years. “Both programmes work ...
All parents and caregivers need to ensure that their children go to school unless they are sick, Associate Education Minister Tracey Martin said today. “The school attendance results for 2019 show, across the board, a drop in the number of students going to school regularly,” the Minister says. “Apart from ...
A Deed of Settlement agreeing redress for historical Treaty claims has been signed by the Crown and Moriori at Kōpinga Marae on Rēkohu (Chatham Islands) today, Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Andrew Little has announced. Moriori have a tradition of peace that extends back over 600 years. This settlement ...
Transport Minister Phil Twyford today with Māori King Tuheitia Pōtatau Te Wherowhero VII officially opened the country’s newest road, the $384 million Huntly section of the Waikato Expressway. The 15km four-lane highway with side and central safety barriers takes State Highway 1 east of Huntly town, across lowlands and streams ...
The rapid uptake of life-saving new hepatitis C medicine Maviret since it was funded by PHARMAC a year ago means the elimination of the deadly disease from this country is a realistic goal, Health Minister David Clark says. Hepatitis C is a blood-borne virus which attacks the liver, proving fatal ...
Kaupapa Māori will underpin the Government’s new plan to deal with homelessness announced by the Prime Minister in Auckland this morning. “Māori are massively overrepresented among people experiencing homelessness, so, to achieve different outcomes for Māori, we have to do things very differently,” says the Minister of Māori Development ...
1000 new transitional housing places delivered by end of year to reduce demand for emergency motel accommodation. Introduce 25% of income payment, after 7 days, for those in emergency motel accommodation to bring in line with other forms of accommodation support. Over $70m extra to programmes that prevents those at ...
Clear requirements for ensuring customers are treated fairly by banks, insurers and other financial service providers are included in new financial conduct legislation that passed its first reading today. “The recent reviews, by the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) and Reserve Bank of New Zealand, into the conduct of banks and ...
Applications are now open for the fifth round of the Regional Culture and Heritage Fund Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Grant Robertson announced today. “I am delighted to open this year’s fund which has some $7 million available to support performing arts venues, galleries, museums and whare ...
The Minister of Māori Development, Hon Nanaia Mahuta today congratulated Associate Professor Amokura Kawharu on her appointment as the next President of the Law Commission. “Amokura Kawharu will be a standout in her new role, leading in an innovative and forward looking approach to the law reform process. She will ...
Auckland University legal academic Amokura Kawharu has been appointed as the next President of the Law Commission, Justice Minister Andrew Little announced today. Associate Professor Kawharu will take up her new appointment on 11 May 2020. “I would like to congratulate Associate Professor Kawharu on her appointment,” Andrew ...
A programme for employers to help them engage effectively with younger employees was launched today by Minister of Employment, Willie Jackson. The Youth Ready Employer Programme contains a range of on-line templates that employers can easily access to help with employing and retaining young people in their businesses. The programme ...
Budget 2020 will be delivered on Thursday 14 May, Finance Minister Grant Robertson announced today. “This year’s Budget will continue the Coalition Government’s focus on tackling the long-term challenges facing New Zealand while also preparing the economy for the future. “Those challenges and opportunities cannot be resolved in one budget, ...
I move, That this House place on record its appreciation and thanks for the devoted and distinguished service to New Zealand by the late Rt Hon Michael Kenneth Moore, member of the Order of New Zealand, a member of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, an Honorary Member of the ...
Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor has today classified the drought conditions in Northland as an adverse event for the primary sector, unlocking $80,000 in Government support. “This is recognition that the extreme and prolonged nature of this dry spell is taking its toll on our farmers and growers and additional support ...
The Minister of Police says an operation to smash a trans national drug smuggling ring today will make a significant impact on the methamphetamine trade fuelling harm in our communities. Police have announced 10 arrests and the seizure of up to five million dollars’ worth of illicit drugs after an ...
The Government’s books are in a strong position to withstand global headwinds, with the accounts in surplus and expenses close to forecast, Finance Minister Grant Robertson says. The Treasury today released the Crown accounts for the six months to December. The operating balance before gains and losses (OBEGAL) was above ...
Race courses can improve safety with this year’s second round of funding from the Racing Safety Development Fund. Minister for Racing Winston Peters has announced the second funding round of 2019/20 is open with $347,875 available for distribution. “The racing industry is integral to the economic and social fabric of ...
The Government is committing $300,000 to fund research to update behavioural information to make sure HIV and STI prevention services are targeted appropriately in New Zealand. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Finance Minister Grant Robertson made the announcement at today’s Big Gay Out in Auckland. “There is much talk about ...
The Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media has announced work will begin on a business case to assess the viability of forming a new public media entity. “The Government must ensure New Zealanders have a strong independent public media service for decades to come, which means ensuring public ...
Minister of Civil Defence Hon Peeni Henare announced today that the Government will contribute $100,000 to the Southland regional Mayoral Relief Fund, to support communities impacted by the recent flooding in Southland. Mr Henare says this week’s flooding has caused significant disruption to communities in the lower South Island. ...
Heritage buildings throughout New Zealand will benefit from the $1.1 million in Heritage EQUIP funding grants announced today. “These grants for seismic strengthening projects help private building owners get the advice they need to start building work or to get the work completed,” Grant Robertson says. “Timaru’s Grosvenor Hotel has ...
A new survey has found New Zealand’s game development sector has grown beyond expectations and is on track to becoming a billion dollar industry in 2025, Economic Development Minister Phil Twyford says. “New Zealand’s interactive media sector grew by 42 per cent in last financial year to $203.4 million, according ...
Te Tii, the lower marae at Waitangi, is among more than 70 marae now connected to broadband internet thanks to the Provincial Growth Fund’s marae connectivity scheme, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones said today. In February 2019, the Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) allocated $21 million to connect rural towns ...
The West Coast has had a funding injection of over $1.2 million from the Provincial Growth Fund, Under Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau announced at Waitangi Day commemorations in Hokitika today. The PGF projects announced are: $800,000 to Development West Coast for a Grey District Regional Digital Hub ...
Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor has declared an adverse event for the Southland and Otago regions, unlocking Government support for farmers and growers. “Widespread flooding has resulted in severe disruption, with many people evacuated from their homes and many farms being affected by flood waters. It’s putting pressure on our farmers, ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced a funeral service for former Labour Prime Minister the Rt Hon Mike Moore, ONZ, AO. A public service will be held on Friday 14 February at 2pm at Dilworth School senior campus, 2 Erin Street, Epsom, Auckland. “The service will be a celebration of ...
Today’s news of low unemployment, rising wages and record numbers of Maori in work shows the economy is in good shape and that the Government is delivering better outcomes across New Zealand. “The Coalition Government has overseen a strong economy. Our investments in infrastructure, our focus on lifting wages of ...
Opening of Waitangi Museum Te Rau Aroha 9.30am, 5 February 2020 [CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY] Good morning, Let us start with important acknowledgements. First, this special day, in remembrance of the 28th Maori Battalion, is also to honour all those men and women who have risked their lives in the service ...
The government has agreed to help crayfish exporters to minimise the impact of trade disruptions caused by the coronavirus outbreak in China. Between 150 and 180 tonnes of live rock lobster are currently held in New Zealand in pots and tanks, at sea and on land, after export orders were ...
The $11 million tourism package announced after today’s Cabinet is a positive response. Auckland Business Chamber head Michael Barnett said possibly more important in the Prime Minister’s announcement was that further support was possible, as ...
By Joenner Paulo L. Enriquez and Ma. Alena O. Castillo in Manila Thomasian Jesuit priests Fr Albert Alejo and Fr Flaviano Villanueva have posted P10,000 (NZ$310) bail each after a judge issued a warrant of arrest in connection with their sedition case. “Nag-piyansa na kami Fr Flavie at sumama ...
Labour and NZ First are delaying a painful call on either lifting or cutting the annual residency visa limit, while the Greens want the limits removed completely. ...
Tame Impala’s new album The Slow Rush dropped over the weekend to universal acclaim. Jordan Hamel talked to the band’s frontman, Kevin Parker, about the five year gap between albums, and where the band fits into riock music in 2020.Kevin Parker’s musical baby Tame Impala steadily rose to indie prominence in the ...
Dr Bryce Edwards.NZ First is facing the boot at this year’s election, especially as it’s now embroiled in an unfolding donations scandal, which comes on top of low poll ratings. But what effect will the scandal have on NZ First’s government coalition colleagues? And is Labour and the Greens’ ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Jones, Climate Scientist, Australian Bureau of Meteorology After the intensely dry conditions of 2019, January and February have brought much-needed rain. Dams in many cities and towns were replenished and some farmers may be able to grow a crop for the ...
New Zealand’s trusted service for ageing well, Age Concern New Zealand, is receiving a New Year boost after inking an agreement with Perpetual Guardian to have the nation’s largest and most dominant trustee services company as the platinum sponsor of Age ...
The boundaries of free speech were at issue in two recent court cases, one in Britain, the other in New Zealand. In the British case, a judge ruled that the police response to an ex-officer’s tweets (allegedly transphobic) was a “disproportionate interference” with his right to freedom of expression. The ...
The Tauranga-based power company Trustpower has cut its earnings expectations by as much as 14 percent because of lower power prices and pressure on margins. ...
It’s not worth putting much credence in Simon Bridges’s complaints about the current Government’s piling on hikes in petrol taxes until he commits to reversing them, says the Taxpayers’ Union . Spokesman Louis Houlbrooke said, “It’s not ...
Researchers say councils need to be doing much more to ensure homes and buildings aren't wiped out when a mega-tsunami eventually strikes the east coast of the North Island. ...
Water utilities right across the country face major challenges to upgrade and maintain their underground three waters network. Water New Zealand’s Technical Manager, Noel Roberts says Wellington’s waste water woes are not unique to the capital city. ...
With more than a thousand locations in 250 cities worldwide, UK company Stasher is allowing travellers to store their luggage while offering local businesses a way to earn extra cash. Having recently launched in New Zealand, co-founder and CEO Jacob Wedderburn-Day explains how the business works. How did Stasher start and ...
National's deputy leader Paula Bennett says if Winston Peters had any involvement in covert photographs of journalists meeting a source, he is not fit to be deputy prime minister. ...
ALRANZ Abortion Rights Aotearoa is co-sponsoring a National Day of Action – Our Bodies, Our Choices, with Fem Force, Victoria University Feminists Organisation, NCW, and HELP. “Now is the time for people who care about women and pregnant people ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s contentPolitical donations Danyl Mclauchlan (Spinoff): The donations mess reveals a vacuum in our political system. Who will fill it? ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Robinson, Lecturer, Department of Occupational Therapy, Monash University When people think about Australian Rules Football injuries, they tend to think about head injuries and the long-term effects of concussion. Or they might think of the potentially lengthy recoveries after hamstring, shoulder ...
Simon Bridges reckons those on the average wage shouldn’t be hit by a 33-cents-in-the-dollar tax. And they’re not. Not even close. Alex Braae explains. It takes an incredible political talent to announce that you disagree with a policy setting, and have that critique be so powerful that it retroactively becomes government ...
Sam Brooks heads along to Meatstock 2020, and finds himself questioning the symbiotic relationship between meat-eating and machismo.As I entered Auckland’s ASB Showgrounds for the first day of Meatstock 2020, a girl was exiting. Trucker cap on, eyes hidden behind aviators, manicured fingers wrapped around a can, itself wrapped in ...
Today’s launch of the Ngati Porou treaty settlement documentary is significant for the iwi and for all New Zealanders as we further our understanding of the journey to Te Tiriti o Waitangi settlements, Bernadette Cavanagh CE Manatū Taonga Ministry ...
Why don’t Western democratic governments typically regulate the porn industry, internet service providers (ISPs) or other internet services who make pornographic content accessible to children? And how is a change in the idea of what it means ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is calling on the Ministry of Health to demand back the $319,000 of taxpayers spent on a flawed study suggesting a weekly lotto ticket is as harmful as an amputated leg and that occasional gambling is comparable to having a heart ...
Across the prime minister’s Monday morning broadcast interviews, there was one overwhelming theme: the behaviour of NZ First and Winston Peters, who happens also to be the deputy prime minister.With turmoil engulfing government coalition partner NZ First and deputy PM Winston Peters, the logical next person to ask for a ...
By Michael Norris in Wellington After a week-long controversy, New Zealand’s public broadcaster Radio New Zealand (RNZ) has withdrawn a proposal to axe its classical music station RNZ Concert. But despite the sudden backtrack, RNZ Concert isn’t safe yet. Whatever the final outcome of RNZ’s rethink, it is clear ...
“The Government’s current dispute with councils regarding the Urban Development Bill is the result of Phil Twyford’s failure to cut red tape on a broader basis,” says New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke. “In Opposition, ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says the New Zealand First Foundation - which faces investigation from the SFO - has nothing to do with her or Winston Peters' role in her Cabinet. ...
The Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has been speaking with her Australian counterpart about options to evacuate New Zealanders stuck on a cruise ship, quarantined in Japan. ...
Government seeks power to seize reins over electricity industry; and property investors to blame for NZ's high house prices, not lack of supply, researcher says. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bénédicte Cenki-Tok, Associate professor at Montpellier University, EU H2020 MSCA visiting researcher, University of Sydney As the world shifts away from fossil fuels, we will need to produce enormous numbers of wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles and batteries. Demand for the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Salisbury, Research Associate, School of Political Science & International Studies, The University of Queensland With cries of “Quexit!” still echoing faintly in our ears, Queenslanders head towards a state election in October. For many, interest lies in whether federal Labor’s poor ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susanne Becken, Professor of Sustainable Tourism and Director, Griffith Institute for Tourism, Griffith University If you’re a traveller who cares about reducing your carbon footprint, are some airlines better to fly with than others? Several of the world’s major airlines have announced ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Pi-Shen Seet, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Edith Cowan University Every year, the Australian Taxation Office releases a report that includes the highest earning occupations in Australia. These are mostly in the medical, legal and financial sectors. This information is commonly used ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hal Pawson, Professor of Housing Research and Policy, and Associate Director, City Futures Research Centre, UNSW Despite two years of housing market cooling in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia stayed near the top of the global unaffordability league in 2019. And with prices ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Diane Kraal, Senior Lecturer, Business Law and Taxation Dept, Monash Business School, Monash University So worried is the government about the meagre income it is getting from gas during the middle of Australia’s biggest gas export boom that it asked an independent ...
NZ's effective policy of tempting guest workers here with the chance of permanent residency and then quietly withdrawing that chance has become a damaging economic addiction that is mean and fraudulent, Bernard Hickey argues. ...
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Bridges gives signal of tax cuts, police under pressure over family violence problem, and condemnation rains down over Peters scandal.Expect plenty of news today about National’s economic manifesto to take into the next election. From Simon Bridges’ appearance on Q+A yesterday (welcome back ...
A "surreptitious" conspiracy to introduce special NZ gold kiwifruit plants into China could cost a Chinese-born local grower $15m for breaches of intellectual property laws. ...
Maia Wilson is being tipped as the next Maria Folau in the Silver Ferns shooting circle, but she wants to stamp her own unique footprint on netball history. ...
Dental decay is NZ's most common chronic disease, yet it is not covered by the health system. Cat McLennan explains why we should introduce free dental care for adults. ...
Winston Peters was once the one who could plausibly rail against the self-interest of the establishment. Today that seems laughable, So where are the real critics offering reform, asks Danyl Mclauchlan. Politics is messy. It’s chaotic; most things happen for complex combinations of reasons and these are not always obvious, ...
The conversation around how we prepare for coronavirus here needs to be guided by a sense of our common humanity, write Ruth Cunningham, Charlotte Paul, Andrew Moore, Ayesha Verrall of the University of Otago’s Department of Public Health.Borders have been closed, arrivals from Wuhan are in quarantine, and New Zealanders ...
Pretty much everything has a breaking point. The only questions are where, when and how. Might it be coming soon with climate change policy? This week there was disarray in the Australian Liberal and National party coalition over the costs of climate change policy. This was one of the issues ...
Ex-tropical cyclone Uesi is due to reach the west of the South Island this afternoon, bringing further pain to flood-hit Southland. Here’s what you need to know.Ex-tropical, you say. What on earth does that mean? A tropical cyclone, which is a low-pressure system that forms over warm waters in the tropics, ...
The Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand has confirmed anti-poverty campaigner Ricardo Menendez March as their candidate for Maungakiekie in this general election. Ricardo Menendez March has been working as the Coordinator for Auckland Action Against Poverty, ...
We review the entire country and culture of New Zealand, one thing at a time. Today, a bunch of us have a hoon on Burger King’s new chip butty.The United Kingdom’s contributions to world cuisine, like its contributions to the world in general (Morris dancing, Piers Morgan, colonialism etc), are ...
Emily Writes reviews the now infamous orgasm episode of the even more infamous Netflix show The Goop Lab.It was four days after the fourth person asked me to review the orgasm episode of Netflix’s The Goop Lab that I finally sat down to watch it.I don’t like Gwyneth Paltrow but ...
Beige and on-trend? Not for this poet. Paula Harris gives some real-life, applicable decor advice.Last night I was procrastinating and avoiding working on some poem revisions, because being a poet means that when you have other things to do, you write a poem, and when you have a poem to ...
Have we reached peak smartphone? Henry Burrell reviews the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip, an engineering marvel which all but highlights how few ways there are to improve phones in 2020.In the age of smartphones, notifications and constant communication, you might wish for a simpler time when the old flip phone ...
By Hans Nicholas Jong in Jakarta Experts have warned that a slate of sweeping deregulation planned by the Indonesian government could prove disastrous for the environment and create even more conflicts over land and resources. The administration of President Joko Widodo is preparing to submit to Parliament two bills ...
Dr Bryce Edwards.Does money buy policy in New Zealand politics and government? Based on the ongoing political finance scandal involving New Zealand First, which comes hot on the heels of the Serious Fraud Office charging four people in relation to donations to the National Party, New Zealanders have every ...
It’s an unprecedented level of excitement in the US for a New Zealand novel. It’s also very sudden. The hype for The Absolute Book, published by Victoria University Press in September last year, took off with a hiss and a roar after Dan Kois’s ...
Taxpayers were called on to cough up $87,994 million in the 2019 Budget, accounting for much of the $120,984m which the Treasury estimated would be collected in government revenue this financial year. In his Budget speech, Finance Minister Grant Robertson said: So, today in this first Wellbeing Budget, we are ...
The State Housing Action Network (SHAN) is deeply disappointed that the Government’s recently announced Aotearoa Homelessness Action Plan fails to provide for increases in the state housing stock which are essential for addressing the homelessness crisis. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Norris, Associate Professor, Programme Director (Composition), Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington After a week-long controversy, New Zealand’s public broadcaster Radio New Zealand (RNZ) has withdrawn a proposal to axe its classical music station RNZ Concert. But despite the ...
Serena Bentley writes on an illuminating survey in Auckland and Christchurch of the work of a daring modernist artist deserving of wider attention.Cigarette in hand, Dame Louise Henderson stares straight down the barrel of the camera. Her gaze is magnetic. So begins this exhibition, a partnership between Christchurch and Auckland ...
A secretive group excavating a cave near Huntly believe it’s filled with a race of pre-Polynesian giants’ skeletons, but iwi and archaeologists have serious concerns, reports RNZ’s Susan Strongman.Archaeologists say a group of people tunnelling into the side of a country road in search of a race of pre-Polynesian giants’ ...
Open Mike 19/09/2017 
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Claim Review... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... Story of the Week... Iceberg twice the size of Washington, D.C., breaks off Pine Island glacier in Antarctica Story Highlights: The Pine Island ...5 hours ago
Prof Philippa Howden-Chapman Housing policy is building up to be the key election issue again. In this blog I reflect on the importance of the role of the New Zealand Government in improving access to affordable housing. I look at what the Government has been doing to increase quality public housing ...7 hours ago
Writing on The Spinoff, Danyl Mclauchlan argues that we have a vacuum in our political system, in that there is no longer an anti-establishment party anymore:I think there’s a vacuum in our political system. There are obvious problems with the status quo but no real critics offering reform. It’s a ...7 hours ago
I am among the most pro-free speech people I know. I don’t doubt there are others more strident than me, but I’m certainly up there. And my support for freedom of expression isn’t limited to opposition to government-imposed restrictions. It extends to a belief that employers should have limited powers ...18 hours ago
After cross-examination Jones knew he would lose the defamation case he took against film maker Renae Maihi. That’s why he threw in the towel. The weight of evidence was clearly against the old tycoon with the defense presenting fifty articles to confirm Jones’ racist views.Being unable to harass somebody into ...3 days ago
Sprung! Former NZ First president, Lester Gray, chats with RNZ's Guyon Espiner in the carpark of a Tauranga shopping centre. (Photo supplied anonymously to NZ First and The BFD.)IT’S CLEAR THAT an important aspect of Jacinda Ardern’s political success is her willingness to seek – and take – advice. This ...3 days ago
by Philip Ferguson Last month B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, reported: “In 2019, Israeli security forces killed 133 Palestinians, including 28 minors. Of the casualties, 104 were killed in the Gaza Strip, 26 in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and three within ...5 days ago
...1 week ago
Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian has penned a column which chastises the left wing of the Labour party for daring to retain principles and ideals, qualities - it seems - that should be jettisoned in pursuit of power.Never mind that Freedland was an ardent Remainer, that is to say, one ...1 week ago
We are confronted with the spectre of Simon Bridges making clear he cannot, will not, trust Winston Peters – the oft-cited “King Maker” in New Zealand politics. Supporters are lauding it as a master stroke, naturally, because in their eyes, it prevents him being the tail that wags the dog. ...2 weeks ago
Inaccuracies are very common in scientific paper abstracts. Image credit: Science in the Abstract: Don’t Judge a Study by its Cover I have come to accept anti-fluoride campaigners will never stop cherry-picking research and findings ... 2 weeks ago
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Darroch Ball, Spokesperson for Law and Order New Zealand First welcomes the deployment of an Eagle Police helicopter in Christchurch in what is a step towards fulfilling its long-standing goal to increase the use of police helicopters for the front line, particularly in addressing the scourge of fleeing drivers. Christchurch leads ...9 hours ago
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Grant Robertson is challenging Simon Bridges to say which services a National government would scrap, in order to deliver tax cuts. ...2 hours ago
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By Joenner Paulo L. Enriquez and Ma. Alena O. Castillo in Manila Thomasian Jesuit priests Fr Albert Alejo and Fr Flaviano Villanueva have posted P10,000 (NZ$310) bail each after a judge issued a warrant of arrest in connection with their sedition case. “Nag-piyansa na kami Fr Flavie at sumama ...4 hours ago
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Taxpayers were called on to cough up $87,994 million in the 2019 Budget, accounting for much of the $120,984m which the Treasury estimated would be collected in government revenue this financial year. In his Budget speech, Finance Minister Grant Robertson said: So, today in this first Wellbeing Budget, we are ...2 days ago
Hope the high early vote turnout means high overall turnout as that’s what changes govts.
The national billboards have acquired yellow party vote overlays obscuring the warm fuzzy images in part now. When do they come down ?
‘The aviation fuel crisis caused by a ruptured pipeline has suddenly become a central issue in a tight election contest, forcing the National Government to scramble in a bid to limit impact to the travelling public and to its own vote.
With just four days to go, Opposition parties piled into National with Labour leader Jacinda Ardern claiming that the failure of the infrastructure was a failure of leadership.
The unexpected headache has the potential to undermine one of National’s longstanding claims to being better managers than Labour.
But it is also an opportunity for the Government to show it can handle a crisis competently – and a test for no-nonsense Energy Minister Judith Collins in controlling the Government response….’
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11923737
The minister for kauris response will probably be a quasi test for the leaders role.
Will she help the cause or help herself as they’re vulnerable due to the gutting of regulators, resources and rules in their adoration of ‘market knows best’.
Wonder if a scapegoat is being lined up for the ‘look how tough we are’ bs.
Winston Peters just said on Garner’s show that the damage done to the pipe was by a foreign owned organisation, operating out of the Cayman Islands and paying no tax.
Hope the media digs further on this – but with more precision that the foreign owned swamp kauri extractors.
! Glad team Winston are on the case
Well if Winston said it and with no proof to back it up then it must be true
You must hate National this campaign then.
I actually mind Labour getting back into power if HC and MC were back, house prices rose quicker under Labour than they did National so be good to make some real money
[care to explain why there are multiple pseudonyms using this IP address, especially after one of them got warned to pick a single name and stick to it? I’ll check in with Lynn to make sure I’m not missing anything here, but I can’t see any reason why you shouldn’t cop a lengthy ban. If you don’t feel comfortable discussing this in the front end, then email Lynn – weka]
moderation note above for you to read and respond to.
You are between a rock and a hard place weka with some moderation. But The Rock sounds awfully like a troll to me, or a flamer, amusing himself poking a stick in to the ant hill, pulling wings off flies etc. Have a good day weka, hope it’s not raining your way, and perhaps a nice cup of tea?
I asked him once where The Cayman Islands were. His reply, as far as could decipher it in the late night noise in the Green Parrot in Wellington, was something like.
“Listen Sunshine. I’ve been going there ever since I first went while working down a mine in Australia. I know everything about it and I’ll stop all those Chinese coming to New Zealand and buying up all our farms ………………”.
That was about when he, and I fell asleep.
Both dead drunk?
Dead drunk! How dare you Sir.
I am the last relic of the WCTU. The purest of the pure.
Depart. Get back to your dungeon before I take to you with my shillelagh.
I can’t speak for Winston though.
Ed dont get caught in the msm positioning on this. The gnats have let down a whole swathe of people and they are showing how useless they are. There is no good for them from this.
Roll on Rma reform, if they don’t get consent now and this happens, what happens when they don’t even have to bother with consent.
I’m pretty sure that the Rena stranding was as well – and they failed there. Seems that they’re maintaining the same failed policies for emergencies, a policy of simply not having anything in place to deal with it because it’s cheaper in the short term.
It might not be a good idea to mention the Rena wreck.
The Green Party are in favour of getting rid of pipelines and switching transport to coastal shipping. It probably isn’t a great thingt to remind people that there are vastly more accidents from shipping than there have been from pipelines.
[citation needed for that claim. It needs to be direct (e.g. not just a vague point at policy). You’ve got until the end of the day to produce that. I don’t know what the GP policy on this is, so maybe you can teach us something. – weka]
really? Got a source for the Greens wanting to ditch pipelines and replace them with coastal shipping?
Well here is their proposal to shift stuff by coastal shipping.
25% is the number by 2027 for shipping.
https://www.greens.org.nz/sites/default/files/policy-pdfs/SaferCleaner%20Freight.pdf
And here is an opinion about the pipeline caused damage.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1709/S00213/fuel-pipeline-debacle-puts-environment-at-risk.htm
By the way do you have a citation for your own views that I have enquired about?
You need to cut and paste the relevant bits, I’m not going to trawl links trying to figure out what you are referring to.
Don’t bother. It doesn’t say anything about fuel transport. Just another made up assertion by resident troll de jour, alwyn.
That’s what I’m guessing, but he needs to do the legwork before I moderate.
Nothing about pipes in your first link.
The second points out that we need stronger enforcement of existing laws to protect the environment.
At no point is there anything about ripping up pipelines.
And your third point: Large majorities of NZ First voters would prefer coalition deal with Labour
Sorry MSM your man got his ass kicked . And all those fake smiles you people come on you people are to easy to read yes I am defensive But like to see what you would do in my situation shit your pants and run .
Now trump he wants the United Nations to Pay america to pay for more for the dum ass war they are fighting and defense spend.
Lets look at this from my view most of the money would go to america the Americans
have all the army bases around the world and trump wants US to pay them for this what a load of crap we should give that idiot trump anything the rest of the World can see right through you the only trick trump has is bulling everyone that doesn’t agree
with his neo liberal bullshit Ideals and this idiot will fuck up the negotiations with North Korea . One needs more skills than being a bully to try and lead OUR WORLD .
The carrot works Better than the stick come on this is basic human Psychology not fucken rocket science . Or is it that trump is like all neo liberals and thinks Koreans or anyone not white is not human. It is obvious that the UN and trumps moves is not working. ALL THE PEOPLE OF THE WOURLD NEED TO BE PUTTING ALL OUR RESOURCES INTO FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE NOT DUM ASS WARS WHICH IDIOTS START trump wants us to pay for the US war machine .
It would be nice if Draco T Bastard would post that you tube video on what motivates PEOPLE. This will help get our point to these people.
Nice one eco.
I would just point out that the Americans do not, and will not, negotiate with Nth Korea, and therein lies much of the problem. This goes back to the Korean war ,which is still a huge problem ( much of which America can’t be proud of, like Vietnam).
Espiner ffs stfu
Jacinda maybe try this – so guyon you want our children to swim in shit do you?
I’d like some drug testing at rnz /sarc
She never gets Susie does she?
Guyon’s “interview” of Jacinda was appalling! He talked over the top of her and didn’t wait for the answers. It was embarrassingly bad.
I didn’t see it as being so bad. He obviously wasn’t as well-informed as he perhaps should have been on how complex some similar taxes are already. He was also pointlessly combative on certain well-publicised details (apparently) not being on the Labour website, and pressed hard for some details that would probably best be finalised once the party had gained access to the Treasury benches and the advisory machinery of government. Overall, though, he posed some serious questions, and Ardern gave some decent answers. I don’t think too many voters are going to be put off by a politician acquitting herself well in a mildly hostile interview. Quite the opposite, in fact.
Hanswurst
A nice measured critique. It sometimes is hard not to damn the interviewer. But to get anywhere they may have to probe. Otherwise it’s all the same every day.
I thought him a nasty, negative spinner. At one point Jacinda said about the water tax that they had given 2 figures in a small range. Espiner immediately interrupted, saying, “Yes, but one figure is double the other.” That makes it sound like a big increase, exactly the vagueness and unpredictability that National are trying to play upon.
I wanted Jacinda to respond: “No, one figure is half the other.” (Making it sound small, spinning it the other way, and pointing out Espiner’s bias.)
Espiner does this to left-wing victims (sorry, interviewees) far more often than he does it to right-wing ones in my experience.
Yes I have heard Espiner pick on a point that he repeats over and over as if he is seeking the answer to the site of the Holy Grail. He decides what is important and it is more like a battle to assert victory over his victim (I mean interviewee). I was trying to be less prejudiced towards him, and have caught him sometimes doing a good job and thought he was improving.
I’d hate to be involved with him and all these opinionated hacks privately, his attitude is not just a persona he adopts and it would be a case of if he gives way on anything, he would keep score for the times he kindly gave in, and demand later balance.
Any half decent broadcaster knows their best interviewer is Kim Hill who takes no shit and gets questions answered.
Espinner is a tool of the right and needs to be removed if nact get turfed, you should always let the polly speak which he seems to only allow nat pollies spinning their BS.
KIm Hill is an awful interviewer. She interrupts constantly and never lets the interviewees speak.
Rubbish, lurgee. Kim Hill interrupts sometimes, but at others she lets people hang themselves by their own petards. She also creates really good, positive, non-combative interviews.
Susie and Guyon are your constant interrupter/talkover artists with scant thought or knowledge.
Heard guyon interviewing himself while driving this morning. He is downright intolerable when he resorts to bad mannered, shouting down methods of asserting his will and trying to direct the narrative to his desired outcome. He just fixates on something and will not let it drop until he either wears his interviewee down or it becomes clear he is not going to get his own way. He is quite irrational at times. At least Jacinda holds her own. Must annoy him no end.
The building of another pipeline is not cost effective for a small country like New Zealand. The real problem is the need for rules and regulations, which today are conveniently side-stepped by many businesses, eg. those looking for swamp kauri, where the Collins clan have a vested interest. Will a robust investigation in the rupture of the pipe line occur, or will it be another so-so investigation similar to that of the Pike River Coal Mine?
What about a large fuel silo at Auckland airport as a backup? You would think our largest airport would have a contingency like that and it wouldn’t be a huge expense in the scheme of things. Who knows they might already have one but it’s not big enough to help much.
It’s why the Greens should be in Government to apply some common sense. After the Rena disaster they were calling for cleanup crews to be based at our major ports just in case something went wrong.
We took 20 years to get rid of the sewerage ponds on the Manukau Harbour, and a whole bunch of people would object to that volume of toxic material being stored on the edge of the Manukau Harbour again.
I would rather see a heavy rail line from Puhinui to the airport as a supplement feeder of jet fuel only when needed for instances like now.
To fill the A380 that flies direct to Dubai requires 5 hours pumping Jet A1 down that [damaged] 10 inch/250mm diameter pipe at 200 bar/2800psi .
The Fuel consumed/carbon footprint of our Tourism industry is enormous.
That’s insane – how close to capacity must it have been running?
That seems odd. An A380 takes up to 323 cu m, a 250mm pipeline has a cross-sectional area of 0.05 sqm. So 323 cu m in 18000 seconds means it’s flowing at about 0.35 m/s. The guideline for maximum flow velocity for kerosene, diesel etc seems to be about 3 m/s.
that’s still a solid half hour for one plane
Yep.
To take a hand-waving order of magnitude guess at the capacity question, if the airport is taking 1.1 billion litres of jet fuel per year through the pipe, and take a wild guess at another billion litres of petrol and a billion litres of diesel (aroundabout 1500 litres petrol/diesel per capita per year for Aucklanders doesn’t look too absurd), then the pipe is carrying around 350 cu m per hour 365/24, which is about half its capacity. But then there’s downtime for product changeovers and maintenance etc.
I’m not confident about that 3 m/s flow velocity, pipe flows aren’t my thing. It’s just what most engineering tips web pages spit out. But a few of them claim higher flow rates.
The outlay would be huge for a second line but so is the cost huge when the line fails.
Something else that wont be known til post election, but that is ok cos it is National.
NZ is a small vulnerable economy that is being marginalised annually, by geographic isolation, low volume trading, low wages and a narrow income base.
Further weakened by an at-risk demographic, eg on any given day up to a third of high school kids in south Auckland are absent. Just look at the High School passes of this group. Rank 30 th in the OECD. Also the crime Stats’ 50% of these folk occupy our prisons.
Gvt benefits payouts are the highest in the first world (Maori & P.I.)
Australia sees all this & is slowly closing its borders to Kiwi’s. Then this [deleted] Adern, standing for the Countries leadership, wants the Primary sector ( which is half of our international income) to pay out additional huge taxes.
Her 3-6 cents a pound for butter fat equals about $50,000 for many NZ Dairy farms. The remedy is dont vote for Labour its backward & communist. This system of Gvt has proven not to work.
[seeing as how we’re most likely heading for 3 years of Ardern as PM, I’m going to start pushing back against the inevitable casual sexism now. It’s unnecessary for the political points you want to make – weka]
[also edited for formatting so I can make sense of what is being said – weka]
Good moderation there Weka.
Hard to attract female commenters – and as Lyn notes in his post today, it’s a hard won democratic gain.
I didn’t see the sexist statements that were moderated out, but there is still a hell of a lot of casual racism left in SB’s comment. For example, “Gvt benefits payouts are the highest in the first world. ( Maori & P.I.)”, without providing any any links to support that assertion (which would be difficult as the majority of benefits paid are superannuation, and Māori tend to be a bit too dead by that age to collect much of that). Then there are; “south Auckland” & “these folk”.
But in any case, what little there is of an argument is nonsensical (in as much as it is decipherable from the imprecise grammar). The remedy to current problems is to not change what you are doing?
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/election-2017/339416/bill-english-grilled-on-wages-in-gisborne
Good points – stan the man is a sham despite his shit he needs a plan cos he’s a fuckwit gnat gland.
If the racism was cut stan would have nothing to say. Typical gnat – so thick he couldn’t fit in the toaster.
“If the racism was cut stan would have nothing to say.”
This is true. I did stumble a bit on the Labour are communists bit though. We wish.
true lol
That’ll be my new quick Gnat put-down – he/she’s a muffin ie too thick to fit in the toaster.
Thanks for pointing that out Dspare. I’ve reread the comment and agree about the casual racism. This is something useful to think about in terms off moderation, where the line is between removing content that is likely to put commenters off (or cause flame wars) vs allowing robust debate even where some of the content is gross.
I think there’s a line between personal attacks on politicians (e.g. had it been about say Turei and the personal comments had been ethnicity based rather than gender, then I would have removed those bits), and people making political arguments (e.g. their belief about ethnicity stats and what it means).
Generally the latter are left for people to argue over, and I certainly think it’s reasonable to ask people to back up claims of fact (I keep an eye out as a moderator for that). I need to have a think about that tolerance though. I draw a lot on the part of the Policy that’s about tone or language that excludes others, and am still trying to find the balance on that. Am open to feedback on this.
Please keep pointing these things out too, because it can be easy to miss especially when there is a lot going on.
I too agree with Dspare. To Stan Blanch I would say that you need to express yourself much more clearly and precisely. That last effort made me think you a semi-articulate right-wing redneck. You deserve the criticism and the moderation comments.
To Stan
Theres much to attack her with so there’s no need to make it about her looks or gender or anything like that
Attack her flip-flopping, her lack of experience, the amount of time she spends campaigning in schools, her “captains calls”, her town v country divisive tactics, her smile and wave, attack all that
But leave the personal attacks out of it we’re better than that…or we should be
Attack her for smiling?
Yeah, go on…
Smile and wave, smile and wave…reminds me of someone but I can’t remember who
Maybe HRH the Queen?
Lol. Heard english gloating the other day about how he was getting mobbed in schools and malls and excitedly said “they are coming, wanting photos. I am going to win!” ..
… Never trust the ankle biters Bill. They will turn on you at the drop of a lollipop.
Attack her flip-flopping, her lack of experience, the amount of time she spends campaigning in schools, her “captains calls”, her town v country divisive tactics,…
1) Her flip flopping? Just because voters make it clear they want to have a final say on changes to the outdated tax regime. That’s not flip flopping, that’s being sensible and heeding their concerns.
2) She’s been in parliament 9 years mate. Far longer than John Key was before becoming PM. Oh, I get it. He’s a man so he doesn’t need as long… right?
3) Lack of experience. She’s only headed a large international youth organisation… worked as an adviser and consultant in the Blair Government and she’s done other admirable things as well. She’s amply qualified for the job.
4) the amount of time she spends campaigning in schools, her “captains calls”…,. English spends equally as much time in schools and cuddling babies and animals . It represents around 20% of their campaign activity but its how the news teams like to portray them – the warm, fuzzy thing that attracts viewers.
5) her town v country divisive tactics,… You are not very insightful then. Anyone with a half a brain should be able to see who is the party creating the divisive tactics for political gain. NATIONAL.
Well said Anne. Thank you!
kia ora
Noho ora mai ra
Thanks Weka. I am SO SICK of the sexism already and she hasn’t even been elected PM yet. You don’t have to scratch too far in this country for rampant sexism and misogynism to be revealed. It disgusted me through the Helen Clark years and I can feel the same angry revulsion kicking in through this campaign.
I think it will be easy enough to knock the more blatant stuff on the head. The more subtle, Hooton-esque* stuff will be harder, but then that should be being dealt with in comments anyway (fingers crossed).
*e.g. his current line is that Ardern is incompetent, but he’s very careful to avoid any suggestion that it’s because of her gender. It’s still sexist as though.
He really must have hated almost the entire Cabinet post election 2008 with all those who had never been in cabinet before.
it is playing on sexist attitudes but Hooten is simply doing a Joyce and sowing doubt, I doubt he believes half the crap he spouts
+111
Why should agriculture get our resources for nothing?
Why should they get to pollute without consequence?
Really, your argument seems to be: Don’t vote Labour because it’s actually taking into account economics.
We havent used pounds since 1967.
” Her 3-6 cents a pound for butter fat equals about $50,000 for many NZ Dairy farms. ” Only for huge Corporate Dairy Farms but nonetheless please post your souce.
In Europe the closeness of 500gm to 1lb means that the term pound (livre in French) has actually survived. But I am not sure if that helps Stan..
No. No, I dont think it does
Oh, look, it’s a butt-hurt palagi whining bitterly about having to share this country with icky, icky, non-white people. Perish the thought that it could act upon the courage of its convictions, get off its fat lily-white arse and high-tail it back to England…
So the poor fellow might have to pay $1500 a year if the water tax is levied. Cry me a river. that’s pretty much the definition of negligible impact. It almost seems as though the only tax that some farmers would find acceptable would be one that cost nothing and that nobody had to pay.
The National Party organiser for the protest was a very poor advocate on Morning Report. Just shows how effective is English scaremongering.
“Labour wants to tax us for everything except the air we breathe.”
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=201859018
Yep that racist thick farmer is a good example of a farmer that lets us all down. Good the gnats have their shithead mates to push their dirty agenda. What a joke.
Yes, he just came across as uninformed and bigoted. Also, what was that supposed to be yesterday about a “positive message“? Was anything concrete at all said about “what farmers have done for the environment”? Certainly, all Lloyd Downing talked about in that interview was his not wanting other farmers to pay taxes real and imaginary. Not wanting to do something is negative in and of itself. It’s like they’ve thought up one PR line, “We want to make a positive statement about how awesome we are,” and one attack line, “Labour want to tax everything,” and not given a single thought to anything else.
“Lloyd Downing acknowledges farming is having an impact, but look how far we’ve come, he says. When asked for evidence, he tells the story of his old dad, back when Lloyd was a lad, taking the farm’s rubbish and chucking it in the river.
I used to shoot at the used light bulbs, he says, as they floated away! Nobody does that any more! ”
FFS
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/96918129/alison-mau-morrinsville–where-the-politics-is-getting-dirtier-than-the-worst-farm-stream
Good to see the redneck bigots falling back on McCarthyism! Time they looked ahead more than one season and started worrying about how their kids are going to survive.
Selling basic milk powder to the Chinese is economic stupidity as is intensive dairying on totally unsuitable terrain.
Their entrenched and narrow view of the changing world is very harmful for all of us.
And the Chinese are getting the hang of NZ dairy expertise at home. They at least have some idea of how to maintain their economy in their own interests.
‘The entrenched and narrow view of the changing world [by farmers] is very harmful for all of us.’ Indeed. And most of us including farmers who are over-leveraged, over any sort of precautionary controls on their overweening ambitions, will all go down together.
For those who like Tom Lehrer’s sarcasm seems to fit
The farmers will like his Pollution song as it has a go at cities, just up their street really.
Pollution
and it is followed by We will all go together when we go –
His song refers to the bomb but being hit by a collapsed economy and perhaps a hurricane will have a similar effect, and both are as possible as another strong earthquake.
notice that the article did not mention the size of his farm or his herds, no perspective in that story, $1500 is peanuts judging from what we can see in the picture/video of the size of his operation.
Informative piece from economist Peter Fraser and agricultural consultant Dr Alison Dewes.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1709/S00523/dairy-farms-using-same-amount-of-water-as-60-million-people.htm
” …. water consumption of New Zealand dairy farms is equivalent to the residential use of 60 million people.
This is on top of the often quoted figure that New Zealand’s dairy herd has the environmental footprint equivalent to 90 million people.
“The implication is if a water royalty was imposed on irrigators then over 80 percent of dairy farmers will be unaffected”
However, this message is not getting through to farmers.
“As illustrated by the farmer protest (sic) in Morrinsville, it is clear many farmers are being unduly worried by baseless scaremongering – especially as Morrinsville is hardly ‘ground zero’ for irrigated dairying.”
The truth isnt getting through… hmm Audrey Young is writing that artie right now…
Or John Roughan …
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11252504
Don’t waste your time reading the article. But the picture’s good, (and paints a thousand words…)
See below @ 9.1111
I’ve had two family members in accounting with experience with farmers accounts and both tell me that farmers don’t pay tax.
So, the only tax that farmers seem to approve of is one that they don’t pay.
You mean they don’t pay income tax? Or business tax?
Probably both as they’re already GST exempt.
If you shuffle income around the whanau up to each persons no tax threshold then max the farm expenses you can end up with a loss on the farm and everybody still gets cash to splash.
IIRC they get generous depreciation and write downs not available ouside the Ag sector unsure how the rebate picture is.
The Otago University Students Association comes out specifically for Labour:
https://www.critic.co.nz/issuu-archives/issuu/199/
They also state that it was imperative for the Green Party to be a part of government.
Which is in turn reported by the Otago Daily Times:
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/election-2017/student-magazine-endorses-labour-party
Well done Otago, Canterbury on the other hand…
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/96907663
Locals say there’s never been any digging there. Perhaps Refinery NZ hasn’t been doing its maintenance program properly and the whole pipe is at risk.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/96941407/digger-scraped-and-cut-crucial-jet-fuel-pipeline-affecting-thousands-of-auckland-airport-travellers
Well, let’s not get carried away here – the article says ‘locals’, but actually only quotes one person, who may have his own good reasons for telling porkies. A good percentage of Northland runs like a banana republic!
Here’s one local’s view…
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11923669
Hopefully this will all become clearer today!
$140k profit for waterblasting it, millions more for a couple of planks – swamp kauri seems to have drug-level markups.
Lets hope a few journos start digging! And unearth the dealer!
The Jackal just put a post if if you haven’t seen it…
http://thejackalman.blogspot.co.nz/2017/09/collins-and-swamp-kauri-petrol-crisis.html
Wow – so there is a swamp kauri business 2kms away that has connections to Oravida !!! Can one smell some very large rats here?
Yes.
This one I believe…
https://opencorporates.com/companies/nz/3518811
See also:
Although correlation does not imply causation… !
Looks like theres’ a good journo digging…
Something an adequately resourced regulator should be able to prove by referring to their latest compliance audit.
There’s nact cue to show NZild what a fantastic job of managing the economy they’ve been doing….don’t hold your breath.
A pipe hit by a digger is going to show physical damage. I’m going to assume that they found that damage first (when they found the leak) and looked to the history of the area.
Yup and the digger tracks and bucket marks around it will be a smoking gun.
To MSM lets not create a divide between TOWN and COUNTRY we are all on this WAKA
called EARTH together. So when it starts sinking no one is going to think about that divide YOU are letting national impose on US there neo liberal bullshit ideals it is so primeval .
There are some todd mclay sign wavers in Rotorua they are not getting any support .
Because we all Know who his father is and what he got up to and that Trade Deal is bullshit if all agriculture is not included in it Europe dosen’t need our FOOD.
+1
Lots of idiots in the town and country.
Well said Eco 😀
All of us wanting/needing clean water and less pollution so we can keep the planet alive is not divisive, it’s inclusive, survival of the planet and all the inhabitants depends on it.
Nat and media driven town v’s country division does nothing to solve any problem
Sharing ideas will help so much with solutions, that’s why I’m so very supportive of the water forum, because it brings all sectors etc together to find solutions which will unite NZ to improve life for all.
Why has the neo liberal Rotorua Lakes Council got no NITROGEN OR EFFLUENT mitigation plans in place Why have they got Lakes in there name and they are sitting on there assess and not even trying to fix that problem .
national have cut our science funding and this is one of the main tools we have to fight Climate Change and create a beautiful future for OUR grandchildren so fucken DUM.
If Jacinda and Labour really wanted to put the boot into dairy farmers in particular they would point out that in a report last year, I think, (sorry too busy or incompetent to find the reference ) that dairy farmers are tax negative by a long way.
On that note I would like to see in a new tax regime the inability of the buyer of a business to acquire simply for the tax losses associated with the target company.
When it’s sold the losses are wiped not credited to arseholes.
Seems like the herald are putting fuel shortage scares out .Nothing like a good panic buying splurge about NOW.
#fillupforchange
He he Mutton, Lets do this now—-fill up all.
It’s good for the economy… didn’t you know?
Chris Trotter sums up the Morrinsville farmer furore nicely:
“When Andrew McGiven and Lloyd Downing encouraged their rural brethren gather under Morrinsville’s giant cow yesterday, they were simply adding another chapter to an already very long story of rural antagonism towards the needs and aspirations of New Zealand’s urban majority. The latter looked on, appalled, at the selfishness and ignorance which unfailingly follow the country into town.”
I heard the farmer on the rnz. The one speaking was just an ignorant racist thick wanker exactly the sort of farmer that should not be in farming imo.
The problem with that framing is that if we want to uplift the needs and aspirations of the majority then we will end up with Auckland running the place. There are distinct problems with most NZers living in cities, and one of them is that their ideas about nature are often once removed. People in cities also tend to see city life as normal and to then normalise that outwards. Hence the idea that part of the solution to the Auckland housing crisis is to send a whole bunch of people to the provinces, presumably to turn them into mini Aucklands. I’m appalled 😉
Besides, this country living person looked on appalled at the protest as well. No need to create a false divide.
The Feds and National have created the divide, imo. They couldn’t see that the optics would be so bad, because they’re in a bubble (methane mainly). I don’t hold with the idea that city-folk are more divorced from the real world than country people; in the country, the wild world is being actively suppressed and most farming action are aimed at suppressing the return of a natural environment. In the city, it’s largely over but city folk aren’t personally, in the main, poisoning stuff, burning stuff, chainsawing down stuff, as many in the farming community are.
true, but I think that’s lack of opportunity as much as anything. Otherwise we’d have had a Green-led govt by now. Look at the kaupapa of poisoning as part of conservation. Those are values held as much by city folk as anyone else. And the need to develop and improve things all the time to the detriment of the environment is a town as well as country value.
It’s not that I think city people are more divorced from the real world, it’s that I think the less time you spend in nature the more your thinking about and experience of it changes. That’s a generalisation, there are still many people in cities that give a shit about nature. But they tend to visit nature rather than seeing themselves as part of it. That’s a problem. Living in the country and seeing nature as something to be tamed is also a problem. Different problems, both need acknowledging and responding to.
weka in my experience of ten years dairyfaming I did not witness any farmers seeing their land as part of nature. They saw their land as a means of converting grass into milk and to hell with everything else.
I must confess that was also our aim when sharemilking.
We were told in the eighties of strict impending environmental laws and 3 year time frame was given. What did the industry do? sfa.
Fonterra will be telling Lloyd Downing to shut up! All that money they spent on PR – they’ll have to bring back Richie McCaw.
LOL
They can’t, garibaldi. Their cultural framing makes wildness invisible to them. They can though, just sense something threatening “over there”, but that can be Rounded-Up, no worries, mate.
If asked i think many city folk would love this idea. People living in cities with nature everywhere else, where the majority of the world would be a conservation estate – one that wouldn’t need looking after much but would be easy to visit.
Agree @ false divide
Whether or not my uncle and his siblings were loaded onto a cattle wagon and transported to Siberia or they were on the very first TikiTour to Siberia is the subject of scientific debate, too. Pricks.
//
I guess the unpublished part of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, in which Germany and the USSR agreed to divide Poland up between them, must have been an invention of “the authors of biased historical narratives.”
Z Energy reporting that petrol stations are beginning to run out:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11923771
“Four Auckland service stations ran out of 95 octane petrol yesterday – and more could run out today – as thousands of air passengers again face a day of cancelled flights.
Z Energy said it would be able to replenish the fuel today and told motorists there was no cause for concern.
Z’s corporate communications manager, Jonathan Hill, said in the first days after a pipeline from the Marsden Point Refinery ruptured, the company concentrated on delivering 91 octane petrol and diesel to Auckland.”
There is no cause for concern … except banner media headlines that freak voters out four days out from polling day.
Um, are there likely to be people without petrol on Saturday?
My thoughts exactly. That would be a deep, dark ploy indeed. Unlikely, but grist to the paranoid-rumour mill 🙂
Well. The locals do say there’s been no activity at the rupture site since it was built in 1981 and you’d think they would notice a digger pulling up Kauri, so…yeah.
Actually, I wouldn’t expect anything like that. Personal observations are notoriously inaccurate.
No one is saying that yet.
TVNZ hasn’t really picked up on this story, but I can see it building all week.
I haven’t followed this side of it, but where I live it’s normal to have petrol supplied via tanker rather than a pipe. Is there some reason that isn’t happening enough? Is it simple physics (not enough tankers/time to meet demand)? Or am I missing something?
Auckland Airport say they supply 1.1 billion litres of jet fuel per year. That’s around 40,000 truckloads. That same pipe also delivers petrol and diesel to the Auckland region so local stations get supplied by truck from Wiri instead trucking it from Tauranga or Whangarei. At a guess that’s probably another couple billion litres of fuel down that pipe.
(that’s also around 1/270 of the world consumption of jet fuel at Auckland and NZ is 1/1600 of the world population)
Great stat there. We and the people who come here are massive users of aviation gas.
that is a great stat.
Did you see that Bill?
The volume of fuel for auckland is somewhat high. It is about a third of the countries populaton. Similarly it is about 70% of the airplane fuel usage. It is also where most of the goods dispatched to the rest of nz come from. Auckland probably accounts for more than 40% of all fuelups.
The terrain between the refinery up north and auckland is difficult. They used to use coastal ships but it is likely that the unloading facility has been killed along with the tank farm at the harbour.
Truck tankers would fill an already full road and be pretty dangerous on some of the sharp corners in hill roads. Not to mention that we probably don’t have enough tanker trucks unless we use some milk tankers.
ok, so given that, why aren’t they rationing already?
The State Services Commission has just put out a note to every single government Department that all flights by the public service into or out of Auckland are stopped until further notice.
Now leads front page of NZHerald:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11923945
Corin Dann will pick it up on TVNZ news tonight.
It’s definitely not Business As Usual any more.
I still haven’t had time to catch up properly, but it does seem very odd that people in general aren’t being advised to use less over the coming few weeks.
Would it be true that the rest of country is ok in terms of supply and supply chain?
Stay Calm and keep voting early!
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/96983542/four-z-energy-stations-have-no-95-after-company-focuses-on-regular-and-diesel
Folks in Northland , Bay of Plenty & Waikato need to be aware that the primary focus of :
Ensuring the critical reduced volumes of Jet Fuel are delivered by Truck to Auckland
Ensuring that Diesel and 91 Octane petrol supply to Auckland is maintained
will result in negligible tanker deliveries in those regions.
Safe Gnat seats will get the least.
It’s unfortunate that the Pipeline outage occurred , even more unfortunate , IMO , that it didn’t occur a week earlier.
Might be good to figure out how to use less petrol over the next week or so too.
Wrong login. This pro-National post should have been under the light blue avatar.
[leave it alone please. Ad is an author, and anyone can comment from different devices and/or internet connections and end up with a different avatar. – weka]
If you are having problems with the symbols for comments take it up with the site editor.
He’s busy. It’s not the symbols I’m interested in anyway, it’s the wild swings in the content of your posts.
see moderation note above please.
No, we’ll take it up with you. You know that the avatar is created by Gravata via an algorithm shaped by the email address. Therefore the problem is you changing the email address.
Pick one and stick with it.
I only have one email address. So suck it up.
If you are that bothered by the colour and shape of a little magic square, take it up with the site manager.
But you must have changed/misspelled it on one of your devices so that it changes the avatar when you post on it. The one with the misspelling needs correcting.
Either that or post on your login account.
The email login is automatic on my devices.
So, no.
I know that you can deal with different swirly shapes.
For instance, this.
And this.
There are approximately zero cars in New Zealand that need 95 octane petrol and won’t run perfectly happily on 91.
A large number of stations in Auckland don’t seem to have 95 anyway. Whenever I visit Auckland I seem to stop at stations that stock 91 and 98 instead.
I guess it is all the Ferraris and Porsches that seem to exist there.
91 and diesel supplies look like they will be fine for a while.
There will only be noticeable political impact if that changes by polling day.
Corin Dann will cover it on TVNZ news tonight – but it’s not yet a vote-turner.
Whenever one of my rellies mistakenly fills my Daihatsu Sirion 1.3 with 91, there’s nearly continual light knocking and fuel consumption noticeably increases.
Z don’t seem to try to foist overpriced 98 onto their customers, around here they all sell 95. Last time I checked into it, the 98 being sold had a lot of ethanol, so the energy content is low and fuel consumption would probably increase. So I avoid Gull, Mobil and BP.
My car can take 91 but doesn’t accelerate or tackle steep hills well unless its on 95. It’s a safety issue (accelerate out of danger).
And my car is more economical on 95.
“There are approximately zero cars in New Zealand that need 95 octane petrol and won’t run perfectly happily on 91.”
citation – coz Im calling bullshit.
There are plenty of cars that are recommended to run on 95+ and they are not all ferraris etc.
Anyone who thinks policy analysis is the basis determining votes need only to listen to this interview to understand the base level at which the electorate determines what direction this country takes
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/201859018/farm-protest-organiser-rural-economist-debate-water-tax
It would also be pertinent to remind ourselves the history and origins of the National Party and we may then have a realistic expectation of the level of public discourse around rural issues
https://nzhistory.govt.nz/page/nz-national-party-founded
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_Reform_Party
That interview was full of whining entitlement, the like of which you only ever hear from a certain sector of the farming community. Well done Peter Fraser for his rebuttal. Chris Trotter has a good post on the long history of farmer activism on his blog.
The Blenheim chapter of the National
FrontParty sound like lovely blokes.http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/election/2017/09/labour-candidate-s-dramatic-gatecrashing-of-english-s-campaign.html
Thanks Muttonbird. Janette must be pretty brave to bowl into the middle of a motley Nat mob. Bill English ran pretty quickly.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/election/2017/09/labour-candidate-s-dramatic-gatecrashing-of-english-s-campaign.html
Wouldn’t it have been a “run walk”
Has anyone else seen the full-page ad in today’s DomPost from the totally non-partisan (sarc) Taxpayers’ Union that claims that spending by a Labour/Greens/NZF government will cost every NZ household $229.41 per week over the next three years?
National/ACT at $22.05/week looks like a real bargain.
Yes Grey Try
/the-man-who-will-do-anything-for-power/#comment-1387029 from 4 onwards.
Thanks. Busy so I couldn’t cover every thread.
If you are on a desktop, have a look at the replies tab on the right.
2008 exclusive bretheren replaced by 2017 inbred nevermen.
Unverified I assume? What happens when thd Taxpayers Union wastes the money of Taxpayer Union members.
Kia Kaha Jacinda Ardern. Tough, tough time to lose a grandmother.
If there is poetic justice in this, it’s on Suffrage Day: 124 years after NZ led the world in granting women the vote. We are on the eve of electing a female Prime Minister for the second time….a time to remember we stand on the shoulder of giants and giantesses.
Not the wife of the grandfather discharged at midnight?
Not sure. Quite possibly. She died in Hamilton hospital (from Herald report).
The official graph has been updated for yesterday’s voting:
http://www.elections.org.nz/events/2017-general-election/advance-voting-statistics
They haven’t given the actual number, but it’s well over 100,000. That’s massive!!
551482. As of 2pm today
Mobilised early to save the government or change it? What seems more plausible?
I’m betting change.
Woo hoo!
What a frigging shambles.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/97009580/air-new-zealand-refueling-long-haul-planes-in-wellington-as-auckland-jet-fuel-crisis-deepens
A good reason to vote Labour
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/97012680/labour-promises-to-boost-teina-poras-compensation-if-elected
Surely a police investigation should be launched to bring the person/s who caused the damage to the pipeline to account.
Not holding my breath.
Muttonbird, I wouldn’t mind betting the surviving relations of the 900 sheep flown to Saudi Arabia are behind the damage to the pipeline.
New poll just came across my desk……..Cant agree with the economy bit as when nats came in
labour had virtually no crown debt @ $8 billion
National crown debt now stands @ $96 billion.
https://horizonpoll.co.nz/page/479/labour-best?gtid=3031264578076XWC
Labour best to manage most issues, but not the economy overall
19 Sep 17
Always amazes me that people still think that National are telling the truth when they say that they manage the economy better. Decades of their mismanagement proves otherwise.
+ 1 Exactly – I too wish their record was scrutinised in more detail – they seem to just get a free ride on that
Exactly. For a start our hospitals are in crisis like no time I can recall.
Hoots the spin merchant is twittering on about latest UMR polls show Labour vote fading. Anything in this?
Children being hospitalized due to malnutrition rockets….yes in NZ
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11923626
Could be msm isn’t pursuing the company which damaged the fuel pipeline at Ruakaka, while harvesting swamp kauri, because it might cause some embarrassment to Natz. If any issue needs some investigative journalism, this one certainly does! But to date, nothing at all!
NZ is definitely not being served by a free and open media, acting as a proxy for the people. Disgraceful!
Patrick Gower calls out Nats spreading false information about Labour’s income tax policy.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/opinion/2017/09/patrick-gower-national-guilty-of-biggest-campaign-lie.html
Well for once in his career he has done the right thing – and about time – who would have believed it. Paddy has seen through their lies and corruption – am still shaking my head over it.
Now we no that the only thing that trump raised was a pile of cash and no mater how much shit that gets poured on money one can wash money clean.
My point is if he raised his children he would know that when you don’t give a child a healthy balanced diet they will get sick and in my view all living things are basically chemical factories and we have to make sure that the stock or vegetation and trees every living organism gets the right balanced diet to much of one chemical and the shit hits the fan.
OUR EARTH IS A LIVING ENTITY AND WE ARE PUT TO MUCH CARBON DIOXIDE INTO OUR LIVING MOTHER AND THE SHIT IS HITTING THE FAN THIS IS A FACT.
So I say fuck Dum ass Wars or money spent on war everyone on our EARTH has to work together to Heal OUR MOTHER EARTH OR WE ARE FUCKED Ka Pai.
Why not concentrate on our country. Trump is just part of the USA that looms and overshadows us all and makes our lives seem insignificant. Like a Hollywood sit com with big dark patches. NZ IS IMPORTANT. And we people here are important and our life here is important. We want to have one, and when we get it we want it to be better than just able to feed and house ourselves, just!
We have to watch the others but keep our eyes on us, and if we don’t no-one else will care. We need to care for all of us in our country 80% and 20% have kindness and interest in the rest of the world.
Trumpet can doodle out his own song in his own time, not take all of our time.