Some time back I gave a tip about the price National were selling off the state houses in Tauranga for. It wasn’t an opinion or gossip, it was stated in black and white in Housing NZs annual report which was released in November last year. I can’t have been the only person to have noticed it and yet I’ve heard nothing from the media or any politlcal party about it. What’s going on, do the opposition parties think it so trivial they won’t even make a noise over it?
For those who don’t know. The 1140 Tauranga state houses being sold were independently valued at $364 million as of March 2016. Housing NZ (appear to have) been instructed by Treasury to write down the value of those houses in preparation for their sale. HNZ accordingly wrote off $224 million and earmarked the houses to be sold for around $137 million. That’s an average sale price of $120,000 in a market that today doesn’t have a single house for sale under $320,000.
Since that revaluation the value of houses in Tauranga has gone up another 10-20% so it’s even worse than it looks. The actual sale price is still being kept under wraps but the HNZ report should have been enough to trigger strong protests.
Now the issue here is not the sale of state assets, it is the gifting of state assets. Governments might claim a mandate to sell assets but none can claim a mandate to give them away to private interests like they’re doing with the Tauranga deal and plan to do with the sale of 2500 more state houses in ChCh
I feel pretty aggrieved about the lack of action on this because I’m 100% convinced that the opposition could have halted this asset sale if they’d actively and strongly opposed the huge discounting. It’s no good complaining after the deal is done, National can’t back out of the contract when the ink is dry.
So what can we expect from the opposition on this ongoing state house looting? Do they really care?
+1 DH -The blame is 100% National, ACT, United Future and The Maori Party for being in coalition with each other and destroying our assets in particular State houses while selling them cheap to cronies.
However I also agree that the opposition has been very weak on this. I hear more about Flags, insulation and property prices than actually real action on our assets being stollen from Kiwi’s AND the eviction of the most vulnerable due to this in a time where housing seems to be coming out of politicians mouths daily.
This seems to be some sort of strategy to have so many disgusting issues going on from the Natz that the opposition gets stretched and weakened on their opposition and there are the trivial distractions like weddings and trite racism/sexism scenarios being played out for weeks on the MSM and non MSM sites….
And the charities (who are already compromised by needing funding from the government) that got side tracked/tricked (who knows) into a ‘market driven’ approach to housing with the unitary plan and spent valuable air time on supporting that approach aka unitary plan, a market driven approach, than the State houses being sold and tenants being evicted right under their noses.
That’s how the Natz are still in power, by burying the real issues and turning groups that should be fighting against them, to fight against themselves and against the voters or be championing Natz vision of solving housing issues in NZ.
I think it is part of a larger picture of what is going wrong with the opposition and their messaging…. surely it would be a win win scenario to champion NOT privatising government assets, while pointing out that National is destroying State housing for the vulnerable while Natz are pretending a housing crisis doesn’t exist or they have a market solution.
Pretty easy message for the opposition, Don’t privatise our State Houses!!! I would say that at least 75% of Kiwis would support that.
But as soon as they get into weakly supporting Natz unitary plan they probably start haemorrhaging support down to 30% who think that is the way to go…. somehow turning a golden opportunity to catch out the government and be popular with Kiwi voters….Somehow they miss it and then turn their housing attentions into a complicated web of supporting unproven market driven Natz speak with unitary plan scenarios…
In addition unitary plan was a regional solution, again turning non Aucklanders off (as well as Aucklanders who did not agree with them). But selling State houses is happening all over NZ so it was always an issue that was important across NZ.
Who advises Labour and Greens… they are not doing a good job….. or is it the politicians themselves getting distracted… who knows…
Let’s be fair about this.
10:19 AM Wednesday Apr 27, 2016
“Public meeting to address Tauranga’s housing crisis
Four senior Labour MPs will be in Tauranga today to address the city’s housing crisis.
Housing spokesman Phil Twyford, plus David Parker, Nanaia Mahuta and Rino Tirikatene are holding a public meeting at the Wesley Centre on 13th Ave at 11am.
None of those links are addressing the substance of my post Tautoko Mangō Mata, which is the massive discount on the price of the houses.
The NBR article of August 2016 had this;
“On Friday, it was announced that Accessible Properties — which outbid two other companies — would buy 1124 state houses in Tauranga. Neither Accessible Properties nor Housing NZ would put a dollar value on the deal.”
Well in November 2016 Housing NZ did put a dollar value on the deal, which revealed a mammoth 62% discount, a “buy one house and we’ll give you two for free” deal, and I haven’t heard a peep out of anyone over it.
I’ve commented about Accessible Properties, Idea Services and IHC before.
I’d strongly recommend interested folk to spend a few hours searching the MSM reports involving this organisation and it’s ”officers”. The Charities Commission is a good start. And the companies register. Because there’s no law that says you can’t be involved in “charitable” housing development AND do private property development too. Is there?
And it seems that certain folk individuals are, kind of, above reproach…in fact get rewarded with plum positions even when they have already stuffed up.
DH…you are on the money (pun intended) on this. The whole deal stinks link a dead possum in the sun.
Disability Funding…there’s GOLD in them there ‘ills.
That was darned hard to read Graeme, but I think I got the gist of it.
It’s hard to see what kind of public benefit Accessible Properties will actually be providing. The deal with social housing is they charge full market rents and the Government pays part of that rent, the amount determined by the needs of the tenant. I’d think it the Govt providing the public benefit there, not the landlord.
Sorry about that DH, but it’s the only thing I could find that actually explained why the Trust lost it’s charitable status, all the press reports just said the Charities Act needed amendment (which is probably right)
That judgement will be having a chilling effect on any entity wanting to get involved in social housing ownership and development in desirable and expensive areas. This may go some way to explaining the difference between the pre sale valuations, which may have been a crock of shit depending on the basis of the valuation, and the offers received.
The Queenstown Trust is a bit different with it’s shared ownership model, but there are very valid reasons for that in a Queenstown context. The objective was to provide security for the grantees so living in Queenstown would be sustainable and reduce our horrendous turnover of mid / lower level workers.
The objective definition of poverty and associated charitable requirements conflicts with the subjective nature of un-affordability and depravation. The way I see it, if an entity wants to do social housing in Tauranga, under a charitable status, the housing would have to be in in the cheapest possible place, say Kawarau
That has nothing to do with the pre-sale valuations or the sale price Graeme.
The sale price was all about the fact that no charity has the cash to buy the state houses. They have to borrow the money and the interest cost on 100% borrowed money is about 2.5x the nett yield from rents on a newly purchased investment property. To make it immediately financially viable the charity either needs cash reserves of its own or it needs a (roughly) 60% discount on the price.
The problem for National is that a 60% discount completely rebuts every possible argument advanced for selling the houses.
Housing NZ housing portfolio in 2015 market value $20,900 million.
Housing NZ rental income for 2015/2016 year $1,076 million. That’s a gross yield from rents of 5.15%
Expenses for Housing NZ were;
Repairs and maintenance $289 million
Rates on properties $115 million
Water rates $34 million
Personnel costs $94 million
Other expenses $113 million
Total expenses $645 million which leaves a nett rental income of $431 million, a rental yield of 2.06%. Housing NZ charges market rents and the social housing providers will also charge market rents and have similar expenses to Housing NZ.
Interest on a loan to buy the housing portfolio would be 5.5-6%, meaning the deal can’t fly unless the price is discounted by a good 60% OR the buyer has substantial cash reserves to tide them over until inflation-driven rent increases improves the cash flow. The would-be buyers don’t have any spare cash.
The issue there as I read it is that the Queenstown charity was selling the houses and the court was not convinced of that as a charitable purpose.
Investing in private development to raise cash for charitable purposes is a different proposition since the purpose is not the property development, it’s to raise money.
More generally, Social housing would fall under relief of poverty, which is one of the charitable purposes in the Statute of Elizabeth. Building houses to rent them very cheaply to the impoverished would count, for example.
It might be more successful if Labour were to package up all the state houses being sold off as an issue they are fighting and publicise it on social media, MSM and non MSM media, rather than do it regionally…. better still work with the Greens and NZ First on it as a joint policy that you all agree on…
Make it the first thing, crystal clear, and point of difference between Labour and National housing policy!
I dunno. They were fighting the good fight but until now they were a bit toothless, there really isn’t much the opposition can do to stop asset sales as such. But this isn’t about just asset sales, it’s about selling assets for only a small fraction of their worth and that does give the opposition some teeth.
What people don’t seem to be grasping is that the Tauranga deal can’t proceed without the massive discount. It may not be possible to stop National selling assets but it should be possible to prevent them giving assets away for nothing. Stopping the discount should therefore logically stop the sale of the state houses. But now it may be too late because the deal has recently been signed and takes effect in April.
I disagree, the opposition could stop asset sales by jointly opposing them and doing a big advertising campaign about what the Natz are up to. The Natz are very concerned with focus groups and the like and they are already close to the wind on the Sky City deal that 95% of people opposed.
The opposition are not really banging home on the real issues that MOST members of the public are opposed to.
If Labour, NZ First and Greens are really serious about working together to form a new government and get the Natz out, that is a way to prove they can work together on point issues such as saving state housing state assets, even if they don’t agree on other issues.
Much debate on the Daily Blog at the moment on the Mt Albert by election.
Yet hardly any here.
Are people on this site as concerned as Chris Trotter and Martin Bradbury about the potential for damage caused by the Mt Albert by election?
Or do you agree with Keith Locke?
Or do you have a different opinion?
Our focus should be on changing the government in 2017 to a government that offers a real alternative to neo-liberalism.
33 years since the Douglas coup d’etat .
33 years since the working class in New Zealand were represented.
Time for that to change.
Bradbury has been attacking the Greens for a year or so. Trotter often attacks Labour. They’ve been stirring up opposition re-the by-election.
My impression here is that people are not so upset about the Greens standing along side Ardern.
Myself, as I work for Auckland Council, there are policies about workers public endorsing a political party in elections. So I don’t say a lot about elections, especially with Auckland elections..
I think Bradbury is right, the Greens should not be contesting the by Election. I was a bit on the fence at first, but if the big picture is to get votes in the General Election and present Labour and Greens as working together, then fighting it out in a by-election where anything other than a Labour victory would help National the most is another type of repeat of Te Tai Tokerau… a hollow victory.
Natz are not smart people, but their advisors are….
“What happens if Bill English tells National Party voters that they could damage Labour’s election chances if Jacinda lost and they vote for Julie Anne Genter instead?”
“What if he was more subtle and says, ‘National could work with the Greens, you should vote for Julie Anne Genter”.”
This could be a highly amusing election, which candidate is going to court the National voters 🙂
That could possibly be the most brilliant thing that could ever happen in NZ politics
To give you an idea of how good that idea is I would chose that option over John Key not retiring from politics
This is a thing, I’m going to email Bill Englishs office to help make this a reality…nope on second thought I’m going to take this higher, I’m going to my paymasters (the ones who really run this planet) and see if I can’t ask a favour from them
Paymasters don’t deign to grant favours, Pucky! Just continue doing as you are told.
*Still hurting from being abandoned by Key, I see. That burn will last a lifetime; how could he have done that to us??? The question of why Key jumped ship is going to provide entertainment for us for a long to to come.
After a (much deserved) Christmas break and through deliberation the only reasonable conclusion is that Sir John Key thrives on a challenge and because there was no challenge he couldn’t muster up the enthusiasm to run another campaign
I heard yellow belly Key ran away because polls were showing that woman in particular were seeing him in his true colors …. that is a cheating, greedy, liar with a creepy hair fetish …..
Places where he has previously worked have a history of going bankrupt or facing some kind of speculative crisis not long after he has left ..
Lets hope his wrecker ball ways are confined to the National party and not NZ …..
…………………..
Personally I think he has a obvious drinking problem…. with a bar in his office, slurred words, liquid lunches, pissed in Parliament and getting to drunk to hammer a nail into soft pine …..or understand simple questions ….
He’s a belligerent snarky sneaky drinker as well….Tory to the core
Merrill Lynch was known as a piss-heads paradise…. in between all the cheating and derivatives scamming they did on their way to going bankrupt … …. with their company called the ‘blundering herd’.
But Bill English will put on the boxing gloves again for Puckish … although he punches like ruth richardson
Had another senior Grey Power member call me and offer support regarding the need for transparency in spending of public monies on private sector consultants and contractors.
You may be surprised just how widespread the appeal is for such transparency?
Bradbury loves to think up cunning plans that aren’t really feasible. It’s one thing for National to ask its supporters to vote for whatsisname who looks like Rimmer or Peter Dunne, it’s quite another to ask them to vote for someone as obviously antipathetic to their interests as Julie-Ann Genter. It would be like Labour asking its supporters to tactical-vote for their local ACT candidate. If National did look at it, they’d probably conclude that most of their supporters in the electorate would file the request under “You must be fucking joking pal” and that the cynicism involved would be so blatant the media would certainly cover it.
I am pretty sure you are right on this. While these sorts of games might be beloved by political theorists, in the real world people are not so malleable.
As you note, it is one thing to encourage supporters to vote for someone they know to be aligned with their own party for the specific purpose of gaining the Treasury benches. But they would balk at this. It goes against their basic political beliefs.
In fact it would be hugely damaging for National to give this sort of direction, not just among supporters, but more generally. It would effectively be holding our democratic system in contempt. Most people expect political parties to be true to themselves, not play games of this order.
So I am pretty sure the next MP for Mt Albert will be Jacinda Arden. The only way she won’t be is if National voters spontaneously decide otherwise. They might do so, but it is pretty unlikely. Most people are just not that engaged with politics.
Interesting comment. Mt Albert has thousands of Nat voters and most will turn out and vote. Who will they vote for? Will they plump for the Labour candidate or will they choose to give Labour a bloody nose and elect Genter?
It is why it is so hard to win back seats at the next election that have gone to third parties. Many voters will not immediately reverse their votes, since they don’t like to admit they made a mistake.
errr …. why would the good people of Mt Albert vote for their MP someone who is already an MP?
Both Jacinda Adern and Julie-Anne Genter are already MPs.
How about a really decisive protest vote against the rorts, ripoffs and corruption, which have helped transform New Zealand into a corrupt, polluted tax haven, and vote into the House the proven anti-corruption (and anti-privatisation) campaigner, who has ‘blown the whistle till her eyeballs bled’ (as it were), persistently and consistently against corruption for the last TEN years?
I’m not an MP (yet).
But what better way to help make a fuss about corruption than to vote Independent candidate Penny Bright MP for Mt Albert?
I’m not a member of ANY political party.
I’ll ‘hit the ground running’.
No sitting in the House quietly ‘breathing in through my nose’.
Having made an initial (and somewhat grumpy) comment on the matter here in late December ( /open-mike-27122016/#comment-1280032 ) , I’ve been working on a post for my Blog entitled Mt Albert Mousetrap. I just knew that if I left it too long someone else would have similar thoughts … and they have … Brads and Trots anticipating most (but not quite all) of my argument.
Bugger, Bugger Bugger !!!
As I already wrote in my draft … “In trying to win a relatively trivial battle for their own Party, the Greens are in danger of losing the entire War for the Left.”
On the one hand, I think – with no candidate – a disproportionate number of Mt Albert Nats will stay home on By-Election day. But I suspect that at least a reasonable minority of the maybe 30-35% of Tories who do get out and vote will be the kind of Party loyalists who are more than prepared to hold their noses and do what’s best for the Nats (vote Genter to embarrass Labour and sew division on the Left). Not necessarily a majority of Nat voters (I agree that for many it will just go too much against the grain) but quite possibly a large minority.
But perhaps even more importantly – and I don’t think Brads or Trots entirely got to the heart of this (they certainly haven’t spelt it out in any way) – an overwhelming 73% of Green Party-Voters backed Shearer in the Candidate-Vote at the last Election. That was way ahead of the average Labour MP – in the Country as a whole, just 47% of Greens Candidate-Voted Labour.
Indeed, Shearer was one of those rare Labour MPs whose Candidate-Vote was derived, first and foremost (ie more than half), from non-Labour voters.
So, in a one-vote By-Election, where voters can’t enjoy the (General Election) luxury of being able to separate out their core political allegiance (as expressed in the Party-Vote) from their favoured personality (Candidate-Vote), it’s reasonable to assume that a significant chunk of that 73% of Greens (5810 voters to be precise) are going to reaffirm their primary political allegiance and chose Genter. All the more so when there is no National candidate to scare them into strategically voting Ardern.
It’s important to avoid being too alarmist, though. I doubt that Ardern is any great danger of actually losing the seat …
… But – with a potential majority of 2014 Green-Shearer voters combining forces with a potential large minority of Nats – it’s quite possible Genter will slash Labour’s majority. And in a seat that Farrar has already loudly proclaimed one of “Labour’s” safest (in fact, it’s a Shearer stronghold, not a Labour one. Labour received just 29% f the Party-Vote at the last Election).
So you can imagine the headlines in a media where senior journalists are often subtlely influenced (to put it generously) by Farrar et al.
I’ve got a few other points to make … so may still do the post … but it’s a real bugger when someone (in fact 2 geezers) beats you to it, especially after I’d done quite a bit of work on it.
Yeah, but with no National candidate, most Greens will assume there is no need to vote tactically. For them, it’s between Ardern and their own candidate … so they’ll assume it’s a win-win situation and hence why not vote Genter. And the Greens will presumably be going all out to win. I don’t think we can rely on ordinary Green voters in Mt Albert getting the message that a slashed Labour majority will generate enormous hostility within the Left and dire headlines in the media.
Greens have certainly strategically voted for the Labour candidate in other recent By Elections (ie those where a Green candidate also stood). But we now find ourselves in a unique situation where there is no National candidate to scare them in Labour’s direction.
I’m sure plenty of Greens will, indeed, vote Ardern … but I doubt it’ll be anything like the 73% who chose Shearer at the (two-vote) General Election.
* 75 more ‘hot days’ a year
* Up to 3.3C hotter in summer
* Double the time spent in drought
* Increased flood risk
* Coastal erosion
* Risk of salmonella, dengue fever, Ross River virus
* Increased biosecurity threat from invasive pests
* Uneconomic crops, kiwifruit (by 2050)
From the local store and the who owns the store could have exploited the situation by putting up the price of bottled water…he didn’t, he’s selling it at cost.
No offence but I really don’t think that Jacinda is the closest we have to a political celebrity…. nor do I think true right wingers will vote for her…
Swimmable rivers and lakes, sustainable farming. TOP’s default goal is for swimmable rivers, unless local communities decide otherwise. We want intensification of land use to cease unless the impacts can be offset. TOP will invest in monitoring, research, improving water quality and resolving Treaty claims. This will be paid for by a levy on commercial water users and polluters, paid into regional Nature Investment Funds (NIFs).
Protect and restore our oceans. TOP will use spatial planning to ensure all ocean users have fair access to the resources in our Exclusive Economic Zone. This would also ensure that at least 10% of all ecosystems is set aside as no-take reserves, with compensation for existing users where appropriate. This process would be funded by a resource rental on all commercial ocean resource users.
Enhancing our natural assets. TOP will impose a $20 levy on all tourists entering the country. This revenue will be used to improve local infrastructure and placed in an independently managed fund that can be invested with partners to get the best biodiversity return (which may include the Regional Council NIFs).
Resource Management – Less paperwork, more protection. TOP will ensure that development which delivers no net loss of natural capital can proceed in a timely fashion. Any use of biodiversity offsets will be quality assured. RMA fines will be directed to restoring the damage caused by the breach.
”TOP is promoting tradeable pollution rights, similar to the Emissions Trading Scheme, when there’s little evidence that allowing polluters to trade the right to pollute will improve water quality and a high risk that tradeable pollution rights will make water and land use management more complicated. The Emissions Trading Scheme has greenhouse emissions trending up when we want them going down, so we hardly want its equivalent to prevent nitrates, sediment and other contaminants going into our rivers, oceans, soils and atmosphere.”
I note she makes no mention that top propose a lowering bar on pollution.
ets will never work because it’s global so to prone to crooks, but an in house nz one could work as long as scum like key is never in charge of it.
best case scenario is the greens at least hold their % and top get over the 5% mark , they seem to have a lot in common.
From the policy announcements so far they seem a bit vague, and I don’t think that’s great if you’re trying to attract voters to you. Case in point was their first policy launched, taxing property owners more. But I can’t tell you how much they will taxed, which is fairly important.
They also want to force elderly people with a mortgage-free home and low income to mortgage their house to pay a property tax. That alone would stop me voting for them. Morgan has some good ideas but when he gets to the detail comes across as clueless about what matter. Same with his UBI model which ignores the supplementary benefits that most beneficiaries are dependent on.
Fair comment. I was going by the title only, and ignored the fact that this is a song with no passion.
However, when you stop to think about it, it’s entirely appropriate for a president with no passion. He couldn’t even sigh convincingly during his farcical performance on Robben Island….
Seriously – Labour need to find a good way to differentiate from National. Sale and privatisation of NZ assets like State houses are a good place to start to show the difference in policy!
I’m thinking of starting up a petition to bring back John and make him be president for life and it doesn’t even bother what party hes leader of, in fact he could take turns being leader of the rest of the parties
Wonderful idea, Pucky!
Let me help: Calling all readers of The Standard. Puckish Rogue is inviting you to sign his petition to Bring Back John Key! Show your support for Pucky, and for “Sir John” by leaving a supportive comment below. With your support, Pucky believes he can Bring Back John!
(I’ve taken the liberty of signing up James as a matter of course, Pucky)
Edit: Oh, and fisiani
Problem for the Left is that the move from socialism is too late to stop. The TOP party will gobble their votes and then if they get 5% will want to be in government. A 4% drop means a National Government a 5% + vote means a National/TOP government
Just to squeeze Robert in beteeen 4 rwnj i also see Uk labour also are doing well (sarc) Jeremy Corbyn’s net approval rating continues to plummet, now hitting -43%. what’s going on why are the dumb ass masses not buying the hard left kool aid
“The NZ Roy Morgan Government Confidence Rating has increased to 140pts (up 9pts) in January with 63% (up 4.5%) of NZ electors saying NZ is ‘heading in the right direction’ compared to 23% (down 4.5%) that say NZ is ‘heading in the wrong direction’.”
Things are good and heading in the right direction. Bill was an architect of this. Why change the government and mess it all up.
oh – and thats got to hurt with National up with Bill in charge.
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For the past week, Extinction Rebellion has been peacefully protesting in London to demand action on climate change. The British government's response? Ban their protests:Police have banned Extinction Rebellion protests from continuing anywhere in London, as they moved in almost without warning to clear protesters who remained at the movement’s ...
An essay by Judith Collins MP reported on Carbon News yesterday seems to show an alarming shift in attitude within the National Party. Collins argues against the Zero Carbon Bill, the Paris Agreement, and downplays the magnitude of climate impacts. The Paris Agreement was adopted in December 2015 and ratified ...
When they were running for election, Labour promised to overhaul the Employment Relations Act and introduce fair pay agreements to set basic pay and conditions on an industry level, preventing bad employers from undercutting good ones. They followed this up by establishing a working group, which reported back in January ...
A list of indicators of bad science – many of these are found in articles promoted by anti-fluoride activists. Anti-fluoride activists have been pouring money into a scaremongering campaign warning pregnant women not to drink fluoridated water. They claim fluoride will lower the IQ of their future child. Fluoride ...
Nothing Left To Say: Labour's pollster, Stephen Mills, remains swaddled-up in the comforting myths of the 1980s. As if the experience of Roger Douglas’s genuinely radical post-Muldoon policy agenda was literally a once-in-a-lifetime thing – as much as the party could possibly absorb for at least the next 50 years.MEMO ...
The Royal Commission on abuse in care is very significant for the disability community. For many decades last century, thousands of disabled children, and adults who managed to survive, were locked away from families and communities. This was not for anything they had done, but for the perceived threat their ...
With an unfair voting system, uneven electorates and an un-elected upper house, the UK's "democracy" is barely worthy of the name. But now the government wants to make it worse:The government has been accused of suppressing voters’ rights with the potential disenfranchisement of tens of thousands of people after plans ...
Back in the 90's and early 2000's, the building industry was building leaky homes which should never have been granted consent. Now it turns out they've been building dodgy office blocks as well:New imaging technology has revealed hundreds of major buildings nationwide have defective or missing concrete or reinforcing steel. ...
Local body election results were released over the weekend, to joy or despair depending on where you live. In Auckland, Phil Goff trounced John Tamihere, who is muttering darkly about running for Parliament again (but which party would want him?) Wellington is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Weta Workshop, except ...
How could government evolve over the next decades? Reports of democracy’s imminent demise are greatly exaggerated. However, satisfaction with political systems in many countries is low, so there is much to do for governments of all political stripes to improve relevance and trust. Digital technologies are seen as one ...
Two years have now gone by since the Friday afternoon when my university-student son and I headed out of our Barcelona flat to a nearby primary school, designated as a polling station for the vote that was to be held the following Sunday: the referendum on Catalonia’s independence from Spain ...
Overruled: The joint decision of Finance Minister, Grant Robertson (Labour) and his Associate Minister, David Parker (Labour) arguably the two most powerful ministers in Jacinda Ardern’s government, to grant OceanaGold the consents which Land Information Minister, Eugenie Sage (Greens) had earlier denied them, offers bitter proof of how hard fighting ...
More than double the number of people who will vote in this year’s local body elections have tried marijuana or urinated somewhere they shouldn’t have. As local elections look set for the lowest turnout in decades, with many regions falling well short of 40%, the Government is exploring a number ...
A Statement on Abortion Law Reform by the Council of Disobedient Women On the eve of bringing an end to antiquated, anti-women abortion laws Green MP Jan Logie intends to write women out of the Bill. With a stroke of the pen, the woke are aiming for total erasure ...
Musings continue apace about “the experienced businessman!” soon to be taking up a National Party MP position. Or to be more accurate, being parachuted into a seat to shut down their former MP Jamie-Lee Ross, who despite his own shortcomings shed at least some more light on the inner workings ...
The Ugandan government wants to murder gay people:Uganda has announced plans to impose the death penalty on homosexuals. The bill, colloquially known as “Kill the Gays” in Uganda, was nullified five years ago on a technicality, but the government said on Thursday it plans to resurrect it within weeks. The ...
Freedom Of Speech? The Säuberung (cleansing by fire) was the work of the German Student Union which, on 10 May 1933, under the watchful eye of the Nazi Reichminister for Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, consigned 25,000 books to the flames in a ritual exorcism of “un-German thought”. According to the logic of the ...
“There can be no such thing as kaupapa Māori political parties or politics in Aotearoa” (Willie Jackson, Labour Party (2017). Māori TV, General/List Election Special) I begin with that claim because at the time, I was confounded at first that it fell out of Willie Jackson’s mouth, and then ...
New Zealand has prided itself for decades with regard to its lack of pollution, and all will be aware that the ‘100% Pure New Zealand‘ meme is under threat through land, water and air pollution of various causes. There is another type of contamination that the country also faces: light ...
New Zealand’s media is doing its part in Japan, reassuring those in the path of the storm that they won’t miss any rugby while away from their flooded homes. New Zealand sports reporters stationed in Japan for the Rugby World Cup have had the rare and heartwarming opportunity to inform ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones is the only Cabinet member in favour of putting it all on green. As Finance Minister Grant Robertson finds himself with an enormous $7.5 billion surplus, the Government has begun intense, at times contentious conversations about whether to put the money on red or black at ...
by Susanne Kemp At the start of September close to 100,000 school teachers went on strike in Jordan. They demanded a 50% pay rise. A pay rise actually agreed to by the regime back in 2014. In early October, however, in the face of government repression and threats, the teachers’ ...
Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change.If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, please send it to climate.change@stuff.co.nzWhy do people still think climate change isn’t real?David ...
Back in 2011, journalist Nicky Hager published Other People's Wars, an expose on NZDF's activities over the previous decade of the "war on terror". NZDF didn't like this, and especially didn't like the fact that it was base don leaks from their own. So, they had the SIS investigate him ...
The Zero Carbon Bill is due back from select committee in two weeks, and will likely pass its final stages in November. So naturally, farmers are planning a hate-march against it. But they're not just demanding lower methane targets so they can keep on destroying the planet; they're also demanding ...
Last year, California burned. This year, to stop it happening again (or rather, to stop themselves from being found liable if it happens again), Pacific Gas and Electric is cutting power to half the state for a week:Schools are closed. Traffic lights down. Tunnels dark. Businesses unopened. Hospitals running on ...
The Best Way: Missing from the on-line voting debate is any reference to the voting system that produces turn-out figures ranging from 77 to 93 percent of registered voters. The voting system used to collect and count the votes cast in our parliamentary elections. The system that involves citizens making ...
Among the great new bunch of political friends we have been making recently is the excellent Australian-based Marxist gender-critical site, Freer Lives. So we asked the comrade who set up that blog to write something for Redline on the blog, himself, his analysis of the rise of gender politics and ...
by Don Franks The Auckland City Mission is struggling with a 40 percent increase in demand for food parcels this year. A total of 23,020 were needed by June. Last month Missioner Chris Farrelly told the Herald the “cupboards are bare” and without an emergency food drive, he can’t see ...
by The Council of Disobedient Women Massey Wellington Student Association had a sit-in today. Imagine a sit-in. On a campus. Against a women’s rights meeting. Did the ’60s really happen or did we fucking dream it? They gathered in the student square, an echo chamber. Sitting on soft pillows ...
For some reasons, my post about the mystery message from inside the Downing Street bunker seemed to catch people's attention. Quite a lot of hits from NZ (unsurprisingly) and the USA (a bit more puzzlingly, but hi there, USAians!!) and 76 views from the Ukraine.I've celebrated my Ukrainian readers in ...
First, almost a score of Labour MPs seem to have sent a letter to the EU basically begging them to accept a deal - any deal - just so Britain can get the Heck on with Brexiting instead of being trapped in limbo:
by Phil Duncan In 2016 the National-led government suspended the Parent Visa Category, through which migrants were able to bring their parents into New Zealand. Since then over 5,700 people have been in immigration limbo, stuck on the visa wait list. Labour is now bringing back the scheme. Well, sort ...
The following was released yesterday (Tues, October 8) by the women’s liberation organisation Speak Up for Women. On 23 September Speak Up For Women announced that we would be holding an event at the Massey University Theaterette in Wellington. The event is called Feminism 2020. The intention of the event ...
The government is currently consulting on plans to improve freshwater quality. So naturally, farmers oppose it:South Taranaki farmers are preparing to fight proposed national freshwater changes that some fear will bankrupt them. The Government's proposed National Environment Standard on Freshwater Management, released in September, rated the Waingongoro River as one ...
Yesterday was the last day for (reliably) posting your vote away in local body elections. Turnouts are mostly much lower than the equivalent time last year (Palmerston North is down 2.3%), and so naturally people are pushing their online-voting snake oil again. Because the online census worked so well, lets ...
This essay, on the political legacy of the eugenics movement, by Kenan Malik was originally published in the Observer on 6 October 2019, under the headline ‘The spirit of eugenics is still with us, as immigrants know to their cost’. Birth control. Intelligence tests. Town planning. Immigration controls. It’s striking how ...
Another year, and the government has announced another enormous government "surplus". And just like last year, its nothing of the sort. When we have people homeless and sick and hungry, when we have schools and hospitals still falling down, when we have underpaid public servants and infrastucture unmaintained or unbuilt, ...
James Forsyth at The Spectator (I know, I know) has tapped one of his contacts inside Number Ten for an insight into the Johnson administration's thinking and strategy.It is fascinating, unsettling and quite, quite mad. Some key points:Negotiations have stalled and the Johnson administration are keen to blame the EU: ...
Fatal Contact: With the arrival of captain James Cook in October 1769, the islands of what would become New Zealand ceased to be the preserve of Polynesian navigators and settlers and became a part of both the world’s map and the world’s history.THE MAORI NATIONALIST assault upon the historical meaning ...
Another round of tactical talks about forming a Government of National Unity have come to nothing with the Liberal Democrats still refusing countenance putting Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street:Opposition talks on Monday made little headway over when to try and vote down Boris Johnson's government and who might succeed him as ...
by Nick Rogers The debate around the meaning of sex and gender made an appearance at this year’s British Labour Party conference in Brighton. Women’s Place UK – an organisation that questions the demand that biological males who self-identify as woman should have access to women’s spaces, to all-women shortlists, ...
Yesterday I went down to Wellington to participate in the Extinction Rebellion protest. Its part of the latest global wave of XR actions, with actions happening all over the world. Some of those protests are massively disruptive: in Canada, XR is blocking major bridges, stopping people from getting to work. ...
The Workshop is a charitable trust for public good. The Workshop undertake research to find ways of communicating that will build support for the solutions that work to solve complex social and environmental problems. See their Report on Talking about Poverty and Welfare Reform below. ...
What is language? We generally assume that it a facility unique to humans, allowing us to share what’s in and on our minds. We can tell of our plans, our past exploits, our knowledge. It also allows us to lie. And yet there are vast numbers of people we can’t ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters is predicting a hard Brexit for the United Kingdom, as he believes British Prime Minister Boris Johnson won’t be able to negotiate terms before the October 30 deadline. The Minister, who was one of the first to publicly come out and predict British voters would leave ...
Speaking at the Council of Trade Unions' (CTU) biennial conference, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters told unionists that any future attacks on the Government won't work. "Now, we are being attacked by the union movement in this country. You can have your views but I'm here to say standing ...
We want every New Zealander to be happy, safe, and healthy. To do this, we need to support strong, safe communities, and a robust and efficient health system. ...
Defence Minister Ron Mark has used his powers to overrule a noise complaint ruling against Whenuapai airbase on the grounds of "national security". The Environment Court last month released a ruling in favour of a private developer, declaring the Auckland airbase had to comply with noise restrictions when it performs ...
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has opened fire against "unreconstructed morons" after NZ First MP Shane Jones was photographed on holiday holding an AR-15 rifle. Mr Peters is defending Mr Jones, telling Magic Talk host Peter Williams that his MP was just having fun "like most people do". "The ...
New Zealand First Deputy Leader and Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau was in attendance during the morning blessing of the Rotorua Lakefront development project. Around 60 people gathered on the shores of Lake Rotorua, including city mayor Steve Chadwick and deputy Dave Donaldson. The Lakefront development is a ...
Forestry Minister Shane Jones is considering reining in on conversions of farmland to forestry, and also issued a warning to foreign-owned forestry companies that make up nearly 75 per cent of the industry. He said too many foreign companies had not provided enough access for domestic processors to get timber. ...
Speaking to Radio NZ, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters said the tightening of the parental category visa is a direct result of the Party’s coalition negotiations with the Labour Party. He said the new changes switch the financial onus from the parent moving to New Zealand to the child ...
The Coalition Government is set to cut red tape in the building and construction sector in an effort to allow more houses to be built, including prefabricated houses. The changes will enable the mass factory production of "high quality" buildings, slash the likely number of building inspections for factory produced ...
Since coming into Government, we’ve worked hard to tackle homelessness and make sure everyone has a warm, dry home. And today, on World Homeless Day, we want to report back and update you on our progress so far. ...
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has hit back at National Party leader Simon Bridges who criticized the Coalition Government’s approach to crime, and said that the latter isn't credible in his attack on the Government over gang recruitment. "We've got as massive drug problem in this country. It is ...
New Zealand Mānuka honey exporters have welcomed an initiative by the Coalition Government to help secure the term “mānuka honey” to be used exclusively by Kiwi exporters, ensuring that our multimillion-dollar industry is protected. Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones had recently announced that a Provincial Growth Funding of $5.7 ...
Political commentator Mike Hosking has labelled New Zealand First leader Winston Peters as “the voice of reason in a government soft on drugs”, for the Party’s stance on drug testing at music festivals. “If common sense is worth a vote, Winston Peters is quids in,” Mr Hosking said. The Labour ...
Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau has announced Provincial Growth Funding to ensure work opportunities in Turangi and Whanganui, through its skills and employment programme, Te Ara Mahi. A fund of $500,000 will go to Rafting NZ in Turangi for a 16-week river guide training course to train ...
Treasury has shown that the Coalition Government has a $7.5 billion surplus, which is $4 billion higher than what was expected in the 2019 Budget unveiled last May. It is also $2 billion higher than the actual surplus unveiled this time last year, and at a size that has not ...
Official Information Act figures released to NZME show there were 350 assaults on officers in the year to the end of June, 79 more than the year before. The increase in attacks have sparked calls for more legal protection for first responders to be enacted. The assaults included officers being ...
“Nobody wants to see babies uplifted”, this was the pronouncement of Minister for Children Hon. Tracey Martin as her department, Oranga Tamariki, faces multiple inquiries into the number of babies being taken from their families. “But a baby can die with a single punch, “the Minister continued. “So sometimes, Oranga ...
We're making progress on tackling the long-term challenges: from homelessness, to strengthening border security, to bringing banking back New Zealand's small towns. ...
Associate Transport Minister Shane Jones has backed the ambitious plan to move Auckland’s port to Northport, at Whangarei harbour, which he says will be the “King Kong of infrastructure”. The plan is part of the recommendations of a six-person independent working group, which has recommended the Ports of Auckland be ...
A six-member independent working group selected the option of moving Auckland’s port to Northport, in Whangarei, ahead of other options. In what could be New Zealand’s most ambitious infrastructure project yet, a major expansion of the Marsden Point port could happen within 15 years. The project, officially called the “Upper ...
The final Electricity Price Review recommended prohibiting prompt payment discounts but allowing “reasonable” late fees. The findings of this review was welcomed by the Coalition Government, but they hope companies will follow through with its recommendations without regulations needed to be passed. Meridian Energy had already stopped prompt payment discounts, ...
Fletcher Tabuteau, Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development The Provincial Growth Fund (PGF)through its skills and employment programme, Te Ara Mahi,will invest nearly $600,000 to ensure work opportunities for locals in Turangia and Whanganui, Parliamentary Under Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau announced today. “I’m pleased to announce the PGF ...
An export-led economy is one of New Zealand First’s key principles, and our commitment to achieving this is shown by the continuing skyrocketing demand for our beef and sheep meat exports. Beef + Lamb New Zealand's New Season Outlook 2019-20 report forecasts beef, lamb and mutton prices to lift from ...
Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today in Gisborne an investment of $17.27m into bringing “world-leading” food-growing technology and the creation of more than 100 new jobs in the East Coast city. The funding comes from the Provincial Growth Fund, and included a $15 million loan to LeaderBrand, a ...
Hon Shane Jones, Minister for Regional Economic Development More than 100 people in Tairāwhiti’s Tolaga Bay will benefit from two employment initiatives supported by the Provincial Growth Fund, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones and Employment Minister Willie Jackson announced today. “Tolaga Bay is an incredibly tight-knit community, but one in ...
Hon Shane Jones, Minister for Regional Economic Development The Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) is supporting Gisborne business Leaderbrand to produce salad vegetables year round and create more jobs in the Tairāwhiti region, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today. “Our support for Leaderbrand will help them build large greenhouses ...
“Nobody wants to see babies uplifted”, this was the pronouncement of Minister for Children Hon. Tracey Martin as her department, Oranga Tamariki, faces multiple inquiries into the number of babies being taken from their families. “But a baby can die with a single punch, “the Minister continued. “So sometimes, Oranga ...
Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has praised the promise by New Zealand’s biggest banks not to close any provincial branches while the Coalition Government trials regional banking hubs across the country. The Minister said the announce was the “first sign of hope for regional communities”, many of which have ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, New Zealand First Leader New Zealand First is proud to have delivered an upgrade of the SuperGold Card website and a new smartphone app, which will help unlock the full benefits of the SuperGold Card for 750,000 New Zealand seniors.Party Leader Rt Hon Winston Peters, ...
Delivering a key election campaign promise, New Zealand First is proud to have accomplished a long overdue upgrade of the SuperGold Card today. At an event in Auckland, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters joined Minister for Seniors Hon. Tracey Martin in unveiling the new website and smartphone app which ...
The Government today announced its support for a project that could substantially reduce agricultural greenhouse gas emissions from cattle. The announcement was made as part of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s and Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor’s visit to Nelson’s Cawthron Aquaculture Park. The Cawthron Institute will receive $100,000 from the Government’s ...
Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni has welcomed the first reading of the New Zealand Superannuation and Veteran’s Pension Legislation Amendment Bill. “Every New Zealander has a stake in New Zealand Superannuation and Veteran’s Pension,” says Carmel Sepuloni. “They are our most common form of social assistance – nearly 800,000 New ...
Babies in Auckland aged six months and over can receive a free vaccination and children will all have access to vaccines, Associate Minister of Health Julie Anne Genter announced today at Papatoetoe High School. The move comes as part of Government efforts to step up the fight against measles. ...
***Check against delivery*** Good morning. It is a pleasure to be here, and to have the honour of opening this important conference on behalf of the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. Let us take the opportunity to acknowledge all the people who have helped make today possible, including our special ...
Police Minister Stuart Nash says the safety of frontline officers and members of the public will be the focus of a new trial of specialist Police response teams in three of our largest urban centres. Police have this morning released details of an initiative to be trialled in Counties Manukau, ...
The Minister of Fisheries is calling for entries for a new public award to celebrate innovation in our seafood sector. “I have established the Seafood Sustainability Awards to recognise and celebrate those throughout industry, tangata whenua and communities who demonstrate outstanding dedication and innovation towards the sustainability of New Zealand’s ...
Minister for Women Julie Anne Genter welcomes leaders in the private sector taking action on closing their gender pay gaps to ensure a fairer workplace for all New Zealanders. Ms Genter today launched a new report, Addressing the gender pay gap and driving women’s representation in senior leadership, from the Champions for ...
Government Ministers today welcomed the release of a marine environment report highlighting the four key issues affecting our oceans, estuaries and coastlines. The release underlines the importance of government proposals to combat climate pollution, ensure clean freshwater, protect biodiversity, make land use more sustainable, and reduce waste and plastic. Environment ...
The Government has approved funding for a new acute mental health facility for Waikato which will provide better care and support to people with mental health and addiction issues. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Health Minister Dr David Clark announced the $100 million project to replace the aging Henry Rongomau ...
The Government is making progress on its goal to integrate te reo Māori into education by 2025, with over 500 teachers and support staff already graduating from Te Ahu o te Reo Māori, Associate Education Minister Kelvin Davis announced today. Kelvin Davis made the announcement at an awards ceremony in Waikanae today, for ...
Statistics Minister James Shaw has welcomed the first release of 2018 Census data. The first release of data today, 23 September, includes key data on population, regional growth, the number of homes and the size of different ethnic groups in New Zealand. Data from the 2018 Census will support the ...
Minister for Statistics James Shaw today announced a public consultation on a proposed algorithm charter for government agencies. The charter has been developed by the Government Chief Data Steward in response to growing calls for more transparency in government use of data. Computer algorithms – procedures or formulas for solving ...
Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor, Climate Change Minister James Shaw and visiting Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte co-hosted a business roundtable in Auckland this morning focused on working together to address climate change. “The Netherlands is an important partner for New Zealand. We share a strong agricultural history. Sustainable agribusiness and ...
The Government is taking action to build an inclusive economy where more of us receive our fair share at work and businesses can compete on great products and services, not undercutting wages and conditions, Immigration and Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Iain Lees-Galloway says. Two consultations launched today seek feedback ...
The future for New Zealand’s threatened indigenous freshwater fish looks brighter with the passing of the Conservation (Indigenous Freshwater Fish) Amendment Bill in Parliament today said Minister of Conservation, Eugenie Sage. “Until now, our freshwater fish legislation has been 20 years out of date. We have lacked effective tools to ...
At 1.30pm tomorrow, hundreds of thousands of Kiwis will join about 65 million people around the globe in ShakeOut, the world’s biggest earthquake drill. The annual drill is to remind people of the right action to take during an earthquake which is to Drop, Cover, Hold, and to practise their ...
Kiwis are benefiting from higher wage growth and low inflation under the Coalition Government. Stats NZ data out today shows the rise in the cost of living remains low, as annual Consumers Price Index (CPI) inflation fell to 1.5% in September from 1.7% in June. “The low inflation comes as ...
New Zealand’s economic strength and resilience has been recognised in a major update on the state of the global economy. The IMF’s latest World Economic Outlook released overnight shows a reduced global growth forecast over the next two years as issues like the US-China trade war and Brexit take hold. ...
Justice Minister Andrew Little has today introduced a new Bill to prevent terrorism and support the de-radicalisation of New Zealanders returning from overseas. The Terrorism Suppression (Control Orders) Bill gives the New Zealand Police the ability to apply to the High Court to impose control orders on New Zealanders who ...
A Bill that proposes targeted changes to simplify the processes for Māori land owners when engaging with the Māori Land Court has had its First Reading today. “The approach taken by the Government is to ensure that the protection of Māori land remains a priority as we seek to improve ...
Let me first thank all the new unionists and members in the room. There is nothing more important to improving people’s working lives than people making the decision to care, to get on board and help, to take up the reins and get involved. Congratulations to you. You bring the ...
Minister of Defence Ron Mark has signed a certificate exempting the activity of engine testing at Whenuapai Airbase from the Resource Management Act 1991. The Act gives the Minister of Defence the power to exempt activities for the purposes of national security. The certificate will mean the recent Environment Court ...
Finance Minister Grant Robertson has announced New Zealand will join the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action while attending APEC meetings in Chile. The objective of the 39 member Coalition is to share information and promote action to tackle climate change. It was formed in April this year, in ...
Feedback sought– Lyttelton commercial zone parking The Associate Minister for Greater Christchurch Regeneration, Poto Williams, is seeking feedback on a proposal to remove on-site car parking requirements for new developments in the Lyttelton commercial zone. The proposal, by Christchurch City Council, asks that powers under section 71 of the Greater ...
Hon Minister Poto Williams Associate Minister for Greater Christchurch Regeneration MEDIA STATEMENT Tuesday 15 October 2019 Feedback sought – Hagley Oval The Associate Minister for Greater Christchurch Regeneration, Poto Williams, is seeking feedback on a proposal about Hagley Oval. The proposal was developed by Regenerate Christchurch ...
Ladies and gentlemen, NZCTU President Richard Wagstaff, members of respective unions – thank you for the invitation to speak to you today. This might be preaching to the choir, but the importance of trade unions in New Zealand’s historical arch is difficult to understate. And it is my belief that ...
"Let’s start by acknowledging that it has been a huge year. " Police Association Annual Conference James Cook Grand Chancellor Hotel Wellington Nau mai, haere mai. Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, ka nui te mihi, ki a koutou katoa. President of the Police Association, Chris Cahill; Members of the Association and ...
Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters and Minister of Defence Ron Mark have announced the New Zealand Government’s decision to again deploy a Royal New Zealand Air Force P-3K2 (P-3) maritime patrol aircraft to support the implementation of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions imposing sanctions against North Korea. New ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says New Zealand continues to have serious concerns for peace and stability in north-east Syria. “Recent reports that hundreds of ISIS-affiliated families have fled from a camp are deeply concerning from a humanitarian and security perspective”, Mr Peters says. “While we acknowledge Turkey’s domestic security ...
Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor is warning travelling Kiwis to be vigilant as the high-season for the crop-eating brown marmorated stink bug (BMSB) is under way. “We’re on high alert to stop BMSB arriving in NZ. The high season runs until April 30 and we’ve strengthened our measures to stop stink ...
The Government is moving swiftly to change the law to improve the welfare and pastoral care of students living in university halls of residence and other tertiary hostels. Cabinet has agreed to several changes, including creating a new mandatory Code of Practice that sets out the duty of pastoral care ...
The Minister for Conservation Eugenie Sage has launched a new comprehensive trapping guide for community trappers to help them protect our native birds, plants and other wildlife, at Zealandia in Wellington today. ‘A practical guide to trapping’, has been developed by the Department of Conservation (DOC), and was launched during ...
Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter welcomes PHARMAC’s move to improve access to long-acting reversible contraception (LARCs). PHARMAC has today announced it will fund the full cost of Mirena and Jaydess for anyone seeking long term contraception, lifting previous restrictions on access to Mirena. “I welcome women having greater choices ...
The Government has approved the next stage of a major redevelopment of Taranaki Base Hospital, which will deliver new and improved facilities for patients. Health Minister Dr David Clark has announced details of a $300 million dollar project to build a new East Wing at the New Plymouth hospital. It ...
Extra funding will allow Rural Support Trusts to help farming families, says Minister for Rural Communities and Agriculture Damien O’Connor. “I know that rural families are worried about some of the challenges facing them, including the ongoing uncertainty created by the Mycoplasma bovis outbreak. “Those concerns sit alongside ongoing worries ...
Thank you for the opportunity to be here to present certificates to the 16 graduates who have completed a beekeeping course delivered by the Howard League. Let us start by acknowledging Auckland Prison’s Deputy Prison Director Tom Sherlock, and Acting Assistant Regional Commissioner of Corrections Northern Region Scott Walker - ...
Finance Minister Grant Robertson leaves this weekend to attend the APEC Finance Ministers meeting in Santiago, Chile. Discussions between APEC Finance Ministers at the meeting will include the effects of the current global economic uncertainty, risks for APEC economies and sustainable development of the region. While at APEC Grant Robertson ...
The Minister for Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio says for Pacific people, language can be a source of strength. It can help ground us and give us confidence. When we speak them, our languages provide us with an immediate and intimate access to our identity and our story - and ...
The Coalition Government has announced an action plan to improve the wellbeing of disabled New Zealanders by addressing inequalities in play, active recreation and sport. The initiative includes training to develop a workforce that understands the needs of children and young people with a range of impairments, advocacy for fit ...
The construction sector is being freed up to allow more homes to be built more quickly as the Government cuts through some of the red tape of the Building Act. “Every New Zealander deserves a warm, dry, safe home and old inefficiencies in the Building Act make building slow and ...
As the New Zealand First Party gathers for its annual conference, the question swirling in the year is how it can carve out a path to avoid electoral defeat in 2020, writes Jo Moir for RNZ. It’s not you, it’s me. It’s a familiar break up excuse that’s used ...
To the early intervention therapists, to the teachers, to the speech therapists, the occupational therapists, music therapists, diabetes nurses and all: you change the world.When I was married almost a decade ago we had the following reading at our wedding:You are holding up a ceilingwith both arms. It is very ...
The faces said it all. The smiles of the European leaders crowded round Boris after the Brexit deal was struck. The deal his opponents – no, pretty much everyone – said was impossible.So what’s in it? The detail is still opaque, but subject to gremlins in the fine print, ...
Iran attracts an onslaught of negative media in New Zealand and Western media. But is it fair or deserved? David Robie has spent several weeks travelling in the country on sabbatical and finds the media negativity far from the reality of the “most friendly” country he has ever visited ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra [embedded content]University of Canberra Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Leigh Sullivan discusses the week in politics with Michelle Grattan. They talk about Alan Jones accusing Prime Minister Scott Morrison of failing the immediate needs of drought-striken farmers, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anita Parbhakar-Fox, Senior Research Fellow in Geometallurgy/Applied Geochemistry, The University of Queensland Last month, scientists uncovered a mineral called Edscottite. Minerals are solid, naturally occurring substances that are not living, such as quartz or haematite. This new mineral was discovered after an ...
The Auckland-based collective talk origins, ambitions and making the rave accessible to everybody.Friendly Potential is an outfit that defies easy summary. They’re among the country’s most ambitious and prolific club promoters. In their almost five-years of operation, they’ve been responsible for the local debuts of electronic music icons including Detroit ...
Analysis: Two polls show support for Labour sliding, the government is accused of breaking another promise and the Greens's refusal to back a bill forces Labour to rely on National to get it through. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kiera Lindsey, University of Technology Sydney One spring morning in 1850, over 8,000 Sydneysiders marched through town to protest the resumption of transportation – the act of sending British criminals to Australia. It was the largest protest in Australia thus far, an ...
Two shareholders of failed insurance firm company CBL are leading a class action against the firm's former directors seeking compensation for financial losses. ...
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Some time back I gave a tip about the price National were selling off the state houses in Tauranga for. It wasn’t an opinion or gossip, it was stated in black and white in Housing NZs annual report which was released in November last year. I can’t have been the only person to have noticed it and yet I’ve heard nothing from the media or any politlcal party about it. What’s going on, do the opposition parties think it so trivial they won’t even make a noise over it?
For those who don’t know. The 1140 Tauranga state houses being sold were independently valued at $364 million as of March 2016. Housing NZ (appear to have) been instructed by Treasury to write down the value of those houses in preparation for their sale. HNZ accordingly wrote off $224 million and earmarked the houses to be sold for around $137 million. That’s an average sale price of $120,000 in a market that today doesn’t have a single house for sale under $320,000.
Since that revaluation the value of houses in Tauranga has gone up another 10-20% so it’s even worse than it looks. The actual sale price is still being kept under wraps but the HNZ report should have been enough to trigger strong protests.
Now the issue here is not the sale of state assets, it is the gifting of state assets. Governments might claim a mandate to sell assets but none can claim a mandate to give them away to private interests like they’re doing with the Tauranga deal and plan to do with the sale of 2500 more state houses in ChCh
I feel pretty aggrieved about the lack of action on this because I’m 100% convinced that the opposition could have halted this asset sale if they’d actively and strongly opposed the huge discounting. It’s no good complaining after the deal is done, National can’t back out of the contract when the ink is dry.
So what can we expect from the opposition on this ongoing state house looting? Do they really care?
+1 DH -The blame is 100% National, ACT, United Future and The Maori Party for being in coalition with each other and destroying our assets in particular State houses while selling them cheap to cronies.
However I also agree that the opposition has been very weak on this. I hear more about Flags, insulation and property prices than actually real action on our assets being stollen from Kiwi’s AND the eviction of the most vulnerable due to this in a time where housing seems to be coming out of politicians mouths daily.
This seems to be some sort of strategy to have so many disgusting issues going on from the Natz that the opposition gets stretched and weakened on their opposition and there are the trivial distractions like weddings and trite racism/sexism scenarios being played out for weeks on the MSM and non MSM sites….
And the charities (who are already compromised by needing funding from the government) that got side tracked/tricked (who knows) into a ‘market driven’ approach to housing with the unitary plan and spent valuable air time on supporting that approach aka unitary plan, a market driven approach, than the State houses being sold and tenants being evicted right under their noses.
That’s how the Natz are still in power, by burying the real issues and turning groups that should be fighting against them, to fight against themselves and against the voters or be championing Natz vision of solving housing issues in NZ.
I can’t even begin to speculate there, the relative silence is a mystery to me.
There’s a decent post on TDB worth reading too;
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2016/12/30/tdb-exclusive-alan-johnson-the-horrific-truth-about-bill-englishs-state-housing-privatisation/
Interestingly he mentions that private investors may be involved in the Tauranga deal which opens an even bigger can of worms if that’s true.
I think it is part of a larger picture of what is going wrong with the opposition and their messaging…. surely it would be a win win scenario to champion NOT privatising government assets, while pointing out that National is destroying State housing for the vulnerable while Natz are pretending a housing crisis doesn’t exist or they have a market solution.
Pretty easy message for the opposition, Don’t privatise our State Houses!!! I would say that at least 75% of Kiwis would support that.
But as soon as they get into weakly supporting Natz unitary plan they probably start haemorrhaging support down to 30% who think that is the way to go…. somehow turning a golden opportunity to catch out the government and be popular with Kiwi voters….Somehow they miss it and then turn their housing attentions into a complicated web of supporting unproven market driven Natz speak with unitary plan scenarios…
In addition unitary plan was a regional solution, again turning non Aucklanders off (as well as Aucklanders who did not agree with them). But selling State houses is happening all over NZ so it was always an issue that was important across NZ.
Who advises Labour and Greens… they are not doing a good job….. or is it the politicians themselves getting distracted… who knows…
Let’s be fair about this.
10:19 AM Wednesday Apr 27, 2016
“Public meeting to address Tauranga’s housing crisis
Four senior Labour MPs will be in Tauranga today to address the city’s housing crisis.
Housing spokesman Phil Twyford, plus David Parker, Nanaia Mahuta and Rino Tirikatene are holding a public meeting at the Wesley Centre on 13th Ave at 11am.
The MPs are keen for anyone with housing concerns in Tauranga to come along and talk about how they are affected and possible solution”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/bay-of-plenty-times/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503343&objectid=11628853
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/bay-of-plenty-times/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503343&objectid=11672275
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1608/S00227/state-house-sell-off-a-kick-in-the-guts.htm
https://www.nbr.co.nz/article/state-houses-being-sold-below-valuation-%E2%80%94-twyford-ck-192951
Bill puts ministers above law – Labour – FBC News
preview-www.fbc.com.fj/world/30821/bill-puts-ministers-above-law—labour
None of those links are addressing the substance of my post Tautoko Mangō Mata, which is the massive discount on the price of the houses.
The NBR article of August 2016 had this;
“On Friday, it was announced that Accessible Properties — which outbid two other companies — would buy 1124 state houses in Tauranga. Neither Accessible Properties nor Housing NZ would put a dollar value on the deal.”
Well in November 2016 Housing NZ did put a dollar value on the deal, which revealed a mammoth 62% discount, a “buy one house and we’ll give you two for free” deal, and I haven’t heard a peep out of anyone over it.
I’ve commented about Accessible Properties, Idea Services and IHC before.
I’d strongly recommend interested folk to spend a few hours searching the MSM reports involving this organisation and it’s ”officers”. The Charities Commission is a good start. And the companies register. Because there’s no law that says you can’t be involved in “charitable” housing development AND do private property development too. Is there?
And it seems that certain folk individuals are, kind of, above reproach…in fact get rewarded with plum positions even when they have already stuffed up.
DH…you are on the money (pun intended) on this. The whole deal stinks link a dead possum in the sun.
Disability Funding…there’s GOLD in them there ‘ills.
Private development is legal for charities as long as it contributes to the charitable purpose(s) e.g. as a form of fundraising.
Not necessarily, and the entity has to be really careful how and where they do it.
The Queenstown Housing Trust fell foul of the Charities Act.
http://www.taxcounsel.co.nz/Resources/NZ+Tax+and+Trusts+Case+Notes/Case+Notes+2011/Community+Housing+Trust+Not+Charitable.html
That was darned hard to read Graeme, but I think I got the gist of it.
It’s hard to see what kind of public benefit Accessible Properties will actually be providing. The deal with social housing is they charge full market rents and the Government pays part of that rent, the amount determined by the needs of the tenant. I’d think it the Govt providing the public benefit there, not the landlord.
Sorry about that DH, but it’s the only thing I could find that actually explained why the Trust lost it’s charitable status, all the press reports just said the Charities Act needed amendment (which is probably right)
That judgement will be having a chilling effect on any entity wanting to get involved in social housing ownership and development in desirable and expensive areas. This may go some way to explaining the difference between the pre sale valuations, which may have been a crock of shit depending on the basis of the valuation, and the offers received.
The Queenstown Trust is a bit different with it’s shared ownership model, but there are very valid reasons for that in a Queenstown context. The objective was to provide security for the grantees so living in Queenstown would be sustainable and reduce our horrendous turnover of mid / lower level workers.
The objective definition of poverty and associated charitable requirements conflicts with the subjective nature of un-affordability and depravation. The way I see it, if an entity wants to do social housing in Tauranga, under a charitable status, the housing would have to be in in the cheapest possible place, say Kawarau
That has nothing to do with the pre-sale valuations or the sale price Graeme.
The sale price was all about the fact that no charity has the cash to buy the state houses. They have to borrow the money and the interest cost on 100% borrowed money is about 2.5x the nett yield from rents on a newly purchased investment property. To make it immediately financially viable the charity either needs cash reserves of its own or it needs a (roughly) 60% discount on the price.
The problem for National is that a 60% discount completely rebuts every possible argument advanced for selling the houses.
Here’s some numbers….
Housing NZ housing portfolio in 2015 market value $20,900 million.
Housing NZ rental income for 2015/2016 year $1,076 million. That’s a gross yield from rents of 5.15%
Expenses for Housing NZ were;
Repairs and maintenance $289 million
Rates on properties $115 million
Water rates $34 million
Personnel costs $94 million
Other expenses $113 million
Total expenses $645 million which leaves a nett rental income of $431 million, a rental yield of 2.06%. Housing NZ charges market rents and the social housing providers will also charge market rents and have similar expenses to Housing NZ.
Interest on a loan to buy the housing portfolio would be 5.5-6%, meaning the deal can’t fly unless the price is discounted by a good 60% OR the buyer has substantial cash reserves to tide them over until inflation-driven rent increases improves the cash flow. The would-be buyers don’t have any spare cash.
The issue there as I read it is that the Queenstown charity was selling the houses and the court was not convinced of that as a charitable purpose.
Investing in private development to raise cash for charitable purposes is a different proposition since the purpose is not the property development, it’s to raise money.
More generally, Social housing would fall under relief of poverty, which is one of the charitable purposes in the Statute of Elizabeth. Building houses to rent them very cheaply to the impoverished would count, for example.
It might be more successful if Labour were to package up all the state houses being sold off as an issue they are fighting and publicise it on social media, MSM and non MSM media, rather than do it regionally…. better still work with the Greens and NZ First on it as a joint policy that you all agree on…
Make it the first thing, crystal clear, and point of difference between Labour and National housing policy!
Not only that they are selling them way under value, ripping off the tax payers as well as enriching cronies buying them up!
Even the most ardent Natz supporter will be against corruption and poor management!
Everyone else will be against the State house privatisation in the first place!
I dunno. They were fighting the good fight but until now they were a bit toothless, there really isn’t much the opposition can do to stop asset sales as such. But this isn’t about just asset sales, it’s about selling assets for only a small fraction of their worth and that does give the opposition some teeth.
What people don’t seem to be grasping is that the Tauranga deal can’t proceed without the massive discount. It may not be possible to stop National selling assets but it should be possible to prevent them giving assets away for nothing. Stopping the discount should therefore logically stop the sale of the state houses. But now it may be too late because the deal has recently been signed and takes effect in April.
I disagree, the opposition could stop asset sales by jointly opposing them and doing a big advertising campaign about what the Natz are up to. The Natz are very concerned with focus groups and the like and they are already close to the wind on the Sky City deal that 95% of people opposed.
The opposition are not really banging home on the real issues that MOST members of the public are opposed to.
If Labour, NZ First and Greens are really serious about working together to form a new government and get the Natz out, that is a way to prove they can work together on point issues such as saving state housing state assets, even if they don’t agree on other issues.
Much debate on the Daily Blog at the moment on the Mt Albert by election.
Yet hardly any here.
Are people on this site as concerned as Chris Trotter and Martin Bradbury about the potential for damage caused by the Mt Albert by election?
Or do you agree with Keith Locke?
Or do you have a different opinion?
Martin Bradbury : How Jacinda Arden loses the Mt Albert by-election
Chris Trotter : In To Win – Responding to Keith Locke’s Post on the Mt Albert By-Election.
Keith Locke : Mt Albert by-election good opportunity for the Greens
Sadly, Paul, the preoccupation of some on this site seems to be on recycling black propaganda against dissenters like Julian Assange.
Our focus should be on changing the government in 2017 to a government that offers a real alternative to neo-liberalism.
33 years since the Douglas coup d’etat .
33 years since the working class in New Zealand were represented.
Time for that to change.
Bradbury has been attacking the Greens for a year or so. Trotter often attacks Labour. They’ve been stirring up opposition re-the by-election.
My impression here is that people are not so upset about the Greens standing along side Ardern.
Myself, as I work for Auckland Council, there are policies about workers public endorsing a political party in elections. So I don’t say a lot about elections, especially with Auckland elections..
I think Bradbury is right, the Greens should not be contesting the by Election. I was a bit on the fence at first, but if the big picture is to get votes in the General Election and present Labour and Greens as working together, then fighting it out in a by-election where anything other than a Labour victory would help National the most is another type of repeat of Te Tai Tokerau… a hollow victory.
Natz are not smart people, but their advisors are….
“What happens if Bill English tells National Party voters that they could damage Labour’s election chances if Jacinda lost and they vote for Julie Anne Genter instead?”
“What if he was more subtle and says, ‘National could work with the Greens, you should vote for Julie Anne Genter”.”
This could be a highly amusing election, which candidate is going to court the National voters 🙂
Or is this a double-bluff by Bradbury to get the Greens an electorate seat by giving the National voters the idea to vote for the Greens! 🙂
Nah, all the Nats should vote for Penny. Then neither the Greens nor Labour get the seat.
That could possibly be the most brilliant thing that could ever happen in NZ politics
To give you an idea of how good that idea is I would chose that option over John Key not retiring from politics
This is a thing, I’m going to email Bill Englishs office to help make this a reality…nope on second thought I’m going to take this higher, I’m going to my paymasters (the ones who really run this planet) and see if I can’t ask a favour from them
Penny for Mt Albert!
Paymasters don’t deign to grant favours, Pucky! Just continue doing as you are told.
*Still hurting from being abandoned by Key, I see. That burn will last a lifetime; how could he have done that to us??? The question of why Key jumped ship is going to provide entertainment for us for a long to to come.
You’d be surprised at what you can exchange ones soul for…
Yeah, but you can only do that once, Pucky, and yours went long ago…
Worked out the reason for Key’s inglorious departure yet? Love to hear your view.
After a (much deserved) Christmas break and through deliberation the only reasonable conclusion is that Sir John Key thrives on a challenge and because there was no challenge he couldn’t muster up the enthusiasm to run another campaign
You spent your holiday anguishing over Slur John?
Figures.
I thought everyone did?
I heard yellow belly Key ran away because polls were showing that woman in particular were seeing him in his true colors …. that is a cheating, greedy, liar with a creepy hair fetish …..
Places where he has previously worked have a history of going bankrupt or facing some kind of speculative crisis not long after he has left ..
Lets hope his wrecker ball ways are confined to the National party and not NZ …..
…………………..
Personally I think he has a obvious drinking problem…. with a bar in his office, slurred words, liquid lunches, pissed in Parliament and getting to drunk to hammer a nail into soft pine …..or understand simple questions ….
He’s a belligerent snarky sneaky drinker as well….Tory to the core
Merrill Lynch was known as a piss-heads paradise…. in between all the cheating and derivatives scamming they did on their way to going bankrupt … …. with their company called the ‘blundering herd’.
But Bill English will put on the boxing gloves again for Puckish … although he punches like ruth richardson
The lizards will surely agree. 🙂
Had another senior Grey Power member call me and offer support regarding the need for transparency in spending of public monies on private sector consultants and contractors.
You may be surprised just how widespread the appeal is for such transparency?
Penny Bright
2017 Independent candidate Mt Albert by-election.
Bradbury loves to think up cunning plans that aren’t really feasible. It’s one thing for National to ask its supporters to vote for whatsisname who looks like Rimmer or Peter Dunne, it’s quite another to ask them to vote for someone as obviously antipathetic to their interests as Julie-Ann Genter. It would be like Labour asking its supporters to tactical-vote for their local ACT candidate. If National did look at it, they’d probably conclude that most of their supporters in the electorate would file the request under “You must be fucking joking pal” and that the cynicism involved would be so blatant the media would certainly cover it.
Psycho Milt,
I am pretty sure you are right on this. While these sorts of games might be beloved by political theorists, in the real world people are not so malleable.
As you note, it is one thing to encourage supporters to vote for someone they know to be aligned with their own party for the specific purpose of gaining the Treasury benches. But they would balk at this. It goes against their basic political beliefs.
In fact it would be hugely damaging for National to give this sort of direction, not just among supporters, but more generally. It would effectively be holding our democratic system in contempt. Most people expect political parties to be true to themselves, not play games of this order.
So I am pretty sure the next MP for Mt Albert will be Jacinda Arden. The only way she won’t be is if National voters spontaneously decide otherwise. They might do so, but it is pretty unlikely. Most people are just not that engaged with politics.
National claim they are keeping their powder dry but Labour are getting time in front of the Voters and headlines.
Interesting comment. Mt Albert has thousands of Nat voters and most will turn out and vote. Who will they vote for? Will they plump for the Labour candidate or will they choose to give Labour a bloody nose and elect Genter?
Once a National vote Green once a small percentage will vote green again in the general election.
Political science 101.
Tricledrown
This is always a risk with such games.
It is why it is so hard to win back seats at the next election that have gone to third parties. Many voters will not immediately reverse their votes, since they don’t like to admit they made a mistake.
No one gives a fuck what you think fsiassi
Please stop dissing the guy’s name. Racism is neither cute nor effective. Aren’t his often-pathetic points enough to respond to?
It would be extra amusing if nuttyanal voters remember that advice come election time.
errr …. why would the good people of Mt Albert vote for their MP someone who is already an MP?
Both Jacinda Adern and Julie-Anne Genter are already MPs.
How about a really decisive protest vote against the rorts, ripoffs and corruption, which have helped transform New Zealand into a corrupt, polluted tax haven, and vote into the House the proven anti-corruption (and anti-privatisation) campaigner, who has ‘blown the whistle till her eyeballs bled’ (as it were), persistently and consistently against corruption for the last TEN years?
I’m not an MP (yet).
But what better way to help make a fuss about corruption than to vote Independent candidate Penny Bright MP for Mt Albert?
I’m not a member of ANY political party.
I’ll ‘hit the ground running’.
No sitting in the House quietly ‘breathing in through my nose’.
I’ll be breathing out through my nose.
FIRE!
Parliament won’t know what the hell hit it 🙂
Penny Bright
Proven ‘anti-privatisation / anti-corruption campaigner’.
2017 Independent candidate Mt Albert by-election.
How would they get the overwhelming stench of cat’s pee out of the debating chamber ?
Why are you going to be in the debating chamber Stunned Mullet?
😉
The only reasonable response to this is:
Mt Albert
Ohhhh Bugger !!!
Having made an initial (and somewhat grumpy) comment on the matter here in late December ( /open-mike-27122016/#comment-1280032 ) , I’ve been working on a post for my Blog entitled Mt Albert Mousetrap. I just knew that if I left it too long someone else would have similar thoughts … and they have … Brads and Trots anticipating most (but not quite all) of my argument.
Bugger, Bugger Bugger !!!
As I already wrote in my draft … “In trying to win a relatively trivial battle for their own Party, the Greens are in danger of losing the entire War for the Left.”
On the one hand, I think – with no candidate – a disproportionate number of Mt Albert Nats will stay home on By-Election day. But I suspect that at least a reasonable minority of the maybe 30-35% of Tories who do get out and vote will be the kind of Party loyalists who are more than prepared to hold their noses and do what’s best for the Nats (vote Genter to embarrass Labour and sew division on the Left). Not necessarily a majority of Nat voters (I agree that for many it will just go too much against the grain) but quite possibly a large minority.
But perhaps even more importantly – and I don’t think Brads or Trots entirely got to the heart of this (they certainly haven’t spelt it out in any way) – an overwhelming 73% of Green Party-Voters backed Shearer in the Candidate-Vote at the last Election. That was way ahead of the average Labour MP – in the Country as a whole, just 47% of Greens Candidate-Voted Labour.
Indeed, Shearer was one of those rare Labour MPs whose Candidate-Vote was derived, first and foremost (ie more than half), from non-Labour voters.
So, in a one-vote By-Election, where voters can’t enjoy the (General Election) luxury of being able to separate out their core political allegiance (as expressed in the Party-Vote) from their favoured personality (Candidate-Vote), it’s reasonable to assume that a significant chunk of that 73% of Greens (5810 voters to be precise) are going to reaffirm their primary political allegiance and chose Genter. All the more so when there is no National candidate to scare them into strategically voting Ardern.
It’s important to avoid being too alarmist, though. I doubt that Ardern is any great danger of actually losing the seat …
… But – with a potential majority of 2014 Green-Shearer voters combining forces with a potential large minority of Nats – it’s quite possible Genter will slash Labour’s majority. And in a seat that Farrar has already loudly proclaimed one of “Labour’s” safest (in fact, it’s a Shearer stronghold, not a Labour one. Labour received just 29% f the Party-Vote at the last Election).
So you can imagine the headlines in a media where senior journalists are often subtlely influenced (to put it generously) by Farrar et al.
I’ve got a few other points to make … so may still do the post … but it’s a real bugger when someone (in fact 2 geezers) beats you to it, especially after I’d done quite a bit of work on it.
All three of you seem to be relying on an assumption that Green voters are less capable of voting tactically in a by-election than Nat ones.
Yeah, but with no National candidate, most Greens will assume there is no need to vote tactically. For them, it’s between Ardern and their own candidate … so they’ll assume it’s a win-win situation and hence why not vote Genter. And the Greens will presumably be going all out to win. I don’t think we can rely on ordinary Green voters in Mt Albert getting the message that a slashed Labour majority will generate enormous hostility within the Left and dire headlines in the media.
Greens have certainly strategically voted for the Labour candidate in other recent By Elections (ie those where a Green candidate also stood). But we now find ourselves in a unique situation where there is no National candidate to scare them in Labour’s direction.
I’m sure plenty of Greens will, indeed, vote Ardern … but I doubt it’ll be anything like the 73% who chose Shearer at the (two-vote) General Election.
It was the guitar.
Just so Pete Seeger.
Climate change – Northland hotter, more droughts, floods and erosion
Climate Change Projections and
Implications for Northland
Right little cheer germs aren’t they? At least they know we exist!
And now they’re stealing water…http://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503450&objectid=11784239
From the local store and the who owns the store could have exploited the situation by putting up the price of bottled water…he didn’t, he’s selling it at cost.
Impossible to predict..
‘Projected’
Whatever the outcomes, they’re now locked in!
There are a myriad of threats which are highly likely to cull the human species well in advance of 2090
Guy McPherson has said this.
Don’t underestimate the star power of Jacinda. A lot of right wingers will vote for her because she is the closest we have to a political celebrity.
No we really won’t
You’d take one for the team Pucky.
No offence but I really don’t think that Jacinda is the closest we have to a political celebrity…. nor do I think true right wingers will vote for her…
No disrespect – but why didn’t that work in Auckland Central?
Hypocritical hand-wringing in the US over Russia meddling in the election.
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/39159-noam-chomsky-on-the-long-history-of-us-meddling-in-foreign-elections
Mmm – should be taught in schools in the best of all worlds
TOP’s Environmental Policy
Swimmable rivers and lakes, sustainable farming. TOP’s default goal is for swimmable rivers, unless local communities decide otherwise. We want intensification of land use to cease unless the impacts can be offset. TOP will invest in monitoring, research, improving water quality and resolving Treaty claims. This will be paid for by a levy on commercial water users and polluters, paid into regional Nature Investment Funds (NIFs).
Protect and restore our oceans. TOP will use spatial planning to ensure all ocean users have fair access to the resources in our Exclusive Economic Zone. This would also ensure that at least 10% of all ecosystems is set aside as no-take reserves, with compensation for existing users where appropriate. This process would be funded by a resource rental on all commercial ocean resource users.
Enhancing our natural assets. TOP will impose a $20 levy on all tourists entering the country. This revenue will be used to improve local infrastructure and placed in an independently managed fund that can be invested with partners to get the best biodiversity return (which may include the Regional Council NIFs).
Resource Management – Less paperwork, more protection. TOP will ensure that development which delivers no net loss of natural capital can proceed in a timely fashion. Any use of biodiversity offsets will be quality assured. RMA fines will be directed to restoring the damage caused by the breach.
the silence around top on this site is deafening , worried they are
I’ll be interested to hear what you think of Eugenie Sage’s blog (Sacha’s link).
”TOP is promoting tradeable pollution rights, similar to the Emissions Trading Scheme, when there’s little evidence that allowing polluters to trade the right to pollute will improve water quality and a high risk that tradeable pollution rights will make water and land use management more complicated. The Emissions Trading Scheme has greenhouse emissions trending up when we want them going down, so we hardly want its equivalent to prevent nitrates, sediment and other contaminants going into our rivers, oceans, soils and atmosphere.”
I note she makes no mention that top propose a lowering bar on pollution.
ets will never work because it’s global so to prone to crooks, but an in house nz one could work as long as scum like key is never in charge of it.
best case scenario is the greens at least hold their % and top get over the 5% mark , they seem to have a lot in common.
From the policy announcements so far they seem a bit vague, and I don’t think that’s great if you’re trying to attract voters to you. Case in point was their first policy launched, taxing property owners more. But I can’t tell you how much they will taxed, which is fairly important.
They also want to force elderly people with a mortgage-free home and low income to mortgage their house to pay a property tax. That alone would stop me voting for them. Morgan has some good ideas but when he gets to the detail comes across as clueless about what matter. Same with his UBI model which ignores the supplementary benefits that most beneficiaries are dependent on.
Eugenie Sage of the Green party assesses Gareth’s environmental policies: https://blog.greens.org.nz/2017/01/20/tops-environmental-policy-no-threat-to-ours/
A song for the great, soon to be gone for ever, President Hopey-Changey,
from the people of Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Gaza….
Thats not a song it has no passion.
Or theatre.
And for the younger people with passion
Fair comment. I was going by the title only, and ignored the fact that this is a song with no passion.
However, when you stop to think about it, it’s entirely appropriate for a president with no passion. He couldn’t even sigh convincingly during his farcical performance on Robben Island….
another rogue poll from Roy Morgan……..
Seriously – Labour need to find a good way to differentiate from National. Sale and privatisation of NZ assets like State houses are a good place to start to show the difference in policy!
They need to shout it from the roof tops…
In case anyone is wondering, heres the link:
http://www.roymorgan.com/findings/7127-roy-morgan-new-zealand-voting-intention-january-2017-201701201143
For those short of time, National up and Lab/Green down
But, but John Keys has gone, what’s going on? he’s the only reason people voted National, I don’t understand?
Lol, there will be so many confused leftwingers.
His sycophantic followers haven’t realised he’s gone. They can still smell his heavenly perfume in the room. Can’t you.
I’m thinking of starting up a petition to bring back John and make him be president for life and it doesn’t even bother what party hes leader of, in fact he could take turns being leader of the rest of the parties
Wonderful idea, Pucky!
Let me help: Calling all readers of The Standard. Puckish Rogue is inviting you to sign his petition to Bring Back John Key! Show your support for Pucky, and for “Sir John” by leaving a supportive comment below. With your support, Pucky believes he can Bring Back John!
(I’ve taken the liberty of signing up James as a matter of course, Pucky)
Edit: Oh, and fisiani
Can Richie be his Vice? As it were
Nah, mate.
It’s the MoU effect.
It was a stupid idea from the day it was signed.
Wouldn’t that be “from the day it was conceived”?
You seem … confused.
Problem for the Left is that the move from socialism is too late to stop. The TOP party will gobble their votes and then if they get 5% will want to be in government. A 4% drop means a National Government a 5% + vote means a National/TOP government
I reckon National will come in around 53% at the next election, won’t be any need for coalitions.
Watch National % start to take off over the next 3-4 months.
Its ok once the voters get to know Bill the party vote will drop 🙂
Hey, triple bores! 3 in a row!
How often does that happen???
Hey, triple bores! 3 in a row!
How often does that happen???
Quite often…
A regular hate in 🙂
No – you have it wrong. Its when the people get to know Angry Andy that Labours vote will increase.
Just to squeeze Robert in beteeen 4 rwnj i also see Uk labour also are doing well (sarc) Jeremy Corbyn’s net approval rating continues to plummet, now hitting -43%. what’s going on why are the dumb ass masses not buying the hard left kool aid
Of course the important figure is
“The NZ Roy Morgan Government Confidence Rating has increased to 140pts (up 9pts) in January with 63% (up 4.5%) of NZ electors saying NZ is ‘heading in the right direction’ compared to 23% (down 4.5%) that say NZ is ‘heading in the wrong direction’.”
Things are good and heading in the right direction. Bill was an architect of this. Why change the government and mess it all up.
oh – and thats got to hurt with National up with Bill in charge.
Oh and MEGA Fail ….
Another Dotcom promise that fizzed.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11786023
A terrible thing is unfolding in Melbourne.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=11786021
Wishing all the best to everybody caught up in this…..
Man, what a fuckwit.