I suspect that Cunliffe has put quite a bit of personal thought into these questions over the last 12 months đ
My take: a sense of elite entitlement and loss of accountability to ordinary members – indeed sometimes outright disdain of those members. quite similar to the Tory ‘born to rule’ conceit, in fact.
And now, after 30 years, we’re going to finish taking our party back this November, goddammit.
My take: a sense of elite entitlement and loss of accountability to ordinary members â indeed sometimes outright disdain of those members. quite similar to the Tory âborn to ruleâ conceit, in fact.
– We elect them when they do shit like this (both sides of the political spectrum) so why should they change?
– I mean Clark flagrantly breaking the law and dropping the cop in it and would anyone from Labour suggest she be gotten rid of? (at the time) and add any example you want of Key for the same thing
– We keep rewarding them so keep acting how they want to and so it goes…
Your use of Helen Clark as an example is petty and small minded. Key has fucked this country over to the tune of billions of dollars to his rich mates and eroded the civil rights of every NZer.
Bottom line is that MPs in each party need to be held more accountable to their membership. When is National going to do this?
When Prebble was Minister of State-Owned Enterprises in the 1980s, then yes; there was the sale of far too many assets. But I regard those dark Douglas days as being a perversion of Labour into an almost proto-ACT party, rather than the return to its socialist roots that I hope Cunliffe’s 6th Labour government will represent.
Nope sorry no matter the spin Douglas and Prebble were part of Labour which reinforces the point of ministers acting how they want with virtually nil ramifications
Douglas & Prebble were indeed members of the 4th Labour government. The leader of the soon to be 6th Labour-led government has stated that he refused in 1987 to be recruited by Treasury due to his opposition to their policies (in TDB interview last night). So the chances of his replicating their folly is hopefully minimal.
As for ramifications:
“Prebble retained his Auckland Central seat in the 1990 election, which Labour lost, arguably because of public dissatisfaction with the reforms. In the 1993 election, however, Prebble lost his seat to Sandra Lee-Vercoe, deputy leader of the left-wing Alliance. For the next three years, he worked as a consultant.”
Then in 1996 he became an MP for the ACT party started by his mate Douglas.
I remember back in the eighties when Lange won.We Labour party members were on a high,every thing and anything was possible, like the Kennedy years for the Americans.
Some months later i was at a meeting attended by Prebble,Caygill and De Cleene.The meeting was held at the local offices of various unions, and also the office of the local party.The meeting was a fiery one, with the local union orginisers and their sub branch members, along with the local Party members.The barny that ensued was about the direction that the government were taking us At the end of the meeting as the Parliamentarians were leaving were over heard to say Union officials, and they chuckled, as they went down the stairs..
It is without question that our elected, and more importantly, our list representatives, are out of touch with the every day rank and file and party members who vote for them, and the recent election has shone a glaring light on that.
Power to the Party members, and lets hope it continues.
My take: a sense of elite entitlement and loss of accountability to ordinary members â indeed sometimes outright disdain of those members. quite similar to the Tory âborn to ruleâ conceit, in fact.
In other words: a total absorption into the neocon mindset of the Beltway bubble (albeit a less harsh version of the Nat model) where members and affiliates cease to be of any importance. What’s the bet more than one ABCer reflected this week about… how much easier and better it would be if there were no members and affilliates in the Labour Party.
Yes even when the writing was on the wall they still persisted in voting for the wrong person
That would have given us
Goff
Shearer
and then RobertsonFFS
Unbelievable And as for unity the biggest attack lines the right and msm has been the disunity in caucus as evidenced by the vote. Did they not see this coming ? are they so out of touch they actually thought Robertson a stood a chance ? Did they not see the media narratives around such a split vote that would eventuate?
Someone should tell them that the biggest enemy is actually the Tories not Cunliffe et el.
The membership agreed with most of the caucus who voted for Robertson. Membership were not unanimously behind Cunliffe, by any means.
So I think the “disconnect” can be overstated.
And I also think that expecting different votes from different groups is reasonable.
So my conclusion is that Sanctuary is overstating the case when talking about a “deep divide”. But I note a couple of tories have been having fun stoking the debate, which is nice for them I guess.
item b is obvious. Build more democracy into the Party. Give the members more say on who represents them. Not sure why we would want the caucus should have a separate vote for leader they should get the same vote as any other member.
Also we need to get the party list process right. We have to decide if we should have open or closed list selection and ordering of the party list. I myself are leaning towards a fully open list where the public can have input into the list but would like to hear alternative views
The Greens do the list reasonably well
Delegates at election conference meet candidates and assess them
They report back to branches who put together list this is aggregated
And becomes the recommended list
This new list goes to wider membership who then can rank candidates in a stv type system
(with a couple of tweaks for gender and geographical balance)
Problems are that sitting MP ‘s have an advantage because of profile and name recognition
and better resourced candidates can visit branches to get there name out there more widely and enhance their profile. This has happened to great effect last time around with at least one of the candidates getting a much higher ranking then from the initial delegate list (members should have listened to the delegates đ
All in all it works quite well with a very strong competent united team. As can be witnessed by there strong performance in this last term.
Labour could learn from this
Really Claire? Just because Pinokeyo says it doesn’t make it true, and I really don’t need you to report his spin on his failures.
One of the main aims of Mr Key’s trip to Europe is to nudge the EU into trade talks – New Zealand is one of only about five countries yet to start negotiations.
He raised the issue with British Prime Minister David Cameron yesterday, and told the media afterwards that the UK could be a powerful advocate for New Zealand’s case because it was a key figure in the EU.
A key figure? The country that hasn’t joined the Eurozone and is in holding a referendum on membership? If he was talking the Merkel or Hollande he would have a point.
“Europe is the biggest economy in the world, it’s a powerful economy notwithstanding the challenges it’s had. And if New Zealand could advance a trade agreement with Europe it would be quite important,” he said.
Last year Nact was calling the EU a basketcase and blaming this non-key trading partner problems for our continuing economic hole.
How about holding him up to his spin instead of hanging on to it? John Hartevelt did a better job of it.
An economy can be powerful and a basketcase at the same time. Those two terms don’t contradict each other.I would argue both the EU and US fit this category.
The article you link to doesn’t blame the non-key trading partner for our economic hole it blames the weakening US and EU economies for the strength of our dollar. That seems reasonable to me – also at the time of that article (October last year) Europe was a basketcase and it still is.
Finally, while the UK may not be as key as Germany it would still be considered a key member by most given the size of its economy – it is the second largest economy (if going by GDP).
Entropy. After three decades of cheap high density fuel flooding the western economies is it any wonder that society, economy, culture is in such chaos. Rebuilding requires that the right wing state gets off the backs of normal people who want to express and live their lives.
“An economy can be powerful and a basketcase at the same time”
Nah, a basketcase is a basketcase. It can be influential, but not powerful because other players can dismantle it if they choose to do so. E.g. the Greek economy is influential in EU economic decsion-making and a basketcase. It would take real spin to turn that situation into stating the Greek economy is powerful.
Key and English spent quite a lot of time blaming the New Zealand poor performing economy and trade deficits on conditions in Europe while ignoring the booming economies of our nearest trading partners Australia and China. Not much was asked about why the NZ economy didn’t get a boost from Aust and China but was impacted by Europe.
“Europe was a basketcase and it still is”
The periphery is in trouble. Core Europe is doing ok – the bit I live in is doing better than NZ in many ways.
And the UK has not the 2nd biggest economy, by GDP, in Europe since 2008 – austerity for the masses will do that to an economy – and any soft power the UK had was diminished by refusing to join the Euro and it’s referendum decision. It’s not committed and that seriously affects it’s power in the union.
The Court of Appeal chose yesterday to uphold last year’s decision by the Employment Court that employers paying the minimum wage had to pay their KiwiSaver contributions on top. This would give some minimum-wage workers an extra $540 a year.
Key was invited by Conservative Party leader and British counterpart David Cameron to a gathering of most of his MPs in Chipping Norton, a couple of hours northwest of London.
Key gave a speech to the MPs and strategists and joined in a “deeply political conversation” with high-ranking Cabinet ministers including Chancellor George Osborne and Home Secretary Theresa May.
Key also chatted with the controversial Australian political strategist Lynton Crosby, who advises Cameron.
Yes most interesting Tracey.Just what are they up too/
In fact its a bit scary ,120 Tory MP’s Crosby Textor smells a bit strong . In wonder if they are planning the next NZ election and how the UK Right would be able to help the NZ
Lets not forget that we were never told who payed for the ” Cossack adverts back in the 1970’s
Labour people need to keep a watchful eye on this . There was a good reason why they held this meeting with closed doors.
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell 7.2.1
Trying to watch the Live coverage of the yachting, but no, all I get is about 2 seconds and the stream just freezes. Every other site I use streams perfectly. So I figure TVNZ must have been sitting with fingers crossed that they didn’t get more then 20 people at once wanting to watch. This must be what happens when the govt strips all the cash out of the company, and they have to do it on the cheap\free!
They used to host some of the content (ad’s) out of Oz and nearly crashed the stn X cable when the ch ch earthquake had their site taking alot of hits….perhaps they still do and the site’s pulling content from outside NZ thus the performance.
It’s not so much the cash David, it’s the competance and general savvy and will to do things properly but when 7 Sharp and Best Bits is your idea of quality is it any surprise.
I watched TVNZ ‘live’ without interruption but ran Herald blog at the same time .. TVNZ ‘live’ was 12 minutes behind the Herald blog. I checked time time the blog gave Peter Lester’s comment “like being at the dentist” against when it was webcast == 12 minutes !! no idea how or why .. maybe commercials ?? “Live” ? Yeah, nah.
The one I can’t stream from is TV3. It has to be the AD Blocker, but I can usually find the feed elsewhere, unless it’s Gower making shit up then I don’t bother with it.
Reading all the available resources it is not hard to come to the conclusion that the age of fossil fuel use is coming to an end.
Even here in New Zealand we can see this. Solid Energy is bankrupt, Denniston coal is also bust and can only go ahead with skewed legalisms that prevent climate change being taken into account. And large wind farms that could let us finally close down coal fired Huntly Power Station are prevented from starting through through lack of the barest legislation costing the taxpayer nothing. Meanwhile tens of $millions of tax payer subsidies are being shoveled into encouraging risky extreme deep water oil exploration, as conventional supplies run out.
It all signals one thing, the age of oil and coal is over. And if we keep desperately subsidising these failing technologies our civilisation will be over too.
Nothing is surer.
We need leaders of vision to prevent this catastrophe. (or at the very least soften the crash)
NZ has enough coal for at least 1200 years. Open cast is the way to go, and put the land back nice afterwards. The Coromandels and the Shotover river were extensively mined and are top tourist attractions now.
And then there’s fracking, which in NZ should allow us to put off nuclear power for many years until it is safe enough. The rest of the world can do with a lot of fracking too!
Those who don’t like fracking can stop opposing new hydro dams, especially on the West Coast.
Whatever happened to that wind farm that a councillor voted to allow on her farm at Waiuku, right where the noise would keep Waiuku awake?
In spite of the ranting by right wing weirdo’s about wanting Abbott as NZ’s PM its it’s taken all of five minutes in office for him to show his true colours:
You ain’t seen nothing yet, he’s dissolved the Climate change body also and is warming up into his role as a fundamentalist christian mysoginist homophobic with anger issues…..politics suits him well.
Barrister Julian Burnside writes about Australia’s refugee policy.
So here we are: Australia in 2013. We have forgotten our origins and our good fortune, we are blind to our own selfishness. In place of memory we cling to a national myth of a generous, welcoming country, a land of new arrivals where everyone gets a fair go; a myth in which vanity fills the emptiness where the truth was forgotten.
‘..national myth of a generous, welcoming country..’ It’s on record Oz favoured europeans re-settling there after WW2.
The Lib’s have tapped past the thin veneer of ‘ a fair go’ into an Oz that most who live there discover very quickly. Wander out of the CBD’s into suburbia or better still rural Oz and it’s rather old fashioned shall we say.
Garrett should reform the Oils now he’s left parliament, their material has never been so relevant.
Brisbane often reminds me of Auckland in the 80s. Some of the places in rural Queensland are just scary. The xenophobia and bigotry has a more overwhelming presence than sulphur in Rotorua. Newman in Queensland and Abbott federally will take it back even further. If they get their way, it’ll become a land that WhaleSpew would be proud to call home.
Rural Oz is scary, probably Tassie being the least scary with alot of foodie/produce/artisan diversity and a massive social welfare dependancy relative to other states.
A good interview : Cunliffe indicates his broad policy directions.
He joined the Daily Blog Editors Selwyn Manning and Martyn Bradbury to discuss what challenges New Zealand faces and what bis solutions are to those challenges.
A pity that Cunliffe made a perceived big booboo at his first great opportunity to impress the public with ‘caucus’ vs ‘Corus’. A bit of lost ground to make up there with the ‘general’ voters. Our stupid media concentrates on such simple errors as their information highlight unfortunately. They do a great injustice to real democracy and politics. [Less than 200 people have viewed Cunliffe’s daily blog interview so far, while hundreds of thousands watched his booboo highlighted by our stupid Main Stream Media!]
CP @ 13.1.1 – you really, really identify that slip of the tongue as something that’ll stick with Cunliffe right through to the last of the leaders’ debates in 2014 ? Unlike the now cemented tangible sense amongst how many tens maybe hundreds of thousands that ShonKey Python is, well, shonky ?
You think that we’re going to see an opinion poll in the lead-up to the election in which the greatest number of respondents are moved to mention as the tipping point “caucus/chorus” in September 2013 ? Whatever the unfortunately turned out weirdo Potty Gower might choose to say ?
There was a well attended meeting; about the dangers of deep-water oil drilling, in Dunedin last night with Gareth Hughes as key speaker (plus a couple of Otago university lecturers with Green mayoral candidate; Aaron Hawkins, moderating). Simon Hartly; who wrote this acticle for today’s ODT business section, obviously didn’t attend:
“…John Warren, the senior business development manager of Halliburton, covering Australasia.”
“On the question of the Deepwater Horizon seabed blowout and subsequent rig fire in the Gulf of Mexico, which became the United States’ worst environmental disaster, Mr Warren said it was a combination of human and technological error.
There was now more technology, reliability and competence in the workforce. ”
But there isn’t any real incentive for a Deepwater Horizon-style exploratory-phase disaster in NZ to actually be avoided (beyond the loss of their ship), or cleaned-up by the company responsible if it does. There is presently $10 million maximum liability under NZ law, plus $30 million mandatory insurance for the oil drilling. Deepwater Horizon cleanup costs are US$40 billion so far.
That’s a 0.02 cent on the dollar cost; to cut their losses and pay the fine, rather than stay and try to clean-up the problem (if you consider that the insurance premiums will already have been paid).
the “human error” was corporate middle managers fucking around with shortcuts in order to make more money and keep to budgets they had promised the board of directors.
And lets add in the captured and under-resourced regulators in the USA, where they had one inspector for every 40-50 rigs, and anyways the regulators would often be out partying with oil company staff, accepting big gifts from the corporates, accepting favours in the forms of prostitutes etc.
when is parliament going to be available to us proles with only an uhf aerial.
at the moment it seems to be restricted to disc users and sky subscribers.
has parliament become pay per view too?
“Nick Smith should resign. He is not the Minister for Conservation; he is the minister for large-scale dams; he is the minister for water pollution; he’s the minister for wiping out New Zealand’s native fish. He has no right to occupy the Minister of Conservation portfolio.”
He is the Minister of tents, caravans, sheds and ‘lean-tos’ and Minister for Property Developers’,” says Sue Henry, Spokesperson for the Housing Lobby.
“He should resign forthwith from the Housing portfolio.”
“It is a disgrace when State Housing tenants are forced out of their homes and along with others referred to sub-standard caravan parks and temporary ‘doss houses’ by Housing New Zealand, when thousands of State houses sit empty, and some have done so for well over over one year.”
“Vulnerable driven to caravan parks” (TV3 News !9 September 2013)
“It’s misleading and deceptive for Nick Smith to promote affordable housing when he’s delivering unaffordable housing, where $700,000 houses are being sold off the plans (eg: Apirana Ave, Glen Innes).”
“This of course, is after the forced removal of State housing tenants and their affordable State houses, which have been, and are being trucked out of the area.”
“This is being replicated in other parts of New Zealand, against the wishes of both the tenants and their communities in which some lived for decades.”
“This situation is becoming critical, and is totally unacceptable.”
“A moratorium to cease forthwith State house removals must be implemented immediately. ”
Sue Henry
Spokesperson
Housing Lobby
_________________________________________________________________________
No one in their eighties or at any age should be expected to trot 50 metres to use a toilet several times a night. This would cause me sleep deprivation as I would be awake just after one trip in the freezing cold.
I knew that HNZ was not performing. I have underestimated how despicable the government are regarding housing. I’d like to see how long they would last in a caravan park.
In an interview on âSquawk Box,â the founder of hedge fund Duquesne Capital said that the Federal Reserveâs policy of quantitative easing was inflating stocks and other assets held by wealthy investors like himself. But the price of making the rich richer will be paid by future generations.
âThis is fantastic for every rich person,â he said Thursday, a day after the Fedâs stunning decision to delay tightening its monetary policy. âThis is the biggest redistribution of wealth from the middle class and the poor to the rich ever.â
âWho owns assetsâthe rich, the billionaires. You think Warren Buffett hates this stuff? You think I hate this stuff? I had a very good day yesterday.â
Druckenmiller, whose net worth is estimated at more than $2 billion, said that the implication of the Fedâs policy is that the rich will spend their wealth and create jobsâessentially betting on âtrickle-down economics.â
âI mean, maybe this trickle-down monetary policy that gives money to billionaires and hopefully we go spend it is going to work,â he said. âBut it hasnât worked for five years.â
The U$ Home of NeoLiberalism and the inspiration of our RWNJ politicians:
“These individuals represent a social type. The saying of Balzac, âBehind every great fortune there is a great crime,â was never truer than for the American ruling class. The list is full of people* who made their money not through any contribution to the productive process, but through various forms of financial swindling, speculation and the impoverishment of working people*
âAccumulation of wealth at one pole is at the same time accumulation of misery, agony of toil, slavery, ignorance, brutality, mental degradation, at the opposite pole,â wrote Marx. And so it is. The Census Bureau report, âIncome, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2012,â showed that the income of a typical household in the US has fallen to the lowest level since 1989, while poverty remains at the highest levels in decades.”
There will always be people who need help from the community. Those who are already filthy rich, and presently get the most help, should not be among them. The economic system that we live under should not contribute to this number, but people will always have accidents, get sick, or have physical deficiencies. I want a system that means these people don’t miss out. I don’t want SSlands’ system, where even a dry spot on footpaths is denied to the needy.
amirite
I like this bit.
“The king earns an annual salary of around 825,000 euros ($1.1 million), though maintaining the Royal House â castles, parades and all â costs the government more than 100 million euros annually. ”
And he should be looking for a smaller throne. The one he was on is wide enough for two.
Austerity and cuts are helping the Dutch Government to shrink the economy so it will fit into a mini-size oil tanker which the pollies will then sail away to spend in a more deserving country leaving the rest of the country to run a participation society, i.e. where they all do their own thing and don’t have to pay any taxes at all as they just look after themselves. I think this is the unspoken end of this utopian, retrograde stumble.
WTF!!! Tax payer money has been spent in the Supreme Court to obtain a declaration that resource management law, as currently worded, excludes climate change considerations.
Just one more law for a new government to change. In the meantime, mass opposition to standard extraction practices needs to grow to the level where mining executives are thought of as being lower than pedophiles, and too embarrassed to show their faces in public.
I’m bloody gobsmacked!!I!!
There’s a documentary on TV3 at the moment about NZ SIS agents’ life and work and how they see themselves in the global economy.
I never thought our security intelligence agencies would – indeed COULD be that open.
I think its called ‘Johny English Reborn’ – or something like that.
It shows how important and competent our intelligence services are in contributing to our safety, and the protection of us all as a sovereign nation.
I’m still coming to terms with how open and up front our intelligence services are as they strive to protect us as NewZill citizens. There’s even one or two Murray radicals in there showing us that we’ve nothing to fear if we have nothing to hide.
God …. it’s such a relief to know – given all this GCSB, TICS, TPPA and other crap that’s going on in the background.
My God – there really are Mightier men than Me! (Geeeez – and I mean I’m pretty butch to start with, but God – I never knew!)
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Indonesiaâs armed forces still have a lot of work to do in making proper use of drones. Two major challenges are pilot training and achieving interoperability between the services. Another is overcoming a predilection for ...
The StrategistBy Sandy Juda Pratama, Curie Maharani and Gautama Adi Kusuma
As a living breathing human being, youâve likely seen the heart-wrenching images from Gaza...homes reduced to rubble, children burnt to cinders, families displaced, and a death toll thatâs beyond comprehension. What is going on in Gaza is most definitely a genocide, the suffering is real, and itâs easy to feel ...
Donald Trump, who has called the Chair of the Federal Reserve “a major loser”. Photo: Getty ImagesLong stories shortest from our political economy on Tuesday, April 22:US markets slump after Donald Trump threatens the Fed’s independence. China warns its trading partners not to side with the US. Trump says some ...
Last night, the news came through that Pope Francis had passed away at 7:35 am in Rome on Monday, the 21st of April, following a reported stroke and heart failure. Pope Francis. Photo: AP.Despite his obvious ill health, it still came as a shock, following so soon after the Easter ...
The 2024 Independent Intelligence Review found the NIC to be highly capable and performing well. So, it is not a surprise that most of the 67 recommendations are incremental adjustments and small but nevertheless important ...
This is a re-post from The Climate BrinkThe world has made real progress toward tacking climate change in recent years, with spending on clean energy technologies skyrocketing from hundreds of billions to trillions of dollars globally over the past decade, and global CO2 emissions plateauing.This has contributed to a reassessment of ...
Hi,I’ve been having a peaceful month of what I’d call “existential dread”, even more aware than usual that — at some point — this all ends.It was very specifically triggered by watching Pantheon, an animated sci-fi show that I’m filing away with all-time greats like Six Feet Under, Watchmen and ...
Once the formalities of honouring the late Pope wrap up in two to three weeks time, the conclave of Cardinals will go into seclusion. Some 253 of the current College of Cardinals can take part in the debate over choosing the next Pope, but only 138 of them are below ...
The National Party government is doubling down on a grim, regressive vision for the future: more prisons, more prisoners, and a society fractured by policies that punish rather than heal. This isnât just a misstep; itâs a deliberate lurch toward a dystopian future where incarceration is the answer to every ...
The audacity of Don Brash never ceases to amaze. The former National Party and Hobsonâs Pledge mouthpiece has now sunk his claws into NZME, the media giant behind the New Zealand Herald and half of our commercial radio stations. Don Brash has snapped up shares in NZME, aligning himself with ...
A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 13, 2025 thru Sat, April 19, 2025. This week's roundup is again published by category and sorted by number of articles included in each. The formatting is a ...
“What I’d say to you is…” our Prime Minister might typically begin a sentence, when he’s about to obfuscate and attempt to derail the question you really, really want him to answer properly (even once would be okay, Christopher). Questions such as “Why is a literal election promise over ...
Ruth IrwinExponential Economic growth is the driver of Ecological degradation. It is driven by CO2 greenhouse gas emissions through fossil fuel extraction and burning for the plethora of polluting industries. Extreme weather disasters and Climate change will continue to get worse because governments subscribe to the current global economic system, ...
A man on telly tries to tell me what is realBut it's alright, I like the way that feelsAnd everybody singsWe are evolving from night to morningAnd I wanna believe in somethingWriter: Adam Duritz.The world is changing rapidly, over the last year or so, it has been out with the ...
MFB Co-Founder Cecilia Robinson runs Tend HealthcareSummary:Kieran McAnulty calls out National on healthcare lies and says Health Minister Simeon Brown is “dishonest and disingenuous”(video below)McAnulty says negotiation with doctors is standard practice, but this level of disrespect is not, especially when we need and want our valued doctors.National’s $20bn ...
Chris Luxonâs tenure as New Zealandâs Prime Minister has been a masterclass in incompetence, marked by coalition chaos, economic lethargy, verbal gaffes, and a moral compass that seems to point wherever political expediency lies. The former Air New Zealand CEO (how could we forget?) was sold as a steady hand, ...
Has anybody else noticed Cameron Slater still obsessing over Jacinda Ardern? The disgraced Whale Oil blogger seems to have made it his lifeâs mission to shadow the former Prime Minister of New Zealand like some unhinged stalker lurking in the digital bushes.The manâs obsession with Ardern isn't just unhealthy...itâs downright ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is climate change a net benefit for society? Human-caused climate change has been a net detriment to society as measured by loss of ...
When the National Party hastily announced its âLocal Water Done Wellâ policy, they touted it as the great saviour of New Zealandâs crumbling water infrastructure. But as time goes by it's looking more and more like a planning and fiscal lame duck...and one thatâs going to cost ratepayers far more ...
Donald Trump, the orange-hued oligarch, is back at it again, wielding tariffs like a mob boss swinging a lead pipe. His latest economic edict; slapping hefty tariffs on imports from China, Mexico, and Canada, has the stench of a protectionist shakedown, cooked up in the fevered minds of his sycophantic ...
In the week of Australia’s 3 May election, ASPI will release Agenda for Change 2025: preparedness and resilience in an uncertain world, a report promoting public debate and understanding on issues of strategic importance to ...
One pill makes you largerAnd one pill makes you smallAnd the ones that mother gives youDon't do anything at allGo ask AliceWhen she's ten feet tallSongwriter: Grace Wing Slick.Morena, all, and a happy Bicycle Day to you.Today is an unofficial celebration of the dawning of the psychedelic era, commemorating the ...
Itâs only been a few months since the Hollywood fires tore through Los Angeles, leaving a trail of devastation, numerous deaths, over 10,000 homes reduced to rubble, and a once glorious film industry on its knees. The Palisades and Eaton fires, fueled by climate-driven dry winds, didnât just burn houses; ...
Four eighty-year-old books which are still vitally relevant today. Between 1942 and 1945, four refugees from Vienna each published a ground-breaking â seminal â book.* They left their country after Austria was taken over by fascists in 1934 and by Nazi Germany in 1938. Previously they had lived in âRed ...
Good Friday, 18th April, 2025: I can at last unveil the Secret Non-Fiction Project. The first complete Latin-to-English translation of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s twelve-book Disputationes adversus astrologiam divinatricem (Disputations Against Divinatory Astrology). Amounting to some 174,000 words, total. Some context is probably in order. Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494) ...
National MP Hamish Campbell's pathetic attempt to downplay his deep ties to and involvement in the Two by Twos...a secretive religious sect under FBI and NZ Police investigation for child sexual abuse...isnât just a misstep; itâs a calculated lie that insults the intelligence of every Kiwi voter.Campbellâs claim of being ...
New Zealand Firstâs Shane Jones has long styled himself as the âPrince of the Provinces,â a champion of regional development and economic growth. But beneath the bluster lies a troubling pattern of behaviour that reeks of cronyism and corruption, undermining the very democracy he claims to serve. Recent revelations and ...
Give me one reason to stay hereAnd I'll turn right back aroundGive me one reason to stay hereAnd I'll turn right back aroundSaid I don't want to leave you lonelyYou got to make me change my mindSongwriters: Tracy Chapman.Morena, and Happy Easter, whether that means to you. Hot cross buns, ...
New Zealandâs housing crisis is a sad indictment on the failures of right wing neoliberalism, and the National Party, under Chris Luxonâs shaky leadership, is trying to simply ignore it. The numbers donât lie: Census data from 2023 revealed 112,496 Kiwis were severely housing deprived...couch-surfing, car-sleeping, or roughing it on ...
The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts & talking about the week’s news with regular and special guests, including: on a global survey of over 3,000 economists and scientists showing a significant divide in views on green growth; and ...
Simeon Brown, the National Partyâs poster child for hubris, consistently over-promises and under-delivers. His track record...marked by policy flip-flops and a dismissive attitude toward expert advice, reveals a politician driven by personal ambition rather than evidence. From transport to health, Brownâs focus seems fixed on protecting National's image, not addressing ...
Open access notables Recent intensified riverine CO2 emission across the Northern Hemisphere permafrost region, Mu et al., Nature Communications:Global warming causes permafrost thawing, transferring large amounts of soil carbon into rivers, which inevitably accelerates riverine CO2 release. However, temporally and spatially explicit variations of riverine CO2 emissions remain unclear, limiting the ...
Once a venomous thorn in New Zealandâs blogosphere, Cathy Odgers, aka Cactus Kate, has slunk into the shadows, her once-sharp quills dulled by the fallout of Dirty Politics.The dishonest attack-blogger, alongside her vile accomplices such as Cameron Slater, were key players in the National Partyâs sordid smear campaigns, exposed by Nicky ...
Once upon a time, not so long ago, those who talked of Australian sovereign capability, especially in the technology sector, were generally considered an amusing group of eccentrics. After all, technology ecosystems are global and ...
The ACT Party leaderâs latest pet project is bleeding taxpayers dry, with $10 million funneled into seven charter schools for just 215 students. Thatâs a jaw-dropping $46,500 per student, compared to roughly $9,000 per head in state schools.Youâd think Seymour wouldâve learned from the last charter school fiasco, but apparently, ...
India navigated relations with the United States quite skilfully during the first Trump administration, better than many other US allies did. Doing so a second time will be more difficult, but Indiaâs strategic awareness and ...
The NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi is concerned for low-income workers given new data released by Stats NZ that shows inflation was 2.5% for the year to March 2025, rising from 2.2% in December last year. âThe prices of things that people canât avoid are rising â meaning inflation is rising ...
Te PÄti MÄori are appalled by Cabinet's decision to agree to 15 recommendations to the Early Childhood Education (ECE) sector following the regulatory review by the Ministry of Regulation. We emphasise the need to prioritise tamariki MÄori in Early Childhood Education, conducted by education experts- not economists. âOur mokopuna deserve ...
The Government must support Northland hapĹŤ who have resorted to rakes and buckets to try to control a devastating invasive seaweed that threatens the local economy and environment. ...
New Zealand First has today introduced a Memberâs Bill that would ensure the biological definition of a woman and man are defined in law. Â âThis is not about being anti-anyone or anti-anything. This is about ensuring we as a country focus on the facts of biology and protect the ...
After stonewalling requests for information on boot camps, the Government has now offered up a blog post right before Easter weekend rather than provide clarity on the pilot. ...
More people could be harmed if Minister for Mental Health Matt Doocey does not guarantee to protect patients and workers as the Police withdraw from supporting mental health call outs. ...
The Green Party recognises the extension of visa allowances for our Pacific whÄnau as a step in the right direction but continues to call for a Pacific Visa Waiver. ...
The Government yesterday released its annual child poverty statistics, and by its own admission, more tamariki across Aotearoa are now living in material hardship. ...
Today, Te PÄti MÄori join the motu in celebration as the Treaty Principles Bill is voted down at its second reading. âFrom the beginning, this Bill was never welcome in this House,â said Te PÄti MÄori Co-Leader, Rawiri Waititi. âOur response to the first reading was one of protest: protesting ...
The Green Party is proud to have voted down the Coalition Governmentâs Treaty Principles Bill, an archaic piece of legislation that sought to attack the nationâs founding agreement. ...
A Memberâs Bill in the name of Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter which aims to stop coal mining, the Crown Minerals (Prohibition of Mining) Amendment Bill, has been pulled from Parliamentâs âbiscuit tinâ today. ...
Labour MP Kieran McAnultyâs Members Bill to make the law simpler and fairer for businesses operating on Easter, Anzac and Christmas Days has passed its first reading after a conscience vote in Parliament. ...
Nicola Willis continues to sit on her hands amid a global economic crisis, leaving the Reserve Bank to act for New Zealanders who are worried about their jobs, mortgages, and KiwiSaver. ...
Australia and New Zealand join forces once more to bring you the best films and TV shows to watch this weekend. This Anzac Day, our free-to-air TV channels will screen a variety of commemorative coverage. At 11am, TVNZ1 has live coverage of the Anzac Day National Commemorative Service in Wellington. ...
Our laws are leaving many veterans who served after 1974 out in the cold. I know, because Iâm one of them.This Sunday Essay was made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.First published in 2024.As I write this story, I am in constant pain. My hands ...
An MP fighting for anti-trafficking legislation says it is hard for prosecutors to take cases to court - but he is hopeful his bill will turn the tide. ...
NONFICTION1 No Words for This by Ali Mau (HarperCollins, $39.99)2 Everyday Comfort Food by Vanya Insull (Allen & Unwin, $39.99)3 Three Wee Bookshops at the End of the World by Ruth Shaw (Allen & Unwin, $39.99)
This Anzac Day marks 110 years since the Gallipoli landings by soldiers in the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps - the ANZACS. It signalled the beginning of a campaign that was to take the lives of so many of our young men - and would devastate the ...
The violent deportation of migrants is not new, and New Zealand forces had a hand in such a regime after World War II, writes historian Scott Hamilton. The world is watching the new Trump government wage a war against migrants it deems illegal. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials and ...
While Anzac Day has experienced a resurgence in recent years, our other day of remembrance has slowly faded from view.This Sunday Essay was made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand. Original illustrations by Hope McConnell.First published in 2022.The high schoolâs head girl and ...
A new poem by Aperahama Hurihanganui, about the name of Aperahama and Abby Haurakiâs three-year-old son, Te Hono ki ÄŞhipa (which translates to âThe Connection to Egyptâ). Te Hono ki ÄŞhipa whatâs in a name? te hono â the connection to your tÄŤpuna, valiant soldiers of the 28th MÄori Battalion ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp');Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions.The post Newsroom daily quiz, Friday 25 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Pacific Media Watch The Fijians for Palestine Solidarity Network today condemned the Fiji governmentâs failure to stand up for international law and justice over the Israeli war on Gaza in their weekly Black Thursday protest. âFor the past 18 months, we have made repeated requests to our government to do ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Michelle Grattan and Amanda Dunn discuss the fourth week of the 2025 election campaign. While the death of Pope Francis interrupted campaigning for a while, the leaders had another debate on Tuesday night and the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Whatever the result on May 3, even people within the Liberals think they have run a very poor national campaign. Not just poor, but odd. Nothing makes the point more strongly than this weekâs ...
The Finance Minister says the leftover funding from the unexpectedly low uptake of the FamilyBoost policy will be redistributed to families who need it. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daniel Ghezelbash, Professor and Director, Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, UNSW Law & Justice, UNSW Sydney People who apply for asylum in Australia face significant delays in having their claims processed. These delays undermine the integrity of the asylum system, erode ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne Every election cycle the media becomes infatuated, even if temporarily, with preference deals between parties. The 2025 election is no exception, with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Hortle, Deputy Director, Tasmanian Policy Exchange, University of Tasmania For each Australian federal election, there are two different ways you get to vote. Whether you vote early, by post or on polling day on May 3, each eligible voter will be ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anna Mortimore, Lecturer, Griffith Business School, Griffith University wedmoment.stock/Shutterstock If elected, the Coalition has pledged to end Laborâs substantial tax break for new zero- or low-emissions vehicles. This, combined with an earlier promise to roll back new fuel efficiency standards, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Pi-Shen Seet, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Edith Cowan University Once again, housing affordability is at the forefront of an Australian federal election. Both major parties have put housing policies at the centre of their respective campaigns. But there are still ...
After a nearly four year hiatus, New Zealandâs premiere popstar is back with a brand new single. Itâs been a thrilling few weeks of breadcrumbing for Lorde fans, as the New Zealand popstar has been teasing her return to the zeitgeist through mysterious silver duct tape on her shoes, rainbow ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Meade, Adjunct Associate Professor, Centre for Applied Energy Economics and Policy Research, Griffith University Daria Nipot/Shutterstock With ongoing cost of living pressures, the Australian and New Zealand supermarket sectors are attracting renewed political attention on both sides of the Tasman. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Erika K. Smith, Associate Lecturer, School of Social Sciences, Western Sydney University This article contains mention of racist terms in historical context. Every Anzac Day, Australians are presented with narratives that re-inscribe particular versions of our national story. One such narrative persistently ...
âAnzac Day is portrayed as a day where the country can reflect on the horrors of war, the costs in human lives and commit collectively to never again allowing genocidal mass murder. We have to ask, is that really happening?â said Valerie Morse, member ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jennifer Parker, Adjunct Fellow, Naval Studies at UNSW Canberra, and Expert Associate, National Security College, Australian National University Australian strategic thinking has long struggled to move beyond a narrow view of defence that focuses solely on protecting our shores. However, in todayâs ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By T.J. Thomson, Senior Lecturer in Visual Communication & Digital Media, RMIT University As Australia begins voting in the federal election, weâre awash with political messages. While this of course includes the typical paid ads in newspapers and on TV (those ones ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Natalie Peng, Lecturer in Accounting, The University of Queensland Shutterstock For Australians approaching retirement, recent market volatility may feel like more than just a bump in the road. Unlike younger investors, who have time on their side, retirees donât have ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Judith Brett, Emeritus Professor of Politics, La Trobe University Beatrice Faust is best remembered as the founder, early in 1972, of the Womenâs Electoral Lobby (WEL). Womenâs Liberation was already well under way. Betty Friedan had published The Feminine Mystique in 1962, ...
The Spinoffâs top picks of events from around the motu. Wow lucky us, itâs time to kiss the wheelie office chairs goodbye and begin another(!) long weekend. As tempting as I know it is to lean into the phone addiction and do just about nothing, you should make the most ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Fitz-Gibbon, Professor (Practice), Faculty of Business and Economics, Monash University In the past week, at least seven women have been killed in Australia, allegedly by men. These deaths have occurred in different contexts â across state borders, communities and relationships. But ...
National MP and diehard Shihad fan Chris Bishop sings the praises of his favourite bandâs classic 1995 album. Last week I went to my first ever Taite Music Prize ceremony, the annual bash to honour independent music in New Zealand. Iâd love to say I was invited, but I wasnât ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wayne Peake, Adjunct research fellow, School of Humanities and Communication Arts, Western Sydney University The story goes that the late billionaire Australian media magnate Kerry Packer once visited a Las Vegas casino, where a Texan was bragging about his ranch and how ...
Coal mine expansion into the West Coastâs Denniston plateau attracted more than 70 protesters over the Easter weekend. Climate activists say this is only the first step in resisting the Bathurst mining company. âOh yeah â right there is where weâre digging trenches to keep tents from getting flooded,â said ...
If my managers were any guide yesterday, today will be a public holiday for the top 10% if ETNZ win the America’s Cup.
Oh and now that the leadership debate has died down, is now the time to ask:
a) how it came to pass that a parliamentary caucus was so fundamentally out of sync with it’s membership and affiliated unions, and
b) how to prevent such a deep divide from re-occurring in the future?
I suspect that Cunliffe has put quite a bit of personal thought into these questions over the last 12 months đ
My take: a sense of elite entitlement and loss of accountability to ordinary members – indeed sometimes outright disdain of those members. quite similar to the Tory ‘born to rule’ conceit, in fact.
And now, after 30 years, we’re going to finish taking our party back this November, goddammit.
My take: a sense of elite entitlement and loss of accountability to ordinary members â indeed sometimes outright disdain of those members. quite similar to the Tory âborn to ruleâ conceit, in fact.
– We elect them when they do shit like this (both sides of the political spectrum) so why should they change?
– I mean Clark flagrantly breaking the law and dropping the cop in it and would anyone from Labour suggest she be gotten rid of? (at the time) and add any example you want of Key for the same thing
– We keep rewarding them so keep acting how they want to and so it goes…
Your use of Helen Clark as an example is petty and small minded. Key has fucked this country over to the tune of billions of dollars to his rich mates and eroded the civil rights of every NZer.
Bottom line is that MPs in each party need to be held more accountable to their membership. When is National going to do this?
+100 absolutely agree.
*Cough* Labour sold off billions of dollars of assets, many more then the present National govt. have
PR
When Prebble was Minister of State-Owned Enterprises in the 1980s, then yes; there was the sale of far too many assets. But I regard those dark Douglas days as being a perversion of Labour into an almost proto-ACT party, rather than the return to its socialist roots that I hope Cunliffe’s 6th Labour government will represent.
Nope sorry no matter the spin Douglas and Prebble were part of Labour which reinforces the point of ministers acting how they want with virtually nil ramifications
Which is a plight on all parties
Very few disagree with the fact that it was the First ACT Government.
PR
Douglas & Prebble were indeed members of the 4th Labour government. The leader of the soon to be 6th Labour-led government has stated that he refused in 1987 to be recruited by Treasury due to his opposition to their policies (in TDB interview last night). So the chances of his replicating their folly is hopefully minimal.
As for ramifications:
“Prebble retained his Auckland Central seat in the 1990 election, which Labour lost, arguably because of public dissatisfaction with the reforms. In the 1993 election, however, Prebble lost his seat to Sandra Lee-Vercoe, deputy leader of the left-wing Alliance. For the next three years, he worked as a consultant.”
Then in 1996 he became an MP for the ACT party started by his mate Douglas.
ref Auckland Central
1″the 1993 election, however, Prebble lost his seat to Sandra Lee-Vercoe, deputy leader of the left-wing Alliance.”
I hope Ardern has woken up to the fact that she reaps what she sows. What she has sown for the past five years has not flowered.
She needs to get stuck into Auckland Central, develops a functioning LEC, show respect to members and to voters and get elected in her own right.
” Douglas and Prebble were part of Labour”
yes well sleeper agents do tend to look like those they are hiding amongst
I remember back in the eighties when Lange won.We Labour party members were on a high,every thing and anything was possible, like the Kennedy years for the Americans.
Some months later i was at a meeting attended by Prebble,Caygill and De Cleene.The meeting was held at the local offices of various unions, and also the office of the local party.The meeting was a fiery one, with the local union orginisers and their sub branch members, along with the local Party members.The barny that ensued was about the direction that the government were taking us At the end of the meeting as the Parliamentarians were leaving were over heard to say Union officials, and they chuckled, as they went down the stairs..
It is without question that our elected, and more importantly, our list representatives, are out of touch with the every day rank and file and party members who vote for them, and the recent election has shone a glaring light on that.
Power to the Party members, and lets hope it continues.
In other words: a total absorption into the neocon mindset of the Beltway bubble (albeit a less harsh version of the Nat model) where members and affiliates cease to be of any importance. What’s the bet more than one ABCer reflected this week about… how much easier and better it would be if there were no members and affilliates in the Labour Party.
Well, they are expected to be “followers” who donate money, deliver flyers, and organise electorate events for the MPs.
I booked my tickets for Christchurch on the Airline that I as a taxpayer will continue to own.
Yes even when the writing was on the wall they still persisted in voting for the wrong person
That would have given us
Goff
Shearer
and then RobertsonFFS
Unbelievable And as for unity the biggest attack lines the right and msm has been the disunity in caucus as evidenced by the vote. Did they not see this coming ? are they so out of touch they actually thought Robertson a stood a chance ? Did they not see the media narratives around such a split vote that would eventuate?
Someone should tell them that the biggest enemy is actually the Tories not Cunliffe et el.
Winston Churchill said something along the lines of “the opposition isn’t the enemy, the ministers behind are”
I think thats true then and still is today (on both sides of the house)
The membership agreed with most of the caucus who voted for Robertson. Membership were not unanimously behind Cunliffe, by any means.
So I think the “disconnect” can be overstated.
And I also think that expecting different votes from different groups is reasonable.
So my conclusion is that Sanctuary is overstating the case when talking about a “deep divide”. But I note a couple of tories have been having fun stoking the debate, which is nice for them I guess.
item b is obvious. Build more democracy into the Party. Give the members more say on who represents them. Not sure why we would want the caucus should have a separate vote for leader they should get the same vote as any other member.
Also we need to get the party list process right. We have to decide if we should have open or closed list selection and ordering of the party list. I myself are leaning towards a fully open list where the public can have input into the list but would like to hear alternative views
The Greens do the list reasonably well
Delegates at election conference meet candidates and assess them
They report back to branches who put together list this is aggregated
And becomes the recommended list
This new list goes to wider membership who then can rank candidates in a stv type system
(with a couple of tweaks for gender and geographical balance)
Problems are that sitting MP ‘s have an advantage because of profile and name recognition
and better resourced candidates can visit branches to get there name out there more widely and enhance their profile. This has happened to great effect last time around with at least one of the candidates getting a much higher ranking then from the initial delegate list (members should have listened to the delegates đ
All in all it works quite well with a very strong competent united team. As can be witnessed by there strong performance in this last term.
Labour could learn from this
Fukushima just had a 5.8 quake. Swell.
I expected to see just the link and not the whole media player thing.
If I mod wishes to delete, to avoid consternation, I wouldn’t be offended.
Updating Jetpack has this habit of enabling that feature.
It should clean out shortly when I get around to looking at it.
CV who is this shima guy that you are cussing?
lolzzz
drawing a line in the kif..
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-michael/if-you-still-think-pot-sh_b_3907678.html
(excerpt..)
â..If You Still Think Pot Should Be Illegal â You Are an A**hole..â (ed:..or as we would say:..a***holeâŚeh..?..)
â..there are a slew of bellowing ignorant statements that you make when you support cannabis prohibition:
That you donât care about injustice;
That you mindlessly repeat propaganda so easily debunked –
– it belies the shallowness of either your intelligence â or your integrity;
That you are so averse to admitting that you were wrong about something –
(regardless of how bigoted â short-sighted â and stupid it makes you look)
– you donât even care what your stubbornness is saying about you.
For one â if you think cannabis should remain a Schedule I drug â one for which there is no accepted medical use â
– then you are scientifically illiterate. .â
(cont..)
(mm-kay..?..)
phillip ure..
Really Claire? Just because Pinokeyo says it doesn’t make it true, and I really don’t need you to report his spin on his failures.
A key figure? The country that hasn’t joined the Eurozone and is in holding a referendum on membership? If he was talking the Merkel or Hollande he would have a point.
Last year Nact was calling the EU a basketcase and blaming this non-key trading partner problems for our continuing economic hole.
How about holding him up to his spin instead of hanging on to it? John Hartevelt did a better job of it.
An economy can be powerful and a basketcase at the same time. Those two terms don’t contradict each other.I would argue both the EU and US fit this category.
The article you link to doesn’t blame the non-key trading partner for our economic hole it blames the weakening US and EU economies for the strength of our dollar. That seems reasonable to me – also at the time of that article (October last year) Europe was a basketcase and it still is.
Finally, while the UK may not be as key as Germany it would still be considered a key member by most given the size of its economy – it is the second largest economy (if going by GDP).
Entropy. After three decades of cheap high density fuel flooding the western economies is it any wonder that society, economy, culture is in such chaos. Rebuilding requires that the right wing state gets off the backs of normal people who want to express and live their lives.
“An economy can be powerful and a basketcase at the same time”
Nah, a basketcase is a basketcase. It can be influential, but not powerful because other players can dismantle it if they choose to do so. E.g. the Greek economy is influential in EU economic decsion-making and a basketcase. It would take real spin to turn that situation into stating the Greek economy is powerful.
Key and English spent quite a lot of time blaming the New Zealand poor performing economy and trade deficits on conditions in Europe while ignoring the booming economies of our nearest trading partners Australia and China. Not much was asked about why the NZ economy didn’t get a boost from Aust and China but was impacted by Europe.
“Europe was a basketcase and it still is”
The periphery is in trouble. Core Europe is doing ok – the bit I live in is doing better than NZ in many ways.
And the UK has not the 2nd biggest economy, by GDP, in Europe since 2008 – austerity for the masses will do that to an economy – and any soft power the UK had was diminished by refusing to join the Euro and it’s referendum decision. It’s not committed and that seriously affects it’s power in the union.
The Court of Appeal chose yesterday to uphold last year’s decision by the Employment Court that employers paying the minimum wage had to pay their KiwiSaver contributions on top. This would give some minimum-wage workers an extra $540 a year.
Key was invited by Conservative Party leader and British counterpart David Cameron to a gathering of most of his MPs in Chipping Norton, a couple of hours northwest of London.
Key gave a speech to the MPs and strategists and joined in a “deeply political conversation” with high-ranking Cabinet ministers including Chancellor George Osborne and Home Secretary Theresa May.
Key also chatted with the controversial Australian political strategist Lynton Crosby, who advises Cameron.
OMG Key spoke to people!!!!!
Unlikely according to Tracey’s account.
Yes most interesting Tracey.Just what are they up too/
In fact its a bit scary ,120 Tory MP’s Crosby Textor smells a bit strong . In wonder if they are planning the next NZ election and how the UK Right would be able to help the NZ
Lets not forget that we were never told who payed for the ” Cossack adverts back in the 1970’s
Labour people need to keep a watchful eye on this . There was a good reason why they held this meeting with closed doors.
Fuck. Do you think maybe they were strategising about how to an election? That is concerning.
Trying to watch the Live coverage of the yachting, but no, all I get is about 2 seconds and the stream just freezes. Every other site I use streams perfectly. So I figure TVNZ must have been sitting with fingers crossed that they didn’t get more then 20 people at once wanting to watch. This must be what happens when the govt strips all the cash out of the company, and they have to do it on the cheap\free!
They used to host some of the content (ad’s) out of Oz and nearly crashed the stn X cable when the ch ch earthquake had their site taking alot of hits….perhaps they still do and the site’s pulling content from outside NZ thus the performance.
It’s not so much the cash David, it’s the competance and general savvy and will to do things properly but when 7 Sharp and Best Bits is your idea of quality is it any surprise.
I watched TVNZ ‘live’ without interruption but ran Herald blog at the same time .. TVNZ ‘live’ was 12 minutes behind the Herald blog. I checked time time the blog gave Peter Lester’s comment “like being at the dentist” against when it was webcast == 12 minutes !! no idea how or why .. maybe commercials ?? “Live” ? Yeah, nah.
LPRENT .. when I try to edit, takes me through to TS homepage in a box ?? very weird .. checked and it did same thing again ?? thx
yeah STD home page appearing as a window inside the edit dialogue box
The one I can’t stream from is TV3. It has to be the AD Blocker, but I can usually find the feed elsewhere, unless it’s Gower making shit up then I don’t bother with it.
pr, of note was he was meeting british mps and yet an australian political strategist was there and who he chose to speak with.
Extreme Oil and Coal.
Reading all the available resources it is not hard to come to the conclusion that the age of fossil fuel use is coming to an end.
Even here in New Zealand we can see this. Solid Energy is bankrupt, Denniston coal is also bust and can only go ahead with skewed legalisms that prevent climate change being taken into account. And large wind farms that could let us finally close down coal fired Huntly Power Station are prevented from starting through through lack of the barest legislation costing the taxpayer nothing. Meanwhile tens of $millions of tax payer subsidies are being shoveled into encouraging risky extreme deep water oil exploration, as conventional supplies run out.
It all signals one thing, the age of oil and coal is over. And if we keep desperately subsidising these failing technologies our civilisation will be over too.
Nothing is surer.
We need leaders of vision to prevent this catastrophe. (or at the very least soften the crash)
Oil will still be a dominant and widely available fuel for another 10-20 years; coal for another 50 years after that.
NZ has enough coal for at least 1200 years. Open cast is the way to go, and put the land back nice afterwards. The Coromandels and the Shotover river were extensively mined and are top tourist attractions now.
And then there’s fracking, which in NZ should allow us to put off nuclear power for many years until it is safe enough. The rest of the world can do with a lot of fracking too!
Those who don’t like fracking can stop opposing new hydro dams, especially on the West Coast.
Whatever happened to that wind farm that a councillor voted to allow on her farm at Waiuku, right where the noise would keep Waiuku awake?
In spite of the ranting by right wing weirdo’s about wanting Abbott as NZ’s PM its it’s taken all of five minutes in office for him to show his true colours:
http://au.news.yahoo.com/latest/a/-/latest/18999353/pm-seeks-legal-advice-on-act-marriage-equality-bill/
You ain’t seen nothing yet, he’s dissolved the Climate change body also and is warming up into his role as a fundamentalist christian mysoginist homophobic with anger issues…..politics suits him well.
Next – Abbott channels Mbeki.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/climate-sceptics-like-aids-deniers-scientist-nilay-shah-says/story-fnb64oi6-1226721777519#
Barrister Julian Burnside writes about Australia’s refugee policy.
So here we are: Australia in 2013. We have forgotten our origins and our good fortune, we are blind to our own selfishness. In place of memory we cling to a national myth of a generous, welcoming country, a land of new arrivals where everyone gets a fair go; a myth in which vanity fills the emptiness where the truth was forgotten.
http://theconversation.com/julian-burnside-alienation-to-alien-nation-18290
‘..national myth of a generous, welcoming country..’ It’s on record Oz favoured europeans re-settling there after WW2.
The Lib’s have tapped past the thin veneer of ‘ a fair go’ into an Oz that most who live there discover very quickly. Wander out of the CBD’s into suburbia or better still rural Oz and it’s rather old fashioned shall we say.
Garrett should reform the Oils now he’s left parliament, their material has never been so relevant.
Indeed, visiting Hay NSW last year was like stepping back into the seventies, late night Friday shopping and all.
Brisbane often reminds me of Auckland in the 80s. Some of the places in rural Queensland are just scary. The xenophobia and bigotry has a more overwhelming presence than sulphur in Rotorua. Newman in Queensland and Abbott federally will take it back even further. If they get their way, it’ll become a land that WhaleSpew would be proud to call home.
Rural Oz is scary, probably Tassie being the least scary with alot of foodie/produce/artisan diversity and a massive social welfare dependancy relative to other states.
Also most Taswegians don’t consider themselves Australians after having been shat on for many many decades by the Mainlanders
Scary, Cunnamulla is a real place.
http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/review/film/s242728.htm
A good interview : Cunliffe indicates his broad policy directions.
He joined the Daily Blog Editors Selwyn Manning and Martyn Bradbury to discuss what challenges New Zealand faces and what bis solutions are to those challenges.
A good interview, but marred by technical difficulties. Hopefully they work the bugs out before next time. Definitely worth the effort though.
A pity that Cunliffe made a perceived big booboo at his first great opportunity to impress the public with ‘caucus’ vs ‘Corus’. A bit of lost ground to make up there with the ‘general’ voters. Our stupid media concentrates on such simple errors as their information highlight unfortunately. They do a great injustice to real democracy and politics. [Less than 200 people have viewed Cunliffe’s daily blog interview so far, while hundreds of thousands watched his booboo highlighted by our stupid Main Stream Media!]
CP @ 13.1.1 – you really, really identify that slip of the tongue as something that’ll stick with Cunliffe right through to the last of the leaders’ debates in 2014 ? Unlike the now cemented tangible sense amongst how many tens maybe hundreds of thousands that ShonKey Python is, well, shonky ?
You think that we’re going to see an opinion poll in the lead-up to the election in which the greatest number of respondents are moved to mention as the tipping point “caucus/chorus” in September 2013 ? Whatever the unfortunately turned out weirdo Potty Gower might choose to say ?
No, I don’t.
And also, I didn’t realise I said all that in my post.
No, you’re right, you didn’t say all that CP. Sorry about that. Me being too rhetorical I guess.
No worries, North. All good.
There was a well attended meeting; about the dangers of deep-water oil drilling, in Dunedin last night with Gareth Hughes as key speaker (plus a couple of Otago university lecturers with Green mayoral candidate; Aaron Hawkins, moderating). Simon Hartly; who wrote this acticle for today’s ODT business section, obviously didn’t attend:
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/business/273950/deepwater-drilling-likely-grow
“…John Warren, the senior business development manager of Halliburton, covering Australasia.”
“On the question of the Deepwater Horizon seabed blowout and subsequent rig fire in the Gulf of Mexico, which became the United States’ worst environmental disaster, Mr Warren said it was a combination of human and technological error.
There was now more technology, reliability and competence in the workforce. ”
But there isn’t any real incentive for a Deepwater Horizon-style exploratory-phase disaster in NZ to actually be avoided (beyond the loss of their ship), or cleaned-up by the company responsible if it does. There is presently $10 million maximum liability under NZ law, plus $30 million mandatory insurance for the oil drilling. Deepwater Horizon cleanup costs are US$40 billion so far.
That’s a 0.02 cent on the dollar cost; to cut their losses and pay the fine, rather than stay and try to clean-up the problem (if you consider that the insurance premiums will already have been paid).
the “human error” was corporate middle managers fucking around with shortcuts in order to make more money and keep to budgets they had promised the board of directors.
And lets add in the captured and under-resourced regulators in the USA, where they had one inspector for every 40-50 rigs, and anyways the regulators would often be out partying with oil company staff, accepting big gifts from the corporates, accepting favours in the forms of prostitutes etc.
Was this also “human error”?
NZ could put rostered inspectors on every rig permanently as a condition of a drilling / extraction permit. All paid for by the company.
when is parliament going to be available to us proles with only an uhf aerial.
at the moment it seems to be restricted to disc users and sky subscribers.
has parliament become pay per view too?
I get Parliament TV with a UHF aerial. Channel 22.
You can also watch it online live – never tried so don’t know what the quality is like but the option is there.
Used to watch it on Parliament TV live on computer. Only small image though:
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/about-parliament/see-hear/ptv/
Now watch on channel 22 Freeview.
The quality is good chris, but it has varied in the past.
Btw, you can enlarge the picture to full size ianmac.
Anyone with a UHF aerial plus a freeview box or TV with inbuilt freeview should be able to et Parliament.
Come December when Analog switches off, that’s what will be needed to get any free-to-air TV.
What’s a disc user? I don’t think I’m one of those, and neither do I subscribe to Sky.
I have a UHF aerial plus Freeview set top box for one old analog TV, & a myfreeview recorder for the small high def LCD TV.
FYI
__________________________________________________________________________
“RE: Greens call for Smith’s sacking
“Nick Smith should resign. He is not the Minister for Conservation; he is the minister for large-scale dams; he is the minister for water pollution; he’s the minister for wiping out New Zealand’s native fish. He has no right to occupy the Minister of Conservation portfolio.”
(Russel Norman, 19 September 2013).
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/222179/doc-defends-minister-over-dam-answers
___________________________________________________________________________
“Nick Smith is NOT the Minister of Housing.
He is the Minister of tents, caravans, sheds and ‘lean-tos’ and Minister for Property Developers’,” says Sue Henry, Spokesperson for the Housing Lobby.
“He should resign forthwith from the Housing portfolio.”
“It is a disgrace when State Housing tenants are forced out of their homes and along with others referred to sub-standard caravan parks and temporary ‘doss houses’ by Housing New Zealand, when thousands of State houses sit empty, and some have done so for well over over one year.”
“Vulnerable driven to caravan parks” (TV3 News !9 September 2013)
http://www.3news.co.nz/Vulnerable-driven-to-caravan-parks/tabid/423/articleID/313937/Default.aspx
“It’s misleading and deceptive for Nick Smith to promote affordable housing when he’s delivering unaffordable housing, where $700,000 houses are being sold off the plans (eg: Apirana Ave, Glen Innes).”
“This of course, is after the forced removal of State housing tenants and their affordable State houses, which have been, and are being trucked out of the area.”
“This is being replicated in other parts of New Zealand, against the wishes of both the tenants and their communities in which some lived for decades.”
“This situation is becoming critical, and is totally unacceptable.”
“A moratorium to cease forthwith State house removals must be implemented immediately. ”
Sue Henry
Spokesperson
Housing Lobby
_________________________________________________________________________
No one in their eighties or at any age should be expected to trot 50 metres to use a toilet several times a night. This would cause me sleep deprivation as I would be awake just after one trip in the freezing cold.
I knew that HNZ was not performing. I have underestimated how despicable the government are regarding housing. I’d like to see how long they would last in a caravan park.
Iâm feeling so much better now.
/
In an interview on âSquawk Box,â the founder of hedge fund Duquesne Capital said that the Federal Reserveâs policy of quantitative easing was inflating stocks and other assets held by wealthy investors like himself. But the price of making the rich richer will be paid by future generations.
âThis is fantastic for every rich person,â he said Thursday, a day after the Fedâs stunning decision to delay tightening its monetary policy. âThis is the biggest redistribution of wealth from the middle class and the poor to the rich ever.â
âWho owns assetsâthe rich, the billionaires. You think Warren Buffett hates this stuff? You think I hate this stuff? I had a very good day yesterday.â
Druckenmiller, whose net worth is estimated at more than $2 billion, said that the implication of the Fedâs policy is that the rich will spend their wealth and create jobsâessentially betting on âtrickle-down economics.â
âI mean, maybe this trickle-down monetary policy that gives money to billionaires and hopefully we go spend it is going to work,â he said. âBut it hasnât worked for five years.â
http://www.nbcnews.com/business/hedge-fund-billionaire-feds-move-fantastic-rich-4B11199524
The U$ Home of NeoLiberalism and the inspiration of our RWNJ politicians:
“These individuals represent a social type. The saying of Balzac, âBehind every great fortune there is a great crime,â was never truer than for the American ruling class. The list is full of people* who made their money not through any contribution to the productive process, but through various forms of financial swindling, speculation and the impoverishment of working people*
âAccumulation of wealth at one pole is at the same time accumulation of misery, agony of toil, slavery, ignorance, brutality, mental degradation, at the opposite pole,â wrote Marx. And so it is. The Census Bureau report, âIncome, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2012,â showed that the income of a typical household in the US has fallen to the lowest level since 1989, while poverty remains at the highest levels in decades.”
* John Key?
“The Looting of America”
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36285.htm
The NL ideology has destroyed working and social America
In this country, if you’re rich you can get away with anything and you can keep on living the high life:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/crime/news/article.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=11126767
And this is where the neoliberal societies are heading to:
Dutch King Willem-Alexander declares the end of the welfare state
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/dutch-king-willemalexander-declares-the-end-of-the-welfare-state-8822421.html
Oh, the irony! The greatest bludger in Holland doesn’t mind other people’s taxes going for his upkeep.
Off with his head!
I would hope that we all want an end to welfare.
Yes, you would. Because you have the moral compass of Emperor Palpatine.
i have got news for you SSLands, think brand spanking new fridges and washing machines courtesy of your mate Paula,
And guess what, your paying for em…
There will always be people who need help from the community. Those who are already filthy rich, and presently get the most help, should not be among them. The economic system that we live under should not contribute to this number, but people will always have accidents, get sick, or have physical deficiencies. I want a system that means these people don’t miss out. I don’t want SSlands’ system, where even a dry spot on footpaths is denied to the needy.
I want an end to “welfare” and a return to “social security” for all.
amirite
I like this bit.
“The king earns an annual salary of around 825,000 euros ($1.1 million), though maintaining the Royal House â castles, parades and all â costs the government more than 100 million euros annually. ”
And he should be looking for a smaller throne. The one he was on is wide enough for two.
Austerity and cuts are helping the Dutch Government to shrink the economy so it will fit into a mini-size oil tanker which the pollies will then sail away to spend in a more deserving country leaving the rest of the country to run a participation society, i.e. where they all do their own thing and don’t have to pay any taxes at all as they just look after themselves. I think this is the unspoken end of this utopian, retrograde stumble.
Hi amirite
100% right! đ This Dutch parasite lives in an alternative reality.
So is T. Mallard coming back to NZ any time soon or is he a wee bit scared? Though I’d say its worth the money to keep him away from NZ đ
Whatever the “Silent T”(revor) does will probably cue if you have to put up with caucus acting like dorks.
‘
WTF!!! Tax payer money has been spent in the Supreme Court to obtain a declaration that resource management law, as currently worded, excludes climate change considerations.
Just one more law for a new government to change. In the meantime, mass opposition to standard extraction practices needs to grow to the level where mining executives are thought of as being lower than pedophiles, and too embarrassed to show their faces in public.
I’m bloody gobsmacked!!I!!
There’s a documentary on TV3 at the moment about NZ SIS agents’ life and work and how they see themselves in the global economy.
I never thought our security intelligence agencies would – indeed COULD be that open.
I think its called ‘Johny English Reborn’ – or something like that.
It shows how important and competent our intelligence services are in contributing to our safety, and the protection of us all as a sovereign nation.
I’m still coming to terms with how open and up front our intelligence services are as they strive to protect us as NewZill citizens. There’s even one or two Murray radicals in there showing us that we’ve nothing to fear if we have nothing to hide.
God …. it’s such a relief to know – given all this GCSB, TICS, TPPA and other crap that’s going on in the background.
My God – there really are Mightier men than Me! (Geeeez – and I mean I’m pretty butch to start with, but God – I never knew!)