Winston’s going strong in a discussion with MPs from various parties on Pacific Viewpoint on Stratos right now. He’s called ational on not keeping their 2008 election promises, GST etc… Key’s Brighter Future is in Aussie. And he’s claimed he’s researched it and the new Conservative Party is really created by National, just like Act has become.
Winston is using gutter politics, because the Conservative Party is trying to take his patch. He’s scared his voters will forget what he’s done for them, when the Conservatives offer the first $25,000 tax free. That would make pensions tax free, something promised, but never delivered, not even by Peters.
This is disgusting, misleading and just plain wrong on so many levels. I think it is more likely to turn people off than turn them on to Labour, so I say “more please”. However, it is still evidence of how far into the sewer some Labour campaigners have got.
Here are some of my thoughts on this pamphlet.
1. The first page appears to make the ludicrous claim that people will die before they see the first year of their child. It is not until they read further into the body of the leaflet that they find its true message. Yet many people just look at the headline and trash the leaflet as junk mail.
2. It uses the National party logo without consent, which I assume breaches some law or another such as copyright infringement, or “passing off”.
3. It actually advertises the National logo to people who have a fleeting view of the leaflet anyway.
4. It is factually wrong. It claims that beneficiaries who become pregnant will have to go to work at one year after the birth of their child, when in fact the law will apply to only a limited class of beneficiaries. The semantics could be argued that it doesn’t specifiy all or some pregnant beneficiaries. But that is a fairly thin argument.
5. And, the requirement is for these people to be “work ready”, so they won’t lose their benefits if they can’t get a job. So the claim that they will be forced to find work is false. If it were true, then it would contradict the arguments Labour has been making that the jobs aren’t there. How can people be forced into jobs that, according to Labour, don’t exist?
So, IMO, a very shabby piece of gutter campaigning more likely to back-fire than fire up the voters.
What sort of comments do you expect? I’ve still got your spit in my face. So Whaleoil is full of wild indignation about someone’s anonymous bit of politicing. Gosh.
Nice try at diversion TVOR. Of course, these problems stem back into Labour’s nine years in office. So why would a vote for Labour change these outcomes?
To the best of my knowledge official autherised leaflets and flyers that are sent by the postal system are sent under a permit system and do not require a stamp.The upsidedown autherisation makes it look cheap and like a failed attempt at cut, copy and paste on a computer,
As usual your selective interpretation is at work,
1. “you won’t be around …” is a statement that the parent will be elsewhere, i.e. not at their child’s birthday,nothing more sinister than that. But you know that already and could not help the juvenile claim of sensationalist bs.
2. They have used the brand image, as is allowed for any representational presentation of an organisation in correspondence.
3. Yawn
4.” But that is a fairly thin argument. ” said it yourself
5. There are no jobs, there will be no jobs. The work referred to is the work for the benefit programmes that National are so keen to bring in. You know, the ones the Rebstock report custom wrote for National earlier this year.
overall a not very warm fuzzy pamphlet but your reaction is about as over the top as we would expect .
Goodness me! “It claims that beneficiaries who become pregnant will have to go to work at one year after the birth of their child, when in fact the law will apply to only a limited class of beneficiaries. “
And here was I thinking that Key/Bennett were making that the major selling point of their policy. You say ts that it is only for a few and then only work ready. Please tell your mates that they must be misleading or even lying to us.
TS, you really are a mean spirited, heartless individual if you think that this flyer is not only offensive but is important enough that you would go to battle over.
This country has so many real world problems that make the lives of its citizens a misery. The health, education, well-being, and future of our children are at stake.
And all you can do is bitch about some perceived offence in this letter.
The only people complaining about it that I can see are pro-National people who just couldn’t wait to ship it off to whaleoil – of all people! – you would think that for the average citizen whaleoil would not be the first person to come to mind when you wanted to complain. They would think of the MSM if they were genuine, unbiased recipients.
Unless of course you’re already a follower of His Magnitude as he leaves a trail across the mudflats of his miserable existence.
This is manufactured outrage – no more, no less.
Insider your leader has promised 170,000 jobs 3years ago
now 60,000 unemployed you must have some
insider information NO jobs now is it at least that’s closer to the truth than your leaders claims
Extrapolating Mankeys job figures 170,000 jobs = 60,000 more unemployed +100,000 to Aus
60,000new job next term of govt must given your leaders claims above = 170,000more unemployed + 300,000 to AUS
Insider trading thanks for insider info!
released 15 November 2011
Produced by Haz Beats
Raps by Tom & Tourettes
Guest vocals by Esther Stephens & Matthew Crawley
Recorded by Jyeah & DJ Substance
Mixed by DJ Substance
Polls show voters want an alternative to National sole rule, and see Labour as lost in bewilderment. Peters has surged on this sentiment but now voters will have a closer look at what that really means.
In difficult times (and if Europe crashes it could get much more difficult) that leaves a stark choice, Winston’s antics versus safe and reliable Peter Dunne and United Future.
Dunne would not know what to do. His answer to deficits is to give middle class tax cuts. He thinks his super policy will make super more affordable even thought it is defined as being cost neutral.
There is a third choice. Don’t waste your vote on United Follicles and vote for a real party of change. Labour or Greens will do nicely.
They get comfortable, get old, get scared, then sell out their kids. Normal Kiwi behaviour. Nothing can explain the sudden purposeful naivety of a politician believing Key will follow up his sweet nothings with commitment. She should ask herself, if Key gets a majority, will he still call her in the morning?
Anyone who’s worked in a corporate knows Key’s behaviour. There are two ways to expose his real intentions: try to get him to commit, set a formal meeting or even just discuss his plans in detail, or literally tell him to F-off. The result will be the same.
Nothing that involves a known sellout who’ll sidle up to whoever promises him power and merrily allies himself with the failed remnants of NZ’s religious right.
What I’d really like to understand – and I realise I harp on about this a fair bit – is how UF can use the tagline of “Fairness & Choice” while blocking any attempt to make changes to our (hideously failed) drug laws.
How is it “Fair” to criminalise people for electing to imbibe one mind altering chemical over another?
How can we have “Choice” when we don’t even have dominion over our own consciousness?
“Fairness and Choice” – as long as you play by our rules, and make your choices from the options we give you.
What a load of bollocks. It is a good tagline – most people support the concepts of fairness and choice – but it’s a complete lie (see also: “Fair and balanced.”).
As a general rule, any political party that reduces it’s policy to a subjective fuzzy slogan means to apply the exact opposite of the positive interpretation of said slogan to all but their target demographic. For example:
A Decent Society
A Brighter Future
It will be a bright, decent, life for those in the top 5%.
There are also deceitful twists: “Balance the books sooner” actually means,
“get rich quick”
and like all those schemes, it’s theft in everything but name.
It is a strange and demoralising language with plenty of grey areas. Own your Future, is a fuzzy slogan too, but it is supported by the absolute of No Asset sales, so the chances of follow through are above 75%.
I’m just interested that I never get a response from Petey Boy on any point I raise regarding UF and Peter Done-His-Dash (hopefully!).
In my experience, failing to address a legitimate point is the behaviour of a coward. Even people who know their views are flawed will answer the question if they have any guts.
Once again Key refuses to front on RNZ this morning to debate Goff.
Listening now to Goff on his own in an extended interview – he is getting very passionate and is doing well
Wondered too but he will need to hammer his Labour/money line and now more urgently have a go at Winston and repeat the line as often as possible. Bet on Hooton doing the same this morning- last chance to manipulate us. Ha.
Ha! Hooton is using the whole time bagging Winston. Wow. They must be really scared of not getting an Election win. The Nat weakness/vulnerability can be grabbed by voting Winston.
A good interview – Goff came across clear and precise and on message. The interview approach was also reasonable for once – not so aggressive, negative as it has been to Goff in recent months.
At the start of the interview, the explanation given for Key not accepting was that he or his advisors said that he has/was participating in four leaders’ debates and that he did not have time to prepare for more than that – or words to that effect. Excuse me, but debating with the leaders of other parties in an election campaign should be his top priority!
Goff should make the point that any CGT is always going to have a ramp up period. If we don’t introduce the CGT and ramp it up now, then when it is eventually introduced it’ll have a ramp up period.
If they keep putting it off for this excuse, then it’ll never be implemented, when it clearly needs to be.
Investment in children is not being given enough of a priority, and that needs to change. Our fully costed plan will make that change happen over six years.
Labour’s policy for children
Draco, why will our children suffering now, have to wait 6 years (obviously) conditional on Labour being in power for two electoral cycles)?
Labour supporters like yourself should be ashamed of this deliberate and opportunist delay when children are suffering now.
Mana’s John Minto has slammed “Labour’s policy for children” as a non-promise.
One concrete measure to address child poverty that is mentioned in the Swedish example is providing free meals in schools.
Inside Child Poverty: A Special Report, set to air this week, Wellington documentary maker Bryan Bruce shows a Swedish doctor footage of sick, scab-ridden schoolchildren suffering from preventable diseases in Porirua and asks if he saw similar situations in his country.
The doctor shakes his head: “In the 70s, maybe.”……..
……..As part of the study, Mr Bruce visited Sweden – a country once considered similar to New Zealand – and found that children there received free healthcare, were provided a free meal a day at school and were free from diseases associated with poverty.
Mana have costed their policy for supplying free breakfasts and lunches for low decile schools.
From MANA Foreign Policy Spokesperson John Minto’s Foreign Policy release – Sunday 20 November
The headline point from the policy
1. Bring the troops back from Afghanistan and use the money to feed kids in decile 1 to 3 schools.
Our troops in Afghanistan are involved in an imperial war on behalf of the US. We are helping prop up an illegitimate government of drug barons and war lords. We are seen quite rightly as foreign invaders and our presence increases the possibility of New Zealand becoming a terrorist target in future.
The $40 million we would save would be used to kick-start our “feed the kids” program which would roll out for all New Zealand children at school to provide healthy breakfasts and lunches. We would start at decile 1 to 3 primary schools at a cost of around $38 million.
I’m not a Labour supporter. I was going to vote Green but I’ve seriously been considering voting Mana as their policies have filled out. They’re still talking about maintaining the capitalist ideology though. Of course, all the political parties are which just proves their complete misunderstanding of economics
To answer your question on Red Alert: Only the Greens have a policy plan to have rental properties rated for energy efficiency (mandatory), which includes insulation. They will extend the current scheme for insulating, but it will not stop slum lords operating. It will however give some people an insight into how it will be to live in a particular home.
They’re still talking about maintaining the capitalist ideology though. Of course, all the political parties are which just proves their complete misunderstanding of economics
I’m not a fan of free market totalitarianism either, but I think pragmatic left policy recognizes that capitalism isn’t so much about economics as it is about psychology and sociology. I’m inclined to Green but resent its bluishness as of now.
Sorry for mistaking you for a Labour Party supporter, Draco. I am kicking myself for being so insensitive. Sorry for the insult.
I thought you were touting Labour’s opportunistically conditional policy for dealing with childhood poverty and hunger in this country of extraordinary wealth.
I do not mean to answer for Draco, but to suggest Labour will do nothing for 6 years is incorrect. Their immediate push to improve the lot of struggling people is the increase in minimum wage and the $5K tax free threshold – which also applies to beneficiaries. Then there is the removal of GST on fruit/veges – small but useful. This is the first steps in lowering the cost of living to people who need a hand the most. It is not a silver bullet, but it is at least a firm commitment. Other measures such as free healthcare to under 6’s will phase in gradually.
This is becoming a real bug-bear for me*. The tax-free threshold is a benefit for all taxpayers, including multimillionaires like Key. The argument that the threshold is for the benefit of the poor simply on the grounds that the poor will appreciate the extra money more, is, to my mind offensive. If Labour had targeted all of the expenditure that this measure will cost to those in need, it would make a big difference.
Same with the GST off fruit and veges. Where does Labour get off saying that because there are people in dire need they will give everyone a small amount extra to address it rather than, you know, actually addressing the need. It would be like providing the equivalent of 5 cents to every human on earth as a response to an emergency affecting a much smaller number of people in Eastern Europe for example.
*Not directed specifically at you uturn, you are just the latest person to say this.
These are valid points and ones Jenny argues in her post above. Why don’t Labour, why don’t The Greens, why doesn’t anyone? Why don’t we all call a meeting of our local community and take back the problem? Why do we rely on the comfortable distance of redistributed income tax instead of getting up close and personal with the people we say we support, or for that matter, hate?
First on the lists of why is that government is a balancing act within a corrupted system. You can’t simply take jillions of dollars from, say, infrastructure projects and build McDonald’s-esque food houses for card carrying poor people to patronise. To attempt such a thing would shake our culture of greed, earning and profit so severly it’s hard to imagine the unintended results/backlash.
Second on the list is that if we allow government to dictate how and when assistance happens, we’ll lose control of our communities every time there is a change of government, effectively undermining our goals.
Third would be that some people will be better suited to assist from a distance and some up close. At least intially. Not everyone is or can be the same, but then not everyone who is poor is the same. People are still people.
I think that in the end, poverty must be challenged face to face, one on one, at whatever the cost. As an intermediary step, people not in poverty need to think about everything they consume, everything they want to buy and streamline the things they have, but don’t use. Give excess away to people at a disadvantage who can use them. Don’t buy stuff no one needs – like the other day I saw a tool for taking chips out of the bag so you don’t get greasy fingers.
When choosing entertainment, try to find it in the company of others first, not on an X-box by default. Make conversation rather than listen to the distraction of TV, pop music and beer. Work on neighbourhood projects together. Share problems. Keep an eye on the fortunes of the people around you. If they’re doing fine, leave them be; if they are falling below the bread line, help them to regain their feet – for free. Learn about other people, learn about yourself – respect both. Listen to what others say, not just the response and ideas in your own head. Take time.
Small changes in atittude and reduction of waste will have a gradual indirect influence on poverty. Understanding why it is right will ease the pain of giving up the “getting ahead” mindset.
A: “Why do we rely on the comfortable distance of redistributed income tax B: instead of getting up close and personal with the people we say we support, or for that matter, hate?”
A: Because poverty is lack of resources just as scurvy is lack of vitamin C. The immediate need in both cases is what is lacking. B: Community korero is great and certainly not mutually exclusive. But it is no substitute for what is lacking. Funnily enough, poor communities have less material resources to share. We have enough resources in NZ, they don’t need to be rationed out of the hands of the poor. As for “up close and personal” speak for yourself.
“You can’t simply take jillions of dollars from, say, infrastructure projects …”
I specifically said that targeting help where it is needed instead of a big, sparse, lolly scramble, would make a huge difference. If the tax-free threshold is such small change that is is only the poor that get any benefit from it, don’t give a bit to everyone. Use the resources where they are needed most. In health we don’t give everyone a small proceedure regularly, regardless of need, and tell those needing heart surgery, for example, that they can have a free mole removal, like everyone else.
“McDonald’s-esque food houses for card carrying poor people to patronise…”
Are you taking the piss here, or is that as far as your imagination can take you?
A: Because poverty is lack of resources just as scurvy is lack of vitamin C.
No it’s not, it’s a misallocation of available resources caused by the capitalist free-market. Although it will turn into a lack of resources over time as all available resources are used up ASAP by the capitalist free-market.
Quick note to the moderator. My email address (and therefore my pictogram) has changed because I’ve changed server. I assume this is the reason my last comment went into moderation.
[sprout: correct, first comments from a new email are auto-moderated]
You can upload a pic and associate it with an email address and change the address when you change ISPs. You can also go get a gmail or similar account and so get a permanent email address.
Ta Draco.
I’ve moved to orcon (miles cheaper) and the email addresses are mine for life.
I think I will organise a gravatar though. Really don’t like my new pictogram.
Thanks to a federal ban on food stamps for people with felony drug convictions, people like McLemore are out of luck when it comes to getting assistance with putting food on their tables. Though states can opt out of the ban, those that don’t (like Mississsippi) deny food stamps even to individuals who have already served their sentences or overcome previous addictions. It’s true that McLemore’s past isn’t perfect — she has four felony drug convictions and one misdemeanor, which place her firmly in the category of people the federal government has declared unfit to receive public benefits. Hence, faced with the prospect of being unable to feed her family, McLemore lied on her application.
Welcome to the war on drugs, where once convicted you’re fucked for life, unless you’re rich that is.
Note also that loan fraudsters get far lower sentences for a crime that impacted negatively far more than one person lying so they and their kids could eat. Justice this is not.
Fucking awesome. although having mucked around with origin of life stuff in uni, sunlight isn’t entirely needed, as warm seeps can kick out a wide range of simple to complex organic molecules*, while black smokers provide various sulphates than can be oxidised to provide an energy source for life. Although what we need to do is send probes into the ice, and even into the black depths of Europa to find signs of “life”, which isn’t as straightforward as you’d think**
________________________
* In biochem land, this means multiple chiral centres.
** aka philosophy of biology fun land, or at it’s simplest “life is a heat engine, exploiting thermodynamic gradients for reproduction, thus creating more entropy”. I’d also argue it’s not time dependent, which causes all sorts of fun-times for the human mind…
[lprent: Sorry – been obsessed with correlations for e-day. I will have another look at this. Found and fixed. Moderators – if you’re going to do blacklist DO NOT tag the persons name. ]
People forget Peter Dunne was Labour MP THEN feel out of bed and ended up looking like Act with a red face
He seems to win the personality stakes for all time in NZ politics without a scratch
He almost fits the proposition that all MPs should be elected as independents to reduce the enormous drain on the voters sanity supporting the BS of party politicing
The shock of having to be standing and winning on their own may cause such a melt down of honesty that the people might even take it very seriously that we are a puppet state of the international corporations and have serious problems that will eventually drive us to join Australia so we can survive
Physically we are one of the most endangered island country’s in the world
The findings were released at a conference in Kampala, Uganda, by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a high-profile United Nations body assigned to review and report periodically on developments in climate research. They come at a time of unusual weather disasters around the globe, from catastrophic flooding in Asia and Australia to blizzards, floods, heat waves, droughts, wildfires and windstorms in the United States that have cost billions of dollars.
“A hotter, moister atmosphere is an atmosphere primed to trigger disasters,” said Michael Oppenheimer, a Princeton University climate scientist and a principal author of the new report. “As the world gets hotter, the risk gets higher.” …
The new report on extreme weather, one of a string of reports that the panel is issuing on relatively narrow issues, did not break much ground scientifically, essentially refining findings that have been emerging in climate science papers in recent years.
Indeed, the delegates meeting in Kampala adopted scientifically cautious positions in some areas. For instance, some researchers have presented evidence suggesting that hurricanes are growing more intense because of climate change, but the report sided with a group of experts who say that such a claim is premature.
Nonetheless, the report predicted that certain types of weather extremes will grow more numerous and more intense as human-induced global warming worsens in coming decades.
“It is virtually certain that increases in the frequency and magnitude of warm daily temperature extremes and decreases in cold extremes will occur in the 21st century on the global scale,” the report said. “It is likely that the frequency of heavy precipitation or the proportion of total rainfall from heavy falls will increase in the 21st century over many areas of the globe.”
By the end of the century, if greenhouse emissions continue unabated, the type of heat wave that now occurs once every 20 years will be occurring every couple of years across large areas of the planet, the report predicted.
I caught this bit of the interview and I don’t think it’s been fairly represented in that story. The thing with Brash is that he’s not like other politicians – he’s quite politically naive. He’ll say what he thinks and is generally up-front about it. Other politicians (Key is a master at it and Goff does it as well) answer questions couched in ways that the listener thinks they’ve said something but they can later come back and ‘clarify’ or refute. Brash on the other hand just says it with little beating around the bush. Political journalists hear this from Brash and think that there really must be more going on behind his words than he’s letting on (as they would be with any other politician), but really in Brash’s case there isn’t any cloak and dagger skullduggery at all.
Contra argument: The hollow men.
He may not be much good at it, but he is dishonest.
On the other hand, Like Te Mana, representatives of parties that aren’t competing for Mr and Ms Middle seem to be far more able to be frank about what they believe.
Sounds like he’s confirmed some of the rumoured contents of the teapots, reaffirmed his consent to the Act/Nat plan, reaffirmed National are in trouble and signalled he is stepping away from the increasingly stinky dung heap it’s all become. He has inadvertently hung a closed for business sign on ACT too – nothing more than an organisation in name only for the machinations of National.
All the polls I’ve seen show that ~85% of people oppose asset sales, ergo, this must be Jonkey trying to rewrite reality so that it conforms with his ideology.
Just one day, sometime down the track, parents might be required to take a little bit more personal responsibility ensuring that they are sending their children to school, well rested, well fed, suitably attired and in the right frame of mind to learn.
It would appear that at the moment it’s the schools’ responsibility to attend to this and also deliver the curriculum to meet the standards.
As it is unlawful not to be enrolled to vote? What is the penalty and has anyone ever been convicted? Therer was reported 240k not currently enrolled for this election
Well there is one reason why John Key might undertake such an exercise… to ensure that New Zealand has to undertake asset sales to service the huge amounts of debt that National has mismanaged us into…
Ok. That eased the situation considerably… The main server is now handling the load. I have to find some time to get that wee editor working nicely with the cache.
Now it is spiking to very high CPU, not locking on 95+% CPU. Cache makes a lot of difference.
Is it not often noted that different ethic groups have defining body language ?
The striking similarities in our PM’s physical gestures to some of the history footage of the 1930’s&40’s of another politician known for lying and debasing the truth to gain political power .
Just an observation and a guide to the validity of the rhetoric being charged to the taxpayer
Like Ben what I’d really like to understand is how UF can use the tagline of “Family Friendly ”, want to have the Families Commission, try to split tax for the stay at home partner in the middle/ upper income brackets whilst cuddling up to the Nact party that spends it’s time slagging off the parent who takes the huge financial and emotional hit involved in bringing up the kids by themselves.(and this is all too often the parent protecting the kids from family violence.)
Another day, another record day. It hasn’t happened since Thursday last week. According to statcounter.
Top page views in a day
Top unique visits in a day.
Much of it in the hour after the debate when I’m sure we hit our highest page views per hour. Looked like 5000pv in a bit over n hour.
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Maybe you’ve seen the graph that says those countries where everyone wears a mask are the ones that have managed to keep Covid-19 under control? The first thing to say about that claim is that those countries also did lots of other things, too – they acted fast, with intense ...
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The Treaty on Open Skies is one of the most effective mechanisms for preventing war curently in force. By letting countries make surveillance flights over each others' territory, it eliminates fears that they are secretly preparing for war. So naturally, the US is planning to withdraw from it: The Trump ...
. . April 5: Day eleven of living in lock-down… My one day of rest for the week, and an opportunity to mow my lawns – which I’d been delaying for about three weeks. (On the plus side, the damp micro-climate in my back yard yielded three lovely fresh mushrooms ...
As far as anyone can say, New Zeaand still has a general election scheduled for September 19 this year. The election will be accompanied by two referenda, one of which will ask voters:Do you support the proposed Cannabis Legalisation and Control Bill?The official campaign period for the cannabis referendum begins ...
The vast majority of tributes to the Listener hearken back to its glory days, with little reflection on the magazine as it was at its end.I wrote for it, for half the Listener’s life; I have known personally all the editors except the first (mythical) three. From 1978 to 2014 ...
As the world economy slides rapidly towards deep recession there are growing calls for a Universal Benefit coming from some leftists and rightists. Now Finance Minister Grant Robertson is saying it is on the table. This article by a French party Workers Struggle provides analysis of various forms of universal ...
This is the advice from the very top of the anti-fluoride movement – Paul Connett, director of the Fluoride Action Network (FAN). Don’t worry about reading up on all the scientific information “You only have ...
. . April 4: Day 10 of living in lock-down… I wake up to a fine Saturday morning which normally would be like an early Christmas. But it’s Day 10 of Level 4 Lock Down. What will my fellow New Zealanders be doing on a day like this – staying ...
Some time during the night we went over the 850,000 views mark. We might have had our millionth view by the end of this year – certainly by early next year. Most of the people involved in Redline spent years and years producing various small left-wing papers and selling them ...
Comfortably, in the very first round, with an impressive 56% of the votes.I wonder, did members of the Shadow Cabinet start tweeting their resignations during Starmer's victory speech, or is that only a trick the right pull?It is odd how all the talk of how the next leader "needs to ...
One of the key voices in this extraordinary time in which we live is that of University of Otago epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker. Philip Matthews did an an excellent job this weekend of capturing the way he became the man for this moment in a profile for The Press.But one ...
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern addressed the nation today about the decline in daylight New Zealand has been experiencing over the previous few months. She said “As many of you will notice, our attempts to stem the dwindling of the daylight over the last few months have been completely ...
Redline received this article from the KOE a Marxist party in Greece Our friends in the KOE describe here the mounting crisis in Greece and tensions on the Turkish border. As desperate people flee from their homelands which have been ruined after decades of imperialist wars and interventions the people ...
As the first week of Level Four lockdown unfolded, mounting questions grew as to just what was (and was not) allowed under its “rules”. Partly these were driven by some apparently contradictory messagesfrom different authority figures and explanations carried in the media. Partly they reflected a somewhat sketchy legal basis ...
. . April 3: Day 9 of living in lock-down… Another late-start to my work day. Everything is temporarily upended as clients are shuffled around so we can minimise our “bubble” by reducing the number of people we help. One of my colleagues has been removed from his clients; his ...
In order to meet our 2050 carbon target and do our bit to avoid making the Earth uninhabitable, New Zealand needs to decarbonise our economy, replacing fossil fuels with electricity in the energy, industrial and transport sectors. The good news is that it will mean cheaper power for all of ...
For those folk who find my other Lock-Down Diary versions too “negative” or otherwise unpalatable… Here’s a photo of a pretty flower, . . Better? Tomorrow’s Sanitised Version: a cute animal video. . . . =fs= ...
. . April 2: Day eight of living in lock-down… Today, my work day starts late. Our rosters and clients have been dramatically changed, lessening (theoretically) the number of people in our work “bubble”. If just one of us catches covid19 the impact could be considerable as Grey Base Hospital ...
As Aotearoa enters week two of lockdown, it’s clear we’re all still working out what our “bubbles” look like and how to stay in them to stop the spread of Covid-19. New to the government’s Covid-19 website is some good guidance for people living in apartment blocks. Recent decades have ...
“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.” Lenin Don’t we all know that feeling now.
Prospect Magazine alerted me to this particularly apt quote. It is a much more evocative quote than Hemingway’s “gradually then suddenly” which is also doing ...
Yesterday was the day the consequences of the lockdown suddenly got very real for many. Firms have been closing and laying people off since the outset of the quarantine but this has mostly been happening out of the public eye. The mass closure of a number of iconic New Zealand ...
Brian Williamson1, Prof Nick Wilson2 (1Economic consultant, UK; 2University of Otago Wellington)In this blog, we outline how a win-win social contract could be forged to address the major dimensions of response to the COVID-19 pandemic when using a mitigation strategy: the particular need to protect older people from high ...
Resuming Normal Service: The Republican Party's nominee for in 1920, Warren Harding, promised the American people: “not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration”. If she wishes to remain our prime minister, then Jacinda Ardern will offer New Zealanders the same.HOW EDUCATED AMERICA snickered when the ...
No Free Society Without A Free And Functioning News Media: If we are to surrender our civil rights to the broader cause of defeating Covid-19, then foreign corporations must, likewise, surrender their right to inflict immense economic and cultural harm on New Zealanders simply because it improves their bottom line.I’M ...
by Daphna Whitmore A third of the world is under lockdown and a clear assessment of this measure to curb the spread of COVID-19 is urgently needed. With any high-stakes decisions it has to be asked what are we dealing with here? Are the measures warranted? Will they achieve their ...
I haven’t done a huge amount in the last few days. I’m reading The Poppy War and I’ve sort of poked at a couple of games – I started SOMA but I’m a wimp and I quit while in the first room after the brain scan. I might try it ...
The swan politicians may be gliding on the water, occasionally snapping at one another. Meanwhile, as the Covid19 crisis illustrates, the officials are desperately paddling below providing the real locomotion. One of the most fatuous recent grandstanding comments (of about a week ago), adding to the public’s anxieties, was ...
Much has been written about the importance of discretion in an emergency situation, and the concerns raised by the potential for it to be exercised arbitrarily. Given the quality of the discussion, there seemed little point in adding to it at any length. In particular, I point to the evidence ...
Today has felt surreal. I was all set to touch base online with my science communication students when a colleague shared the news that Bauer Media would be shutting down its publications immediately. The first link I saw implied it was Woman’s Weekly affected, and even that shocked me. But ...
Bogeymen, Real And Imagined: Is the number of psychopathic and sociopathic individuals in any given society truly as vanishingly small as we like to tell ourselves? Isn’t it more likely that the mass-shooters and serial-killers filling the headlines represent only the tip of a much, much larger iceberg of frightfulness? ...
Outgoing Police Commissioner Mike Bush appeared before the Epidemic Response Committee today, who asked him for the rules police are using to enforce the lockdown. He refused:Police Commissioner Mike Bush has admitted the advice given to Kiwis about what they're able to do during the lockdown hasn't been clear enough. ...
For those folk who find my other Lock-Down Diary versions too “negative” or otherwise unpalatable… Here’s a photo of my cat, . . Better? Tomorrow’s Sanitised Version: a pretty flower. . . . =fs= ...
. . April 1: Day seven of living in lock-down… This morning I had a brief chat with one of my neighbours, “D” (social distance between us, a good three or four metres). I learned he had resigned from his previous job and had been hired by another company – ...
Funnily enough, my thought as I start this post is whether it will be well written enough. Or should that be well enough written? Because so much of what I know about good writing came from my two stints at The Listener, which this morning was shut down due to ...
With normal democratic procedures in abeyance, there were two ways to go. First, it was open for the government to dissolve itself and invite the National Party to join a ministry of national salvation. That would have lessened the democratic deficit of the times by having a team of rivals without ...
Dr Kirsty Ross Children and young people can respond differently in times of distress. This also varies by age and developmental stage, with younger children having more magical and imaginative thinking, and older children having more awareness and knowledge of the issues our communities are facing (which brings up ...
Hungary has been a virtual dictatorship for a decade now, as Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has gradually eroded its democracy. But now, its official, with the passage of an indefinite emergency law allowing rule by decree:Hungary’s parliament has passed a new set of coronavirus measures that includes jail terms for ...
While the economy is on pause under lockdown, the government is beginning to plan how to cope with the post-lockdown, post-tourism, post-export education world we will eventually find ourselves in. They're planning a lot of infrastructure spending as economic stimulus, and have asked for proposals which can start the moment ...
It's my distraction, setting up tiny scenes to photograph. I've got stuck on the Babushka dolls for now. Something about their bubble shape. Something about their never changing, smiling features, suggesting persistent equanimity. Can we get through everything that is being thrown at us and keep at least a tiny ...
. . March 31: Day six of living in lock-down… This time I managed to sleep a little longer and the alarm woke me at the pre-set time: 6.55am. Then remembered I was working a later shift and could’ve slept in. Oh well, there are things to do at home. ...
Image credit:Diamond Harbour School Blogs I notice a few regulars no longer allow public access to the site counters. This may happen accidentally when the blog format is altered. If your blog is unexpectedly missing or ...
Yesterday's Horizon poll showing support for a "Yes" vote in this year's cannabis referendum sliding into the majority for the first time in a year looked like good news for reformers – and it probably is. But the result warrants some scrutiny.The poll is the fifth in a series commissioned ...
For almost a week now, every one of us who isn’t an essential worker has been confined to their bubble. We are allowed to go shopping for groceries, to visit the doctor, and to get a bit of exercise if we stay local. The reason we are doing this is ...
The Covid-19 saga will no doubt produce many twists and turns for us before it is finally brought to an end. But one thing it has shown us – and what comfort it should bring us – is that our country’s government is in good hands. I am not thinking ...
In the absence of a vaccine or a cure for a deadly disease, staying home in your bubble is what you do, the concept is not new. To the best of my knowledge last time we did this in NZ was for polio, in the years before a vaccine came ...
The following statement was released on March 28 by the National Network on Cuba, a coalition of 40 groups, based in the United States. In recent weeks, Cuba has deployed hundreds of medical providers to over a dozen countries in Europe, Asia, as well as to their neighbors in Latin ...
While New Zealand is at Alert Level 4, we're making sure that New Zealanders are kept informed and up to date with all the latest developments of the Government's COVID-19 response. It's been a shortened week because of Easter, so we're bringing you our weekly wrap a day early. ...
Earlier this week, the Prime Minister informed the nation that the Easter Bunny (and the Tooth Fairy!) were deemed essential workers. However, she made it clear that, due to the restrictions we are all facing at COVID-19 Alert Level 4, the Easter Bunny may find it tricky to get to ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Foreign Affairs Hon. Ron Mark, Minister of Defence Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Ron Mark today announced that New Zealand will provide a further package of assistance to Vanuatu, to support the response to Tropical Cyclone Harold. “Tropical ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Foreign Affairs Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced that New Zealand will enter into transit arrangements with a range of countries to make it easier for each other’s citizens to get home. “There are millions of people around the world stranded ...
From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, our Government has striven to provide calm, clear and consistent communication, including daily press conference updates from the Prime Minister. ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters says getting New Zealanders back home and other travellers out of the country is "a nightmare for our embassies, consuls, and staff around the world".Speaking to NewstalkZB's Mike Hosking, the Foreign Minister said that he gave a clear message to people travelling overseas that they ...
The domestic travel ban has been lifted for stranded foreign tourists trying to get to international airports to fly home, after the Coalition Government announced a plan to help the tens of thousands of foreigners stranded here. Foreign Minister Rt. Hon. Winston Peters spoke with RNZ's Susie Ferguson said foreign ...
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters believes the country is rediscovering its resilience and self-reliance through its response to the COVID-19 pandemic.He says he is heartened that the mass majority of New Zealanders are following lockdown rules and that the government looking at the future, including paying to keep much ...
New Zealand can emulate the success of the US after the Great Depression by exploiting our own resources to turn the economy around quickly, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters says. Mr. Peters told Magic Talk that New Zealand has an opportunity to come out of the COVID-19 pandemic a "superior, ...
All 45 New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel are either on their way back to New Zealand, or already in the country, according to Defence Minister Ron Mark."Twenty-eight personnel arrived back in New Zealand last week and are in isolation at the Royal New Zealand Air Force base in ...
The COVID-19 situation in New Zealand is moving fast - and to avoid what we've seen overseas - the Government's response must be to move fast too. We're committed to keeping New Zealanders safe and well-informed every step of the way. ...
We know people are feeling anxious about COVID-19. While the situation is serious, New Zealand has a world-class health system and we’re well-prepared to keep New Zealanders safe. ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters is encouraging New Zealanders overseas to stay where they are amid the COVID-19 pandemic. "We are reaching a point where the best option for most New Zealanders offshore is to shelter in place, by preparing to safely stay where they are.” "This includes following the instructions ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs Foreign Minister Winston Peters is encouraging the tens of thousands of New Zealanders travelling overseas to consider sheltering in place, in light of COVID-19. “Since 18 March, we have been warning New Zealanders offshore that the window for flying ...
The Sport and Recreation Minister Grant Robertson has announced that urgent maintenance of turf and care for plants in non-plantation nurseries will soon be able to go ahead under Level 4 restrictions. “The Government has agreed that urgent upkeep and maintenance of biological assets will be able to go ahead ...
E tangi ana a Taranaki iwi, e tangi ana te ao Māori, otirā e tangi ana te motu. Mōu katoa ngā roimata e riringi whānui ana, mōu katoa ngā mihi. E te kaikōkiri i te reo Māori, e Te Huirangi, takoto mai. Takoto mai me te mōhio ko ngā ...
Today is day 15 of Alert Level 4 lockdown. And at the halfway mark I have no hesitation in saying, that what New Zealanders have done over the last two weeks is huge. In the face of the greatest threat to human health we have seen in over a century, ...
All driver licences, WoFs, CoFs, and some vehicle certifications, that expired on or after 1 January 2020 will be valid for up to six months from 10 April 2020, Transport Minister Phil Twyford has announced. “People shouldn’t have to worry about getting fined for having an expired document if driving ...
The Government has today released the report from the Public Inquiry into the Earthquake Commission chaired by Dame Silvia Cartwright. Minister Responsible for the Earthquake Commission Grant Robertson says the Government wants to learn from people’s experiences following the Canterbury earthquakes and other recent natural disasters. “Dame Silvia’s report documents ...
The Government has extended by two weeks till April 27 the amount of time priority groups, such as health workers and those aged over 65, have to get their flu vaccine before it is made available to the wider public. This year’s vaccination campaign is a key component of the ...
Communities stepping up to help New Zealanders stay at home to break the transmission of COVID-19 and save lives have received Government support, said Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni. “Delivering groceries for the elderly who can’t shop online, providing data packs for low income families to keep them connected, and being ...
Across New Zealand 120 sites are taking samples to be tested for COVID-19. 68 community based assessment centres (CBACs) have been established to take samples from people with COVID-19 symptoms. Alongside this, 52 other centres including designated general practices, swabbing centres, and mobile clinics are now testing people for ...
The Ministry of Education is working with partners to develop a package of options so that students can learn at home when Term 2 begins on 15 April, Education Minister Chris Hipkins said today. Supports are also being prepared for households with children under five, to help parents and whānau ...
Māori Television to begin educational te reo programmes Ki te Ao Mārama – a new online learning space Thousands of hard copy learning packs ready for distribution Helpdesk and advice service for kōhanga, kura and wharekura Television, the internet and hard copy learning packs are some of the ways whānau ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has announced an initial package of support to help the people and the Government of Vanuatu respond to the impact of Tropical Cyclone Harold. “Our Pacific neighbours have been hit by a Category 5 Cyclone at the same time as dealing with the economic impacts ...
Tourism New Zealand to lead work reimagining the way tourism operates in post-COVID-19 world. Ministers to review International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy investment plan. The Government, industry and business are working together to develop a plan for how tourism will operate in a post-COVID-19 world, Tourism Minister Kelvin Davis ...
More New Zealanders are taking up the chance to work in horticulture as the sector keeps New Zealanders fed and in jobs during the COVID-19 Alert Level 4 lockdown. “Our horticulture sector has long been one of New Zealand’s export star performers, contributing around $6 billion a year to our ...
The Provincial Development Unit is working through applications and projects to see where Provincial Growth Fund money can be repurposed for initiatives deemed more critical to fighting the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones says. “We need to be throwing everything we have at ...
The Government’s wage subsidy to protect jobs and keep workers and businesses connected during the lockdown has now supported over a million New Zealanders, with $6.6 billion already paid out. “We’re supporting businesses to pay wages, and stay connected with their workers so that we are all in a better ...
The Government is stepping up efforts to help protect New Zealand’s Pacific communities in the fight against COVID-19. Cabinet has agreed that $17 million will be allocated to support a COVID-19 Pacific Response Package, which will: Support Pacific health and disability services facing increased demand; Ramp up public health messaging ...
“Yesterday evening the Health Minister advised me of his trip to a beach during the lockdown and offered his resignation,” Jacinda Ardern said. “Under normal conditions I would sack the Minister of Health. What he did was wrong, and there are no excuses. “But right now, my priority is our ...
Last night as part of my preparation for the Epidemic Response Committee, I provided the Prime Minister with a complete picture of my activity outside my home during Alert Level 4. That included the fact that on the first weekend of the Alert Level 4 lockdown I drove my family ...
A range of support is being rolled out across New Zealand to help people look after their mental health during COVID-19 Health Minister David Clark said this morning. “COVID-19 has brought a lot of uncertainty into our lives and many of us will be feeling some level of distress or ...
The New Zealand Government has made arrangements to charter a flight for New Zealanders stranded in Peru to depart the country, following agreement with the Chilean government to allow the necessary transit through Chile, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters announced today. “Like many travellers around the world at the moment, ...
Hospital preparations for COVID-19 are well advanced says Health Minister David Clark. “Hospitals across New Zealand are repurposing buildings and training staff to get ready for COVID-19 patients. This gives me confidence that we are well prepared for any potential increase in COVID-19 patients needing hospital level care,” said David ...
The Government will be introducing legislation to make changes to the Companies Act to help companies facing insolvency due to COVID-19 to remain viable and keep New Zealanders in jobs. The temporary changes include: Giving directors of companies facing significant liquidity problems because of COVID-19 a ‘safe harbour’ from insolvency ...
The Government’s plan to cushion the blow of COVID-19 by supporting incomes, jobs and businesses, and position the economy to recover has been backed by another international report. International credit rating agency Moody’s today reaffirmed its highest Aaa credit rating on New Zealand, saying the economy is expected to remain ...
The Government has stepped in to support vital air links to our offshore islands, the Chatham Islands, Great Barrier Island and Motiti Island, Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today. “As part of our $600 million support package to minimise the impacts of COVID-19 on the aviation sector, the Government has ...
National sports organisations have been given certainty of funding to ensure they can remain viable through the COVID-19 pandemic, Sport and Recreation Minister Grant Robertson announced today. “The global spread of COVID-19 has had a significant impact on sport and recreation in New Zealand, including the cancellation or postponement of ...
Changes have been made to allow butchers to process pork, only for supply to supermarkets or other processors or retailers that are open, Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor has announced. “We carefully weighed the risk of allowing butchers to open their shops for retail customers, but the risk of spreading COVID-19 ...
Essential workers who take leave from work to comply with public health guidance are being supported with a leave scheme to ensure they will continue to receive income, say the Minister of Workplace Relations and Safety Iain Lees-Galloway and Minister for Social Development, Carmel Sepuloni. A number of essential businesses ...
A Government WhatsApp channel has been launched to help make information more easily accessible and shareable in the fight against COVID-19. Govt.NZ, which is free to use on any mobile device, will carry information and news for the public, businesses, healthcare providers, not for profits and local government. It can ...
The Government has announced a plan to enable the safe, orderly exit of tens of thousands of stranded foreign nationals from New Zealand during the current COVID-19 Alert Level 4 restrictions, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Winston Peters has said. “When we moved into lockdown a week ago, the ...
Health Minister Dr David Clark says the Government is delivering on its commitment to support general practice doctors and nurses, and pharmacies on the front-line of our fight against COVID-19. "For us to overcome COVID-19, we need community health services such as general practice and community pharmacy to step up ...
Justice Susan Thomas has been appointed Chief High Court Judge, Attorney-General David Parker announced today. She replaces Justice Geoffrey Venning who has resigned from the position. David Parker paid tribute to Justice Venning, who he said had stewarded the High Court very capably over the last five years. “On behalf ...
Businesses can start applying to their banks for loans under the Business Finance Guarantee Scheme set up to support the New Zealand economy during the COVID-19 pandemic. “We’re moving quickly to protect New Zealand businesses, jobs and the economy during this unprecedented global economic shock,” Finance Minister Grant Robertson said. ...
Work is underway looking at measures to speed up consents for development and infrastructure projects during the recovery from COVID 19, to provide jobs and stimulate our economy. Environment Minister David Parker said the COVID-19 pandemic is a serious global crisis that will have a wide ranging and lasting impact ...
Advance payments will be made to transport construction industry contractors to retain the workforce and ensure it is ready to quickly gear up to build projects which will be vital to New Zealand’s COVID-19 economic recovery, Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today. He said keeping the workforce required to build ...
The Government has tasked a group of industry leaders to seek out infrastructure projects that are ready to start as soon as the construction industry returns to normal to reduce the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, Economic Development Minister Phil Twyford and Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones say. The Infrastructure ...
Work to scale up the health system in preparation for COVID-19 was today outlined by Health Minister David Clark, as he reported back to the new Epidemic Response Committee. “We are well placed to contain the spread of COVID-19. We have taken early and decisive action at our borders, and ...
The Government is refining its COVID-19 essential business guidance to include the distribution of news publications for communities which are hard to reach. The Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media, Kris Faafoi, said the move was in recognition of the importance for New Zealanders who might be harder to ...
The Government is ensuring supermarkets can open on Easter Sunday so we can buy groceries, but stay closed on Good Friday allowing workers to take a break. This provides a balanced approach and ensures we avoid large queues that two days closure may cause. “Supermarkets will be able to open ...
Following the successful conclusion of the Building Partner Capacity (BPC) mission at Taji, New Zealand defence personnel are returning to New Zealand from Iraq, in accordance with the Cabinet decision made in June 2019, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Ron Mark announced today. “New Zealand is very ...
The State of National Emergency to help stop the spread of COVID-19 has been extended for a further seven days, Minister of Civil Defence Peeni Henare said. The initial declaration on March 25 lasted seven days and can be extended as many times as necessary. “Since we went into isolation ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Education Minister Dan Tehan has warned non-government schools that if they fail to open for the next term they will face losing funding. He said on Thursday that “as part of the funding requirement” a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Remember how last year’s Easter felt bizarre because the country was in election-mode? How normal that seems, now everything is surreal, with the nation “holidaying” in this peculiar, unpleasant limbo. As we contemplate the grimness ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Michelle Grattan talks with MPs Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Victoria), Fiona Martin (Reid, NSW), Clare O’Neil (Hotham, Victoria) and Helen Haines (Indi, Victoria) about how they do their job during the pandemic. They discuss the operation ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nic Geard, Senior Lecturer, School of Computing and Information Systems, University of Melbourne; Senior Research Fellow, Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, University of Melbourne Following the emergence and rapid spread of COVID-19, several countries have succeeded in bringing local outbreaks under ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin Today’s chart shows the per capita level of testing performed in a number of countries. While the highest testing rate shown is Norway, we should note that Iceland has tested over eight percent of its population; too high to show on this chart. A ...
By RNZ News New Zealand has recorded just 29 new cases of Covid-19 in the past 24 hours, but the prime minister says a decision on changing the alert level will only be made two days before the lockdown ends. It is the fourth day in a row there ...
The Guardian’s Pacific Project disaster video.By the Pacific Project Tropical Cyclone Harold lashed the South Pacific island of Vanuatu, ripping off roofs and downing telecommunications, before moving towards Fiji and Tonga. The powerful cyclone made landfall on Monday in Sana province, an island north of Vanuatu’s capital Port ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elyse Methven, Lecturer in Law, University of Technology Sydney The message to everyone during the coronavirus pandemic is to stay at home and only leave if you really need to for, say, food, health care or exercise. Police now have powers to ...
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand. This week he talks to Pat MacFie from Manaaki.This week we have another special podcast highlighting some of ...
NZ First leader Winston Peters today said he wants the election held on November 21, Radio NZ reported. He says he believes the health system would be under the pump in September with the winter flu season and the country potentially still dealing with the impacts of Covid-19. Prime Minister ...
New Zealand Rock Lobster (crayfish) are once again heading to China with the first small consignment being airfreighted last week. It was one of the first primary industry sectors in New Zealand to be affected by Covid-19, and as we now know, the sledgehammer that hit this industry was just ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lauren Bloomfield, Senior Lecturer, School of Medicine, University of Notre Dame Australia Lockdown measures aimed at limiting the spread of COVID-19 should actually help cut the cases of flu this year. That’s because keeping people apart to reduce the spread of coronavirus ...
New modelling from Te Pūnaha Matatini projects the impact of the lockdown, and what our next steps could be, Marc Daalder reports New figures from a team of mathematicians and scientists modelling the way Covid-19 could affect New Zealand indicate the lockdown has significantly dampened the spread of the virus. ...
Bernard Hickey talks to Kiwibank chief economist Jarrod Kerr about the latest retail spending data and the Reserve Bank's call for banks to step up as market-makers for corporate and local government bonds. In their latest daily 'Bernard Zooms out to lunch with Jarrod' video, Bernard Hickey and Jarrod ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Georgie Russell, Senior Lecturer, Deakin University This Easter will be especially challenging, with family isolation and many parents under financial strain, or other stressors. So, many parents will be looking to restore some sense of “normality” by welcoming the Easter bunny into ...
The Beths’ live-streamed concert yesterday showed that even in lockdown, music isn’t dead. Here’s why it worked, and where you can see Kiwis live streaming for the next week.Yesterday at 9am, Liz Stokes put a giant pineapple mask over her head and played the Animal Crossing theme on a trumpet ...
New Conservative Leader Leighton Baker has lived in and around the Waimakariri district since 1992 and is revelling in the opportunity to represent the electorate in Parliament after the 2020 general election. “Waimakariri is a diverse district with a strong ...
“Hard-hit councils, who oversee half this country’s public infrastructure, require financial support from central government that is tied to shared priorities through Urban Growth Partnerships,” says Paul Blair CEO of Infrastructure New Zealand. ...
Airways may close seven of its regional air traffic control towers because of a collapse in traveller numbers. The services under review are provided at Hawke's Bay, Gisborne, New Plymouth, Rotorua and Invercargill Airport as well as the airfield flight information services provided at Kapiti Coast Airport and Milford Sound ...
Proposals to expand the role of local councils into climate change mitigation under the Resource Management Act would add confusion, complexity and duplication, according to the Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of New Zealand (PEPANZ) and ...
As New Zealand enters its third week of Covid-19 lockdown, a just released set of modelling provides a flare of light at the end of the tunnel, reports Toby Manhire.On a day that the active case number decreased, it finds that “While New Zealand case numbers remain low, tracing, testing, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachael L. Brown, Director of the Centre for Philosophy of the Sciences and Lecturer at the School of Philosophy, Australian National University As they released the modelling of the COVID-19 pandemic behind Australia’s social isolation policies this week, Prime Minister Scott Morrison ...
The latest in our new series of charts, graphics and data visualisations by Chris McDowall.This work is entirely funded by the generosity of The Spinoff MembersThese posts collate the most recent statistics and present them as charts and maps. The Ministry of Health typically publishes data updates in the early ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jim Tognolini, Director, Centre for Educational Measurement and Assessment, University of Sydney Following a meeting with states and territories, federal education minister, Dan Tehan said year 12 students were a priority, and were being sent a clear signal: “There will be no ...
The Council of Licenced Firearms Owners (COLFO) is calling for an equal extension to all licencing regimes, following the Government’s announcement today offering motorists a six-month licencing grace period. COLFO says that like motorists, licenced ...
Dear Minister Jones, Firstly, let me introduce myself. My name is Adrian. I am an employee in the forestry industry, a Future Forester, a graduate of Canterbury University and, albeit very small, a forest owner. ...
As countries in Europe plan a tightrope walk back out of lockdown, the World Health Organisation warns it is too early to relax strict suppression measures in the fight against Covid-19, writes Peter Bale Two weeks into New Zealand's aggressive and early lockdown to combat the spread of Covid-19, voices ...
Consumers dramatically changed their spending patterns last month because of Covid-19 and the government ordered lockdown. Official numbers show overall retail spending using electronic cards fell a record seasonally adjusted 3.9 percent on the previous month. Stats NZ senior manager Sue Chapman said spending on eating out and accommodation plunged ...
A new $200,000 business subsidy package is being launched in Christchurch to help those affected by Covid-19. The ChristchurchNZ business support subsidy will offer eligible businesses up to $1000 each to seek professional advice. The scheme - funded by ChristchurchNZ, the city's economic development agency, will support small to medium ...
Large retailers have been quick to apply for government wage subsidies during the Covid-19 lockdown. The Warehouse has received $67.7 million to cover the labour costs of the shutdown of its Red Shed, Torpedo, Noel Leeming, and Warehouse Stationery chains, which between them employ about 11,000 staff. "The receipt of ...
A new report Quantifying the wellbeing costs of Covid-19 by the New Zealand Initiative shows how an economic hit of about 6.1% of GDP would be justified if it meant saving 33,600 lives during the Covid-19 pandemic. The figures, compiled by research fellow ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dougal Sutherland, Clinical Psychologist, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington The COVID-19 pandemic has forced millions of people to live under strict lockdown conditions, but the psychology of human behaviour predicts they will find it harder to stick to the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Smillie, Associate Professor, University of Melbourne The coronavirus pandemic has caused tens of thousands of deaths around the world and pushed major economies into a tailspin. Beyond those impacts, almost all of us will face psychological challenges – trying to maintain ...
We asked Tony Baird, of Newsroom foundation supporter Vodafone NZ, to provide some insights into how New Zealanders have been using online and their smartphones during the first fortnight of lockdown. At Vodafone NZ, we entered new territory in this lockdown as New Zealanders have been turning to their smartphones and devices ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union has launched a new campaign to temporarily reduce the remuneration of politicians, senior bureaucrats, and council bosses to match those voluntary and involuntary efforts in the private sector where pay is being ...
Analysis by Keith RankinWhat is Mercantilism?Keith Rankin. Mercantilism is the form of public policy that was dominant in Europe – especially Northern Europe – in the ‘early modern’ period; meaning in the period loosely between 1500 and 1800 (sixteenth to eighteenth centuries). In a political sense it ...
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency says legislative changes to driver licensing and vehicle certification requirements coming into effect tomorrow (10 April) will help drivers and vehicle owners safely navigate through the COVID-19 lockdown period and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Woolaston, Lawyer, Queensland University of Technology Never before have we seen how the human use of wildlife can yield such catastrophe, as we have with COVID-19. The current available evidence indicates COVID-19 was first transmitted in a wildlife market in Wuhan. ...
In a week alone there was an increase of about 10,000 people now relying on welfare to get by. As the number of benefit recipients rapidly increases as a result of COVID-19, Auckland Action Against Poverty is calling on the Government to urgently lift benefits ...
CEAC stands alongside Forest & Bird, Greenpeace, WWF-New Zealand, Generation Zero, EDS and Ecologic letter to Jacinda Ardern calling on the Government to transform the New Zealand economy to tackle climate change, save native species, improve freshwater ...
Better Public Media welcomes the announcement that the Ministry of Education will fund Television New Zealand and Māori Television to provide up to six hours daily of educational content for our children and students, beginning next week. It is ...
It’s OK if you don’t come out of lockdown with abs.We are living through the worst global pandemic since the Spanish Flu in 1918 and the beginning of an economic calamity that has already claimed the jobs of millions of workers the world over. Hospitals are full, schools are closed and many countries are in ...
One thing is abundantly clear, when this lock down is over, many tourism related businesses will be reliant on Domestic Tourism to stay afloat. But what will that mean from a Freedom Camping point of view? While it has been true, that many towns ...
The Government has announced that all incoming travellers will be quarantined away from their homes and families for a 14 day period, after a public campaign that received widespread support The Government has bowed to a public campaign led by epidemiologists and the National Party to have all returning New Zealanders ...
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening.The following charts are based on numbers shared at the daily press conference. These may vary from the full day's numbers released in the Ministry of Health's spreadsheet ...
New Zealand is has joined the ranks of countries experiencing a wave of sabotage attempts against mobile networks as false claims about 5G go viral, Marc Daalder reports Spark, 2degrees, Vodafone and the Rural Connectivity Group have all experienced threats or actual attempts of sabotage of cell towers in recent ...
Air traffic control closure sends COVID-19 shockwaves through regional airports Seven regional airports are shocked that Airways NZ, the national air traffic management organisation, wants to discuss the removal of air traffic control at their facilities ...
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters wants an election on November 21st. Peters told RNZ he fought for that originally as it's his long held position that summer elections are better. ...
The national lockdown was justifiable to protect the nation's intensive care capacity. But any prolonged lockdown and border closure will cause economic issues that lead to broader, indirect problems for our health and wellbeing, writes Professor Grant Guilford. In a caring society it is right that we do our utmost ...
She’s not a teacher or a fluent speaker – she just wants to practise with you. Join Leonie Hayden as she works through the first four weeks of Scotty Morrison’s Māori Made Easy.Yesterday we were counting things, today we’re counting people. We have different ways of counting each because people aren’t ...
A news item by Māni Dunlop, Māori News Director, has been posted on the RNZ website under the heading Government urged to put Māori at forefront of Covid-19 planning. “Forefront” means the position of greatest importance or prominence. One implication to be drawn from the headline, therefore. is that Māori ...
Women’s Rights Commissioner Saunoamaali’i Karanina Sumeo is encouraging women to seek help immediately if they find themselves in an abusive situation during the COVID-19 isolation. Often, people who were already in an abusive situation will likely ...
COMMENTARY:By Georgie Bright, Australia associate director of Human Rights Watch Even before the coronavirus pandemic, the fragile health system in Papua New Guinea was underfunded and overwhelmed, with high rates of malaria, tuberculosis, and diabetes among its population of more than eight million. Access to hospitals is extremely ...
New home owners will pay tens of thousands of dollars more on their mortgage if they accept a six-month mortgage 'holiday' option. That’s money going to the banks. But should lender and borrower be sharing the pain? There’s always a nagging worry about holidays. They are fun while they last, but ...
An Auckland bus driver tells Leonie Hayden what it’s like to operate under alert level four, and the struggle to secure a safer work environment.Mike moved to New Zealand in 2001. “I’m a Kiwi now,” he says, “and a die-hard unionist.” He’s employed by a large New Zealand bus company ...
The 1pm briefing has become appointment viewing. But it is no substitute for transparent, timely information, even in such extraordinary times, writes Newshub investigations reporter Michael Morrah in this post originally published on Newshub.Like all journalists in New Zealand right now, I’ve been covering stories day after day, all of ...
The Chair of the Earthquake Commission, Sir Michael Cullen, has welcomed Dame Silvia Cartwright’s Report of the Public Inquiry into the Earthquake Commission, released today. “The Report lays out clearly the challenges faced by EQC in responding to ...
With 14 days before the lockdown period is - for now - set to end, big questions remain about how the country is going to be able to stamp out flareups of Covid-19. ...
Environmental groups from across New Zealand have written to the Prime Minister urging the Government to restore Aotearoa in the economic recovery after lockdown. Forest & Bird, Greenpeace, WWF-New Zealand, Generation Zero, EDS and Ecologic ...
We've published a Controller update on Government spending in response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. On 25 March 2020, Parliament passed legislation in response to the pandemic authorising the Government to spend up to $52 billion in addition ...
‘It is sobering watching what a country can do if it wants to. Having been told for so long that nothing is possible. These are strange times down the back of the bus, John.’Read more Lockdown Letters here.Dear John KeatsFunny that it’s had to come to this. But when I think ...
By Kelly Vacala in Suva Fiji disaster authorities have lifted movement restrictions imposed yesterday during the height of Severe Tropical Cyclone Harold have been lifted and both Queens and Kings highways are open. However, Covid-19 restrictions remain. Category 5 Harold is now heading for Tonga after leaving a trail ...
The Ministry of Social Development and the Ministry of Education will be taking questions from the opposition in the Epidemic Response Committee meeting. ...
Today’s EQC report urges the country’s natural disaster insurer to prepare for the next “big one”. David Williams reports The Canterbury earthquakes killed 185 people, and damaged 180,000 houses, some of which still haven’t been adequately repaired. Or re-repaired. But they also did something else. They shook people’s confidence in the ...
KiwiSaver funds invested solely in ethical companies are outperforming other funds amidst market volatility. An analysis of returns for the first quarter of 2020 shows growth funds were on average down more than 12 percent, but growth funds that were ethically invested lost on under 8 percent. Conservative and balanced ...
An Auckland small business owner says he's paying full price for broadband in an empty factory and it is not fair. Steve has been wrangling with Spark for days arguing it should share in the pain of thousands of its customers. He runs a small manufacturing business with a handful ...
Paywave limits will increase to $200 to reduce physical contact with PIN pads during the Covid-19 pandemic. Previously only transactions of $80 or less were able to be completed without a PIN using a contactless card. After a pilot, Payments NZ will progressively roll out the new higher contactless payment ...
The Overstory, the winnner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, is an engulfing, worldview-shifting novel about climate catastrophe and hope, writes Susan Wardell. (Photographs are from a photo essay on kauri dieback by Michelle Hyslop; captions by Andrea Ewing). The year before last, I spent the month of January hugging ...
US death toll jumps 779 in a day; WTO warns global trade could drop by 13-33%; Trump says WHO biased towards China; WHO boss says finger-pointing just results in 'many more body bags'US toll surges: The United States is standing out in the Coid-19 numbers count with more than ...
By Sri Krishnamurthi, contributing editor of Pacific Media Watch After some weeks of heavy criticism of Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape’s government amid the Covid-19 pandemic, support for the administration has come from a surprising quarter – one of the media. Scott Waide is the Lae bureau ...
NZX50 back over 10k again as Mainfreight keeps its profit forecast with just single digit fall in sales, while Tilt Renewables' big payday helps Infratil pay a dividendPushing higher: The NZX50 finally managed to close above the key 10,000 level for the first time in almost a month, finishing ...
Open mike 21/11/2011 
The pandemic has shown us how effective our public service is. They've pulled together a massive policy response, from a lockdown to economic support to healthcare to planning how to keep everything running when this is over, and done it in next to no time. They are heroes, who have ...11 hours ago
In 1968 Canadian sociologist Laurence Peter coined the phrase “Peter Principle” as a contribution to the sociology of organisations. It explains that in complex organizations people rise to the level of their own incompetence. That is, they get promoted so long as they meet or exceed the specified criteria for ...12 hours ago
The practice and business of music has been one of the sectors most gravely impacted by the virus sweeping the world. The emphatic nature of our government's response, necessary as it was, has slammed the industry and the people who work in it.There are New Zealand artists – Nadia Reid, ...13 hours ago
. . April 8: Day 14 of living in lock-down… The good news first: the downward trajectory of new cases appears to be a real thing. In the last four days, since Sunday, new infections have been dropping: Sunday: 89 new cases Monday: 67 Tuesday: 54 Today (Wednesday): 50 The ...15 hours ago
The anti-fluoride movement wants to restrict your reading to “just four studies.” They actively ignore or attempt to discredit other relevant studies. Image credit: Censorship in media. For earlier articles in this series see: ... 19 hours ago
Not Now, Not Ever, Never! The problem with Labour's leading activists is that there is never a good time for democratic socialism. Never. They are like Saint Augustine who prayed to the Almighty: “Lord, give me chastity and self-control – but not yet.” In the case of Labour "junior officers", however, ...20 hours ago
52 Articles Physical science of global warming & effects Sensitivity of ice flow to uncertainty in flow law parameters in an idealized one-dimensional geometry (open access) Observations & observational methods of global warming & effects Will heat stress take its toll on milk production in China? Uncoupled El Niño ...21 hours ago
We are seeing what has been termed “a greater challenge than the crash of 2008” by a growing number of economists and more rational, sane commentators, because whilst that was a shocking exposure of the levels to which hubris had sunk, right down to the blank cheque given those who ...1 day ago
It’s a beautiful autumn afternoon, we need to get out of the house, and so our bubble sets off on a bike ride around our local neighbourhood, Cambridge Park. The bikes come out of the garage, and, being really certain we have a front door key, close the garage door ...2 days ago
The Queen’s coronavirus broadcast, with its overtones of Winston Churchill and Vera Lynn, prompted me to reflect on the tribulations my parents’ generation suffered during the Second World War – and I imagine that those parallels, given her own wartime experience, were very much in the Queen’s mind as she ...2 days ago
We all know that Simon Bridges has, at the best of times, an intermittent relationship with the truth. However you would think that during a pandemic and economic crisis the current opposition leader would pull his head in and start to do the right thing.Obviously leading by example should be ...3 days ago
Connett promotes Riddell et al (2019) as one of the only four studies one needs to read about fluoridation. But he misunderstands and misrepresents the findings of this study. Image credit: Fluoride Action ... 3 days ago
Last month I wrote my blog on covid-19 pointing out the in our pre Alert Level 4 days that a subject no one had heard here months ago was now dominating the media. An amazing feature of this crisis is how quickly it has swept every other issue aside worldwide. ...3 days ago
As the world economy slides rapidly towards deep recession there are growing calls for a Universal Benefit coming from some leftists and rightists. Now Finance Minister Grant Robertson is saying it is on the table. This article by a French party Workers Struggle provides analysis of various forms of universal ...4 days ago
This is the advice from the very top of the anti-fluoride movement – Paul Connett, director of the Fluoride Action Network (FAN). Don’t worry about reading up on all the scientific information “You only have ... 4 days ago
Comfortably, in the very first round, with an impressive 56% of the votes.I wonder, did members of the Shadow Cabinet start tweeting their resignations during Starmer's victory speech, or is that only a trick the right pull?It is odd how all the talk of how the next leader "needs to ...5 days ago
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern addressed the nation today about the decline in daylight New Zealand has been experiencing over the previous few months. She said “As many of you will notice, our attempts to stem the dwindling of the daylight over the last few months have been completely ...5 days ago
We must root out the traitors among us! ...6 days ago
I haven’t done a huge amount in the last few days. I’m reading The Poppy War and I’ve sort of poked at a couple of games – I started SOMA but I’m a wimp and I quit while in the first room after the brain scan. I might try it ...1 week ago
Image credit: Diamond Harbour School Blogs I notice a few regulars no longer allow public access to the site counters. This may happen accidentally when the blog format is altered. If your blog is unexpectedly missing or ... 1 week ago
The following statement was released on March 28 by the National Network on Cuba, a coalition of 40 groups, based in the United States. In recent weeks, Cuba has deployed hundreds of medical providers to over a dozen countries in Europe, Asia, as well as to their neighbors in Latin ...1 week ago
While New Zealand is at Alert Level 4, we're making sure that New Zealanders are kept informed and up to date with all the latest developments of the Government's COVID-19 response. It's been a shortened week because of Easter, so we're bringing you our weekly wrap a day early. ...9 hours ago
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Foreign Affairs Hon. Ron Mark, Minister of Defence Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Ron Mark today announced that New Zealand will provide a further package of assistance to Vanuatu, to support the response to Tropical Cyclone Harold. “Tropical ...13 hours ago
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The scale of what we face right now is unlike anything we have ever seen before. Overcoming it is our common purpose. ...2 weeks ago
The Sport and Recreation Minister Grant Robertson has announced that urgent maintenance of turf and care for plants in non-plantation nurseries will soon be able to go ahead under Level 4 restrictions. “The Government has agreed that urgent upkeep and maintenance of biological assets will be able to go ahead ...12 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Education Minister Dan Tehan has warned non-government schools that if they fail to open for the next term they will face losing funding. He said on Thursday that “as part of the funding requirement” a ...4 hours ago
State housing provider Kāinga Ora is phoning 6000 tenants to apologise after many received letters saying their rent would go up. ...9 hours ago
NZ First leader Winston Peters today said he wants the election held on November 21, Radio NZ reported. He says he believes the health system would be under the pump in September with the winter flu season and the country potentially still dealing with the impacts of Covid-19. Prime Minister ...11 hours ago
New Zealand Rock Lobster (crayfish) are once again heading to China with the first small consignment being airfreighted last week. It was one of the first primary industry sectors in New Zealand to be affected by Covid-19, and as we now know, the sledgehammer that hit this industry was just ...11 hours ago
New modelling from Te Pūnaha Matatini projects the impact of the lockdown, and what our next steps could be, Marc Daalder reports New figures from a team of mathematicians and scientists modelling the way Covid-19 could affect New Zealand indicate the lockdown has significantly dampened the spread of the virus. ...11 hours ago
Bernard Hickey talks to Kiwibank chief economist Jarrod Kerr about the latest retail spending data and the Reserve Bank's call for banks to step up as market-makers for corporate and local government bonds. In their latest daily 'Bernard Zooms out to lunch with Jarrod' video, Bernard Hickey and Jarrod ...11 hours ago
The Beths’ live-streamed concert yesterday showed that even in lockdown, music isn’t dead. Here’s why it worked, and where you can see Kiwis live streaming for the next week.Yesterday at 9am, Liz Stokes put a giant pineapple mask over her head and played the Animal Crossing theme on a trumpet ...12 hours ago
New Conservative Leader Leighton Baker has lived in and around the Waimakariri district since 1992 and is revelling in the opportunity to represent the electorate in Parliament after the 2020 general election. “Waimakariri is a diverse district with a strong ...12 hours ago
Airways may close seven of its regional air traffic control towers because of a collapse in traveller numbers. The services under review are provided at Hawke's Bay, Gisborne, New Plymouth, Rotorua and Invercargill Airport as well as the airfield flight information services provided at Kapiti Coast Airport and Milford Sound ...12 hours ago
As countries in Europe plan a tightrope walk back out of lockdown, the World Health Organisation warns it is too early to relax strict suppression measures in the fight against Covid-19, writes Peter Bale Two weeks into New Zealand's aggressive and early lockdown to combat the spread of Covid-19, voices ...13 hours ago
Consumers dramatically changed their spending patterns last month because of Covid-19 and the government ordered lockdown. Official numbers show overall retail spending using electronic cards fell a record seasonally adjusted 3.9 percent on the previous month. Stats NZ senior manager Sue Chapman said spending on eating out and accommodation plunged ...13 hours ago
A new $200,000 business subsidy package is being launched in Christchurch to help those affected by Covid-19. The ChristchurchNZ business support subsidy will offer eligible businesses up to $1000 each to seek professional advice. The scheme - funded by ChristchurchNZ, the city's economic development agency, will support small to medium ...13 hours ago
Large retailers have been quick to apply for government wage subsidies during the Covid-19 lockdown. The Warehouse has received $67.7 million to cover the labour costs of the shutdown of its Red Shed, Torpedo, Noel Leeming, and Warehouse Stationery chains, which between them employ about 11,000 staff. "The receipt of ...13 hours ago
We asked Tony Baird, of Newsroom foundation supporter Vodafone NZ, to provide some insights into how New Zealanders have been using online and their smartphones during the first fortnight of lockdown. At Vodafone NZ, we entered new territory in this lockdown as New Zealanders have been turning to their smartphones and devices ...13 hours ago
The Government has announced that all incoming travellers will be quarantined away from their homes and families for a 14 day period, after a public campaign that received widespread support The Government has bowed to a public campaign led by epidemiologists and the National Party to have all returning New Zealanders ...14 hours ago
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening. The following charts are based on numbers shared at the daily press conference. These may vary from the full day's numbers released in the Ministry of Health's spreadsheet ...14 hours ago
New Zealand is has joined the ranks of countries experiencing a wave of sabotage attempts against mobile networks as false claims about 5G go viral, Marc Daalder reports Spark, 2degrees, Vodafone and the Rural Connectivity Group have all experienced threats or actual attempts of sabotage of cell towers in recent ...15 hours ago
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters wants an election on November 21st. Peters told RNZ he fought for that originally as it's his long held position that summer elections are better. ...15 hours ago
The national lockdown was justifiable to protect the nation's intensive care capacity. But any prolonged lockdown and border closure will cause economic issues that lead to broader, indirect problems for our health and wellbeing, writes Professor Grant Guilford. In a caring society it is right that we do our utmost ...15 hours ago
A news item by Māni Dunlop, Māori News Director, has been posted on the RNZ website under the heading Government urged to put Māori at forefront of Covid-19 planning. “Forefront” means the position of greatest importance or prominence. One implication to be drawn from the headline, therefore. is that Māori ...16 hours ago
New home owners will pay tens of thousands of dollars more on their mortgage if they accept a six-month mortgage 'holiday' option. That’s money going to the banks. But should lender and borrower be sharing the pain? There’s always a nagging worry about holidays. They are fun while they last, but ...16 hours ago
Today’s EQC report urges the country’s natural disaster insurer to prepare for the next “big one”. David Williams reports The Canterbury earthquakes killed 185 people, and damaged 180,000 houses, some of which still haven’t been adequately repaired. Or re-repaired. But they also did something else. They shook people’s confidence in the ...18 hours ago
KiwiSaver funds invested solely in ethical companies are outperforming other funds amidst market volatility. An analysis of returns for the first quarter of 2020 shows growth funds were on average down more than 12 percent, but growth funds that were ethically invested lost on under 8 percent. Conservative and balanced ...18 hours ago
An Auckland small business owner says he's paying full price for broadband in an empty factory and it is not fair. Steve has been wrangling with Spark for days arguing it should share in the pain of thousands of its customers. He runs a small manufacturing business with a handful ...18 hours ago
Paywave limits will increase to $200 to reduce physical contact with PIN pads during the Covid-19 pandemic. Previously only transactions of $80 or less were able to be completed without a PIN using a contactless card. After a pilot, Payments NZ will progressively roll out the new higher contactless payment ...18 hours ago
US death toll jumps 779 in a day; WTO warns global trade could drop by 13-33%; Trump says WHO biased towards China; WHO boss says finger-pointing just results in 'many more body bags' US toll surges: The United States is standing out in the Coid-19 numbers count with more than ...18 hours ago
NZX50 back over 10k again as Mainfreight keeps its profit forecast with just single digit fall in sales, while Tilt Renewables' big payday helps Infratil pay a dividend Pushing higher: The NZX50 finally managed to close above the key 10,000 level for the first time in almost a month, finishing ...19 hours ago
Winston’s going strong in a discussion with MPs from various parties on Pacific Viewpoint on Stratos right now. He’s called ational on not keeping their 2008 election promises, GST etc… Key’s Brighter Future is in Aussie. And he’s claimed he’s researched it and the new Conservative Party is really created by National, just like Act has become.
Winston is using gutter politics, because the Conservative Party is trying to take his patch. He’s scared his voters will forget what he’s done for them, when the Conservatives offer the first $25,000 tax free. That would make pensions tax free, something promised, but never delivered, not even by Peters.
How many lefties here are proud of this little gem that has come to the attention of whale oil.
This is disgusting, misleading and just plain wrong on so many levels. I think it is more likely to turn people off than turn them on to Labour, so I say “more please”. However, it is still evidence of how far into the sewer some Labour campaigners have got.
Here are some of my thoughts on this pamphlet.
1. The first page appears to make the ludicrous claim that people will die before they see the first year of their child. It is not until they read further into the body of the leaflet that they find its true message. Yet many people just look at the headline and trash the leaflet as junk mail.
2. It uses the National party logo without consent, which I assume breaches some law or another such as copyright infringement, or “passing off”.
3. It actually advertises the National logo to people who have a fleeting view of the leaflet anyway.
4. It is factually wrong. It claims that beneficiaries who become pregnant will have to go to work at one year after the birth of their child, when in fact the law will apply to only a limited class of beneficiaries. The semantics could be argued that it doesn’t specifiy all or some pregnant beneficiaries. But that is a fairly thin argument.
5. And, the requirement is for these people to be “work ready”, so they won’t lose their benefits if they can’t get a job. So the claim that they will be forced to find work is false. If it were true, then it would contradict the arguments Labour has been making that the jobs aren’t there. How can people be forced into jobs that, according to Labour, don’t exist?
So, IMO, a very shabby piece of gutter campaigning more likely to back-fire than fire up the voters.
fuk you talk some crap idiot
get outside and do some exercise
I guess that means you like the leaflet, then. That wouldn’t surprise me.
wouldnt waste my time @ that slime site-i got banned hahahahah wayyyyy bk
why dont you go bk there and live?
free rent and all
Trolling on behalf of the fat man eh, or maybe that’s because its very close to your home……yawn.
Come on TS you can do better than that or has sideshow hit the panic button so all his minions react accordingly.
Your unwillingness to condemn this piece of trash says a lot about you IMO.
What sort of comments do you expect? I’ve still got your spit in my face. So Whaleoil is full of wild indignation about someone’s anonymous bit of politicing. Gosh.
Not anonymous. It is clear it is authorised. Have a close look at the leaflet.
Try a dose of reality, ts. Government policy is killing our kids. Now that’s really shabby.
Nice try at diversion TVOR. Of course, these problems stem back into Labour’s nine years in office. So why would a vote for Labour change these outcomes?
So what do you think of the leafleat?
I back it 100%. What’s the problem?
Because Labour has children at the centre of its policies, whereas National has multimillionaires at the centre of theirs.
To the best of my knowledge official autherised leaflets and flyers that are sent by the postal system are sent under a permit system and do not require a stamp.The upsidedown autherisation makes it look cheap and like a failed attempt at cut, copy and paste on a computer,
Your facts are wrong. There is no free postage.
As usual your selective interpretation is at work,
1. “you won’t be around …” is a statement that the parent will be elsewhere, i.e. not at their child’s birthday,nothing more sinister than that. But you know that already and could not help the juvenile claim of sensationalist bs.
2. They have used the brand image, as is allowed for any representational presentation of an organisation in correspondence.
3. Yawn
4.” But that is a fairly thin argument. ” said it yourself
5. There are no jobs, there will be no jobs. The work referred to is the work for the benefit programmes that National are so keen to bring in. You know, the ones the Rebstock report custom wrote for National earlier this year.
overall a not very warm fuzzy pamphlet but your reaction is about as over the top as we would expect .
Since you are so concerned about people defending the actions of others, care to defend your great leader’s statements about the Police having spare time when crimes go uninvestigated
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/6002076/Thief-to-hand-herself-in-after-police-fail-to-act
Goodness me! “It claims that beneficiaries who become pregnant will have to go to work at one year after the birth of their child, when in fact the law will apply to only a limited class of beneficiaries. “
And here was I thinking that Key/Bennett were making that the major selling point of their policy. You say ts that it is only for a few and then only work ready. Please tell your mates that they must be misleading or even lying to us.
National desperate in New Plymouth. Orange add-on to billboard telling the blue-rinsed to be sure to vote on Saturday, ‘it’s “crucial”.
TS, you really are a mean spirited, heartless individual if you think that this flyer is not only offensive but is important enough that you would go to battle over.
This country has so many real world problems that make the lives of its citizens a misery. The health, education, well-being, and future of our children are at stake.
And all you can do is bitch about some perceived offence in this letter.
The only people complaining about it that I can see are pro-National people who just couldn’t wait to ship it off to whaleoil – of all people! – you would think that for the average citizen whaleoil would not be the first person to come to mind when you wanted to complain. They would think of the MSM if they were genuine, unbiased recipients.
Unless of course you’re already a follower of His Magnitude as he leaves a trail across the mudflats of his miserable existence.
This is manufactured outrage – no more, no less.
Insider your leader has promised 170,000 jobs 3years ago
now 60,000 unemployed you must have some
insider information NO jobs now is it at least that’s closer to the truth than your leaders claims
Extrapolating Mankeys job figures 170,000 jobs = 60,000 more unemployed +100,000 to Aus
60,000new job next term of govt must given your leaders claims above = 170,000more unemployed + 300,000 to AUS
Insider trading thanks for insider info!
So Key reckons that Peters will hold the country to ransom.
Oh yeah, and if Key is re elected, he will sell a king’s ransom (and more).
Oh that’s a good line. Winston will hold our country’s ransom. Key will flog it off first chance he gets.
What really worries Key is that he would have to back down from his clever unbending anti-Peters line and negotiate with Winston. Loss of face?
“a politically charged tune that will have left-leaners fist-pumping, and Key supporters frowning.”
from Home Brew, Tourrettes and Matthew Crawley
“5500 listens in 24 hours, we’ve run out of free downloads on Soundcloud… So here it is:
http://homebrew.bandcamp.com/track/listen-to-us-feat-tourettes
released 15 November 2011
Produced by Haz Beats
Raps by Tom & Tourettes
Guest vocals by Esther Stephens & Matthew Crawley
Recorded by Jyeah & DJ Substance
Mixed by DJ Substance
Polls show voters want an alternative to National sole rule, and see Labour as lost in bewilderment. Peters has surged on this sentiment but now voters will have a closer look at what that really means.
In difficult times (and if Europe crashes it could get much more difficult) that leaves a stark choice, Winston’s antics versus safe and reliable Peter Dunne and United Future.
Critical choice – Winsome’s ransom versus United Future. What sort of future do we want?
UF – where you are promised everything except good hair days.
Geez Petey where is your authoriser’s statement.
Dunne would not know what to do. His answer to deficits is to give middle class tax cuts. He thinks his super policy will make super more affordable even thought it is defined as being cost neutral.
There is a third choice. Don’t waste your vote on United Follicles and vote for a real party of change. Labour or Greens will do nicely.
His authoriser statement is down the bottom of the page.
Too many upper middle class Green committee members are ready to sell out to John Key. And it seems he is good with the idea.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/election-2011/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503012&objectid=10767544
They get comfortable, get old, get scared, then sell out their kids. Normal Kiwi behaviour. Nothing can explain the sudden purposeful naivety of a politician believing Key will follow up his sweet nothings with commitment. She should ask herself, if Key gets a majority, will he still call her in the morning?
Anyone who’s worked in a corporate knows Key’s behaviour. There are two ways to expose his real intentions: try to get him to commit, set a formal meeting or even just discuss his plans in detail, or literally tell him to F-off. The result will be the same.
Nothing that involves a known sellout who’ll sidle up to whoever promises him power and merrily allies himself with the failed remnants of NZ’s religious right.
What I’d really like to understand – and I realise I harp on about this a fair bit – is how UF can use the tagline of “Fairness & Choice” while blocking any attempt to make changes to our (hideously failed) drug laws.
How is it “Fair” to criminalise people for electing to imbibe one mind altering chemical over another?
How can we have “Choice” when we don’t even have dominion over our own consciousness?
“Fairness and Choice” – as long as you play by our rules, and make your choices from the options we give you.
What a load of bollocks. It is a good tagline – most people support the concepts of fairness and choice – but it’s a complete lie (see also: “Fair and balanced.”).
As a general rule, any political party that reduces it’s policy to a subjective fuzzy slogan means to apply the exact opposite of the positive interpretation of said slogan to all but their target demographic. For example:
A Decent Society
A Brighter Future
It will be a bright, decent, life for those in the top 5%.
There are also deceitful twists: “Balance the books sooner” actually means,
“get rich quick”
and like all those schemes, it’s theft in everything but name.
It is a strange and demoralising language with plenty of grey areas. Own your Future, is a fuzzy slogan too, but it is supported by the absolute of No Asset sales, so the chances of follow through are above 75%.
True, UTurn. Very true.
I’m just interested that I never get a response from Petey Boy on any point I raise regarding UF and Peter Done-His-Dash (hopefully!).
In my experience, failing to address a legitimate point is the behaviour of a coward. Even people who know their views are flawed will answer the question if they have any guts.
UF was in coalition with peters twice before no doubt will be again follicle!
Once again Key refuses to front on RNZ this morning to debate Goff.
Listening now to Goff on his own in an extended interview – he is getting very passionate and is doing well
Guess John Key’s continual no show is part of National’s SCAMpaign strategy
makes you wonder, will he show up tonight for the debate ?.
Wondered too but he will need to hammer his Labour/money line and now more urgently have a go at Winston and repeat the line as often as possible. Bet on Hooton doing the same this morning- last chance to manipulate us. Ha.
Ha! Hooton is using the whole time bagging Winston. Wow. They must be really scared of not getting an Election win. The Nat weakness/vulnerability can be grabbed by voting Winston.
Almost makes me consider voting NZ1st 😈
agreed.
a few less votes for Labour will not be as bad as NZ First soaking up 4.9% of wasted anti-government vote.
A good interview – Goff came across clear and precise and on message. The interview approach was also reasonable for once – not so aggressive, negative as it has been to Goff in recent months.
At the start of the interview, the explanation given for Key not accepting was that he or his advisors said that he has/was participating in four leaders’ debates and that he did not have time to prepare for more than that – or words to that effect. Excuse me, but debating with the leaders of other parties in an election campaign should be his top priority!
Goff should make the point that any CGT is always going to have a ramp up period. If we don’t introduce the CGT and ramp it up now, then when it is eventually introduced it’ll have a ramp up period.
If they keep putting it off for this excuse, then it’ll never be implemented, when it clearly needs to be.
Welcome to New Zealand, where kids die from poverty and no one cares.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/6002311/Shock-look-at-NZs-child-poverty
We’d rather punish their parents than help them, and it’s only going to get worse when National starts ‘reforming’ the welfare system.
What will happen to these kids if their parents fail a drug test and get their benefit cut in half?
Grant Robinson has a post up at Red Alert about what Labour plan to do about this.
Draco, why will our children suffering now, have to wait 6 years (obviously) conditional on Labour being in power for two electoral cycles)?
Labour supporters like yourself should be ashamed of this deliberate and opportunist delay when children are suffering now.
Mana’s John Minto has slammed “Labour’s policy for children” as a non-promise.
One concrete measure to address child poverty that is mentioned in the Swedish example is providing free meals in schools.
Shock look at NZ’s child poverty
Mana have costed their policy for supplying free breakfasts and lunches for low decile schools.
From MANA Foreign Policy Spokesperson John Minto’s Foreign Policy release – Sunday 20 November
The headline point from the policy
1. Bring the troops back from Afghanistan and use the money to feed kids in decile 1 to 3 schools.
Our troops in Afghanistan are involved in an imperial war on behalf of the US. We are helping prop up an illegitimate government of drug barons and war lords. We are seen quite rightly as foreign invaders and our presence increases the possibility of New Zealand becoming a terrorist target in future.
The $40 million we would save would be used to kick-start our “feed the kids” program which would roll out for all New Zealand children at school to provide healthy breakfasts and lunches. We would start at decile 1 to 3 primary schools at a cost of around $38 million.
I’m not a Labour supporter. I was going to vote Green but I’ve seriously been considering voting Mana as their policies have filled out. They’re still talking about maintaining the capitalist ideology though. Of course, all the political parties are which just proves their complete misunderstanding of economics
To answer your question on Red Alert: Only the Greens have a policy plan to have rental properties rated for energy efficiency (mandatory), which includes insulation. They will extend the current scheme for insulating, but it will not stop slum lords operating. It will however give some people an insight into how it will be to live in a particular home.
They’re still talking about maintaining the capitalist ideology though. Of course, all the political parties are which just proves their complete misunderstanding of economics
I’m not a fan of free market totalitarianism either, but I think pragmatic left policy recognizes that capitalism isn’t so much about economics as it is about psychology and sociology. I’m inclined to Green but resent its bluishness as of now.
Sorry for mistaking you for a Labour Party supporter, Draco. I am kicking myself for being so insensitive. Sorry for the insult.
I thought you were touting Labour’s opportunistically conditional policy for dealing with childhood poverty and hunger in this country of extraordinary wealth.
I do not mean to answer for Draco, but to suggest Labour will do nothing for 6 years is incorrect. Their immediate push to improve the lot of struggling people is the increase in minimum wage and the $5K tax free threshold – which also applies to beneficiaries. Then there is the removal of GST on fruit/veges – small but useful. This is the first steps in lowering the cost of living to people who need a hand the most. It is not a silver bullet, but it is at least a firm commitment. Other measures such as free healthcare to under 6’s will phase in gradually.
This is becoming a real bug-bear for me*. The tax-free threshold is a benefit for all taxpayers, including multimillionaires like Key. The argument that the threshold is for the benefit of the poor simply on the grounds that the poor will appreciate the extra money more, is, to my mind offensive. If Labour had targeted all of the expenditure that this measure will cost to those in need, it would make a big difference.
Same with the GST off fruit and veges. Where does Labour get off saying that because there are people in dire need they will give everyone a small amount extra to address it rather than, you know, actually addressing the need. It would be like providing the equivalent of 5 cents to every human on earth as a response to an emergency affecting a much smaller number of people in Eastern Europe for example.
*Not directed specifically at you uturn, you are just the latest person to say this.
These are valid points and ones Jenny argues in her post above. Why don’t Labour, why don’t The Greens, why doesn’t anyone? Why don’t we all call a meeting of our local community and take back the problem? Why do we rely on the comfortable distance of redistributed income tax instead of getting up close and personal with the people we say we support, or for that matter, hate?
First on the lists of why is that government is a balancing act within a corrupted system. You can’t simply take jillions of dollars from, say, infrastructure projects and build McDonald’s-esque food houses for card carrying poor people to patronise. To attempt such a thing would shake our culture of greed, earning and profit so severly it’s hard to imagine the unintended results/backlash.
Second on the list is that if we allow government to dictate how and when assistance happens, we’ll lose control of our communities every time there is a change of government, effectively undermining our goals.
Third would be that some people will be better suited to assist from a distance and some up close. At least intially. Not everyone is or can be the same, but then not everyone who is poor is the same. People are still people.
I think that in the end, poverty must be challenged face to face, one on one, at whatever the cost. As an intermediary step, people not in poverty need to think about everything they consume, everything they want to buy and streamline the things they have, but don’t use. Give excess away to people at a disadvantage who can use them. Don’t buy stuff no one needs – like the other day I saw a tool for taking chips out of the bag so you don’t get greasy fingers.
When choosing entertainment, try to find it in the company of others first, not on an X-box by default. Make conversation rather than listen to the distraction of TV, pop music and beer. Work on neighbourhood projects together. Share problems. Keep an eye on the fortunes of the people around you. If they’re doing fine, leave them be; if they are falling below the bread line, help them to regain their feet – for free. Learn about other people, learn about yourself – respect both. Listen to what others say, not just the response and ideas in your own head. Take time.
Small changes in atittude and reduction of waste will have a gradual indirect influence on poverty. Understanding why it is right will ease the pain of giving up the “getting ahead” mindset.
A: “Why do we rely on the comfortable distance of redistributed income tax B: instead of getting up close and personal with the people we say we support, or for that matter, hate?”
A: Because poverty is lack of resources just as scurvy is lack of vitamin C. The immediate need in both cases is what is lacking. B: Community korero is great and certainly not mutually exclusive. But it is no substitute for what is lacking. Funnily enough, poor communities have less material resources to share. We have enough resources in NZ, they don’t need to be rationed out of the hands of the poor. As for “up close and personal” speak for yourself.
“You can’t simply take jillions of dollars from, say, infrastructure projects …”
I specifically said that targeting help where it is needed instead of a big, sparse, lolly scramble, would make a huge difference. If the tax-free threshold is such small change that is is only the poor that get any benefit from it, don’t give a bit to everyone. Use the resources where they are needed most. In health we don’t give everyone a small proceedure regularly, regardless of need, and tell those needing heart surgery, for example, that they can have a free mole removal, like everyone else.
“McDonald’s-esque food houses for card carrying poor people to patronise…”
Are you taking the piss here, or is that as far as your imagination can take you?
No it’s not, it’s a misallocation of available resources caused by the capitalist free-market. Although it will turn into a lack of resources over time as all available resources are used up ASAP by the capitalist free-market.
Quick note to the moderator. My email address (and therefore my pictogram) has changed because I’ve changed server. I assume this is the reason my last comment went into moderation.
[sprout: correct, first comments from a new email are auto-moderated]
http://en.gravatar.com/
You can upload a pic and associate it with an email address and change the address when you change ISPs. You can also go get a gmail or similar account and so get a permanent email address.
Ta Draco.
I’ve moved to orcon (miles cheaper) and the email addresses are mine for life.
I think I will organise a gravatar though. Really don’t like my new pictogram.
a recurring thought, feel free to share it around,
No-one likes giving their money to a Banker, so why would you give your Vote to one?
Made this my Facebook status.
Me too! 🙂
I would imagine something like this.
Thanks to a federal ban on food stamps for people with felony drug convictions, people like McLemore are out of luck when it comes to getting assistance with putting food on their tables. Though states can opt out of the ban, those that don’t (like Mississsippi) deny food stamps even to individuals who have already served their sentences or overcome previous addictions. It’s true that McLemore’s past isn’t perfect — she has four felony drug convictions and one misdemeanor, which place her firmly in the category of people the federal government has declared unfit to receive public benefits. Hence, faced with the prospect of being unable to feed her family, McLemore lied on her application.
Welcome to the war on drugs, where once convicted you’re fucked for life, unless you’re rich that is.
Note also that loan fraudsters get far lower sentences for a crime that impacted negatively far more than one person lying so they and their kids could eat. Justice this is not.
throw away American citizens. Bet she votes Republican too.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/11/17/huge-lakes-of-water-may-exist-under-europas-ice/
Fucking awesome. although having mucked around with origin of life stuff in uni, sunlight isn’t entirely needed, as warm seeps can kick out a wide range of simple to complex organic molecules*, while black smokers provide various sulphates than can be oxidised to provide an energy source for life. Although what we need to do is send probes into the ice, and even into the black depths of Europa to find signs of “life”, which isn’t as straightforward as you’d think**
________________________
* In biochem land, this means multiple chiral centres.
** aka philosophy of biology fun land, or at it’s simplest “life is a heat engine, exploiting thermodynamic gradients for reproduction, thus creating more entropy”. I’d also argue it’s not time dependent, which causes all sorts of fun-times for the human mind…
Its not time dependent? Or rather can occur on scales so large (or small) that it appears not to be time dependent?
just commenting to see if it comes through.
[lprent: Sorry – been obsessed with correlations for e-day. I will have another look at this. Found and fixed. Moderators – if you’re going to do blacklist DO NOT tag the persons name. ]
People forget Peter Dunne was Labour MP THEN feel out of bed and ended up looking like Act with a red face
He seems to win the personality stakes for all time in NZ politics without a scratch
He almost fits the proposition that all MPs should be elected as independents to reduce the enormous drain on the voters sanity supporting the BS of party politicing
The shock of having to be standing and winning on their own may cause such a melt down of honesty that the people might even take it very seriously that we are a puppet state of the international corporations and have serious problems that will eventually drive us to join Australia so we can survive
Physically we are one of the most endangered island country’s in the world
Get a little unsettled NZ and WAKE UP
Metafilter: Our glorious new public/private partnership military industrial police complex.
joe90 : Any idea if the NZ police are affiliated with PERF?
Oh yeah, a familiar name and a regular mention.
NYT: U.N. Panel Finds Climate Change Behind Some Extreme Weather Events
The findings were released at a conference in Kampala, Uganda, by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a high-profile United Nations body assigned to review and report periodically on developments in climate research. They come at a time of unusual weather disasters around the globe, from catastrophic flooding in Asia and Australia to blizzards, floods, heat waves, droughts, wildfires and windstorms in the United States that have cost billions of dollars.
“A hotter, moister atmosphere is an atmosphere primed to trigger disasters,” said Michael Oppenheimer, a Princeton University climate scientist and a principal author of the new report. “As the world gets hotter, the risk gets higher.” …
The new report on extreme weather, one of a string of reports that the panel is issuing on relatively narrow issues, did not break much ground scientifically, essentially refining findings that have been emerging in climate science papers in recent years.
Indeed, the delegates meeting in Kampala adopted scientifically cautious positions in some areas. For instance, some researchers have presented evidence suggesting that hurricanes are growing more intense because of climate change, but the report sided with a group of experts who say that such a claim is premature.
Nonetheless, the report predicted that certain types of weather extremes will grow more numerous and more intense as human-induced global warming worsens in coming decades.
“It is virtually certain that increases in the frequency and magnitude of warm daily temperature extremes and decreases in cold extremes will occur in the 21st century on the global scale,” the report said. “It is likely that the frequency of heavy precipitation or the proportion of total rainfall from heavy falls will increase in the 21st century over many areas of the globe.”
By the end of the century, if greenhouse emissions continue unabated, the type of heat wave that now occurs once every 20 years will be occurring every couple of years across large areas of the planet, the report predicted.
Conflicts across the globe that don’t make the headlines: Wars in the World
Also, from Tidy Read: War nesw updates.
Here’s a little video mash up of the Teapot tapes footage: Teapot tape debacle
Poor Brash: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/6005840/Brash-leaves-leadership-door-ajar-for-Isaac
I caught this bit of the interview and I don’t think it’s been fairly represented in that story. The thing with Brash is that he’s not like other politicians – he’s quite politically naive. He’ll say what he thinks and is generally up-front about it. Other politicians (Key is a master at it and Goff does it as well) answer questions couched in ways that the listener thinks they’ve said something but they can later come back and ‘clarify’ or refute. Brash on the other hand just says it with little beating around the bush. Political journalists hear this from Brash and think that there really must be more going on behind his words than he’s letting on (as they would be with any other politician), but really in Brash’s case there isn’t any cloak and dagger skullduggery at all.
Contra argument: The hollow men.
He may not be much good at it, but he is dishonest.
On the other hand, Like Te Mana, representatives of parties that aren’t competing for Mr and Ms Middle seem to be far more able to be frank about what they believe.
Sounds like he’s confirmed some of the rumoured contents of the teapots, reaffirmed his consent to the Act/Nat plan, reaffirmed National are in trouble and signalled he is stepping away from the increasingly stinky dung heap it’s all become. He has inadvertently hung a closed for business sign on ACT too – nothing more than an organisation in name only for the machinations of National.
Been away for a week, so this may be a repeat if somebody else has posted it, but this is a great election track from Avondale’s finest! Must listen.
Are you a Kiwi? Am I a Kiwi? Are we Kiwis?
Well, John Key is now presuming to speak on your behalf:
“Key: Kiwis Support Asset Sales”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10767604
Will we be selling our assets?
Will you be voting?
Presumptuous twit. Punish the prick
All the polls I’ve seen show that ~85% of people oppose asset sales, ergo, this must be Jonkey trying to rewrite reality so that it conforms with his ideology.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/6005657/Labour-flyer-threatening-mum
Yup, another good idea from the Labour brains trust.
It’s not Labour threatening mum but NAct.
No its labour telling porkies again…
The thuggery continues.
http://twitpic.com/7h5os4
#OccupyTahrirSquare
#Tahrir
#Beleidy
#Ghonim
#Wa7damasrya
And no prizes for guessing who supplies the thugs with their weaponry.
Another excellent column from Tapu Misa:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10767482
You can see where NACT get their education policy. There is nothing new under the sun.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/nov/20/schools-michael-gove-behaviour-adviser
Just one day, sometime down the track, parents might be required to take a little bit more personal responsibility ensuring that they are sending their children to school, well rested, well fed, suitably attired and in the right frame of mind to learn.
It would appear that at the moment it’s the schools’ responsibility to attend to this and also deliver the curriculum to meet the standards.
As it is unlawful not to be enrolled to vote? What is the penalty and has anyone ever been convicted? Therer was reported 240k not currently enrolled for this election
Personal gain from privatisation?
Well there is one reason why John Key might undertake such an exercise… to ensure that New Zealand has to undertake asset sales to service the huge amounts of debt that National has mismanaged us into…
WTF, is John Key drunk? certainly looks like it
http://www.times-age.co.nz/news/key-drops-in-on-school-unit-and-visits-jnl-mill/982641/
What a fucking hypocrite Key is
This unit set up to catch these kids that fall through the cracks,has a 85 % pass rate is being closed by this government
Shame on you bastards
This has really pissed me off
Key lied to get into power by using this as a example, among many others
Absolutely disgusting
Act has apparently been a Stolid partner
Anonymous steps it up with the first release of their newly acquired database in response to Pepper spray incident..
Sorry to those of you using the WSIWYG editor, I’m going to have to disable it so it doesn’t interfere with the caching system I just turned on.
Bit of a load tonight.
Ok. That eased the situation considerably… The main server is now handling the load. I have to find some time to get that wee editor working nicely with the cache.
Now it is spiking to very high CPU, not locking on 95+% CPU. Cache makes a lot of difference.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/6008050/Workers-in-55-job-roles-getting-paid-less-Survey
sort of dismisses Keys claim about wages going up dont it
Test message
Is it not often noted that different ethic groups have defining body language ?
The striking similarities in our PM’s physical gestures to some of the history footage of the 1930’s&40’s of another politician known for lying and debasing the truth to gain political power .
Just an observation and a guide to the validity of the rhetoric being charged to the taxpayer
Like Ben what I’d really like to understand is how UF can use the tagline of “Family Friendly ”, want to have the Families Commission, try to split tax for the stay at home partner in the middle/ upper income brackets whilst cuddling up to the Nact party that spends it’s time slagging off the parent who takes the huge financial and emotional hit involved in bringing up the kids by themselves.(and this is all too often the parent protecting the kids from family violence.)
Some parents are more equal than others ……
Another day, another record day. It hasn’t happened since Thursday last week. According to statcounter.
Top page views in a day
Top unique visits in a day.
Much of it in the hour after the debate when I’m sure we hit our highest page views per hour. Looked like 5000pv in a bit over n hour.
Comment load looks pretty high as well.