Toby Manhire: "Campbell, who did a good job at keeping things rolling, at one point observed, “You sound like you’re both on auto-pilot,” he was mostly right, except that would have required leaving the ground."
Trish Sherson: "Real politics is live, off script, a contest of ideas with tough questions. Collins owned it."
Morgan Godfery: "The prime minister had it all over her: on the border, on housing, on education, and in personality. "
Ben Thomas: "Ardern was strangely hesitant."
Justin Giovannetti: "When asked about her plan for poverty reduction, Collins responded with ripping up the RMA. Campbell was incredulous, voters were probably confused."
Madeleine Chapman: "both leaders argued about who could commit the hardest to not taxing property. In my mind, we all lost tonight. And I will spend the next seven working days of my life fake-smiling and announcing “my husband is Samoan, so talofa” to everyone I meet. In that sense, Judith Collins won simply by saying something so ridiculous that she’ll be living rent-free in my brain until the next debate."
Steve Braunias has written an article for the Guardian on the leaders' debate. The link is below. One notable quote…
After the curious stage direction, Campbell gave a warm welcome to Ardern and Collins, and revealed that he was holding nothing more sinister than a brand new clipboard. The next 90 minutes were all downhill.
“I tell you what, John,” she kept saying, and one of the things she told him over and over is that she had experience as a small business owner. “I once was one.” She treated the debate as a kind of autobiography in instalments.
Old Jude's really quite skillful, don't you think? No flies on her in this regard.
When there is very little of relevance that you can confidently dominate the debate with, revert to repetitive and vague historical recollections, including inane self promotion.
And then hope that it might appeal to the emotions of a number of the disillusioned or worried, (in this case small and medium business operators), or any other target audience which you know will be feeling some pain or distress at the time you take to the podium.
Then hope like Hell that your murmurings will convince the target audience that their suffering and predicament was brought about by your opponent, or those who advised him or her and also by those who continue to do so.
Maybe Ardern was just plain tired , pandemic to navigate NZ through since March and electioneering since July. She knew it and had to tread cautiously first time around.
Janet I would think you're 100% right. The knowledge that the election would be over now if not having to be fitted round wilfully ignorant people undoing the efforts of those really doing God's work on earth leads to pockets of depression. She may have been on the edge of one of them.
And for those not wishing to sleepwalk to the polls, just roll over and go back to sleep, (perhaps until 2023).
Another way, if are worried that you might be accused of NOT voting or you are getting a bit nervous about being caught out abstaining from the three yearly habit, is to go to the nearest polling place, walk in, and then out.
After you've done and then just mill around (smoke a ciggy if you're that way inclined, or sip on a water for about 20 minutes) and then leave with an old "I voted" sticker from 2017 or 2014 that you brought with you, stuck to your jacket, shirt or blouse.
Collins made her points rather than answer the actual questions. The arrogance was on show with those cutaway shots so her media minders have work to do unless that's the desired outcome.
Collin's is hardly going to make any impact trying to play Ardern at her particular skills, because a) she isn’t that cuddly feely, b) She would look incincere, so pointing out basic points is pretty much all she has to go with at this late stage I think.
I did think Collins got the better of Ardern with coming across to your average normal voter who doesn't particularly follow politics, with plain speak tbh, while Ardern's normally excellent communication skills kind of had an off night.
If anything, to me it looked oddly like Ardern had just over practiced the thing and was just sticking to a routine or script, with no improv' when Collins pointed things out.
If you like full on cringe you would have picked Collins over Ardern. Her performance was on par with what a certain Don Brash could produce, even Bridges probably would have been more convincing.
Collins response of "that we know of!" to Ardern's statement on the tiny amount of border/quarantine breaches was one such example.
I guess it comes down to how you prefer you leader to come across.
Different voters prefer different things. If you like the touchy feely persona, Ardern is always going to win (although she had an off night last night). If you prefer just basic truthful points rammed at you then you would go Collins.
And if you are a die hard voter for either party, you are going to view each persons performance with rose coloured glasses and ignore the flaws of your preferred.
An old trick that seasoned or street smart politicians on the offensive often come up with is having it appear that they are trying to be polite and truthful, when all they are trying to do is to dislodge their opponent and dominate the debate.
Ardern seems to be aware of this tactic and has obviously been quite well coached in relation to avoiding repetitive distraction. For example, repetitive title errors or name pronunciations"errors".
Expressing opinion as to package it as a "truthful presentation" is another tactic which is well used. It is commonly acceptable just as long as the opinion expressed cannot be legitimately challenged as being erroneous or non-factual at the time that opinion is provided.
This is as old a trick as using percentages of percentages to embellish or appear to exaggerate a statement so as to give it impact.
Say the unemployment figure for women in NZ from Sept 2017 through to Sept 2018 decreased from 5.4% to 4%, some might convey it this way; "The number of registered unemployed women in NZ dropped by about 22% during Sept 2017 and Sept 2018".
Quite entertaining really.
All I am suggesting is that we all need to be careful with our definition of the word; "truthful", especially when quoting politicians lines.
No matter what her minders have told her she must change – and it's obvious her minders have said there's a lot she needs to change – there's nothing Collins can do to mask her abject narcissism and multiple personality disorders.
I was a bit put off by the hype- Wendy Petrie over the poll results, as if they were handed down to Moses as gospel to the repeated gushy ad with Campbell.
I am not the target audience, I have made up my mind and will be early voting.
@ Dennis Frank …yep with you there..I fucking love political debates, and this one I actually thought was pretty good, it showed for anyone who bothered to watch the whole thing where both political parties lined up and where the light was between them…the environment was obviously the most stark difference between them, while Madeleine Chapman summed up housing and capital gains (which is also of course directly related to inequality and poverty outcomes etc)…"both leaders argued about who could commit the hardest to not taxing property. In my mind, we all lost tonight."
I found Ardern to be quite uncharismatic which combined with an awful semi pleading delivery style was quite hard to watch, while Collins left me with the feeling that I cannot excuse anyone who would actually vote for someone so seething with uncontrolled rage and a barely contained nasty streak that spilled out time and time again in almost every sideways look and glance she made at Ardren..she seemed to me to be quite unhinged.
Indeed. Someone ought to explain biological signalling to her! Viewers read the plea as a sign of weakness. Sincere, genuine leftists use the plea style out of habit, presuming others have rapport, empathy, and will give the reasoning due consideration. My guess is that their assumption is valid for about 20% of the audience. Inept politics to use it then, eh?
" Sincere, genuine leftists use the plea style out of habit" exactly right, which is why I have been advocating taking a hard line for years…stop asking and start demanding change from these fuckers..no more bended knees and more clenched fists of righteous outrage imo.
The problem in NZ is that we have never strung up any politician from a lamp post by their feet, so there is no historical reference for them to have any fear of us..hence their demeaning, insulting and frankly outrageous shift over the past thirty or so years to regarding the population as mere consumers rather active citizens.
Really? I can't think of any Leftist politicians or activists that do/have ever done the plea gesture so often..if at all..ever.
It has certainly never been used to create change or forward momentum. Infact the only political figures who tend towards that sort of thing are possibly James Shaw and Justin Trudeau..add Ardern to that list..and it looks rather like a Centrist's trying hard not to look like centrists technique…pleading with the voters to buy into their fragile narrative with its elusive promises.
That being said..qudos to Shaw for managing to talk about inequality at the finance debate…
“…so seething with uncontrolled rage and a barely contained nasty streak that spilled out time and time again in almost every sideways look and glance she made at Ardern…she seemed to me to be quite unhinged."
Spot on, wholly accurate assessment. I cannot add a thing to it. Would be good if the commentators had the balls to say so, too, although many wouldn't have the tools to detect it.
A lot of dreams are in tatters around the town, and a lot who thought it was all over in April are going like never before, so a very interesting town right now.
It's a bit different to actually have an election campaign in town, usually it's a pretty subdued affair with just the local candidates and maybe a senior Nat down on a fundraiser. This time the work is going in and it's all on. Labour actually putting up a viable local candidate along with the current situation has really got things going.
They played a short clip on breakfast news and I couldn't believe how much Robertson – who doesn't normally seem a big man – towered over the pipsqueaks on either side of him. One of whom was Goldsmith.
Tova just now reckoned that Seymour won. He seems to be flavour of the month, so wouldn't surprise me.
"ACT leader David Seymour announced the party's tourism policy at an event at the Te Anau Club last night, calling for privately run managed isolation facilities, and allowing rich foreigners to pay to use them for a New Zealand holiday. "
edit
We need to be retreating from barefoot tourism but still need to keep overseas tourists' money cycling through the economy. You express horror at the idea of wealthy coming here to managed isolation prior to being able to tour round the country using some of the expensive infrastructure set up for such people. And also it would I hope have a dedicated set of workers earning, is not a disgraceful or impractical idea.
Until we get organised shipping set up that perhaps follows the seasons, and sails around the tornado areas as much as possible, then having an airline running reducing kilometres to bring people here, and enable NZs to go to certain places, requires the two-way coming and going numbers to keep viable.
Who has thought about how shipping could serve us? Can we expand the numbers of berths on container ships? I have an old advertisement advertising these on a 'banana boat'. And can we provide business for the Greeks again? The Fairstar and the Fairsky ships were owned by Onassiss I think. They did a busy trade in the 1960-70s.
" You express horror at the idea of wealthy coming here to managed isolation prior to being able to tour round the country using some of the expensive infrastructure set up for such people. And also it would I hope have a dedicated set of workers earning, is not a disgraceful or impractical idea."
I express horror? Dont imagine what I express. I merely stated
" Lets not forget what act really is… "
and linked to an article. But hey your comment paints a picture.
Well you know what thought thought…Anyway you seem to want to be on both ends of the game. You decry neoliberalism…while praising an idea that stems exactly from there. Huh?
Thanks to both neolib nats and neolib "labour". NZ did away with our our NZ Apprenticeship scheme and became a hospitality/waiter/waitress/touristguide/bartender/service industry neolib playground.
If you cant see the Irony here? I cant help you across the road to it.
Labour seems to be getting back to what they are supposed to be. I really hope so.
No. I briefly thought I should watch it, then decided a better use of my time would be to find a rusty old can-opener and give myself an anesthetic-free vasectomy.
Did not watch. Working. Caught the odd snippet here and there.
I doubt I missed much, to be honest. I find Collins personally repellent and I try to avoid watching her in the same way I actively avoid reading anything written by Mike Hosking and his similarly awful wife. Life is too short to spend it shrieking at the television. I've spend decades watching National ruin everything they touch, and National would have to stop being National for me to ever consider voting for them. The current incarnation is probably the worst I've ever witnessed.
"National ruin everything they touch", unlike Lange and the Graham Scott Puppet Show.
"In late 1979 Mr Scott moved to the Treasury, eventually becoming secretary in 1986. He worked closely with the fourth Labour Government as it reformed the New Zealand economy in the 1980s."
The main point of a debate is the post-debate momentum- did an underdog 'wipe the floor' with their opponent? Was there a "show me the money" moment? Did someone drop a clanger?
Facts matter, but most people won't have watched the debate. They will probably see the distilled coverage, though. That's the bit that affects the outcome.
The problem with debates is that they are not easy to fact check on the fly. Nationals claims tend to lose in the long run when properly fact checked.
National tend to claim a lot of things that when fact checked are shown to be made up of cherry picked data that falls over, or put up claims they are they ones who could better balance the books when they can not even seam to get the accounting right on their alternate budget.
Look at the holes slowly showing up in Nationals alternate budget as people start to go through the numbers. First an easy to catch mistake they have owned up to and now a second big hole they are not admitting to.
Judith's claims that NSW in Australia dealt better with Covid 19 than NZ with fewer restriction, another claim that falls over when the full numbers are looked at and not cherry picked.
National in a debate are like a boxer that hits below the belt every time the ref is not looking to win a match. They toss in cherry picked and misleading data all the time to win debates and it is hard to win a debate against someone with actual facts when they have "Alternate Facts" they will use to score points on you.
Quite right Anne – I play my TV through a good Hi Fi sound system, and distinctly heard 'Miss Ardern'. Mind you, I doubt if it matters in terms of votes. Judith is trying to sound nice, but every so often I find myself wondering if she is a sour cow or a sour sow. That may sound sexist, so maybe I should balance it with full of bull, and boring bore..
The nasty Muldoon persona does not help. It is actually a bit piggy, I think.
The debate needed a better camera person/s. We were often looking at the back of Jacinda's head, though we never saw the back of John's or Judith's!! What was that about??
Leaders debates like this are about personality and not the facts, about building popularity through charisma rather than informing people and have them make informed choices.
Because of this I consider such debates detrimental to democracy.
Ardern, for her part, a now hardened political professional, seemed determined to avoid creating a viral Internet meme out of the night. If that were the intent, she achieved it.
The tactic from Collins seems to try to get under Ardern’s skin, while Ardern seemed to be trying to be relentlessly optimistic and nice – presumably to draw a contrast between the two. She consistently hewed back to Labour talking points. Both leaders fell back to entrenched positions and didn't answer a lot of questions.
How much extra tax did it bring to the coffers. They will need some to help pay for their coffins.
However we need extra tax to help provide living people with decent basics, of which we have a thriving market selling off to toffs from NZ and overseas. Come and buy anything you like, our houses for instance, (and our farms, by the dozens), and get lots of moolah. Then pile it in one of your spare rooms with a diving board like Grandpa Duck used, though that silly duffer had piles of gold coins. But the wealthy aren't too sensitive, he probably never noticed the hard edges.
But I wonder how much CGT here would have raised because the poor here do feel the hard edges of everything.
Bomber's cultural analysis features the Top 8 Green Party Woke Alienations. The photo of the Wellington Twitteratti Green Activists ready for their next micro aggression policing social media lynch mob shows the traditional side of wokesterism.
It’s like the woke middle class identity politics mummy blogger trans ally Green Party cancel culture militant cyclist humourless vegan micro aggression policing activists are incapable of understanding how their behaviour over the last 3 years on social media has done nothing other than alienate voters to the point the Greens are now in danger of sinking beneath 5%.
Not only like that. It is that. They think
they are speaking truth to power by endlessly calling people out for breaches of woke mantra, but to everyone else they are simply toxic.
When you are class left, the demarkation of power in society is between the richest 1% and their 9% enablers vs the 90% rest of us, that’s how we win the democratic majority, but when you are a woke Identity Politics activist, all men are rapists, all white people are racist and anyone supporting free speech is an actual uniform wearing Nazi.
Yes, yes, but that's been obvious the past year or more, so why not learn the lesson? He can't – he's so fixated on bitching about the problem. If a faction seems to discredit a party in the public mind, you fix that problem by changing the public mind. That's what political management is for.
Why have the Green caucus not used their moral authority to make that happen? Because too many of them are wokesters themselves, perhaps. Because those who aren't lack sufficient leverage. It's a failure of collective leadership.
Bradbury has been banging on about the same thing for some time. I think he is ageing mentally, getting into that inflexible style of thinking that is so prevalent in the older age group.
Perhaps his blog has had its day as a therapeutic outlet for his boiling stresses, and he has gone to excess so often that he has poisoned any fertile ground around him where inspiration and creatively beneficial ideas might grow about better policies and wise politicians.
" woke middle class identity politics mummy blogger trans ally Green Party cancel culture militant cyclist humourless vegan micro aggression policing activists"
This interests me. As the world we are living in becomes more and more complex; ideas surface and add to those already circulating, they fracture and multiply like the brooms of the Sorcerer's apprentice, do we dig our heels in and sweep the nuanced plethora of new ideas away with our broom of conservatism and condemnation (listen to Magic talkback if you don't know what I mean) or do we surge forward, into the morass of fractionated thinking; meet those challenging ideas head-on and ride the wave of knowledge they represent? I reckon, catch the wave. Bomber seems to want to build a sandcastle on the beach, while wearing a knotted handkerchief on his head.
The irony of his past three years line – is he started the three years saying the same thing and has repeated it ad nauseum throughout the entire period.
He basically wants to silence the Green Party on identity politics society concerns and reduce it to class and environment economics (not sure how that relates to historic party support for Maori self-government/revival aspiration, multi-cultural society and feminist concerns).
He has basically taken up the Free Speech rights are at risk line of the ACT Party protecting white race man civilisation from the woke threat – which is what one would expect from someone who keeps meeting Sean Plunkett and the insolvent wage subsidy dependent libertarian.
He will claim the polls prove him right – but that is cynical – minor parties in government lose support, and minor parties out of it but in parliament gain. As per 2002 – Alliance down and United Party up. This time NZF and Greens down and ACT up.
Awlful to watch. Did anyone else think Campbell cut Jacinda off far more than Collins. ? I also noticed quite frequently when Jacinda was talking the camera went to Judith. And I am not sure about this but an after thought was that the camera angle favoured Judith. ……..interested to hear if others noticed this.
Thought Jacinda was not at her best. This is rare. Seem to remember first tv debate Jacinda was in with English didn’t go so well.
I think it would be great if someone fact checked the debate. Collins said something about building houses and that I am sure was crap.
campbell didn’t address competency of the two parties. I think that is a serious omission.
national could spout any policy, but surely it blindingly obvious that they. Have lied, acted unethically and made major mistakes
"Did anyone else think Campbell cut Jacinda off far more than Collins.?"
YES
"I also noticed quite frequently when Jacinda was talking the camera went to Judith. And I am not sure about this but an afterthought was that the camera angle favoured Judith. ……..interested to hear if others noticed this."
YES. Also, I noticed that the focus was on Collins pulling stupid faces and slightly off focus on Ardern. Being a photographer this is a technique used to highlight the main subject,
Also Campbell did not shut Collins up when Ardern was speaking so Ardern could not finish what she was saying.
Agreed 100% John Campbell may live for these debates but he did not ask any clarifying questions, nor was he actively listening to what Jacinda was saying, cutting her off at the end of her first point, more than once.
The camera work and the lighting favoured Judith greatly, shaving at least 15 years off her face. The shadows showed Jacinda's almost gaunt look of 3 years of unrelenting responsibility, and the knowledge of what is ahead.
However, I feel Jacinda's lack of reaction led to overconfidence on Judith's part, and Judith clearly showed her lack of respect and her scoffing "give back double" nature.
The insincere swap between charm and scoffing was quite marked
Jesicca Much MacKay is excited to lead "her" next debate!! "Judith did so well." "When is yours?" says John…..the ego of these people is amazing. It is all about them of course.
I didn't watch the debate because Collins repulses me. So l appreciate the updates. Sounds like Collins had more energy on the night but Ardern stuck to her high road approach.
Ardern's main weapon is that she is a normal adult humanbeing and comes across as such. Sadly a rarity among senior politicians.
I didn't watch because I just find it all incredibly stupid anyway … and I find Judith's mantra of "hurting people double who hurt her" incredibly juvenile.
Making enemies just means there are fewer and fewer people on your side and fewer people willing to go the extra mile to help you. It seems like an odd way to be a politician.
Excellent comment! How many non-voters would have been enticed to vote now after watching this show on TV, if they watched at all? Is this format good for voter engagement?
I did not watch for one reason only – Judith Collins' sheer nastiness. I just don't choose to spend my time witnessing that sort of behaviour. We have had more than enough of National Party members and hangers on behaving disgracefully this year.
Talking to friends this morning, they picked up on the eye rolling etc.etc. One used the words 'hate her' which is their usual way of talking.
"Shifting Arctic ice, raging wildfires in western US states and elsewhere, and methane leaks in the North Sea are all warning signs that we are approaching a tipping point on climate change, when protecting the future of civilisation will require dramatic interventions.
Under a “climate lockdown,” governments would limit private-vehicle use, ban consumption of red meat, and impose extreme energy-saving measures, while fossil-fuel companies would have to stop drilling. To avoid such a scenario, we must overhaul our economic structures and do capitalism differently.
Many think of the climate crisis as distinct from the health and economic crises caused by the pandemic. But the three crises – and their solutions – are interconnected."
The letter from Public Service Association (PSA) union members to senior managers was written in February this year but workers say little has changed since.
The Chief Ombudsman inspected the unit in March and found it breached the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel or Degrading Treatment.
In the strongly worded letter to Capital and Coast District Health Board, 28 staff detailed a list of what they called urgent and critical problems.
They described the ward – Te Whare O Matairangi, Wellington's acute in-patient mental health facility – as severely overcrowded, under-resourced and unsafe – both for workers and patients.
The letter gave examples such as a homicidal patient showing up with a bag of weapons, and a staff member being sexually assaulted.
At the time it was written, most of the patients in the unit had a criminal or violent past including assaulting staff, significant stalking behaviour, arson and drug use.
PSA organiser Alexandra Ward said the 29-bed unit was over capacity for 11 months of the past year, sometimes caring for 34 people at a time.
so our pm who odds on will be on after the election still PM and could also govern alone, and then any legislation resulting from the cannabis vote can be whatever labour decides (captains call)will not tell us what her personal views are. Ffs you are a leader what are you afraid of ?? That your opinions may result is losing a few votes. Your opinion has more than any other in deciding how any law is shaped.
imo this is steep walking to a victory, I hope that labour does not govern alone because they do not deserve to allow NZ to drift further. And their First past the post strategy just shows how they think the greens deserve to be managed… with distaste.
I don't agree, remember Keys support of the flag, many people voted to keep the flag to spite Key. Adern staying out of it is sensible, as well as her right, to keep her decision private. Also, the euthanasia bill being supported by Seymour makes me question by own beliefs around it (I support it, or do I? I'm not 100% sure, coz Seymour supports it, loudly).
Our PM and labour keeping out of it is ALL political as IMO they want to win and govern on their own and will do whatever to achieve this (no team including The Greens). What happens if the vote is 45-55 or even 50-50?We have been given no indication as to what any law will look like or if should the vote be too close what then? So totally disagree.
Labour will be averse to taking risks that might dent their commanding lead over the National opposition party in recent political opinion polls. I'm guessing their strategists are pretty comfortable letting National indulge in risky business, and there's been plenty of that since the Bridges-Ross spat kicked off, Boag-Walker, Andrew ‘Balloon-Falloon’, and ‘Merv from Manurewa’ being recent examples.
It's worse than that. Brexit has antagonized the US and Eu leading to a probable economic crisis on which Judith does not seem to have a constructive position.
[This user handle and e-mail address are now blacklisted. Please use the pair that you last used on 21 Aug and that we had agreed on previously, thanks.
You are wasting Moderator time each time you change your user name and/or e-mail address and you have never provided a good reason why you are doing it.
I did ask you again only 2 days ago but you simply ignored the note so I wasted even more time on your antics when I gave you the benefit of doubt – Incognito]
Thoughts from abroad – Headlines from UK The Telegraph: You will have to search for more details yourself. This is just to show the drift of the thinking of the UK.
'Despite 10,000 new cases a day the French are embracing life – not imposing new rules.. From the Travel Correspondent.
(The French have large numbers of cases of Covid19 and are still enjoying life. Fool or hardy? Sounds like an oxymoron to me.)
Oxford’s Sir John Bell: ‘We’re not going to beat the second wave’ Oxford University has announced that clinical trials of its coronavirus vaccine are to resume in the UK At lunchtime on Tuesday, Sir John Bell received a call telling him that the groundbreaking Oxford coronavirus vaccine trial would, regretfully, be paused.
(So UK is at sixes and sevens. But they know what they are doing, right. Trust us to do the right thing is the Conservative approach – now they've kicked Labour and Corbyn to the side.)
'We can beat Covid without lockdowns, says top German virologist Hendrik Streeck argues big gatherings in closed spaces amplify the spread, but going to shops or hairdressers are manageable levels of risk'
Margaret Atwood wants to see The Handmaid's Tale scenario remain a fiction!
And Brexit, the entitled classes from which Boris has arisen stamps its foot over EU intransigence or something. It's all their fault. The bad-faith EU is furious that the UK now has a backstop of its own The PM is offering Brussels a choice: negotiate fairly, or the whole country will leave without a deal
Are we feeling a little anxious while we wait for the election and the Right waffle on about things, and thrust sharp things into the thread of our democracy and then grab our arms and say 'Look at these holes we found', that they made themselves? And all the time the Left are doing a pretty-good job. Here is Jonathan Pie relating the cares and woes of the UK people about their Right government, that is attempting to lead them all up the garden path, like a character out of P.G.Wodehouse.
Boris is advancing fast, he's a father now, and getting into confused grandfather territory at supersonic speed; reminiscent of the joke I got out of the paper years ago and put on the fridge:
"My grandfather's a little forgetful, but he likes to give me advice. One day he took me aside, and left me there." Ron Richards* (Witty & Wise.)
*Ron Richards (22 January 1929 – 30 April 2009) was a British record producer, manager and promoter, best known for discovering The Hollies. and – The record producer Ron Richards played a central part in the British “beat boom” of the 1960s, taking charge of the Beatles' first recording .. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Richards_(producer)
A friend who is a mortgage advisor told me that the banks apparently refuse to lend to people whose businesses either received the wage subsidy or who did receive the wage subsidy themselves. So yeah, anyone who thought that the low lever interests would benefit the houseless is in for serious disappointment.
At this stage the housing market – private, social and commercial – and the official response to it is nothing more but a farce.
Yes, Judith Collins sat down with an “adoring supporter” who has a tattoo of the latest leader of the opposition on one of his thighs. Could this be a turning point in Collins' election campaign (worked for Trump) – maybe we'll all see more of her soon.
It is with the cost of paying a mortgage or limitation on access to finance to buy.
A guy called Bollard said he would not need to increase the OCR to constrain inflation resulting from rising land and property value if the government introduced a mortgage surcharge instead – then the OCR would be lower and so would the dollar to the advantage of exporters.
But now over a decade later and still nothing. The RBG gets rid of the equity requirement and cuts the OCR and so of course property values will rise.
This will change as soon as the government adds a mortgage surcharge or taxes equity in property (TOP) or a land tax. Of course only taxing property equity wealth over $M is Green policy.
Lower interest rates only benefit those with access to property finance, a mortgage surcharge is the balance to this so that government can help tenants and finance homes for first home buyers or build more state houses.
We used as first home buyers, to get a 25 year mortgage at an affordable rate, and that was a good start. It encouraged people to settle into stable lives etc etc. But though you would think that good people in government roles would want that, I think that this evil neolib economics is actually keen to keep people on the hop, make them work harder, not be complacent, and ensure that they didn't have anything to sink savings into, underpay them so they had to borrow so business would profit from the interest they had to pay to provide the necessities demanded in a 'developed' economy, and keeping more money flowing in the economy.
It is such a twisted approach that ordinary people don't comprehend it; don't understand the diabolical nature of the financial people at the top who twiddle the economy's knobs.
It used to be expressed that government gave first home buyers a step up into the housing market to get them started. But neolib doesn't want people to even get started. Don Brash didn't think that people should be tying their money up in their own house. Though the system produced a stable and relatively happy country pleased and proud most of the time.
Not the way we are now with an attitude of the quick or the dead, and lack of generosity towards others, competing for stuff all the time. To the people at the top the hoi polloi are just to be used as if life was a cockfight, and the hens get slaughtered if they don't produce enough eggs. As you can tell, I am pretty disillusioned – the NZ spirit is mainly found in bottles now.
Judith Collins is just a trashy piece of trailer trash. Her "poor wee thing" describing Jacinda Adern is classic "how low can you get" – uncouth is another description or as my old grannie used to say to me "all hair oil and no socks". She is a disgrace to any position of responsibility or representation of our country. Jacinda Adern should never have to be put in a position that she has to even engage with her. Fine porcelain versus crude pottery. Trump is the company Collins deserves.
I think it's a major miscalculation to think people are flocking to Labour and a self described bold progressive because they think she'll be moderate and consersative.
What if labours rise in the polls is due to non voters who jacindas boldness turned on and who need change and former Nat voters whose lives have fallen apart and this moderate tinkering approach makes them stay home. Honestly. Labours dropped in the polls since it announced policy and showed it's cautious af direction. Labours messaging just seems so wrong for the times.
Labour desperately needs to start exciting people again. People who were excited are getting bored and despondent. Maybe I'm wrong maybe people are flocking to her because they want a self described transformational progressive to not be bold or transformational and middle class people are flocking to Labour cos they want everything to stay the same. I think it's a bit of both
They'll need a cast-iron gut to keep the meal down – but it's a dirty job that needs doing. They might even become a genuine conservative (in the best sense of the word) party. One worthy of respect – which we don't have at present.
Trust the hard left to whine about it. Calling an anxious voter looking for policy change 'hard left' is hard Ad. It's nervousness really – probably better left unsaid at this stage.
Maybe those who really want "bold transformational progressives" have already flocked – the rest are hunkering down, still hoping to weather a 'storm' that shall not pass.
A former senior government manager planted a spy camera in an Auckland gym's changing room capturing video of a naked couple, then went on to plant the camera on at least three more occasions, the Auckland High Court has heard.
Police appealing the man's discharge without conviction and permanent name suppression, argued his offending, which took place on at least four separate days, was not taken into account by District Court Judge Clare Bennett.
RNZ and NZME also challenged the man's name suppression.
I wonder if we have here the Judge adopting Queen Victoria’s moral levels whereby if one doesn’t want one’s mind to be sullied by distasteful scuttlebutt, one just doesn’t listen. The Queen is supposed to have said, “I don’t want to know that.” The better secondary schools now probably don’t even study DH Lawrence Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
‘We’re better than that’, is the quote of the new century, to be applied to bloody massacres, and derelictions of duty by well-paid government officials. I can say that, without a qualm, that bit about well-paid, because it seems to be an absolute dead cert these days as the anointed move up the line following the well-worn Peter’s Principle Curve.
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
Open access notablesImproving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society:To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
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Spinoff has a team verdict on the leaders' debate: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/22-09-2020/leaders-debate-the-verdicts/
Toby Manhire: "Campbell, who did a good job at keeping things rolling, at one point observed, “You sound like you’re both on auto-pilot,” he was mostly right, except that would have required leaving the ground."
Trish Sherson: "Real politics is live, off script, a contest of ideas with tough questions. Collins owned it."
Morgan Godfery: "The prime minister had it all over her: on the border, on housing, on education, and in personality. "
Ben Thomas: "Ardern was strangely hesitant."
Justin Giovannetti: "When asked about her plan for poverty reduction, Collins responded with ripping up the RMA. Campbell was incredulous, voters were probably confused."
Madeleine Chapman: "both leaders argued about who could commit the hardest to not taxing property. In my mind, we all lost tonight. And I will spend the next seven working days of my life fake-smiling and announcing “my husband is Samoan, so talofa” to everyone I meet. In that sense, Judith Collins won simply by saying something so ridiculous that she’ll be living rent-free in my brain until the next debate."
Steve Braunias has written an article for the Guardian on the leaders' debate. The link is below. One notable quote…
Braunias is such a good writer.
First TV debate between Ardern and Collins avoids being a horror show
She told him what.
Exactly Dennis. It's a good one.![wink wink](https://cdn.ckeditor.com/4.11.3/full-all/plugins/smiley/images/wink_smile.png)
Old Jude's really quite skillful, don't you think? No flies on her in this regard.
When there is very little of relevance that you can confidently dominate the debate with, revert to repetitive and vague historical recollections, including inane self promotion.
And then hope that it might appeal to the emotions of a number of the disillusioned or worried, (in this case small and medium business operators), or any other target audience which you know will be feeling some pain or distress at the time you take to the podium.
Then hope like Hell that your murmurings will convince the target audience that their suffering and predicament was brought about by your opponent, or those who advised him or her and also by those who continue to do so.
Ardern has done truckloads of speeches with radiant anecdotes and transcendent aspiration.
Absent.
Maybe she prefers we just sleepwalk to the polls.
Maybe Ardern was just plain tired , pandemic to navigate NZ through since March and electioneering since July. She knew it and had to tread cautiously first time around.
Janet I would think you're 100% right. The knowledge that the election would be over now if not having to be fitted round wilfully ignorant people undoing the efforts of those really doing God's work on earth leads to pockets of depression. She may have been on the edge of one of them.
And for those not wishing to sleepwalk to the polls, just roll over and go back to sleep, (perhaps until 2023).
Another way, if are worried that you might be accused of NOT voting or you are getting a bit nervous about being caught out abstaining from the three yearly habit, is to go to the nearest polling place, walk in, and then out.
After you've done and then just mill around (smoke a ciggy if you're that way inclined, or sip on a water for about 20 minutes) and then leave with an old "I voted" sticker from 2017 or 2014 that you brought with you, stuck to your jacket, shirt or blouse.
That'll be sure to do the trick.
Personally found the whole debate totally underwhelming.
Thought Ardern was flat and Collins, was just stating points we all knew, and Campbell was just irritating.
Collin's probably pipped it, but neither were particularly inspiring me to think vote for them.
Collins made her points rather than answer the actual questions. The arrogance was on show with those cutaway shots so her media minders have work to do unless that's the desired outcome.
Different styles I think.
Collin's is hardly going to make any impact trying to play Ardern at her particular skills, because a) she isn’t that cuddly feely, b) She would look incincere, so pointing out basic points is pretty much all she has to go with at this late stage I think.
I did think Collins got the better of Ardern with coming across to your average normal voter who doesn't particularly follow politics, with plain speak tbh, while Ardern's normally excellent communication skills kind of had an off night.
If anything, to me it looked oddly like Ardern had just over practiced the thing and was just sticking to a routine or script, with no improv' when Collins pointed things out.
If you like full on cringe you would have picked Collins over Ardern. Her performance was on par with what a certain Don Brash could produce, even Bridges probably would have been more convincing.
Collins response of "that we know of!" to Ardern's statement on the tiny amount of border/quarantine breaches was one such example.
I guess it comes down to how you prefer you leader to come across.
Different voters prefer different things. If you like the touchy feely persona, Ardern is always going to win (although she had an off night last night). If you prefer just basic truthful points rammed at you then you would go Collins.
And if you are a die hard voter for either party, you are going to view each persons performance with rose coloured glasses and ignore the flaws of your preferred.
"truthful points" Judith? spare us!! Se incognito’s quotes.
Codger? Truthful? C'mon man.
An old trick that seasoned or street smart politicians on the offensive often come up with is having it appear that they are trying to be polite and truthful, when all they are trying to do is to dislodge their opponent and dominate the debate.
Ardern seems to be aware of this tactic and has obviously been quite well coached in relation to avoiding repetitive distraction. For example, repetitive title errors or name pronunciations"errors".
Expressing opinion as to package it as a "truthful presentation" is another tactic which is well used. It is commonly acceptable just as long as the opinion expressed cannot be legitimately challenged as being erroneous or non-factual at the time that opinion is provided.
This is as old a trick as using percentages of percentages to embellish or appear to exaggerate a statement so as to give it impact.
Say the unemployment figure for women in NZ from Sept 2017 through to Sept 2018 decreased from 5.4% to 4%, some might convey it this way; "The number of registered unemployed women in NZ dropped by about 22% during Sept 2017 and Sept 2018".
Quite entertaining really.
All I am suggesting is that we all need to be careful with our definition of the word; "truthful", especially when quoting politicians lines.
No matter what her minders have told her she must change – and it's obvious her minders have said there's a lot she needs to change – there's nothing Collins can do to mask her abject narcissism and multiple personality disorders.
Straw poll….how many subjected themselves to the full 90 mins?
Yes…..0
No….1
Another no from me, I tried to stay engaged.
I was a bit put off by the hype- Wendy Petrie over the poll results, as if they were handed down to Moses as gospel to the repeated gushy ad with Campbell.
I am not the target audience, I have made up my mind and will be early voting.
who was the target audience I wonder?…insomniacs?
Psychiatrists.
Yes for me. And regretted it.
Yes…..1
No….2
Yes I watched it all. Regret? Not really – you risk missing a gotcha or king-hit moment if you yield to the tedium.
@ Dennis Frank …yep with you there..I fucking love political debates, and this one I actually thought was pretty good, it showed for anyone who bothered to watch the whole thing where both political parties lined up and where the light was between them…the environment was obviously the most stark difference between them, while Madeleine Chapman summed up housing and capital gains (which is also of course directly related to inequality and poverty outcomes etc)…"both leaders argued about who could commit the hardest to not taxing property. In my mind, we all lost tonight."
I found Ardern to be quite uncharismatic which combined with an awful semi pleading delivery style was quite hard to watch, while Collins left me with the feeling that I cannot excuse anyone who would actually vote for someone so seething with uncontrolled rage and a barely contained nasty streak that spilled out time and time again in almost every sideways look and glance she made at Ardren..she seemed to me to be quite unhinged.
awful semi pleading delivery
Indeed. Someone ought to explain biological signalling to her! Viewers read the plea as a sign of weakness. Sincere, genuine leftists use the plea style out of habit, presuming others have rapport, empathy, and will give the reasoning due consideration. My guess is that their assumption is valid for about 20% of the audience. Inept politics to use it then, eh?
" Sincere, genuine leftists use the plea style out of habit" exactly right, which is why I have been advocating taking a hard line for years…stop asking and start demanding change from these fuckers..no more bended knees and more clenched fists of righteous outrage imo.
The problem in NZ is that we have never strung up any politician from a lamp post by their feet, so there is no historical reference for them to have any fear of us..hence their demeaning, insulting and frankly outrageous shift over the past thirty or so years to regarding the population as mere consumers rather active citizens.
Really? I can't think of any Leftist politicians or activists that do/have ever done the plea gesture so often..if at all..ever.
It has certainly never been used to create change or forward momentum. Infact the only political figures who tend towards that sort of thing are possibly James Shaw and Justin Trudeau..add Ardern to that list..and it looks rather like a Centrist's trying hard not to look like centrists technique…pleading with the voters to buy into their fragile narrative with its elusive promises.
That being said..qudos to Shaw for managing to talk about inequality at the finance debate…
It's the tedium that’s interesting to see.
“…so seething with uncontrolled rage and a barely contained nasty streak that spilled out time and time again in almost every sideways look and glance she made at Ardern…she seemed to me to be quite unhinged."
Spot on, wholly accurate assessment. I cannot add a thing to it. Would be good if the commentators had the balls to say so, too, although many wouldn't have the tools to detect it.
Got bored after 10 mins.
Queenstown one was much better.
Would have been a good night, 400 turnout is pretty good for Queenstown But we're right at the front end with Covid economic effects, so a lot of motivated people.
A lot of dreams are in tatters around the town, and a lot who thought it was all over in April are going like never before, so a very interesting town right now.
It's a bit different to actually have an election campaign in town, usually it's a pretty subdued affair with just the local candidates and maybe a senior Nat down on a fundraiser. This time the work is going in and it's all on. Labour actually putting up a viable local candidate along with the current situation has really got things going.
They played a short clip on breakfast news and I couldn't believe how much Robertson – who doesn't normally seem a big man – towered over the pipsqueaks on either side of him. One of whom was Goldsmith.
Tova just now reckoned that Seymour won. He seems to be flavour of the month, so wouldn't surprise me.
Did anyone learn anything of import at the Queenstown debate?
Yes. Act really is on a roll.
Goldsmith is flat.
Robertson needs a lot better lines than "we've got policy coming"
Lets not forget what act really is…
"ACT leader David Seymour announced the party's tourism policy at an event at the Te Anau Club last night, calling for privately run managed isolation facilities, and allowing rich foreigners to pay to use them for a New Zealand holiday. "
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/426599/act-tourism-policy-bold-but-operators-question-uptake
edit
We need to be retreating from barefoot tourism but still need to keep overseas tourists' money cycling through the economy. You express horror at the idea of wealthy coming here to managed isolation prior to being able to tour round the country using some of the expensive infrastructure set up for such people. And also it would I hope have a dedicated set of workers earning, is not a disgraceful or impractical idea.
Until we get organised shipping set up that perhaps follows the seasons, and sails around the tornado areas as much as possible, then having an airline running reducing kilometres to bring people here, and enable NZs to go to certain places, requires the two-way coming and going numbers to keep viable.
Who has thought about how shipping could serve us? Can we expand the numbers of berths on container ships? I have an old advertisement advertising these on a 'banana boat'. And can we provide business for the Greeks again? The Fairstar and the Fairsky ships were owned by Onassiss I think. They did a busy trade in the 1960-70s.
" You express horror at the idea of wealthy coming here to managed isolation prior to being able to tour round the country using some of the expensive infrastructure set up for such people. And also it would I hope have a dedicated set of workers earning, is not a disgraceful or impractical idea."
I express horror? Dont imagine what I express. I merely stated
" Lets not forget what act really is… "
and linked to an article. But hey your comment paints a picture.
I thought that you thought that the idea was a significant one. It actually is important whether ACT said it or not.
Well you know what thought thought…Anyway you seem to want to be on both ends of the game. You decry neoliberalism…while praising an idea that stems exactly from there. Huh?
Thanks to both neolib nats and neolib "labour". NZ did away with our our NZ Apprenticeship scheme and became a hospitality/waiter/waitress/touristguide/bartender/service industry neolib playground.
If you cant see the Irony here? I cant help you across the road to it.
Labour seems to be getting back to what they are supposed to be. I really hope so.
so no then.
Yes an no.
Was listening to the stream on the web while watching TV, and tbf for a bit of it, my attention to the tv won over the stream in my attention span
10 minutes was plenty.
NO and that is the right question !
Not a single second.
Yes
No. I briefly thought I should watch it, then decided a better use of my time would be to find a rusty old can-opener and give myself an anesthetic-free vasectomy.
Did not watch. Working. Caught the odd snippet here and there.
I doubt I missed much, to be honest. I find Collins personally repellent and I try to avoid watching her in the same way I actively avoid reading anything written by Mike Hosking and his similarly awful wife. Life is too short to spend it shrieking at the television. I've spend decades watching National ruin everything they touch, and National would have to stop being National for me to ever consider voting for them. The current incarnation is probably the worst I've ever witnessed.
"National ruin everything they touch", unlike Lange and the Graham Scott Puppet Show.
"In late 1979 Mr Scott moved to the Treasury, eventually becoming secretary in 1986. He worked closely with the fourth Labour Government as it reformed the New Zealand economy in the 1980s."
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/804306/An-old-hand-sees-the-parallels
Didn't watch.
The main point of a debate is the post-debate momentum- did an underdog 'wipe the floor' with their opponent? Was there a "show me the money" moment? Did someone drop a clanger?
Facts matter, but most people won't have watched the debate. They will probably see the distilled coverage, though. That's the bit that affects the outcome.
The problem with debates is that they are not easy to fact check on the fly. Nationals claims tend to lose in the long run when properly fact checked.
National tend to claim a lot of things that when fact checked are shown to be made up of cherry picked data that falls over, or put up claims they are they ones who could better balance the books when they can not even seam to get the accounting right on their alternate budget.
Look at the holes slowly showing up in Nationals alternate budget as people start to go through the numbers. First an easy to catch mistake they have owned up to and now a second big hole they are not admitting to.
Judith's claims that NSW in Australia dealt better with Covid 19 than NZ with fewer restriction, another claim that falls over when the full numbers are looked at and not cherry picked.
National in a debate are like a boxer that hits below the belt every time the ref is not looking to win a match. They toss in cherry picked and misleading data all the time to win debates and it is hard to win a debate against someone with actual facts when they have "Alternate Facts" they will use to score points on you.
Collins said that Agriculture contributed 0.02 % to the Worlds pollution.
Quite true but the Agriculture contributing 48% of NZ's pollution more relevant. But who cares in such a non debate.
Sort of interesting that she 'knew" that, when she she was well out with number of covid deaths in aust states.
And her 'scrapping' the RMA fills me with dread. Remember what happened last time the Natz did that —LEAKY BUILDINGS.
Mould deserves freedom, you know.
Jacinda, "Ms Ardern" pointed that out, and that transport was a further 20%.
Actually I'm sure she was saying "Miss Ardern" Patricia.
The one thing I took away from the debate is that Judith Collins showed us what a nasty cow she really is.
Quite right Anne – I play my TV through a good Hi Fi sound system, and distinctly heard 'Miss Ardern'. Mind you, I doubt if it matters in terms of votes. Judith is trying to sound nice, but every so often I find myself wondering if she is a sour cow or a sour sow. That may sound sexist, so maybe I should balance it with full of bull, and boring bore..
The nasty Muldoon persona does not help. It is actually a bit piggy, I think.
Or how about crushing boar?
I reckon Piggy Jude is about right. Muldoon reincarnated in female form.
She is nowhere near as competent as Muldoon was in his prime..
True, but she doesn't know it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
The debate needed a fact checker.
The debate needed a better camera person/s. We were often looking at the back of Jacinda's head, though we never saw the back of John's or Judith's!! What was that about??
Yes I particularly noticed that too – the lighting was not balanced over the two speakers – often a bit "dark "on Ardern .
Good – we need aware viewers to complain and let TVNZ know that we understand their biased editing techniques.
With an electric shock capability.
Leaders debates like this are about personality and not the facts, about building popularity through charisma rather than informing people and have them make informed choices.
Because of this I consider such debates detrimental to democracy.
What a smart line from Madeline Chapman. (See No 1 Dennis @ 6.19 from Spinoff.)
I thought her line "In my mind we all lost tonight" was the closer to the mark
CGT did nothing to Australia's housing market.
There are other ways of reigning in the ponzi scheme….if the will is there.
How much extra tax did it bring to the coffers. They will need some to help pay for their coffins.
However we need extra tax to help provide living people with decent basics, of which we have a thriving market selling off to toffs from NZ and overseas. Come and buy anything you like, our houses for instance, (and our farms, by the dozens), and get lots of moolah. Then pile it in one of your spare rooms with a diving board like Grandpa Duck used, though that silly duffer had piles of gold coins. But the wealthy aren't too sensitive, he probably never noticed the hard edges.
But I wonder how much CGT here would have raised because the poor here do feel the hard edges of everything.
I guess because it was poorly executed.
Green voter attacks Green Party: https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2020/09/23/why-are-the-greens-dying-and-what-happens-if-they-do/
Bomber's cultural analysis features the Top 8 Green Party Woke Alienations. The photo of the Wellington Twitteratti Green Activists ready for their next micro aggression policing social media lynch mob shows the traditional side of wokesterism.
Not only like that. It is that. They think
Yes, yes, but that's been obvious the past year or more, so why not learn the lesson? He can't – he's so fixated on bitching about the problem. If a faction seems to discredit a party in the public mind, you fix that problem by changing the public mind. That's what political management is for.
Why have the Green caucus not used their moral authority to make that happen? Because too many of them are wokesters themselves, perhaps. Because those who aren't lack sufficient leverage. It's a failure of collective leadership.
The answer is in the question.
Bradbury has been banging on about the same thing for some time. I think he is ageing mentally, getting into that inflexible style of thinking that is so prevalent in the older age group.
Perhaps his blog has had its day as a therapeutic outlet for his boiling stresses, and he has gone to excess so often that he has poisoned any fertile ground around him where inspiration and creatively beneficial ideas might grow about better policies and wise politicians.
" woke middle class identity politics mummy blogger trans ally Green Party cancel culture militant cyclist humourless vegan micro aggression policing activists"
This interests me. As the world we are living in becomes more and more complex; ideas surface and add to those already circulating, they fracture and multiply like the brooms of the Sorcerer's apprentice, do we dig our heels in and sweep the nuanced plethora of new ideas away with our broom of conservatism and condemnation (listen to Magic talkback if you don't know what I mean) or do we surge forward, into the morass of fractionated thinking; meet those challenging ideas head-on and ride the wave of knowledge they represent? I reckon, catch the wave. Bomber seems to want to build a sandcastle on the beach, while wearing a knotted handkerchief on his head.
That rant reveals more about Bradbury than the party. What a word salad.
The irony of his past three years line – is he started the three years saying the same thing and has repeated it ad nauseum throughout the entire period.
He basically wants to silence the Green Party on identity politics society concerns and reduce it to class and environment economics (not sure how that relates to historic party support for Maori self-government/revival aspiration, multi-cultural society and feminist concerns).
He has basically taken up the Free Speech rights are at risk line of the ACT Party protecting white race man civilisation from the woke threat – which is what one would expect from someone who keeps meeting Sean Plunkett and the insolvent wage subsidy dependent libertarian.
He will claim the polls prove him right – but that is cynical – minor parties in government lose support, and minor parties out of it but in parliament gain. As per 2002 – Alliance down and United Party up. This time NZF and Greens down and ACT up.
Bradbury is a pain in the ass.
I think it would be great if someone fact checked the debate. Collins said something about building houses and that I am sure was crap.
campbell didn’t address competency of the two parties. I think that is a serious omission.
national could spout any policy, but surely it blindingly obvious that they. Have lied, acted unethically and made major mistakes
Some fact-checking:
https://interactives.stuff.co.nz/2020/08/election-2020-the-whole-truth/#/1193304839/the-avocados-will-be-fine
https://interactives.stuff.co.nz/2020/08/election-2020-the-whole-truth/#/1193304232/collins-jobless-numbers-claim
"Did anyone else think Campbell cut Jacinda off far more than Collins.?"
YES
"I also noticed quite frequently when Jacinda was talking the camera went to Judith. And I am not sure about this but an afterthought was that the camera angle favoured Judith. ……..interested to hear if others noticed this."
YES. Also, I noticed that the focus was on Collins pulling stupid faces and slightly off focus on Ardern. Being a photographer this is a technique used to highlight the main subject,
Also Campbell did not shut Collins up when Ardern was speaking so Ardern could not finish what she was saying.
Agree with you on all points U made
Agreed 100% John Campbell may live for these debates but he did not ask any clarifying questions, nor was he actively listening to what Jacinda was saying, cutting her off at the end of her first point, more than once.
The camera work and the lighting favoured Judith greatly, shaving at least 15 years off her face. The shadows showed Jacinda's almost gaunt look of 3 years of unrelenting responsibility, and the knowledge of what is ahead.
However, I feel Jacinda's lack of reaction led to overconfidence on Judith's part, and Judith clearly showed her lack of respect and her scoffing "give back double" nature.
The insincere swap between charm and scoffing was quite marked
Jesicca Much MacKay is excited to lead "her" next debate!! "Judith did so well." "When is yours?" says John…..the ego of these people is amazing. It is all about them of course.
I watched the first 5 minutes, but then found this!!! Really interesting!
"New Zealand's oldest surviving observatory falling down in a field, held up only by a tree"
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/122815070/new-zealands-oldest-surviving-observatory-falling-down-in-a-field-held-up-only-by-a-tree
Judith looked liked she was auditioning for Mean Girls.
John doing his fanboy impersonation.
Jacinda the only adult in the room.
I didn't watch the debate because Collins repulses me. So l appreciate the updates. Sounds like Collins had more energy on the night but Ardern stuck to her high road approach.
Ardern's main weapon is that she is a normal adult humanbeing and comes across as such. Sadly a rarity among senior politicians.
I didn't watch because I just find it all incredibly stupid anyway … and I find Judith's mantra of "hurting people double who hurt her" incredibly juvenile.
Making enemies just means there are fewer and fewer people on your side and fewer people willing to go the extra mile to help you. It seems like an odd way to be a politician.
This is totally anecdotal but a friend of a friend works for a Nat List MP. She said they’ve all started looking for new jobs.
Goldsmith's staff who check his numbers have clocked off already too.
Well if anyone still has the will to do so after last night we can vote in 10 days (and counting)
Excellent comment! How many non-voters would have been enticed to vote now after watching this show on TV, if they watched at all? Is this format good for voter engagement?
How many non voters would waste their time watching a non debate?
bullseye.
I did not watch for one reason only – Judith Collins' sheer nastiness. I just don't choose to spend my time witnessing that sort of behaviour. We have had more than enough of National Party members and hangers on behaving disgracefully this year.
Talking to friends this morning, they picked up on the eye rolling etc.etc. One used the words 'hate her' which is their usual way of talking.
"Shifting Arctic ice, raging wildfires in western US states and elsewhere, and methane leaks in the North Sea are all warning signs that we are approaching a tipping point on climate change, when protecting the future of civilisation will require dramatic interventions.
Under a “climate lockdown,” governments would limit private-vehicle use, ban consumption of red meat, and impose extreme energy-saving measures, while fossil-fuel companies would have to stop drilling. To avoid such a scenario, we must overhaul our economic structures and do capitalism differently.
Many think of the climate crisis as distinct from the health and economic crises caused by the pandemic. But the three crises – and their solutions – are interconnected."
https://www.interest.co.nz/opinion/107187/mariana-mazzucato-sees-no-alternative-radical-overhaul-corporate-governance-finance
They will have a policy for this, right? Surely?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12367232
so our pm who odds on will be on after the election still PM and could also govern alone, and then any legislation resulting from the cannabis vote can be whatever labour decides (captains call)will not tell us what her personal views are. Ffs you are a leader what are you afraid of ?? That your opinions may result is losing a few votes. Your opinion has more than any other in deciding how any law is shaped.
imo this is steep walking to a victory, I hope that labour does not govern alone because they do not deserve to allow NZ to drift further. And their First past the post strategy just shows how they think the greens deserve to be managed… with distaste.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12355405
I don't agree, remember Keys support of the flag, many people voted to keep the flag to spite Key. Adern staying out of it is sensible, as well as her right, to keep her decision private. Also, the euthanasia bill being supported by Seymour makes me question by own beliefs around it (I support it, or do I? I'm not 100% sure, coz Seymour supports it, loudly).
Our PM and labour keeping out of it is ALL political as IMO they want to win and govern on their own and will do whatever to achieve this (no team including The Greens). What happens if the vote is 45-55 or even 50-50?We have been given no indication as to what any law will look like or if should the vote be too close what then? So totally disagree.
We appear to have a risk averse Labour Party.
Labour will be averse to taking risks that might dent their commanding lead over the National opposition party in recent political opinion polls. I'm guessing their strategists are pretty comfortable letting National indulge in risky business, and there's been plenty of that since the Bridges-Ross spat kicked off, Boag-Walker, Andrew ‘Balloon-Falloon’, and ‘Merv from Manurewa’ being recent examples.
There’s a lot riding on Collins’ eyebrows.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2020_New_Zealand_general_election#Graphical_summary
At the end, when Campbell was wrapping up, he spoke of one of the two leaders being the Prime Minister.
Interestingly, Ardern was looking straight ahead and Collins? She was looking at Ardern.
It's the eyes that give us away………….
It's worse than that. Brexit has antagonized the US and Eu leading to a probable economic crisis on which Judith does not seem to have a constructive position.
[This user handle and e-mail address are now blacklisted. Please use the pair that you last used on 21 Aug and that we had agreed on previously, thanks.
You are wasting Moderator time each time you change your user name and/or e-mail address and you have never provided a good reason why you are doing it.
I did ask you again only 2 days ago but you simply ignored the note so I wasted even more time on your antics when I gave you the benefit of doubt – Incognito]
See my second Moderation note to you in 2 days @ 11:59 AM.
Thoughts from abroad – Headlines from UK The Telegraph: You will have to search for more details yourself. This is just to show the drift of the thinking of the UK.
'Despite 10,000 new cases a day the French are embracing life – not imposing new rules.. From the Travel Correspondent.
(The French have large numbers of cases of Covid19 and are still enjoying life. Fool or hardy? Sounds like an oxymoron to me.)
Oxford’s Sir John Bell: ‘We’re not going to beat the second wave’
Oxford University has announced that clinical trials of its coronavirus vaccine are to resume in the UK
At lunchtime on Tuesday, Sir John Bell received a call telling him that the groundbreaking Oxford coronavirus vaccine trial would, regretfully, be paused.
(So UK is at sixes and sevens. But they know what they are doing, right. Trust us to do the right thing is the Conservative approach – now they've kicked Labour and Corbyn to the side.)
'We can beat Covid without lockdowns, says top German virologist
Hendrik Streeck argues big gatherings in closed spaces amplify the spread, but going to shops or hairdressers are manageable levels of risk'
Margaret Atwood wants to see The Handmaid's Tale scenario remain a fiction!
And Brexit, the entitled classes from which Boris has arisen stamps its foot over EU intransigence or something. It's all their fault.
The bad-faith EU is furious that the UK now has a backstop of its own
The PM is offering Brussels a choice: negotiate fairly, or the whole country will leave without a deal
Are we feeling a little anxious while we wait for the election and the Right waffle on about things, and thrust sharp things into the thread of our democracy and then grab our arms and say 'Look at these holes we found', that they made themselves? And all the time the Left are doing a pretty-good job. Here is Jonathan Pie relating the cares and woes of the UK people about their Right government, that is attempting to lead them all up the garden path, like a character out of P.G.Wodehouse.
Boris is advancing fast, he's a father now, and getting into confused grandfather territory at supersonic speed; reminiscent of the joke I got out of the paper years ago and put on the fridge:
"My grandfather's a little forgetful, but he likes to give me advice. One day he took me aside, and left me there." Ron Richards* (Witty & Wise.)
* Ron Richards (22 January 1929 – 30 April 2009) was a British record producer, manager and promoter, best known for discovering The Hollies. and – The record producer Ron Richards played a central part in the British “beat boom” of the 1960s, taking charge of the Beatles' first recording .. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Richards_(producer)
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/122845115/tick-tick-podcast-the-economic-phoney-war-and-what-will-happen-to-house-prices
House prices will not take a hit because the wealthy will continue to buy them all up so nobody else can afford them.
A friend who is a mortgage advisor told me that the banks apparently refuse to lend to people whose businesses either received the wage subsidy or who did receive the wage subsidy themselves. So yeah, anyone who thought that the low lever interests would benefit the houseless is in for serious disappointment.
At this stage the housing market – private, social and commercial – and the official response to it is nothing more but a farce.
Yes, Judith Collins sat down with an “adoring supporter” who has a tattoo of the latest leader of the opposition on one of his thighs. Could this be a turning point in Collins' election campaign (worked for Trump) – maybe we'll all see more of her soon.
https://www.ktnv.com/now-trending/ohio-man-has-donald-trumps-face-tattooed-on-arm
https://www.wnep.com/article/news/local/trump-stamp-man-gets-trump-tattoo-on-lower-back-after-losing-bet/523-a89bac84-d7eb-4523-9551-83a5e89c7825
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3937678/British-roofer-38-gets-huge-tattoo-Donald-Trump-leg-says-doesn-t-mind-criticism-great-art-controversial.html
@ 22 The "minds" (I use the term advisedly : ) of them . Gotta laugh
Let me know if you'd like some more.
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
would you like to be out for the day?
Once a month I'm allowed out for the day.
The way to reduce house prices is known.
It is with the cost of paying a mortgage or limitation on access to finance to buy.
A guy called Bollard said he would not need to increase the OCR to constrain inflation resulting from rising land and property value if the government introduced a mortgage surcharge instead – then the OCR would be lower and so would the dollar to the advantage of exporters.
But now over a decade later and still nothing. The RBG gets rid of the equity requirement and cuts the OCR and so of course property values will rise.
This will change as soon as the government adds a mortgage surcharge or taxes equity in property (TOP) or a land tax. Of course only taxing property equity wealth over $M is Green policy.
Lower interest rates only benefit those with access to property finance, a mortgage surcharge is the balance to this so that government can help tenants and finance homes for first home buyers or build more state houses.
We used as first home buyers, to get a 25 year mortgage at an affordable rate, and that was a good start. It encouraged people to settle into stable lives etc etc. But though you would think that good people in government roles would want that, I think that this evil neolib economics is actually keen to keep people on the hop, make them work harder, not be complacent, and ensure that they didn't have anything to sink savings into, underpay them so they had to borrow so business would profit from the interest they had to pay to provide the necessities demanded in a 'developed' economy, and keeping more money flowing in the economy.
It is such a twisted approach that ordinary people don't comprehend it; don't understand the diabolical nature of the financial people at the top who twiddle the economy's knobs.
Yes a government could waive the mortgage surcharge for first home buyers …
It used to be expressed that government gave first home buyers a step up into the housing market to get them started. But neolib doesn't want people to even get started. Don Brash didn't think that people should be tying their money up in their own house. Though the system produced a stable and relatively happy country pleased and proud most of the time.
Not the way we are now with an attitude of the quick or the dead, and lack of generosity towards others, competing for stuff all the time. To the people at the top the hoi polloi are just to be used as if life was a cockfight, and the hens get slaughtered if they don't produce enough eggs. As you can tell, I am pretty disillusioned – the NZ spirit is mainly found in bottles now.
I think Collins sounded more like Trump. Me me me, I know best, Vote for me,![devil devil](https://cdn.ckeditor.com/4.11.3/full-all/plugins/smiley/images/devil_smile.png)
Judith Collins is just a trashy piece of trailer trash. Her "poor wee thing" describing Jacinda Adern is classic "how low can you get" – uncouth is another description or as my old grannie used to say to me "all hair oil and no socks". She is a disgrace to any position of responsibility or representation of our country. Jacinda Adern should never have to be put in a position that she has to even engage with her. Fine porcelain versus crude pottery. Trump is the company Collins deserves.
She is starting to make John Key look reasonable.
I'll tell you what. The sooner this election comes round, the better.
I think it's a major miscalculation to think people are flocking to Labour and a self described bold progressive because they think she'll be moderate and consersative.
What if labours rise in the polls is due to non voters who jacindas boldness turned on and who need change and former Nat voters whose lives have fallen apart and this moderate tinkering approach makes them stay home. Honestly. Labours dropped in the polls since it announced policy and showed it's cautious af direction. Labours messaging just seems so wrong for the times.
Labour desperately needs to start exciting people again. People who were excited are getting bored and despondent. Maybe I'm wrong maybe people are flocking to her because they want a self described transformational progressive to not be bold or transformational and middle class people are flocking to Labour cos they want everything to stay the same. I think it's a bit of both
Labour still has the highest polling it's had in thirty years.
Sure we're not exciting, but not-exciting is effectively eating National.
Trust the hard left to whine about it.
"Labour … is effectively eating National"
They'll need a cast-iron gut to keep the meal down – but it's a dirty job that needs doing. They might even become a genuine conservative (in the best sense of the word) party. One worthy of respect – which we don't have at present.
Trust the hard left to whine about it. Calling an anxious voter looking for policy change 'hard left' is hard Ad. It's nervousness really – probably better left unsaid at this stage.
If people want bold transformational progressives, why aren't they flocking to the Greens?
Good question
Maybe those who really want "bold transformational progressives" have already flocked – the rest are hunkering down, still hoping to weather a 'storm' that shall not pass.
edit
This is a good bit of goss and shows our system is working at weeding out the baddies eventually, somewhat.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/426737/spy-camera-case-police-appeal-suppression-of-former-government-employee
A former senior government manager planted a spy camera in an Auckland gym's changing room capturing video of a naked couple, then went on to plant the camera on at least three more occasions, the Auckland High Court has heard.
Police appealing the man's discharge without conviction and permanent name suppression, argued his offending, which took place on at least four separate days, was not taken into account by District Court Judge Clare Bennett.
RNZ and NZME also challenged the man's name suppression.
I wonder if we have here the Judge adopting Queen Victoria’s moral levels whereby if one doesn’t want one’s mind to be sullied by distasteful scuttlebutt, one just doesn’t listen. The Queen is supposed to have said, “I don’t want to know that.” The better secondary schools now probably don’t even study DH Lawrence Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
‘We’re better than that’, is the quote of the new century, to be applied to bloody massacres, and derelictions of duty by well-paid government officials. I can say that, without a qualm, that bit about well-paid, because it seems to be an absolute dead cert these days as the anointed move up the line following the well-worn Peter’s Principle Curve.
"Westpac has agreed to pay a record $A1.3 billion ($NZ1.4b) fine for major breaches of money laundering and terror financing laws."
https://www.odt.co.nz/business/westpac-cops-record-fine-australia
I've often wondered….why is westpac our NZ Govt's Bank? Maybe Kiwibank should be…