The country’s private schools are raking in a big share of taxpayer funding designed to help special needs students sit exams.
The Dyslexia Foundation of New Zealand says the system allows wealthy parents at private schools to work the system at the expense of poor parents whose children miss out.
Applications for funding require parents to pay for a report from an educational psychologist to prove their children have special needs – which critics say benefits those who can afford it.
The foundation said that contrast ( facts provided in article) “epitomises the current inequality of access to SAC between the haves and have-nots”.
That’s a bit like nicking the change from the Child Cancer jar on the coffee shop counter, isn’t it? – and I bet they laugh about how clever they are to ‘minimise’ their tax bill then rip off the taxpayer by taking money from kids who need access to this resource, but can’t afford to go get it. I mean it’s pennies to them.
Why, also, does the NZQA put a financial barrier to financial aid like this? It doesn’t make any sense at all, increasing the disadvantage of the disadvantaged when this resource is meant to improve their lot.
This is a bit more than the Coffee jar rip off. This is the systematic rip off of to start with the NHS, but how many other countries are getting ripped off ?
I wish I could say this surprised me, but it’s very much what you’d expect from NACT NZ. Is there some kind of; Rorts of the Month Newsletter, that goes out to their supporters? The near tripling of SAC expenditure in a single year (159 000 to 433 000) is most suspicious. Especially given that a quarter of King’s students got assistance, while Otahahu College got nothing.
If NZQA require educational psychologist assessment before handing over the cash, you’d hope the ministry review will recommend their funding this themself. I suspect it’ll just be a whitewash though, or maybe they’ll even recommend canceling the SAC programme altogether (as the private schools will have gone on to the next scam by then).
this is unfortunate; individuals living with autism and dyslexia are generally gifted in other dimensions, yet if situated in a lower-decile area / school, these qualities are less likely to be revealed, with the children concerned becoming labeled as ‘difficult’. Then there was the revelation on RNZ this week that of the school settings receiving funding to provide a learning environment for ‘difficult’ children, few are meeting Ministry of Education criteria and guidelines. Instead, many children are just warehoused in a holding pattern.
In the game I watched, the French led twice, and forced scrum penalties from the All Black scrum. The All Blacks scored a try which a referee could not have allowed without video review and which remained dubious, and prevented a French try only by a professional foul with blatant jersey pulling.
The score could have been AB 17 FR 16! Rugby watching is like political commentating and poll watching, isn’t it?
In the game I watched, the French led twice, and forced scrum penalties from the All Black scrum. The All Blacks scored a try which a referee could not have allowed without video review and which remained dubious, and prevented a French try only by a professional foul with blatant jersey pulling.
In the second minute of the match, France got perfect running ball a few metres from the NZ goal line. Any team, even the least talented, would have at least had a go at passing the ball in such a situation; a team of France’s calibre would be almost guaranteed of scoring. But instead of spinning it, French flyhalf Remi Tales kicked it into the All Black’s in-goal area, and a chance went begging. Tales’ “choice” of squandering possession so grossly was to be repeated by him and his lackadaisacal team-mates throughout the “game”.
You can take Steve Hansen’s lead and pretend that France made an effort if you want, just as the clowns in the Herald on Sunday have done. But please don’t pretend to be doing anything other than talking up a hollow win in a friendly match against a team that made only a token effort.
The score could have been AB 17 FR 16!
Sure it could, if the French had turned up to play. They did not, and it was another disgraceful lack of effort, on a par with last weekend’s horror show in Christchurch.
Rugby watching is like political commentating and poll watching, isn’t it?
Some political pollsters like to pretend things are other than what they actually are. Just like Steve Hansen, actually.
Read your own comments as one who reads them from our side of the internet divide. From what you write in reply, if we disagree with you we are clowns like the Herald or Hansen since we (bad12 and myself) saw that game differently, or pretenders who are dishonest in our commenting.
Morrissey, there is a large problem of how to communicate or argue here. Did you ever wonder why you get commenters’ backs up here- and this is over (choke) an unimportant thing like a game of rugby, where they play the ball and not the man!
Read your own comments as one who reads them from our side of the internet divide. From what you write in reply, if we disagree with you we are clowns like the Herald or Hansen since we (bad12 and myself) saw that game differently, or pretenders who are dishonest in our commenting.
I don’t think you are being dishonest, my friend. But I do think you are not looking at that travesty of a match either sensibly or dispassionately. Of course the All Blacks played well, and deserved to win each of the three friendly games. The All Blacks approached those games seriously; the Tricolors, on the other hand, clearly did not. You saw just as clearly as I did that the French team hardly tried to do anything with the ball during any of those matches; even one of that extraordinarily dimwitted commentary team on Prime TV remarked on Saturday night that the French had done nothing other than boot any possession they got down-field and hope for mistakes from the All Blacks, a “tactic” which was never going to succeed, ever. The French showed no commitment, no passion, and not a hint of creativity, in spite of the TV advertisements blathering about “French flair”. In other words, they hardly made an effort. You can either face up to that fact, and condemn them for it, or you can pretend that the All Blacks won against a French team playing football seriously.
Morrissey, there is a large problem of how to communicate or argue here. Did you ever wonder why you get commenters’ backs up here-
That’s a mighty big statement. I have got people’s backs up now and again, certainly. But we usually reconcile and I get along well with most of my interlocutors, even if we squabble occasionally.
and this is over (choke) an unimportant thing like a game of rugby, where they play the ball and not the man!
Yes, you’re right, mac, I should tone it down a bit. Must try harder….
A non-effort by the French,??? my opinion is that the French turned up at Yarrow stadium last night with a game plan designed to negate the game the All Blacks brought to Christchurch the previous week,
Considering that the French were for most of last nights game in a position were a converted try could have won them the game their game plan could be said to have been superior to that of the previous week,
Obviously the French negating the attacking capabilities of the All Blacks last night gave us more an exhibition of thugby as opposed to the brilliant use of the football of the previous week and the old adage about changing a winning team was once again proved as the line-out failed to adequately compete against the French when compared with the previous week and a rusty number 10 in Dan Carter produced what was a pretty lack-luster game by His own standards….
Well at least they actually put warm bodies on the park, even though their hearts were clearly not in it. They did tackle and get in the way, of course, but they tried absolutely nothing on attack, and in fact deliberately squandered chances to score by mindlessly punting away perfect front-foot ball.
…my opinion is that the French turned up at Yarrow stadium last night with a game plan designed to negate the game the All Blacks brought to Christchurch the previous week,
What “game plan”? They showed nothing and did nothing. Except get in the way of the All Blacks.
Considering that the French were for most of last nights game in a position were a converted try could have won them the game their game plan could be said to have been superior to that of the previous week,
Again, WHAT game plan are you talking about? They did nothing. Possibly this was a good tackling practice for them, and I would not put it past them to have treated it as nothing more serious.
Obviously the French negating the attacking capabilities of the All Blacks last night gave us more an exhibition of thugby as opposed to the brilliant use of the football of the previous week
What “brilliant use” of the football? It was virtually an unopposed training run for the All Blacks in Christchurch.
and the old adage about changing a winning team was once again proved as the line-out failed to adequately compete against the French when compared with the previous week and a rusty number 10 in Dan Carter produced what was a pretty lack-luster game by His own standards….
And what about the rustiness of the Tricolors’ No. 10? At least Carter never did anything as grossly irresponsible as his opposite number (Remi Tales) did in the first 90 seconds of last night’s debacle.
Worldwide, demand for medicines is outstripping governments’ ability to pay for them, as people live longer and expensive new therapies come to market. But Pharmac CEO Steffan Crausaz said unlike similar bodies in other countries, Pharmac has a fixed budget, forcing it to prioritise.
Now, for the first time, the public is being asked to give its opinion on whether those priorities need reform.
Harris told the Sunday Star-Times that funding decisions work best when they are based on a set of principles, rather than ad hoc decisions on what seems reasonable. Deciding just what those principles should be, though, can be tricky.
The New Zealand system attempts to compare and prioritise, “independently of disease-based lobbying, whether it’s from manufacturers or doctors or patient groups”.
From Tuesday, Pharmac is hosting a series of free community forums seeking the public’s views on what its decision criteria should be. For details see bit.ly/19m3Jvr
Thanks for raising this really important issue, LynWiper. Pharmac has been under attack from drug companies for some time now because they’ve been holding prices of meds down, and using generics rather than expensive drug company specialities. I think we need to give them as much support as possible, help them work out those priorities, so we continue to get reasonable costs on our medications and not be subject to the prices of those huge multinational drugs manufacturers.
The TPP negotiations loom large on this issue. The Americans have their eye on Pharmac and one wonders what is the real position of our Nact representatives at these talks.
For a start they could pay attention to their first 8 decision making criteria and END all funding for the current tranche of Nicotine Replacement Therapies (patches, inhalers, gum etc that all contain nicotine) and save, how many millions of dollars per annum that currently goes to lining the pockets of Big Pharma? Instead, and in line with 1 through 8 of their own criteria, they could provide nicotine in solution to ex-smokers, allowing them to either continue the addiction with far fewer health consequences or to step their dosage down in incremental stages until they were nicotine free.
I’m hoping to see an interest in what people think about quality of life concerns in Pharmac’s decision-making process.
From my point of view, decisions are too focused on a narrow medical benefit and cost to the health system. For example there are relatively rare disabling conditions that can prevent people taking part in society. Standard drugs can keep them as functioning invalids, prevent hospitalisation, and slow the course of the disease, but may not allow the patient to resume a life without assistance – financial (including invalid benefit for those who don’t have a partner to rely on) and/or physical – due to disabilities resulting from the illness.
However, newer, very expensive drugs can allow the ill person to function at the same level as a person without the condition – interacting with family, having a social life, and crucially (in term of other societal/taxpayer costs), able to work and pay tax, play, and physically look after their families. However in Pharmac’s view the new drug does nothing more than the older, cheaper drugs in the reduction of health system costs so is heavily restricted.
And yet, (for my personal pet rant) Pharmac pay a fortune in omeprazole (Losec) (due to the number of people who are prescribed it) so people can eat spicy chicken (queue Losec ad) when a green prescription may have a greater impact. Rant exceptions, of course, for people with little choice – I don’t intend to dismiss need – e.g. those with stomach ulcers, IBDs or taking anti-inflammatories for a condition that the above example incorporates.
I posted this link last night: USA Today did a great interview with 3 former NSA whistleblowers who say Snowden has succeeded where they have failed. Some of the things they reveal about attitudes in the US govt since 9-11 are very scary. But kudos to them and to USA today for doing this piece.
The SST is reporting Truth’s escort service website has been hacked and the phone numbers of escorts replaced by Cam Slater’s number. Imagine the surprised calls he must be receiving …
on pA3, there’s a small article, “Official: Truth a bunch of Hacks” about the website hack. SLater says he put his phone on silent, and wasn’t very bothered by “the childish games people play”.
Slater says he hasn’t heard from the Truth’s owners since the closure was announced, and that he’s now “exploring a digital-only newspaper venture”.
Q + A………to be renamed “Qeue + Adore” (ShonKey Python and National that is).
In the first 20 minutes:
– Key given full novelistic reign on QE with nothing from Norman.
– Big ups to National for protecting vulnerable immigrant workers (oh how
marvellous……everyone else is implacably opposed to that of course, yeah right).
– Miller, Mapp and Mei waxing lyrical how wonderful is “Minister” Woodhouse for militating
against immigrant worker exploitation. Mapp……..the embarrassingly pompous pedant former National Party cabinet minister. On the show to lead the cheering by and for “Woody” ?
– Oh wow……..Palestine……..thank you lawyer Mei…….”this is a very important matter for which a
solution must be found…..”. Strangely, no addressing “justice the seed, peace the
flower”. To do so I guess would be too challenging for the Susan (thick as a piece of) Wood.
– And on the question of workers rights no mention during the acclaimation for “Minister”
Woodhouse of the attack on New Zealand workers’ rights promoted by that sleaze the slightly
cleverer than Gilmore, Jamie-Lee Ross. Parallel to the startlingly innovative focus of
“Minister ” Woodhouse in boldly enforcing law already on the statute book.
Qeue + Adore not worth watching I’m afraid. Why not just can it and toss production costs into National Party coffers.
Yes, migrant labour exploitation equivalent to NAct labour law exploitation.
After a few token prosecutions, where will the resourcing come from to follow up notifications.
And on New Zealanders returning from overseas? from Tracey Lee , ‘Brand Strategist’ and wastage of a sociology education, “we must smooth the hardship of their transition” (paraphrased) …I shake my head in despair! Lord give us strength, strewth!
Did I say, I’m feeling disgust about now…
+1 The bit about Kiwis returning back to New Zealand was particularly naive. Not once was our low waged economy, which is the main reason for the mass-exodus, mentioned. All we had was propaganda about a supposed 25,000 Kiwis returning each year, which morphed into a puff piece with claims that most Kiwis only left for a little while anyway.
Meanwhile in the real world there’s approximately a million Kiwis permanently living abroad, and the mass exodus continues unabated.
But whatever, John Key promising that people would waive goodbye to higher taxes and not their loved ones is a distant memory, especially it seems for the deluded spin doctors over at Q+A.
I well remember the time when John Campbell broke the investigation by Nicky Hager into Corngate. Senior Labour Party activists I spoke to were ropeable. The air was blue. And the abuse they showered on Campbell and Hager. “They were close friends”, “They were working together to discredit the Labour Party”, “They are rats”, “anti-Labour” etc. etc
Yeah I near vomited at the sycophancy that was shown. Shit it’s another program that’s on the why bother list, as it’s been dumbed down, and is at the level of 7 sharp now. and it’s getting worse, the MSM is hopeless. And the so called Current Affairs shows are either dumbed down, or are on at such weird times that the stories are lost to the main stream.
Q + A is part of the NACT spin machine. The nats know how to make the SOE’s do their bidding, it’s all too easy when you stack the board/management and have that mafia style approach to the ‘funding ‘
Susan Wood as on of the attack dogs..says it all really, just a revolving door of hacks and has beens.
Q + A is part of the NACT spin machine. The nats know how to make the SOE’s do their bidding, it’s all too easy when you stack the board/management and have that mafia style approach to the ‘funding ‘
Susan Wood as one of the attack dogs says it all really, just a revolving door of hacks and has beens who know how to keep the paymasters happy.
Labour is planning to ‘ take the fight to National’, and will announce new policy imminently, on what it says is one of the most pressing issues facing New Zealand. It asks:
What are we doing to make Herne Bay housing more
affordable for young professional first-home buyers?
Labour leader, David Shearer says he expects this to be one of the key election issues in 2014 and Labour will ‘terrorise’ its National Party opponents in the ferocity with which they will fight for the “hard working children of our own hard working families, who work very hard”.
The Herald this morning – front page online – elderly lady attacked and assaulted in her own home – surveillance camera style photograph of a capped and hoodied young brown guy:
I will try Andy. Where’s the Herald at leaving the photo completely unexplained in the article.
Sensible to link surely ? Oh hang on, maybe the stereoptype is so established as to obviate the link.
The police have given the Herald footage from a crime to help solve it, evil fucker robbing old folk. Jeeebus they aint perfect (teh herald) but cut them some slack on this.
Fuck you and your ‘established stereotype’ nonsense. There is some dangerous dude robbing old people with increasing violence. Colour of perpetrator and old folk not important.
Dead right Angry Andy as I now know. But who was to know that without any explanation of the photo ? Just in case you blow a fuse Dick !!, give a thought to this: the article has been updated as CV says. My comment was posted at about 11.00 am, before the update.
If you wanna stay Angry Andy I’ll falsely state “Good on ya young brown fulla, bash those old ladies and steal their money”, just to prove your point and invigorate your strawman
I give the herald a little bit of credit. Not much but, some. Jumping to conclusions on a Sunday when they have the least staff on board still makes you a dick, when proven wrong by further updates.
Yeah, I’m angry. Angry at your stupid and angry that some douche bag is robbing old people.
Press F5 on your keyboard, its called ‘refresh’. Makes you less of a dick sometimes.
You can falsely state whatever you want, but your still wrong and will not, withdraw and apologise.
There is no strawman, just facts.
Dick!!!
Edit: was updated at 10.40am ish with attribution on photo.
Yeah, facts, as presented by the Herald at 11.00 am, and crucially, differently and more instructively, some hours later.
Careful with your fuse Andy. Happy to cut the Herald some slack aye ? Fair enough. How about some for me since I commented on the appearance of the earlier set of Herald “facts”, not the later set of Herald “facts”.
Highly unreasonable of you to keep up the insistence that I approve of the criminality and cowardice we mutually detest when you know full well I do not.
Tried to edit the above comment after reading your edit. Understand Andy, not facts that I saw. I read and reread the article, surprised there was no explanation as to the guy’s connection. Then spent 10-15 minutes writing a comment in response to the article as first presented by the Herald which response I submitted at 10.50 am.
Still not satisfied ? Tough. Be obtuse.
Yeah right. I applaud the bastard responsible. Of course I do ! Happy now ? How’s the fuse ?
In scenes reminiscent of the early days of the Syrian protests. Turkish police break up peaceful demonstrations with unprovoked violence.
Though he didn’t state who they were, following Basher Assad’s lead, Turkish leader Tayip Erdogan blamed Turkey’s enemies.
Turkish riot police fired water cannon to disperse thousands of anti-government demonstrators in central Istanbul on Saturday, as Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan castigated those behind protests he said had played into the hands of Turkey’s enemies.
The latest unrest in Taksim Square punctured six days of relative calm in Turkey’s biggest city, although it was a long way frommatching the ferocity of previous clashes there and in other cities that began more than three weeks ago.
Demonstrators threw carnations at a phalanx of officers carrying shields who slowly advanced towards them, flanked by water cannon, to clear the square.
“Police, don’t betray your people!” activists shouted after they had been scattered into streets leading to Taksim. Witnesses said police later used teargas to disperse pockets of protesters on a main shopping street nearby.
Hours earlier, Erdogan had told thousands of supporters in the Black Sea city of Samsun that the unrest had played into the hands of Turkey’s enemies.
Maybe Colonial Viper could help Erdogan out here. And put a name to these unnamed enemies of Turkey
This shouldn’t be to hard for CV. As CV doesn’t need to have any knowledge at all of conditions on the ground in Turkey. Or even take note of those who do. All he has to do is pull out his tired old Marxist dogmatic script which reliably informed him that the Yankee Imperialists were behind every other Middle Eastern revolt.
Maybe CV could helpfully suggest to Erdogan, as he did for Assad, that the use of deadly nerve gas against the enemies of his country wouldn’t be a war crime.
You are probably right. I will stop wasting my time and energy on this supporter of fascism when he stops provoking me.
What I was responding to was his attack on me.
I posted a statement in support of Edward Snowden. Which Colonial Viper took exception to. And which I replied to by trying to keep it light. To which Colonial Viper launched an unwarranted attack on me for supporting the Syrian people’s struggle to free themselves of a murderous dictatorship.
I have never used CV’s support for the fascist regime of Basher Assad against him. Preferring to argue the merit of the issue at hand. I had also hoped that CV’s support for the Assad regime, indeed his whole racist dismissal of the validity of the Arab Spring, was some sort of grotesque mistake. Everyone can make mistakes. And so out of politeness I have never used it to beat him up, when discussing other issues.
However I feel that I would be remiss in not responding to CV’s unprovoked attack. IMHO to allow CV’s sick support for the facist style Bashar Assad regime to go unchallenged would be tantamount to agreeing not to challenge this sort of repression anywhere. If he thinks he can bring this up in an attempt to embarrass me every time he disagrees with me, then he is mistaken
I make no apology for supporting the struggle of the people of Syria fighting for democracy. That that struggle has become brutal and fratracidal, in the nature of all civil wars, was not of their choice but of the dictator Bashar Assad. Bashar Assad could have agreed to grant the protesters the minor democratic reforms that they originally sought. Instead he decided to gun them down instead.
What I take from CV’s attack on me over the comment on Edward Snowden, is that Colonial Viper hates the sort of political activism that the citizens of Hong Kong are famous for. The courageous political activism that has seen the people of Hong Kong openly defy the Beijing communist regime, and that Snowden has put his faith in, to protect him, from both the Chinese communist and the American capitalist governments.
And I might add, also the same sort of political activism that New Zealanders too can also rightly lay claim to as a proud tradition of protest practiced here.
I believe this argument has relevance to what happens here.
Colonial Viper dismisses the power and the success and validity of all grass roots citizen protest movements protesting against authority and injustice.
Though it can be seriously argued that such movements have achieved more for human progress and human rights than all the pragmatic top table horse trading that political parties spend their time on.
I believe that Colonial Viper is of the opinion that we should leave everything up to the high ups in the Labour Party and the Greens.
If the Greens and Labour decide in their coalition discussions that Deep Sea Oil drilling is OK. Then we must accept it. If these “leaders” decide on our behalf that there is nothing we here in New Zealand can do about climate change, we must accept that too. In fact we must accept everything that the political bureaucracies shove down our throats even if it is killing us.
I believe that the sort of activism that I talk about, makes people like Colonial Viper uneasy, because it holds mainstream parties to account and decreases the amount of wriggle room that the mainstream politicians have to make compromises and sellouts.
But it is the tradition that made New Zealand become nuclear free and left no room for compromise for the Lange government. It is the tradition that saw New Zealand reject racially selected sports teams.
It is the same proud tradition of protest that keeps democracy alive in Hong Kong while surrounded by a communist dictatorship.
Finally it is the same spirit that moved the people of Syria to take up arms against the state in response to the violence unleashed against them by the regime. (A lesson that Erdogan of Turkey, indeed all autocratic leaders where ever they are, should take note of.)
(Reuters) – Turkey detained 10 people on Tuesday on suspicion of providing weapons and fighters in the name of al Qaeda to Islamist rebels trying to topple the Syrian government, highlighting the dilemma Turkey faces as one of the rebel movement’s biggest backers
The United States has been sending communication equipment to rebels of the Free Syrian Army through Turkey. Rebels have picked up shipments in Istanbul and driven them across the border into Syria along secure routes.
Turkey has sea ports for larger shipments. Most of the arms rebel leaders have requested are light weapons, chief among them shoulder-fired missiles. The missiles are wanted to shoot down Syrian aircraft or disable Syrian tanks.
Turkey allowed itself to be used by the USA/UK/France, imperialists in their desire to upend the ME, to control the resources on that region, as well as the continued resource theft in Africa.
Turkey, has played its part very poorly, and alienated Muslim sects, by being used as an imperialist puppet, and is now feeling the fallout of the administrations corrupted actions!
Not to hard to understand where these, *enemies* might come from, Jenny!
The subject of the ME/Africa, is clearly beyond your ability to comprehend, Jenny. Perhaps its a good time to re-focus on those areas you might consider to be, strenghts!
Maybe CV could helpfully suggest to Erdogan, as he did for Assad, that the use of deadly nerve gas against the enemies of his country wouldn’t be a war crime.
Maybe we should introduce some facts,which tend to get in the way of Jenny’s story books.
In your your deadly serious campaign to support mass murder and torture CV you and your mates are so out of touch with reality that you have completely lost your sense of the ridiculous.
Do you guys seriously expect us to believe this rubbish?
What you are trying to tell us is that the rebels who can’t even build a safe field hospital. Assembled all the chemical ingredients to make sarin. Not to mention, putting in place all the high tech containment and safety procedures that need to be at the very least a PC1 level containment. According to wikipedia, a task even the nazis couldn’t fully complete in time before the end of the war.
And having achieved all that, loaded it into a specialised artillery shell. Or did they deliver it in the back of a bread van?
Jenny, I think your overwrought witterings are the problem. eg Assad and CV are not fascists and not liking the makeup of parts of the Syrian opposition does not make one a fascist. And you are dreaming if you think anyone much is fighting for ‘democracy’. One of the reasons the West has been slow to get involved is exactly that question; is there any point in replacing Assad when an even worse regime will be taking over?
We went through that scenario in Iraq and look how that turned out.
One of the reasons the West has been slow to get involved is exactly that question; is there any point in replacing Assad when an even worse regime will be taking over?
Te Reo Putake
TRP Your defence of Colonial Viper’s support for the brutal Basha Assad regime falls down on the fact that from the beginning CV has claimed that the whole thing is an American plot. Including the Arab Spring itself.
This is not just factually wrong but is actually a racist slur on the Arab people.
I don’t think that any party that calls itself democratic can long tolerate in their ranks an Islamaphobic racist who openly admires a fascist style dictatorial regime that indulges in mass murder and torture.
No I got it right. You have consistently argued in the past to do nothing about climate change. I have never called you a “climate change denialist“. What I did term you as, and I think I was being accurate at the time, was a “climate change ignorer“. (something you share in common with David Shearer). However on saying that I have noticed of late, a positive change in your position. It just goes to shows me that no one is irredeemable. I play rough but you are learning.
What have you got right exactly, Jenny? Your Arab Spring working out for ordinary people in Egypt and Libya is it? Your Syrian “popular revolt” still importing a lot of foreign Islamic fighters just to keep going? Green party coming around to your way of looking at the world?
What exactly is it that you have got right?
It just goes to shows me that no one is irredeemable. I play rough but you are learning.
New information about the drive to place sick and incapacitated WINZ beneficiaries with mental health issues into employment:
Learn a bit about some of the possibly leading “pigs at the government trough”, who are likely contenders for MSDs contracts to outsource employment services for getting mentally ill (and other incapacitated) WINZ beneficiaries into work, for nice fees paid that will be based on referrals, duration of employment and so forth (more to come):
Press Release – Wise Group, 10:15 May 16, 2013: http://business.scoop.co.nz/2013/05/16/employment-and-mental-health/
describing a new “tool” for doctors and mental health service providers, to “assist” and “motivate” clients to move back into work, developed by ‘The Wise Group’ – more on them further below!!!
See what was already done last year to prepare for the push to get mentally ill assisted back into work in last year:
Employment Support as a Mental Health Intervention Forum: 9 March 2012
Quote:
“This is your invitation to a forum for clinicians and others that will focus on this developing field of practice. International research andthe experience of practitioners, signals that evidence-based supported employment is emerging as a significant intervention to help people into paid competitive work.This symposium with is focus on employment is timely as the Government has indicated a comprehensive review of the benefit system.”
…with information on a forum last year, at the Ko Awatea Centre for Education & Innovation, Otahuhu
attended by speakers:
Rob Warriner, CEO of Walsh Trust: http://www.walsh.org.nz;
Warren Elwin, CEO of Workwise, Employment Agency: http://www.workwise.org.nz;
Helen Lockett, Strategic Development, Wise Group: http://www.wisegroup.co.nz;
Clive Bensemann, Director of Mental Health, Auckland District Health Bd;
David Codyre, Clinical Director/ Consultant Psychiatrist, ProCare Psychological Services …
And –
John Zonnevylle, Capital Coast DHB
Magdel Hammond, Edge Employment,
Dale Rook, Occupational Therapist, Auckland District Health Board
Also to take note of: http://grow.co.nz/real-value-helen-lockett/
(another “UK expert”, but I am a bit unsure whether she is one of those supporting Prof. Mansel Aylward’s and Dr David Bratt’s particularly hardline philosophies on “work capacity” and the “health benefits of work”)
So there we have it – more “corporate welfare” in the form of generous employment schemes for the well paid running of such services, and for perhaps a bit less generously paid bulk of the remaining “staff”. All likely to be part of the planned outsourcing and privatisation of welfare.
One thing is sure for the Wise Group:
$ 61,277,236 government grants and contract payments, out of $ 65,412,195 total income of that “charity”!!! Not bad really, especially for the ones running it.
I had some personal experiences with “Workwise” some time ago, as a former flatmate with some mental health issues tried to find work through the help of two of their staff. She got “stuff all” in real, effective support, and was rather disappointed by the “service” delivered by at times very unreliable and not all that motivated staff!
***When thinking of “charities” “Sanitarium” comes to mind again, owned by a church that can run the business as a “charity”, paying no tax on earnings. ***
I presume much is just “illness belief” (e.g. imagination), I suppose: http://awdpa.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Models-of-Sickness-Disability-Waddell-and-Aylward-2010-2.pdf
(Publication by Prof. M. Aylward from 2010: ‘Models of Sickness and Disability’, or perhaps rather “blurring the lines, to open up attack lines on sick and disabled with incapacities – for state welfare agencies or insurance companies to dis-entitle beneficiaries and claimants”)
In contrast the more widely known and well-established agency used by MSD and Work and Income to place people with physical disabilities into employment: http://www.workbridge.co.nz/?page=121
(this is harmless, the more conventional approach, not covering mental health though)
Some visuals to go with the information on job finding!
They’ve got pens – The League of Gentlemen – BBC
Pauline turns up for her new start session with the unemployed but is quite shocked to find that the tables have turned. Contains adult humour. Watch more high quality….
Good to check out the prospectus webpages of the ‘Wise’ outfit, especially the cvs of the main players. I’d love to know what sort of salaries they are pulling in for caring so deeply.
There are sharks competing for funding with the little fish in the NGO/charity world.
No prizes for guessing the winners in that particular battle for survival.
Had a lovely experience this morning, knock at the door, and a lovely maori lady from a local iwi social services and education trust, -initiated by a blind maori gentleman, Jim (last name escapes me) – invited me (and every other whanau in the street) to a sausage sizzle and a check out of some surplus winter clothing. They had parked up with a trailer at the end of the street and when I had to go out, most folk had wandered down and were catching up. Excellent after the cold spell.
Organised in cooperation with Kia Ora Gaza, Students For Justice in Palestine (Auckland, Hamilton & Wellington), Palestine Human Rights Campaign, Wellington Palestine Group, and Global Peace & Justice Auckland.
PROGRAMME:
Saturday 22 June 10am to 5pm
Leys Institute Hall
20 St Marys Rd, Three Lamps, Ponsonby.
Including workshops on promoting boycott and divestment campaigns, lobbying for sanctions, political prisoners, other solidarity actions. PARTICIPANTS MUST REGISTER AT OUR WEBSITE IN ORDER TO ATTEND DAY ONE or registration form available here https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1vHZw3H-KVD07vECOTilP_t23qH3BjCL3kXY_AwNEPvY/viewform.
Sunday 23 June from 12.30pm
Auckland Town Hall Concert Chamber, Queen St:
Presentations on Palestine, building support & links from NZ.
4pm: special screening of Oscar-nominated Palestinian documentary “5 Broken Cameras”.
5.30 – 6.30pm: meal break.
6.30pm: talk by Palestinian teacher/blogger Yousef Aljamal on ‘Life under occupation’.
Copies of ‘The General’s Son’ will be available at the conference at $25 (retail price about $30). You can request a copy now by emailing us at: [email protected] and send $25 + $4 postage to bank account below.
FREE ADMISSION – donations & pledges welcome.
This important event depends on your generous support.
HOW TO DONATE:
Make a direct payment to our bank account:
Conference on Palestine,
03-0211-0447718-000,
Westpac Bank, Onehunga branch.
Afterwards, send an email to: [email protected] with your deposit details so we can send you an e-receipt.
Or write a cheque to ‘Conference on Palestine’ & post to:
Conference on Palestine
PO Box 86022, Mangere East,
Auckland 2158, New Zealand.
[Include you email or postal address for a receipt.]
– The amalgamation of Occupied Territories with pre1967 Israel (ie the ‘Two State Solution” is dead on the ground)
– Full citizenship for Palestinians, including per-1967 exiles
– Right of return and compensation for Palestinians
– South African style Truth & Reconciliation process
Here’s a link to Miko Peled’s interview with Kim Hill
There is a great item on Chris Laidlaw Radionz this a.m. on spy-ring etc. Thinking about Edward Snowden et al. http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday
A couple or more of speakers. The last I heard before putting this was a quip from a Hong Kong dignitary. She said that ‘The reason that the sun never set on the British Empire is because God doesn’t trust the British.’ Good eh!
This is after remembering how Brits organised spying on foreign dignitaries at I think one G8 meeting, even organising special internet cafes that were set up so they could get access to all their emails. Another bit of negative information is that they sent a top diver under a Russian vessel with advanced propeller technology but unfortunately his head was cut off. The comment was made that the English speaking countries were heavily into spying and we have been involved, along with Australia, in the ‘Five Eyes’ system since the Eighties I think.
Yes great interview: “God doesn’t trust the British…… in the dark !”….(end of quote , i think)
Also praise for Winston’s peace making role in Fiji….from previous interview.
( Why does everyone pick on the bugger…..He has always stood for not selling NZ assets!…unlike the two major parties( and he brought National down over selling public assets) …and why is it always assumed he will join with National?…)
Thanks Chooky for FIFY
I was just rereading mine and thought I missed the punchline on that quote. It reads even better when you see the whole thing Olwyn.
And it was interesting to hear how staunch and reliable Winston Peters had been at the Fiji time of change and the high respect of the diplomatic staff for him.
“New Zealand government fast tracks domestic spying laws”
“In an interview with TV3 on June 11, Key fell into step with the international vilification of Snowden, sharply denouncing him as a “criminal”, and saying he should face the “full force of the law.” While Key has flatly refused to comment on any aspect of NSA activities and its links with New Zealand spy agencies, he has not denied that they exist.”
40,000 plus some more perhaps?
Listening to Radio NZ ‘Arts on Sunday’ I learnt that movie film processing will stop shortly at Miramar, Wellington.
The outfit started life in 1941 as a result of a reccomendation to the NZ Govt by John Greirson the British documentary film-maker which had the National Film Unit established. Reputedly the only time the NZ Govt acted on a commissioned report
Later taken over by Television NZ and recently back at Miramar thanks to Peter Jackson but sadly[?] closing due to lack of throughput in the digital age.
Seemingly the last Australasian lab to go under as apparently Aussies are sending last minute film to Miramar and they are very busy in their last days, just next week left before the gear is dismantled.
Don’t quote me on this as it is just what I think I heard from the broadcast and memories, often not very accurate
That’s an easy one to answer – we had governments believing the economists and business people and thus put in place policies that rewarded the business people at everyone else’s expense. This has, quite predictably, resulted in a massive increase in poverty for the many while a few got immeasurably richer.
Much of that would have to do with many ‘homeless’ actually suffering from mental illnesses that manifests for various reasons in homelessness. Once upon a time they would have been institutionalised.
Ms Daly, MP for Dublin North, hit out at the “almost unprecedented slobbering” over the Obama family’s visit. “It’s really hard to know which is worst, whether it’s the outpourings of the Obamas themselves or the sycophantic falling over them by sections of the media and the political establishment,” she said. “We’ve had separate and special news bulletins by the State broadcaster to tell us what Michelle Obama and her daughters had for lunch in Dublin, but very little questioning of the fact that she was having lunch with Mr Tax Exile himself,” she said in reference to U2’s Bono.
She described Mr Obama as a “war criminal”, having “just announced his decision to supply arms to the Syrian opposition, including the jihadists, fuelling the destabilisation of that region, continuing to undermine secularism and knock back conditions for women”.
Ms Daly said: “This is the man who is in essence stalling the Geneva peace talks by trying to broker enhanced leverage for the Syrian opposition by giving them arms – and to hell with the thousands more who’ll lose their lives, or the tens of thousands who will be displaced. This is the man who has facilitated a 200 per cent increase in the use of drones which have killed thousands of people, including hundreds of children.” […]
the GCHQ have been spying on eurozone governenment and private corporations.
In a related thread 😉 , St Johns are continuing to bear the increasing “brunt of an ageing population”, coupled with “increases in minor incident calls” (yes Pop. , including for mental illness, and sheltered villages are much more protective) ; the stress is being piled on the organization, who are losing $15M a year.
These attacks on the elderly in Auckland has the police “very concerned about the escalation of violence”- Malthus.
NZ Parliamentarians should take a long hard look at that link.
I just saw an exchange between two politicians that contained actual information and that wasn’t sliced and diced by bullshit ‘points of order’…I saw an absolute absence of glib ‘one liners’…and I saw speakers allowed to offer their opinion and ask/answer questions without any childish braying from any opposite benches.
Add to that, a politician calling a spade a spade, well…when was the last time I had the pleasure?
Questions are being asked about the advice the government received on the $2.50 offer price and share allocations, considering the drop in Mighty River’s share price and the relatively low target prices in broking firm research reports released on Wednesday – at the end of a research blackout. (Mighty River [NZX:MRP] closed Friday at $2.20).
Market sources suggest the government – on Treasury’s advice – may have over-egged the price based on the possibility of strong international demand which has not materialised.
A senior broking firm source asks: “How does it follow that the Treasury, which had insight and banned the research from public consumption, priced the shares above where the analysts were saying?
“It’s now trading at a level that the local institutions were saying was probably where the good demand was at….
…Questions over the offer price come as documents released to NBR by the Treasury reveal the direct hand cabinet ministers played in setting the price – with one cabinet paper suggesting Prime Minister John Key and cabinet ministers Bill English, Steven Joyce and Tony Ryall all be physically present in the “bookbuild room” in Wellington when key decisions were to be made on May 8.
State-owned Enterprises Minister Mr Ryall’s press secretary Jackie Maher confirms the ministers were present during the “appropriate parts of the bookbuild process” and Mr Key was consulted by phone.
Ghostrider888 mentioned this in another thread. Slingshot are offering a new free Global Mode service for their customers, supposedly for international visitors staying with them, but it really looks like it’s giving NZers access to international content that was previously blocked.
National is dripping “blue blood” again. The revelations over Sam Uffindell’s violent assault indicate that the National Party under Christopher Luxon hasn’t quite shed the toxicity and internal damage of the last few years. The crises besetting the party have recently been well documented in journalist Andrea Vance’s new book ...
Most of us believe in redemption and atonement… But the timing, the nature and the semantics of Sam Uffindell‘s apology for his role in a gang that beat a younger kid (reportedly) with wooden bed legs, has left much to be desired. The victim seems pretty clear about the motivation ...
Yesterday the news broke that newly elected National MP Sam Uffindell was asked to leave private Auckland school King’s College at the end of his fifth form year after being part of a group that viciously beat a younger student one night. There are many elements to this latest political ...
You’ve got to wonder why the National Party knowingly hid information from the public about their newest MP, Sam Uffindell. Surely they must’ve realised that their secret would eventually leak into the public domain. New Zealand is far too small for cover-ups of this kind to be effective.Despite his violent ...
Back in the 1990s, Tony Blair rebranded The British Labour Party as “New Labour”, to try and draw a line under past failures. It’s as if Christopher Luxon is attempting to follow suit, and launch “New National” at the moment – a party that’s fresh-looking, has made some big breaks ...
Back in June Sam Uffindell was elected to parliament in the Tauranga by-election. Turns out he's a bully who beat a kid with a bed-leg at school: The National Party’s newest MP, Sam Uffindell, was asked to leave his exclusive boarding school after viciously beating a younger student late ...
The Justice Committee has called for submissions on the Electoral Amendment Bill. Submissions are due by Wednesday, 31 August 2022, and can be made at the link above. The bill improves disclosure of party finances, lowering the declaration threshold to $5,000 and requiring parties to disclose their annual financial statements. ...
Laughing With The Poor Folks - Or At Them? Christopher Luxon took rapper LunchMoney Lewis’s lyrics at their face value. “Bills”, as heard by Luxon, is a cri-de-cœur from a hard-working man determined to pull himself and his family up by their own bootstraps. It simply wouldn’t occur to him ...
On the rare occasions when it ever gets asked, the public keeps rejecting tax cuts as such, as a policy priority. It keeps saying it wants tax levels to either stay the same or be increased, so that public services can be maintained, or even (perish the thought) improved. In ...
Europe has been baking in a heatwave, of course. Not so much this part of the world, which benefits by still being in Winter (though let’s just say I am not looking forward to January 2023). Not that it’s been a particularly cold Winter – we haven’t had one ...
The Wagner Group is a private military company – effectively mercenaries. It has been used for the military activity of the Russian Federation in various parts of the world. Currently, it is operating in Ukraine and apparently has a reputation as a very brave and effective force in the ...
I have said this in other forums, but here is the deal: PRC military exercises after Pelosi’s visit are akin to male gorillas who run around thrashing branches and beating their chests when annoyed, disturbed or seeking to show dominance. They are certainly dangerous and not to be ignored, but ...
From July 7 to 26 we tried something new on our Facebook page by sharing one Cranky Uncle cartoon each day for 20 days in a row. There were two reasons for doing this: firstly, we wanted to ensure that at least one post would get published each day while I was ...
Too many commentators on current price pressures have not understood that this time it is very different from the 1970s. Their prescriptions may accelerate inflation.The New Zealand economy is experiencing an external price shock arising from the Covid pandemic and the Ukrainian invasion compounded by related supply chain difficulties. It ...
During the years of the Key government one hardy perennial of political journalism was that whenever the Labour Opposition would suggest a policy alternative to the status quo, the hard bitten response from the Gallery realists would be “But how’re you gonna pay for it?” National in Opposition has been ...
In The Wizard’s Garden: George Dunlop Leslie, 1904IT ALL SEEMS so long ago now, and, to be fair, in human terms, 48 years is a long time. New Zealand was a different country in 1974. Someone unafraid of courting controversy might say it had achieved “Peak Pakeha”. Although the Labour Government of ...
Proximate Cause: Tellingly, it was Helen Clark who was seated close by when, earlier this week, Jacinda Ardern delivered a speech carefully crafted to keep New Zealand’s dairy exports heading China’s way. Photo by PolitikPURISTS WOULD ARGUE that New Zealand’s foreign policy should not be determined by who its Prime Minister ...
We have a new clip out of The Rings of Power. It sees Galadriel and the affectionately nicknamed Gigwit* venturing into dark places in search of evil. At fifty-odd seconds, it also constitutes the longest single piece of show dialogue we have seen thus far. *An acronym. “Galadriel Is ...
Rising To The Challenge: Te Pāti Māori is reassuring the angry and the alienated that in 2023 voting will make a difference. Aotearoa is changing. Pakeha – especially young Pakeha – are changing. The racism is still there, of course, heightened, it would seem, by the prospect of Labour, the ...
"CAGW." A thing? With its provocative title and remarks grounded in respected published research, the perspective Climate Endgame: Exploring catastrophic climate change scenarios just published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has caused a few ripples reaching into popular media. "Endgame" and "catastrophic" lean hard in the direction of "pay ...
In the past there's been a few interesting data points about the New Zealand Intelligence Community's desire to covertly manipulate public opinion through media and academic mouthpieces. In 2015 the Council for Civil Liberties revealed the existence of an NZIC "Strategic Communications Group" tasked with persuading the public that spying ...
Inflation is through the roof, and "coincidentally" so is oil company profiteering. UN Secretary-General António Guterres calls it what it is: grotesque: The UN secretary general, António Guterres, has described the record profits of oil and gas companies as immoral and urged governments to introduce a windfall tax, using ...
What on earth is going on with the main opposition parties at the moment? Both National and ACT have been making numerous flip-flops and miscommunications, clearly indicating that they aren’t a viable alternative to the current Labour led Government.Of particular note is the duplicitous reasoning given for why they support ...
A ballot for two member's bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn: Housing Infrastructure (GST-sharing) Bill (Brooke van Velden) Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill (Debbie Ngarewa-Packer) Ngarewa-Packer's bill looks likely to start a shitfight with Labour, and not just because the ...
As you might have noticed, I have an on-going interest in working my way through old and intellectually influential reading material. Occasionally I even share my thoughts on it, which allows me to take a break from my generally-dominant Tolkien analysis. Well, today I thought I would take a ...
Golriz Ghahraman's Electoral (Strengthening Democracy) Amendment Bill will probably face its first reading today. And three months after it was introduced - pissing on the "as soon as practicable" requirement of Standing Order 269 - it has received a section 7 report from Attorney-General David Parker stating that its proposed ...
There's an interesting select committee report out today, from the Petitions Committee on the Petition of Conrad Petersen: The Independent Police Conduct Authority (IPCA). The petitioner raises some concerns about the slowness of the IPCA process and its lack of oversight, and suggests some solutions. The committee doesn't seem keen ...
Today is a Member's Day, but likely to be a boring one. There's no general debate today, and instead the House will move right into the third reading of the Canterbury Regional Council (Ngāi Tahu Representation) Bill, which will add unelected, inherently conflicted Ngai Tahu representatives to ECan. Then there's ...
That gormlessly glum picture of Christopher Luxon in Samoa graphically tells us what kind of image New Zealand would be projecting abroad if there’s a change of government next year. The glumness is understandable. For months, National and ACT had been dog whistling to the bigots who oppose the creation ...
There is no corruption in New Zealand. At least that’s what authorities want the public to believe. For decades now our system of political finance regulation has been portrayed as highly rigorous, ensuring our politicians cannot be bought. Unfortunately, that’s just not true. Although politicians and officials have claimed tight ...
Pundits have come out of the woodwork to defend the Greens co-leader, after he was stripped of his leadership last week by unhappy party members. The defences have all stuck to basically the same script: Shaw is a successful leader and minister who’s handed the party big victories in politics ...
Meghan Murphy talks with Batya Ungar-Sargon the author of Bad News: How Woke Media Is Undermining Democracy. The book charts the trajectory of journalism in the US as it shifted from being a blue collar occupation producing the penny press for the masses, to a profession for Ivy League university ...
Co-Leaders? The uncomfortable truth is: not the Army, not the Police, not the Spooks, and not even a combination of all three, could defeat the scale and violence of White Supremacist and Māori Nationalist resistance which the imposition of radical decolonisation – or its racism-inspired defeat – would unleash upon ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Bob Henson and Jeff Masters Torrents of rain that began before dawn on Tuesday, July 26, gave St. Louis, Missouri, its highest calendar-day total since records began in 1873. And the deadly event is just the latest example of a well-established trend ...
Completed reads for July: The Prince, by Niccolo MachiavelliFaust, Part I, by Johann Wolfgang von GoetheFaust, Part II, by Johann Wolfgang von GoetheParadise Lost, by John MiltonParadise Regained, by John MiltonThe NibelungenliedAgricola, by TacitusGermania, by TacitusDialogue on Orators, by TacitusThe Gods of Pegana, by Lord DunsanyTime and the Gods, ...
A couple of weeks ago the High Court exposed a loophole in our electoral donations law, enabling corrupt parties to take in unlimited amounts of secret money and explicitly sell policy to the rich. Pretty obviously, this is unacceptable in a country which wants to call itself a democracy, and ...
This morning, National’s deputy leader Nicola Willis managed to get top of the bulletin news coverage by pointing out that some Kiwis living abroad might receive the government’s cost of living payment. Quelle horreur. What is the problem here? Inflation is a global problem, and Kiwis living abroad may be ...
Beyond Fixing? The critical question confronting New Zealanders is whether we any longer have the resources to repair our physical and human infrastructure?WHO WILL MAKE the New Zealand of the next 50 years? We had better hope that, whoever they are, they make a better job of it than those ...
Today’s speech by Jacinda Ardern to the China Business Summit in Auckland was full of soothing words for Beijing. The headline-grabber was Ardern’s comment that ‘a few plans are afoot’ for New Zealand ministers to return to China – and that the Prime Minister herself hopes to return to the ...
Rule-Breaker? It is easy to see why poor James Shaw found himself brutally deposed as the Greens’ co-leader. By seeking the responsibilities of leadership – and exercising them – he violated the first rule of Green Party governance. Then, by accepting the limitations of the Green Party’s electoral mandate (7.8 ...
After the incredibly sad story about the deaths of over 50 Ukrainian POWs in a Ukrainian missile attack on the prison they were housed in (see Over 50 POWs killed. A military accident or a cynical war crime?)I came across the heartwarming story about another Ukrainian POW. It’s about a ...
British mercenary Aiden Aslin, now a prisoner in the Donetsk People’s Republic, expressed real concern that he may die from the Ukrainian shelling of Donetsk. He has experienced many missile attacks that came close to the prison.Is he still alive? Understandably, we are always shocked about the losses ...
Politics is largely reported as theatre: tragedy and comedy, thriller and farce. Andrea Vance captures it all very successfully in Blue Blood. But it is the politics of personality, not of policy – of the impact of government on the people’s wellbeing. Even so, we can see from the book ...
This year the government finally got its clean car feebate scheme into place. But there's a problem: it's been too successful: Transport Minister Michael Wood will shortly review the cost of the fees and rebates in the Government's "feebate" scheme after the runaway success of the policy has meant ...
Given how the pandemic has disrupted the sporting calendar, no-one would begrudge our elite athletes their chance to compete at international level. What with the war in Ukraine and the cost of living, there are also not many ‘good news” stories out there. So… I suppose the strenuous efforts the ...
Everybody Having A Say: Democracy commands us to look outward; it demands our trust; it tells us what is expected of our humanity; it elevates the collective above the self; it celebrates the things we have in common; it defines our morals and values; it calculates what we owe one ...
Even right-wing commentators have, over recent days, and jusrifiably enough, been taking the National leader, Christopher Luxon, to task. They have lambasted him over his soft-shoe shuffle over abortion, for bad-mouthing New Zealand business while he was overseas, and for pretending to be in Te Puke while he was actually ...
So, now we know for sure. The “protesters” who defiled the grounds of parliament and who (according to their own account) intended to create in three of our major cities “maximum disruption and inconvenience” to other citizens, are not interested in democracy – indeed, quite the contrary. Their objective, quite ...
The issue with Christopher Luxon’s social media post talking about his day in Te Puke when he was in Hawaii is it’s fake news. He has since apologised for the mistake. But this doesn’t negate its impact. This mistake, misstep, gaffe or whatever you like to call it, is about ...
Over the last couple of years there has been a disturbing trend of new legislation containing secrecy clauses, which effectively make it illegal for affected government bodies to disclose information under the Official Information Act. Some of these are re-enacting old legislation from the pre- or early-OIA era (in which ...
Allegations of political corruption are once again at the heart of a new High Court trial this week. The trial follows straight on from the “not guilty” verdict for those running the New Zealand First Foundation. And this latest trial is once again about whether wealthy businesspeople and political parties ...
Ukrainian operation to steal Russian military aircraft exposed [English edit] Representatives of the Ukrainian special services offered up to $2 million for hijacking Russian military aircraft, as well as European passports for the pilots and their families. In order to gain trust, Ukrainians shared information they were not allowed ...
Struck Down: As James Shaw saved the pure Greens from themselves in 2017, they resented him. As he secured the Climate Change portfolio for his party, they suspected him. As he achieved cross-party support for crucial climate change legislation, they condemned him. And, as he was white, and male, and ...
If nothing else, some of the media treatment of the Luxon lu’au has reeked of a double standard. If Jacinda Ardern – or any of her Cabinet Ministers – had been holidaying in Hawaii while their social media imagery was depicting them working hard on the public’s behalf in Te ...
The Emissions Trading Scheme is broken. Stuffed with free allocations and rigged with a "cost containment reserve" which floods the market any time prices get "too high" (for a definition of "too high" set in a different world), its basicly served as a machanism to subsidise the production of the ...
Think Big: A democratic-socialist government could remove GST from basic food items. It could re-nationalise and centralise the generation and distribution of electric power, and then retail it to citizens at an affordable price. A democratic-socialist government could nationalise the public transportation system and make it free for everyone. A democratic-socialist government ...
Pure Poison: It is when the fetid atmosphere created by the Right’s toxic accusations and denunciations is at its thickest, that comparisons with the Woke Left spring most easily to mind. If the level of emotion on display, and the strength of the invective used, is inversely related to the ...
New Zealand companies are using their oligopolistic market power to gouge mega profits, driving up inflation. Overseas, such actions have resulted in windfall taxes, which have been used both to drive down inflation, and ameliorate its impacts (while driving down emissions). With New Zealand petrol companies pocketing record margins and ...
Poll Axed: What happened to James Shaw on Saturday, 23 July 2022 exposed the Greens’ minoritarian political culture for all to see. Once voters grasp the enormity of 30 percent of Green delegates to the Green AGM being constitutionally empowered to overrule the wishes of the 70 percent of delegates ...
Now, that was strange. That was very strange. Having dropped an initial July teaser for The Rings of Power, Amazon put out a full two-minute trailer in the middle of the month. That one, I liked. Now, however, we have an additional three-minute trailer, released a couple of days ...
I have prepared the following (draft) submission on the Electoral (Māori Electoral Option) Legislation Bill, which you all have until Saturday to submit on. Happy to consider comments, or to fix typos: have I used the word whakapapa incorrectly, etc? Please let me know :-)======The Justice CommitteeElectoral (Māori Electoral Option) ...
The big news over the weekend was that Green party delegates at their AGM voted to re-open nominations for James Shaw's co-leadership position, effectively toppling him as co-leader. I'm not a member of the Greens, so its not really my place to have an opinion on who should lead them ...
COVID-19 is here to stay and so the Government needs to put in place long-term protection measures, including mandatory ventilation standards, the Green Party says. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to overhaul the Recognised Seasonal Employers scheme in the wake of revelations of shocking human rights violations. ...
The Green Party is calling for a cross-party commitment to guaranteeing at least a living wage and safe working conditions to people seeking employment, instead of continuing benefit sanctions. ...
The Green Party is once again calling on the Government to announce its support for a moratorium on deep sea mining, and to support a member’s bill going to select committee. ...
The Government must take steps to ensure that the way we build our homes is helping to meet New Zealand’s climate change targets, the Green Party said. ...
The Government’s employment initiatives led by the Ministry of Social Development must guarantee liveable incomes and fair working conditions, the Green Party says. ...
New Zealanders deserve a health system that works for everyone, no matter who you are or where you live. Our Government has a plan to make this a reality, and we’re taking the next steps. We now have thousands more health professionals, such as doctors and nurses, working in New ...
During her time as Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern has navigated New Zealand through unprecedented times. Through it all, she’s become known as someone who leads with kindness, compassion and strength, while keeping the wellbeing of Kiwis at the heart of her approach. To celebrate five years of Jacinda leading the ...
Since taking office in 2017, our Government has worked hard to lift wages and make life more affordable for New Zealanders, as we move forward with our plan to grow a secure economy for all. ...
The Government must use the opportunity of the Electoral Amendment Bill in Parliament to close the loophole in the political donations regime, the Green Party says. ...
Thanks to political pressure from the Green Party and the more than 900 personal stories of birth injury and trauma delivered to Minister Sepuloni, more injuries have been added to the ACC birth injuries bill. ...
Supporting New Zealanders is at the heart of our approach as a Government, and we’re working hard to tackle the big issues Kiwis are facing. While long term challenges like child poverty won’t be solved overnight, we’re putting in place policies that make a real difference for New Zealanders. Here ...
Delegates at the AGM of the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand have voted to retain Marama Davidson as Green Party co-leader and to re-open nominations for the other co-leader position. ...
Every New Zealander deserves a healthy, affordable place to call home. We have a comprehensive plan to make it happen, and we’re making good progress. Here's the latest on how we're supporting Kiwis into homes: ...
Work is under way on preliminary steps to improve the Government’s support for survivors of abuse in care while a new, independent redress system is designed, Public Service Minister Chris Hipkins says. These steps – recommended by the Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquiry – include rapid payments for ...
Remembering Hiroshima and Nagasaki Online Forum 77 years ago today, an atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki. Three days earlier, on the 6th of August 1945, the same fate had befallen the people of Hiroshima. Tens of thousands died instantly. In the years that followed 340,000 ...
An agreement signed today between the New Zealand and United States governments will provide new opportunities for our space sector and closer collaboration with NASA, Economic and Regional Development Minister Stuart Nash said. Stuart Nash signed the Framework Agreement with United States Deputy Secretary of State, Wendy Sherman. The signing ...
An agreement signed today between New Zealand’s National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and the United States’ Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will strengthen global emergency management capability, says Minister for Emergency Management Kieran McAnulty. “The Government is committed to continually strengthening our emergency management system, and this Memorandum of Cooperation ...
New Zealand will remain at the Orange traffic light setting, while hospitalisations remain elevated and pressure on the health system continues through winter. “There’s still significant pressure on hospitals from winter illnesses, so our current measures have an ongoing role to play in reducing the number of COVID-19 cases and ...
Streets will soon be able to be transformed from unsafe and inaccessible corridors to vibrant places for all transport modes thanks to new legislation proposed today, announced Transport Minister Michael Wood. “We need to make it safe, quicker and more attractive for people to walk, ride and take public transport ...
More young minds eyeing food and fibre careers is the aim of new Government support for agricultural and horticultural science teachers in secondary schools, Agriculture and Rural Communities Minister Damien O’Connor announced today. The Government is committing $1.6 million over five years to the initiative through the Ministry for Primary ...
Kākāpō numbers have increased from 197 to 252 in the 2022 breeding season, and there are now more of the endangered parrots than there have been for almost 50 years, Conservation Minister Poto Williams announced today. The flightless, nocturnal parrot is a taonga of Ngāi Tahu and a species unique ...
The relationship between Aotearoa New Zealand and Malaysia is to be elevated to the status of a Strategic Partnership, to open up opportunities for greater co-operation and connections in areas like regional security and economic development. Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta met her Malaysian counterpart Dato’ Saifuddin Abdullah today during a ...
With additional trains operating across the network, powered by the Government’s investment in rail, there is need for a renewed focus on rail safety, Transport Minister Michael Wood emphasised at the launch of Rail Safety Week 2022. “Over the last five years the Government has invested significantly to improve level ...
The Foreign Minister has wrapped up a series of meetings with Indo-Pacific partners in Cambodia which reinforced the need for the region to work collectively to deal with security and economic challenges. Nanaia Mahuta travelled to Phnom Penh for a bilateral meeting between ASEAN foreign ministers and Aotearoa New Zealand, ...
Extension of Aotearoa Touring Programme supporting domestic musicians The Programme has supported more than 1,700 shows and over 250 artists New Zealand Music Commission estimates that around 200,000 Kiwis have been able to attend shows as a result of the programme The Government is hitting a high note, with ...
Minister of Defence Peeni Henare will depart tomorrow for Solomon Islands to attend events commemorating the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Guadalcanal. While in Solomon Islands, Minister Henare will also meet with Solomon Islands Minister of National Security, Correctional Services and Police Anthony Veke to continue cooperation on security ...
The Government is partnering with Ngāi Tahu Farming Limited and Ngāi Tūāhuriri on a whole-farm scale study in North Canterbury to validate the science of regenerative farming, Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor announced today. The programme aims to scientifically evaluate the financial, social and environmental differences between regenerative and conventional practices. ...
52.5% of people on public boards are women Greatest ever percentage of women Improved collection of ethnicity data “Women’s representation on public sector boards and committees is now 52.5 percent, the highest ever level. The facts prove that diverse boards bring a wider range of knowledge, expertise and skill. ...
I am honoured to support the 2022 Women in Governance Awards, celebrating governance leaders, directors, change-makers, and rising stars in the community, said Minister for Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio. For the second consecutive year, MPP is proudly sponsoring the Pacific Governance Leader category, recognising Pacific women in governance and presented to ...
Today Economic and Regional Development Minister Stuart Nash turned the sod for the new Whakatāne Commercial Boat Harbour, cut the ribbon for the revitalised Whakatāne Wharf, and inspected work underway to develop the old Whakatāne Army Hall into a visitor centre, all of which are part of the $36.8 million ...
New Zealanders are not getting a fair deal on some key residential building supplies and while the Government has already driven improvements in the sector, a Commerce Commission review finds that changes are needed to make it more competitive. “New Zealand is facing the same global cost of living and ...
Mana in Mahi reaches a milestone surpassing 5,000 participants 75 per cent of participants who had been on a benefit for two or more years haven’t gone back onto a benefit 89 per cent who have a training pathway are working towards a qualification at NZQA level 3 or ...
The Government has invested $7.7 million in a research innovation hub which was officially opened today by Minister of Research, Science and Innovation Dr Ayesha Verrall. The new facility named Te Pā Harakeke Flexible Labs comprises 560 square metres of new laboratory space for research staff and is based at ...
Unemployment has remained near record lows thanks to the Government’s economic plan to support households and businesses through the challenging global environment, resulting in more people in work and wages rising. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate was 3.3 percent in the June quarter, with 96,000 people classed out ...
Action to address the risks identified in the 2020 climate change risk assessment, protecting lives, livelihoods, homes, businesses and infrastructure A joined up approach that will support community-based adaptation with national policies and legislation Providing all New Zealanders with information about local climate risks via a new online data ...
Māori with mental health and addiction challenges have easier access to care thanks to twenty-nine Kaupapa Māori primary mental health and addiction services across Aotearoa, Associate Minister of Health Peeni Henare says. “Labour is the first government to take mental health seriously for all New Zealanders. We know that Māori ...
A Bill which updates New Zealand’s statistics legislation for the 21st century has passed its third and final reading today, Minister of Statistics David Clark said. The Data and Statistics Act replaces the Statistics Act, which has been in effect since 1975. “In the last few decades, national data and ...
The Accessibility for New Zealanders Bill has passed its first reading in Parliament today, marking a significant milestone to improve the lives of disabled people. “The Bill aims to address accessibility barriers that prevent disabled people, tāngata whaikaha and their whānau, and others with accessibility needs from living independently,” said ...
Kia ora koutou, da jia hao It’s great to be back at this year’s China Business Summit. I would first like to acknowledge Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, former Prime Minister Helen Clark, His Excellency Ambassador Wang Xiaolong, and parliamentary colleagues both current and former the Right Honourable Winston Peters, the ...
Narrowing the expenses considered by lenders Relaxing the assumptions that lenders were required to make about credit cards and buy-now pay-later schemes. Helping make debt refinancing or debt consolidation more accessible if appropriate for borrowers The Government is clarifying the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance (CCCFA) Regulations, to ensure ...
The Firearms Prohibition Order Legislation Bill will be passed through all remaining stages by the end of next week, Police Minister Chris Hipkins said. The Justice Select Committee has received public feedback and finalised its report more quickly than planned. It reported back to the House on Friday. “The Bill will ...
The Government has stepped up activity to protect kauri, with a National Pest Management Plan (NPMP) coming into effect today, Biosecurity Minister Damien O'Connor and Associate Environment Minister James Shaw said. “We have a duty to ensure this magnificent species endures for future generations and also for the health of ...
Prime Minister Ardern met with members of Samoa’s Cabinet in Apia, today, announcing the launch of a new climate change partnership and confirming support for the rebuild of the capital’s main market, on the occasion of the 60th Anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Friendship between Aotearoa New ...
Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta departs for the Indo-Pacific region today for talks on security and economic issues at meetings of ASEAN and the East Asia Summit in Cambodia, and during bilateral engagements in Malaysia. “Engaging in person with our regional partners is a key part of our reconnecting strategy as ...
United Nations Headquarters, New York City Thank you, Mr President. Ngā mihi ki a koutou. I extend my warm congratulations to you and assure you of the full cooperation of the New Zealand delegation. I will get right to it. In spite of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the nuclear ...
A major milestone of 10,037 additional public homes has been achieved since Labour came into office, the Housing Minister Dr Megan Woods confirmed today. “It’s extremely satisfying and a testament to our commitment to providing a safety net for people who need public housing, that we have delivered these warm, ...
The Minister of Foreign Affairs Nanaia Mahuta has announced further sanctions on the armed forces and military-industrial complex of the Russian Federation. “President Putin and the Russian military are responsible for violating the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, which is a grave breach of fundamental international law,” Nanaia Mahuta ...
Easing the process for overseas nurses and provision of up to $10,000 in financial support for international nurses for NZ registration costs. Provide for the costs of reregistration for New Zealand nurses who want to return to work. Covering international doctors’ salaries during their six-week clinical induction courses and ...
A new future between Pacific Aotearoa and Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei is the essence of a Dawn Raids Apology anniversary event in Auckland this month, said Minister for Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio. One year ago, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern formally apologised to Pacific communities impacted by the Dawn Raids in ...
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It’s Cook Islands Language week and the Minister of Pacific Peoples, Aupito William Sio wants the community to focus on what it means to keep the language alive across the generations. “Our Cook Islands community in Aotearoa have decided to focus on the same theme as last years; ‘ Ātuitui’ia ...
From 1 August an estimated 2.1 million New Zealanders will be eligible to receive the first targeted Cost of Living Payment as part of the Government’s plan to help soften the impact of rising global inflationary pressures affecting New Zealanders, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says. The payments will see eligible ...
· New Zealand’s international border opens to all visitors, including from non-visa waiver countries, and international students from 11:59PM, 31 July 2022. · Cruise ships and recreational yachts able to arrive at New Zealand ports. This evening marks the final step in the Government’s reconnecting plan, with visitors from non-visa ...
Sam Uffindell's constituents in Tauranga appear largely ready to forgive and forget after the revelations of their MP's past as a self-confessed high school bully. ...
The government has passed its bill repealing the three strikes law, which automatically hands maximum sentences to criminals who commit three serious crimes. Justice Minister Kiri Allan says serious and repeat offenders will still be held to account. ...
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Yesterday Maori Development Minister Willie Jackson decided to write an opinion piece in the NZHerald that tries to justify the Labour Party’s push for apartheid in our country via co-governance. The fact that Willie loudly announced that New ...
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National Party leader Christopher Luxon is standing by his MP for Tauranga, but says the assault of a smaller boy at boarding school should have been made public. ...
By Giff Johnson, editor of the Marshall Islands Journal in Majuro The Marshall Islands lost its covid-free status yesterday when tests confirmed six positive cases in the capital, the first known community transmission since the pandemic started in early 2020. It was not immediately clear the source of the covid-19 ...
By Jairo Bolledo of Rappler in Manila Former Philippines vice-presidential candidate and Laban ng Masa chairperson Walden Bello has been arrested for two counts of alleged cyber libel by the police. Bello, 76, is a globally renowned environmental and social justice activist and academic. Bello’s arrest yesterday was confirmed by ...
By Gorethy Kenneth of the PNG Post-Courier in Port Moresby If there is a glimmer of hope in Papua New Guinea’s violence marred national general elections, then it has to be the elevation of a lone woman to the National Parliament. It took the People’s National Congress (PNC) Governor-elect of ...
RNZ Pacific About 100 people have marched in the New Caledonian capital of Noumea to protest against what they see as government inaction to curb violence against women. The rally was called by the group Women in Anger just days after the latest killing of a woman at the hands ...
RNZ Pacific A Japanese sailor has been stabbed at Bloody Ridge in Solomon Islands during a World War II remembrance ceremony in Honiara. Witnesses say the man, who was part of the Japanese Navy media team, was stabbed in the neck with a pair of scissors. Bloody Ridge community chief ...
By Rusiate Baleilevuka of Fijivillage in Suva “We need to scrap or reform the Media Industry Development Act.” This is one of the key recommendations in the National Media Reporting of the 2018 Fijian General Elections Report. Co-author and University of the South Pacific (USP) journalism coordinator, Associate Professor Shailendra ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Henry Maher, Lecturer in Politics, Department of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney Dan Himbrechts/AAP The much-debated term “neoliberalism” again entered the political debate last week, with Greens leader Adam Bandt using a National Press Club speech to decry neoliberalism ...
Petition requesting that Parliament urge the Government to expel the ambassador of the Russian Federation and sever diplomatic relations with Russia will be submitted 11 August, 1.30pm for presenting by Dr Gaurav Sharma MP to NZ House of Representatives. ...
Buzz from the Beehive Our Foreign Affairs Minister has announced the relationship between New Zealand and Malaysia is to be elevated to the status of a Strategic Partnership, the Minister of Conservation is clucking about the growth in kākāpō numbers in the 2022 breeding season, the Covid Response Minister has ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Patrick Taylor, Chief Environmental Scientist, EPA Victoria; Honorary Professor, Macquarie University Shutterstock There’s nothing like the fresh eggs from your own hens, the more than 400,000 Australians who keep backyard chooks will tell you. Unfortunately, it’s often not just ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards. National Party MP for Tauranga, Sam Uffindell. Political Roundup: The Uffindell scandal raises big questions about integrity in National National is dripping “blue blood” again. The revelations over Sam Uffindell’s violent assault indicate that the National Party under Christopher Luxon hasn’t quite shed the toxicity and ...
Last week, a groundbreaking hearing between Students for Climate Solutions and the Minister of Energy and Resources began. The Victoria University group is suing Minister Megan Woods for her decision to grant permits for onshore oil and gas exploration ...
Sam Uffindell says he's not the same person he was 20 odd years ago after his involvement as a teenager in an attack on a younger student came to light. ...
Point of Order a week ago was serving up some commentary on the news that the Tiwai Point aluminium smelter will not shut down in 2024 — and could have a long-term future. The question now is whether Meridian Energy, which supplies the bulk of Tiwai Point’s electricity from ...
Local Government NZ (LGNZ) is concerned that some roles won’t be filled, or key roles will go uncontested at this year's local body elections unless more candidates throw their hat in the ring before nominations close on Friday. Last election saw ...
The Tūpuna Maunga Authority has called for public submissions on the proposed amendment to its award-winning Integrated Management Plan 2016. The new section details proposed ecological restoration projects (including the planting of native species and removal ...
Former National MP Jami-Lee Ross told the police he sounded the alarm over a donation to the party because he thought it was dodgy and potentially illegal. ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lucas Cernusak, Associate Professor, Plant Physiology, James Cook University Hasan Almasi / Unsplash Have you ever wondered just how much water plants need to grow, or indeed why they need it? Plants lose a lot of water when they take in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Natasha Yates, Assistant Professor, General Practice, Bond University Shutterstock Everyone feels tired sometimes. But how do you know whether your tiredness is a problem worth seeing a doctor about? And with all the mental and emotional strain we have been under ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Farr-Wharton, Associate Dean of Management, Edith Cowan University Former AFL star Eddie Betts’ revelations about the 2018 Adelaide Crows training camp, which left him feeling like he had been brainwashed and sapped his passion for football, raises all sorts of questions. ...
National is standing by Tauranga MP Sam Uffindell following revelations he was asked to leave King's College due to his involvement in the assault of a younger student. ...
In a submission to the select committee, Auditor-General John Ryan has urged the government to require auditing of the incoming Water Services Entities. ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards. Political Roundup: Luxon’s “New National”Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. Back in the 1990s, Tony Blair rebranded The British Labour Party as “New Labour”, to try and draw a line under past failures. It’s as if Christopher Luxon is attempting to follow suit, and launch “New ...
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National's newest MP has admitted he was kicked out of his boarding school as a teen for beating a younger student. The party knew of the incident during the candidate selection process for the Tauranga by-election. ...
“The Auditor-General’s comments on Labour’s divisive Three Waters should be the final nail in the coffin for the widely-rejected reforms,” says ACT’s Local Government spokesperson Simon Court. “The Auditor-General raised serious concerns ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alex Simpson, Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Macquarie University Crown Resorts’ striking new A$2 billion casino on Sydney’s Barangaroo Point opens its doors to gamblers for the first time this week. But only if they are “VIPs”. Its licence to operate remains conditional, ...
One of New Conservative’s core principles is a commitment to the sanctity of life. We believe human life is sacred, from conception to natural death. These principles are not held by the ruling Labour/Greens coalition; neither are they held by National ...
The magenta wash shot through the true blue National branding is one way Christopher Luxon is making his mark as party leader, and he'll be hoping this past weekend's party conference will be another, writes Jane Patterson. ...
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The country’s private schools are raking in a big share of taxpayer funding designed to help special needs students sit exams.
The Dyslexia Foundation of New Zealand says the system allows wealthy parents at private schools to work the system at the expense of poor parents whose children miss out.
Applications for funding require parents to pay for a report from an educational psychologist to prove their children have special needs – which critics say benefits those who can afford it.
The foundation said that contrast ( facts provided in article) “epitomises the current inequality of access to SAC between the haves and have-nots”.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/8830344/Private-schools-snare-special-needs-cash
That’s a bit like nicking the change from the Child Cancer jar on the coffee shop counter, isn’t it? – and I bet they laugh about how clever they are to ‘minimise’ their tax bill then rip off the taxpayer by taking money from kids who need access to this resource, but can’t afford to go get it. I mean it’s pennies to them.
Why, also, does the NZQA put a financial barrier to financial aid like this? It doesn’t make any sense at all, increasing the disadvantage of the disadvantaged when this resource is meant to improve their lot.
This is a bit more than the Coffee jar rip off. This is the systematic rip off of to start with the NHS, but how many other countries are getting ripped off ?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10892350
I wish I could say this surprised me, but it’s very much what you’d expect from NACT NZ. Is there some kind of; Rorts of the Month Newsletter, that goes out to their supporters? The near tripling of SAC expenditure in a single year (159 000 to 433 000) is most suspicious. Especially given that a quarter of King’s students got assistance, while Otahahu College got nothing.
If NZQA require educational psychologist assessment before handing over the cash, you’d hope the ministry review will recommend their funding this themself. I suspect it’ll just be a whitewash though, or maybe they’ll even recommend canceling the SAC programme altogether (as the private schools will have gone on to the next scam by then).
this is unfortunate; individuals living with autism and dyslexia are generally gifted in other dimensions, yet if situated in a lower-decile area / school, these qualities are less likely to be revealed, with the children concerned becoming labeled as ‘difficult’. Then there was the revelation on RNZ this week that of the school settings receiving funding to provide a learning environment for ‘difficult’ children, few are meeting Ministry of Education criteria and guidelines. Instead, many children are just warehoused in a holding pattern.
DUM QUOTE OF THE WEEK
No. 1: Steve Hansen
# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #
“The French definitely turned up to play.”
# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #
—The All Blacks’ dozy coach Steve Hansen, following yet another abject non-effort by the Tricolors.
Saturday 22 June 2013
In the game I watched, the French led twice, and forced scrum penalties from the All Black scrum. The All Blacks scored a try which a referee could not have allowed without video review and which remained dubious, and prevented a French try only by a professional foul with blatant jersey pulling.
The score could have been AB 17 FR 16! Rugby watching is like political commentating and poll watching, isn’t it?
In the game I watched, the French led twice, and forced scrum penalties from the All Black scrum. The All Blacks scored a try which a referee could not have allowed without video review and which remained dubious, and prevented a French try only by a professional foul with blatant jersey pulling.
In the second minute of the match, France got perfect running ball a few metres from the NZ goal line. Any team, even the least talented, would have at least had a go at passing the ball in such a situation; a team of France’s calibre would be almost guaranteed of scoring. But instead of spinning it, French flyhalf Remi Tales kicked it into the All Black’s in-goal area, and a chance went begging. Tales’ “choice” of squandering possession so grossly was to be repeated by him and his lackadaisacal team-mates throughout the “game”.
You can take Steve Hansen’s lead and pretend that France made an effort if you want, just as the clowns in the Herald on Sunday have done. But please don’t pretend to be doing anything other than talking up a hollow win in a friendly match against a team that made only a token effort.
The score could have been AB 17 FR 16!
Sure it could, if the French had turned up to play. They did not, and it was another disgraceful lack of effort, on a par with last weekend’s horror show in Christchurch.
Rugby watching is like political commentating and poll watching, isn’t it?
Some political pollsters like to pretend things are other than what they actually are. Just like Steve Hansen, actually.
Or maybe like you, Morrissey.
Read your own comments as one who reads them from our side of the internet divide. From what you write in reply, if we disagree with you we are clowns like the Herald or Hansen since we (bad12 and myself) saw that game differently, or pretenders who are dishonest in our commenting.
Morrissey, there is a large problem of how to communicate or argue here. Did you ever wonder why you get commenters’ backs up here- and this is over (choke) an unimportant thing like a game of rugby, where they play the ball and not the man!
Read your own comments as one who reads them from our side of the internet divide. From what you write in reply, if we disagree with you we are clowns like the Herald or Hansen since we (bad12 and myself) saw that game differently, or pretenders who are dishonest in our commenting.
I don’t think you are being dishonest, my friend. But I do think you are not looking at that travesty of a match either sensibly or dispassionately. Of course the All Blacks played well, and deserved to win each of the three friendly games. The All Blacks approached those games seriously; the Tricolors, on the other hand, clearly did not. You saw just as clearly as I did that the French team hardly tried to do anything with the ball during any of those matches; even one of that extraordinarily dimwitted commentary team on Prime TV remarked on Saturday night that the French had done nothing other than boot any possession they got down-field and hope for mistakes from the All Blacks, a “tactic” which was never going to succeed, ever. The French showed no commitment, no passion, and not a hint of creativity, in spite of the TV advertisements blathering about “French flair”. In other words, they hardly made an effort. You can either face up to that fact, and condemn them for it, or you can pretend that the All Blacks won against a French team playing football seriously.
Morrissey, there is a large problem of how to communicate or argue here. Did you ever wonder why you get commenters’ backs up here-
That’s a mighty big statement. I have got people’s backs up now and again, certainly. But we usually reconcile and I get along well with most of my interlocutors, even if we squabble occasionally.
and this is over (choke) an unimportant thing like a game of rugby, where they play the ball and not the man!
Yes, you’re right, mac, I should tone it down a bit. Must try harder….
A non-effort by the French,??? my opinion is that the French turned up at Yarrow stadium last night with a game plan designed to negate the game the All Blacks brought to Christchurch the previous week,
Considering that the French were for most of last nights game in a position were a converted try could have won them the game their game plan could be said to have been superior to that of the previous week,
Obviously the French negating the attacking capabilities of the All Blacks last night gave us more an exhibition of thugby as opposed to the brilliant use of the football of the previous week and the old adage about changing a winning team was once again proved as the line-out failed to adequately compete against the French when compared with the previous week and a rusty number 10 in Dan Carter produced what was a pretty lack-luster game by His own standards….
A non-effort by the French,???
Well at least they actually put warm bodies on the park, even though their hearts were clearly not in it. They did tackle and get in the way, of course, but they tried absolutely nothing on attack, and in fact deliberately squandered chances to score by mindlessly punting away perfect front-foot ball.
…my opinion is that the French turned up at Yarrow stadium last night with a game plan designed to negate the game the All Blacks brought to Christchurch the previous week,
What “game plan”? They showed nothing and did nothing. Except get in the way of the All Blacks.
Considering that the French were for most of last nights game in a position were a converted try could have won them the game their game plan could be said to have been superior to that of the previous week,
Again, WHAT game plan are you talking about? They did nothing. Possibly this was a good tackling practice for them, and I would not put it past them to have treated it as nothing more serious.
Obviously the French negating the attacking capabilities of the All Blacks last night gave us more an exhibition of thugby as opposed to the brilliant use of the football of the previous week
What “brilliant use” of the football? It was virtually an unopposed training run for the All Blacks in Christchurch.
and the old adage about changing a winning team was once again proved as the line-out failed to adequately compete against the French when compared with the previous week and a rusty number 10 in Dan Carter produced what was a pretty lack-luster game by His own standards….
And what about the rustiness of the Tricolors’ No. 10? At least Carter never did anything as grossly irresponsible as his opposite number (Remi Tales) did in the first 90 seconds of last night’s debacle.
A discussion well worth being involved in.
Worldwide, demand for medicines is outstripping governments’ ability to pay for them, as people live longer and expensive new therapies come to market. But Pharmac CEO Steffan Crausaz said unlike similar bodies in other countries, Pharmac has a fixed budget, forcing it to prioritise.
Now, for the first time, the public is being asked to give its opinion on whether those priorities need reform.
Harris told the Sunday Star-Times that funding decisions work best when they are based on a set of principles, rather than ad hoc decisions on what seems reasonable. Deciding just what those principles should be, though, can be tricky.
The New Zealand system attempts to compare and prioritise, “independently of disease-based lobbying, whether it’s from manufacturers or doctors or patient groups”.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/8830368/The-pills-bills-Its-life-or-death
From Tuesday, Pharmac is hosting a series of free community forums seeking the public’s views on what its decision criteria should be. For details see bit.ly/19m3Jvr
Pharmac’s consultation guidelines:
http://www.bit.ly/12PsGzh
Thanks for raising this really important issue, LynWiper. Pharmac has been under attack from drug companies for some time now because they’ve been holding prices of meds down, and using generics rather than expensive drug company specialities. I think we need to give them as much support as possible, help them work out those priorities, so we continue to get reasonable costs on our medications and not be subject to the prices of those huge multinational drugs manufacturers.
The TPP negotiations loom large on this issue. The Americans have their eye on Pharmac and one wonders what is the real position of our Nact representatives at these talks.
Or indeed their ABC Labour opponents.
I don’t. They’ll sell out to US demands.
For a start they could pay attention to their first 8 decision making criteria and END all funding for the current tranche of Nicotine Replacement Therapies (patches, inhalers, gum etc that all contain nicotine) and save, how many millions of dollars per annum that currently goes to lining the pockets of Big Pharma? Instead, and in line with 1 through 8 of their own criteria, they could provide nicotine in solution to ex-smokers, allowing them to either continue the addiction with far fewer health consequences or to step their dosage down in incremental stages until they were nicotine free.
I’m hoping to see an interest in what people think about quality of life concerns in Pharmac’s decision-making process.
From my point of view, decisions are too focused on a narrow medical benefit and cost to the health system. For example there are relatively rare disabling conditions that can prevent people taking part in society. Standard drugs can keep them as functioning invalids, prevent hospitalisation, and slow the course of the disease, but may not allow the patient to resume a life without assistance – financial (including invalid benefit for those who don’t have a partner to rely on) and/or physical – due to disabilities resulting from the illness.
However, newer, very expensive drugs can allow the ill person to function at the same level as a person without the condition – interacting with family, having a social life, and crucially (in term of other societal/taxpayer costs), able to work and pay tax, play, and physically look after their families. However in Pharmac’s view the new drug does nothing more than the older, cheaper drugs in the reduction of health system costs so is heavily restricted.
And yet, (for my personal pet rant) Pharmac pay a fortune in omeprazole (Losec) (due to the number of people who are prescribed it) so people can eat spicy chicken (queue Losec ad) when a green prescription may have a greater impact. Rant exceptions, of course, for people with little choice – I don’t intend to dismiss need – e.g. those with stomach ulcers, IBDs or taking anti-inflammatories for a condition that the above example incorporates.
United States to charge Snowden with Spying.
Who said the Americans don’t do irony?
The US justice department has filed criminal charges against a fugitive ex-intelligence analyst who leaked details of a secret surveillance operation.
The charges against ex-National Security Agency (NSA) analyst Edward Snowden include espionage and….
Read more, if you can bear it….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23012317
I posted this link last night: USA Today did a great interview with 3 former NSA whistleblowers who say Snowden has succeeded where they have failed. Some of the things they reveal about attitudes in the US govt since 9-11 are very scary. But kudos to them and to USA today for doing this piece.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/06/16/snowden-whistleblower-nsa-officials-roundtable/2428809/
I should not laugh but …
The SST is reporting Truth’s escort service website has been hacked and the phone numbers of escorts replaced by Cam Slater’s number. Imagine the surprised calls he must be receiving …
The irony is strong as cammy has an interesting moral compass when it comes to the provision of his services
*funny*. And no, it wasn’t me.
Note to myself – might have to buy the SST this morning.
There is an online version of the main article: “The Truth Was Out There”. pp A11-12 of the hard copy.
on pA3, there’s a small article, “Official: Truth a bunch of Hacks” about the website hack. SLater says he put his phone on silent, and wasn’t very bothered by “the childish games people play”.
Slater says he hasn’t heard from the Truth’s owners since the closure was announced, and that he’s now “exploring a digital-only newspaper venture”.
Should be fun – *yawn*.
I should not laugh…
Why not. That’s hilarious. Wish we knew who it was…
Rather than the work of a super duper hacker I suspect it was an inside job by an employee who does not hold Cameron in the highest of regard.
might be cameron himself looking for alternative employment
Perhaps a black-hearted Crow?
That is very funny
Q + A………to be renamed “Qeue + Adore” (ShonKey Python and National that is).
In the first 20 minutes:
– Key given full novelistic reign on QE with nothing from Norman.
– Big ups to National for protecting vulnerable immigrant workers (oh how
marvellous……everyone else is implacably opposed to that of course, yeah right).
– Miller, Mapp and Mei waxing lyrical how wonderful is “Minister” Woodhouse for militating
against immigrant worker exploitation. Mapp……..the embarrassingly pompous pedant former National Party cabinet minister. On the show to lead the cheering by and for “Woody” ?
– Oh wow……..Palestine……..thank you lawyer Mei…….”this is a very important matter for which a
solution must be found…..”. Strangely, no addressing “justice the seed, peace the
flower”. To do so I guess would be too challenging for the Susan (thick as a piece of) Wood.
– And on the question of workers rights no mention during the acclaimation for “Minister”
Woodhouse of the attack on New Zealand workers’ rights promoted by that sleaze the slightly
cleverer than Gilmore, Jamie-Lee Ross. Parallel to the startlingly innovative focus of
“Minister ” Woodhouse in boldly enforcing law already on the statute book.
Qeue + Adore not worth watching I’m afraid. Why not just can it and toss production costs into National Party coffers.
Yes, migrant labour exploitation equivalent to NAct labour law exploitation.
After a few token prosecutions, where will the resourcing come from to follow up notifications.
And on New Zealanders returning from overseas? from Tracey Lee , ‘Brand Strategist’ and wastage of a sociology education, “we must smooth the hardship of their transition” (paraphrased) …I shake my head in despair! Lord give us strength, strewth!
Did I say, I’m feeling disgust about now…
+1 The bit about Kiwis returning back to New Zealand was particularly naive. Not once was our low waged economy, which is the main reason for the mass-exodus, mentioned. All we had was propaganda about a supposed 25,000 Kiwis returning each year, which morphed into a puff piece with claims that most Kiwis only left for a little while anyway.
Meanwhile in the real world there’s approximately a million Kiwis permanently living abroad, and the mass exodus continues unabated.
But whatever, John Key promising that people would waive goodbye to higher taxes and not their loved ones is a distant memory, especially it seems for the deluded spin doctors over at Q+A.
a dearth of balanced, objective pundits on the local current faire, yet there is always Colin James and Jon Johanssen 😎
http://whoar.co.nz/2013/q-a-a-review-7/
(excerpt..)
“….next subject:..returning expats..
.a ‘brand-strategist’ is up first..(ed::..no..!..really..!..good grief..!’)
..who does a ‘brand-strategist’/cliche-stringing-together tour-de-force..
..then some returning ice-cream-maker..(!)..
(ed:..q & a veers into ‘good morning’ territory..again..)
(ed:..we are halfway thru this show now..and not a moment of that first half would be worth getting up off the couch for..)
..(the ‘brand-strategist’ talks of the stigmas from being a returning expat..(!)..(ed:..who the fuck knew..?..)
..then her and compere woods seriously camp out in ‘good morning’ territory..both getting over–excited/comfortable with/over ‘connecting’-talk..”
phillip ure..
Its good theres a counter-balance to the blatantly left Campbell Live
Glad you accept it was the National Campaigning Show through and through.
Just like Campbell is anti-National, I mean fairs fair right
Is Campbell blatantly left and anti-National, or just challenging whatever government is in power?
Campbell’s sucking up to Helen Clark obviously proves Chris’ point. Oh, wait…
John Campbell speaks up for disadvantaged people and points out social inequality.
I suspect that is why you label him “anti National”
Spot on CV, Helping the disadvantaged = Anti National. Sums it up!
Reality has a left-wing bias.
I well remember the time when John Campbell broke the investigation by Nicky Hager into Corngate. Senior Labour Party activists I spoke to were ropeable. The air was blue. And the abuse they showered on Campbell and Hager. “They were close friends”, “They were working together to discredit the Labour Party”, “They are rats”, “anti-Labour” etc. etc
Yeah I near vomited at the sycophancy that was shown. Shit it’s another program that’s on the why bother list, as it’s been dumbed down, and is at the level of 7 sharp now. and it’s getting worse, the MSM is hopeless. And the so called Current Affairs shows are either dumbed down, or are on at such weird times that the stories are lost to the main stream.
Q + A is part of the NACT spin machine. The nats know how to make the SOE’s do their bidding, it’s all too easy when you stack the board/management and have that mafia style approach to the ‘funding ‘
Susan Wood as on of the attack dogs..says it all really, just a revolving door of hacks and has beens.
Q + A is part of the NACT spin machine. The nats know how to make the SOE’s do their bidding, it’s all too easy when you stack the board/management and have that mafia style approach to the ‘funding ‘
Susan Wood as one of the attack dogs says it all really, just a revolving door of hacks and has beens who know how to keep the paymasters happy.
lol @ Petey George getting fisked by David Fisher on his twitter machine:
Tweets by DFisherJourno
Is that conversation intelligible to people who use twitter regularly? (couldn’t quite follow it myself).
Labour is planning to ‘ take the fight to National’, and will announce new policy imminently, on what it says is one of the most pressing issues facing New Zealand. It asks:
What are we doing to make Herne Bay housing more
affordable for young professional first-home buyers?
Labour leader, David Shearer says he expects this to be one of the key election issues in 2014 and Labour will ‘terrorise’ its National Party opponents in the ferocity with which they will fight for the “hard working children of our own hard working families, who work very hard”.
http://www.imperatorfish.com/2013/06/i-get-it-now.html
Its just lazy making fun of Shearer and Labour…wheres the challenge?
Can’t argue with that.
It’s just that sometimes I need an outlet to express my ongoing anger.
” imminently” Is that like Soon? or Sometime Soon?, or Could Be Soon?
That information is not contained on the auto-cue and will therefore remain unknown.
The Herald this morning – front page online – elderly lady attacked and assaulted in her own home – surveillance camera style photograph of a capped and hoodied young brown guy:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/
Go to the article – photograph of a police car. No picture of the young brown guy and no mention of him.
Why no mention of him Herald ? Oh I see, the photograph of the young brown guy is unrelated to the article.
So why then is there a photo of a capped and hoodied young brown guy on your front page under the headline “Elderly victims targeted” ?
No No I’m not complaining…….racial profiling is just fine with me.
The photo is from a cash machine where one of the elderly victims cards was trying to be used by the hoodied young brown guy.
Its not racial profiling when its a picture of someone using a stolen ATM card.
Get over yourself.
I will try Andy. Where’s the Herald at leaving the photo completely unexplained in the article.
Sensible to link surely ? Oh hang on, maybe the stereoptype is so established as to obviate the link.
I think they modified the article to make it clearer.
The police have given the Herald footage from a crime to help solve it, evil fucker robbing old folk. Jeeebus they aint perfect (teh herald) but cut them some slack on this.
Oh look, more photos.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10892362
Fuck you and your ‘established stereotype’ nonsense. There is some dangerous dude robbing old people with increasing violence. Colour of perpetrator and old folk not important.
Dick!!
The police have given footage……..
Dead right Angry Andy as I now know. But who was to know that without any explanation of the photo ? Just in case you blow a fuse Dick !!, give a thought to this: the article has been updated as CV says. My comment was posted at about 11.00 am, before the update.
If you wanna stay Angry Andy I’ll falsely state “Good on ya young brown fulla, bash those old ladies and steal their money”, just to prove your point and invigorate your strawman
You who needs a life.
I give the herald a little bit of credit. Not much but, some. Jumping to conclusions on a Sunday when they have the least staff on board still makes you a dick, when proven wrong by further updates.
Yeah, I’m angry. Angry at your stupid and angry that some douche bag is robbing old people.
Press F5 on your keyboard, its called ‘refresh’. Makes you less of a dick sometimes.
You can falsely state whatever you want, but your still wrong and will not, withdraw and apologise.
There is no strawman, just facts.
Dick!!!
Edit: was updated at 10.40am ish with attribution on photo.
Yeah, facts, as presented by the Herald at 11.00 am, and crucially, differently and more instructively, some hours later.
Careful with your fuse Andy. Happy to cut the Herald some slack aye ? Fair enough. How about some for me since I commented on the appearance of the earlier set of Herald “facts”, not the later set of Herald “facts”.
Highly unreasonable of you to keep up the insistence that I approve of the criminality and cowardice we mutually detest when you know full well I do not.
No strawman you reckon ? Huh !
Again, it’s for you to get a life.
Tried to edit the above comment after reading your edit. Understand Andy, not facts that I saw. I read and reread the article, surprised there was no explanation as to the guy’s connection. Then spent 10-15 minutes writing a comment in response to the article as first presented by the Herald which response I submitted at 10.50 am.
Still not satisfied ? Tough. Be obtuse.
Yeah right. I applaud the bastard responsible. Of course I do ! Happy now ? How’s the fuse ?
You mean this one?
In scenes reminiscent of the early days of the Syrian protests. Turkish police break up peaceful demonstrations with unprovoked violence.
Though he didn’t state who they were, following Basher Assad’s lead, Turkish leader Tayip Erdogan blamed Turkey’s enemies.
Maybe Colonial Viper could help Erdogan out here. And put a name to these unnamed enemies of Turkey
This shouldn’t be to hard for CV. As CV doesn’t need to have any knowledge at all of conditions on the ground in Turkey. Or even take note of those who do. All he has to do is pull out his tired old Marxist dogmatic script which reliably informed him that the Yankee Imperialists were behind every other Middle Eastern revolt.
Maybe CV could helpfully suggest to Erdogan, as he did for Assad, that the use of deadly nerve gas against the enemies of his country wouldn’t be a war crime.
maybe Jenny could stop wasting bait on the Viper, and set sights on other fish 😀
You are probably right. I will stop wasting my time and energy on this supporter of fascism when he stops provoking me.
What I was responding to was his attack on me.
I posted a statement in support of Edward Snowden. Which Colonial Viper took exception to. And which I replied to by trying to keep it light. To which Colonial Viper launched an unwarranted attack on me for supporting the Syrian people’s struggle to free themselves of a murderous dictatorship.
See the exchange here
I have never used CV’s support for the fascist regime of Basher Assad against him. Preferring to argue the merit of the issue at hand. I had also hoped that CV’s support for the Assad regime, indeed his whole racist dismissal of the validity of the Arab Spring, was some sort of grotesque mistake. Everyone can make mistakes. And so out of politeness I have never used it to beat him up, when discussing other issues.
However I feel that I would be remiss in not responding to CV’s unprovoked attack. IMHO to allow CV’s sick support for the facist style Bashar Assad regime to go unchallenged would be tantamount to agreeing not to challenge this sort of repression anywhere. If he thinks he can bring this up in an attempt to embarrass me every time he disagrees with me, then he is mistaken
I make no apology for supporting the struggle of the people of Syria fighting for democracy. That that struggle has become brutal and fratracidal, in the nature of all civil wars, was not of their choice but of the dictator Bashar Assad. Bashar Assad could have agreed to grant the protesters the minor democratic reforms that they originally sought. Instead he decided to gun them down instead.
What I take from CV’s attack on me over the comment on Edward Snowden, is that Colonial Viper hates the sort of political activism that the citizens of Hong Kong are famous for. The courageous political activism that has seen the people of Hong Kong openly defy the Beijing communist regime, and that Snowden has put his faith in, to protect him, from both the Chinese communist and the American capitalist governments.
And I might add, also the same sort of political activism that New Zealanders too can also rightly lay claim to as a proud tradition of protest practiced here.
I believe this argument has relevance to what happens here.
Colonial Viper dismisses the power and the success and validity of all grass roots citizen protest movements protesting against authority and injustice.
Though it can be seriously argued that such movements have achieved more for human progress and human rights than all the pragmatic top table horse trading that political parties spend their time on.
I believe that Colonial Viper is of the opinion that we should leave everything up to the high ups in the Labour Party and the Greens.
If the Greens and Labour decide in their coalition discussions that Deep Sea Oil drilling is OK. Then we must accept it. If these “leaders” decide on our behalf that there is nothing we here in New Zealand can do about climate change, we must accept that too. In fact we must accept everything that the political bureaucracies shove down our throats even if it is killing us.
I believe that the sort of activism that I talk about, makes people like Colonial Viper uneasy, because it holds mainstream parties to account and decreases the amount of wriggle room that the mainstream politicians have to make compromises and sellouts.
But it is the tradition that made New Zealand become nuclear free and left no room for compromise for the Lange government. It is the tradition that saw New Zealand reject racially selected sports teams.
It is the same proud tradition of protest that keeps democracy alive in Hong Kong while surrounded by a communist dictatorship.
Finally it is the same spirit that moved the people of Syria to take up arms against the state in response to the violence unleashed against them by the regime. (A lesson that Erdogan of Turkey, indeed all autocratic leaders where ever they are, should take note of.)
Lol.
That’s good advice from the Ghostrider, Jenny
Not all reptiles are dragons
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/04/16/uk-syria-crisis-turkey-idUKBRE93F0PG20130416
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/06/14/syria-rebels-weapons-logistics/2423185/
Turkey allowed itself to be used by the USA/UK/France, imperialists in their desire to upend the ME, to control the resources on that region, as well as the continued resource theft in Africa.
Turkey, has played its part very poorly, and alienated Muslim sects, by being used as an imperialist puppet, and is now feeling the fallout of the administrations corrupted actions!
Not to hard to understand where these, *enemies* might come from, Jenny!
The subject of the ME/Africa, is clearly beyond your ability to comprehend, Jenny. Perhaps its a good time to re-focus on those areas you might consider to be, strenghts!
Maybe CV could helpfully suggest to Erdogan, as he did for Assad, that the use of deadly nerve gas against the enemies of his country wouldn’t be a war crime.
Maybe we should introduce some facts,which tend to get in the way of Jenny’s story books.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/05/us-syria-crisis-un-idUSBRE94409Z20130505
Cheers guys, much appreciated.
You guys must be kidding?
Is this some sort of black comedy?
In your your deadly serious campaign to support mass murder and torture CV you and your mates are so out of touch with reality that you have completely lost your sense of the ridiculous.
Do you guys seriously expect us to believe this rubbish?
What you are trying to tell us is that the rebels who can’t even build a safe field hospital. Assembled all the chemical ingredients to make sarin. Not to mention, putting in place all the high tech containment and safety procedures that need to be at the very least a PC1 level containment. According to wikipedia, a task even the nazis couldn’t fully complete in time before the end of the war.
And having achieved all that, loaded it into a specialised artillery shell. Or did they deliver it in the back of a bread van?
Maybe you guys have got your scripts mixed up?
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/yt-hD3w_VdTG30/john_smiths_bachelor_party/
Got a little nazi frat boy thing going on here CV?
that is funny.
Jenny, I think your overwrought witterings are the problem. eg Assad and CV are not fascists and not liking the makeup of parts of the Syrian opposition does not make one a fascist. And you are dreaming if you think anyone much is fighting for ‘democracy’. One of the reasons the West has been slow to get involved is exactly that question; is there any point in replacing Assad when an even worse regime will be taking over?
We went through that scenario in Iraq and look how that turned out.
TRP Your defence of Colonial Viper’s support for the brutal Basha Assad regime falls down on the fact that from the beginning CV has claimed that the whole thing is an American plot. Including the Arab Spring itself.
This is not just factually wrong but is actually a racist slur on the Arab people.
I don’t think that any party that calls itself democratic can long tolerate in their ranks an Islamaphobic racist who openly admires a fascist style dictatorial regime that indulges in mass murder and torture.
you forgot to add in climate change denialist and proxy for the fossil fuel industry, for gods sakes can you get my credentialling right
No I got it right. You have consistently argued in the past to do nothing about climate change. I have never called you a “climate change denialist“. What I did term you as, and I think I was being accurate at the time, was a “climate change ignorer“. (something you share in common with David Shearer). However on saying that I have noticed of late, a positive change in your position. It just goes to shows me that no one is irredeemable. I play rough but you are learning.
What have you got right exactly, Jenny? Your Arab Spring working out for ordinary people in Egypt and Libya is it? Your Syrian “popular revolt” still importing a lot of foreign Islamic fighters just to keep going? Green party coming around to your way of looking at the world?
What exactly is it that you have got right?
You’re not a valkyrie, Jenny, just mistaken.
Thankyou for the back handed compliment. I may take up Voice of Reason AKA Te Reo Putake’s suggestion that I change my call sign after all.
Hey you’re very welcome.
And having achieved all that, loaded it into a specialised artillery shell. Or did they deliver it in the back of a bread van?
Mr Whippy would be a reasonable delivery mechanism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarin_gas_attack_on_the_Tokyo_subway
Also there have been plenty of defections from the Syrian armed forces as well as break-ins to military armouries by rebels.
Do tell. So they stole the sarin off Assad.
And used it, yes.
New information about the drive to place sick and incapacitated WINZ beneficiaries with mental health issues into employment:
Learn a bit about some of the possibly leading “pigs at the government trough”, who are likely contenders for MSDs contracts to outsource employment services for getting mentally ill (and other incapacitated) WINZ beneficiaries into work, for nice fees paid that will be based on referrals, duration of employment and so forth (more to come):
Press Release – Wise Group, 10:15 May 16, 2013:
http://business.scoop.co.nz/2013/05/16/employment-and-mental-health/
describing a new “tool” for doctors and mental health service providers, to “assist” and “motivate” clients to move back into work, developed by ‘The Wise Group’ – more on them further below!!!
See what was already done last year to prepare for the push to get mentally ill assisted back into work in last year:
“Engage Aotearoa”:
http://www.engagenz.co.nz/?tag=employment-support-as-a-mental-health-intervention-forum
Employment Support as a Mental Health Intervention Forum: 9 March 2012
Quote:
“This is your invitation to a forum for clinicians and others that will focus on this developing field of practice. International research andthe experience of practitioners, signals that evidence-based supported employment is emerging as a significant intervention to help people into paid competitive work.This symposium with is focus on employment is timely as the Government has indicated a comprehensive review of the benefit system.”
…with information on a forum last year, at the Ko Awatea Centre for Education & Innovation, Otahuhu
attended by speakers:
Rob Warriner, CEO of Walsh Trust: http://www.walsh.org.nz;
Warren Elwin, CEO of Workwise, Employment Agency: http://www.workwise.org.nz;
Helen Lockett, Strategic Development, Wise Group: http://www.wisegroup.co.nz;
Clive Bensemann, Director of Mental Health, Auckland District Health Bd;
David Codyre, Clinical Director/ Consultant Psychiatrist, ProCare Psychological Services …
And –
John Zonnevylle, Capital Coast DHB
Magdel Hammond, Edge Employment,
Dale Rook, Occupational Therapist, Auckland District Health Board
More information: http://www.engagenz.co.nz/?p=1677
Main website: http://www.engagenz.co.nz/
Also to take note of:
http://grow.co.nz/real-value-helen-lockett/
(another “UK expert”, but I am a bit unsure whether she is one of those supporting Prof. Mansel Aylward’s and Dr David Bratt’s particularly hardline philosophies on “work capacity” and the “health benefits of work”)
See Workwise’s “information” on “evidence based supported employment”:
http://www.workwise.org.nz/about-us/EBSE
http://www.workwise.org.nz/news/2012/02/27/new-zealands-first-primary-care-partnership-in-evidence_based-supported-employment
http://www.workwise.org.nz/news/2012/02/27/analysis-shows-strong-financial-returns-from-employment
The Wise Group – a major player, who own/operate ‘Workwise’:
http://www.wisegroup.co.nz/page/5-Home
http://www.wisegroup.co.nz/page/24-The-Wise-family
http://www.wisegroup.co.nz/page/14-who-we-are+our-history
http://www.socialangels.org.nz/about
(see ‘The Wise Group’ being a “charitable trust” and “Social Angels” a registered “charity”)
Workwise on the Charities Register:
http://www.register.charities.govt.nz/CharitiesRegister/ViewCharity?accountId=8f8b356e-320f-dd11-99cd-0015c5f3da29&searchId=291abede-5d72-4bbc-a693-165e621a71ce
Workwise Trust Group on the Charities Register:
http://www.register.charities.govt.nz/CharitiesRegister/ViewCharity?accountId=8febe8e5-290d-dd11-99cd-0015c5f3da29&searchId=291abede-5d72-4bbc-a693-165e621a71ce
Charities Register – last filed return:
http://www.register.charities.govt.nz/CharitiesRegister/PublicAnnualReturn?nocId=797d3395-4749-e211-84ab-00155d0d1916&charityRef=WOR18206&accountId=8f8b356e-320f-dd11-99cd-0015c5f3da29&searchId=291abede-5d72-4bbc-a693-165e621a71ce&nocRef=WIS18147AR005
So there we have it – more “corporate welfare” in the form of generous employment schemes for the well paid running of such services, and for perhaps a bit less generously paid bulk of the remaining “staff”. All likely to be part of the planned outsourcing and privatisation of welfare.
One thing is sure for the Wise Group:
$ 61,277,236 government grants and contract payments, out of $ 65,412,195 total income of that “charity”!!! Not bad really, especially for the ones running it.
I had some personal experiences with “Workwise” some time ago, as a former flatmate with some mental health issues tried to find work through the help of two of their staff. She got “stuff all” in real, effective support, and was rather disappointed by the “service” delivered by at times very unreliable and not all that motivated staff!
***When thinking of “charities” “Sanitarium” comes to mind again, owned by a church that can run the business as a “charity”, paying no tax on earnings. ***
See other organisations and agencies involved in this approach:
http://www.platform.org.nz/
http://www.tepou.co.nz/
http://www.tepou.co.nz/news/2013/06/13/employment-is-a-health-intervention
http://www.tepou.co.nz/story/2011/01/01/supporting-people-with-mental-health-issues-to-return-to-and-stay-at-work
http://www.pathways.co.nz/page/21-support-services+real-jobs+real-jobs
http://carenz.co.nz/
http://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/1003540
(Dr David Bratt, one of the directors at Care NZ Ltd!!! Only indirectly involved, but participating in the same “drive” to get sick back into work the “Bratt way”)
Remember also:
The whole agenda is being pushed strongly, and familiar people are behind it:
http://www.wellnz.co.nz/about_us/press_release_details.asp?pressID=36&bhcp=1
Paula Bennett’s speech to medical professionals in Sept. 2012, indicating work capacity assessments UK style (remember ATOS, DWP and the scandalous developments):
http://www.beehive.govt.nz/speech/speech-medical-professionals
I presume much is just “illness belief” (e.g. imagination), I suppose:
http://awdpa.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Models-of-Sickness-Disability-Waddell-and-Aylward-2010-2.pdf
(Publication by Prof. M. Aylward from 2010: ‘Models of Sickness and Disability’, or perhaps rather “blurring the lines, to open up attack lines on sick and disabled with incapacities – for state welfare agencies or insurance companies to dis-entitle beneficiaries and claimants”)
In contrast the more widely known and well-established agency used by MSD and Work and Income to place people with physical disabilities into employment:
http://www.workbridge.co.nz/?page=121
(this is harmless, the more conventional approach, not covering mental health though)
Some visuals to go with the information on job finding!
They’ve got pens – The League of Gentlemen – BBC
Pauline turns up for her new start session with the unemployed but is quite shocked to find that the tables have turned. Contains adult humour. Watch more high quality….
Good to check out the
prospectuswebpages of the ‘Wise’ outfit, especially the cvs of the main players. I’d love to know what sort of salaries they are pulling in for caring so deeply.There are sharks competing for funding with the little fish in the NGO/charity world.
No prizes for guessing the winners in that particular battle for survival.
Had a lovely experience this morning, knock at the door, and a lovely maori lady from a local iwi social services and education trust, -initiated by a blind maori gentleman, Jim (last name escapes me) – invited me (and every other whanau in the street) to a sausage sizzle and a check out of some surplus winter clothing. They had parked up with a trailer at the end of the street and when I had to go out, most folk had wandered down and were catching up. Excellent after the cold spell.
Arbeit macht frei
WHO’S COMING to “Presentations on Palestine, building support & links from NZ?”
It’s FREE, VERY informative and ABOUT TIME!
Sunday 23 June from 12.30pm
Auckland Town Hall Concert Chamber, Queen St:
Presentations on Palestine, building support & links from NZ.
4pm: special screening of Oscar-nominated Palestinian documentary “5 Broken Cameras”.
5.30 – 6.30pm: meal break.
6.30pm: talk by Palestinian teacher/blogger Yousef Aljamal on ‘Life under occupation’.
7.30pm – 8.30pm: powerpoint presentation by author Miko Peled (“The General’s Son”).
_____________________________________________________
http://www.conferenceonpalestine.co.nz
Organised in cooperation with Kia Ora Gaza, Students For Justice in Palestine (Auckland, Hamilton & Wellington), Palestine Human Rights Campaign, Wellington Palestine Group, and Global Peace & Justice Auckland.
PROGRAMME:
Saturday 22 June 10am to 5pm
Leys Institute Hall
20 St Marys Rd, Three Lamps, Ponsonby.
Including workshops on promoting boycott and divestment campaigns, lobbying for sanctions, political prisoners, other solidarity actions. PARTICIPANTS MUST REGISTER AT OUR WEBSITE IN ORDER TO ATTEND DAY ONE or registration form available here https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1vHZw3H-KVD07vECOTilP_t23qH3BjCL3kXY_AwNEPvY/viewform.
Sunday 23 June from 12.30pm
Auckland Town Hall Concert Chamber, Queen St:
Presentations on Palestine, building support & links from NZ.
4pm: special screening of Oscar-nominated Palestinian documentary “5 Broken Cameras”.
5.30 – 6.30pm: meal break.
6.30pm: talk by Palestinian teacher/blogger Yousef Aljamal on ‘Life under occupation’.
7.30pm – 8.30pm: powerpoint presentation by author Miko Peled (“The General’s Son”).
Copies of ‘The General’s Son’ will be available at the conference at $25 (retail price about $30). You can request a copy now by emailing us at: [email protected] and send $25 + $4 postage to bank account below.
FREE ADMISSION – donations & pledges welcome.
This important event depends on your generous support.
HOW TO DONATE:
Make a direct payment to our bank account:
Conference on Palestine,
03-0211-0447718-000,
Westpac Bank, Onehunga branch.
Afterwards, send an email to: [email protected] with your deposit details so we can send you an e-receipt.
Or write a cheque to ‘Conference on Palestine’ & post to:
Conference on Palestine
PO Box 86022, Mangere East,
Auckland 2158, New Zealand.
[Include you email or postal address for a receipt.]
Or paypal via our website:
http://www.conferenceonpalestine.co.nz
Miko Peled’s an interesting guy.
Argues for:
– The amalgamation of Occupied Territories with pre1967 Israel (ie the ‘Two State Solution” is dead on the ground)
– Full citizenship for Palestinians, including per-1967 exiles
– Right of return and compensation for Palestinians
– South African style Truth & Reconciliation process
Here’s a link to Miko Peled’s interview with Kim Hill
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/remote-player?id=2559559
There is a great item on Chris Laidlaw Radionz this a.m. on spy-ring etc. Thinking about Edward Snowden et al.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday
A couple or more of speakers. The last I heard before putting this was a quip from a Hong Kong dignitary. She said that ‘The reason that the sun never set on the British Empire is because God doesn’t trust the British.’ Good eh!
This is after remembering how Brits organised spying on foreign dignitaries at I think one G8 meeting, even organising special internet cafes that were set up so they could get access to all their emails. Another bit of negative information is that they sent a top diver under a Russian vessel with advanced propeller technology but unfortunately his head was cut off. The comment was made that the English speaking countries were heavily into spying and we have been involved, along with Australia, in the ‘Five Eyes’ system since the Eighties I think.
I just love that quote!
Yes great interview: “God doesn’t trust the British…… in the dark !”….(end of quote , i think)
Also praise for Winston’s peace making role in Fiji….from previous interview.
( Why does everyone pick on the bugger…..He has always stood for not selling NZ assets!…unlike the two major parties( and he brought National down over selling public assets) …and why is it always assumed he will join with National?…)
Hah! If only my father and grandfather were alive to hear that quote with that punchline!
Thanks Chooky for FIFY
I was just rereading mine and thought I missed the punchline on that quote. It reads even better when you see the whole thing Olwyn.
And it was interesting to hear how staunch and reliable Winston Peters had been at the Fiji time of change and the high respect of the diplomatic staff for him.
“New Zealand government fast tracks domestic spying laws”
“In an interview with TV3 on June 11, Key fell into step with the international vilification of Snowden, sharply denouncing him as a “criminal”, and saying he should face the “full force of the law.” While Key has flatly refused to comment on any aspect of NSA activities and its links with New Zealand spy agencies, he has not denied that they exist.”
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/06/22/nzin-j22.html
40,000 plus some more perhaps?
Listening to Radio NZ ‘Arts on Sunday’ I learnt that movie film processing will stop shortly at Miramar, Wellington.
The outfit started life in 1941 as a result of a reccomendation to the NZ Govt by John Greirson the British documentary film-maker which had the National Film Unit established. Reputedly the only time the NZ Govt acted on a commissioned report
Later taken over by Television NZ and recently back at Miramar thanks to Peter Jackson but sadly[?] closing due to lack of throughput in the digital age.
Seemingly the last Australasian lab to go under as apparently Aussies are sending last minute film to Miramar and they are very busy in their last days, just next week left before the gear is dismantled.
Don’t quote me on this as it is just what I think I heard from the broadcast and memories, often not very accurate
“Economic Reform Necessary”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10892298
-Bernard Hickey
“When I first came to New Zealnd there were hardly any homeless people but now there are heaps, so where have we gone wrong?”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10892330
-Simon Buckingham, Lawyer.
That’s an easy one to answer – we had governments believing the economists and business people and thus put in place policies that rewarded the business people at everyone else’s expense. This has, quite predictably, resulted in a massive increase in poverty for the many while a few got immeasurably richer.
Much of that would have to do with many ‘homeless’ actually suffering from mental illnesses that manifests for various reasons in homelessness. Once upon a time they would have been institutionalised.
Supermoon , again. 😀
Saw it!
“Almost unprecedented slobbering”
Irish parliamentarian speaks out against fawning treatment of war criminal
http://xrepublic.tv/node/3893
Ms Daly, MP for Dublin North, hit out at the “almost unprecedented slobbering” over the Obama family’s visit. “It’s really hard to know which is worst, whether it’s the outpourings of the Obamas themselves or the sycophantic falling over them by sections of the media and the political establishment,” she said. “We’ve had separate and special news bulletins by the State broadcaster to tell us what Michelle Obama and her daughters had for lunch in Dublin, but very little questioning of the fact that she was having lunch with Mr Tax Exile himself,” she said in reference to U2’s Bono.
She described Mr Obama as a “war criminal”, having “just announced his decision to supply arms to the Syrian opposition, including the jihadists, fuelling the destabilisation of that region, continuing to undermine secularism and knock back conditions for women”.
Ms Daly said: “This is the man who is in essence stalling the Geneva peace talks by trying to broker enhanced leverage for the Syrian opposition by giving them arms – and to hell with the thousands more who’ll lose their lives, or the tens of thousands who will be displaced. This is the man who has facilitated a 200 per cent increase in the use of drones which have killed thousands of people, including hundreds of children.” […]
http://xrepublic.tv/node/3893
Shit she’s definitely on the GCHQ monitoring list now.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/22/gchq-spying-catastrophe-german-politicans
the GCHQ have been spying on eurozone governenment and private corporations.
In a related thread 😉 , St Johns are continuing to bear the increasing “brunt of an ageing population”, coupled with “increases in minor incident calls” (yes Pop. , including for mental illness, and sheltered villages are much more protective) ; the stress is being piled on the organization, who are losing $15M a year.
These attacks on the elderly in Auckland has the police “very concerned about the escalation of violence”- Malthus.
NZ Parliamentarians should take a long hard look at that link.
I just saw an exchange between two politicians that contained actual information and that wasn’t sliced and diced by bullshit ‘points of order’…I saw an absolute absence of glib ‘one liners’…and I saw speakers allowed to offer their opinion and ask/answer questions without any childish braying from any opposite benches.
Add to that, a politician calling a spade a spade, well…when was the last time I had the pleasure?
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/questions-surround-mrp-float-price-ck-141888
$1.7b raised @ $2.50 = 680m shares. If the shares had been sold at $2.20 it would have raised slightly less than $1.5b
At what point, if there was such a point, would the government not have sold?
More importantly though, do NZers in general feel that they got a good price for the sale?
meanwhile, farmers request “armies of volunteers” to help clear snow-trapped stock in the Maniopoto and Millers Flat areas. sigh.
I thought that’s what woofers are for 😉 (‘cept you have to be organic-ish).
I’d tell them to plant some shelter belts
I’d just tell them to fuck off. It’s their problem that they can’t plan for perfectly reasonable expectations such as inclement weather.
Unfortunately you are speaking with the ignorance of a townie.
Ghostrider888 mentioned this in another thread. Slingshot are offering a new free Global Mode service for their customers, supposedly for international visitors staying with them, but it really looks like it’s giving NZers access to international content that was previously blocked.
Anyone tried it?
http://www.slingshot.co.nz/products/global-mode/support/
ta, getting weary-eyed.
BREAKING NEWS
Snowden is on a plane to Moscow.
http://www.scmp.com/
US are powerless to stop him having recently lost Maxwell Smart.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-05-15/accused-u-s-spy-s-tools-get-a-laugh-from-russians.html
ooooh, Ice ice baby.
Holy Frak: HK Govt allows Snowden to leave for Moscow
Tweets by KimDotcom
And further afield…. .
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/snowden-says-us-targets-included-china-cell-phones
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/23/us-usa-security-flight-idUSBRE95M02H20130623
Massive crackdown on leakers in all US gov agencies; employees to inform on each other or face penalties themselves
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/06/20/194513/obamas-crackdown-views-leaks-as.html#.Ucbhp9hU1d3