Power is off all day for us so a swap/buy/exchange market up the road for us, then the beach – not bad practice for the times ahead where fun and experience will be had closer to home and closer to hand.
Capitalist extremist identifies homelessness as democracy.
During the Cold War, terms like ‘Democratic Society’, ‘The Free World’ became synonymous with capitalism. These terms were often used interchangeably, (and opportunistically, IMO), as antonyms in reference to Communist societies like Soviet Russia.
In an extraordinary blast from the past, this cold war dog whistle is being dragged up to justify keeping families in cars, on the streets, or bunked up in motels at huge expense to the taxpayer, while tens of thousands of perfectly good houses stand empty.
The problems of homelessness, housing stress, and the housing crisis in this country have been laid at the feet of the past National Government by the current Housing Minister, Phil Twyford. But that we should reverse this policy has been labeled, “Extremist nonsense” by Property Institute of New Zealand chief executive Ashley Church
The notion that people should be penalised for owning empty homes is “extremist nonsense” in a democratic society, he says.
Stuff.co.nz reporters Rob Stock and John Anthony debunk Ashley Church’s fallacious and self serving justification, noting that other democratic societies have implemented measures to crackdown on empty home owners.
Vancouver in Canada recently introduced a tax on empty homes expected to bring in C$30m (NZ$32.8m) of revenue in its first year.
I would encourage the current housing minister to push past the nasty bed baiting spin of Ashley Church, and other self interested parties, and copy Vancouver’s courageous, (and dare I say it, socialist) example.
New Zealand’s Housing Minister Phil Twyford blames the National Government for the proliferation of ghost houses but has stopped short of offering up any measures to discourage the practice.
See that? It’s the invisible hand of the market giving we the people the invisible finger…
Anthony Robins – June 16, 2015
To which I would add Anthony Robins’ invisible hand is attached to the very visible and self interested wrist of Ashley Church and the Property Institute, and the landlords and speculators whose interests his organisation exists to protect.
The notion that people should be penalised for owning empty homes is “extremist nonsense” in a democratic society, he says.
Proof, if you needed it, that capitalists don’t give a shit about anybody but themselves.
In a democratic society we’d ensure that everyone had a place to live and food on the table. It’s only in capitalism that we start accepting excuses from the capitalists as to why people need to be poor and oppressed.
That data doesn’t really tell us much Jenny. What we don’t know is how many of those 33,360 vacant homes are potentially available for rental/sale.
At any given point in time there will always be a large quantity of vacant properties and the reasons they’re empty are many & varied as is the duration of their vacancies. That 33.36k were only vacant at the time of the census, it didn’t mean they were permanently vacant.
Stats give this info;
“An unoccupied dwelling is classified as ’empty’ if it clearly has no current occupants and new occupants are not expected to move in on or before census night. Unoccupied dwellings that are being repaired or renovated are defined as empty dwellings. Unoccupied baches or holiday homes are also defined as empty dwellings.
A dwelling is classified as having ‘residents away’, where occupants of a dwelling are known to be temporarily away and are not expected to return on or before census night.”
The data table for the census unoccupied dwelling count has this at note 1;
“1. Unoccupied dwelling count is made up of ‘residents away’ and ‘empty dwelling’. ”
Anyone on holiday at the time of the census would be ‘residents away’ if they left the house vacant (no-one left behind)
The census recorded 36,597 cases of overcrowding, affecting 203,820 people.
There were two main classifications for unoccupied homes in the census “empty dwelling” and “residents away”. Just as you say, it seems that there was no further breakdown.
We can argue around the margins about how many houses might be empty for valid reasons, And I admit that I may be making a subjective call here, but I the sheer numbers, “empty dwellings” recorded, 141,366 nationally and 33,360 in Auckland, tells a story of unaffordability, in rents and house prices, that puts the majority of these “empty dwellings” out of the reach of many of the people captured in this survey suffering from housing distress.
Maybe when we can get to compare the 2013 figures, with the latest 2018 census figures for housing we might be better informed.
In the meantime we will have to go to other sources to get a handle on the problem.
Figures from the last census showed there were 141,366 empty dwellings in New Zealand, which are separate from houses that are vacant because their owners are away around census time.* More than 33,000 houses in Auckland were officially classified as empty in 2016.
Colleen Hawkes – May 16, 2018
*(My emphasis) J.
Minister of Housing Phil Twyford stated earlier this month that New Zealand will not be following Vancouver’s example in introducing taxes on empty houses.
“The Labour-led government has a comprehensive plan to address the housing shortage including cracking down on offshore speculators and changing rules around negative gearing,” Twyford said.
Christchurch Progressive Network convenor John Minto, who is advocating such a scheme, has criticised the government’s “poor use of money”. “It is stupid for the government to spend tens of millions on motel accommodation for homeless families when we have 33,000 empty homes in Auckland (2016 figures).”
I might ask Phil Twyford and Phil Goff both: is the suffering of middle and upper class bach owners, and housing speculators really comparable with the suffering of families living with overcrowding, insecurity and homelessness?
I don’t dispute the seriousness of the lack of housing Jenny. I was just making the observation that the numbers look to be wrong on the empty houses and it may be a dead duck. Wrong numbers lead to wrong decisions.
I honestly can’t see that many investors sitting on property like that, they exist for sure but my expectations are that it occurs in the high-wealth areas mostly. You’d need to be pretty cash rich to not need rental income, interest on borrowing chews capital and eats up profits real fast.
Kia ora DH, I strongly suspect that your expectations that many of the 33,360 “empty houses” recorded in Auckland in the census are at the high end of the market. (Of course it would be good to know for sure). But anecdotal evidence seems to back up this expectation.
But forcing these houses back onto the rental or housing market should free up more houses further down the housing ladder. The sheer numbers guarantee it.
Vancouver thought it was worth it.
Vancouver’s tax on empty homes will bring in $30-million of revenue in its first year, but that will come from only a tiny proportion of homeowners.
More than 5,000 properties out of 8,500 deemed vacant by city staff received exemptions under rules of the new tax bylaw, which is a first for Canada and is being watched closely around the world.
Nearly 61% of the homes declared empty in Vancouver were condos, and other multi-family properties made up almost 6%, according to the city government. More than a quarter of the empty properties were in downtown Vancouver.
The City of Vancouver released a heat map Thursday showing the distribution of residential properties where owners haven’t yet made a declaration to avoid its new empty-homes tax, and the highest concentration is in condo-rich Yaletown.
The city says about 182,000 residential property owners — about 98 per cent — have submitted their declarations but another 4,000 still haven’t. Most of the undeclared properties are in the downtown core and the highest concentrations are in Yaletown, Coal Harbour and the West End.
Homeowners in the three condo-dense neighbourhoods who have not declared occupancy risk paying a one per cent tax on their properties’ assessed values. Assessed values of residential strata units — such as condos — in Metro Vancouver skyrocketed this year by five to 35 per cent.
Residential property owners had until Feb. 2 to declare occupancy, however, the city extended the deadline to March 5 in order to give the 4,000 who had not declared a chance to avoid penalties and fines.
The empty-homes tax, a nationwide-first, was approved by councillors in 2016 as a tool to spur owners to rent out their empty homes. Any property owner that fails to declare by March 5 is subject to the tax plus a $250 fee. Declarations will be subject to an audit process and false declarations could result in fines of up to $10,000 per day, according to the city.
“With a near-zero vacancy rate in Vancouver, our key goal is to shift empty or under-used housing into the rental market. The city has done extensive advertising and notifications about the Empty Homes Tax for more than a year — all homeowners should know that they have to file a declaration, or their homes will be considered empty by default,” Mayor Gregor Robertson said in a news release.
Andy Yan, director of Simon Fraser University’s City Program, who has been researching the distribution of empty homes in Vancouver, said the city’s heat map matches well with a map he generated from city data identifying private dwellings not occupied by usual residents. It also matches closely with a map of population density he prepared based on 2016 census data.
I was moved to make my original comment about this issue by the Stuff.co.nz report yesterday that mentioned Ghost Houses. And also because I had followed Victoria Crone and Phil Goff’s debate on this issue with keen interest. I was hardly aware of what was going on in Vancouver.
However, the more I read yesterday about the Vancouver example, the more fascinated I became. It’s incredible really, Many of the exact same arguments, for and against, that were made by Goff and Crone during the Auckland Mayoral debate were shadowed by the opponents and supporters of this scheme in Vancouver.
One of the arguments made by opponents of the scheme in Vancouver was that it would penalise owners of two homes.
Yes it would, that’s the point, you will be penalised if you keep one of them empty, while other people are struggling to find accomodation.
The lack of self awareness of the ridiculous nature of this objection, as seen by families without any home at all, is breathtaking.
One of the biggest criticisms made here by Goff of Crone’s proposal, was that there would be no method of telling which homes were being left empty.
In reply Crone suggested that water usage would give a good indication of which houses were being left idle and unused.
In opposition to Crone’s suggestion that water use would give a good indication of whether a house was being parked up, I remember one numpty commenting at the time on this website, criticising Crone’s suggestion, writing that this would just encourage absent owners to leave the taps running.
In the end, it seems that Vancouver settled on using the lack of electricity consumption as an indicator of an empty address.
More Innovatively Vancouver also did a poll on property owners asking them to declare whether their properties were empty or not.
This gave some very interesting results, for instance the first thing revealed was that contrary to the racist scape goating of Asians and immigrants as being behind the Ghost House problem, many of the owners of these empty houses were revealed as being Canadians or Americans from across the border. Another thing revealed was that most of the empty properties were in condominiums.
Revealed by the tax itself, was that (in line with DH’s expectations above) many of these empty homes were higher valued properties. Another thing revealed is that the owners of these high end properties were prepared to pay the tax rather than let them out, or put them on the market. (Some paying as much as $250,000 for the 2018 tax period.)
In total the owners of the these properties paid the city $30 million for the privilege of keeping these properties empty.
But Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson is pleased with the results anyway.
“Thank you for contributing to Vancouver’s affordable-housing fund,” the mayor said wryly at a news conference outlining the details of the new tax. He acknowledged it’s not clear yet whether the tax has caused any owners to rent out their apartments or houses, which is one of the city’s goals.
But, he said, the city needed to do something to ensure that desperately needed housing is available.
“It’s unacceptable to have homes sitting empty when so many people are looking for a place to live.”
The 1,200 to 2,300 homeowners who may eventually pay the tax are far less than the numbers that have circulated for years about empty units.
Two years ago, the city said 10,800 units were unoccupied for a year or more, after a comprehensive study of electrical use.
At last count, 7 per cent of Auckland’s homes sit empty.
New Zealand’s Housing Minister Phil Twyford blames the National Government for the proliferation of ghost houses but has stopped short of offering up any measures to discourage the practice.
Maybe Phil Twyford instead of stopping short of offering up any measures to discourage the practice, could take a leaf out Victoria Crone’s mayoral campaign
In 2016 Independent Mayoral Candidate, Victoria Crone championed action to address Ghost houses as part of her Mayoral campaign.
Labour Party candidate Phil Goff vehemently opposed Crone over this policy, characterising it as unfairly affecting “bach owners”.
(For God’s sakes, as if bach owners hardships could be anyway comparable to the hardships faced by families with out any home at all, let alone a spare one to go to on for holidays.)
Instead Phil Goff, echoing the Trump Presidential campaign, chose a more traditionally Right Wing strategy; scapegoating immigrants for the housing crisis.
Not only was Goff’s anti-immigrant strategy Right Wing, it was dishonest – immigration policy is set by central government not by the Auckland Region, a fact which he well knows.
* (Except it seems, the interests of property developers, landlords and speculators and other wide boys. A fact we may all come to regret when the housing market is flooded with even more empty and unaffordable houses.)
‘A collection of research published last week in a special edition of the major scientific journal Nature showed that Antarctica has lost 3 trillion tonnes of ice over the past 25 years. Half of that melting has happened in the past 5 years. Professor Tim Naish is from the Victoria University of Wellington’s Antarctic Research Centre says we have less than a decade to stop a catastrophe.’
Top work Ireland taking out Australia in their Rugby series.
I’m really, really sorry about the last-minute decision by the ref.
Really, really sorry not.
Q&A (TV1) had a very good panel this morning.
I’m hopeless remembering names so you will need to link through yourselves.
Subjects: Business confidence taking a dip… the Mexican Border fiasco fallout… and EU Trade negotiations. No babies.
An inherent message to the Labour-led government:
You will need to do a much better job explaining your policy positions/decisions if you want to avoid confusion among voters and mischievous spin from your political opponents gaining traction.
Could not agree more. At the moment those opponents are having a free run on misrepresentation because ministers (with a few exceptions) are not stepping up to properly counter them. If they can’t do the political side of the job, then they need to be replaced with those who can. My cent-worth for the day.
Q&A (TV1) had a very good panel this morning.
I’m hopeless remembering names so you will need to link through yourselves.
Subjects: Business confidence taking a dip… the Mexican Border fiasco fallout… and EU Trade negotiations. No babies.
An inherent message to the Labour-led government:
You will need to do a much better job explaining your policy positions/decisions if you want to avoid confusion among voters and false spin from your political opponents gaining traction.
Could not agree more. At the moment those opponents are having a free run on misrepresentation because ministers (with a few exceptions) are not stepping up to properly counter them. If they can’t do the political side of the job, then they need to be replaced with those who can. My cent-worth for the day.
Yes, an interesting Q & A. Not one of Grant’s better performances. Very monotone, he looked tired and listless.
On business confidence, and in fact on forward spending/investment plans, as mentioned by Barnett, I can’t think of one thing the government has done to encourage business.
But I can think of plenty of government decisions that will increase regulatory burdens, that look capricious (oil and gas virtually out of the blue) and which will increase costs (fuel taxes, $20 min wage, a lot more union control, proposed CGT).
In these circumstances, it is not surprising that business are not making new investments, it looks too risky. Safer to keep spare capital in passive investments (either in NZ or offshore) or alternatively not borrow. The business will operate at a lower but safer level.
The cost is lower growth, lower taxes, less employment growth.
Why should business expect to be led by the government?
New Zealand business has had oblique and small policy markers from central government under National’s 9 long and directionless years.
Under Labour’s government, they are being led by the public sector through construction and transport funding, which are the economic policy areas this government really care about anyway. Those areas will continue to boom under this government for the foreseeable future.
Unless your business is rent, housing rent, in which case you are about to be shown the door. The Productivity Commission would firmly encourage landlords to find something else more productive to invest in.
Broadly speaking, this government seeks to tilt real estate capitalism, and that’s about it.
Business organizations in New Zealand don’t want to be led. They’ve been clear about that for a while. They are virulently and relentlessly anti-Labour and they don’t care who knows it, and it won’t change. It’s on business to determine if they want to make something useful out of this Labour-led government.
Meanwhile, headline unemployment is great, property prices are stabilizing, the governments’ investment direction and savings culture are fantastic, and the government is really popular.
”(fuel taxes, $20 min wage, a lot more union control, proposed CGT).””
How dare a govt actually do shit . And try make the country function ,I long for the days we had a bunch of greasy middle management tossers doing fuck all other than tell us how good they are.
On business confidence, and in fact on forward spending/investment plans, as mentioned by Barnett, I can’t think of one thing the government has done to encourage business.
How could you say that, Wayne? This Government signed TPPA-11!
And there are proposals for an ‘Amazon Tax’ and for R & D tax loss credits for companies that spend more than $100k pa on R & D.
CPTPP 11I will concede, although it has a sting in the tail with the new restrictions on foreign investment. The R& D tax credit is essentially the Callaghan growth grant repackaged (though expanded somewhat).
The furore over the Te Arai exemption just illustrated the problems. Quite a few proposed tourist resort projects had the intent of selling the units to overseas investors as a means of raising the capital.
Not one of Grant’s better performances. Very monotone, he looked tired and listless.
And there’s the standard RWNJ ad hominem.
I can’t think of one thing the government has done to encourage business.
The government isn’t actually there for business – it’s there for the people.
But I can think of plenty of government decisions that will increase regulatory burdens
That’s good. A market system can’t work without proper regulation. It was the lack of regulation and then followed by bad regulation that brought us the ‘legal highs’ fiasco.
and which will increase costs (fuel taxes, $20 min wage, a lot more union control, proposed CGT).
You don’t seem to be concerned with the rising costs of living that needs to be covered by wages. Costs that the capitalists almost always ignore which is why we need a minimum wage in the first place. It would actually be better to have a universal income rather than a minimum wage to ensure that everyone has a good living standard. Although, considering how greedy the capitalists are, I think we’d still need a minimum wage to ensure that they actually paid.
The cost is lower growth, lower taxes, less employment growth.
Which is, of course, a load of bollocks. We’ve been cutting taxes and regulations for the last thirty years and it’s made us all worse off. It’s cut productivity increases and wages while rewarding the bludging shareholders and speculators.
Maybe Grant Robertson needed a Redbull drink to pep him up before the interview. I have seen him give plenty more energetic and therefore more engaging interviews than this mornings on Q & A.
Saying grant looks tired listless is not at an ad hom. You throw it round so often I am beginning to think you don’t know what words mean.
An ad hom would be “Grant is fat/lazy/stupid therefore his argument is invalid”. Ad hom means to attack the person to denigrate the argument or point they are putting forward. Saying someone looks tired and listless is not an ad hom.
This is the second time I have had to point this out to you. Please try harder
“In these circumstances, it is not surprising that business are not making new investments, it looks too risky. Safer to keep spare capital in passive investments (either in NZ or offshore) or alternatively not borrow. The business will operate at a lower but safer level.”
There’s also the actions of a lot of New Zealand business that are causing these reactions as well. Take the actual and perceived losses of around 4 billion from Fletcher Building and Fontera, along with the M. Bovis debacle and there’s more than enough to give business the willies. This occurred under the leadership of the previous National government.
I look around Queenstown and see a lot of similarity to the situation in 2007 with a lot of developments that are unlikely to be profitable first time around. This has a chilling effect on business confidence.
Maybe New Zealand business, and the National Party, should look at their own actions and leadership before trying to blame someone else for their problems.
Unfortunately our “business leaders” and National politicians won’t be terribly affected by the fallout from the fuck-ups above, that will fall on the workers, subcontractors and share-milkers who will have their lives destroyed.
Wayne increasing wages means more money in businesses where this money is spent.
$880 million to bail out farmer’s.
Business confidence is over 50 which means business ha got over National loosing the election.
Just business leaders doing their expected “it’s a Labour government” hissy fit.
Saw it in 2000, same again.
Put Thompson & Clark onto them as they clearly need monitoring as a threat to the democratic process.
the Prime Minister’s baby name just announced: Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford. I am so proud of this Kiwi family, with both Jacinda and Clarke new role models of how men and women can be in the world – in my life time.
It has finally been revealed. Little Prime Miniature’s real name is – Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford. (Snap -I now see Venezia has already announced the name.)
An uncommon first name which apparently is ( or maybe from) from an Old Irish feminine name “Niamh” pronounced Neev, meaning “bright” or radiant”, according to Wikipedia.
The first part of this bit in the Wikipedia entry made me laugh vis a vis the proud new father – ” In Irish mythology, Niamh is the daughter of the god of the sea, Manannán mac Lir and one of the queens of Tír na nÓg, the land of eternal youth. She was the lover of the poet-hero Oisín” .
As mentioned by Jacinda Ardern in the press conference at 11am at the hospital before the Ardern Gayford family left for home, “Neve” also means “snow” in some languages – eg Latin, Italian and Portuguese.
Here is a link to the TVNZ article which includes video of the short press conference.
Mum looked radiant and not at all like someone who had had very little sleep over the last few days; and Dad is as proud as punch. Baby slept …
For the fashion conscious:
Neve was wearing a soft green home knitted hat, which virtually matched the jacket (and shoes) of one of their DPS minders. (LOL)
Mum wore a white top and black pants and white sneakers.
Dad wore his “trial father’s cardigan” as it was described in a (rather funny double act) video some months ago when he wore it for the first time. According to JA it was bought in an op shop.
I wondered who would bite when I submitted my comment – and sure enough … LOL.
Just the usual One Two type of shitty comment. He/she thinks they are soooo clever. I gave up reading his/her comments a long time ago and just pass over them so did not see this one until someone pointed it out to me.
As for knowing JA, I am pretty sure that you and I are in the same position there if I correctly remember a comment of yours some months ago – but I am not going to say what that was. LOL
The Dad cardie is getting a lot of air time – apparently from the Sally’s op shop in Gisborne according to JA in her latest Facebook video.
Jacinda and Clarke with their daughter, showed wonder grace happiness and kindness.
In her speech and answers she acknowledged all the kindness they had received, mentioning some had come from loss and sadness as well as open acceptance from NZers who had given love freely, from home made gifts to names, to the offer of placenta burial by Ngapui.
They looked a lovely wee family we can be proud of. I have had the good fortune to meet her prior to the election. She has gone from strength to strength and does us all proud, along with her clearly loving supportive partner.
Their selection of names shows a nod to their own choices coupled with a strong connection to love. “Love and happiness” the expectations for their daughter, Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford, are simple but profound.
OK, it SAYS “Flying car”, but it functions more like a human carrying drone. A car would surely be a more apt description if it had wheels and used the air current to lift about a meter or so off road so to speak.
Even so the Kitty Hawk is cool. Needs a roll bar type device.
It will be interesting to watch how this all develops. Safety will be a big concern I’d think, the potential for midair collisions will magnify very quickly if/when they become mainstream. Lots to think about.
I can imagine the rozzers scratching their heads wondering how they’ll get speed cameras up there…
Abstract:
Low Flying Aircraft (LFA) may be used to smuggle illicit drugs or illegal immigrants across borders. Sound radiated by LFA was used for their detection, tracking and classification by the developed Acousto Seismic Air Detection (ASAD) system. ASAD consists of several nodes, where each node has five microphone clusters and three geophones. Single ASAD node can detect aircraft sound, determine their bearing, and classify the target. Two or mode nodes provide target localization. Extended tests of various small aircraft flying according to planned test patterns were conducted in difficult mountainous areas. The comparison of acoustic detection and tracking with ground truth from the GPS carried by the targets allowed the estimation of acoustic detection, bearing and localization distances and their accuracy.
Weka disappeared at least two months ago. I recall ‘tracey’ responding to the same question with words to the effect “Weka is fine”.
I don’t know why she has left TS but suspect it might have something to do with some stoush in what is termed “the backend”. But that is no more than a guess and could be wrong.
Pile your firewood inside so you don’t have to go out.
Next three days is going to be incredibly cold; snow between 100 and 200 metres above sea level from Stewart Island and Fiordland right through Otago, and a long cold snap all the way up the centre and east of the North Island.
We’ve already had it pretty cold lately Ad. Highs of 4 or 5 and lows of -5 to -6 at my place most of last week. Ice has been building up in shady areas of the garden. The woodburner has been running day and night.
A snow laden southerly usually means temps around 0 to 2 across the board so a bit of a relief really.
Good morning The Am Show one should not count there chickens Peter Burling came second .
Loyd would have still celebrated as a Kiwi salior won the race on Chinese boat Dong Fang and Blair Tuke came 3rd Ka pai.
Duncan everyone knows that buildings construction slow down in the winter one just makes a mess when you dig holes in the rain also the timber framing don’t pass there moisture test so there cladding cannot be installed many other reason that construction slows in winter less day light hours. Thats were prefab house increase house building productivity . These prefab building could target using the renewable resource we have a lot of laminated timber this product is alot less energy in producing this laminated timber products
The Kiwi Rugby League team and management are in rebuild mode you wait and see they will get back to there best form .
With the Roseanne Show in the USA that shows that te Papatuanuku has had enough of the racial discriminating slander Ka pai but the show gives US a view into the reality’s of common tangata in the USA and how hard they have it just to survive in the USA the big picture is we were heading in that direction till the changes we have had with the new Labour lead Coalition Government. Duncan Te kumara never tells how sweet it is
Ka kite ano P.S it is a super food loaded with good minerals good for the mokopunas
Many thanks to Saudi Arabia for granting the rights for ladies to drive cars this is a win for Ladies Equality around Papatuanuku as Saudi ladies have won the right to drive there are many more rights these ladies need to be granted to get to Equality its all about a bright healthy future for all Tangata link below.
Didn't See It Coming: NZ Herald columnist Lizzie Marvelly's latest column merits serious scrutiny because such a clear example of anti-democratic thinking is encountered only rarely on the pages of the daily press. Which is not to say that the elitism which lies at the heart of such social disparagement ...
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh Initially it was reported that in an aerial bombardment that took place on August 30th seven children were massacred; the figure then went up to eight and then on November 11th Noticias Uno reported that, according to people from the community in close proximity to the ...
Next year is an election year, and Labour needs money to fund its campaign. So naturally, they're selling access:Labour is charging wealthy business figures $1500-a-head to lunch with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern at its annual conference later this month. [...] On the weekend beginning November 29th, around 800 delegates will ...
Yesterday the government announced its changes to tenancy laws, including an end to no-cause evictions, limits on rent increases, and anonyminity for tenants who defend their rights against bad landlords (sadly necessary because landlords are scum who maintain blacklists of "uppity" tenants). They're all good moves, and have resulted in ...
In 2003 New Zealand sent a Provincial Reconstruction Team to Afghanistan to support America's doomed war there. While there, they conducted regular weapons practice on local firing ranges, littering the landscape with unexploded ammunition. These ranges weren't secure - they're on land used by locals for animal herding - so ...
Green MP Gareth Hughes has announced he will retire at the election. Its understandable - he's been there ten years, and wants to actually see his children grow up rather than miss it while drowning in the toxic parliamentary sewer. But his departure is also a huge loss for the ...
Words and images by Jacqui GibsonGone are Auckland Museum’s days of doing science using a museum-centric academic approach, after Māori land rights holders Ngāti Kuri gave the museum an ultimatum.Tom Trnski holding a fossilised whale tooth from the Far North.Aussie-born Head of Natural Sciences at Auckland Museum ...
MediaWorks announced in October 2019 that it intended to sell off its struggling television business and cancel or cut back on several popular local programmes, including New Zealand Today, Married at First SightNew Zealand and 7 Days. Its radio and outdoor advertising arms are currently performing well, but MediaWorks’ ...
Westminster voting intention:CON: 44% (+3)LAB: 28% (-1)LDEM: 14% (-1)BREX: 6% (-)via @OpiniumResearch, surveyed this weekChgs. w/ 08 Nov— Britain Elects (@britainelects) 16 November 2019 This, of course, doesn't look good. Labour have been chucking big, headline grabbing policies left, right and centre ... Well, maybe not right. Left, left ...
Some readers may remember that I mentioned last year that I was applying for NZ citizenship. I filled out the paperwork and had my original citizenship interview in February. Everything went well until they discovered that, because I had spent five months in the US in 2017, I had not ...
by Deirdre O’Neill It is becoming quite acceptable for certain sections of the left to declare that people like me – women who are ‘gender critical’ – should not be allowed in leftist or anarchist spaces. Leaving aside the arrogance and implicit authoritarianism of this claim, its lack of critical ...
There is an article in The Conversation, written by Jeremy P. Shapiro (Adjunct Assistant Professor of Psychological Sciences, Case Western Reserve University), about what he sees as the psychologically-based underpinnings of three main matters that seem to vex people all around the planet. The article is titled “The Thinking ...
. . Blogger Martyn Bradbury has won his case against unreasonable search and surveillance against the NZ Police; and subsequent Police attempts to produce evidence in secrecy, in a closed Court. His case highlights a disturbing growing trend in Aotearoa New Zealand for State power to be used against ...
The Committee of Disobedient Women has intercepted an email from Dr Emma Eejut, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, Massey University to the university’s Vice-Chancellor, Jan Thomas. Dear Jan, Thank you for your courageous move. I think 10 pages of blether** should tie any of the students game enough to try holding ...
That's the only response to the findings of the Ombudsman's investigation into LGOIMA practices at the Christchurch City Council:My investigation identified serious concerns about the Council’s leadership and culture, and its commitment to openness and transparency. In particular, Council staff raised concerns with me about various methods employed by some ...
NZ First seems to be nakedly trying to enrich itself from public office:A powerful New Zealand First figure helped establish a forestry company that then pushed for money from two key funding streams controlled by a New Zealand First Minister. An RNZ investigation has found Brian Henry, lawyer for Winston ...
Behrouz Boochani is an award winning author and journalist. He is also a refugee, who for the past six years has been detained in Australia's offshore gulag on Manus Island, and in Papua New Guinea. But last night, with the cooperation of the WORD Christchurch festival and Amnesty International, he ...
Different Strokes: If a multicultural immigration policy imposes no obligation on immigrant communities to acknowledge and ultimately embrace their host nation’s most cherished traditions and values, then how is that nation to prevent itself from being reduced to a collection of inward-looking and self-replicating ethnic and cultural enclaves?THE COALITION GOVERNMENT’S ...
Protective Zone: Reading the rules and guidelines released by Massey University, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that its governing body considers the whole concept of free speech a disruptive threat to the orderly imparting of orthodox academic knowledge.IN TRUE ORWELLIAN fashion, Massey University has announced its commitment to ...
Farmers held a hate-march on Parliament today, complete with MAGA hats, gun-nut signs, and gendered insults. While supposedly about a grab-bag of issues - including, weirdly, mental health - it was clear that the protest was about one thing, and one thing only: climate change. And specifically, forestry "destroying" rural ...
The Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security released their annual report today, and I've been busy reading through it. In amongst the usual review of what they've been doing all year, there's a few interesting bits. For example, a discussion on "agency retention and disposal of information", which points out that ...
Recently more than 150 post-graduate students and young scientists presented an open letter to the Green Party via The Spinoff, encouraging them to reconsider their position on genetic modification. Their target is tackling climate change issues.[1] Can any party continue to be dismissive about genetic modification (GM) contributing to ...
by Deirdre O’Neill Under Thatcher and then Blair and continuing up until our contemporary moment, the working class has seen its culture slowly and progressively destroyed. The change from an industrial society to a service society produced a marked shift in focus from the working class as the backbone of ...
Since 2013, the Australian government has detained refugees without trial in Pacific gulags, where they are abused, tortured, and driven to suicide. The policy is not just an abuse of human rights and possible crime against humanity; it has also had a corrosive effect on the states Australia uses as ...
It seems fair to say that we currently live in a problematic political moment in world history. Democracies are in decline and dictatorships are on the rise. Primordial, sectarian and post-modern divisions have re-emerged, are on the rise or have been accentuated by political evolutions of the moment such as ...
Last month, Greenpeace head Russel Norman surrendered his speaking slot at an EPA conference to student climate activist Sorcha Carr, who told the EPA exactly what she thought of them. It was a bold move, which confronted both regulators and polluters (or, as the EPA calls them, "stakeholders") with the ...
The core principle supposedly underlying New Zealand's electoral finance regime is transparency: parties can accept large donations from rich people wanting to buy policy, but only if they tell the public they've been bought. Most parties abide by this, so we know that TOP was wholly-owned by Gareth Morgan, and ...
Today is a Member's Day, probably the second-to-last one of the year, and its a big one, with the Third Reading of David Seymour's End of Life Choice Bill. last Member's Day it was reported back from committee, after MPs voted narrowly to make it subject to a (rules TBA) ...
Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change.If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, please send it to climate.change@stuff.co.nzThe growth of the human population over the last 70 ...
by The Council of Disobedient Women In her excellent oral submission to the Abortion reform select committee on 31st October on behalf of Otago University’s Department of Public Health, historian and public health researcher Hera Cook stated: “We would ask that the committee not use the term ‘pregnant persons’ and ...
by Don Franks In 1957, E M Forster wrote, of his greatest work: “The India described in ‘A Passage to India’ no longer exists either politically or socially. Change had begun even at the time the book was published ( 1924) and during the following quarter of a century it ...
The Referendums Framework Bill was due back from select committee today. But there's no report on it. Instead, the bill has been bounced back to the House under Standing order 29593) because the Committee didn't bother to produce one. They probably tried. But given the membership of the committee (which ...
Two years into New Zealand’s Labour-led government, the long-delayed Zero Carbon Bill became law on 7 November. Passed essentially unanimously, the lengthy public debates and political manoeuvring faded away until the final passage was even anticlimactic: Flipping through the @nzstuff@DomPost I was starting to wonder if I’d dreamt ...
Now the Zero Carbon Bill is law, what's next? Obviously, the ETS changes currently before select committee are going to be the next battleground. But we're also going to get a good idea of where we're going, and if the progress the Zero Carbon Act promises is good enough, during ...
Grant PearceThe effects of the current Australian bushfires in New South Wales and Queensland (and also again in California) are devastating and far-reaching. To date, the fires have resulted in several lives being lost and many homes and properties destroyed. Here in New Zealand, the impacts have been only ...
A passing comment in a post the other day about the labour force participation rates of older people prompted me to pull down the fuller data and see what we could see about various participation rates over the decades since the HLFS began in 1986. As it happens, the ...
Distract And Divert: The rise of what we have come to call “Identity Politics” represents the ideological manifestation of the ruling class’s objective need to destroy class politics, and of the middle-class’s subjective need to justify their participation in the process.THE RELIEF of the ruling class can only be imagined. ...
"I saw a newspaper picture,From the political campaignA woman was kissing a child,Who was obviously in pain.She spills with compassion,As that young child'sFace in her hands she gripsCan you imagine all that greed and avariceComing down on that child's lips?" ...
Dr Matt Boyd, Prof Michael Baker, Prof Nick WilsonThe Global Health Security Index which considers pandemic threats has just been published. Unfortunately, NZ scores approximately half marks (54/100), coming in 35th in the world rankings – far behind Australia. This poor result suggests that the NZ Government needs to ...
The Zero Carbon Act is inadequate, with a weak methane target designed to give farmers a free ride. But it turns out it could have been worse: Climate Change Minister James Shaw was so desperate to get National on board, he wanted to gut that target, and leave it in ...
The Herald reprints an Australian story on a couple of tragic deaths in Bali from drinking cocktails that had methanol in them. The story argues that methanol is likely the result of home distillation. But what the young tourists were experiencing was far from a hangover. They’d consumed a toxic cocktail ...
Last month, the police announced a trial of specialist roaming armed units, which would drive round (poor, brown) areas in armoured SUVs, armed to the teeth. When they announced the trial, they told us it was about having armed police "ready to attend major incidents at any time if needed". ...
Spain went to the polls today in the second elections this year, after the Socialists (who had come to power in a confidence vote, then gone to the polls in April) rejected the offer of a coalition with the left-wing PoDemos, and instead decided to gamble n a better outcome ...
A couple of days ago I attended (and spoke at) the University of Waikato’s “LearnFest” event. There were lots of talks and sessions on very diverse aspects of teaching, mostly at tertiary level. One was by Myra Williamson from Te Piringa Faculty of Law here at Waikato, on Contract Cheating ...
There will be a transit of Mercury – the planet Mercury will pass across the face of the Sun – taking place at sunrise in New Zealand on Tuesday, 12th November. It was by observing such an event 250 years ago that James Cook and his scientist colleagues were able ...
Since becoming the world’s first openly transexual mayor and member of parliament, Georgina Beyer has been recognised as a trailblazer for trans rights. Daphna Whitmore talks with her about where she sees the current trans movement We start out talking about legislation the government put on hold that would have ...
If FFNZ really put their faith in “Top Medical Journals” they would now be amending their billboards to recognise new research results. Image from FFNZ but updated to agree with the latest research. ...
National Messiah? Chris Luxon identifies himself as an evangelical Christian. If he is genuine in this self-characterisation, then he will take every opportunity his public office provides to proselytise on behalf of his faith. He will also feel obliged to bear witness against beliefs and practices he believes to be ...
I'm going to make a Reckless Prediction™ that the Tories have 'topped out' in the 'poll of polls' / Britain Elects multipoll tracker at about 38%, and in the next week we will start to see Labour creep up on them.In fact, we might just be seeing the start of ...
by The Council of Disobedient Women Lizzie Marvelly: “I may have missed this… has @afterellen gone all terf-y? Or am I reading something incorrectly? “ https://twitter.com/LizzieMarvelly/status/1191840059105742849 After Ellen is a lesbian website that is unashamedly pro-lesbian, as you’d expect. So why is Ms Marvelly so bothered about lesbians having their ...
Did you know there once was a time when it was illegal to be a gypsy (aka Romani) in Britain?That was between 1530, when the Egyptians Act was passed, and 1856, when it was repealed.Amongst other things, the act forbade the entry of 'Egyptians' into England, ordered those already there ...
Some days I sit and think, “what will I write…?” What do you say when you get to 1000 posts? Maybe you just start where you are, diverge to where this all began, then offer a collection of reader’s favourite posts, and a few of your own? (And throw in ...
Counter-Puncher: The “activists” and “radicals” (his own words) from the Indian community who took such strong exception to Shane Jones’ remarks about Immigration NZ’s treatment of arranged marriages, may end up bitterly regretting their intervention. Jones is not the sort of person who turns the other cheek to his critics.SHANE ...
In the spirit of Remember, remember the fifth of November, let's keep this in mind FOREVER.
Oh dear. Extraordinary interview on PM with Andrew Bridgen and @EvanHD just now. Bridgen was defending Jacob Rees Mogg’s Grenfell comments. Evan asked him if JRM had meant to say he would have left ...
Collision Course? In conditions of ideological white-out, the international bankers’ “Woop-Woop! Pull Up!” warning may have come too late to save global capitalism.WHAT DOES IT MEAN when international bankers are more willing to embrace radical solutions than our politicians and their electors? At both the International Monetary Fund and the ...
Pertussis (whooping cough) is a conundrum. It is a disease that was described hundreds of years ago and the bacteria that causes it (Bordetella pertussis) isolated in 1906. We have had vaccines for about 80 years but this disease is defiant in the face of human immunity. I wanted to ...
The Zero Carbon Bill has just passed its third reading, uanimously. In the end, National supported it - but we all know they'll turn around and gut it the moment they regain power. Meanwhile, I guess ACT's David Seymour didn't even bother to show up. I am on record as ...
Dr Lindsay Robertson, Dr Jerram Bateman, Professor Janet HoekMembers of the public health community hold divergent views on how access to vaping products or electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) products should be arranged. Some believe ENDS should be as widely available as smoked tobacco and argue for liberal ...
When the Police were trying to cover up for the National Party over Dirty Politics, they went all-in with their abuses of power. They illegally search Nicky Hager's house, violating his journalistic privilege and invading his privacy. They unlawfully acquired Hager's bank records. They did the same to left-wing blogger ...
Last month, in response to a wave of protests by Extinction Rebellion, the British government purported to ban their protests from the whole of London. It was a significant interference with the freedoms of expression and assembly, and another sign of the country's decline into tyranny. But now, a court ...
Last year, the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security reported on significant problems with the intelligence warrant system. While they were unwilling to declare any warrant "irregular" (meaning unlawful) due to the recent law change, they were also not willing to give the system a clean bill of health. Now, they've ...
The National Party has come out in support of encouraging greater vaccination uptake. But it sure isn’t the way I’d do it. National’s suggested docking the benefits of those on benefit whose kids aren’t keeping up with their vaccinations. Some in National have suggested extending that to payments under Working ...
Feeding The Flames: It is simply not enough to demand an end to “corruption”, or “inequality”, or the overbearing influence of the authorities in Beijing. These are just “lowest common denominator” demands: the sort of slogans that pull people onto the streets. They are not a plan.WHERE’S THE PLAN? Across ...
The labour market statistics have been released, and unemployment has risen to 4.2%. There are 115,000 unemployed - 11,000 fewer than when Labour took office. In that time the minimum wage has gone up by $2 an hour, which shows that the right's fears about increases causing unemployment are simply ...
The Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee has called for submissions on Andrew Little's tyrannicalTerrorism Suppression (Control Orders) Bill. Normally I encourage participation in the democratic process. I am not doing so in this case. Instead, I encourage all of you to boycott this submissions process, and to post ...
Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change.If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, please send it to climate.change@stuff.co.nzIf tiny concentrations of carbon dioxide can hold enough heat ...
Aviation is one of the fastest growing sources of greenhouse gas emissions, and within it, one of the fastest sources is elite travel: billionaires flitting around the world in their private jets, spewing excessive pollution into the atmosphere just so they can avoid mixing with us dirty peasants. But in ...
That's what we face if we don't stop climate change, according to a warning from 11,000 scientists:The world’s people face “untold suffering due to the climate crisis” unless there are major transformations to global society, according to a stark warning from more than 11,000 scientists. “We declare clearly and unequivocally ...
by Phil Duncan Here’s just a few of the kind of threats issued day in and day out against gender-critical women – feminists, marxists, etc – overwhelmingly by MEN (albeit men identifying as women). “Kill all Terfs”. “Shoot a Terf today”. “All terfs deserve to be shot in the head”. ...
This is the third of the synopses of parts of the opening chapter of John Smith’s Imperialism in the 21st Century (New York, Monthly Review Press, 2016). The synopsis and commentary below is written by Phil Duncan. Unlike the humble cup of coffee and t-shirt that we looked at in ...
Mark Patterson, Spokesperson for Primary Industries Today the Government announced the delivery of the promise to protect New Zealand interests by applying a new National Interest Test to the sales of our most sensitive and high risk assets to overseas buyers. This further strengthening of the Overseas Investment Act will ...
The Coalition Government is delivering on its promise to protect New Zealanders’ interests by applying a new national interest test to the sales of our most sensitive and high-risk assets to overseas buyers. Under current Overseas Investment Act (OIA) rules, assets such as ports and airports, telecommunications infrastructure, electricity and ...
Rt Winston Peters, Leader of New Zealand First Allegations raised this morning by Stuff Limited / Fairfax concern a party matter but I am confident that New Zealand First has operated within electoral laws, now and for the last 27 years. Declarable donations were declared to the Electoral Commission. Our ...
The chairman of the Upper North Island Supply Chain Strategy (UNISCS) working group, Wayne Brown, has hit back at critics of his group’s recommendations to relocate the Ports of Auckland cargo operations to Whangarei’s deepwater port of Northport. The working group's recommendation to close Auckland waterfront to all but cruise ...
Jenny Marcroft MP, Spokesperson for Health New Zealand First backs the public to decide on the End of Life Choice Bill via a referendum at the 2020 General Election. The Bill, with New Zealand First’s referendum provision incorporated, passed its final reading in Parliament this evening. New Zealand First Spokesperson for ...
Darroch Ball, Spokesperson for Justice New Zealand First is proud that a key Coalition Agreement commitment which will provide for a more transparent and effective criminal justice system has been realised. Legislation to establish the Criminal Cases Review Commission, an independent body focused on identifying and responding to possible miscarriages of ...
"Today we have made a choice that will leave a legacy... I hope that means that future generations will see that we, in New Zealand, were on the right side of history." - Jacinda Ardern, Third Reading of the Zero Carbon Bill ...
Darroch Ball, New Zealand First List MP A Member’s bill has been proposed that would provide income tax exemptions for all New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel while on operational deployment overseas. The Income Tax (Exemption for Salary or Wages of NZDF Members on Active Deployment) Amendment Bill proposed by New Zealand First ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, New Zealand First Leader New Zealand First is proud to have brought common sense to the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Bill, which passed its final reading in Parliament today. Party Leader Rt Hon Winston Peters says months of hard work went into negotiating a balanced ...
Jenny Marcroft MP, Spokesperson for Health New Zealand First has listened to calls to recognise paramedics as registered health professionals under the Health Practitioners’ Competence Assurance Act (the Act).Today, the Coalition Government announced plans for paramedics to be registered as health practitioners under the Act, and the establishment of a ...
We began the week by commemorating the New Zealand Wars and celebrating a major increase in the number of teachers. Then, we were busy supporting offenders into work and getting our rail back on track after years of underinvestment. And that's just the start! ...
In October I was sworn in as the Mayor of Lower Hutt.It’s the privilege of my life to serve Hutt people as their Mayor. There is something really special to be able to serve the community where I was raised, and where I live. ...
An independent Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission is a step closer after it unanimously passed its first vote in Parliament today. The Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission Bill lays the groundwork for establishing the Commission as a fully independent crown entity – delivering on a key recommendation of He Ara ...
We’ve improved border security with the NZeTA, New Zealand Electronic Travel Authority, which helps us to screen travellers for border and immigration risks off-shore before they travel to New Zealand. It was launched in August and became mandatory on 1 October 2019. More than 500,000 NZeTAs have been issued since ...
A proposed national plan of action to reduce the number of seabirds caught in fisheries is being circulated for public feedback. Fisheries Minister Stuart Nash and Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage say New Zealand is a global centre of seabird diversity with about 145 species in our waters. It has more ...
The Government is delivering on its promise to protect New Zealanders’ interests by applying a new national interest test to the sales of our most sensitive and high risk assets to overseas buyers. Associate Finance Minister David Parker said under current Overseas Investment Act rules, assets such as ports and ...
The Government is building special housing to accommodate one of Aotearoa’s greatest taonga- our kaumātua, says the Minister for Māori Development, Hon Nanaia Mahuta. Speaking at a National Kaumātua Service Providers Conference in Rotorua today, the Minister reinforced the importance kaumātua play in maintaining and passing on mātauranga Māori, knowledge, ...
Eleven men from a pilot forestry training programme for prisoners in Northland now have full time jobs or job offers upon release, Corrections Minister Kelvin Davis and Forestry Minister Shane Jones announced today. The ‘release to work’ programme was a collaboration between Te Uru Rākau and the Department of Corrections, ...
Minister of State Services Chris Hipkins today introduced into Parliament a Bill that will make it easier for the public service to tackle the biggest challenges facing Governments. The Bill represents the most significant change in the public service in 30 years. The State Sector Act 1988 will be repealed ...
The families of more than 416,000 students will be better off next year as their schools have signed up to the Government’s donations scheme, Education Minister Chris Hipkins said today. The scheme will see almost $62.5 million in additional Government funding go to schools nationwide next year. “I’m really pleased ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has announced further support as the Government of Samoa responds to a serious measles outbreak. “New Zealand will deploy a further 18 vaccination nurses, bringing the total to 30 working in Samoa over the next four weeks,” Mr Peters said. “A New Zealand Medical Assistance ...
Fa’atalofa atu, malo e lelei, Kia ora koutou katoa Thank you to the Child Poverty Action Group for asking me to be here today to provide an update on some of the things that have been happening across my the social development portfolio. Can I firstly acknowledge the vast ...
***Please check against delivery*** Good morning everyone. It is a pleasure to be with you this morning to open this year’s New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing Conference and AGM. Firstly, thank you Dr Alan Jackson, NZTR Chair for your introduction. And let us acknowledge also: The NZTR Board; Dean McKenzie, Chair ...
The Government has delivered on its promise to the over one million New Zealanders who now rent to make it fairer and more secure, Associate Minister of Housing (Public Housing) Kris Faafoi has announced today. Both renters and landlords will benefit from the suite of practical changes to the Residential ...
A marine conservation milestone - the 20th anniversary of the establishment of Te Tapuwae o Rongokako Marine Reserve - is being celebrated today at a community event in Tairāwhiti/East Coast attended by the Minister of Conservation, Eugenie Sage. “The creation of this marine reserve in November 1999 was a game ...
The Government is asking the food industry to step up work to tackle obesity including reducing sugar, fat and salt in their products, better information for consumers, and tighter restrictions on advertising to children. Health Minister David Clark and Food Safety Minister Damien O’Connor have responded to a ...
ew, modern emergency department and outpatient facilities at Queenstown’s Lakes District Hospital mean better emergency care for the growing tourist mecca’s visitors and locals, says Health Minister David Clark. Today Dr Clark officially opened the hospital’s redeveloped Emergency Department and Outpatient facilities. The new facilities include: • An extended Emergency Department ...
Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter says today’s release of sexual and reproductive health data reinforces the significance of the Government’s commitment to providing free or very low-cost contraception. The Ministry of Health today published statistics from the Ministry of Health’s 2014/15 Health Survey. “It is important people can make ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced that at the request of the Samoan Government, New Zealand will be providing further support to Samoa as it faces a worsening measles outbreak. “In response to a request from the people of Samoa, New Zealand is providing 3000 measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) ...
“The new Disability Action Plan 2019–2023 moves us towards the inclusive and accessible New Zealand that this government has committed to,” Minister for Disability Issues Carmel Sepuloni announced today. “The Action Plan was designed by disabled people, their family and supporters, the disability sector and government agencies. It will ensure ...
Third Singapore-New Zealand Defence Ministers’ Meeting 14 November 2019 Joint Statement 1. Defence Ministers Ron Mark and Dr Ng Eng Hen today conducted their third annual Singapore-New Zealand Defence Ministers’ Meeting in Singapore. 2. Building on the Enhanced Partnership signed between both countries in May this year, this annual meeting ...
A Bill to improve the court system’s response to sexual violence has passed its first reading in Parliament today. Justice Minister Andrew Little says the Sexual Violence Legislation Bill will reduce the trauma sexual violence complainants experience in court, while maintaining defendants’ fundamental rights and making sure the trial process ...
Streamlined payment practices are a step closer for Kiwi businesses with the formal launch of New Zealand’s e-Invoicing framework. Small Business Minister Stuart Nash says the government has now established the structure to enable automated and direct data exchange between the accounting systems of buyers and sellers. “The move to ...
Another 51 quarantine officers and four new biosecurity detector dog teams will help protect New Zealand from invasive pests and diseases this summer, says Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor. “The Government is delivering on its commitment to strengthen New Zealand’s biosecurity system and support our valuable primary sector “New Zealand’s flora, fauna ...
A new report has found New Zealand’s space sector contributed $1.69 billion to the economy in the last financial year and employs 12,000 people, Minister for Economic Development Phil Twyford announced today. The report by Deloitte was commissioned by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment and shows New Zealand ...
Judge Coral Shaw has been appointed as the new Chair of the Royal Commission into Historical Abuse in State Care and in the Care of Faith-based Institutions, Internal Affairs Minister Tracey Martin announced today. "Judge Shaw, who is currently one of the inquiry commissioners, is extremely well qualified for the ...
The Government has confirmed its third major mental health facility upgrade since the Budget, this time at Palmerston North Hospital. The Prime Minister and Health Minister today visited MidCentral DHB to announce that $30 million has been allocated to upgrade its acute mental health facility. It follows earlier announcements in ...
The roll out of the National Bowel Screening Programme has reached the halfway mark, with 10 out of 20 District Health Boards now part of the programme. MidCentral DHB, which covers Palmerston North, Manawatu and surrounding districts, this week became the latest to DHB to offer free bowel screening to ...
The Government welcomes PHARMAC’s decision to fund a vaccine to protect young people from meningococcal disease from 1 December this year. “Meningococcal disease is a serious threat which people at higher risk should be protected from,” says Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter. “The combined pharmaceutical budget was increased by ...
Groups involved with innovative fisheries research projects are encouraged to apply for government support in the latest funding round from the Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures programme. Fisheries Minister Stuart Nash says the SFF Futures funding is designed to be flexible enough to support small or large projects across a ...
The Government has fixed an issue affecting how Immigration New Zealand has processed visa applications for culturally arranged marriages, which will now see a consistent process applied which ensures people with legitimate arranged marriages can visit New Zealand while also preventing any rorting of the system. Earlier this year Immigration ...
The Royal Commission into the Attacks on Christchurch Mosques will report back on 30 April 2020 to give it more time to hear submissions and consider information, Internal Affairs Minister Tracey Martin announced today. The Royal Commission was originally scheduled to report back to Government by 10 December 2019. “There has ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Washington DC today to attend a ministerial meeting focused on defeating ISIS, and to continue pursuing New Zealand’s trade opportunities. Mr Peters will participate in a meeting of Foreign and Defence Ministers from key countries contributing to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS. ...
The recently crowned Bird of the Year, the hoiho/yellow eyed penguin, is getting a much needed helping hand alongside more than 168 other community conservation projects announced Minister for Conservation Eugenie Sage today. 168 community conservation projects throughout New Zealand are benefiting from $8 million in government grants, including $500,000 ...
Controls on assault rifles and semi-automatic firearms are to be broadened to include some types of pistols, under changes to a bill currently making its way through Parliament. Police Minister Stuart Nash has tabled a Supplementary Order Paper to the Arms Legislation Bill, which is currently before a Select Committee ...
Minister of Defence Ron Mark will travel to Singapore today to conduct a counterpart visit and to co-chair the third annual Singapore-New Zealand Defence Ministers’ Meeting with his counterpart, Minister for Defence Dr Ng Eng Hen. “Singapore is one of our most important defence partners in the region, and our ...
Nelson’s Salisbury School is to be rebuilt, creating a modern and suitable learning environment for students at the residential special school, Education Minister Chris Hipkins and Associate Education Minister Tracey Martin announced today. The school for girls aged 8-15, in Richmond, was earmarked for closure by National until the process ...
The panel undertaking a comprehensive review of the Resource Management Act has identified the main issues to be addressed and options for reform and is calling for feedback to inform its final report. In July the Government announced the comprehensive review of the resource management system, including the RMA - ...
An important safety valve has been added to New Zealand’s criminal justice system with the third reading of the Criminal Cases Review Commission Bill today. The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) will investigate claimed miscarriages of justice. “We’ve seen how our justice system can very occasionally get things spectacularly wrong, ...
Racing Minister Winston Peters welcomes the tabling of the Racing Industry Transition Agency (RITA) 2019 Annual Report in Parliament today. He says the 2019 Annual Report marks the point when New Zealand’s racing industry’s decline was arrested and a turnaround started. RITA’s 2019 Annual Report recorded an industry net profit ...
The New Zealand Government is today sending 21 firefighters to help fight the ongoing catastrophic Australian bushfires. “The fires in Australia are in some of the toughest, most challenging conditions ever,” says Internal Affairs Minister Tracey Martin. “As of yesterday morning, there were 100 active bushfire-related incidents across Queensland and ...
More frontline support for schools through a new education agency, as part of a redesigned Ministry of Education More support for principals and school boards including through a new centre of leadership and local leadership advisor roles New independent disputes panels for parents and students Management of school property ...
Power Play - Rumours of dodgy political donations, Winston Peters full of bluster and denial, and potentially a drawn-out series of combative but ultimately meaningless exchanges with the press gallery. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The government has overhauled its much-criticised robo-debt scheme which has seen many welfare recipients asked to repay money they do not owe. A Tuesday email to staff in the Human Services department’s customer compliance division ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The government has overhauled its much-criticised robo-debt scheme which has seen many welfare recipients asked to repay money they do not owe. A Tuesday email to staff in the Human Services department’s customer compliance division ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Karleen Gribble, Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Western Sydney University Every summer in Australia, bushfires, cyclones and floods threaten lives and properties. Preparing for these emergencies includes creating an emergency kit that contains everything you and your baby will ...
I am an everyday Mum and I am scared. My youngest child is 4 years old. In 2100 she will turn 85. What will that world look like? On our current trajectory, it’s not looking great. You have all heard the consequences of every degree that goes up in ...
Sam Brooks gives you the lowdown on Disney+, the exhaustive streaming service launching today.What on this good green world is Disney+?Disney+ is a streaming service run by, as you might expect, Disney. If you need someone to explain what Disney is to you, then this service probably isn’t for you. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Caroline Wake, Senior Lecturer in Theatre and Performance, UNSW Australia invests heavily in its major festivals: A$5 million in state government funding for Sydney Festival, $7 million for Perth, and $9 million for Adelaide. Funding for festivals has remained relatively constant over ...
Forest & Bird is calling on New Zealanders to back strong rules to protect penguins, albatross, and other seabirds from fishing nets and hooks, as the Government releases its National Plan of Action on Seabirds for consultation . ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Colin Klein, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Australian National University Why do people believe conspiracy theories? Is it because of who they are, what they’ve encountered, or a combination of both? The answer is important. Belief in conspiracy theories helps fuel climate change ...
There are many things up for debate in Parliament this week, including wheel clamping, farm debt and loan sharks. Among the work load here are few of the key things to keep an eye out for. ...
After months of silence on Ihumātao, the government is considering a loan to Auckland Council to buy the occupied Fletcher-owned land, according to an RNZ report.What is the dispute over the land? Fletcher Residential bought a section of land in South Auckland in 2014 for $19m with plans to build a ...
Organisations from across Auckland have gathered to come up with solutions to make the city safer for women at night – including a commitment from Uber NZ to make it easier to report harassment and abuse, write Emma McInnes and Amanda Gilmore.Over 70% of women in Aotearoa have been a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amanda Tattersall, Postdoc in Urban Geography and Research Lead at Sydney Policy Lab. Host of ChangeMakers Podcast., University of Sydney While thousands of Hong Kongers have protested “like water” for the past six months – flowing through the city with seemingly spontaneous ...
Tuesday, 19 November: An international team of scientists have just found that nitrous oxide emissions are rising much faster than had been previously thought. ...
The Labour led coalition government is continuing to create homelessness. The impact of immigration, failure of Kiwibuild, and attacks on the rental market, have resulted in the opposite outcomes that New Zealanders were promised. ...
Kris Faafoi, ranked 17th in Cabinet, emerged as the politician who most impressed top chief executives for ministerial performance in this year’s NZ Herald CEOs survey. It is the first time in the history of the Mood of the Boardroom survey that a minister ranked towards the tailend of Cabinet, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Bowman, Professor of Pyrogeography and Fire Science, University of Tasmania Last week’s catastrophic fires on Australia’s east coast – and warnings of more soon to come – will become all too common as climate change gathers pace. And as the challenges ...
NZ First leader Winston Peters has responded to allegations his party breached electoral law, saying he's confident the party has always acted within the law. ...
19 November 2019: In May 2019, Hon Judith Collins raised some concerns about KiwiBuild with our Office. We decided to look into those concerns as part of the 2018/19 annual audit of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development. We have now completed that ...
The Radio New Zealand headline was emphatic– Ihumātao protest: Govt will not intervene, PM says. Some four months later we can put this into the same political leadership category as Bill Clinton’s equally emphatic “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.” The RNZ headline sat atop a ...
A global movement which has transformed the way young people engage with philanthropy is launching in New Zealand and 10x10 is encouraging young Kiwis to choose charity over avocado toast at its first event in Auckland this month. ...
In the second part of a new event series looking at the future of Auckland, The Spinoff and Auckland Council host In My Backyard: Glen Innes, to ask what the suburb can teach the rest of the city about housing. Photographer Brendan Kitto shares his images from the 2016 exhibition Redevelop ...
Employees of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research say they don’t want to take industrial action, but management have backed them into a corner. ...
NZ First leader Winston Peters is refusing to comment on news reports raising questions about how the party uses the New Zealand First Foundation to handle donations. ...
The Finance Minister Grant Robertson says it's too early to definitively say the Government is looking to lend millions of dollars to Auckland Council, to buy disputed land at Ihumātao. ...
The government will strengthen overseas investment rules by assessing whether the sale of high-risk assets - including "significant media entities" - is in the national interest. ...
The Public Service Association supports a Bill introduced by the government yesterday that aims to replace the State Sector Act 1988 with a new Public Service Act. ...
A quiz from the NZ Initiative got people talking this morning, mostly because it showed we were a nation of dumb-dumbs. Alex Braae, a person of limited intelligence and vast general knowledge, took the test. People who know me often conclude that there’s one area in which I really shine – ...
Leaks of NZ First Foundation records raise big questions about the party’s funding, and there’s every chance of more to come. A glance at history suggests the scale of the problem. An early election may not be a bad idea at all, suggests Danyl MclauchlanIt’s happening.During its time in government ...
The Independent Police Conduct Authority has found that Police were justified in using a Police dog during the arrest of a man in Auckland on 9 November 2018. ...
A review of the Crown Minerals Act 1991 to ensure it supports the long-term well-being of New Zealanders has been launched today with the release of a discussion document. ...
The A2 Milk Company expects continued strong growth for its speciality dairy products with increased marketing investment in China and the United States. ...
Greenpeace protesters have covered Parliament lawn with replica coral this morning, calling on the Government to take urgent action on bottom trawling. ...
Chlöe Swarbrick’s “OK boomer” retort in Parliament has proved to be the spark that set alight a dry field of latent generational angst. The debate over the remark rolls on and on, revealing that generational warfare is a growing cleavage in New Zealand. Increasingly, political problems of housing, inequality, climate ...
Can the flagship Disney+ show The Mandalorian serve the Star Wars diehards at the same time as the casual viewer, asks Sam Brooks.A quick multiple-choice test to find out if The Mandalorian is for you or not.Q. Does the title The Mandalorian mean anything to you?A) No.B) Kind of? It’s definitely part of ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s content by Dr Bryce Edwards.NZ First Matt Shand (Stuff): NZ First Foundation dodging electoral rules? Records suggest breaches Matt ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is labelling the Government and Auckland Council cowards, for reportedly giving in to the thugs occupying privately owned Ihumātao and proposing to use taxpayer funds and Auckland Council to buy the land. Radio NZ is reporting ...
Auckland one of the worst cities in the world for public transport, road taxes according to new data; and substantial benefit hikes appear off the Government's agenda. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rochelle Einboden, Lecturer, The Susan Wakil School of Nursing and Midwifery, University of Sydney In Victoria, 35 young people aged 12-17 years ended their lives by suicide between 2007 and 2019 – all were entangled in the child protection system. This was ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alex Haslam, Professor of Psychology and ARC Laureate Fellow, The University of Queensland The ABC’s Australia Talks project aims to stimulate a conversation on a broad sweep of topics — from job security and sexual habits to national pride and personal finances. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Pep Canadell, Chief research scientist, CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere; and Executive Director, Global Carbon Project, CSIRO Nitrous oxide (N₂O) (more commonly known as laughing gas) is a powerful contributor to global warming. It is 265 times more effective at trapping heat in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hilary Hollingsworth, Principal Research Fellow, Australian Council for Educational Research Australian teachers are in the thick of producing end-of-year reports. In many schools, the report writing process begins several weeks – or even months – before reports are eventually released. This process ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future. (attributed to Danish physicist Niels Bohr) The difficulty of making predictions has long been known, but the rise of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Claire Smith, Professor of Archaeology, College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, Flinders University The Stuart Highway in the Northern Territory is dotted with around 300 termite mounds, dressed as people. They are reminiscent of giant, ochre coloured “snowmen” in their distinctly ...
Almost half a million dollars in political donations appear to have been hidden inside a secret slush fund controlled by a coterie of Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters’ trusted advisers. ...
Sources tell RNZ the Crown is considering loaning money to the council to buy the disputed land, with Fletcher seeking $40m - more than double what it paid in 2014. ...
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Christchurch stadium funding in the spotlight, more trouble for NZ First, and medical students caught in rort.Construction hasn’t even come close to starting on the new Christchurch stadium and the money is looking shaky. Stuff’s Michael Hayward reports a business case is ...
New rental reforms aren’t about shafting landlords, they’re about requesting that those who built an industry around housing accept that with industry, comes regulation, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell. ...
Severe storm surges will get bigger around parts of the South Island and smaller around the North Island as the climate changes, two studies have now predicted. ...
Bernard Hickey visited E-Go’s electric car factory in Aachen, Germany to find how it used a 5G network to flip car-making on its head, and how it’s an example of what Industry 4.0 could look like in New Zealand. ...
Were Fonterra’s Open Gates events a shallow PR stunt, or was there something deeper going on? Alex Braae went to Mangatawhiri to find out.This feature is made possible thanks to the Spinoff Members Fund. We need your help to make journalism that matters. For more information, click here.Walking into the Fonterra ...
It was meant to ‘draw a line under the whole episode’. So how did it turn into an unmitigated PR disaster, asks former Edelman executive David Brain.The thing about the Royal Family is that everything they do is PR really. I mean in the old sense of image and spin. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Clarke, Associate Professor, National Security College, Australian National University This past weekend, The New York Times’ China correspondents, Chris Buckley and Austin Ramzy, published an expose of over 400 internal Chinese government documents relating to Beijing’s mass detentions of Uighurs, Kazakhs ...
Open Mike 24/06/2018 
Stuff's story on NZDF's negligence around its Afghan firing ranges has produced a result, with a commitment from the Prime Minister for an urgent cleanup. But this doesn't mean NZDF is accepting responsibility for the deaths and injuries that have occured - they're still refusing compensation. Which given that the ...8 hours ago
Didn't See It Coming: NZ Herald columnist Lizzie Marvelly's latest column merits serious scrutiny because such a clear example of anti-democratic thinking is encountered only rarely on the pages of the daily press. Which is not to say that the elitism which lies at the heart of such social disparagement ...11 hours ago
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh Initially it was reported that in an aerial bombardment that took place on August 30th seven children were massacred; the figure then went up to eight and then on November 11th Noticias Uno reported that, according to people from the community in close proximity to the ...13 hours ago
Words and images by Jacqui Gibson Gone are Auckland Museum’s days of doing science using a museum-centric academic approach, after Māori land rights holders Ngāti Kuri gave the museum an ultimatum.
MediaWorks announced in October 2019 that it intended to sell off its struggling television business and cancel or cut back on several popular local programmes, including New Zealand Today, Married at First Sight New Zealand and 7 Days. Its radio and outdoor advertising arms are currently performing well, but MediaWorks’ ...2 days ago
Some readers may remember that I mentioned last year that I was applying for NZ citizenship. I filled out the paperwork and had my original citizenship interview in February. Everything went well until they discovered that, because I had spent five months in the US in 2017, I had not ...2 days ago
There is an article in The Conversation, written by Jeremy P. Shapiro (Adjunct Assistant Professor of Psychological Sciences, Case Western Reserve University), about what he sees as the psychologically-based underpinnings of three main matters that seem to vex people all around the planet. The article is titled “The Thinking ...3 days ago
. . Blogger Martyn Bradbury has won his case against unreasonable search and surveillance against the NZ Police; and subsequent Police attempts to produce evidence in secrecy, in a closed Court. His case highlights a disturbing growing trend in Aotearoa New Zealand for State power to be used against ...4 days ago
by The Council of Disobedient Women In her excellent oral submission to the Abortion reform select committee on 31st October on behalf of Otago University’s Department of Public Health, historian and public health researcher Hera Cook stated: “We would ask that the committee not use the term ‘pregnant persons’ and ...7 days ago
If FFNZ really put their faith in “Top Medical Journals” they would now be amending their billboards to recognise new research results. Image from FFNZ but updated to agree with the latest research. ... 1 week ago
Mark Patterson, Spokesperson for Primary Industries Today the Government announced the delivery of the promise to protect New Zealand interests by applying a new National Interest Test to the sales of our most sensitive and high risk assets to overseas buyers. This further strengthening of the Overseas Investment Act will ...5 hours ago
We're setting our young people up for success, investing in education around the country. ...1 day ago
An independent Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission is a step closer after it unanimously passed its first vote in Parliament today. The Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission Bill lays the groundwork for establishing the Commission as a fully independent crown entity – delivering on a key recommendation of He Ara ...32 mins ago
Power Play - Rumours of dodgy political donations, Winston Peters full of bluster and denial, and potentially a drawn-out series of combative but ultimately meaningless exchanges with the press gallery. ...44 mins ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The government has overhauled its much-criticised robo-debt scheme which has seen many welfare recipients asked to repay money they do not owe. A Tuesday email to staff in the Human Services department’s customer compliance division ...56 mins ago
Claims of a concerted effort to cloak donations are not yet proven, but there is enough there to concern Jacinda Ardern and the public. ...3 hours ago
I am an everyday Mum and I am scared. My youngest child is 4 years old. In 2100 she will turn 85. What will that world look like? On our current trajectory, it’s not looking great. You have all heard the consequences of every degree that goes up in ...3 hours ago
The Bank of New Zealand (BNZ) has been ordered to add $250 million to its capital reserves after miscalculating its risk. ...3 hours ago
Sam Brooks gives you the lowdown on Disney+, the exhaustive streaming service launching today.What on this good green world is Disney+?Disney+ is a streaming service run by, as you might expect, Disney. If you need someone to explain what Disney is to you, then this service probably isn’t for you. ...4 hours ago
Labour's Māori caucus is pushing for a settlement at Ihumāto, which could include a creative solution. ...4 hours ago
The Commerce Minister is refusing to comment on reports the government is backing a new bid from NZME to buy Stuff. ...5 hours ago
Retirement village and aged care company Arvida has benefited from strong gains in the value of property and improved sales prices. ...6 hours ago
Kris Faafoi, ranked 17th in Cabinet, emerged as the politician who most impressed top chief executives for ministerial performance in this year’s NZ Herald CEOs survey. It is the first time in the history of the Mood of the Boardroom survey that a minister ranked towards the tailend of Cabinet, ...7 hours ago
The Radio New Zealand headline was emphatic – Ihumātao protest: Govt will not intervene, PM says. Some four months later we can put this into the same political leadership category as Bill Clinton’s equally emphatic “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.” The RNZ headline sat atop a ...7 hours ago
The Finance Minister Grant Robertson says it's too early to definitively say the Government is looking to lend millions of dollars to Auckland Council, to buy disputed land at Ihumātao. ...8 hours ago
NZ First leader denies wrongdoing after allegations of donations being funnelled through a foundation to avoid disclosure. ...9 hours ago
The A2 Milk Company expects continued strong growth for its speciality dairy products with increased marketing investment in China and the United States. ...9 hours ago
Auckland one of the worst cities in the world for public transport, road taxes according to new data; and substantial benefit hikes appear off the Government's agenda. ...12 hours ago
Discussions are under way for Auckland Council to buy the disputed Ihumātao land in a bid to break the three-year deadlock. ...12 hours ago
Almost half a million dollars in political donations appear to have been hidden inside a secret slush fund controlled by a coterie of Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters’ trusted advisers. ...12 hours ago
"To me, boxing is art. It is beautiful. It is brutal. It is violent. It is challenging. It is pure." ...15 hours ago
New rental reforms aren’t about shafting landlords, they’re about requesting that those who built an industry around housing accept that with industry, comes regulation, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell. ...15 hours ago
Severe storm surges will get bigger around parts of the South Island and smaller around the North Island as the climate changes, two studies have now predicted. ...15 hours ago
Bernard Hickey visited E-Go’s electric car factory in Aachen, Germany to find how it used a 5G network to flip car-making on its head, and how it’s an example of what Industry 4.0 could look like in New Zealand. ...15 hours ago
John McCrystal reviews a book of maps by someone called John McCrystal. ...15 hours ago
Pat Baskett asks: Are we so worried about methane and agriculture we don’t even think about carbon from vehicles? ...15 hours ago
Two investigators with a meal allowance are hoped to address nationwide inconsistencies with council RMA monitoring and enforcement. ...15 hours ago
Ashley Stanley will join LockerRoom early next year as a full-time writer on women in sport, thanks to a partnership with Sky Sport. ...15 hours ago
Out of control fires, distressed animals, sleepless nights as your suburb turns into a war zone - has our annual fireworks fun gone too far? ...15 hours ago
"Mum and Dad" landlords are likely to turn to property managers, or even exit the market ...24 hours ago
Watched “The Old Curiosity Shop” last night. Daniel Quilp shoulda let go those money bags!
Power is off all day for us so a swap/buy/exchange market up the road for us, then the beach – not bad practice for the times ahead where fun and experience will be had closer to home and closer to hand.
Capitalist extremist identifies homelessness as democracy.
During the Cold War, terms like ‘Democratic Society’, ‘The Free World’ became synonymous with capitalism. These terms were often used interchangeably, (and opportunistically, IMO), as antonyms in reference to Communist societies like Soviet Russia.
In an extraordinary blast from the past, this cold war dog whistle is being dragged up to justify keeping families in cars, on the streets, or bunked up in motels at huge expense to the taxpayer, while tens of thousands of perfectly good houses stand empty.
The problems of homelessness, housing stress, and the housing crisis in this country have been laid at the feet of the past National Government by the current Housing Minister, Phil Twyford. But that we should reverse this policy has been labeled, “Extremist nonsense” by Property Institute of New Zealand chief executive Ashley Church
Stuff.co.nz reporters Rob Stock and John Anthony debunk Ashley Church’s fallacious and self serving justification, noting that other democratic societies have implemented measures to crackdown on empty home owners.
I would encourage the current housing minister to push past the nasty bed baiting spin of Ashley Church, and other self interested parties, and copy Vancouver’s courageous, (and dare I say it, socialist) example.
Related:
The hidden homeless and the speculators
Ashley Church gives the finger to the homeless
To which I would add Anthony Robins’ invisible hand is attached to the very visible and self interested wrist of Ashley Church and the Property Institute, and the landlords and speculators whose interests his organisation exists to protect.
Proof, if you needed it, that capitalists don’t give a shit about anybody but themselves.
In a democratic society we’d ensure that everyone had a place to live and food on the table. It’s only in capitalism that we start accepting excuses from the capitalists as to why people need to be poor and oppressed.
In another context, it was Edward Snowden who once said he regarded meta-data as more valuable than personal data.
The raw data tells the story.
According to the 2013 census, New Zealand’s usually resident population count at 5 March 2013 was 4.242048 million.
In Auckland, the 2013 census counted 33,360 vacant homes.
Nation wide the census counted 36,597 overcrowded residences*
Nation wide 203,820 people in total were recorded as living in these overcrowded residences
Source: Statistics NZ, Census 2013
last updated 26 February, 2018
*Overcrowded means more than two people per bedroom, or bedrooms shared by adults other than couples or by opposite-sex children.
That data doesn’t really tell us much Jenny. What we don’t know is how many of those 33,360 vacant homes are potentially available for rental/sale.
At any given point in time there will always be a large quantity of vacant properties and the reasons they’re empty are many & varied as is the duration of their vacancies. That 33.36k were only vacant at the time of the census, it didn’t mean they were permanently vacant.
Stats give this info;
“An unoccupied dwelling is classified as ’empty’ if it clearly has no current occupants and new occupants are not expected to move in on or before census night. Unoccupied dwellings that are being repaired or renovated are defined as empty dwellings. Unoccupied baches or holiday homes are also defined as empty dwellings.
A dwelling is classified as having ‘residents away’, where occupants of a dwelling are known to be temporarily away and are not expected to return on or before census night.”
The data table for the census unoccupied dwelling count has this at note 1;
“1. Unoccupied dwelling count is made up of ‘residents away’ and ‘empty dwelling’. ”
Anyone on holiday at the time of the census would be ‘residents away’ if they left the house vacant (no-one left behind)
Kia ora DH,
The census recorded 36,597 cases of overcrowding, affecting 203,820 people.
There were two main classifications for unoccupied homes in the census “empty dwelling” and “residents away”. Just as you say, it seems that there was no further breakdown.
We can argue around the margins about how many houses might be empty for valid reasons, And I admit that I may be making a subjective call here, but I the sheer numbers, “empty dwellings” recorded, 141,366 nationally and 33,360 in Auckland, tells a story of unaffordability, in rents and house prices, that puts the majority of these “empty dwellings” out of the reach of many of the people captured in this survey suffering from housing distress.
Maybe when we can get to compare the 2013 figures, with the latest 2018 census figures for housing we might be better informed.
In the meantime we will have to go to other sources to get a handle on the problem.
From an attached link to the main report, Stuff.co.nz reporter Colleen Hawkes asks; “Is it time to address the question of empty ‘ghost houses’?”
*(My emphasis) J.
I might ask Phil Twyford and Phil Goff both: is the suffering of middle and upper class bach owners, and housing speculators really comparable with the suffering of families living with overcrowding, insecurity and homelessness?
I don’t dispute the seriousness of the lack of housing Jenny. I was just making the observation that the numbers look to be wrong on the empty houses and it may be a dead duck. Wrong numbers lead to wrong decisions.
I honestly can’t see that many investors sitting on property like that, they exist for sure but my expectations are that it occurs in the high-wealth areas mostly. You’d need to be pretty cash rich to not need rental income, interest on borrowing chews capital and eats up profits real fast.
Kia ora DH, I strongly suspect that your expectations that many of the 33,360 “empty houses” recorded in Auckland in the census are at the high end of the market. (Of course it would be good to know for sure). But anecdotal evidence seems to back up this expectation.
But forcing these houses back onto the rental or housing market should free up more houses further down the housing ladder. The sheer numbers guarantee it.
Vancouver thought it was worth it.
This is how you do it.
I was moved to make my original comment about this issue by the Stuff.co.nz report yesterday that mentioned Ghost Houses. And also because I had followed Victoria Crone and Phil Goff’s debate on this issue with keen interest. I was hardly aware of what was going on in Vancouver.
However, the more I read yesterday about the Vancouver example, the more fascinated I became. It’s incredible really, Many of the exact same arguments, for and against, that were made by Goff and Crone during the Auckland Mayoral debate were shadowed by the opponents and supporters of this scheme in Vancouver.
One of the arguments made by opponents of the scheme in Vancouver was that it would penalise owners of two homes.
Yes it would, that’s the point, you will be penalised if you keep one of them empty, while other people are struggling to find accomodation.
The lack of self awareness of the ridiculous nature of this objection, as seen by families without any home at all, is breathtaking.
One of the biggest criticisms made here by Goff of Crone’s proposal, was that there would be no method of telling which homes were being left empty.
In reply Crone suggested that water usage would give a good indication of which houses were being left idle and unused.
In opposition to Crone’s suggestion that water use would give a good indication of whether a house was being parked up, I remember one numpty commenting at the time on this website, criticising Crone’s suggestion, writing that this would just encourage absent owners to leave the taps running.
In the end, it seems that Vancouver settled on using the lack of electricity consumption as an indicator of an empty address.
More Innovatively Vancouver also did a poll on property owners asking them to declare whether their properties were empty or not.
This gave some very interesting results, for instance the first thing revealed was that contrary to the racist scape goating of Asians and immigrants as being behind the Ghost House problem, many of the owners of these empty houses were revealed as being Canadians or Americans from across the border. Another thing revealed was that most of the empty properties were in condominiums.
Revealed by the tax itself, was that (in line with DH’s expectations above) many of these empty homes were higher valued properties. Another thing revealed is that the owners of these high end properties were prepared to pay the tax rather than let them out, or put them on the market. (Some paying as much as $250,000 for the 2018 tax period.)
In total the owners of the these properties paid the city $30 million for the privilege of keeping these properties empty.
“Nothing is sacred…..”*
And it seems that nothing is profane, either.
Maybe Phil Twyford instead of stopping short of offering up any measures to discourage the practice, could take a leaf out Victoria Crone’s mayoral campaign
In 2016 Independent Mayoral Candidate, Victoria Crone championed action to address Ghost houses as part of her Mayoral campaign.
Labour Party candidate Phil Goff vehemently opposed Crone over this policy, characterising it as unfairly affecting “bach owners”.
(For God’s sakes, as if bach owners hardships could be anyway comparable to the hardships faced by families with out any home at all, let alone a spare one to go to on for holidays.)
“Crone would up rates on empty baches”
Instead Phil Goff, echoing the Trump Presidential campaign, chose a more traditionally Right Wing strategy; scapegoating immigrants for the housing crisis.
“Phil Goff: Limit immigration to fix housing crisis”
Not only was Goff’s anti-immigrant strategy Right Wing, it was dishonest – immigration policy is set by central government not by the Auckland Region, a fact which he well knows.
* (Except it seems, the interests of property developers, landlords and speculators and other wide boys. A fact we may all come to regret when the housing market is flooded with even more empty and unaffordable houses.)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2531852/Exorcising-Irelands-ghost-estates-Demolition-begins-housing-projects-built-economic-boom-left-country-300-000-homes.html
This TED talk is inspiring as hell. Ft. Curtis “Wall Street” Carroll. *must watch* (although best bits 3 or 4 mins in)
‘A collection of research published last week in a special edition of the major scientific journal Nature showed that Antarctica has lost 3 trillion tonnes of ice over the past 25 years. Half of that melting has happened in the past 5 years. Professor Tim Naish is from the Victoria University of Wellington’s Antarctic Research Centre says we have less than a decade to stop a catastrophe.’
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday/audio/2018650659/tim-naish-says-we-can-still-save-antarctic-ice
a timely and well conducted interview on RNZ this morning.
Top work Ireland taking out Australia in their Rugby series.
I’m really, really sorry about the last-minute decision by the ref.
Really, really sorry not.
Ireland! Celebrate long and hard!
Spiritual sunday tune
another
3rd uplifting hymn from the good oils
Q&A (TV1) had a very good panel this morning.
I’m hopeless remembering names so you will need to link through yourselves.
Subjects: Business confidence taking a dip… the Mexican Border fiasco fallout… and EU Trade negotiations. No babies.
An inherent message to the Labour-led government:
You will need to do a much better job explaining your policy positions/decisions if you want to avoid confusion among voters and mischievous spin from your political opponents gaining traction.
Could not agree more. At the moment those opponents are having a free run on misrepresentation because ministers (with a few exceptions) are not stepping up to properly counter them. If they can’t do the political side of the job, then they need to be replaced with those who can. My cent-worth for the day.
Q&A (TV1) had a very good panel this morning.
I’m hopeless remembering names so you will need to link through yourselves.
Subjects: Business confidence taking a dip… the Mexican Border fiasco fallout… and EU Trade negotiations. No babies.
An inherent message to the Labour-led government:
You will need to do a much better job explaining your policy positions/decisions if you want to avoid confusion among voters and false spin from your political opponents gaining traction.
Could not agree more. At the moment those opponents are having a free run on misrepresentation because ministers (with a few exceptions) are not stepping up to properly counter them. If they can’t do the political side of the job, then they need to be replaced with those who can. My cent-worth for the day.
Anne,
Yes, an interesting Q & A. Not one of Grant’s better performances. Very monotone, he looked tired and listless.
On business confidence, and in fact on forward spending/investment plans, as mentioned by Barnett, I can’t think of one thing the government has done to encourage business.
But I can think of plenty of government decisions that will increase regulatory burdens, that look capricious (oil and gas virtually out of the blue) and which will increase costs (fuel taxes, $20 min wage, a lot more union control, proposed CGT).
In these circumstances, it is not surprising that business are not making new investments, it looks too risky. Safer to keep spare capital in passive investments (either in NZ or offshore) or alternatively not borrow. The business will operate at a lower but safer level.
The cost is lower growth, lower taxes, less employment growth.
Why should business expect to be led by the government?
New Zealand business has had oblique and small policy markers from central government under National’s 9 long and directionless years.
Under Labour’s government, they are being led by the public sector through construction and transport funding, which are the economic policy areas this government really care about anyway. Those areas will continue to boom under this government for the foreseeable future.
Unless your business is rent, housing rent, in which case you are about to be shown the door. The Productivity Commission would firmly encourage landlords to find something else more productive to invest in.
Broadly speaking, this government seeks to tilt real estate capitalism, and that’s about it.
Business organizations in New Zealand don’t want to be led. They’ve been clear about that for a while. They are virulently and relentlessly anti-Labour and they don’t care who knows it, and it won’t change. It’s on business to determine if they want to make something useful out of this Labour-led government.
Meanwhile, headline unemployment is great, property prices are stabilizing, the governments’ investment direction and savings culture are fantastic, and the government is really popular.
”(fuel taxes, $20 min wage, a lot more union control, proposed CGT).””
How dare a govt actually do shit . And try make the country function ,I long for the days we had a bunch of greasy middle management tossers doing fuck all other than tell us how good they are.
How could you say that, Wayne? This Government signed TPPA-11!
And there are proposals for an ‘Amazon Tax’ and for R & D tax loss credits for companies that spend more than $100k pa on R & D.
CPTPP 11I will concede, although it has a sting in the tail with the new restrictions on foreign investment. The R& D tax credit is essentially the Callaghan growth grant repackaged (though expanded somewhat).
The furore over the Te Arai exemption just illustrated the problems. Quite a few proposed tourist resort projects had the intent of selling the units to overseas investors as a means of raising the capital.
And there’s the standard RWNJ ad hominem.
The government isn’t actually there for business – it’s there for the people.
That’s good. A market system can’t work without proper regulation. It was the lack of regulation and then followed by bad regulation that brought us the ‘legal highs’ fiasco.
You don’t seem to be concerned with the rising costs of living that needs to be covered by wages. Costs that the capitalists almost always ignore which is why we need a minimum wage in the first place. It would actually be better to have a universal income rather than a minimum wage to ensure that everyone has a good living standard. Although, considering how greedy the capitalists are, I think we’d still need a minimum wage to ensure that they actually paid.
Which is, of course, a load of bollocks. We’ve been cutting taxes and regulations for the last thirty years and it’s made us all worse off. It’s cut productivity increases and wages while rewarding the bludging shareholders and speculators.
Maybe Grant Robertson needed a Redbull drink to pep him up before the interview. I have seen him give plenty more energetic and therefore more engaging interviews than this mornings on Q & A.
He likes rugby and beer I believe .
Dissapointed to see you advocate for such lowlife company.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-39427291
Saying grant looks tired listless is not at an ad hom. You throw it round so often I am beginning to think you don’t know what words mean.
An ad hom would be “Grant is fat/lazy/stupid therefore his argument is invalid”. Ad hom means to attack the person to denigrate the argument or point they are putting forward. Saying someone looks tired and listless is not an ad hom.
This is the second time I have had to point this out to you. Please try harder
Within context, within the opening statement, yeah it is. It was a declaration that he can’t handle the job.
No, it was a comment on how he appeared in the interview. Maybe you disagree with the statement but it was a statement, not an argument.
It was not an ad him however much you want to believe it was.
“In these circumstances, it is not surprising that business are not making new investments, it looks too risky. Safer to keep spare capital in passive investments (either in NZ or offshore) or alternatively not borrow. The business will operate at a lower but safer level.”
There’s also the actions of a lot of New Zealand business that are causing these reactions as well. Take the actual and perceived losses of around 4 billion from Fletcher Building and Fontera, along with the M. Bovis debacle and there’s more than enough to give business the willies. This occurred under the leadership of the previous National government.
I look around Queenstown and see a lot of similarity to the situation in 2007 with a lot of developments that are unlikely to be profitable first time around. This has a chilling effect on business confidence.
Maybe New Zealand business, and the National Party, should look at their own actions and leadership before trying to blame someone else for their problems.
Unfortunately our “business leaders” and National politicians won’t be terribly affected by the fallout from the fuck-ups above, that will fall on the workers, subcontractors and share-milkers who will have their lives destroyed.
“The cost is lower growth, lower taxes, less employment growth.”
Did you ever stop and consider that the problem may be growth?
Wayne increasing wages means more money in businesses where this money is spent.
$880 million to bail out farmer’s.
Business confidence is over 50 which means business ha got over National loosing the election.
Just business leaders doing their expected “it’s a Labour government” hissy fit.
Saw it in 2000, same again.
Put Thompson & Clark onto them as they clearly need monitoring as a threat to the democratic process.
QFT
the Prime Minister’s baby name just announced: Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford. I am so proud of this Kiwi family, with both Jacinda and Clarke new role models of how men and women can be in the world – in my life time.
Aww that’s nice.
Irish and Maori – love pure as snow
You’ve made that comment entirely about yourself…Despite the vicarious nature of the comment…
Focus on your own journey, family and personal development…
Don’t look outward for inward inspiration…
Don’t shit on someone else’s inoffensive happiness just because your ego wants you to be Buddha.
Thank you One Two. Food for thought.
Sadly lacking you are sad it is
Millsy came 2nd in the Sweep, they guessed Aroha a few days ago.
It has finally been revealed. Little Prime Miniature’s real name is – Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford. (Snap -I now see Venezia has already announced the name.)
An uncommon first name which apparently is ( or maybe from) from an Old Irish feminine name “Niamh” pronounced Neev, meaning “bright” or radiant”, according to Wikipedia.
The first part of this bit in the Wikipedia entry made me laugh vis a vis the proud new father –
” In Irish mythology, Niamh is the daughter of the god of the sea, Manannán mac Lir and one of the queens of Tír na nÓg, the land of eternal youth. She was the lover of the poet-hero Oisín” .
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niamh
As mentioned by Jacinda Ardern in the press conference at 11am at the hospital before the Ardern Gayford family left for home, “Neve” also means “snow” in some languages – eg Latin, Italian and Portuguese.
Here is a link to the TVNZ article which includes video of the short press conference.
Mum looked radiant and not at all like someone who had had very little sleep over the last few days; and Dad is as proud as punch. Baby slept …
For the fashion conscious:
Neve was wearing a soft green home knitted hat, which virtually matched the jacket (and shoes) of one of their DPS minders. (LOL)
Mum wore a white top and black pants and white sneakers.
Dad wore his “trial father’s cardigan” as it was described in a (rather funny double act) video some months ago when he wore it for the first time. According to JA it was bought in an op shop.
Ooops, forgot to put in the link to the TVNZ video of the press conference.
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/name-pm-jacinda-ardern-and-clarke-gayfords-newborn-baby-announced
Here is also the RNZ article with videos, photos, live blog.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/360285/watch-pm-jacinda-ardern-leaves-hospital-with-neve-te-aroha
VV, are you as passionate and expressive about and towards people you know personally?
You’re an a******e One Two.
For all you know “vv” does personally know Jacinda.
Piss off and play your puerile little games elsewhere.
Well said, Anne.
I wondered who would bite when I submitted my comment – and sure enough … LOL.
Just the usual One Two type of shitty comment. He/she thinks they are soooo clever. I gave up reading his/her comments a long time ago and just pass over them so did not see this one until someone pointed it out to me.
As for knowing JA, I am pretty sure that you and I are in the same position there if I correctly remember a comment of yours some months ago – but I am not going to say what that was. LOL
The Dad cardie is getting a lot of air time – apparently from the Sally’s op shop in Gisborne according to JA in her latest Facebook video.
.
She is going to be a Green!
Absolutely! I’m sure she won’t be a neoliberal Labourite like uncle Grant or uncle Stuart.
With the need for additional workers within some sectors e.g. “While the construction sector is set to get policy tweaks to allow for more migrant workers, the aged-care sector has been lobbying Lees-Galloway for more people.”
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/104863218/government-set-to-greenlight-skilled-foreign-workers-for-construction-sector
Can anyone out there point out if this will still be requirement ?
“Construction firms will be exempt from applying the existing labour market test to bring in up to 1,500 foreign tradespeople at any one time if employers promise to take on a local apprentice for every migrant under a new ‘KiwiBuild Visa’ proposed by Labour.”
https://www.interest.co.nz/news/88240/labours-immigration-policy-targets-kiwibuild-workers-and-apprentice-boost-aims-cut-20000
Fine to source overseas works BUT shouldn’t we also expect the same industries to “future proof” themselves and give a little back in exchange for this govt intervention ?
Jacinda and Clarke with their daughter, showed wonder grace happiness and kindness.
In her speech and answers she acknowledged all the kindness they had received, mentioning some had come from loss and sadness as well as open acceptance from NZers who had given love freely, from home made gifts to names, to the offer of placenta burial by Ngapui.
They looked a lovely wee family we can be proud of. I have had the good fortune to meet her prior to the election. She has gone from strength to strength and does us all proud, along with her clearly loving supportive partner.
Their selection of names shows a nod to their own choices coupled with a strong connection to love. “Love and happiness” the expectations for their daughter, Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford, are simple but profound.
OK, it SAYS “Flying car”, but it functions more like a human carrying drone. A car would surely be a more apt description if it had wheels and used the air current to lift about a meter or so off road so to speak.
Even so the Kitty Hawk is cool. Needs a roll bar type device.
It will be interesting to watch how this all develops. Safety will be a big concern I’d think, the potential for midair collisions will magnify very quickly if/when they become mainstream. Lots to think about.
I can imagine the rozzers scratching their heads wondering how they’ll get speed cameras up there…
You can’t have flying cars while humans pilot them. Far too dangerous.
Acoustic detection, tracking and classification of Low Flying Aircraft
Yeah, not difficult.
Where is Weka? Is Weka ok?
Weka disappeared at least two months ago. I recall ‘tracey’ responding to the same question with words to the effect “Weka is fine”.
I don’t know why she has left TS but suspect it might have something to do with some stoush in what is termed “the backend”. But that is no more than a guess and could be wrong.
around the time psycho milt was banned if my recollection is correct.
Doors opening soon.
Be there, or be square
https://kiaoragaza.wordpress.com/2018/06/21/auckland-fundraising-event-this-sunday/
Wrap up warm New Zealand.
Pile your firewood inside so you don’t have to go out.
Next three days is going to be incredibly cold; snow between 100 and 200 metres above sea level from Stewart Island and Fiordland right through Otago, and a long cold snap all the way up the centre and east of the North Island.
http://www.metservice.com/maps-radar/rain-forecast/rain-forecast-3-day
Its shaping up to be a significant cold event.
mean sea level pressure
http://cr.acg.maine.edu/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat6_mslp_1-day.png
500 hpa mass levels.
http://cr.acg.maine.edu/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat6_gph500_1-day.png
Jetstream (the polar night jet) coming straight from the Antarctic.
.
We’ve already had it pretty cold lately Ad. Highs of 4 or 5 and lows of -5 to -6 at my place most of last week. Ice has been building up in shady areas of the garden. The woodburner has been running day and night.
A snow laden southerly usually means temps around 0 to 2 across the board so a bit of a relief really.
what region are you?
Southern Lakes near Queenstown. It’s currently about 1c and rain has turned to a sleety mix.
Good morning The Am Show one should not count there chickens Peter Burling came second .
Loyd would have still celebrated as a Kiwi salior won the race on Chinese boat Dong Fang and Blair Tuke came 3rd Ka pai.
Duncan everyone knows that buildings construction slow down in the winter one just makes a mess when you dig holes in the rain also the timber framing don’t pass there moisture test so there cladding cannot be installed many other reason that construction slows in winter less day light hours. Thats were prefab house increase house building productivity . These prefab building could target using the renewable resource we have a lot of laminated timber this product is alot less energy in producing this laminated timber products
The Kiwi Rugby League team and management are in rebuild mode you wait and see they will get back to there best form .
With the Roseanne Show in the USA that shows that te Papatuanuku has had enough of the racial discriminating slander Ka pai but the show gives US a view into the reality’s of common tangata in the USA and how hard they have it just to survive in the USA the big picture is we were heading in that direction till the changes we have had with the new Labour lead Coalition Government. Duncan Te kumara never tells how sweet it is
Ka kite ano P.S it is a super food loaded with good minerals good for the mokopunas
Many thanks to Saudi Arabia for granting the rights for ladies to drive cars this is a win for Ladies Equality around Papatuanuku as Saudi ladies have won the right to drive there are many more rights these ladies need to be granted to get to Equality its all about a bright healthy future for all Tangata link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/24/saudi-arabia-women-celebrate-as-driving-ban-lifted Ka kite ano
Pity the rest of the laws in that country are based on a brutal and backward religion.