Maybe the herald could show some credibility and stand behind its words by naming its anonymous editorial writers …. if they have nothing to hide then they have nothing to fear.
Lordy I don’t know how many times this silly subject has arisen.
Imo it is entirely legitimate to remain anonymous here, for the exact same reasons that voting is anonymous.
On the other hand the Herald is claiming that everyone’s entire information should be known to the state. In addition the herald and its writers in the past have claimed that bloggers should not be able to hide behind anonymity, while hypocritically penning anonymous articles and ed pieces itself.
Who cares anyway, I gave up on editorials a very long time ago. They are basic, they are partisan, they are pieces of shit.
You have to take their “news” with a pinch of salt, but by watching RT you can compare their reporting against the right wing crap from CNN and Sky and our media and come up with a more or less what really is happening scenario.
Can I also suggest France 24 (if you can find the English Language Channel – assuming your French or Arabic isn’t up to it!!)?
It’s particularly good on Africa and even South America. Also try Deutsche Welle which is also quite good.
Broadly speaking both are “public broadcasters” giving an international view slightly different from the Anglophone broadcasters (and as an aside observe what a proper public broadcaster might look like!).
France 24 has a quite good Iphone & Android Apps as well.
I will have a look at these.
My French is almost fluent but I wouldn’t even recognise that someone was speaking Arabic and I only recognise about one word in ten in German. A traditional New Zealand education I fear.
Russian Today has only had a glance but it looks very interesting.
If Labour had got 3% more, and the Greens 2% more, both of which should and could have ocurred had events not transpired against them, we would be celebrating a relatively progressive government with an intelligent and progressive PM.
It can be done next time. 35% is a good base to build to 45%.
But right now the MSM should hold its head in shame for the way it conspired with Key to bring about this result.
And yet almost a million adults didn’t vote – labour are dead, because they sold out their constituency. They chose to hurt the vulnerable, then did nothing to redeem themselves for 30 years.
even rightwinger fran o’sullivan notes/confirms how the media have been suckered..’played’ as rubes…..
“.The media will also be more scrappy towards the Government after journalists found out the extent to which they had been played in the previous three years..”
Try Tracey Watkins in Wednesday’s Press…. Choice of adjectives almost orgasmic as she salivates over Labour’s problems.
Is she a journalist or is she back handed by Crosby Textor and just copies what they tell her to write?
Other journalists should cringe at her ethics but Slater must love her as a true partner with identical values.
And not a word of criticism of Key on Pike River entry. There is bound to be a lie there somwhere.
But both the Herald and Stuff know every word spoken in the Labour caucus meeting and even a head count on who’s not supposedly supporting Cunliffe.
It’s come out only now because it would show this Govt for what it is: heartless and only caring about money. Note the five failed attempts to obtain OIA on the safety of entering the mine? Compare it to the speed with which they are delivered to WhaleOil.
If Labour talked to their members and had networks in the community, they may have known about the decision about safe entry well before now. They could have hit NAct with it. Wouldn’t have changed the election, but it would have been another straw on the camel’s back. FFS, the party came from the mines and was deeply rooted in those communities. What’s it deeply rooted in now? Some organic vegan restaurant in Wellington?
Bearded git,
except NZ1st would have gone with National because that means they are negotiating with only one party.
Also that extra 10% is hard to get and that 35% is near impossible to loose.
Of course none of that means one should “write off” labour, just realize there are some voters there that labour should be winning if it want’s to govern (as opposed to the non voters who will never vote).
(as opposed to the non voters who will never vote).
That’s a lie Scott – I know many people who were encouraged to vote again because of Mana and Hone. A big bunch voted green, or followed the strategic voting guide over at the daily blog. I also know many people who regret voting for labour in their electorate vote because of what labour did to Mana.
Also, to dismiss non-voters just makes you sound like another right wing drop kick, or an apologist for all of labour’s failures.
I did not mean that you can’t get a voter or two who would not otherwise have voted to vote via an additional get out the vote strategy.
Just that there are so many people who will not vote that targeting them as a group is pretty ineffective. You will waste a lot of effort on a lot of people most of whom who will not vote.
As to your assessment of what voters did – if we assume you are correct there must be some larger and opposite effects that completely obscured your effects.
Does that always seem to be the case? What is your record for predicting political results?
Labour (both the old guard/ABCers), Labour members, and indeed anyone concerned with democracy should reflect on this: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/09/24/one-party-state/
Astute analysis by Wayne Hope (as always)
A different and worthy perspective by Wayne Hope from that which many other commentators have made imo. He explores the cultural basis for Nat support.
If I read him right, he’s saying we are on the cusp of ‘one party rule’. But you don’t need one party when you have professional politicians spread over parties. The illusion of choice and the act of voting for alternatives can remain – although the alternatives are just mute shades of one another.
Thinking I prefer the term I used yesterday somewhere to describe what’s coming up – dictatorial governance.
When the Labour Party rules were written it was expected that the election would be in November – the election loss would have been analysed prior to the year end and then on reflection there would have been a leadership confidence vote in February.
The early election date means an alternate plan is to be considered.
The problem for the party under the new rules is that a leader who has lost caucus confidence can still contest the subsequent contest and possibly win.
Having a leader without caucus confidence is a recipe for disunity and this leads to losing public confidence. No better is having a favourite of caucus as leader if they do not have the confidence of the party members.
Neither a leader beholden to activists, nor a leader and caucus who are not true to the will of the wider party appeals. The party not existing to facilitate the aspiration for the baubles of office as a National lite regime change.
The best option here is a party review, and a decision to have a leadership contest next year, one not requiring a caucus vote first or any contestant to resign their existing position. If no one but the existing leader runs then there is no contest, otherwise there is.
SPC, spot on observation Having a leader without caucus confidence is a recipe for disunity and this leads to losing public confidence. No better is having a favourite of caucus as leader if they do not have the confidence of the party members.
Listened to the radio this morning, cant work out who is more keen to kill David, the media or the caucus. Bland faceless non entities the lot of them. There is absolutely nobody amongst the old guard to inspire, why the fekk are the likes of Mallard, King and Goff still lurking?
Three years goes fast, I would counsel caution in any fast decision, without a clear strategy its deckchairs on the Titanic.
I do hope labour supporters vote with their feet and leave. But no, they will bury their heads in the sand and take this same old shit for another 30 years?
The right wing of labour make me sick.
Nice analysis of Cosgrove by the way Tracey – once again, nail, head, bang on…
This helps explain one part of the explosion of health care insurance providers in NZ. And what that business model is morphing into. Notice Cigna in the mix – Mmmm maybe you want to ask some firemen in NYC what they think of Cigna.
Looks like the Key Government sat on an Official Information response until after the election. Turns out it has been safe to go up the drift at Pike River for almost a year. On Saturday, Coasters gave their party vote to National. They were tricked. The Chief Ombudsman warned that this sort of behaviour form Government meant “We could kiss our democracy good bye.” Looks like the country was tricked. Why, so far, is the media ignoring the Minister’s and Key’s role in this? Scared? Bought?
I find it depressing.
It’s like the election is a clean slate for National. “win” the election, and put the dirty politics allegations, the lying over GCSB all behind them. Pull a blanket over the sordid lot, and Put it down to Politiking, without addressing any issues, and without Key having to answer to anything. Meanwhile, the biggest opposition party squabbles and enables it all to be swept under the carpet. I really despair.
Labour aren’t allowing it to be swept under the carpet. If they didn’t squabble, somebody would have had a cat turn up after being presumed lost for a month… and that would be more newsworthy than Key’s lies. If Labour pointed out that Key was lying, Key would be on television with a soundbite saying, “Of course they are going to come out attacking my credibility. They’ve just been resoundingly rejected by New Zealanders, who will see this for what it is, which is a smear campaign from the Left”.
The blame for allowing it to be swept under the carpet lies squarely and solely with journalists in the MSM.
This must be devastating news for the Pike River families and was shocking to see on Campbell Live last night.
What if Solid Energy’s reason for not entering the drift comes down to $$$? What are the other reasons?
As for West Coast Tasman giving their party vote to National, that was staggering, they have been mucked around by the Government for years over the Pike River disaster. (“mucked around”, a condensed version of the final chapters in Tragedy at Pike River Mine: how and why 29 men died, by Rebecca Macfie).
isn’t it sick, rosie. i wonder if it something to do with liability, as to where bodies might be found ? key is cold, callous and cruel, albeit welcomed by many as a true leader. go figure.
Liability/ lack of access to insurance funds? Campbell Live will no doubt keep up with the situation. It seems like they are the only media who care.
BTW: have kept up with your concerns over the TPP being singed and GE crop seed being allowed into the country. I share those concerns. I know there is a pro GE faction within fed farmers but hadn’t realised how tight the connections with Monsanto are, as you suggested a few days back.
It’s tragic this is the likely path we will go down, along with intensified dairying. more animal suffering and an environment degraded, potentially beyond repair under the removal of protections of the RMA. The vision the Greens had was the opposite.
@yeshe 9.53
Would this southern West Coast National result come from the faction that were getting uptight about Shane Jones being a real man of the people yet not getting a go at leader. Perhaps Shane was their idea of a good politician and a working class hero and when by-passed all their brain cells sort of got fried.
so hard to know isn’t it ? but we could safely bet the seat would not be blue today if these hidden OIA docs had appeared last week. Evil bastards the bunch of them.
Hows about we already had footage showing rescue boxes had been opened, meaning that some miners survived the explosion. So, pre-election, does a ruling party that made ‘a million and one’ promises, while determinedly doing nothing, want evidence suggesting men were simply left to die?
You might recall that rescue workers wanted to enter the mine soon after the explosion (methane gone) and were prevented from doing so on the basis that more explosions were imminent. How long was it til the second explosion? I can’t remember, but am sure it wasn’t mere hours before that methane built up again.
Then you might also recall the days and weeks that passed while ‘air quality’ measurements were taken, suggesting methane was hovering at 12% (the concentration it’s apt to explode at).
And remember all the tosh that because there was a fire in the mine, temperatures within the mine were at ‘coal fire’ temperatures, meaning entry couldn’t take place?
That’s just off the top of my head before the first coffee of the morning is down.
In short – bad, dog shit cynicism – adverse publicity was to be avoided pre-election.
“So, pre-election, does a ruling party that made ‘a million and one’ promises, while determinedly doing nothing, want evidence suggesting men were simply left to die?”
A entirely plausible but horrifying scenario Bill. We know that Key and his Ministers are capable of outright deceit so withholding this information about the drift entry being possible in October 2013 fits comfortably with their other demonstrated methods of self preservation ( ala Dirty Politics).
Chapter 10 and 11 in MacFie’s book cover the day of the explosion and the events in the days and weeks after, including the air testing, expected mine temperature, and intense disagreement between police and mines rescue about the safety of entering the mine to retrieve the bodies. I recall thinking “what a shambles” when reading it.
Haven’t got time to re read those chapters now to refresh the memory but it would be good to.
Where did I hear, a while ago, one reason the mine couldn’t be re entered was due to the changes in regulation at WorkSafe? Since the Pike disaster WorkSafe deemed that all mines in NZ must have a second egress, Pike doesn’t and therefore they wouldn’t send a body recovery mission into the mine. (prior to that NZ was one of the few places in the world that didn’t require a second egress, a fact which caused a lot of upset among the overseas miners working at Pike).
When I heard that, where ever it was, I thought that was a lame and convenient excuse for Solid Energy to reneg on it’s duty to remove the bodies. There’s certainly something very fishy going on.
here we are, as suspected …. .. at the forefront of the directors’ minds, according to Solid Energy CEO …
‘The board of Solid Energy also has its directors’ liability “at the forefront of their minds”, Mr Clifford said.
“Directors’ liability is an important thing, and it’s been taken very seriously. There’s been a fundamental change in the law since Pike River. We need to learn from that, and it’s been taken seriously.”
We should remove the right to vote from residents and only allow citizens to vote. We are one of only a few countries that do allow residents to vote.
I’m not in favour of that. Residents can up sticks and move anytime… And don’t have the historical knowledge to make informed decisions at the ballot box.
A least a citizen has a long term vested interest in the country.
It would be illuminating to know the breakdown of voters by residency/citizen numbers.
I daresay majority of residents would have gone National. NZH article in April this year highlighted a number of residents intending to vote National because “national good for business, Labour bad” which we all know isn’t borne out in reality.
Citizens can up sticks and move any time, too. Similarly, vilifying non-citizen residents for voting National in the majority is entirely misleading, since that also applies to citizens.
James, your suggestion would mean Mr Rosie would lose his right to vote. He has lived most of his life in NZ and is more committed to the well being of our society than many of the citizens we know who couldn’t care less and don’t vote. He’s a CD volunteer, a promoter of H&S in the workplace and a Left voter.
He has shown that he has a “long term vested interest in the country”. I wouldn’t paint all residents the same colour. Such apathy and ignorance among the voters can’t really be put down to their status of citizen vs resident. It’s more complex than that.
I never thought I would go along with James but on this occasion I agree with Paragraph one of his comment. I too think that only citizens should be allowed to vote.
I don’t agree with the rest of what he says and I hope he doesn’t mean we should try and find out the answer to the fourth para. That would mean identifying everyone’s vote.
As far as Mr Rosie goes one can only ask, if he wants to vote, why doesn’t he take up citizenship? It isn’t really that hard is it?
I would actually extend the requirement a bit further. I would have a rule that an MP must be EXCLUSIVELY a New Zealand citizen. No dual citizenship would be allowed for an MP and before they could become one they would be required to renounce any other citizenship they hold. Australia do that and I think it is an excellent idea.
ps There is a minor problem for people born in Greece, and possibly other countries in that they don’t allow you to renounce their citizenship but that can be got around by the Australian rules.
I would actually extend the requirement a bit further. I would have a rule that an MP must be EXCLUSIVELY a New Zealand citizen. No dual citizenship would be allowed for an MP and before they could become one they would be required to renounce any other citizenship they hold. Australia do that and I think it is an excellent idea.
/agreed
Thing is, it used to be like that until Labour changed it because they wanted one of their own to have dual citizenship. And, yes, it was one law change that I was thoroughly disgusted by.
And it’s not just Australia that does that either – the US and other Anglo countries do as well.
I remember it slightly differently, but you may be right.
As I thought it was you were allowed to hold dual citizenship and become an MP but no sitting MP could take citizenship of another country without them forfeiting their seat.
That is what sitting MP Harry Duynhoven (spelling?) did. He took out Dutch citizenship. The Labour Government, when the complaint was made pretended they hadn’t received it for a day and hurriedly changed the law in the interim.
A friend of mine, now a QC, said that he thought that the seat had been vacated the moment he took the new citizenship and the effect of the law Labour passed was to appoint H.D. to the position of MP for New Plymouth, without an election, as he had already vacated the seat.
“Australia do that and I think it is an excellent idea.”
It’s actually law, but the Liberals don’t feel bound by it. Abbott probably hasn’t renounced his British citizenship. Some other guy with a German name had been elected without renouncing his other citizenship. When caught, he renounced it, but his whole campaign had been illegitimate. He should have been booted, but that doesn’t seem to happen with the right.
If you live in a country and you pay taxes, you should get a vote. You’re likely to have more interest in the future of the country than some foreign CEO with a deputy assistant whose secretary has Key on speed dial.
James, your suggestion would mean Mr Rosie would lose his right to vote.
No he wouldn’t. If he’s married to a NZ citizen then he’s probably already a NZ citizen and if he isn’t it’d just be a formality for him to become one.
Permanent residency is a step along the way to becoming a citizen. Sure, not everyone would take that step but if you don’t take that step then you shouldn’t have the right to vote.
Changing the rules to what just about every other country does. Doesn’t matter what your political orientation is, only people with a long term commitment to a country should be able to determine its future.
So your election strategy is to deny residents who are long term taxpayers the right to vote? Charming. Dont you think some Pacific Island citizens would be hurt by this? what about Sub-continent residents? Asian residents? The broad church eh? Do you have evidence that “majority of residents would have gone National”.
I have been arguing this for a long time. Its about commitment to this country and its future, not ethnicity. I have tried to explain it to people with the anology… that I own a house that I share with my partner. We take in a boarder. Partner and I have a commitment to our future and long term interest in our home. We’re not going to give the boarder the same say in the care, maintainence and ownership of our home as each other.
So why do we do it with our country?
So might I also ask ask why Mr Rosie hasnt taken out NZ citizenship ?
Potato and alwyn. The first and foremost reason Mr R doesn’t have NZ citizenship is the cost, which Blue has referred to. We can barely keep up with weekly living expenses and are running into the red with unexpected bills, all the while the to do list keeps piling up.
Secondly he doesn’t see himself as anything but an NZer he’s been here for so long. To him citizen ship would just be a bit of unaffordable paper, and a hollow gesture at patriotism, after all this time.
He is a NZer in all respects and it shows in his actions and in the way he contributes to our community.
If citizenship is needed to vote, then the cost of people getting it should be made cheaper. Cost shouldn’t be a major consideration here though, it is about the future of our country. Voting is considered a privilege of citizenship of a country, and we give the right away too easily in NZ.
“No taxation without representation!”
And the hundreds of thousands of New Zealand Citizens who live permanently overseas without any intention of coming back to New Zealand. They should vote?
I guess you would argue that anyone with Scottish heritage should have been able to vote in the recent referendum as well …
There are rules that require that you have some continuing contact with New Zealand, although I don’t think they are tough enough. A citizen has to have been back in the last 3 years, a permanent resident in the last year.
Personally I would toughen them up.
I lived in Australia for years and voted in New Zealand. On the other hand I did not take out Australian citizenship, returned several times a year, owned property here and paid New Zealand taxes as well as my Australian taxes. I certainly never lost contact with New Zealand, intended to return to live permanently and felt no guilt about voting.
“Those people are free to apply for citizenship if they want to vote.”
So willingness to commit to New Zealand to the extent required to gain the solemn right to vote is determined by a willingness and ability to pay several hundred dollars to Internal Affairs?
An ex-colleague of mine (from Britain) was working here in New Zealand for 6 years during which time he and his family began their application for citizenship. After the 6 years he applied for, was offered and he accepted a job in Australia (where he and his family now live). A year or so ago, he came back (on holiday) to complete the ‘in-person’ part of the citizenship ritual and then returned to Australia with his New Zealand citizenship.
I’m a permanent resident (have been since 1967) as are all surviving members of my birth family. I’ve lived in New Zealand (in Christchurch) for all that time (as have all members of my birth family) except when I went on my ‘OE’ at age 21 for 1.5 years. I have a New Zealand-born (fifth generation) partner and New Zealand-born and raised daughter. I have worked for a (very New Zealand) employer continuously for the last 23 years.
Why, then, am I not a citizen?
One of the things that has put me off applying for citizenship is the citizenship ritual. I dislike nationalism – singing anthems, pledging allegiance (to flags, queens and other symbols), mouthing oaths, etc..
(One of the ironies is that I have British citizenship but, of course, never had to pledge allegiance to queen and country to gain it – yet I would have to do that here in order to gain New Zealand citizenship :-))
Frankly, I would feel hypocritical performing what I’d see as empty rituals and, if I’m going to be hypocritical, perhaps I should go the whole hog and show my commitment to New Zealand through John Key and I ritualistically slicing the heels of our thumbs and uniting as blood brothers?
At that deeper, personal level I also know that my ‘heart’ does not respond sentimentally to the words ‘New Zealand’ and to mythic cultural norms (e.g., barbecues, rugby, the beach, sailing, tramping in the hills, whitebaiting, Bluff oysters, etc.) in the way that their hearts apparently do for people born here (although I genuinely do have a deep emotional commitment to Christchurch, specifically).
For those ‘deep’ reasons, I would actually feel a bit of a fraud to claim citizenship because that deep sense of ‘belonging’ is not embodied in me the way it seems to be in most native-born New Zealanders. And it never would be. That is simply the emotional truth of the matter.
Nevertheless, until now I have believed that my enduring good citizenship (in the generic sense rather than some nominal sense such as ‘New Zealand citizenship’) is my prime claim to being treated as a citizen of the country in which I live, in terms of rights. But maybe that’s not enough.
As you can see, I do appreciate the tribal point you are making. It makes me think that I should not vote in future elections, based on that principle.
Although, of course, that tribal point could only ever apply to those actually born and raised in New Zealand. If the aim is to get as close as possible to a guarantee of deep commitment to the country perhaps only such people should be allowed to be citizens and, hence, be allowed to vote? (e.g., only people born in New Zealand and who have continuously lived the first 20 years of their life, at least, here?)
After all, they are the people most likely to have real, embodied, emotional, familial and enculturated commitment to New Zealand – as a nation, place and people – rather than the kind of commitment that money, a few years, an instrumental mindset and a liking (or tolerance) for ritual can get from Internal Affairs.
Maybe the bar for voting rights should be set that high to ensure commitment of the voting population to this country and its future?
I totally agree, only citizens should have the vote in NZ. You have to be a citizen to vote in Australia and in most of the rest of the world. There is a reason for that- only people with a long term commitment to a country should be able to determine its future. And then also make it compulsory to vote, like in Australia. Australians have had a better deal than us over the last 30 years, they have been shafted much less, maybe their electoral system has something to do with that. And make applying for citizenship much cheaper- $500 seems excessive. You only have to have been in NZ for 5 years to be apply to become a citizen.
“There is a reason for that- only people with a long term commitment to a country should be able to determine its future”
Mr R has voted in every election since 1990. If that isn’t long term commitment for you I don’t what is.
There is an insinuation on this thread that permanent residents are somehow less worthy and less committed than citizens and should be denied the right to vote. It’s a very excluding view bordering on xenophobia and one that would not benefit the country in any way.
And how the voting rights of residents somehow contributed to a defeat for the left is beyond me.
As a resident, you might be pleased to hear I’ve a fairly solid grasp of NZ history…more, it seems, than many NZ born folks, and voted for a further left choice than most.
Also, it’s simply not true that I can ‘up sticks and go’.
Here’s an alternative.
How’s about only people who reside in the country and pay taxes get to vote? That was the situation in the recent Scottish referendum that I (fairly) couldn’t vote in, in spite of having been born and raised there as well as having spent a good portion of my adult life living there.
The way it stands at the moment is that if you live elsewhere you can vote so long as you have visited NZ in the past year (or 3 years?). That I assume is a nod towards people that still have ties here, as opposed to people that have left permanently. It strikes me as problematic (eg getting home from Oz is easier/cheaper than getting home from the UK). However I don’t think disenfranchising people who have say gone to Oz for work who will most likely return at some point is a good way to go.
Not sure why James bought this up. Is there even an issue here with mass residents voting and then leaving town? Maybe voting rights should kick in a the citizenship mark (5 years?) irrespective of whether one takes up citizenship or not.
an expat needs to have returned home once in the previous 3 years to vote.
As for voting, I don’t think it’s as simple as being physically resident in NZ or not. For example we are NZ citizens who work overseas on a fixed term contract for a company that operates in NA. We don’t have residency overseas and we’re paid in NZ, own our home in NZ and are tax resident in NZ. Most expats we know are working overseas on a similar basis.
Another example – would an exemption apply for government or diplomatic staff? I’m sure there are also other situations where removing the right to vote would appear unfair to a non-resident.
It is three years for citizens, one year for permanent residents. There are special rules for people who are representing New Zealand overseas including diplomats and people in the armed services.
Imagine if, in WW II, all the 100,000 or so soldiers overseas had been banned from voting because they had been away for more than 3 years?
Nor would it be reasonable to totally disenfranchise the 620,000 odd New Zealanders working in Australia who could easily finish up in a situation of not being able to vote in either country.
I don’t actually have any problem with accepting that. If they are New Zealand citizens but don’t have any real connection to the country I don’t see why they should be allowed to vote here.
Diplomats working in New Zealand embassies for New Zealand or soldiers serving in New Zealand forces overseas are a different thing to people who have chosen to depart voluntarily.
Thank you for giving us the views of Winston First. I live in Australia at the moment and I can’t vote. They are kind enough to let me pay taxes and they have performed major surgery on me. But I get no representation. I would love to vote for a party that would keep that level of medical care for everyone in Australia, but I can’t.
I firmly believe in no taxation without representation.
On that you will have to get someone who is more of an expert than I am. I am only up to reading the procedures without really understanding the detail. I do know that when a member retires (or gets kicked out) any private member’s bill they were promoting is often taken up by some other member of their party. This happened with the same-sex marriage bill didn’t it?
Quite who would take up Hone’s bill when the whole party is gone I don’t know. I suppose someone from the Green’s might do so.
I am also not really clear on what “reinstatement” means for a private members bill and where in the process it comes back.
Graeme Edgeler, where are you?
So Labour have 32 seats and NZ First have 11. And the great purge of 2014 is about to commence (or not).
And the left wing activists I see on here seem to think that getting rid of the ABCs and all right leaning folk in Labour who have failed to support the the leader and have failed to work for the party, is the way forward.
By my calculations there are about 10 labour electorate MPs (give or take) who might fall into that category. Others who know the MPs better may get a more accurate figure than I can.
So where could these “treacherous Labour lite MPs” go? None have the energy to form their own party and lets face it that long forgotten middle party from the 90s with Gilbert Miles didnt have any shelf life.
So the only logical option would be for them to join forces with Winston and NZ First. And that would give Winston more MPs (maybe) than the freshly purged Labour Party, and Winston could, and would no doubt, claim to be the leader of the opposition, and ask for the baubles of power that go with that position.
And that would leave Labour left with what? Being just another minor party in Parliament, but with a chance to rebuild “out left?” or dead in the water? How much more demoralisation can your party faithful take?
Labour needs to sort its seething MPs out and it needs to work as a united team. Anything less is letting down the voters in New Zealand.
Winston can do anything he likes but if he wants to be the leader of the opposition he is going to have to get a hell of a lot more votes. The position is defined in law and with the results of this election it is, unless they go into a coalition with National, the leader of the Labour Party.
The have one right, they get briefings by the SIS. That was the one that bit Goff when he publicly denied getting one and basically accused the head of the SIS of breaking the law. Silly boy. He could have just shut up when he was shown to be wrong.
They also get the right to make the first speech in the budget debate and so on.
See the definition of the Leader here. http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/about-parliament/how-parliament-works/people/00CLOOCHowPWorks1411/people-in-parliament
The Leader of the Opposition is the member who leads the largest political party that is not part of the Government.
The Leader of the Opposition’s role in the House is to:
be the leader of the ‘government-in-waiting’
lead opposition responses in major debates.
The Leader of the Opposition sits directly opposite the Prime Minister in the debating chamber.
What it hasnt ever had to do is to define if the largest opposition party is the one who got the most votes at the previous election or whether its the one with the most MPs, if electorate MPs were jump ship from Labour to NZF.
Having extra TV time on the 6 oclock news would suit Winston.
I have memories of reading that it was the opposition party that had the greatest number of votes in the preceding General Election, rather than the most seats, but for the life of me I can’t remember where I saw that.
Guess the economic slump is going to happen a couple of months too late for you. Sorry guys about that but jeeze that John Key certainly knows how to schedule an election doesn’t he?
Well if the economy had tanked just before the election instead of looking quite healthy the left may well have had more traction and therefore a better result. Don’t you agree?
Being the astute economic analyst that you have claimed to be you will have known for quite some time that the global economy on which we heavily rely, is on shaky ground. Wouldn’t you?
Yes, National fucked the economy, knew that they had and had a reasonable idea as to when it would tank and so called an early election. I believe that this was mentioned at the time that National called the election.
Wouldn’t have made any difference – the payout will be for the current season (2014-2015) and won’t really start impacting for another 6-12 months. This time next year I would expect to see the full impact to the wider economy as the decisions farmers are making now around investment and spending kick in.
Well the farmers can’t get out of Fonterra fast enough and I look forward to them as a group letting their party Nact know how shafted they feel . Maybe they will suggest that the exchange rate needs to be a little lower??
I still do not see anyone putting ACT under the microscope for its election performance. Even though they only got 0.7% and thanks to National’s political welfare scheme a boy for an MP. In 2008 they had 5 (life) experienced MP’s and 2 ministers and a swag of concessions and promises. ACT had a fresh leader and a new start and policies like getting rid of the RMA and privatising the schools. Where is the analysis for ACT? They brought in Bassett to carry on about Labour, but he is ACT now. They should be quizzing him about the direction ACT is taking. If NZ had moved to the right, then ACT would get more.
And no discussion about whether Boscawen would have led ACT to a higher total.
Does it matter? The problem with the left is they’re too busy worrying about things like this and not enough wondering why the Greens (for example) have been around for 24 years yet never been in government
I think you missed Millsy’s point mate. In the context of what he/she wrote of course it matters as it is pertinent to what he/she was saying. In the context of the wider left bloc etc. it matters not a jot but that’s irrelevant to the initial comment.
What he wrote (I think hes a dude) I guess I’m thinking hes trying to say “hey look the left did bad but Act did bad as well”
Which is true and I’d cut Act loose and woo Ron Marks instead but it doesn’t help the Left which has to face some uncomfortable truths such as they’re out of touch with NZ and why are they out of touch…
What – that the forecast & profits would be lower?
It was pretty widely understood in the farming community that the payout would be lower and that profit would be lower. Global Dairy prices have slumped nearly 40% in the last 6 months. It just doesn’t get much coverage in the MSM outside of the Farming news sections and certainly gets very little actual economic analysis (and certainly didn’t make it into the political analysis during the election).
Whether Fonterra choose to delay the announcement until after the election may be a discussion worth having if you are so minded.
Now lets get back to holding Nact up for all to see. See in stuff he wants ideas about poverty from his governement.
Well Mr key are you and your ministers going to go and tour the poorest areas of the country or sit out the front in a Winz office??? Actually go and connect with poor people???
Does anyone here know when any of that lot went near or opened anything in one of these areas?? Do they even know where they are?? Can we embarass them about this or something else – don’t forget that the social media does shape how people think and that turns up in his little focus groups!
For a certain definition of smart, maybe. What he does have is an ability to hide his limitations from most people. Most of this is based on the flawed idea that the suit in charge is competent and trustworthy.
A loved and trusted friend told me yesterday of a client of his, from mainland China, still lives in mainland China, but now owns 50 residential properties in Auckland, all made possible by low interest loans in China at about 1% or 2%.
There is no way in the world that the caucus will unite and swing behind David Cunliffe as long as the ABC club remains the leaks will continue and any hint of disunity gets punished at the ballot box.
So there are two workable options as I see It both nuclear and both signalling the future direction of the party,
1, Cunliffe resigns and caucus gets their preferred candidate through a singular nomination for leader, obviously this will result in much aggravation amongst the membership and likely position the party more towards the centre.
2, Expel the ABC club and start again from what will be a much smaller base. It would be likely that some electorate mp’s would end up as independents or perhaps they would resign and force a by-election that labour may not win going by the party vote in places like Hutt South where in all likelihood name recognition got Trevor through.
I guess the 3rd option is to have the Primary in which the members deliver Cunliffe against the will of the caucus and the white anting continues unabated for 3 more years or there is a messy leadership spill again a year out from the election triggered by caucus voting no confidence as per the constitution which I think will be fast track to electoral oblivion.
As an aside I had Phill Goff knock on my door 3 times in the lead up to the election and I can honestly say he promoted the Labour party and their policy’s he was the only local candidate I saw and I think his effort had a lot to do with the high personal vote he achieved. I voted Green for the first time as I refused to vote for the rabble that labour had become this cycle but I gave Phil my electorate vote. Im sure people that voted right did the same…
What’s this move towards the centre. Hell as they stand, labours economics are centre right – any shift right will put them further to the right.
But, no lets not talk about the fact labour are economically speaking, a right wing party – No unity is needed and the rest of the left better shut up.
cricklewood: thanks for your anecdote of Goff’s hard work. I don’t like his centrist political economics, but also think he should have stayed on after 2011.
Yes we were on the cusp of all sorts of stuff which is why we had to get the election done in hurry. We were possibly on the cusp of Cunliffe getting some name recognition, familiarity and traction with voters which takes a long time. Has anyone ever taken leadership less than a year out from an election and won? On either side? Ever?
I hope we are not on the cusp of having mumbleface back again as our champion. I worked hard as a volunteer for labour in the election because I believed in the policies and believed in Cunliffe. The disloyalty during the campaign slayed me. If they shaft him, I’m afraid I will be on the cusp of withdrawing my loyalty to the party I have voted for in the last 10 elections.
It was David Cunliffe that brought me back to being a Labour voter. Then along came the impressive policies and that sealed the deal. If he goes and Labour muck around AGAIN with a new less capable leader I will completely lose my faith in the Party.
DC has the support of the membership and Unions behind him. Thats what should matter, not the petty ambitions of a few self serving caucus members.
Alwyn – won’t need to identify individual votes. Its easy enough to cross reference the marked roll of those who voted with their status as a resident or citizen. No vote identification necessary.
I believe that the enrollment form asks for details on residency or citizenship status.
Australia doesn’t allow residents to vote (but as outlined above do make exceptions where citizenship cannot be revoked by countries such as Greece)
As for Mr Rosie – good on him for his work in the community, but the point stands… Citizenship is relatively inexpensive, and some do get sponsored by employers etc.
I read the comment, and the bit that followed as meaning that you wanted to know how they voted. That was what worried me.
Please note that I would only forbid dual citizenship for MPs, not for everyone. That is what Australia does. People with dual citizenship can vote over there. The Australian exemption is for the odd MP who was born in Greece.
If the rules were changed, and the government needed to process a bulk lot of citizenship applications for people who just wanted to vote, then economies of scale should apply and the costs significantly reduced to reduce hardship on people who have been here a long time and just need to formalize their relationship with this country. There is always a way to make a change like that fairer.
Governments must shift subsidies and research funding from agro-industrial monoculture to small farmers using ‘agroecological’ methods, according to the UN’s Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food.
Modern industrial agricultural methods can no longer feed the world, due to the impacts of overlapping environmental and ecological crises linked to land, water and resource availability.
The UN official said that new scientific research increasingly shows how ‘agroecology’ offers far more environmentally sustainable methods that can still meet the rapidly growing demand for food:
“Agroecology is a traditional way of using farming methods that are less resource oriented, and which work in harmony with society. New research in agroecology allows us to explore more effectively how we can use traditional knowledge to protect people and their environment at the same time.”
What i’m saying is you can pretty much read the same thing on here as what that guys written which boils to this: Its not our fault we suck its someone elses fault
actually …there has been quite a lot of soul searching as to what went wrong …and it is not always “it is not our fault”…far from it if you read many of the comments
this is not to negate the validity of what Dr.Wayne Hope says
The problem for the left its always “we did some things wrong BUT *insert whatever excuse you like here*
So it’s not appropriate for people who are observers, rather than players, to point out that a large and infulential group are spreading misnformation?
Reasons for Nationals win?
28th on the Happy planet index in 2012. Up from 109 in 2009. -From wikipidia
Fifth in Legatum’s prosperity index. Been around 3rd to 5th since 2009.
“So who’s the happiest? As has been the case the past five years, that distinction goes to countries that enjoy peace, freedom, good healthcare, quality education, a functioning political system and plenty of opportunity: Norway, Sweden, Canada and New Zealand.”
Are we doing OK- Yes
Could we do better- yes.
We are lucky to live in NZ.
I think this is a large reason the government was returned on Saturday night.
Looking into the Happy Planet Index figures a bit more fully, it would appear that New Zealand’s results in the 2012 report show a negligible improvement in life expectancy over its 2009 counterpart (from 79.8 to 80.7 years), whereas the ‘life satisfaction’ indicator has plummeted (7.8 to 7.2). The big improvement noted between the two reports is in the ecological footprint (down from 7.7 to 4.3). That would appear to be a huge stride forward on the environmental front under National, until one notices that the ecological footprint in the 2012 report is based on figures from… 2008 (full 2008 data on ecological footprints here). So it would seem that the report only accounts for a lightening of the ecological footprint under the most recent Labour government (although I’m sceptical of that, too, as I’m not sure exactly what happened under Labour that would have made that kind of difference).
So the only relevant indicator in that report for the National government is a big negative. I hope that helps.
British David Mitchell, comedian and author talking about Amazon recently http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/sep/23/david-mitchell-amazon-cynical-life-crushing-business laid into Amazon for its business model: “They already have an enormous technological edge but apparently that isn’t enough. They also have to have a rapacious near-monopoly.” He also criticised the retailer for its tax payments, pointing to the fact that Amazon paid just £2.4m in corporation tax in 2012, on £4.2bn of UK sales….
Yesterday, after reading an extract from his forthcoming book, a collection of his Observer columns in which he calls Amazon “a benefits scrounger”, Mitchell was greeted with “rapturous applause”, reported the Bookseller….
Yes it is tough, but print book sales through bookshops are still strong”, and that “we should reiterate our belief that booksellers believe in freedom, diversity, partnership and a profitable book industry for all”.
But Mitchell also sounded a note of positivity. “For all that there is hope,” said the comedian. “Theatre and radio still survive, after lots of people were predicting their death, and people are wrong in their depressing predictions. Sometimes bad things don’t happen just because most people don’t want them to.”
I’m not a member, but did some volunteering. It’s a bit dispiriting that the extra energy didn’t seem to pay off in extra votes.
There needs to be some re-assessment into how the energy was spent.
I also think there needs to be a building of relationships, and community participation at a flax roots level – something organisational. I know the Greens regularly do some meet and greets around various places. However, I think something more solid needs to be done to build the networks within communities.
I reckon the GP lost some votes to Labour (who lost votes to NZF and the non-vote) and to IMP. In other words, your effort help the GP retain their MPs 🙂
@karol re-Labour…..yes but do they know who they are supporting as leader?….seems like it is an attempt to get rid of David Cunliffe!….nasty PR campaign?
…not a good look imo….looks like Labour has been infiltrated and is imploding….i can see the Labour Party being split into ‘Red Labour’ and ‘Rogered Labour’
…i feel for committed Labour Party people for their agony …but quite frankly the Labour Party people I know eg family …..would move sideways to the Greens without much trouble ( and they do NOT like Shearer… who demoted Dalziel who then jumped …and Chauvel, who fled) )
….so Labour needs to look at its loyal ( thus far) but nevertheless soft core
This on DPF’s dirty politics. By Dr Jarrod Gilbert, Sociologist. Maybe it could best be referred to as the politics of deception and manipulation.
In the lead up to the election the Minister of Corrections Anne Tolley launched a gang policy. In order to justify the government’s approach she used gang figures that overstated the gang problem. Not by a little bit, but a lot. And I mean a lot. I couldn’t prove it at the time (I can now) but because they were so obviously nonsense I called her out and said I would eat a suitcase full of carrots if she was correct.
Carrots proved to be the least of my problems. My problem proved to be the dishonest Right Wing blogger David Farrar. I initially took Farrar’s challenge in good humour thinking it would be a healthy tussle to seek the truth. It wasn’t. As we know now, he and Cameron Slater are birds of a feather, but where Slater is dim-witted Farrar is marginally smarter and this makes him more insidious.
Fully explained at the link, along with all the nastiness of the KB followers who descended on the good Dr in order to attack, denigrate, mislead, and stifle honest debate.
+100 karol…the egg stinks…”As we know now, he and Cameron Slater are birds of a feather, but where Slater is dim-witted Farrar is marginally smarter and this makes him more insidious”.
I think we need another of Blip’s lists of people whom Slater & Farrar have attacked.. So far I have see this bloke, a south auckland local body politician, the herald food writer, Brian Gaynor on being sued, Fisher in the herald again.
Perhaps next time an academic has this problem, and I can see his argument, he could drop on over here for some help. We can dig out some figures for him etc, etc
Like the bottle of wine photo. i’m sure the MSM read here and the real facts might shut them down a bit. They have lawyers you know.
As for the cops and gang associates, looks like they count everyone in the same burb.
First off as a pollster hes obviously pretty good, good enough to get a ringing endorsement from the PM on election nigfht whereas Labours pollsters were…well a bit shit really
He apologised after all the nastiness? And what lesson is it that the left should learn, given that it doesn’t generally indulge in such orchestrated campaigns of attack, divert and denigrate?
At least he’s not apologising for being a man I guess. He’s apologising for making an error and rightly so. A rarity for the left, even when an incompetently run campaign ends in a trouncing at the polls. It’s simple costed policies delivered in a coherent manner that win elections.
Okay, turning that around: Can you put into one sentence what National stands for, in a way that is appealing, comprehensive and accurate? I’m asking for a verifiable statement of intent, not a vacuous piece of branding like “Working for New Zealand” (the same could be said of most political parties, including Labour). Equally pointless would be a couple of throwaway founding principles like “freedom, private enterprise and getting ahead”, because that would be no more or less (in)accurate than saying that Labour are for “equal opportunity, fairness and workers’ rights”.
If you can’t, can you admit that formulating a vision and a plan in a single sentence is a pointless exercise, and that nobody should bother taking up your challenge?
People feel comfortable with National and don’t require any words. When you ask most National voters, they also can’t explain why they vote National in very many words, but they do know, somehow, that National are just better than the other options on the table.
Agreed. I just think that asking for a solution that is simple, straightforward and to the point is putting the cart before the horse. I can’t claim to be familiar with all the ins and outs of Labour’s situation, but I think get the impression from reading here and elsewhere that there is a very complex set of issues with the party including on-the-ground promotion, media communication, responding to National’s media utterances, opposing National’s policy, identifying the targets of Labour’s own policies, communicating those policies and personnel manangement at caucus level. In my opinion, those all need to be quantified and a strategy developed at a complex and detailed level, so that the actual players with the time, inclination and obligation to evaluate the complex issues understand the entirety – then it’s time to think about how to package any resulting strategy for people who want the short version.
“Working for New Zealand”, Iwi/Kiwi etc. have been effective for National, but they worked because they encapsulated an existing narrative and strategy, not because they actually communicate in a single soundbite what the party stands for.
And if all those ‘missing million’ working class people cannot bring themselves to vote for Labour then maybe the activists who keep it running should have taken the hint a while back – and kicked it to the kerb.
Look the left isn’t going to win any election anytime soon. I think Wayne Hope’s analysis is pretty accurate. The behaviour in the Labour caucus post-election has highlighted the truth of it.
Do you know for sure that the missing million are “working class”? Maybe they just cant be fucked voting? Maybe they are waiting for a party that shares their view of the world as they would like to see it. Just because the left got trounced, where is the correlation that they would all have voted left? Maybe that group would reflect those that voted in their preferences. I ask this because the last election was the same, the refrain was “if they had voted we would have won”, not necessarily.
That is the problem for sure they have to start at the mass of the people at the bottom end of society and understand that they have to work from there to the top
no good even addressing Nationals tornts you have to be 100% focused on who is missing out in nationals policies
This is bizarre for me because I thought Cunliffe’s Labour was very clear:
People first and Inclusiveness.
It did seem all year, though, here on the Standard that others didn’t pick up on that message, which I thought was extremely clear and simple and also a message to counter the neo-liberal mindset.
I wonder why the hell I heard it so clearly and so many others didn’t?
much to my surprise my son was going to Party vote Labour( neither of his parents have for years) …but he was outraged by the axing of Hone…so ruled out Labour ….I would have thought he would have chosen Int/Mana next….but indoctrinated by commercial radio ( eg Sean Plunket) and its poison against Dotcom ….he ruled out INt/Mana!
…. instead he Party voted for the Greens ( all decided in the last week of the Election campaign)
…many others I know were confused up to the last minute …and obviously didnt vote at all ( i forced all the “confused” I knew to at least vote for a party on the Left)
The point about Dotcom is he is a genius if you look at the continum of his two hrs of footage , uninterrupted viewing on my old crappy laptop, get that anywhere else I dont think so ,no advertising interruptions or the plug pulled by the nations security services
people ought to get savvy the guy is an asset not a liability because a few people got fucked up in america and are they just playing the movie moguls game, has any one complained about mega yet
YOU think about the security of any ideas you have and post them thru conventional commercial internet communications anything from the gcsb to the american patent office can view it
THERE IS NO SECURITY FOR THE INDIVIDUAL NO MATTER HOW HONEST THEY ARE
The election everyones stoned /stunned on KEY -XKEYSCORE USA SECURITY
HELLO its 1984 rowing backwards
TELL all these politicians its a 5 oclock start for 12 hrs till they get off no tea breaks AND drug tests before you start and go home, the cops watching you go home pissed so you get busted
See how theyd like that
The real world of a good worker
“..the cops watching you go home pissed so you get busted”. Whats driving home pissed got to with it? If you drive a car after drinking too much you’re an unbelievable moron.
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Not since 1988 when Richard Prebble openly criticised David Lange have we seen such a challenge to a Prime Minister as that of David Seymour to Christopher Luxon last night. Prebble suggested Lange had mental health issues during a TV interview and was almost immediately fired. Seymour hasn’t gone quite ...
Three weeks in, and the 24/7 news cycle is not helping anyone feel calm and informed about the second Trump presidency. One day, the US is threatening 25% trade tariffs on its friends and neighbours. The reasons offered by the White House are absurd, such as stopping fentanyl coming in ...
This video includes personal musings and conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). Wherever you look, you'll hear headlines claiming we've passed 1.5 degrees of global warming. And while 2024 saw ...
Photo by Heather M. Edwards on UnsplashHere’s the key news, commentary, reports and debate around Aotearoa’s politics and economy in the week to Feb 10 below. That’s ahead of live chats on the Substack App and The Kākā’s front page on Substack at 5pm with: on his column in The ...
Is there anyone in the world the National Party loves more than a campaign donor? Why yes, there is! They will always have the warmest hello and would you like to slip into something more comfortable for that great god of our age, the High Net Worth Individual.The words the ...
Waste and fraud certainly exist in foreign aid programs, but rightwing celebration of USAID’s dismantling shows profound ignorance of the value of soft power (as opposed to hard power) in projecting US influence and interests abroad by non-military/coercive means (think of “hearts and minds,” “hugs, not bullets,” “honey versus vinegar,” ...
Health New Zealand is proposing to cut almost half of its data and digital positions – more than 1000 of them. The PSA has called on the Privacy Commissioner to urgently investigate the cuts due to the potential for serious consequences for patients. NZNO is calling for an urgent increase ...
We may see a few more luxury cars on Queen Street, but a loosening of rules to entice rich foreigners to invest more here is unlikely to “turbocharge our economic growth”. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate ...
Let us not dance daintily around the elephant in the room. Our politicians who serve us in the present are not honest, certainly not as honest as they should be, and while the right are taking out most of the trophies for warping narratives and literally redefining “facts”, the kiwi ...
A few weeks ago I took a look at public transport ridership in 2024. In today’s post I’m going to be looking a bit deeper at bus ridership. Buses make up the vast majority of ridership in Auckland with 70 million boardings last year out of a total of 89.4 ...
Oh, you know I did itIt's over and I feel fineNothing you could say is gonna change my mindWaited and I waited the longest nightNothing like the taste of sweet declineSongwriters: Chris Shiflett / David Eric Grohl / Nate Mendel / Taylor Hawkins.Hindsight is good, eh?The clarity when the pieces ...
Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on UnsplashHere’s what we’re watching in the week to February 16 and beyond in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty:Monday, February 10The Kākā’s weekly wrap-up of news about politics and the economy is due at midday, followed by webinar for paying subscribers in Substack’s ...
A listing of 23 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, February 2, 2025 thru Sat, February 8, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
Today, I stumbled across a Twitter Meme: the ending of The Lord of the Rings as a Chess scenario: https://x.com/mellon_heads/status/1887983845917564991 It gets across the basic gist. Aragorn and Gandalf offering up ‘material’ at the Morannon allows Frodo and Samwise to catch Sauron unawares – fair enough. But there are a ...
Last week, Kieran McAnulty called out Chris Bishop and Nicola Willis for their claims that Kāinga Ora’s costs were too high.They had claimed Kāinga Ora’s cost were 12% higher than market i.e. private devlopersBut Kāinga Ora’s Chair had already explained why last year:"We're not building to sell, so we'll be ...
Stuff’s Political Editor Luke Malpass - A Fellow at New Zealand IniativeLast week I half-joked that Stuff / The Post’s Luke Malpass1 always sounded like he was auditioning for a job at the New Zealand Initiative.Mountain Tui is a reader-supported publication. For a limited time, subscriptions are 20% off. Thanks ...
At a funeral on Friday, there were A4-sized photos covering every wall of the Dil’s reception lounge. There must have been 200 of them, telling the story in the usual way of the video reel but also, by enlargement, making it more possible to linger and step in.Our friend Nicky ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park from the Gigafact team in collaboration with members from our team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is methane the ...
The Government’s idea is that the private sector and Community Housing Providers will fund, build and operate new affordable housing to address our housing crisis. Meanwhile, the Government does not know where almost half of the 1,700 children who left emergency housing actually went. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong ...
Oh, home, let me come homeHome is wherever I'm with youOh, home, let me come homeHome is wherever I'm with youSongwriters: Alexander Ebert / Jade Allyson CastrinosMorena,I’m on a tight time frame this morning. In about an hour and a half, I’ll need to pack up and hit the road ...
This is a post about the Mountain Tui substack, and small tweaks - further to the poll and request post the other day. Please don’t read if you aren’t interested in my personal matters. Thank you all.After oohing-and-aahing about how to structure the Substack model since November, including obtaining ...
This transcript of a recent conversation between the Prime Minister and his chief economic adviser has not been verified.We’ve announced we are the ‘Yes Government’. Do you like it?Yes, Prime Minister.Dreamed up by the PR team. It’s about being committed to growth. Not that the PR team know anything about ...
The other day, Australian Senator Nick McKim issued a warning in the Australian Parliement about the US’s descent into fascim.And of course it’s true, but I lament - that was true as soon as Trump won.What we see is now simply the reification of the intention, planning, and forces behind ...
Among the many other problems associated with Musk/DOGE sending a fleet of teenage and twenty-something cultists to remove, copy and appropriate federal records like social security, medicaid and other supposedly protected data is the fact that the youngsters doing the data-removal, copying and security protocol and filter code over-writing have ...
Jokerman dance to the nightingale tuneBird fly high by the light of the moonOh, oh, oh, JokermanSong by Bob Dylan.Morena folks, I hope this fine morning of the 7th of February finds you well. We're still close to Paihia, just a short drive out of town. Below is the view ...
It’s been an eventful week as always, so here’s a few things that we have found interesting. We also hope everyone had a happy and relaxing Waitangi Day! This week in Greater Auckland We’re still running on summer time, but provided two chewy posts: On Tuesday, a guest ...
Queuing on Queen St: the Government is set to announce another apparently splashy growth policy on Sunday of offering residence visas to wealthy migrants. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Friday, February 7:PM Christopher ...
The fact that Waitangi ended up being such a low-key affair may mark it out as one of the most significant Waitangi Days in recent years. A group of women draped in “Toitu Te Tiriti” banners who turned their backs on the politicians’ powhiri was about as rough as it ...
National’s cuts to disability support funding and freezing of new residential placements has resulted in significant mental health decline for intellectually disabled people. ...
The hundreds of jobs lost needlessly as a result of the Kinleith Mill paper production closure will have a devastating impact on the Tokoroa community - something that could have easily been avoided. ...
Today Te Pāti Māori MP for Te Tai Tokerau, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi, released her members bill that will see the return of tamariki and mokopuna Māori from state care back to te iwi Māori. This bill will establish an independent authority that asserts and protects the rights promised in He Whakaputanga ...
The Whangarei District Council being forced to fluoridate their local water supply is facing a despotic Soviet-era disgrace. This is not a matter of being pro-fluoride or anti-fluoride. It is a matter of what New Zealanders see and value as democracy in our country. Individual democratically elected Councillors are not ...
Nicola Willis’ latest supermarket announcement is painfully weak with no new ideas, no real plan, and no relief for Kiwis struggling with rising grocery costs. ...
Half of Pacific children sometimes going without food is just one of many heartbreaking lowlights in the Salvation Army’s annual State of the Nation report. ...
The Salvation Army’s State of the Nation report is a bleak indictment on the failure of Government to take steps to end poverty, with those on benefits, including their children, hit hardest. ...
New Zealand First has today introduced a Member’s Bill which would restore decision-making power to local communities regarding the fluoridation of drinking water. The ‘Fluoridation (Referendum) Legislation Bill’ seeks to repeal the Health (Fluoridation of Drinking Water) Amendment Act 2021 that granted centralised authority to the Direct General of Health ...
New Zealand First has introduced a Member’s Bill aimed at preventing banks from refusing their services to businesses because of the current “Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Framework”. “This Bill ensures fairness and prevents ESG standards from perpetuating woke ideology in the banking sector being driven by unelected, globalist, climate ...
Erica Stanford has reached peak shortsightedness if today’s announcement is anything to go by, picking apart immigration settings piece by piece to the detriment of the New Zealand economy. ...
Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. The intention was to establish a colony with the cession of sovereignty to the Crown, ...
Te Whatu Ora Chief Executive Margie Apa leaving her job four months early is another symptom of this government’s failure to deliver healthcare for New Zealanders. ...
The Green Party is calling for the Prime Minister to show leadership and be unequivocal about Aotearoa New Zealand’s opposition to a proposal by the US President to remove Palestinians from Gaza. ...
The latest unemployment figures reveal that job losses are hitting Māori and Pacific people especially hard, with Māori unemployment reaching a staggering 9.7% for the December 2024 quarter and Pasifika unemployment reaching 10.5%. ...
Waitangi 2025: Waitangi Day must be community and not politically driven - Shane Jones Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. ...
Despite being confronted every day with people in genuine need being stopped from accessing emergency housing – National still won’t commit to building more public houses. ...
The Green Party says the Government is giving up on growing the country’s public housing stock, despite overwhelming evidence that we need more affordable houses to solve the housing crisis. ...
Before any thoughts of the New Year and what lies ahead could even be contemplated, New Zealand reeled with the tragedy of Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming losing her life. For over 38 years she had faithfully served as a front-line Police officer. Working alongside her was Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson will return to politics at Waitangi on Monday the 3rd of February where she will hold a stand up with fellow co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick. ...
Te Pāti Māori is appalled by the government's blatant mishandling of the school lunch programme. David Seymour’s ‘cost-saving’ measures have left tamariki across Aotearoa with unidentifiable meals, causing distress and outrage among parents and communities alike. “What’s the difference between providing inedible food, and providing no food at all?” Said ...
The Government is doubling down on outdated and volatile fossil fuels, showing how shortsighted and destructive their policies are for working New Zealanders. ...
Green Party MP Steve Abel this morning joined Coromandel locals in Waihi to condemn new mining plans announced by Shane Jones in the pit of the town’s Australian-owned Gold mine. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to strengthen its just-announced 2030-2035 Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement and address its woeful lack of commitment to climate security. ...
Today marks a historic moment for Taranaki iwi with the passing of the Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill in Parliament. "Today, we stand together as descendants of Taranaki, and our tūpuna, Taranaki Maunga, is now formally acknowledged by the law as a living tūpuna. ...
Labour is relieved to see Children’s Minister Karen Chhour has woken up to reality and reversed her government’s terrible decisions to cut funding from frontline service providers – temporarily. ...
It is the first week of David Seymour’s school lunch programme and already social media reports are circulating of revolting meals, late deliveries, and mislabelled packaging. ...
The Government’s commitment to get New Zealand’s roads back on track is delivering strong results, with around 98 per cent of potholes on state highways repaired within 24 hours of identification every month since targets were introduced, Transport Minister Chris Bishop says. “Increasing productivity to help rebuild our economy is ...
The former Cadbury factory will be the site of the Inpatient Building for the new Dunedin Hospital and Health Minister Simeon Brown says actions have been taken to get the cost overruns under control. “Today I am giving the people of Dunedin certainty that we will build the new Dunedin ...
From today, Plunket in Whāngarei will be offering childhood immunisations – the first of up to 27 sites nationwide, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. The investment of $1 million into the pilot, announced in October 2024, was made possible due to the Government’s record $16.68 billion investment in health. It ...
New Zealand’s strong commitment to the rights of disabled people has continued with the response to an important United Nations report, Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston has announced. Of the 63 concluding observations of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), 47 will be progressed ...
Resources Minister Shane Jones has launched New Zealand’s national Minerals Strategy and Critical Minerals List, documents that lay a strategic and enduring path for the mineral sector, with the aim of doubling exports to $3 billion by 2035. Mr Jones released the documents, which present the Coalition Government’s transformative vision ...
Firstly I want to thank OceanaGold for hosting our event today. Your operation at Waihi is impressive. I want to acknowledge local MP Scott Simpson, local government dignitaries, community stakeholders and all of you who have gathered here today. It’s a privilege to welcome you to the launch of the ...
Racing Minister, Winston Peters has announced the Government is preparing public consultation on GST policy proposals which would make the New Zealand racing industry more competitive. “The racing industry makes an important economic contribution. New Zealand thoroughbreds are in demand overseas as racehorses and for breeding. The domestic thoroughbred industry ...
Business confidence remains very high and shows the economy is on track to improve, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis says. “The latest ANZ Business Outlook survey, released yesterday, shows business confidence and expected own activity are ‘still both very high’.” The survey reports business confidence fell eight points to +54 ...
Enabling works have begun this week on an expanded radiology unit at Hawke’s Bay Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital which will double CT scanning capacity in Hawke’s Bay to ensure more locals can benefit from access to timely, quality healthcare, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. This investment of $29.3m in the ...
The Government has today announced New Zealand’s second international climate target under the Paris Agreement, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand will reduce emissions by 51 to 55 per cent compared to 2005 levels, by 2035. “We have worked hard to set a target that is both ambitious ...
Nine years of negotiations between the Crown and iwi of Taranaki have concluded following Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/the Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill passing its third reading in Parliament today, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “This Bill addresses the historical grievances endured by the eight iwi ...
As schools start back for 2025, there will be a relentless focus on teaching the basics brilliantly so all Kiwi kids grow up with the knowledge, skills and competencies needed to grow the New Zealand of the future, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “A world-leading education system is a key ...
Housing Minister Chris Bishop and Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson have welcomed Kāinga Ora’s decision to re-open its tender for carpets to allow wool carpet suppliers to bid. “In 2024 Kāinga Ora issued requests for tender (RFTs) seeking bids from suppliers to carpet their properties,” Mr Bishop says. “As part ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today visited Otahuhu College where the new school lunch programme has served up healthy lunches to students in the first days of the school year. “As schools open in 2025, the programme will deliver nutritious meals to around 242,000 students, every school day. On ...
Minister for Children Karen Chhour has intervened in Oranga Tamariki’s review of social service provider contracts to ensure Barnardos can continue to deliver its 0800 What’s Up hotline. “When I found out about the potential impact to this service, I asked Oranga Tamariki for an explanation. Based on the information ...
A bill to make revenue collection on imported and exported goods fairer and more effective had its first reading in Parliament, Customs Minister Casey Costello said today. “The Customs (Levies and Other Matters) Amendment Bill modernises the way in which Customs can recover the costs of services that are needed ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Department of Internal Affairs [the Department] has achieved significant progress in completing applications for New Zealand citizenship. “December 2024 saw the Department complete 5,661 citizenship applications, the most for any month in 2024. This is a 54 per cent increase compared ...
Reversals to Labour’s blanket speed limit reductions begin tonight and will be in place by 1 July, says Minister of Transport Chris Bishop. “The previous government was obsessed with slowing New Zealanders down by imposing illogical and untargeted speed limit reductions on state highways and local roads. “National campaigned on ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has announced Budget 2025 – the Growth Budget - will be delivered on Thursday 22 May. “This year’s Budget will drive forward the Government’s plan to grow our economy to improve the incomes of New Zealanders now and in the years ahead. “Budget 2025 will build ...
For the Government, 2025 will bring a relentless focus on unleashing the growth we need to lift incomes, strengthen local businesses and create opportunity. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today laid out the Government’s growth agenda in his Statement to Parliament. “Just over a year ago this Government was elected by ...
By Lydia Lewis, RNZ Pacific presenter/Bulletin editor Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark maintains that Cook Islands, a realm of New Zealand, should have consulted Wellington before signing a “partnership” deal with China. “[Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown] seems to have signed behind the backs of his own ...
COMMENTARY:By Saige England Mediawatch on RNZ today strongly criticised Stuff and YouTube among other media for using Israeli propaganda’s “Outbrain” service. Outbrain is a company founded by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) military and its technology can be tracked back to a wealthy entrepreneur, which in this case could ...
Luxon said protesters linked to Destiny Church "went too far" by disrupting Pride events in Auckland, while church leader Brian Tamaki said he told protesters, "I want you to storm the library they're in." ...
Hundreds of engineers are losing their jobs and leaving our shores due to infrastructure project delays, creating "significant" risk to our nation's development, says the head of New Zealand's engineering body. ...
By Caleb Fotheringham, RNZ Pacific journalist Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown says the deal with China “complements, not replaces” the relationship with New Zealand after signing it yesterday. Brown said “The Action Plan for Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP) 2025-2030” provides a structured framework for engagement between the Cook Islands ...
The government should not set military style academies into youth justice law, the children's commissioner says, despite its first bootcamp getting a glowing report. ...
The infamous over-the-suit T-shirt worn by the PM at a Parliament barbecue has gone on sale to raise funds for children living in poverty, in a TradeMe auction. ...
MONDAYSheriff Seymour rode slowly down the main street of Dodge on his faithful white horse Atlas Network.He liked what he saw.Children were being fed free lunches prepared by kind people who collected the scraps from an offal rendering plant.“Very strongly flavoured liver, such as ox liver, can be soaked overnight ...
Once upon a time it was all about being an astronaut, a firefighter or doctor; but these days kids have their sights set on becoming vloggers or YouTubers.That’s according to a 2019 study by Lego that surveyed 3000 children between the ages of eight to 12 from the US, the ...
Madeleine Chapman reflects on the week that was. From the moment I started high school and realised almost every other girl in my year was at least partially interested in what the boys were up to, I realised that I would be single for life. The feeling wasn’t one of ...
The Pacific profiles series shines a light on Pacific people in Aotearoa doing interesting and important work in their communities, as nominated by members of the public. Today, Selina Alesana Alefosio.All photos by Geoffery Matautia.On a bright Sunday morning from her grandparent’s home in Pito-one, I spoke with ...
The White Lotus star reflects on her life in TV, including the local ad reference that doesn’t work in Australia, and her bananas co-star on Neighbours.Morgana O’Reilly was scrolling her phone next to her sleeping son on an idle Saturday morning when she got the call confirming that she ...
Claire Mabey explores the pros and cons of puff quotes on book covers.In January, Publishers Weekly put out an article by Sean Manning – publisher of Simon & Schuster’s flagship US imprint – in which he said he’d “no longer require authors to obtain blurbs for their books”.The ...
New Zealand’s Entomological Society is hosting its annual bug of the year contest. Here are some of the insects in the running. For some reason – perhaps humans’ inherent competitiveness, the idealisation of democracy, the need to demarcate winners and losers – one of the best ways to get people ...
A journey along the border, with words and illustrations by Bob Kerr.The Spinoff Essay showcases the best essayists in Aotearoa, on topics big and small. Made possible by the generous support of our members.The Sunset Limited leaves Union Station New Orleans on time at nine in the morning. We ...
Neville Peat is the 2024 recipient of the Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement in nonfiction. He’s written 56 books, mostly on natural history; this excerpt is from The Falcon and the Lark: A New Zealand High Country Journal, first published in 1992. The falcon wintering on the Rock and ...
It was a light-hearted gesture Greta Pilkington will be forever grateful for – thanks to an Aussie rival who jumped in when the Olympic sailor couldn’t be at her own graduation.Pilkington, then 20, had been leading a double life – while qualifying for the 2024 Paris Olympics in the ILCA ...
I was born in the back of my grandfather’s ute, by an overgrown windbreak in a remote place called Wahi-Rakauyou can’t find on a map. I was born a girl but given the man’s name Harvey, as my dad always wanted a violent-minded boy to one day help him ...
“We’re not here to interfere in people’s property rights,” Ngāi Tahu’s Te Maire Tau has told the High Court.Tau, a historian, Upoko (traditional leader) of Ngāi Tūāhuriri, and a university professor of history, is the lead witness in a case designed to force the Crown to recognise the tribe’s rangatiratanga ...
Pacific Media Watch Trump administration officials barred two Associated Press (AP) reporters from covering White House events this week because the US-based independent news agency did not change its style guide to align with the president’s political agenda. The AP is being punished for using the term “Gulf of Mexico,” ...
By Lydia Lewis, RNZ Pacific Presenter/Bulletin editor France’s top diplomat in the Pacific region says talks around the “unfreezing” of New Caledonia’s highly controversial electoral roll are back on the table. The French government intended to make a constitutional amendment that would lift restrictions prescribed under the Nouméa Accord, which ...
By bringing these global voices to the fight for free expression in New Zealand, we’ll continue to protect and expand our culture of free speech, says Nathan Seiuli, the Free Speech Union's Events Manager. ...
The issue is no longer a hypothetical one. US President Donald Trump will not explicitly suggest death camps, but he has already consented to Israel’s continuing a war that is not a war but rather a barbaric assault on a desolate stretch of land. From there, the road to annihilation is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cecelia Cmielewski, Research Fellow, Institute for Culture and Society, Western Sydney University To be selected as the artist and curator team to represent Australia at the Venice Biennale is considered the ultimate exhibition for an artistic team. To have your selection rescinded, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steve Turton, Adjunct Professor of Environmental Geography, CQUniversity Australia Severe Tropical Cyclone Zelia is bearing down on the northwest coast of Australia and is likely to make landfall early Friday evening. It’s a monster storm of great concern to Western Australia. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Danielle Ireland-Piper, Associate Professor, ANU National Security College, Australian National University A Victorian government decision to allow dingo culling in the state’s east until 2028 has reignited debate over what has been dubbed Australia’s most controversial animal. Animals Australia, an animal welfare ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hassan Vally, Associate Professor, Epidemiology, Deakin University Overnight, Robert F. Kennedy Jr was confirmed as the secretary of the US Health and Human Services Department. Put simply, this makes him the most influential figure in overseeing the health and wellbeing of more ...
Everything you missed from day five of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard eight hours of submissions.Read our recaps of the previous hearings here.It was another work from home day for the Justice Committee, the only people in Room 3 being security guards, committee ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milad Haghani, Associate Professor & Principal Fellow in Urban Risk & Resilience, The University of Melbourne Juris Teivans/Shutterstock In Australia, fatal road crashes are climbing again, especially since the pandemic, and despite years of attempts to reduce road trauma, the numbers ...
rightwing-rag..the herald..has an editorial today..
..urging support for mass-surveillance..
..and urging the govt to hurry up and catch up with the latest american war effort…
(and/but they shouldn’t worry..john key will be right behind both..
..should we hold a sweepstake as to the day key announces we will be going ‘to help’ the americans..?
..i’m picking within a week from now..we will again be at war..
..and again as americas’ spear-carriers/mercenaries..)
Maybe the herald could show some credibility and stand behind its words by naming its anonymous editorial writers …. if they have nothing to hide then they have nothing to fear.
@ vto..
..john roughan..the writer of that hagiography of key..probably..
.it’s all his way of thinking..
..and yeah..it is an arcane/byegone practice..
..the refusal of writers to ‘own’ editorials..
And we could all use our real names here too, but for various reasons – no doubt some very good ones too – we dont
(Phillip being the exception of course)
Lordy I don’t know how many times this silly subject has arisen.
Imo it is entirely legitimate to remain anonymous here, for the exact same reasons that voting is anonymous.
On the other hand the Herald is claiming that everyone’s entire information should be known to the state. In addition the herald and its writers in the past have claimed that bloggers should not be able to hide behind anonymity, while hypocritically penning anonymous articles and ed pieces itself.
Who cares anyway, I gave up on editorials a very long time ago. They are basic, they are partisan, they are pieces of shit.
We’re not anonymous – we’re pseudonymous.
You start. What’s your name, LH?
but we have no real airforce..
..maybe bennet cd load up our cargo planes with benificiaries..
..and go and throw them at isis..?
..(just trying to think laterally/problem-solve here..)
We could start problem solving by trying to get some reliable and true information on the situation over there.
At the moment all we have is the corporate-owned media and politicians and I don’t believe one tiny bit of their propaganda bullshit.
RT “appears ” to give a different prospective.
You have to take their “news” with a pinch of salt, but by watching RT you can compare their reporting against the right wing crap from CNN and Sky and our media and come up with a more or less what really is happening scenario.
Please help me. Who, or what, is “RT”?
Russia Today.
Thanks.
Can I also suggest France 24 (if you can find the English Language Channel – assuming your French or Arabic isn’t up to it!!)?
It’s particularly good on Africa and even South America. Also try Deutsche Welle which is also quite good.
Broadly speaking both are “public broadcasters” giving an international view slightly different from the Anglophone broadcasters (and as an aside observe what a proper public broadcaster might look like!).
France 24 has a quite good Iphone & Android Apps as well.
I will have a look at these.
My French is almost fluent but I wouldn’t even recognise that someone was speaking Arabic and I only recognise about one word in ten in German. A traditional New Zealand education I fear.
Russian Today has only had a glance but it looks very interesting.
pickin up on phillip ures laterleness ……seen the Israeli trucks?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQZ4FZJ4uBM
weell, muckspread cowshit over ISIS? Herculean effort to spread our 100%pureshit
That would be about right!
maybe more people should cancel their subscriptions to The Herald…some have already
People are writing Labour off. Come on!
If Labour had got 3% more, and the Greens 2% more, both of which should and could have ocurred had events not transpired against them, we would be celebrating a relatively progressive government with an intelligent and progressive PM.
It can be done next time. 35% is a good base to build to 45%.
But right now the MSM should hold its head in shame for the way it conspired with Key to bring about this result.
If…
And yet almost a million adults didn’t vote – labour are dead, because they sold out their constituency. They chose to hurt the vulnerable, then did nothing to redeem themselves for 30 years.
I think the MSM can be pretty proud of the result they achieved. And therein lies the problem.
i think if the ‘msm’ has any collective-consciousness/self-awareness..
..you’d think they would be getting somewhat red-faced as it sinks in for them how they so allowed themselves to be played/used by the right..
..in so so many ways..
What makes you think they have a problem with it?
@ hanswurst..
..of course that could well be true..
..i guess i am presuming journalistic-ethics..there..somewhere..
I don’t think the MSM have a problem promoting radical right-wing policies and parties at all.
One Party State
even rightwinger fran o’sullivan notes/confirms how the media have been suckered..’played’ as rubes…..
“.The media will also be more scrappy towards the Government after journalists found out the extent to which they had been played in the previous three years..”
Try Tracey Watkins in Wednesday’s Press…. Choice of adjectives almost orgasmic as she salivates over Labour’s problems.
Is she a journalist or is she back handed by Crosby Textor and just copies what they tell her to write?
Other journalists should cringe at her ethics but Slater must love her as a true partner with identical values.
Set your own damn media up then. Oh wait. You can’t do that without 10’s of millions of other peoples money via the State for some reason.
So you admit that the media lean to the right?
@ gossie..
um..!..no..!
http://whoar.co.nz/
Build your own roads and power stations.
“we would be celebrating a relatively progressive government with an intelligent and progressive PM.”
If Winston had gone with Labour.
It’s all the naughty media’s fault. Bad media, bad!
@ gossie..they definitely had their part to play..
..anyone doubting this should go to the nation website..and watch the interview gower did with harawira/harre..
..for me..that was a journalistic/campaign-nadir..
..of some note..
..really really ‘bad media’..
Cunliffe is already proving what a lot of people thought about him. There is no way he is going to stay leader.
And not a word of criticism of Key on Pike River entry. There is bound to be a lie there somwhere.
But both the Herald and Stuff know every word spoken in the Labour caucus meeting and even a head count on who’s not supposedly supporting Cunliffe.
The real enemy is within the caucus and party leadership, banish them or continue to decline.
the obvious questions for key being:
..did key know..?
..when did he know..?
..why did he keep silent about it..?
..and if he didn’t know…why not..?
Or if they don’t know MSM make it up to cause further trouble.
It’s come out only now because it would show this Govt for what it is: heartless and only caring about money. Note the five failed attempts to obtain OIA on the safety of entering the mine? Compare it to the speed with which they are delivered to WhaleOil.
They got the OIA from another dept concerned with safety, not Solid Energy. I believe.
that and the revised growth stats.
In my glum phases, I need to resist the urge to simply believe that rats were elected by turkeys. sigh.
Still, democracy is better than the alternatives.
If Labour talked to their members and had networks in the community, they may have known about the decision about safe entry well before now. They could have hit NAct with it. Wouldn’t have changed the election, but it would have been another straw on the camel’s back. FFS, the party came from the mines and was deeply rooted in those communities. What’s it deeply rooted in now? Some organic vegan restaurant in Wellington?
Bearded git,
except NZ1st would have gone with National because that means they are negotiating with only one party.
Also that extra 10% is hard to get and that 35% is near impossible to loose.
Of course none of that means one should “write off” labour, just realize there are some voters there that labour should be winning if it want’s to govern (as opposed to the non voters who will never vote).
(as opposed to the non voters who will never vote).
That’s a lie Scott – I know many people who were encouraged to vote again because of Mana and Hone. A big bunch voted green, or followed the strategic voting guide over at the daily blog. I also know many people who regret voting for labour in their electorate vote because of what labour did to Mana.
Also, to dismiss non-voters just makes you sound like another right wing drop kick, or an apologist for all of labour’s failures.
“I know many people who were encouraged to vote again because of Mana and Hone.”
Yes, and the results and turnout suggest that a lot of them went out and voted National, specifically to keep Mana out.
Adam,
No there is a subtle difference.
I did not mean that you can’t get a voter or two who would not otherwise have voted to vote via an additional get out the vote strategy.
Just that there are so many people who will not vote that targeting them as a group is pretty ineffective. You will waste a lot of effort on a lot of people most of whom who will not vote.
As to your assessment of what voters did – if we assume you are correct there must be some larger and opposite effects that completely obscured your effects.
Does that always seem to be the case? What is your record for predicting political results?
Labour (both the old guard/ABCers), Labour members, and indeed anyone concerned with democracy should reflect on this:
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/09/24/one-party-state/
Astute analysis by Wayne Hope (as always)
A different and worthy perspective by Wayne Hope from that which many other commentators have made imo. He explores the cultural basis for Nat support.
yeah..it’s a good/worthwhile read..
..i’ve linked to it..
I disagree with only one thing in that article.
If I read him right, he’s saying we are on the cusp of ‘one party rule’. But you don’t need one party when you have professional politicians spread over parties. The illusion of choice and the act of voting for alternatives can remain – although the alternatives are just mute shades of one another.
Thinking I prefer the term I used yesterday somewhere to describe what’s coming up – dictatorial governance.
That aside, a ‘nail. head’, post.
When the Labour Party rules were written it was expected that the election would be in November – the election loss would have been analysed prior to the year end and then on reflection there would have been a leadership confidence vote in February.
The early election date means an alternate plan is to be considered.
The problem for the party under the new rules is that a leader who has lost caucus confidence can still contest the subsequent contest and possibly win.
Having a leader without caucus confidence is a recipe for disunity and this leads to losing public confidence. No better is having a favourite of caucus as leader if they do not have the confidence of the party members.
Neither a leader beholden to activists, nor a leader and caucus who are not true to the will of the wider party appeals. The party not existing to facilitate the aspiration for the baubles of office as a National lite regime change.
The best option here is a party review, and a decision to have a leadership contest next year, one not requiring a caucus vote first or any contestant to resign their existing position. If no one but the existing leader runs then there is no contest, otherwise there is.
SPC, spot on observation Having a leader without caucus confidence is a recipe for disunity and this leads to losing public confidence. No better is having a favourite of caucus as leader if they do not have the confidence of the party members.
Listened to the radio this morning, cant work out who is more keen to kill David, the media or the caucus. Bland faceless non entities the lot of them. There is absolutely nobody amongst the old guard to inspire, why the fekk are the likes of Mallard, King and Goff still lurking?
Three years goes fast, I would counsel caution in any fast decision, without a clear strategy its deckchairs on the Titanic.
they moved fast last time, went into cannabilism mode, and look how well that worked. Yet. Here they go again.
Clayton Cosgrove, the “I” doctor.
I do hope labour supporters vote with their feet and leave. But no, they will bury their heads in the sand and take this same old shit for another 30 years?
The right wing of labour make me sick.
Nice analysis of Cosgrove by the way Tracey – once again, nail, head, bang on…
This helps explain one part of the explosion of health care insurance providers in NZ. And what that business model is morphing into. Notice Cigna in the mix – Mmmm maybe you want to ask some firemen in NYC what they think of Cigna.
http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/09/22/15562/health-insurers-turning-who-knows-what?utm_source=email&utm_campaign=watchdog&utm_medium=publici-email&goal=0_ffd1d0160d-cce1722a86-100020097&mc_cid=cce1722a86&mc_eid=c346e018f7
And on the good news front of labour and their struggles.
http://libcom.org/news/seattle-solidarity-network-wins-first-multi-worker-strike-22092014
Looks like the Key Government sat on an Official Information response until after the election. Turns out it has been safe to go up the drift at Pike River for almost a year. On Saturday, Coasters gave their party vote to National. They were tricked. The Chief Ombudsman warned that this sort of behaviour form Government meant “We could kiss our democracy good bye.” Looks like the country was tricked. Why, so far, is the media ignoring the Minister’s and Key’s role in this? Scared? Bought?
reduced growth promise from 4-2%
Announced resignation of jason ede…
Pike river
I am not sure why anyone thought the lying would stop. But as someone wrote yesterday apparently its irrelevant cos 50% of voters dont care.
I find it depressing.
It’s like the election is a clean slate for National. “win” the election, and put the dirty politics allegations, the lying over GCSB all behind them. Pull a blanket over the sordid lot, and Put it down to Politiking, without addressing any issues, and without Key having to answer to anything. Meanwhile, the biggest opposition party squabbles and enables it all to be swept under the carpet. I really despair.
Labour aren’t allowing it to be swept under the carpet. If they didn’t squabble, somebody would have had a cat turn up after being presumed lost for a month… and that would be more newsworthy than Key’s lies. If Labour pointed out that Key was lying, Key would be on television with a soundbite saying, “Of course they are going to come out attacking my credibility. They’ve just been resoundingly rejected by New Zealanders, who will see this for what it is, which is a smear campaign from the Left”.
The blame for allowing it to be swept under the carpet lies squarely and solely with journalists in the MSM.
@ Hanswurst
+1
@ sans cle..
..you can cheer up a bit..’cos those dirty politics and spooking-scandals have not gone away…
..the number of official investigations already launched will ensure that..
..and the injunctions against the msm using that whaledump material given to them..
..are being worked thru…
..rest assured..there is no ‘clean slate’ for key/national..
..this will all unfold..in due course..
(and of course..key will ‘distract’..by again taking us to war..
..at the behest of the americans..)
That sounds interesting. What evidence is there that injunctions taken against the MSM are being worked through?
@ hans..
..a reported mumbled-aside of ‘super-injunction’ from toby manhire..
..who was one of the recipients of the whaledump..
This must be devastating news for the Pike River families and was shocking to see on Campbell Live last night.
What if Solid Energy’s reason for not entering the drift comes down to $$$? What are the other reasons?
As for West Coast Tasman giving their party vote to National, that was staggering, they have been mucked around by the Government for years over the Pike River disaster. (“mucked around”, a condensed version of the final chapters in Tragedy at Pike River Mine: how and why 29 men died, by Rebecca Macfie).
isn’t it sick, rosie. i wonder if it something to do with liability, as to where bodies might be found ? key is cold, callous and cruel, albeit welcomed by many as a true leader. go figure.
Liability/ lack of access to insurance funds? Campbell Live will no doubt keep up with the situation. It seems like they are the only media who care.
BTW: have kept up with your concerns over the TPP being singed and GE crop seed being allowed into the country. I share those concerns. I know there is a pro GE faction within fed farmers but hadn’t realised how tight the connections with Monsanto are, as you suggested a few days back.
It’s tragic this is the likely path we will go down, along with intensified dairying. more animal suffering and an environment degraded, potentially beyond repair under the removal of protections of the RMA. The vision the Greens had was the opposite.
@yeshe 9.53
Would this southern West Coast National result come from the faction that were getting uptight about Shane Jones being a real man of the people yet not getting a go at leader. Perhaps Shane was their idea of a good politician and a working class hero and when by-passed all their brain cells sort of got fried.
so hard to know isn’t it ? but we could safely bet the seat would not be blue today if these hidden OIA docs had appeared last week. Evil bastards the bunch of them.
You ask, “What are the other reasons?”
Hows about we already had footage showing rescue boxes had been opened, meaning that some miners survived the explosion. So, pre-election, does a ruling party that made ‘a million and one’ promises, while determinedly doing nothing, want evidence suggesting men were simply left to die?
You might recall that rescue workers wanted to enter the mine soon after the explosion (methane gone) and were prevented from doing so on the basis that more explosions were imminent. How long was it til the second explosion? I can’t remember, but am sure it wasn’t mere hours before that methane built up again.
Then you might also recall the days and weeks that passed while ‘air quality’ measurements were taken, suggesting methane was hovering at 12% (the concentration it’s apt to explode at).
And remember all the tosh that because there was a fire in the mine, temperatures within the mine were at ‘coal fire’ temperatures, meaning entry couldn’t take place?
That’s just off the top of my head before the first coffee of the morning is down.
In short – bad, dog shit cynicism – adverse publicity was to be avoided pre-election.
“So, pre-election, does a ruling party that made ‘a million and one’ promises, while determinedly doing nothing, want evidence suggesting men were simply left to die?”
A entirely plausible but horrifying scenario Bill. We know that Key and his Ministers are capable of outright deceit so withholding this information about the drift entry being possible in October 2013 fits comfortably with their other demonstrated methods of self preservation ( ala Dirty Politics).
Chapter 10 and 11 in MacFie’s book cover the day of the explosion and the events in the days and weeks after, including the air testing, expected mine temperature, and intense disagreement between police and mines rescue about the safety of entering the mine to retrieve the bodies. I recall thinking “what a shambles” when reading it.
Haven’t got time to re read those chapters now to refresh the memory but it would be good to.
Where did I hear, a while ago, one reason the mine couldn’t be re entered was due to the changes in regulation at WorkSafe? Since the Pike disaster WorkSafe deemed that all mines in NZ must have a second egress, Pike doesn’t and therefore they wouldn’t send a body recovery mission into the mine. (prior to that NZ was one of the few places in the world that didn’t require a second egress, a fact which caused a lot of upset among the overseas miners working at Pike).
When I heard that, where ever it was, I thought that was a lame and convenient excuse for Solid Energy to reneg on it’s duty to remove the bodies. There’s certainly something very fishy going on.
here we are, as suspected …. .. at the forefront of the directors’ minds, according to Solid Energy CEO …
‘The board of Solid Energy also has its directors’ liability “at the forefront of their minds”, Mr Clifford said.
“Directors’ liability is an important thing, and it’s been taken very seriously. There’s been a fundamental change in the law since Pike River. We need to learn from that, and it’s been taken seriously.”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11330799
so heartbreaking Bill …
We should remove the right to vote from residents and only allow citizens to vote. We are one of only a few countries that do allow residents to vote.
I’m not in favour of that. Residents can up sticks and move anytime… And don’t have the historical knowledge to make informed decisions at the ballot box.
A least a citizen has a long term vested interest in the country.
It would be illuminating to know the breakdown of voters by residency/citizen numbers.
I daresay majority of residents would have gone National. NZH article in April this year highlighted a number of residents intending to vote National because “national good for business, Labour bad” which we all know isn’t borne out in reality.
Citizens can up sticks and move any time, too. Similarly, vilifying non-citizen residents for voting National in the majority is entirely misleading, since that also applies to citizens.
James, your suggestion would mean Mr Rosie would lose his right to vote. He has lived most of his life in NZ and is more committed to the well being of our society than many of the citizens we know who couldn’t care less and don’t vote. He’s a CD volunteer, a promoter of H&S in the workplace and a Left voter.
He has shown that he has a “long term vested interest in the country”. I wouldn’t paint all residents the same colour. Such apathy and ignorance among the voters can’t really be put down to their status of citizen vs resident. It’s more complex than that.
I never thought I would go along with James but on this occasion I agree with Paragraph one of his comment. I too think that only citizens should be allowed to vote.
I don’t agree with the rest of what he says and I hope he doesn’t mean we should try and find out the answer to the fourth para. That would mean identifying everyone’s vote.
As far as Mr Rosie goes one can only ask, if he wants to vote, why doesn’t he take up citizenship? It isn’t really that hard is it?
I would actually extend the requirement a bit further. I would have a rule that an MP must be EXCLUSIVELY a New Zealand citizen. No dual citizenship would be allowed for an MP and before they could become one they would be required to renounce any other citizenship they hold. Australia do that and I think it is an excellent idea.
ps There is a minor problem for people born in Greece, and possibly other countries in that they don’t allow you to renounce their citizenship but that can be got around by the Australian rules.
Citizenship costs over $500 to apply for. Many couldnt afford that, I’m sure its one of the valid reasons deciding not to.
/agreed
Thing is, it used to be like that until Labour changed it because they wanted one of their own to have dual citizenship. And, yes, it was one law change that I was thoroughly disgusted by.
And it’s not just Australia that does that either – the US and other Anglo countries do as well.
I remember it slightly differently, but you may be right.
As I thought it was you were allowed to hold dual citizenship and become an MP but no sitting MP could take citizenship of another country without them forfeiting their seat.
That is what sitting MP Harry Duynhoven (spelling?) did. He took out Dutch citizenship. The Labour Government, when the complaint was made pretended they hadn’t received it for a day and hurriedly changed the law in the interim.
A friend of mine, now a QC, said that he thought that the seat had been vacated the moment he took the new citizenship and the effect of the law Labour passed was to appoint H.D. to the position of MP for New Plymouth, without an election, as he had already vacated the seat.
“Australia do that and I think it is an excellent idea.”
It’s actually law, but the Liberals don’t feel bound by it. Abbott probably hasn’t renounced his British citizenship. Some other guy with a German name had been elected without renouncing his other citizenship. When caught, he renounced it, but his whole campaign had been illegitimate. He should have been booted, but that doesn’t seem to happen with the right.
If you live in a country and you pay taxes, you should get a vote. You’re likely to have more interest in the future of the country than some foreign CEO with a deputy assistant whose secretary has Key on speed dial.
No he wouldn’t. If he’s married to a NZ citizen then he’s probably already a NZ citizen and if he isn’t it’d just be a formality for him to become one.
Permanent residency is a step along the way to becoming a citizen. Sure, not everyone would take that step but if you don’t take that step then you shouldn’t have the right to vote.
Hi Drax. He is a permanent resident and isn’t entitled to citizenship via marriage status.
Wonderful, would you be writing the same opinion if they are all voting left?
So if you can’t win, lets change the rules.
Changing the rules to what just about every other country does. Doesn’t matter what your political orientation is, only people with a long term commitment to a country should be able to determine its future.
So would that apply to people who fund parties?
I think it should. I also think that businesses, trusts, unions or any other legal entity shouldn’t be allowed to fund political parties.
So your election strategy is to deny residents who are long term taxpayers the right to vote? Charming. Dont you think some Pacific Island citizens would be hurt by this? what about Sub-continent residents? Asian residents? The broad church eh? Do you have evidence that “majority of residents would have gone National”.
Those people are free to apply for citizenship if they want to vote. Like in just about every other country.
I have been arguing this for a long time. Its about commitment to this country and its future, not ethnicity. I have tried to explain it to people with the anology… that I own a house that I share with my partner. We take in a boarder. Partner and I have a commitment to our future and long term interest in our home. We’re not going to give the boarder the same say in the care, maintainence and ownership of our home as each other.
So why do we do it with our country?
So might I also ask ask why Mr Rosie hasnt taken out NZ citizenship ?
Potato and alwyn. The first and foremost reason Mr R doesn’t have NZ citizenship is the cost, which Blue has referred to. We can barely keep up with weekly living expenses and are running into the red with unexpected bills, all the while the to do list keeps piling up.
Secondly he doesn’t see himself as anything but an NZer he’s been here for so long. To him citizen ship would just be a bit of unaffordable paper, and a hollow gesture at patriotism, after all this time.
He is a NZer in all respects and it shows in his actions and in the way he contributes to our community.
If citizenship is needed to vote, then the cost of people getting it should be made cheaper. Cost shouldn’t be a major consideration here though, it is about the future of our country. Voting is considered a privilege of citizenship of a country, and we give the right away too easily in NZ.
The costs should be waived. Get away from the user pays system that punishes the poor.
“No taxation without representation!”
And the hundreds of thousands of New Zealand Citizens who live permanently overseas without any intention of coming back to New Zealand. They should vote?
I guess you would argue that anyone with Scottish heritage should have been able to vote in the recent referendum as well …
There are rules that require that you have some continuing contact with New Zealand, although I don’t think they are tough enough. A citizen has to have been back in the last 3 years, a permanent resident in the last year.
Personally I would toughen them up.
I lived in Australia for years and voted in New Zealand. On the other hand I did not take out Australian citizenship, returned several times a year, owned property here and paid New Zealand taxes as well as my Australian taxes. I certainly never lost contact with New Zealand, intended to return to live permanently and felt no guilt about voting.
How about:
No representation without citizenship
“Those people are free to apply for citizenship if they want to vote.”
So willingness to commit to New Zealand to the extent required to gain the solemn right to vote is determined by a willingness and ability to pay several hundred dollars to Internal Affairs?
An ex-colleague of mine (from Britain) was working here in New Zealand for 6 years during which time he and his family began their application for citizenship. After the 6 years he applied for, was offered and he accepted a job in Australia (where he and his family now live). A year or so ago, he came back (on holiday) to complete the ‘in-person’ part of the citizenship ritual and then returned to Australia with his New Zealand citizenship.
I’m a permanent resident (have been since 1967) as are all surviving members of my birth family. I’ve lived in New Zealand (in Christchurch) for all that time (as have all members of my birth family) except when I went on my ‘OE’ at age 21 for 1.5 years. I have a New Zealand-born (fifth generation) partner and New Zealand-born and raised daughter. I have worked for a (very New Zealand) employer continuously for the last 23 years.
Why, then, am I not a citizen?
One of the things that has put me off applying for citizenship is the citizenship ritual. I dislike nationalism – singing anthems, pledging allegiance (to flags, queens and other symbols), mouthing oaths, etc..
(One of the ironies is that I have British citizenship but, of course, never had to pledge allegiance to queen and country to gain it – yet I would have to do that here in order to gain New Zealand citizenship :-))
Frankly, I would feel hypocritical performing what I’d see as empty rituals and, if I’m going to be hypocritical, perhaps I should go the whole hog and show my commitment to New Zealand through John Key and I ritualistically slicing the heels of our thumbs and uniting as blood brothers?
At that deeper, personal level I also know that my ‘heart’ does not respond sentimentally to the words ‘New Zealand’ and to mythic cultural norms (e.g., barbecues, rugby, the beach, sailing, tramping in the hills, whitebaiting, Bluff oysters, etc.) in the way that their hearts apparently do for people born here (although I genuinely do have a deep emotional commitment to Christchurch, specifically).
For those ‘deep’ reasons, I would actually feel a bit of a fraud to claim citizenship because that deep sense of ‘belonging’ is not embodied in me the way it seems to be in most native-born New Zealanders. And it never would be. That is simply the emotional truth of the matter.
Nevertheless, until now I have believed that my enduring good citizenship (in the generic sense rather than some nominal sense such as ‘New Zealand citizenship’) is my prime claim to being treated as a citizen of the country in which I live, in terms of rights. But maybe that’s not enough.
As you can see, I do appreciate the tribal point you are making. It makes me think that I should not vote in future elections, based on that principle.
Although, of course, that tribal point could only ever apply to those actually born and raised in New Zealand. If the aim is to get as close as possible to a guarantee of deep commitment to the country perhaps only such people should be allowed to be citizens and, hence, be allowed to vote? (e.g., only people born in New Zealand and who have continuously lived the first 20 years of their life, at least, here?)
After all, they are the people most likely to have real, embodied, emotional, familial and enculturated commitment to New Zealand – as a nation, place and people – rather than the kind of commitment that money, a few years, an instrumental mindset and a liking (or tolerance) for ritual can get from Internal Affairs.
Maybe the bar for voting rights should be set that high to ensure commitment of the voting population to this country and its future?
An interesting discussion.
I totally agree, only citizens should have the vote in NZ. You have to be a citizen to vote in Australia and in most of the rest of the world. There is a reason for that- only people with a long term commitment to a country should be able to determine its future. And then also make it compulsory to vote, like in Australia. Australians have had a better deal than us over the last 30 years, they have been shafted much less, maybe their electoral system has something to do with that. And make applying for citizenship much cheaper- $500 seems excessive. You only have to have been in NZ for 5 years to be apply to become a citizen.
“There is a reason for that- only people with a long term commitment to a country should be able to determine its future”
Mr R has voted in every election since 1990. If that isn’t long term commitment for you I don’t what is.
There is an insinuation on this thread that permanent residents are somehow less worthy and less committed than citizens and should be denied the right to vote. It’s a very excluding view bordering on xenophobia and one that would not benefit the country in any way.
And how the voting rights of residents somehow contributed to a defeat for the left is beyond me.
As a resident, you might be pleased to hear I’ve a fairly solid grasp of NZ history…more, it seems, than many NZ born folks, and voted for a further left choice than most.
Also, it’s simply not true that I can ‘up sticks and go’.
Here’s an alternative.
How’s about only people who reside in the country and pay taxes get to vote? That was the situation in the recent Scottish referendum that I (fairly) couldn’t vote in, in spite of having been born and raised there as well as having spent a good portion of my adult life living there.
The way it stands at the moment is that if you live elsewhere you can vote so long as you have visited NZ in the past year (or 3 years?). That I assume is a nod towards people that still have ties here, as opposed to people that have left permanently. It strikes me as problematic (eg getting home from Oz is easier/cheaper than getting home from the UK). However I don’t think disenfranchising people who have say gone to Oz for work who will most likely return at some point is a good way to go.
Not sure why James bought this up. Is there even an issue here with mass residents voting and then leaving town? Maybe voting rights should kick in a the citizenship mark (5 years?) irrespective of whether one takes up citizenship or not.
an expat needs to have returned home once in the previous 3 years to vote.
As for voting, I don’t think it’s as simple as being physically resident in NZ or not. For example we are NZ citizens who work overseas on a fixed term contract for a company that operates in NA. We don’t have residency overseas and we’re paid in NZ, own our home in NZ and are tax resident in NZ. Most expats we know are working overseas on a similar basis.
Another example – would an exemption apply for government or diplomatic staff? I’m sure there are also other situations where removing the right to vote would appear unfair to a non-resident.
It is three years for citizens, one year for permanent residents. There are special rules for people who are representing New Zealand overseas including diplomats and people in the armed services.
Imagine if, in WW II, all the 100,000 or so soldiers overseas had been banned from voting because they had been away for more than 3 years?
Nor would it be reasonable to totally disenfranchise the 620,000 odd New Zealanders working in Australia who could easily finish up in a situation of not being able to vote in either country.
I don’t actually have any problem with accepting that. If they are New Zealand citizens but don’t have any real connection to the country I don’t see why they should be allowed to vote here.
Diplomats working in New Zealand embassies for New Zealand or soldiers serving in New Zealand forces overseas are a different thing to people who have chosen to depart voluntarily.
Thank you for giving us the views of Winston First. I live in Australia at the moment and I can’t vote. They are kind enough to let me pay taxes and they have performed major surgery on me. But I get no representation. I would love to vote for a party that would keep that level of medical care for everyone in Australia, but I can’t.
I firmly believe in no taxation without representation.
Same boat here Murray. This is a real festering issue for both countries that a succession of governments on both sides of the Tasman have failed on.
Does anyone know what will happen to Hone’s Feed the Kids members bill that was drawn out last Parliament?
@ lanth..
..goneburger..
It lapses with the dissolution but can be reinstated by the next Parliament.
See section 20 of the Constitution Act
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0114/latest/whole.html#DLM94243
Right, so the rules say everything expires and has to be specifically reinstated.
But how does it work in terms of convention? Are member’s bills, by convention, reinstated?
On that you will have to get someone who is more of an expert than I am. I am only up to reading the procedures without really understanding the detail. I do know that when a member retires (or gets kicked out) any private member’s bill they were promoting is often taken up by some other member of their party. This happened with the same-sex marriage bill didn’t it?
Quite who would take up Hone’s bill when the whole party is gone I don’t know. I suppose someone from the Green’s might do so.
I am also not really clear on what “reinstatement” means for a private members bill and where in the process it comes back.
Graeme Edgeler, where are you?
So Labour have 32 seats and NZ First have 11. And the great purge of 2014 is about to commence (or not).
And the left wing activists I see on here seem to think that getting rid of the ABCs and all right leaning folk in Labour who have failed to support the the leader and have failed to work for the party, is the way forward.
By my calculations there are about 10 labour electorate MPs (give or take) who might fall into that category. Others who know the MPs better may get a more accurate figure than I can.
So where could these “treacherous Labour lite MPs” go? None have the energy to form their own party and lets face it that long forgotten middle party from the 90s with Gilbert Miles didnt have any shelf life.
So the only logical option would be for them to join forces with Winston and NZ First. And that would give Winston more MPs (maybe) than the freshly purged Labour Party, and Winston could, and would no doubt, claim to be the leader of the opposition, and ask for the baubles of power that go with that position.
And that would leave Labour left with what? Being just another minor party in Parliament, but with a chance to rebuild “out left?” or dead in the water? How much more demoralisation can your party faithful take?
Labour needs to sort its seething MPs out and it needs to work as a united team. Anything less is letting down the voters in New Zealand.
There are no baubles of power that go with that position.
I understand that the Leader of the Opposition is paid at the same level as a cabinet minister, and gets similar baubles
Yes, but what “power” does that reflect?
Baubles of impotence then.
Winston can do anything he likes but if he wants to be the leader of the opposition he is going to have to get a hell of a lot more votes. The position is defined in law and with the results of this election it is, unless they go into a coalition with National, the leader of the Labour Party.
The have one right, they get briefings by the SIS. That was the one that bit Goff when he publicly denied getting one and basically accused the head of the SIS of breaking the law. Silly boy. He could have just shut up when he was shown to be wrong.
They also get the right to make the first speech in the budget debate and so on.
See the definition of the Leader here.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/about-parliament/how-parliament-works/people/00CLOOCHowPWorks1411/people-in-parliament
Leader of the Opposition
The Leader of the Opposition is the member who leads the largest political party that is not part of the Government.
The Leader of the Opposition’s role in the House is to:
be the leader of the ‘government-in-waiting’
lead opposition responses in major debates.
The Leader of the Opposition sits directly opposite the Prime Minister in the debating chamber.
What it hasnt ever had to do is to define if the largest opposition party is the one who got the most votes at the previous election or whether its the one with the most MPs, if electorate MPs were jump ship from Labour to NZF.
Having extra TV time on the 6 oclock news would suit Winston.
I have memories of reading that it was the opposition party that had the greatest number of votes in the preceding General Election, rather than the most seats, but for the life of me I can’t remember where I saw that.
Meanwhile
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/dairy/10537574/Fonterra-profit-plunges-payout-forecast-cut
The co-operative’s net profit for the year to July 31 was $179 million, down 76 per cent from $736m last year, while its pre-tax earnings slumped by 50 per cent from $1 billion to $503m.
AND
Debt
88,963,432,720
Interest per year
4,359,265,206
Guess the economic slump is going to happen a couple of months too late for you. Sorry guys about that but jeeze that John Key certainly knows how to schedule an election doesn’t he?
HUH
Well if the economy had tanked just before the election instead of looking quite healthy the left may well have had more traction and therefore a better result. Don’t you agree?
SO the economy IS tanking.
Is that the cusp?
maybe this is the ‘something special’ Key has in mind for us all ?
it’s a downward-‘cusp’..that we are on the edge of..
..fonterra is tanking..and will tank further..
..(a predicted five yr glut driving that..and of course there is the impending arrival of mufree to totally disrupt their business-model..)
..and imagine when the housing bubble bursts..eh..?
..whoar..!
..and gosman is right..key timed the election for those reasons..
..the forecasters told him the sooner the better…for the election..
..’cos we have pear-shaped economy coming up..
..so yep..!..he’s/key’s as cunning as a shithouse rat…
..albeit one with a gold toothpick..
but wait..!..there’s more..!
rnz is reporting an expert on the sector saying he thinks fonterra are being too optimistic –
– even with that downgraded prediction…
It very well could be, couldn’t it?
Being the astute economic analyst that you have claimed to be you will have known for quite some time that the global economy on which we heavily rely, is on shaky ground. Wouldn’t you?
Yes, National fucked the economy, knew that they had and had a reasonable idea as to when it would tank and so called an early election. I believe that this was mentioned at the time that National called the election.
Wouldn’t have made any difference – the payout will be for the current season (2014-2015) and won’t really start impacting for another 6-12 months. This time next year I would expect to see the full impact to the wider economy as the decisions farmers are making now around investment and spending kick in.
Yes, Key does know how to exploit the electoral rules of our country to his advantage.
Yes, a very tricky politician – I can see now why the word leapt to his mind to describe Cunliffe.
Perhaps it was a term of admiration?
Well the farmers can’t get out of Fonterra fast enough and I look forward to them as a group letting their party Nact know how shafted they feel . Maybe they will suggest that the exchange rate needs to be a little lower??
I still do not see anyone putting ACT under the microscope for its election performance. Even though they only got 0.7% and thanks to National’s political welfare scheme a boy for an MP. In 2008 they had 5 (life) experienced MP’s and 2 ministers and a swag of concessions and promises. ACT had a fresh leader and a new start and policies like getting rid of the RMA and privatising the schools. Where is the analysis for ACT? They brought in Bassett to carry on about Labour, but he is ACT now. They should be quizzing him about the direction ACT is taking. If NZ had moved to the right, then ACT would get more.
And no discussion about whether Boscawen would have led ACT to a higher total.
Acts in power theres the difference
Through their own merits or from the benevolence of National?
Does it matter? The problem with the left is they’re too busy worrying about things like this and not enough wondering why the Greens (for example) have been around for 24 years yet never been in government
I think you missed Millsy’s point mate. In the context of what he/she wrote of course it matters as it is pertinent to what he/she was saying. In the context of the wider left bloc etc. it matters not a jot but that’s irrelevant to the initial comment.
What he wrote (I think hes a dude) I guess I’m thinking hes trying to say “hey look the left did bad but Act did bad as well”
Which is true and I’d cut Act loose and woo Ron Marks instead but it doesn’t help the Left which has to face some uncomfortable truths such as they’re out of touch with NZ and why are they out of touch…
@ millsy..
..who really gives a flying-fuck about any aspect of act..?
Frontera couldn’t have seen that coming a week ago, before the election
What – that the forecast & profits would be lower?
It was pretty widely understood in the farming community that the payout would be lower and that profit would be lower. Global Dairy prices have slumped nearly 40% in the last 6 months. It just doesn’t get much coverage in the MSM outside of the Farming news sections and certainly gets very little actual economic analysis (and certainly didn’t make it into the political analysis during the election).
Whether Fonterra choose to delay the announcement until after the election may be a discussion worth having if you are so minded.
Thats because nobody really cares about ACTs future but a lot of people care (and have opinions) about Labours future
Now lets get back to holding Nact up for all to see. See in stuff he wants ideas about poverty from his governement.
Well Mr key are you and your ministers going to go and tour the poorest areas of the country or sit out the front in a Winz office??? Actually go and connect with poor people???
Does anyone here know when any of that lot went near or opened anything in one of these areas?? Do they even know where they are?? Can we embarass them about this or something else – don’t forget that the social media does shape how people think and that turns up in his little focus groups!
OK, so if Nats do nothing = moan. Now they say they will do something = moan.
get a grip
We will stop moaning when National actually does something (as opposed to talking about it, or tinkering).
They managed to shut down the health portfolio as a source problems so I have a good feeling about this
John Key is smarter then anyone (currently) on the left so its quite possible he’ll shut down the left on this as well
For a certain definition of smart, maybe. What he does have is an ability to hide his limitations from most people. Most of this is based on the flawed idea that the suit in charge is competent and trustworthy.
Its just talk Grant where’s the walk huh? There is nothing new about the poverty or the Nact arrogance.
A loved and trusted friend told me yesterday of a client of his, from mainland China, still lives in mainland China, but now owns 50 residential properties in Auckland, all made possible by low interest loans in China at about 1% or 2%.
No visible taxes even ??
Where is your property register dictator Key ?
Wow.
see bubble grow..
..grow! bubble..grow..!
..see bubble burst..
..burst bubble..burst…
There is no way in the world that the caucus will unite and swing behind David Cunliffe as long as the ABC club remains the leaks will continue and any hint of disunity gets punished at the ballot box.
So there are two workable options as I see It both nuclear and both signalling the future direction of the party,
1, Cunliffe resigns and caucus gets their preferred candidate through a singular nomination for leader, obviously this will result in much aggravation amongst the membership and likely position the party more towards the centre.
2, Expel the ABC club and start again from what will be a much smaller base. It would be likely that some electorate mp’s would end up as independents or perhaps they would resign and force a by-election that labour may not win going by the party vote in places like Hutt South where in all likelihood name recognition got Trevor through.
I guess the 3rd option is to have the Primary in which the members deliver Cunliffe against the will of the caucus and the white anting continues unabated for 3 more years or there is a messy leadership spill again a year out from the election triggered by caucus voting no confidence as per the constitution which I think will be fast track to electoral oblivion.
As an aside I had Phill Goff knock on my door 3 times in the lead up to the election and I can honestly say he promoted the Labour party and their policy’s he was the only local candidate I saw and I think his effort had a lot to do with the high personal vote he achieved. I voted Green for the first time as I refused to vote for the rabble that labour had become this cycle but I gave Phil my electorate vote. Im sure people that voted right did the same…
What is the Labour Party’s internal process for expelling MPs? I doubt that Cunliffe can just tell them to go.
What’s this move towards the centre. Hell as they stand, labours economics are centre right – any shift right will put them further to the right.
But, no lets not talk about the fact labour are economically speaking, a right wing party – No unity is needed and the rest of the left better shut up.
In that case how about a plan to reverse that dynamic so that it is the left side that is doing the Trojan horsing.
Just quietly retire a couple of the worse because by- elections rarely favour governments and it won’t change the MP numbers
cricklewood: thanks for your anecdote of Goff’s hard work. I don’t like his centrist political economics, but also think he should have stayed on after 2011.
Yes we were on the cusp of all sorts of stuff which is why we had to get the election done in hurry. We were possibly on the cusp of Cunliffe getting some name recognition, familiarity and traction with voters which takes a long time. Has anyone ever taken leadership less than a year out from an election and won? On either side? Ever?
I hope we are not on the cusp of having mumbleface back again as our champion. I worked hard as a volunteer for labour in the election because I believed in the policies and believed in Cunliffe. The disloyalty during the campaign slayed me. If they shaft him, I’m afraid I will be on the cusp of withdrawing my loyalty to the party I have voted for in the last 10 elections.
My thoughts are the same. I wish the ABC outfit would grow up or go away.
+1 westie chick. Big ups for your hard work too.
It was David Cunliffe that brought me back to being a Labour voter. Then along came the impressive policies and that sealed the deal. If he goes and Labour muck around AGAIN with a new less capable leader I will completely lose my faith in the Party.
DC has the support of the membership and Unions behind him. Thats what should matter, not the petty ambitions of a few self serving caucus members.
I read that Key holds the record of time between becoming leader of a party & then becoming PM, which was about 2 years.
Rosie- My thoughts also. I want Cunliffe as PM as much as I admired and respected Helen Clark. Takes time.
If Cunliffe stays so will I.
Can’t reply on Mobile..
Alwyn – won’t need to identify individual votes. Its easy enough to cross reference the marked roll of those who voted with their status as a resident or citizen. No vote identification necessary.
I believe that the enrollment form asks for details on residency or citizenship status.
Australia doesn’t allow residents to vote (but as outlined above do make exceptions where citizenship cannot be revoked by countries such as Greece)
As for Mr Rosie – good on him for his work in the community, but the point stands… Citizenship is relatively inexpensive, and some do get sponsored by employers etc.
I read the comment, and the bit that followed as meaning that you wanted to know how they voted. That was what worried me.
Please note that I would only forbid dual citizenship for MPs, not for everyone. That is what Australia does. People with dual citizenship can vote over there. The Australian exemption is for the odd MP who was born in Greece.
“Citizenship is relatively inexpensive”
In other words bugger the people who don’t have $500, they can just do without voting.
If the rules were changed, and the government needed to process a bulk lot of citizenship applications for people who just wanted to vote, then economies of scale should apply and the costs significantly reduced to reduce hardship on people who have been here a long time and just need to formalize their relationship with this country. There is always a way to make a change like that fairer.
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2566719/un_only_small_farmers_and_agroecology_can_feed_the_the_world.html
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/10538018/Labour-woes-Rift-between-the-Davids
I think the Cunliffe should stay on as hes good for National but this, this would be even better for National
i agree..!
..parker leading labour..?
..someone has to be fucken kidding..
..a ministerial-role..sure..
..but he has all the charisma/presence of a dried cow-pat..
..that parker..
..and the right would just love him to get the job..
he says not, phillip ….
or now maybe not ? gruesome mess …
Brilliant post Election analysis by Dr. Wayne Hope :
‘One Party State’
By Wayne Hope / September 24, 2014
“In years to come this election will be seen as a historic turning point towards one party rule…”.
– See more at: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/09/24/one-party-state/#sthash.FgjntQ65.dpuf
(Pretty interesting comment below this article also….saying a unified Left is the only way to go into the future)
Meh, much of a muchness really, although i will say hes a pretty good writer but really its a rehash of what you read on here
Blaming the MSM
Blaming the money (which didn’t do much good for KDC or Colin Craig)
Blaming resources
Not no pointing the finger at the left for its own failings
glad you read it Pucky…maybe it is true?
What i’m saying is you can pretty much read the same thing on here as what that guys written which boils to this: Its not our fault we suck its someone elses fault
actually …there has been quite a lot of soul searching as to what went wrong …and it is not always “it is not our fault”…far from it if you read many of the comments
this is not to negate the validity of what Dr.Wayne Hope says
The problem for the left its always “we did some things wrong BUT *insert whatever excuse you like here*”
MSM
Funding
Resources
Cameron slater
John Key
the people don’t understand our policies (thats my favourite one by the way)
Until you accept your failings you can’t fix them
His willful blindness is truly a wonder to behold.
So it’s not appropriate for people who are observers, rather than players, to point out that a large and infulential group are spreading misnformation?
I do wonder what it is that makes celebrities act the way they do:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2766871/Leonardo-DiCaprio-s-climate-change-hypocrisy-As-Hollywood-star-lectures-U-N-MailOnline-reveals-jetset-lifestyle-includes-19-flights-world-year-borrowing-mega-yacht-owned-oil-billionaire.html
Not saying all are look this as there must be some who walk the walk as well as talk the talk but it does make me wonder at times
*Disclaimer, this is not about climate change but rather celebrities*
Unless of course you want to talk about climate change then thats cool as well
Reasons for Nationals win?
28th on the Happy planet index in 2012. Up from 109 in 2009. -From wikipidia
Fifth in Legatum’s prosperity index. Been around 3rd to 5th since 2009.
“So who’s the happiest? As has been the case the past five years, that distinction goes to countries that enjoy peace, freedom, good healthcare, quality education, a functioning political system and plenty of opportunity: Norway, Sweden, Canada and New Zealand.”
Are we doing OK- Yes
Could we do better- yes.
We are lucky to live in NZ.
I think this is a large reason the government was returned on Saturday night.
“28th on the Happy planet index in 2012. Up from 109 in 2009. -From wikipidia”
Something is suspicious about those figures.
Just passing on the info….
All international measures have NZ pretty near the top of the pile.
And lots have us number 1 in education.
Not the feeling around that there was a need to change the government.
In fact a sound endorsement.
We are also rated as having very low corruption.
It would help if you provided links. Like I said, there is something very odd about the happiness figures.
I will have a crack at posting the link.
Why are they odd to you?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Planet_Index.
That’s what I looked at
Hope it helps
Looking into the Happy Planet Index figures a bit more fully, it would appear that New Zealand’s results in the 2012 report show a negligible improvement in life expectancy over its 2009 counterpart (from 79.8 to 80.7 years), whereas the ‘life satisfaction’ indicator has plummeted (7.8 to 7.2). The big improvement noted between the two reports is in the ecological footprint (down from 7.7 to 4.3). That would appear to be a huge stride forward on the environmental front under National, until one notices that the ecological footprint in the 2012 report is based on figures from… 2008 (full 2008 data on ecological footprints here). So it would seem that the report only accounts for a lightening of the ecological footprint under the most recent Labour government (although I’m sceptical of that, too, as I’m not sure exactly what happened under Labour that would have made that kind of difference).
So the only relevant indicator in that report for the National government is a big negative. I hope that helps.
We’re rated as having having a very low perception of corruption. Dirty Politics proved that we’re probably one of the most corrupt though.
The wiki happy planet score, isn’t just around people, it rates the eco footprint as well.
Maybe you should petition for a recount?
lolz, post-election happiness scale.
“there is no depression in New Zealand.
there are no sheep on our farms…”
LEGATUM lol more fucking right wing think tankery
Measuring how rich the rich are. Joke. A cruel joke.
British David Mitchell, comedian and author talking about Amazon recently
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/sep/23/david-mitchell-amazon-cynical-life-crushing-business
laid into Amazon for its business model: “They already have an enormous technological edge but apparently that isn’t enough. They also have to have a rapacious near-monopoly.” He also criticised the retailer for its tax payments, pointing to the fact that Amazon paid just £2.4m in corporation tax in 2012, on £4.2bn of UK sales….
Yesterday, after reading an extract from his forthcoming book, a collection of his Observer columns in which he calls Amazon “a benefits scrounger”, Mitchell was greeted with “rapturous applause”, reported the Bookseller….
Yes it is tough, but print book sales through bookshops are still strong”, and that “we should reiterate our belief that booksellers believe in freedom, diversity, partnership and a profitable book industry for all”.
But Mitchell also sounded a note of positivity. “For all that there is hope,” said the comedian. “Theatre and radio still survive, after lots of people were predicting their death, and people are wrong in their depressing predictions. Sometimes bad things don’t happen just because most people don’t want them to.”
So think positive and keep trying.
120 new members have joined the Green Party since the election (just got an email).
Interesting. I’ve been reading some comments about the surge in GP membership.
over 6000 volunteers.
I gave about 250 in total I think. I like the way they ask for support for different things be it ads or a policy campaign.
I’m not a member, but did some volunteering. It’s a bit dispiriting that the extra energy didn’t seem to pay off in extra votes.
There needs to be some re-assessment into how the energy was spent.
I also think there needs to be a building of relationships, and community participation at a flax roots level – something organisational. I know the Greens regularly do some meet and greets around various places. However, I think something more solid needs to be done to build the networks within communities.
I reckon the GP lost some votes to Labour (who lost votes to NZF and the non-vote) and to IMP. In other words, your effort help the GP retain their MPs 🙂
Labour is also saying they have had hundreds of people join Labour in last few days.
@karol re-Labour…..yes but do they know who they are supporting as leader?….seems like it is an attempt to get rid of David Cunliffe!….nasty PR campaign?
…not a good look imo….looks like Labour has been infiltrated and is imploding….i can see the Labour Party being split into ‘Red Labour’ and ‘Rogered Labour’
…i feel for committed Labour Party people for their agony …but quite frankly the Labour Party people I know eg family …..would move sideways to the Greens without much trouble ( and they do NOT like Shearer… who demoted Dalziel who then jumped …and Chauvel, who fled) )
….so Labour needs to look at its loyal ( thus far) but nevertheless soft core
This on DPF’s dirty politics. By Dr Jarrod Gilbert, Sociologist. Maybe it could best be referred to as the politics of deception and manipulation.
Fully explained at the link, along with all the nastiness of the KB followers who descended on the good Dr in order to attack, denigrate, mislead, and stifle honest debate.
+100 karol…the egg stinks…”As we know now, he and Cameron Slater are birds of a feather, but where Slater is dim-witted Farrar is marginally smarter and this makes him more insidious”.
I think we need another of Blip’s lists of people whom Slater & Farrar have attacked.. So far I have see this bloke, a south auckland local body politician, the herald food writer, Brian Gaynor on being sued, Fisher in the herald again.
Perhaps next time an academic has this problem, and I can see his argument, he could drop on over here for some help. We can dig out some figures for him etc, etc
Like the bottle of wine photo. i’m sure the MSM read here and the real facts might shut them down a bit. They have lawyers you know.
As for the cops and gang associates, looks like they count everyone in the same burb.
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2014/09/parliamentary_demographics_2014.html
– Interesting stats
talking to yourself again …eh Pucky?…trying to interest us in kiwiblog now?
What is interesting about them? Explain why I should go to KB.
First off as a pollster hes obviously pretty good, good enough to get a ringing endorsement from the PM on election nigfht whereas Labours pollsters were…well a bit shit really
Secondly you might learn something
So no reason to click on the link then. Also see Dr Jarrod Gilbert above for an endorsement of just how honest and upstanding the good DPF is.
He got it wrong and apoligised, a lesson some on the left might like to learn
He apologised after all the nastiness? And what lesson is it that the left should learn, given that it doesn’t generally indulge in such orchestrated campaigns of attack, divert and denigrate?
Puckish Rogue is full of shit…again.
Gilbert is a good guy and his expertise and credibility is seen as sufficient threat to warrant personal attack by the National smear machine.
‘He got it wrong and apoligised, a lesson some on the left might like to learn.
Good heavens Farrar apologised!!!!
hahaha. Is Farrar apologising for being an integral part of dirty politics? Thought not. It’s a clayton’s apology from someone who got caught.
Always after the the damage is done.
🙄
not very good at this click bait thing are you?
And that would be an appeal to authority.
So, tell me, are you able to make an argument without logical fallacies in them?
A good example in this case would be to show if DPF has actually been right about anything at all ever. Or, perhaps, showing that he hasn’t lied.
At least he’s not apologising for being a man I guess. He’s apologising for making an error and rightly so. A rarity for the left, even when an incompetently run campaign ends in a trouncing at the polls. It’s simple costed policies delivered in a coherent manner that win elections.
well, apologising is certainly not something that John key would ever do…. for anything.
Correct – and it works for him, because that’s what National’s internal polling tells him.
Actually, I never see apologies from the right but lots from the left.
Because they keep stuffing up I guess 🙂
Well, seems National voters know what they think.
Now we watch Labour eat each other to death.
So sad.
What does Labour stand for today ?
In one sentence, can anyone articulate ?
thng is, nobody knows now.
We are doomed untill someone can answer that question in one sentence that makes
sence.
Okay, turning that around: Can you put into one sentence what National stands for, in a way that is appealing, comprehensive and accurate? I’m asking for a verifiable statement of intent, not a vacuous piece of branding like “Working for New Zealand” (the same could be said of most political parties, including Labour). Equally pointless would be a couple of throwaway founding principles like “freedom, private enterprise and getting ahead”, because that would be no more or less (in)accurate than saying that Labour are for “equal opportunity, fairness and workers’ rights”.
If you can’t, can you admit that formulating a vision and a plan in a single sentence is a pointless exercise, and that nobody should bother taking up your challenge?
People feel comfortable with National and don’t require any words. When you ask most National voters, they also can’t explain why they vote National in very many words, but they do know, somehow, that National are just better than the other options on the table.
Agreed. I just think that asking for a solution that is simple, straightforward and to the point is putting the cart before the horse. I can’t claim to be familiar with all the ins and outs of Labour’s situation, but I think get the impression from reading here and elsewhere that there is a very complex set of issues with the party including on-the-ground promotion, media communication, responding to National’s media utterances, opposing National’s policy, identifying the targets of Labour’s own policies, communicating those policies and personnel manangement at caucus level. In my opinion, those all need to be quantified and a strategy developed at a complex and detailed level, so that the actual players with the time, inclination and obligation to evaluate the complex issues understand the entirety – then it’s time to think about how to package any resulting strategy for people who want the short version.
“Working for New Zealand”, Iwi/Kiwi etc. have been effective for National, but they worked because they encapsulated an existing narrative and strategy, not because they actually communicate in a single soundbite what the party stands for.
Labour doesn’t have a team with the experience, skills, focus and resources to execute that, at the moment.
CV.
And if all those ‘missing million’ working class people cannot bring themselves to vote for Labour then maybe the activists who keep it running should have taken the hint a while back – and kicked it to the kerb.
Look the left isn’t going to win any election anytime soon. I think Wayne Hope’s analysis is pretty accurate. The behaviour in the Labour caucus post-election has highlighted the truth of it.
Now is the perfect time to demolish and rebuild.
Do you know for sure that the missing million are “working class”? Maybe they just cant be fucked voting? Maybe they are waiting for a party that shares their view of the world as they would like to see it. Just because the left got trounced, where is the correlation that they would all have voted left? Maybe that group would reflect those that voted in their preferences. I ask this because the last election was the same, the refrain was “if they had voted we would have won”, not necessarily.
That is the problem for sure they have to start at the mass of the people at the bottom end of society and understand that they have to work from there to the top
no good even addressing Nationals tornts you have to be 100% focused on who is missing out in nationals policies
This is bizarre for me because I thought Cunliffe’s Labour was very clear:
People first and Inclusiveness.
It did seem all year, though, here on the Standard that others didn’t pick up on that message, which I thought was extremely clear and simple and also a message to counter the neo-liberal mindset.
I wonder why the hell I heard it so clearly and so many others didn’t?
I did. But then they came back with. “Except for Mana” and “the Greens” etc.
Predicted on Twitter today that when the voter demographics come out, just over 1/8th of Pakeha males will have voted for Labour.
Or 1/16th of eligible voters
much to my surprise my son was going to Party vote Labour( neither of his parents have for years) …but he was outraged by the axing of Hone…so ruled out Labour ….I would have thought he would have chosen Int/Mana next….but indoctrinated by commercial radio ( eg Sean Plunket) and its poison against Dotcom ….he ruled out INt/Mana!
…. instead he Party voted for the Greens ( all decided in the last week of the Election campaign)
…many others I know were confused up to the last minute …and obviously didnt vote at all ( i forced all the “confused” I knew to at least vote for a party on the Left)
And in the last week the Labour campaign came out with the very blatant lie…Only a party vote for Labour will change the Government.
Bloody awful, harmful decision to insult the intelligence of your supporters.
Politicheck website has expired. Did anyone notice? 😉
http://www.politicheck.org.nz/
if nobody noticed the politicheck site expired, did it really exist?
*grin*
I’m sure that it was all the fault of The Standard (better than PG looking in mirror).
indeed…or did anybody care…
so much promise, such an abject failure…
how right you are
For all those who think National is far right:
The point about Dotcom is he is a genius if you look at the continum of his two hrs of footage , uninterrupted viewing on my old crappy laptop, get that anywhere else I dont think so ,no advertising interruptions or the plug pulled by the nations security services
people ought to get savvy the guy is an asset not a liability because a few people got fucked up in america and are they just playing the movie moguls game, has any one complained about mega yet
YOU think about the security of any ideas you have and post them thru conventional commercial internet communications anything from the gcsb to the american patent office can view it
THERE IS NO SECURITY FOR THE INDIVIDUAL NO MATTER HOW HONEST THEY ARE
any link, Think ? +100%
The only link is a clear head and analysing wat I see and here
The election everyones stoned /stunned on KEY -XKEYSCORE USA SECURITY
HELLO its 1984 rowing backwards
TELL all these politicians its a 5 oclock start for 12 hrs till they get off no tea breaks AND drug tests before you start and go home, the cops watching you go home pissed so you get busted
See how theyd like that
The real world of a good worker
“..the cops watching you go home pissed so you get busted”. Whats driving home pissed got to with it? If you drive a car after drinking too much you’re an unbelievable moron.