Each election campaign has its own theory. Its own account of who New Zealanders are and what they want and what issues they will prioritise. Parties then come up with policies accordingly.
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Labour now has at least one theory: that New Zealanders are a positive bunch and that running an overly negative campaign carries real risks, particularly for National, which, as the Opposition, is trying to find things wrong with the Government and the country.
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The fact remains that, at the moment, the only credible path into government for National involves NZ First being knocked out.
While it would be foolish to rule anything out with NZ First, it seems highly unlikely that, if given the option, it won't simply continue in a government that looks similar, even if the proportions are slightly changed.
New Zealanders are a positive bunch and that running an overly negative campaign carries real risks, particularly for National, which, as the Opposition, is trying to find things wrong with the Government and the country.
It would be nice to think so, but don't wholly agree it is true. Yes, there is plenty of positivity in NZ but there is a lot of negativity too and sometimes the latter wins.
Take the 2008 election. The campaign waged by National was negative without precedence in this country and it worked a treat. Yes, they had a new charismatic leader who also pulled in votes but it was the negativity that won the day for them.
By all means run a positive campaign. It is what we would expect of them. But when the fake news, the lies and the misinformation starts flying (and it already has but can only increase in frequency) be ready to return the fire because if Labour doesn't, they risk a repeat performance of 2008.
I don't mean stooping to National's level. Far from it. But I do remember Helen Clark and Labour ignoring the lies, falsehoods emanating from National. I think they assumed the voters would see it for what it was…. misinformation. Many of them didn't. It was Crosby/Textor stuff – cleverly presented and needed to be swiftly rebuffed. It wasn't.
We can expect to see an updated version – with a degree of Trumpism thrown in.
Edit: and they need to be supported by the Greens when it is appropriate. There will be a concerted effort to discredit them as well.
There is no need for 'enemas' of Labour to generate fake news or promulgate misinformation or tell lies.
Allowing a bureaucrat with a decade long history of mismanaging MOH:DSS a front and centre position in the midst of major reform (as a result of long running Human Rights cases) is messaging of the most honest in nature.
This is Labour and its partners in crime giving a loud and emphatic Fuck You to those of us in the disability community who have fought long and hard for justice and a modicum of parity with our entitled ACC cousins.
Ditto allowing Pharmac unfettered authority to ignore international protocols and put the lives of Kiwis at risk.
Ditto largely ignoring the strong advice of the WEAG and CPAG to remove sanctions and significantly raise benefits.
Oh yes…Labour doesn't need its enemies to lose votes in the upcoming election…those of us who were hoping that there was the collective will in the Coalition for real transformation and hard reform of what is falsely called 'the Publc Service ' have only ourselves to blame for almost buying into their shit.
Labour just might capture the vote of the Muddles, the Woman's Weekly readership beguiled by cutesy family outing shots, and they may even seduce a few wavering National voters (unless That Mob comes up with more palatable spokespeople) but bet my bottom dollar they have well and truly shat in the pond of traditional Labour supporters.
Problem is that many bureaucrats do get ‘recycled’ and NZ just happens to be a tiny little fish bowl, which aggravates the problem with the small ‘talent pool’. In many ways, NZ still is a colonial outpost.
We’ll have to get through the euthanasia debate first.
It’ll be a busy year for the Moderators here 😉
Just one word of friendly advice, be careful what you say about specific persons, here or elsewhere in public.
Always happy to receive advice ,friendly or otherwise.
"My mate" has been more than happy to put her name and face out there trumpeting the Good Works of MOH:DSS for the past decade in their Newsletter.
ROFLMAO
I even have a letter signed by her in 2012 declaring that they were working on a 'non-discriminatory family carer policy'….you will no doubt remember the reaction from those who actually give a shit about NZBORA and sound legislative practise in 2013?
I have no fear of being accused of defamation…I don't lie…the truth is damning enough.
The only other risk is being punished by having MOH:DSS supports cut.
Already happened in 2012…we get nothing from them so have nothing to lose.
As a general point of information, i.e. not specifically addressed to you, if somebody defames another person on this site, it is the site or Trust(ees) rather that is liable.
Sorry, I cannot remember; my memory leaks like a sieve on a landfill.
Whoever is in that ‘boss of Disability Support Services’ role also has at least Legal and their Director-General to convince before something becomes policy. Likewise the DG is susceptible to whatever signals are coming from the Minister's office – which is why whoever is in there is critical, unfortunately.
However it is easy for it to become personalised when, as you note, you see the same person fronting decisions with direct and unescapable personal impacts over a long period of time.
All well and good in principle, but then we end up with an American-style bureaucracy where every change in government results in thousands of political appointees of varying professional competence and knowledge.
At the end of the day, you're criticising the bureaucracy for political decisions made because ministers don't have the guts to just take the budgetary impact of doing the right thing.
"At the end of the day, you're criticising the bureaucracy for political decisions made because ministers don't have the guts to just take the budgetary impact of doing the right thing."
In Pharmac's case they have well and truly brought all criticism upon themselves, and continue to do so persisting in attempting to defend their now indefendable actions.
I was under the impression you were capable of examining all the available material on an issue and forming your own opinion.
A tad sad that despite evidence available from a variety of sources you seem committed to the narrative that Pharmac's decisions are all justified under For The Good Of All rule and any criticism can be traced back to Big Pharma lobbying.
The key piece of data in whether an action is killing people via a specific cause is whether the death rate from that cause actually increased while or after the action was taken.
That’s the only way of looking at it. Each case has to be first investigated individually and then as a (population) statistic. One cannot ignore the deaths as ‘within the normal range of statistical probabilities’ or whatever because that doesn’t explain anything.
The most probable conclusion is that one can't prove a negative.
There's always the possibility that in ten or twenty years some level-5 bureaucrat will run the numbers and discover that this decision, statistically speaking, was associated with the deaths of three people more than would have been expected.
But that's the peril of every healthcare funding decision. You take funding away from some area, even if it looks like it will have no negative impact on the population, maybe you're wrong. And maybe the area you divert that funding to will not save more lives than covered by your miscalculated downside.
But you will never be able to convince someone that your decision had nothing to do with their loved one's death, even if there's zero actual evidence you had anything to do with it at all.
Understandably, people are upset and angry and they want to know what happened. They may also want some kind of justice if a preventable mistake was made and someone was found culpable.
I fear these people will be disappointed, disillusioned, and remain angry for quite some time because it is highly unlikely that the investigation into the brand switch will find that kind of information and identify culpability in a legal sense.
As you know, SUDEP is poorly understood and will remain so for the foreseeable future IMO.
This is not to say that it will be a whitewash. Hopefully, some lessons will be learned from this and avoided in future. Again, I believe they will in lowering the risk threshold and a stricter adherence to the first precautionary principle of healthcare: first, do no harm. In other words, if it ain’t broken, don’t try to fix it.
"For the lamotrigine brand change we identified the need for additional support for consumers and health professionals. A five-month transition period was put in place to allow people time to change brands."
The spokesperson said a "range of resources" for patients and pharmacists were circulated widely and information was put on the Pharmac website.
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Pharmac said patients should not stop using lamotrigine, and if they had concerns they should contact their healthcare professional. [my italics]
Patients are no ordinary consumers.
I know that a few people shove all blame onto PHARMAC because they went against international best evidence and Medsafe’s advice, which is within their rights.
However, PHARMAC is a funding agency and there are (at least) three other parties directly involved in a patient’s prescriptions: the healthcare professional (usually the GP), the pharmacy, and the patient him or herself.
It seems to me that at least one issue is the uncertainty about who takes responsibility for what, i.e. it might have fallen in between the cracks.
It could be a while before we find out if the brand switch has contributed to any of the five reported deaths and other reported adverse events.
In NZ health jargon they are pretty interchangeable. Hence the Health & Disability Commission having a Code Of Consumers Rights. Part of a broader attempt at the time to redefine people's relationship with health practitioners and services in the process of being neoliberalised, but not properly addressed since. Influences from the US.
Yes, it is unfortunate that the lines between these two concepts are blurred because there really is a fundamental difference between patients and consumers.
You mention the US and together with NZ, these are the only two countries that allow direct-to-consumer-advertising of prescription drugs (DTCA).
Personally, I don’t believe this is in the best interests of patients.
“American-style bureaucracy where every change in government results in thousands of political appointees”
There aren't actually that many of them, when you compare the number to either the total number of employees of the US Government or the population of the US.
There are approximately 4,000 political appointments in the Executive Branch, at least according to Wiki. That covers just about all of the Government except the Post Office and the Military.
The population of the US is about 70 times that of New Zealand. If we had the same sort of ratio that would mean around 55-60 political appointees here. I don't know but I would be willing to wager that there are far more than that in the Minister's Offices in the Beehive who serve at the Minister's discretion rather than being seconded by a Department.
After all, that is only a couple of people per Minister.
Except that they're mostly higher-level roles, so to argue a relative proportion it's the number of different functions and services rather than the number of employees. Even if population difference corresponded to difference in size of bureaucracy.
An, of course, there's the entire distinction between ministers and departments, which they don't seem to have in the US: their cabinet members have direct operational control over their departments, rather than a governance role.
Minister comes up with a goal, the department come up with the plan (including costs), minister signs off on it as a decision, department implements the plan.
Sometimes ministers want a plan, but it costs too much so they kick it back to the department to find savings (or the department doesn't understand that cost is less of a factor so automatically slips in ways of saving cash, like refusing to recognise previous experience of family carers).
that doesn't quite explain how someone could be fired or moved on though.
I think it does explain that much of what we see in welfare and health is on Labour (and NZF) rather the public servants (although I'm sure there are plenty of ways to undermine a new Minister's plan).
Someone would need to be actually held accountable for their previous decisions and actions while a public servant, which will never happen. It would also make them even more risk-averse.
As long as they competently do the job they are instructed to do, why would you fire them?
If they don't do their job properly, that's internal through the department or SSC.
If their job requires them to commit crimes, they and their superiors should be arrested.
If the incoming minister doesn't like the job the previous minister ordered the department to do, that's not the fault of the department.
That having been said, there is some fudging at senior levels where part of the role might be to have a good working relationship with the minister, but the responsibility for what jobs ministers are instructed to do rests with the minister. And ministers are constrained by Cabinet priorities, as well.
Arseholes who want to be arseholes when they are instructed to be fair and reasonable fail to competently perform their duties. The intractable arseholes fail to change and go through standard performance management. A purge would just flood the department with inexperienced staff who have poor job security because there will be another purge in three years.
It's bad enough already with restructurings to align with ministerial wishes and areas of responsibility. Basic stuff like differentiating researcher data requests from OIA requests, or knowing who is responsible for what subject area at the moment all fall through a myriad of little cracks because there's FA institutional memory or knowledge. Whacking a purge on top of that is just piling dysfunction upon dysfunction.
Despite doing a largish amount of physical work in an average day I still experience episodes of insomnia.
I am a ridiculously fast reader…but I admit to finding it increasingly difficult to read stuff on screen…my days of dilligence/ self flagellation may be seriously numbered.
Still..the BIMs are certainly a go to document if one has a couple of 'wtf!' moments and need to find the source of a new Minister's blunders.
I've been known to read the odd Treasury Report as well.
"It would be nice to think so, but don't wholly agree it is true. Yes, there is plenty of positivity in NZ but there is a lot of negativity too and sometimes the latter wins."
I tend to agree with you (Mathew) to SOME (and a growing) extent.
The 4 P's play an increasingly role too – from a sliding scale between apathy and desperation through to hope, and "positivity"
Pot, 'P', Piss and Prozac.
For the first time in my life, I'm about to change my vote from Labour to Green.
And it's not because the Adhern government isn't the best of a load of bad alternatives. It's because time is actually running out before populism become entrenched.
When I heard JA say (in a Henry Cooke interview), she didn't realise how long things take, AND THEN praised our public service (admitedly I assumed she was referring to the senior ranks), I thought – naivety maybe?
I'm not sure some in Labour have yet developed adequate bullshit detectors even if some will only ever have to face a used-car salesman (in this space going forward)
When I heard JA say (in a Henry Cooke interview), she didn't realise how long things take, AND THEN praised our public service (admitedly I assumed she was referring to the senior ranks), I thought – naivety maybe?
Yes, I think there is a bit of naivety and not just on JA's part. To my knowledge, she was never a P.S. employee – not in NZ anyway – and there are politicians on all sides who fall into that category.
As you know OWT, the P.S. was very much a dog eat dog place but whether that is still the case I don't know. In my day, "seniority" usually depended on how far up 'you know where' a person was prepared to go. Individuality was frowned upon, and anyone who dared to stick their neck above the parapet had it chopped off and thrown into the moat.
A period of P.S. employment should be a requirement for all senior politicians. 😉
Yep, well – Just can't do it anymore. I'm afraid JA may well have signed up to superficiality over substance.
Second time this week concerning an immigration issue ( and that's only 2 that've been made public after just watching 1 news ).
The good thing is that it won't just be me that does the big switch – there are now 3 generations of family that are in agreement.
Apparently, I seem to have misjudged Iain Lees-Galloway too. Nice bloke though he may be, he's obviously not as bright as I thought he was – or maybe its more to do with expediency over principle. Either way, cudda shudda wudda.
….All over the world, corporate lobbyists seek to brand opponents of their industries as extremists and terrorists, and some governments and police forces are prepared to listen. A recent article in the Intercept seeks to discover why the US Justice Department and the FBI had put much more effort into chasing mythical “ecoterrorists” than pursuing real, far-right terrorism. A former official explained, “You don’t have a bunch of companies coming forward saying ‘I wish you’d do something about these rightwing extremists’.” By contrast, there is constant corporate pressure to “do something” about environmental campaigners and animal rights activists…..
While I agree with Monbiot's main point. Personally I think that his notion that we should own the label of ‘extremist’ is wrong.
James Hanson, Naomi Klein and in particular Bill McKibben, are of the opinion that the polluters that we are protesting against are the ‘extremists’ and should be made to own this label. These corporate 'extremists' are out of control, recklessly conducting an experiment with the climate which will impact us all.
…Our government is helping propel us towards a catastrophe on a scale humankind has never encountered before: the collapse of our life-support systems. It does so in support of certain ideologies – consumerism, neoliberalism, capitalism – and on behalf of powerful industries. This, apparently, meets the definition of moderation. Seeking to prevent this catastrophe is extremism.
Let’s be clear the supporters BAU are not moderate but extreme
You can be sure that the label of 'terrorist' attached to Greenpeace by British Intelligence is the same label that the French Intelligence service the DGSE also attach to Greenpeace.
You can also be sure that the British Intelligence consider French Intelligence the DGSE, just like themselves, to be counter terrorists.
The French secret intelligence agency that murdered Nando Pereira and bombed Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior will not be on any establishment organisation terrorist watch list.
….Tarring environmental campaigners and terrorist organisations with the same brush is not going to help fight terrorism,” said John Sauven, the executive director of Greenpeace UK. “It will only harm the reputation of hard-working police officers … How can we possibly teach children about the devastation caused by the climate emergency while at the same implying that those trying to stop it are extremists?”
Peta’s director, Elisa Allen, said: “This appears to be a sinister attempt to quash legitimate campaigning organisations – something that is as dangerous as it is undemocratic.”
The bombing and murder carried out by the DGSE may be the most egregious act by an establishment Intelligence agency but it underlines what Elisa Allen said, that these views held by secret intelligence agencies and the police are dangerous and undemocratic.
Tens of millions form human chain in India's Bihar State in climate protest
Tens of millions of people have reportedly formed an long human chain in the northern Indian state of Bihar to raise awareness about the environment and social justice…..
……The official Twitter account of the United Nations Environment Programme tweeted: "An estimated 50 million people in India's Bihar State made a massive human chain stretching over 18,000 km yesterday. Why? To raise awareness that we are in a #ClimateCrisis and to show resolve to protect our planet."
The state has organised similar events for such causes in the last three years.
Stretching? 18,000 km is 18 million metres. If they squeezed 50 million people into 18 million metres, that's 0.36 metres per person. Even the rudest budget airlines give you a lot more than that in their stingiest seats.
The numbers (online) are all over the place but it seems to me that a major event did take place. Quibbling about the actual numbers is just semantics IMO. Maybe satellite images can verify the claims 😉
The problem with distinguishing between fake and fact is that things are never that simple and black & white (binary).
Professor Ann Marie Brady takes New Zealand's government to task for its lax attitude towards Chinese state and donor influence within New Zealand politics.
You do realise that it's racist to say anything critical of the CCP. Our very own wumao 'Mark' assured us of this repeatedly. 🙂
However my own personal Chinese sources tell me Xi's 'Presidency for Life' gambit is an act of desperation. China has four long standing problems:
1. At present they remain highly dependent on imported resources that only arrive because ships are still free to move across oceans. But to get to China they must pass through several choke points all of which are contested and highly deniable.
2. The four or five thousand years of civilisation is largely a myth. Just as modern Germany has only existed for a relatively short period, and prior to this it was an endless sequence of warlords, imperial expansions, invasions and collapses, the same with China. One of the most stable Chinese periods was when the Mongols invaded and ruled for 200 years or so. At least two major languages divide the nation, and numerous others remain. There is no particular reason why China’s current borders should be considered stable, and you only have to look at the intense resistance from the Taiwanese and HongKongers to the idea of reunification to get a taste of this.
3. Their demographics are terrible. Contrary to what I imagined a few years back, China is running out of young people. This will put an enormous handbrake on their internal expansion. They remain a very low trust society; inner circle/out circle is very much a thing. Together these factors makes it very hard for China to continue expanding on internal growth only
4. And to date most of that 'miraculous' expansion has been very much the result of China's entry into the global world trade order … mostly sponsored by the American Bretton Woods system. The USA tolerated the rise of Germany, Europe and Japan as competitors, because these nations largely played by the rules. China has not, it's policies of hypersubsidisation, and rampant IP theft have gone well past merely annoying. With the USA defaulting back to it's natural isolationism it's no longer interested in maintaining a trade system that largely benefits a nation that is posturing itself as an enemy.
So far the CCP has been able to maintain social order because everyone was getting richer. The raising of 800m people into the middle class is indeed a remarkable achievement, but the ground on which it was achieved is shifting from under them. Hence Xi Xinping's rampant authoritarianism and projection of influence beyond it's borders. Australia and New Zealand are notionally linked into the "Third Island Chain" , ultimately our geography makes us a clear target to be subsumed into the CCP's long term goals to create a New Middle Earth.
The primary reason China will continue to do great is: the United States.
The United States is the gift that keeps on giving in terms of talent pool for innovations, financial capital for expansion, right kind of customer base for all their kinds of products and services, innovations to copy cheaply, and because they have acted so badly for four decades that they are making China look reasonably OK as an alternative ally.
The United States has a fair number of problems which benefit China's place in the world for the remainder of the century.
1. It has squandered the massive moral authority it gained across much of the world after helping Europe defeat Nazi Germany and defeat global communism (I'm sure the very young and the last remaining commies will deny they ever had it but they're the ones who didn't fight).
China is on the other hand building a purely mercantilist and instrumental mode of transacting in the world. Trade deals are replacing the moral pacts built after World World 2 through the United Nations.
2. Its constitutional innovations from the Revolution have worn out, so it no longer functions as a set of ideals to aspire to. In particular its Constitutional checks and balances of executive power have stopped working.
China on the other hand has coherent government which is growing in precision and authority. Sure, I don't like it. But their Chinese social credit system may well turn into a more powerful system of corrective behaviours than the entire US judicial framework of law and prison. Imagine a world where the use of courts was less and less necessary, on China's scale.
3. The USA is about as addicted to oil-based products as one could think, despite having invented and promulgated the digital economy which has significantly decarbonised parts of it.
China is certainly addicted to oil, but it's making many of the right transformative moves, and if you want a 300km/h train to get you somewhere rather than a plane, look not to the USA.
4. The USA used to be ambitious for the rest of the world and could roll out truly massive nation-building programmes through massive instruments including the US armed forces, the CIA, the World Bank, and the IMF. It’s also proven incapable of winning or at least completing a war in 50 years.
China is now the world leader on nation-building systems, and only China has the instruments to roll them out now. Who knows if they will really come off – as in Pakistan – but they don't lack for will or ambit. China's the one that forges the really big trade deals.
There's a really good chance that China is now better positioned for the future due to the systems of governance and control it has rolling, its capacity to decarbonise compared to other major countries, and its diplomatic force stripped of non-mercantile idealism.
In the Year of the Rat, it's China that behaves like one.
And that's a compliment to both China and to rats.
All interesting and valid responses. Still I have to add some qualifiers.
Post WW2 the USA allowed competitors to flourish as long as they stayed on their side ideologically and didn't challenge them militarily. China has broken both of those rules and the USA is now rapidly disengaging with China. The past few years have seen an increasing return of US business back to North America.
The other big one that people keep missing is this; the USA never really needed the global trade order it established. It's imports/exports as a percentage of GDP are something in the order of 6%. They are now oil and gas independent. They simply don't need the rest of the world anymore and are certainly no longer interested in expending American lives in wars they have no interest in. As far as they're concerned they did their best to get the world on a more peaceful orderly basis but the effort has been largely spat upon. No US President since GW Bush has shown any real interest in global affairs and Trump is merely the clown show giving the middle finger to the rest of the planet.
China is now the world leader on nation-building systems
Which has to explain why it's nearest and most intimate neighbors, from Hong Kong to the Philippines are all anxious and unhappy about China's overt military expansion in the region. South China Sea pops into mind. The idea that China is a pacifist, merchantile power with only benign non-military intent is laughable to anyone in the region. Wherever they have the opportunity the Chinese are expanding and exerting their military muscle.
its capacity to decarbonise compared to other major countries,
What kind of travesty is this that pretty much allows us to be a satellite of US military power? …and a target..under the guise of plucky Kiwi ingenuity
The binary thinking is strong in this one. The third option, which we appear to be following, with the recent visit of a Chinese warship, is: both. Option 4 obviously is neutrality; 4(b) or 5, to suit those of us with a benevolent and inclusive nature being a foreign policy which is both neutral and pacifist.
Small nations like NZ that are utterly dependent of freedom of the seas and open trade will ultimately be forced to pick a side. Just to be clear, I've advocated for many years that the age of empires is going to end, but in the meantime we have to deal with the realities in front of us.
Wishful thinking about 'neutral and pacifist' will cut no mustard with the great powers.
"Wishful thinking"…How very dare I! As co-creators of our world, what we humans need collectively is a shitload more "wishful thinking" and way less of the fossilized acceptance of "the realities in front of us."
The problem with having typed out in excess of maybe 8,000 comments here over the past 13 years is that I tend to assume everyone has read all of them. Which is a terrible conceit of course.
But yes I've outlined in many comments a vision for a post-empire political world, based on a global form of federal govt. Not dissimilar in nature to the UN, but in which the nations give up the aspects of their sovereignty that relate to international matters, such as trade agreements, freedom of navigation, communications, diplomacy and most especially war. I've repeatedly argued that all of the big problems we face are global in nature therefore demand political responses and authority at the same scale.
However I've been a lonely voice on this for a long time now, and I'm assuming that none of this is going to come about for at least another generation. It may well take another catastrophic war to bring it about, who knows.
We don't need to make any decisions for a while yet.
Our security and military establishment will be independent in name only with Australia making almost all of our hard choices for us (no need for thinking there)…
… along with 90% of our banking (still no need for thinking)…
…whereas as a society New Zealand cares only cares if your Visa is good rather than where you are from (in all our guest nights, student nights, and exports) …
… and those three defaults enable China's rise in New Zealand and in Australia (and still not a fresh thought needed for any of the above to continue 🙂 )
Kiwibank aren't even 10% of our banking after 19 years of operation, and have needed massive bailouts so big they had to be hocked off to ACC and NZSuperfund.
Nor does it have the business and farm lending profits.
Which is all good until those sectors go down the tubes. Which may be why there's suddenly rumours that BNZ is on the block. This could easily be another Hanover / Allied Farmers situation, in which case Kiwi Bank and backers would be keeping well clear, or should be.
I've seen the evidence of US power (going back at least as far as Hiroshima and Korea , Vietnam, Cambodia ,Guatemala etc ad infinitum)and I'm not impressed….except in a fearful way.
China's military impact on the world?
Bases globally?
I know you put a case that American hegemony has resulted in less death, and widespread peace and prosperity, but I don't buy it
There may be fewer battle deaths, but economic sanctions are the new way of doing business..and war..and the deaths and ongoing misery are undeniable
Battle deaths also don't take into account the lingering and longlasting death count asscociated with land mines,depleted uranium exposure … disability, birth defects ,cancer,and denial of access to medicines and food, general poverty from sanctions,destruction of cultures and societies.The US has steadily retreated from international treaties intended to make the world safer
Peace and prosperity for the few, not the many
I'm not choosing China either , I guess I have more optimism (or stupid hope) that we humans can be better..and need to be
Compared to what? Short of trying to argue historic counter factuals in which we imagine that the USSR had become the dominant world power post-WW2, or whatever, we can only really compare with the past. The data clearly shows that the past was nowhere near as peaceful as you imagine, and that war between the 'great powers of the day' has steadily declined, especially since WW2.
Lol. Your solid data rich reference starts with the words "draft version".
There is an obvious reason for a cessation of direct conflict between the major powers, nuclear weapons.There is nothing in your link to suggest that there would have been more conflict overall if US foreign policy had been less aggressive. You are welcome to hold an opinion that there would have been based on conjecture, but "hard data" to support that there is not.
Obviously you didn't even get as far as reading the first paragraph, before you found a petty distraction to amuse yourself with. Well there is another version here that's highly visual, doesn't require a lot of reading and isn't a draft. Unless you care to refute this, then merely pretending it doesn’t exist is irrational.
There is an obvious reason for a cessation of direct conflict between the major powers, nuclear weapons.
Yes indeed. So now can we drop that idiotic 'nuclear free' policy?
As for American foreign policy being so 'aggressive' by exactly what measure are you judging this? For 70 years since then end of WW2 the US military has ensured freedom of trade and movement of peoples between all nations resulting in a huge reduction in warfare, the end of overt colonisation, the growth of democracy, and an immense improvement in living standards … as long as you were on their side. That was not an unreasonable demand.
At various points they've fucked up, the invasion of Iraq being an obvious one. Covert actions in Latin America having little to commend them either. Since the end of the Cold War their interest and competency in maintaining the global peace has become increasingly erratic and ill-directed.
No-one is arguing that Pax-Americana did not have it's ugly moments, but if you imagine that reverting to a pre-WW2 era in which multiple competing great power empires constantly vied and battled with each other over controlling territory and trade routes is going to be somehow an improvement … well the data I've presented suggests you're dreaming.
Which at the same time doesn't say this dominant US role in world affairs is going to be sustainable either; at some point we need to have some tough conversations about what will replace it.
The Green Party have been consistent in opposing genocide and helping its victims.
Syrian protesters: 'Nobody can deny this anymore
RNZ, 17 December 2016
…..The Green Party and Amnesty International have urged the government to consider another emergency intake of refugees from Syria, in light of the humanitarian crisis.
The Syrian Solidarity group said that needed to go further, and said the government needed to demand the Assad regime, Russia, Iranian and Iraq militias stop killing civilians.
Spokesperson Ali Akil said its rally in central Auckland this afternoon was a push for action.
One of the protesters, Fareeda Kassem, said she wanted New Zealand to take a stand against the violence.
"The innocent people, the children, the newborn, who are being bombed in hospitals and schools. And this is just so crazy to see the whole world is being so silent about it. We're seeing this live, it's like nobody can deny this anymore."….
……Green Party immigration spokesperson Denise Roche said New Zealand had the capacity to take more refugees.
"I do think it should be considered right now because of the conflict that's happening there, and there's some people who are seeking a safe haven."
Ms Roche said the Green Party was also calling for a permanent increase to the refugee quota, to 1500.
Does sound from that article like a straightforward failure to declare local body election campaign donations over $1500. Dalziel subsequently listing them on 18 December does not change that.
The wriggleroom in the law is only over whether a breach was 'intentional' or not. ('Ignorance not being a defence' somehow does not apply to candidates seeking local power, only to plebs).
Thus here is the defence argument:
Dalziel said she had acted on her [lawyer] husband's advice that none of the donors [at an auction organised by him] paid over $1500 for the auctioned items, so could remain anonymous.
Davidson later advised her to include the details of the donors "after taking additional advice" about the law.
There's a big difference in a few donations of $1800 ($300 over the limit) which was slap-happily overlooked in a local body campaign, and a donation of $100.000 from a single donor carved up into packages of $14,999 in a general election campaign.
OK. I hadn't seen that update. The last link I read was some time ago. There was "a few of them" but I thought they were all around the $1800 mark. That makes a difference I concede but (imo) still doesn't put it on a par with Nationals misdemeanor.
I'm with you over the need to be scrupulous about the rules being followed. No point in having them otherwise. It sounds like it was carelessness, but it should not have happened. Hopefully there will be less "carelessness" on both sides in the future.
I'd personally like to see private money completely removed from politics.
If we want truly democratic elections there's no other alternative but it will never happen cos… you know "we're not gonna fund politicians out of our money. Let em fund their own campaigns. It's bad enough we have to pay for em sittin around in parliament all day doin nothing. 🙄
Anne wasn't making this “shit” up though, was she James.
"a donation of $100.000 from a single donor carved up into packages of $14,999 in a general election campaign"
"In March [2019] National's Jami-Lee Ross nightmare back to haunt the party when the police handed its election donation inquiry to the Serious Fraud Office. Ross had claimed a $100,000 donation from a Chinese businessman had been split into smaller amounts so the donor's identity did not have to be revealed. The investigation is ongoing." https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/384516/sfo-to-investigate-jami-lee-ross-complaint-on-national-party-donations
…..There is something very telling about the fact that the election of Donald Trump in late 2016 — a great victory for incoherence — took place at the exact time that Russia and Bashar al-Assad were bombing Aleppo to smithereens, shamelessly breaking humanitarian norms established since World War II. For those paying attention to both stories, a sickening montage played out between Trump’s television debates, with their breakdown of discourse as we knew it, and the nonstop video evidence of barrel bombs bringing down hospitals and apartment blocks, with babies found in the rubble. Of course humanitarian principles have been broken many times before, but in the past there was usually some attempt to deny, to cover things up, to be ashamed, to pretend ignorance. Here it was done with the shrug of the Sovereign Murderer. We have never had more evidence, more facts, to prove that atrocities are taking place. And never has it mattered less. In 2019, we see this all again: as Idlib is obliterated and Trump talks word-salad.
This is the great paradox of the end of the Cold War: the future, or rather the future-less present, arrived first in Russia. We are only now catching up. Though maybe there’s a simple cultural logic at work here. If our own ideological coherence was based on opposition to the Soviet Union’s, when it collapsed we would invariably follow.
The Russian regime finds itself at ease in this environment because it has been acting in it for longer. There’s nothing mystical at work in its success: it simply has a head start. Matching its messages to different audiences, constantly capturing attention and conjuring the illusion of strength through spectacle, lying for fun, throwing truth to the wind, and reducing facts to feelings — this is all familiar territory for the Kremlin. Some politicians in the West have joined in, but most institutions and bureaucracies are still playing by yesterday’s rules.
In a final twist, a nostalgia can arise for “normalnost,” for a time of stable meaning, which for many, especially among media and intellectual elites in the United States, was the end of the Cold War. Perhaps this yearning for a time that still made sense explains the attention Russia now receives in the “liberal press” and in conversations among those “resisting” Trump. I don’t mean the quest for policies to deter the Kremlin’s invasions and information operations — which I consider a matter of urgency — but the language and iconography that is sometimes used in this debate: motifs from Soviet posters to advertise books and articles on the subject; Cold War secret service terminology to describe Russia’s behavior today. The Kremlin’s actual strength lies in having arrived at our future first, in how contemporary and similar it is to the thing once known as the West, but by describing it in ways reminiscent of the Soviet Union there seems a longing to recover a narrative and system of interpretation where we knew who we were. The more our reality becomes like the new Russia, the more we pine for the old Soviet Union.
The victory for incoherence.
‘There is something very telling’ about the rise of incoherence in the West that culminated in Trump's election victory, and the misinformation war against the Syrian revolution.
Colonial Viper a Trump supporter and apologist for the Assad regime, right from the earliest months of the protests for democratic rights in Syria, openly advocated in these very pages for the slaughter of anti regime protesters as CIA agents.
That for his efforts CV was then later elevated to ‘Author’ marked a victory for incoherence and the end of normalnost where facts don’t matter and opinion is everything.
[Colonial Viper authored his first post here at end of 2013. He authored his first post on Assad and Syria at the end of 2015. You can check for yourself using the search function. AFAIK, he was not a Trump supporter in those days.
CV’s comments and posts were highly controversial at times and he became somewhat unhinged later on and went off reserve. He no longer has Author status here and has not commented here for a long time AFAIK.
I don’t know if CV has openly advocated for mass violence as you allege and I doubt it would have been condoned if this were indeed the case. However, you seem to suggest that TS ‘rewarded’ CV for calling for mass violence and slaughter and that is a pertinent lie and utterly uncalled for.
Your latest insinuations fly in the face of the hard work that Authors and Moderators (and SYSOP) as well as most commenters put into TS to distinguish between facts and opinions; there is a place for both, but they are not the same.
I am done with your lies and falsehoods and the continuing snide remarks aimed at TS, which are a stab in the back given that you have been a commenter on this site for 11 years with thousands of comments.
Don’t bother with e-mail or any other attempt to communicate regarding this Moderation note; the only opinions I’ll take into account are those of the other Moderators and SYSOP. You can pray that they see your case differently and in your favour.
He has certainly red-pilled himself in recent years if you look at his Twitter feed. His latest pet peeve is drag queens reading to a few middle class kids at a public library.
Never mind the thousands of kids who have to live in boarding houses and hotel rooms along side all sorts of nutters each and every day in this country.
Abortion today, then sex before marriage, then same sex relation shops, then dress codes, then no more evolution in schools.
It's happening here as well. We all like seeing footage of the brass bands at Ratana church and Neve frolicking on the paepae, but Ratanaism is very conversative and reactionary. They are anti choice, anti women, anti gay, anti evolution and live in the dark ages. They are more or less brownwashed alt right.
Trump has proven that he won't defend U.S. troops in Iraq.
34 U.S. troops suffered traumatic brain injuries after Iran's missile strike. Iran now knows that the orange commander-in-chief has a big mouth and tiny balls.
“And one day we must ask the question, ‘Why are there forty million poor people in America? And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising questions about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth.’ When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. And I’m simply saying that more and more, we’ve got to begin to ask questions about the whole society…”
–Speech to Southern Christian Leadership Conference Atlanta, Georgia, August 16, 1967.
You know that "I have a Dream" guy.
Did you know there was a trial that said he was assassinated by the US government?
Labours die hard neo liberal aligned members of whom D. Parker is a stirling example, seem to believe that “out fiscal scrooging” the Nats is a vote winner. The logic re sidelining Capital Gains given the holy war National was generating on CGT, and Coalition dynamics, was somewhat understandable as a one off tactical move, and may well have salvaged 2020 for them regardless of the negative messages it sent to many Labour Green supporters.
Likewise the Cannabis Referendum may play a part in the return of the Govt. But touching Super is a no no for many working class Kiwis as much as it is for the double dipping middle class who are happy to accept their super while they disparage beneficiaries.
National Superannuation at 65 is a de facto UBI for that age group, and despite the generational issues and calls from bureaucrats (often with their own personal retirement schemes) for change-Labour do so at their peril.
Not so sure this is a vote loser. It removes quite a lot of discrimination which I suspect skewed more towards women because of common life experiences. .
The partner with an overseas pension removing eligibility has been an issue for a long time- good to see it sorted.
A bit more thought needs to go into the rates of married couple, single person and two superannuitants sharing living space.
There is also other financial discrimination in this space- if a couple's adult children come to live with them there is no financial penalty , if they return to live with a single parent superannuitant then $50 a week is lost.
With respect to the partner age differences – if the qualifying partner dies – then the younger partner loses payment and has to depend on other welfare benefits.
I see that all current arrangements have been grandfathered. Personally I would have thought that there should have been a transitional period (shorter for youngest partners ) so that over a period of 2-5 years they transit onto the same rules as the newly eligible.Booting any under 50's off shoudn't be a hardship – I don't see why they should remain eligible for a better benefit. Conversely applying the reverse of these rules would ease the transition for couples with narrow age spreads close to retirement.
Hundreds of patients in Wuhan who have yet to be confirmed as carrying the new strain of coronavirus are becoming increasingly desperate as the city struggles to cope with the numbers reporting pneumonia symptoms.
One 36-year-old, speaking by phone outside a major hospital in the city, said she had spent the past week taking her sick husband from hospital to hospital in a vain attempt to get him tested for the virus, which has already killed 41 people and infected hundreds more.
“I have nothing. No protective clothing, only a raincoat, and I am standing outside the hospital in the rain,” said the woman, who gave her name as Xiaoxi.
“I am desperate, I have lost count of time and days. I don’t know if we will both live to see the new year.”
The internet and incompetence did not protect samoa from measles.
Dr Helen Petousis-Harris said given New Zealand's responsibility for the 1918 flu epidemic reaching Samoa and wiping out 22 percent of the population, the country should have done more to protect Samoa from this outbreak.
As measles reduces the immune response,there are significant risks for an outbreak in both the pacific islands and south auckland.The problem is it is already here.
Cohen, Omarosa and Parnas have all secretly recorded tRump.
Anyone think the mobster oligarchs don't have him on tape?
A recording obtained by ABC News appears to capture President Donald Trump telling associates he wanted the then-U.S. ambassador to UkraineMarie Yovanovitch fired while speaking at a small gathering that included Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman — two former business associates of Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani who have since been indicted in New York.
The recording appears to contradict statements by Trump and support the narrative that has been offered by Parnas during broadcast interviews in recent days. Sources familiar with the recording said the recording was made during an intimate April 30, 2018, dinner at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.
Trump has said repeatedly he does not know Parnas, a Soviet-born American who has emerged as a wild card in Trump’s impeachment trial, especially in the days since Trump was impeached.
"Get rid of her!" is what the voice that appears to be Trump’s is heard saying. "Get her out tomorrow. I don't care. Get her out tomorrow. Take her out. OK? Do it.
There are now only a few days left to give feedback on the Draft Government Policy Statement (GPS) on Land Transport 2024-34 (see our earlier post this week on GPS submission guides). As we’ve reported, the GPS is a disaster for Local Government, so we were particularly interested to hear ...
Willis has pledged to go ahead with the debt-funded tax cuts, despite growing opposition from her own supporters worried about appearing fiscally irresponsible. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for ...
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
Photo by Alvan Nee on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
Buzz from the Beehive One minister is talking tough while a colleague – whose ministry had acted tough and drawn a barrage of flak – has shown an official softening. Some ministers are doing what Labour was good at, which is distributing public funds to causes regarded as worthy or ...
A ballot for 4 Member's Bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn: Insurance Contracts Bill (Duncan Webb) Income Tax (Clean Transport FBT Exclusion) Amendment Bill (Julie Anne Genter) Crimes (Increased Penalties for Slavery Offences) Amendment Bill (Greg Fleming) Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
Jesus had dinner with his 12 disciples right before he died. Noted historian Madeleine Chapman finds out who really deserved to be there.First published in 2018 but let’s be honest, the subject is timeless. As you sit on your couch this Easter Sunday, eating a chocolate egg you know ...
The newly-promoted Northern League club is on a mission to return to the National League for the first time in two decades. Plenty about domestic football in New Zealand has changed in that time – but the sense that this amateur competition is not an entirely level playing field remains. ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
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Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Hesp, Professor, Flinders University Patrick Hesp In some parts of Australia, coastal dunes are retreating from the ocean at an alarming rate, as waves carve up the beach and wind blows the sand inland. But coastal communities are largely ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Heemsbergen, Senior Lecturer, Digital, Political, Media, Deakin University With an impressive 60% of the US smartphone market, Apple is undeniably big, but not a clear monopoly. Yet, years of innovation by Apple have effectively given the company its own exclusive ...
Whether you’re facing layoffs or are just an emotional junior staffer, it’s always a good idea to scout out a good crying place before you need it. It’s an incredibly hard time for Wellington. Across the city, thousands of public servants are hearing tough news about redundancies and layoffs. Government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Miller-Jones, Professor, Curtin University Nuclear explosions on a neutron star feed its jets. Danielle Futselaar and Nathalie Degenaar, Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, CC BY-SA How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daryl Adair, Associate Professor of Sport Management, University of Technology Sydney Earlier this week, independent MP Andrew Wilkie accused the AFL of conducting “off the books” illicit drug testing to identify players using substances of abuse, then inappropriately withdrawing them from matches ...
The Government’s announcement that it will scrap plans for a vast marine sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands is ‘shameful’ and will make it impossible for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its international commitments, says the World Wide Fund for Nature ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Shutterstock The federal government has bowed to pressure from the car industry, announcing it will relax proposed emissions rules for utes and vans and delay enforcement of the new standards ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Rutland, Professor Emerita, University of Sydney In his latest book, Jewish Life in Medieval Spain, Jonathan Ray focuses on the tumult of the 14th century in Spain – a time of the plague, civil strife and war between the two largest ...
While creating a slate of world-class shows, Whakaata Māori also developed a generation of world-class creatives. Television is an odd word. It mixes the Ancient Greek and Latin languages, and its most literal meaning is “far-off sight”. In the contemporary and living language of te reo Māori, “whakaata” as a ...
Yesterday the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. This significant step and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza prompted an urgent debate in the New Zealand Parliament. Leader ...
The Government’s decision to reduce access to continuous glucose monitors (CGM) not only threatens the lives of children with type 1 diabetes and increases the potential for ‘Dead in Bed’ syndrome, but also threatens the health of their parents an ...
Apples are available year-round, but the wide variety on offer involves intensive scientific research – and large-scale commercialisation. What’s beautiful, red, sweet and crunchy? Tony Martin’s favourite kind of apple: Sassy. The CEO of apple and pear breeding organisation Prevar, Martin’s fondness for Sassy represents professional success as well as ...
Family violence specialist service Shine is calling on employers to stop asking for proof of domestic violence in order for employees to access domestic violence leave. The call comes five years after the introduction of the Domestic Violence ...
The Deputy Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is calling for public submissions on the Budget Policy Statement 2024. The Budget Policy Statement 2024 (BPS) sets out the Government's priorities for the 2024 Budget. It explains the approach ...
Brutal government spending cuts that will see the size of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples slashed by 40% will hit Pasifika communities hard, the PSA says. The Ministry has told staff that it is seeking voluntary redundancies, and to redeploy and reassign ...
I live with five people I mostly love, but our different ideas about generosity are starting to really irk me.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,This is a bit of a random one but here goes. I’m 22 and work an OK job (OK meaning I get paid ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maria Nicholas, Senior Lecturer in Language and Literacy Education, Deakin University Earlier this month, the New South Wales government announced it would roll out programs for gifted students in every public school in the state. This comes amid concerns gifted school ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Rudge, Law lecturer, University of Sydney Massachusetts General Hospital In a world first, we heard last week that US surgeons had transplanted a kidney from a gene-edited pig into a living human. News reports said the procedure was a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tombs, Howard Paterson Chair of Theology and Public Issues, University of Otago The 5th-century Maskell panel showing Jesus in a loincloth.British Museum, CC BY-NC-SA When Jesus is shown on the cross, he is almost always depicted wearing a loincloth around ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University Shutterstock When you think about a red object, you might picture a red carpet, or the massive ruby in the Queen’s crown. Indeed, Western monarchies and marketing from brands such ...
COMMENTARY:Jewish Voice for Peace The UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza on Monday — and for the first time since the beginning of the Israeli military’s genocide of Palestinians, the United States abstained rather than vetoing it. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, ...
Asia Pacific Report A New Zealand investigative journalist and author says the US spy system hosted by the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) appears to be a controversial intelligence system used in global capture-kill operations. Writing a commentary for RNZ News today, Nicky Hager, author of Secret Power, a 1996 ...
While Nicola Willis wouldn’t give any details on its size, she said a package of tax cuts is definitely still coming in this year’s budget, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the investigation into the Department of Internal Affairs after it was revealed that the Department’s Chief Executive personally reached out to expedite a DJs passport application. Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns ...
Finance minister Nicola Willis delivers her first budget statement, and unwittingly helps Joel MacManus save his relationship. Nicola Willis strode into the Beehive Theatrette. Around me, on the green foldout seats, were the country’s top business and political journalists. They were all here to see her announce the Budget Policy ...
Twenty years ago today, Māori Television launched after much controversy. Jamie Tahana looks back on its survival and impact across two decades. Chad Chambers stepped onto the stage, the brim of his cap casting a shadow across his face. His smile beamed as bright as his white freezing works gumboots, ...
Tauranga, Rotorua, Wellsford, Onehunga, Westhaven marina – Gavin Strawhan walks the meanish streets of New Zealand in his entertaining debut novel The Call, almost sure to roar into the number 1 position on the Nielsen bestseller chart, its front cover bearing a rave from somebody: “A really good and genuinely ...
On a Thursday in February, at Wellington’s Conservation House, the Conservation Authority, a statutory body advising the eponymous department and minister, Tama Potaka, opened its 195th meeting. Under consideration that afternoon was an agenda item written by Tim Bamford, chief advisor in the Department of Conservation’s biodiversity, heritage and visitors ...
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A lengthy response to the recently released draft Government policy statement on transport will soon be delivered from Auckland Council to Minister of Transport Simeon Brown. A submission raising concerns about funding distribution and the plan’s treatment of Auckland passed through the council’s transport committee on Wednesday, despite some councillors ...
The unidentified foreign intelligence operation discussed in a scathing report by New Zealand’s Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) last week appears to be a controversial United States intelligence system. The IGIS report said the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) decision to host a foreign system from 2012-2020 was “improper” ...
Straightforward and detailed read of where NZ political parties are at in election year (and broader than the headline): https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/119033188/what-will-the-nats-do-about-winston
It would be nice to think so, but don't wholly agree it is true. Yes, there is plenty of positivity in NZ but there is a lot of negativity too and sometimes the latter wins.
Take the 2008 election. The campaign waged by National was negative without precedence in this country and it worked a treat. Yes, they had a new charismatic leader who also pulled in votes but it was the negativity that won the day for them.
By all means run a positive campaign. It is what we would expect of them. But when the fake news, the lies and the misinformation starts flying (and it already has but can only increase in frequency) be ready to return the fire because if Labour doesn't, they risk a repeat performance of 2008.
'A Brighter Future'
for them and their enablers.
the rest are darn near hopeless, bludgers and lazy people whom the no mates party has no use for.
Also, we have become tenants.
Nope. We have had this discussion repeatedly in recent weeks.
I don't mean stooping to National's level. Far from it. But I do remember Helen Clark and Labour ignoring the lies, falsehoods emanating from National. I think they assumed the voters would see it for what it was…. misinformation. Many of them didn't. It was Crosby/Textor stuff – cleverly presented and needed to be swiftly rebuffed. It wasn't.
We can expect to see an updated version – with a degree of Trumpism thrown in.
Edit: and they need to be supported by the Greens when it is appropriate. There will be a concerted effort to discredit them as well.
Again, nope. Plan and deliver your own messages rather than reacting to and amplifying the reach of theirs.
There is no need for 'enemas' of Labour to generate fake news or promulgate misinformation or tell lies.
Allowing a bureaucrat with a decade long history of mismanaging MOH:DSS a front and centre position in the midst of major reform (as a result of long running Human Rights cases) is messaging of the most honest in nature.
This is Labour and its partners in crime giving a loud and emphatic Fuck You to those of us in the disability community who have fought long and hard for justice and a modicum of parity with our entitled ACC cousins.
Ditto allowing Pharmac unfettered authority to ignore international protocols and put the lives of Kiwis at risk.
Ditto largely ignoring the strong advice of the WEAG and CPAG to remove sanctions and significantly raise benefits.
Oh yes…Labour doesn't need its enemies to lose votes in the upcoming election…those of us who were hoping that there was the collective will in the Coalition for real transformation and hard reform of what is falsely called 'the Publc Service ' have only ourselves to blame for almost buying into their shit.
Labour just might capture the vote of the Muddles, the Woman's Weekly readership beguiled by cutesy family outing shots, and they may even seduce a few wavering National voters (unless That Mob comes up with more palatable spokespeople) but bet my bottom dollar they have well and truly shat in the pond of traditional Labour supporters.
Vote Greens, I guess. Stronger hand in next govt will depend on Winston being weaker in relation to them.
The bureaucrats will be mostly the same regardless of who’s in Government.
This is true.
But it is not right.
The buggers should be purged…unless they have performed outstandingly and according to the expectations of the Gummint.
Actually, that's very possibly the case with my mate Toni Atkinson.
Bring on the EOLC Bill!!!
Problem is that many bureaucrats do get ‘recycled’ and NZ just happens to be a tiny little fish bowl, which aggravates the problem with the small ‘talent pool’. In many ways, NZ still is a colonial outpost.
We’ll have to get through the euthanasia debate first.
It’ll be a busy year for the Moderators here 😉
Just one word of friendly advice, be careful what you say about specific persons, here or elsewhere in public.
Always happy to receive advice ,friendly or otherwise.
"My mate" has been more than happy to put her name and face out there trumpeting the Good Works of MOH:DSS for the past decade in their Newsletter.
ROFLMAO
I even have a letter signed by her in 2012 declaring that they were working on a 'non-discriminatory family carer policy'….you will no doubt remember the reaction from those who actually give a shit about NZBORA and sound legislative practise in 2013?
I have no fear of being accused of defamation…I don't lie…the truth is damning enough.
The only other risk is being punished by having MOH:DSS supports cut.
Already happened in 2012…we get nothing from them so have nothing to lose.
All good then 🙂
As a general point of information, i.e. not specifically addressed to you, if somebody defames another person on this site, it is the site or Trust(ees) rather that is liable.
Sorry, I cannot remember; my memory leaks like a sieve on a landfill.
Whoever is in that ‘boss of Disability Support Services’ role also has at least Legal and their Director-General to convince before something becomes policy. Likewise the DG is susceptible to whatever signals are coming from the Minister's office – which is why whoever is in there is critical, unfortunately.
However it is easy for it to become personalised when, as you note, you see the same person fronting decisions with direct and unescapable personal impacts over a long period of time.
All well and good in principle, but then we end up with an American-style bureaucracy where every change in government results in thousands of political appointees of varying professional competence and knowledge.
At the end of the day, you're criticising the bureaucracy for political decisions made because ministers don't have the guts to just take the budgetary impact of doing the right thing.
@McFlock
"At the end of the day, you're criticising the bureaucracy for political decisions made because ministers don't have the guts to just take the budgetary impact of doing the right thing."
In Pharmac's case they have well and truly brought all criticism upon themselves, and continue to do so persisting in attempting to defend their now indefendable actions.
The actions that seem to have resulted in no change in the rate of death while freeing up funds to help other patients?
Seriously, McFlock?
I was under the impression you were capable of examining all the available material on an issue and forming your own opinion.
A tad sad that despite evidence available from a variety of sources you seem committed to the narrative that Pharmac's decisions are all justified under For The Good Of All rule and any criticism can be traced back to Big Pharma lobbying.
Sigh.
The key piece of data in whether an action is killing people via a specific cause is whether the death rate from that cause actually increased while or after the action was taken.
That’s the only way of looking at it. Each case has to be first investigated individually and then as a (population) statistic. One cannot ignore the deaths as ‘within the normal range of statistical probabilities’ or whatever because that doesn’t explain anything.
SUDEP by its nature tells us nothing, like most "SU" deaths.
A person who was alive is now dead, with no obvious cause and only a condition or time of life as a common factor with other unexplained deaths.
At least a change in the rate of unexplained deaths would indicate that something has changed.
True, but given that the numbers are small and ‘soft’ I believe this will not lead to conclusions. https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-15-11-2019/#comment-1666718
The most probable conclusion is that one can't prove a negative.
There's always the possibility that in ten or twenty years some level-5 bureaucrat will run the numbers and discover that this decision, statistically speaking, was associated with the deaths of three people more than would have been expected.
But that's the peril of every healthcare funding decision. You take funding away from some area, even if it looks like it will have no negative impact on the population, maybe you're wrong. And maybe the area you divert that funding to will not save more lives than covered by your miscalculated downside.
But you will never be able to convince someone that your decision had nothing to do with their loved one's death, even if there's zero actual evidence you had anything to do with it at all.
Understandably, people are upset and angry and they want to know what happened. They may also want some kind of justice if a preventable mistake was made and someone was found culpable.
I fear these people will be disappointed, disillusioned, and remain angry for quite some time because it is highly unlikely that the investigation into the brand switch will find that kind of information and identify culpability in a legal sense.
As you know, SUDEP is poorly understood and will remain so for the foreseeable future IMO.
This is not to say that it will be a whitewash. Hopefully, some lessons will be learned from this and avoided in future. Again, I believe they will in lowering the risk threshold and a stricter adherence to the first precautionary principle of healthcare: first, do no harm. In other words, if it ain’t broken, don’t try to fix it.
If money in the health system is being spent inefficiently, harm is already being done.
There was another article on the brand switch on Stuff today: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/118814341/bipolar-disorder-patients-suffer-terrible-side-effects-after-pharmac-drug-brand-switch
Patients are no ordinary consumers.
I know that a few people shove all blame onto PHARMAC because they went against international best evidence and Medsafe’s advice, which is within their rights.
However, PHARMAC is a funding agency and there are (at least) three other parties directly involved in a patient’s prescriptions: the healthcare professional (usually the GP), the pharmacy, and the patient him or herself.
It seems to me that at least one issue is the uncertainty about who takes responsibility for what, i.e. it might have fallen in between the cracks.
It could be a while before we find out if the brand switch has contributed to any of the five reported deaths and other reported adverse events.
" It could be a while before we find out…."
By which time most of the unaffected Muddles will have forgotten what the fuss was all about.
Convenient, and just what they are relying on.
SSDD
In NZ health jargon they are pretty interchangeable. Hence the Health & Disability Commission having a Code Of Consumers Rights. Part of a broader attempt at the time to redefine people's relationship with health practitioners and services in the process of being neoliberalised, but not properly addressed since. Influences from the US.
Yes, it is unfortunate that the lines between these two concepts are blurred because there really is a fundamental difference between patients and consumers.
You mention the US and together with NZ, these are the only two countries that allow direct-to-consumer-advertising of prescription drugs (DTCA).
Personally, I don’t believe this is in the best interests of patients.
“American-style bureaucracy where every change in government results in thousands of political appointees”
There aren't actually that many of them, when you compare the number to either the total number of employees of the US Government or the population of the US.
There are approximately 4,000 political appointments in the Executive Branch, at least according to Wiki. That covers just about all of the Government except the Post Office and the Military.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_appointments_by_Donald_Trump
The population of the US is about 70 times that of New Zealand. If we had the same sort of ratio that would mean around 55-60 political appointees here. I don't know but I would be willing to wager that there are far more than that in the Minister's Offices in the Beehive who serve at the Minister's discretion rather than being seconded by a Department.
After all, that is only a couple of people per Minister.
Except that they're mostly higher-level roles, so to argue a relative proportion it's the number of different functions and services rather than the number of employees. Even if population difference corresponded to difference in size of bureaucracy.
An, of course, there's the entire distinction between ministers and departments, which they don't seem to have in the US: their cabinet members have direct operational control over their departments, rather than a governance role.
Set new objectives and ask senior staff to leave if they cannot meet them? Not sure what kind of employment agreements they have.
Basically, that's the routine.
Minister comes up with a goal, the department come up with the plan (including costs), minister signs off on it as a decision, department implements the plan.
Sometimes ministers want a plan, but it costs too much so they kick it back to the department to find savings (or the department doesn't understand that cost is less of a factor so automatically slips in ways of saving cash, like refusing to recognise previous experience of family carers).
that doesn't quite explain how someone could be fired or moved on though.
I think it does explain that much of what we see in welfare and health is on Labour (and NZF) rather the public servants (although I'm sure there are plenty of ways to undermine a new Minister's plan).
Someone would need to be actually held accountable for their previous decisions and actions while a public servant, which will never happen. It would also make them even more risk-averse.
As long as they competently do the job they are instructed to do, why would you fire them?
If they don't do their job properly, that's internal through the department or SSC.
If their job requires them to commit crimes, they and their superiors should be arrested.
If the incoming minister doesn't like the job the previous minister ordered the department to do, that's not the fault of the department.
That having been said, there is some fudging at senior levels where part of the role might be to have a good working relationship with the minister, but the responsibility for what jobs ministers are instructed to do rests with the minister. And ministers are constrained by Cabinet priorities, as well.
What if their job asks them to be an arsehole and they turn out to be a little too good at it and keen for more?
Yes Minister gives a nice summary of both sides of the discussion.
Arseholes who want to be arseholes when they are instructed to be fair and reasonable fail to competently perform their duties. The intractable arseholes fail to change and go through standard performance management. A purge would just flood the department with inexperienced staff who have poor job security because there will be another purge in three years.
It's bad enough already with restructurings to align with ministerial wishes and areas of responsibility. Basic stuff like differentiating researcher data requests from OIA requests, or knowing who is responsible for what subject area at the moment all fall through a myriad of little cracks because there's FA institutional memory or knowledge. Whacking a purge on top of that is just piling dysfunction upon dysfunction.
For a number of years now I have been reading the post election Briefings to the Incomming Ministers.
Fascinating.
Quite plain that these documents are pitched at the level of the 'in control but mostly ignorant…let's baffle them with bullshit.'
Helps to read a few Yes Minister scripts for some grounding.
ooh, are those available to the public?
Not wanting to pre-empt Rosemary’s reply, yes, they are publically available – they are known as BIMs.
https://dpmc.govt.nz/our-business-units/cabinet-office/ministers-and-their-portfolios/ministerial-portfolios/briefings
https://www.beehive.govt.nz/feature/briefings-incoming-ministers-2019
Yes: https://www.beehive.govt.nz/feature/bims
Your diligence amazes me Rosemary. There are hundreds of them and they can be anything up to a hundred pages or so.
I have read a few of them on occasion but only a very few. The thought of reading any significant number gave me nightmares.
There’s a Moderation note for you.
Haven't watched telly for more than a decade.
Despite doing a largish amount of physical work in an average day I still experience episodes of insomnia.
I am a ridiculously fast reader…but I admit to finding it increasingly difficult to read stuff on screen…my days of dilligence/ self flagellation may be seriously numbered.
Still..the BIMs are certainly a go to document if one has a couple of 'wtf!' moments and need to find the source of a new Minister's blunders.
I've been known to read the odd Treasury Report as well.
Just for fun.
"It would be nice to think so, but don't wholly agree it is true. Yes, there is plenty of positivity in NZ but there is a lot of negativity too and sometimes the latter wins."
I tend to agree with you (Mathew) to SOME (and a growing) extent.
The 4 P's play an increasingly role too – from a sliding scale between apathy and desperation through to hope, and "positivity"
Pot, 'P', Piss and Prozac.
For the first time in my life, I'm about to change my vote from Labour to Green.
And it's not because the Adhern government isn't the best of a load of bad alternatives. It's because time is actually running out before populism become entrenched.
When I heard JA say (in a Henry Cooke interview), she didn't realise how long things take, AND THEN praised our public service (admitedly I assumed she was referring to the senior ranks), I thought – naivety maybe?
I'm not sure some in Labour have yet developed adequate bullshit detectors even if some will only ever have to face a used-car salesman (in this space going forward)
Yes, I think there is a bit of naivety and not just on JA's part. To my knowledge, she was never a P.S. employee – not in NZ anyway – and there are politicians on all sides who fall into that category.
As you know OWT, the P.S. was very much a dog eat dog place but whether that is still the case I don't know. In my day, "seniority" usually depended on how far up 'you know where' a person was prepared to go. Individuality was frowned upon, and anyone who dared to stick their neck above the parapet had it chopped off and thrown into the moat.
A period of P.S. employment should be a requirement for all senior politicians. 😉
Yep, well – Just can't do it anymore. I'm afraid JA may well have signed up to superficiality over substance.
Second time this week concerning an immigration issue ( and that's only 2 that've been made public after just watching 1 news ).
The good thing is that it won't just be me that does the big switch – there are now 3 generations of family that are in agreement.
Apparently, I seem to have misjudged Iain Lees-Galloway too. Nice bloke though he may be, he's obviously not as bright as I thought he was – or maybe its more to do with expediency over principle. Either way, cudda shudda wudda.
The right to protest defines democracy, but for some protesting is terrorism.
While I agree with Monbiot's main point. Personally I think that his notion that we should own the label of ‘extremist’ is wrong.
James Hanson, Naomi Klein and in particular Bill McKibben, are of the opinion that the polluters that we are protesting against are the ‘extremists’ and should be made to own this label. These corporate 'extremists' are out of control, recklessly conducting an experiment with the climate which will impact us all.
Let’s be clear the supporters BAU are not moderate but extreme
British tax payer funded state oganisations define environmentalists and peace activists as 'terrorist'
You can be sure that the label of 'terrorist' attached to Greenpeace by British Intelligence is the same label that the French Intelligence service the DGSE also attach to Greenpeace.
You can also be sure that the British Intelligence consider French Intelligence the DGSE, just like themselves, to be counter terrorists.
The French secret intelligence agency that murdered Nando Pereira and bombed Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior will not be on any establishment organisation terrorist watch list.
The bombing and murder carried out by the DGSE may be the most egregious act by an establishment Intelligence agency but it underlines what Elisa Allen said, that these views held by secret intelligence agencies and the police are dangerous and undemocratic.
The chicken-loving cousin of Fernando the photographer. 🙂
This is what democracy looks like.
No, that is simply fake news. 18,000km is more than the distance from London to Sydney.
The total length of your digestive system is quite a lot longer than the straight-line distance from your mouth to your ass.
Did you miss the word “stretching”?
Stretching? 18,000 km is 18 million metres. If they squeezed 50 million people into 18 million metres, that's 0.36 metres per person. Even the rudest budget airlines give you a lot more than that in their stingiest seats.
Yeah, I did the same and even tried to make some comparisons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_chain_(politics)
The numbers (online) are all over the place but it seems to me that a major event did take place. Quibbling about the actual numbers is just semantics IMO. Maybe satellite images can verify the claims 😉
The problem with distinguishing between fake and fact is that things are never that simple and black & white (binary).
Professor Ann Marie Brady takes New Zealand's government to task for its lax attitude towards Chinese state and donor influence within New Zealand politics.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/commentisfree/2020/jan/24/new-zealand-needs-to-show-its-serious-about-addressing-chinese-interference
A couple of good links in there.
You do realise that it's racist to say anything critical of the CCP. Our very own wumao 'Mark' assured us of this repeatedly. 🙂
However my own personal Chinese sources tell me Xi's 'Presidency for Life' gambit is an act of desperation. China has four long standing problems:
1. At present they remain highly dependent on imported resources that only arrive because ships are still free to move across oceans. But to get to China they must pass through several choke points all of which are contested and highly deniable.
2. The four or five thousand years of civilisation is largely a myth. Just as modern Germany has only existed for a relatively short period, and prior to this it was an endless sequence of warlords, imperial expansions, invasions and collapses, the same with China. One of the most stable Chinese periods was when the Mongols invaded and ruled for 200 years or so. At least two major languages divide the nation, and numerous others remain. There is no particular reason why China’s current borders should be considered stable, and you only have to look at the intense resistance from the Taiwanese and HongKongers to the idea of reunification to get a taste of this.
3. Their demographics are terrible. Contrary to what I imagined a few years back, China is running out of young people. This will put an enormous handbrake on their internal expansion. They remain a very low trust society; inner circle/out circle is very much a thing. Together these factors makes it very hard for China to continue expanding on internal growth only
4. And to date most of that 'miraculous' expansion has been very much the result of China's entry into the global world trade order … mostly sponsored by the American Bretton Woods system. The USA tolerated the rise of Germany, Europe and Japan as competitors, because these nations largely played by the rules. China has not, it's policies of hypersubsidisation, and rampant IP theft have gone well past merely annoying. With the USA defaulting back to it's natural isolationism it's no longer interested in maintaining a trade system that largely benefits a nation that is posturing itself as an enemy.
So far the CCP has been able to maintain social order because everyone was getting richer. The raising of 800m people into the middle class is indeed a remarkable achievement, but the ground on which it was achieved is shifting from under them. Hence Xi Xinping's rampant authoritarianism and projection of influence beyond it's borders. Australia and New Zealand are notionally linked into the "Third Island Chain" , ultimately our geography makes us a clear target to be subsumed into the CCP's long term goals to create a New Middle Earth.
Great response thankyou.
I'm painting the roof this weekend so I won't respond until the evening.
Sorry to butt in….but isn't it too damn hot for roof painting?
Or are you perchance at Ross Base?
Sent from my phone with our Bus jammed into the only available shade north of Kataia.
I stop at 10 and reconvene at 4.
It's over a couple of weekends.
The primary reason China will continue to do great is: the United States.
The United States is the gift that keeps on giving in terms of talent pool for innovations, financial capital for expansion, right kind of customer base for all their kinds of products and services, innovations to copy cheaply, and because they have acted so badly for four decades that they are making China look reasonably OK as an alternative ally.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mzx0YHLj_Ws
The United States has a fair number of problems which benefit China's place in the world for the remainder of the century.
1. It has squandered the massive moral authority it gained across much of the world after helping Europe defeat Nazi Germany and defeat global communism (I'm sure the very young and the last remaining commies will deny they ever had it but they're the ones who didn't fight).
China is on the other hand building a purely mercantilist and instrumental mode of transacting in the world. Trade deals are replacing the moral pacts built after World World 2 through the United Nations.
2. Its constitutional innovations from the Revolution have worn out, so it no longer functions as a set of ideals to aspire to. In particular its Constitutional checks and balances of executive power have stopped working.
China on the other hand has coherent government which is growing in precision and authority. Sure, I don't like it. But their Chinese social credit system may well turn into a more powerful system of corrective behaviours than the entire US judicial framework of law and prison. Imagine a world where the use of courts was less and less necessary, on China's scale.
3. The USA is about as addicted to oil-based products as one could think, despite having invented and promulgated the digital economy which has significantly decarbonised parts of it.
China is certainly addicted to oil, but it's making many of the right transformative moves, and if you want a 300km/h train to get you somewhere rather than a plane, look not to the USA.
4. The USA used to be ambitious for the rest of the world and could roll out truly massive nation-building programmes through massive instruments including the US armed forces, the CIA, the World Bank, and the IMF. It’s also proven incapable of winning or at least completing a war in 50 years.
China is now the world leader on nation-building systems, and only China has the instruments to roll them out now. Who knows if they will really come off – as in Pakistan – but they don't lack for will or ambit. China's the one that forges the really big trade deals.
There's a really good chance that China is now better positioned for the future due to the systems of governance and control it has rolling, its capacity to decarbonise compared to other major countries, and its diplomatic force stripped of non-mercantile idealism.
In the Year of the Rat, it's China that behaves like one.
And that's a compliment to both China and to rats.
All interesting and valid responses. Still I have to add some qualifiers.
Post WW2 the USA allowed competitors to flourish as long as they stayed on their side ideologically and didn't challenge them militarily. China has broken both of those rules and the USA is now rapidly disengaging with China. The past few years have seen an increasing return of US business back to North America.
The other big one that people keep missing is this; the USA never really needed the global trade order it established. It's imports/exports as a percentage of GDP are something in the order of 6%. They are now oil and gas independent. They simply don't need the rest of the world anymore and are certainly no longer interested in expending American lives in wars they have no interest in. As far as they're concerned they did their best to get the world on a more peaceful orderly basis but the effort has been largely spat upon. No US President since GW Bush has shown any real interest in global affairs and Trump is merely the clown show giving the middle finger to the rest of the planet.
China is now the world leader on nation-building systems
Which has to explain why it's nearest and most intimate neighbors, from Hong Kong to the Philippines are all anxious and unhappy about China's overt military expansion in the region. South China Sea pops into mind. The idea that China is a pacifist, merchantile power with only benign non-military intent is laughable to anyone in the region. Wherever they have the opportunity the Chinese are expanding and exerting their military muscle.
its capacity to decarbonise compared to other major countries,
Which has to explain why it's the largest emitter by far and growing faster than any other nation. Right? They have one hell of a trajectory to turn around.
I'm with the Greens on this
What kind of travesty is this that pretty much allows us to be a satellite of US military power? …and a target..under the guise of plucky Kiwi ingenuity
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/118957475/greens-concerned-about-rocket-lab-launch-for-us-spy-agency
The Greens are the only party to say it how it is when it comes to the US and its war mongering
That we happily collude with Trump…a street corner drunk in the international sphere…truly exposes us as the lackeys we are
Pick a lane … a satellite of US or CCP military power. There is no third option.
The binary thinking is strong in this one. The third option, which we appear to be following, with the recent visit of a Chinese warship, is: both. Option 4 obviously is neutrality; 4(b) or 5, to suit those of us with a benevolent and inclusive nature being a foreign policy which is both neutral and pacifist.
Small nations like NZ that are utterly dependent of freedom of the seas and open trade will ultimately be forced to pick a side. Just to be clear, I've advocated for many years that the age of empires is going to end, but in the meantime we have to deal with the realities in front of us.
Wishful thinking about 'neutral and pacifist' will cut no mustard with the great powers.
"Wishful thinking"…How very dare I! As co-creators of our world, what we humans need collectively is a shitload more "wishful thinking" and way less of the fossilized acceptance of "the realities in front of us."
The problem with having typed out in excess of maybe 8,000 comments here over the past 13 years is that I tend to assume everyone has read all of them. Which is a terrible conceit of course.
But yes I've outlined in many comments a vision for a post-empire political world, based on a global form of federal govt. Not dissimilar in nature to the UN, but in which the nations give up the aspects of their sovereignty that relate to international matters, such as trade agreements, freedom of navigation, communications, diplomacy and most especially war. I've repeatedly argued that all of the big problems we face are global in nature therefore demand political responses and authority at the same scale.
However I've been a lonely voice on this for a long time now, and I'm assuming that none of this is going to come about for at least another generation. It may well take another catastrophic war to bring it about, who knows.
In the meantime NZ has some hard choices to make.
The art of diplomacy for small nations isn't so much which side to pick, but when.
When still dodges the question … which side do you pick McF?
We don't need to make any decisions for a while yet.
Our security and military establishment will be independent in name only with Australia making almost all of our hard choices for us (no need for thinking there)…
… along with 90% of our banking (still no need for thinking)…
…whereas as a society New Zealand cares only cares if your Visa is good rather than where you are from (in all our guest nights, student nights, and exports) …
… and those three defaults enable China's rise in New Zealand and in Australia (and still not a fresh thought needed for any of the above to continue 🙂 )
So far so good.
… along with 90% of our banking (still no need for thinking)…
Not in the loop .
Kiwibank might need to fork out about $12 billion if it is to buy BNZ, industry sources say.
It is believed that negotiations are under way for the Government-backed bank to buy BNZ from Australian owners NAB.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/118989116/bnz-sale-price-likely-to-top-10b-experts-predict
That would be an interesting state-funded long-term infrastructure investment, I'm guessing through the NZ Super Fund.
i would suppose the NZSF would be the best vehicle.As a spend it would improve the sustainability of the nz current account faster then export growth.
Not going to happen and you know it.
Kiwibank aren't even 10% of our banking after 19 years of operation, and have needed massive bailouts so big they had to be hocked off to ACC and NZSuperfund.
Imagine if they had been capitalised enough a decade ago to take on the Aussie mortgage-floggers?
Kiwibank does not have business or farm lending portfolio risks either.
Nor does it have the business and farm lending profits.
Which is all good until those sectors go down the tubes. Which may be why there's suddenly rumours that BNZ is on the block. This could easily be another Hanover / Allied Farmers situation, in which case Kiwi Bank and backers would be keeping well clear, or should be.
no thanks Red
I've seen the evidence of US power (going back at least as far as Hiroshima and Korea , Vietnam, Cambodia ,Guatemala etc ad infinitum)and I'm not impressed….except in a fearful way.
China's military impact on the world?
Bases globally?
I know you put a case that American hegemony has resulted in less death, and widespread peace and prosperity, but I don't buy it
There may be fewer battle deaths, but economic sanctions are the new way of doing business..and war..and the deaths and ongoing misery are undeniable
Battle deaths also don't take into account the lingering and longlasting death count asscociated with land mines,depleted uranium exposure … disability, birth defects ,cancer,and denial of access to medicines and food, general poverty from sanctions,destruction of cultures and societies.The US has steadily retreated from international treaties intended to make the world safer
Peace and prosperity for the few, not the many
I'm not choosing China either , I guess I have more optimism (or stupid hope) that we humans can be better..and need to be
I know you put a case that American hegemony has resulted in less death, and widespread peace and prosperity, but I don't buy it
The hard data I've produced over and over is a bitch, but then you have your own pre-conceptions to look after. I've never argued the Americans have produced a perfect world, but it's a fallacy to condemn the good by comparison with an ideal of perfection that has never been achieved.
I guess I have more optimism (or stupid hope) that we humans can be better..and need to be
Indeed, yet oddly enough whenever I give concrete expression to that exact hope … everyone around here goes quiet.
The hard data I've produced
You are very clever to have created a control planet where the US has not been so aggressive.
US has not been so aggressive.
Compared to what? Short of trying to argue historic counter factuals in which we imagine that the USSR had become the dominant world power post-WW2, or whatever, we can only really compare with the past. The data clearly shows that the past was nowhere near as peaceful as you imagine, and that war between the 'great powers of the day' has steadily declined, especially since WW2.
I never said the past was peaceful. "Hard data", what a knob.
"Hard data", what a knob.
I produced a solid data rich reference you demonstrably failed to counter. Then you resort to name calling. Is that really the best you can do?
Lol. Your solid data rich reference starts with the words "draft version".
There is an obvious reason for a cessation of direct conflict between the major powers, nuclear weapons.There is nothing in your link to suggest that there would have been more conflict overall if US foreign policy had been less aggressive. You are welcome to hold an opinion that there would have been based on conjecture, but "hard data" to support that there is not.
Obviously you didn't even get as far as reading the first paragraph, before you found a petty distraction to amuse yourself with. Well there is another version here that's highly visual, doesn't require a lot of reading and isn't a draft. Unless you care to refute this, then merely pretending it doesn’t exist is irrational.
There is an obvious reason for a cessation of direct conflict between the major powers, nuclear weapons.
Yes indeed. So now can we drop that idiotic 'nuclear free' policy?
As for American foreign policy being so 'aggressive' by exactly what measure are you judging this? For 70 years since then end of WW2 the US military has ensured freedom of trade and movement of peoples between all nations resulting in a huge reduction in warfare, the end of overt colonisation, the growth of democracy, and an immense improvement in living standards … as long as you were on their side. That was not an unreasonable demand.
At various points they've fucked up, the invasion of Iraq being an obvious one. Covert actions in Latin America having little to commend them either. Since the end of the Cold War their interest and competency in maintaining the global peace has become increasingly erratic and ill-directed.
No-one is arguing that Pax-Americana did not have it's ugly moments, but if you imagine that reverting to a pre-WW2 era in which multiple competing great power empires constantly vied and battled with each other over controlling territory and trade routes is going to be somehow an improvement … well the data I've presented suggests you're dreaming.
Which at the same time doesn't say this dominant US role in world affairs is going to be sustainable either; at some point we need to have some tough conversations about what will replace it.
TBH, I'm starting to lean towards the Chinese.
Never saw a President for Life you couldn't love eh ….
The Green Party have been consistent in opposing genocide and helping its victims.
They should campaign on it and make it a public bottom line of supporting labour.
Best chance they will have of getting labour to agree to it.
Lol. I'd forgotten the joys of right wing advice for the left in election year.
You give him too much ‘credit’; he’s a stirrer.
I was being sarcastic 🙂
What can I say – I’m here to help.
Your concern is always appreciated.
And often repudiated. 😉
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/119036650/complaint-about-christchurch-mayors-election-expenses-taken-to-police
Complaint about Lianne Dalziel and her election expenses (naming doners) referred to police.
Great news.
Hiding donations from people with strong links to china or are china based. Here is hoping that justice prevails.
"If a candidate is found to have knowingly filed a false electoral return, the maximum penalty is up to two years in prison or a $10,000 fine."
That would do the trick !
My doner’s name is kebab.
Lol. Very witty.
Does sound from that article like a straightforward failure to declare local body election campaign donations over $1500. Dalziel subsequently listing them on 18 December does not change that.
The wriggleroom in the law is only over whether a breach was 'intentional' or not. ('Ignorance not being a defence' somehow does not apply to candidates seeking local power, only to plebs).
Thus here is the defence argument:
I was just following poor advice, your honour.
"I was just following poor advice, your honour."
Or perhaps she could try an earlier excuse.
"I'm just a housewife Your Honour. I always do what my husband tells me to do".
No call for that.
There's a big difference in a few donations of $1800 ($300 over the limit) which was slap-happily overlooked in a local body campaign, and a donation of $100.000 from a single donor carved up into packages of $14,999 in a general election campaign.
From the Stuff article that James linked to:
Not small money. What's a valid excuse for not following the few rules we have to minimise influence in elections?
OK. I hadn't seen that update. The last link I read was some time ago. There was "a few of them" but I thought they were all around the $1800 mark. That makes a difference I concede but (imo) still doesn't put it on a par with Nationals misdemeanor.
I'm with you over the need to be scrupulous about the rules being followed. No point in having them otherwise. It sounds like it was carelessness, but it should not have happened. Hopefully there will be less "carelessness" on both sides in the future.
I'd personally like to see private money completely removed from politics.
Looks like the SFO may finally be ready to say something about the Nat investigation: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/407687/serious-fraud-office-announcement-over-national-donations-expected-in-coming-weeks
Ah, I see that story has already been posted below too.
If we want truly democratic elections there's no other alternative but it will never happen cos… you know "we're not gonna fund politicians out of our money. Let em fund their own campaigns. It's bad enough we have to pay for em sittin around in parliament all day doin nothing. 🙄
And where in t link did it say that it was just a few donations $300 over.
either you are very lousy at reading or simply making shit up (I’m going with the later).
to help you out one donation – as clearly listed was over $17k.
Anne wasn't making this “shit” up though, was she James.
"a donation of $100.000 from a single donor carved up into packages of $14,999 in a general election campaign"
Who knew that Russians used to refer to the West as a place of 'Normalnost' . (But don't anymore).
The victory for incoherence.
‘There is something very telling’ about the rise of incoherence in the West that culminated in Trump's election victory, and the misinformation war against the Syrian revolution.
Colonial Viper a Trump supporter and apologist for the Assad regime, right from the earliest months of the protests for democratic rights in Syria, openly advocated in these very pages for the slaughter of anti regime protesters as CIA agents.
That for his efforts CV was then later elevated to ‘Author’ marked a victory for incoherence and the end of normalnost where facts don’t matter and opinion is everything.
[Colonial Viper authored his first post here at end of 2013. He authored his first post on Assad and Syria at the end of 2015. You can check for yourself using the search function. AFAIK, he was not a Trump supporter in those days.
CV’s comments and posts were highly controversial at times and he became somewhat unhinged later on and went off reserve. He no longer has Author status here and has not commented here for a long time AFAIK.
I don’t know if CV has openly advocated for mass violence as you allege and I doubt it would have been condoned if this were indeed the case. However, you seem to suggest that TS ‘rewarded’ CV for calling for mass violence and slaughter and that is a pertinent lie and utterly uncalled for.
Your latest insinuations fly in the face of the hard work that Authors and Moderators (and SYSOP) as well as most commenters put into TS to distinguish between facts and opinions; there is a place for both, but they are not the same.
I am done with your lies and falsehoods and the continuing snide remarks aimed at TS, which are a stab in the back given that you have been a commenter on this site for 11 years with thousands of comments.
Don’t bother with e-mail or any other attempt to communicate regarding this Moderation note; the only opinions I’ll take into account are those of the other Moderators and SYSOP. You can pray that they see your case differently and in your favour.
Take the rest of the year off – Incognito]
See my Moderation note @ 11:12 AM.
Our old mate CV.
He has certainly red-pilled himself in recent years if you look at his Twitter feed. His latest pet peeve is drag queens reading to a few middle class kids at a public library.
Never mind the thousands of kids who have to live in boarding houses and hotel rooms along side all sorts of nutters each and every day in this country.
I can never remember which damned pill was supposed to do what. I just know I'm up to half a dozen a day lol
edit: oh wait, I remember what the little blue pills are supposed to do…
Just never take the black pill!
https://pando.com/2015/05/17/neocons-2-0-the-problem-with-peter-pomerantsev/
He's an old time propagandist, a real master
Somewhere I read he was described as "ex-reality TV producer turned journalist and academic"
Hilarious I thought.
Paul and Pascale Hennessey established Park Homes five years ago.
This is the kind of business the government could be encouraging given our situation with unaffordable housing and lack of supply.
It is sad that the acts of evil people can destroy a business that can help with what many are desperate for but can’t get.
A home.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/118973205/couples-heartbreaking-loss-of-tiny-house-business-after-burglaries
Barrelling toward theocracy, and no one is lifting a finger.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jan/24/march-for-life-anti-abortion-rally-washington
Abortion today, then sex before marriage, then same sex relation shops, then dress codes, then no more evolution in schools.
It's happening here as well. We all like seeing footage of the brass bands at Ratana church and Neve frolicking on the paepae, but Ratanaism is very conversative and reactionary. They are anti choice, anti women, anti gay, anti evolution and live in the dark ages. They are more or less brownwashed alt right.
Trump has proven that he won't defend U.S. troops in Iraq.
34 U.S. troops suffered traumatic brain injuries after Iran's missile strike. Iran now knows that the orange commander-in-chief has a big mouth and tiny balls.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/01/34-troops-suffered-traumatic-brain-injury-iran-strike-200124173832457.html
“And one day we must ask the question, ‘Why are there forty million poor people in America? And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising questions about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth.’ When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. And I’m simply saying that more and more, we’ve got to begin to ask questions about the whole society…”
–Speech to Southern Christian Leadership Conference Atlanta, Georgia, August 16, 1967.
You know that "I have a Dream" guy.
Did you know there was a trial that said he was assassinated by the US government?
https://www.globalresearch.ca/court-decision-u-s-government-agencies-found-guilty-in-martin-luther-kings-assassination-2/5320024
Oh well – feel free to keep dreaming and doing jack.
How to lose the 2020 General election…a continuing series from the NZ Labour Party Caucus.
The law change being discussed re changing superannuation payments for non qualifying partners is a blunder as sure as trumpeting “increase the age to 67” for two elections was. https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/118933472/pension-changes-remove-extra-payments-for-nonworking-younger-partners
Labours die hard neo liberal aligned members of whom D. Parker is a stirling example, seem to believe that “out fiscal scrooging” the Nats is a vote winner. The logic re sidelining Capital Gains given the holy war National was generating on CGT, and Coalition dynamics, was somewhat understandable as a one off tactical move, and may well have salvaged 2020 for them regardless of the negative messages it sent to many Labour Green supporters.
Likewise the Cannabis Referendum may play a part in the return of the Govt. But touching Super is a no no for many working class Kiwis as much as it is for the double dipping middle class who are happy to accept their super while they disparage beneficiaries.
National Superannuation at 65 is a de facto UBI for that age group, and despite the generational issues and calls from bureaucrats (often with their own personal retirement schemes) for change-Labour do so at their peril.
Not so sure this is a vote loser. It removes quite a lot of discrimination which I suspect skewed more towards women because of common life experiences. .
The partner with an overseas pension removing eligibility has been an issue for a long time- good to see it sorted.
A bit more thought needs to go into the rates of married couple, single person and two superannuitants sharing living space.
There is also other financial discrimination in this space- if a couple's adult children come to live with them there is no financial penalty , if they return to live with a single parent superannuitant then $50 a week is lost.
With respect to the partner age differences – if the qualifying partner dies – then the younger partner loses payment and has to depend on other welfare benefits.
I see that all current arrangements have been grandfathered. Personally I would have thought that there should have been a transitional period (shorter for youngest partners ) so that over a period of 2-5 years they transit onto the same rules as the newly eligible.Booting any under 50's off shoudn't be a hardship – I don't see why they should remain eligible for a better benefit. Conversely applying the reverse of these rules would ease the transition for couples with narrow age spreads close to retirement.
1918, again, or Stephen King writes nonfiction.
https://twitter.com/Tominmedill/status/1220627305728368640
https://twitter.com/Tominmedill/status/1220630749159677952
Hundreds of patients in Wuhan who have yet to be confirmed as carrying the new strain of coronavirus are becoming increasingly desperate as the city struggles to cope with the numbers reporting pneumonia symptoms.
One 36-year-old, speaking by phone outside a major hospital in the city, said she had spent the past week taking her sick husband from hospital to hospital in a vain attempt to get him tested for the virus, which has already killed 41 people and infected hundreds more.
“I have nothing. No protective clothing, only a raincoat, and I am standing outside the hospital in the rain,” said the woman, who gave her name as Xiaoxi.
“I am desperate, I have lost count of time and days. I don’t know if we will both live to see the new year.”
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3047613/china-coronavirus-wuhan-residents-describe-doomsday-scenes
In 1918 most people didn't really know what was happening. Today we have the internet and what you've posted.
Social cohesion could get tricky
We're in interesting times
The internet and incompetence did not protect samoa from measles.
Dr Helen Petousis-Harris said given New Zealand's responsibility for the 1918 flu epidemic reaching Samoa and wiping out 22 percent of the population, the country should have done more to protect Samoa from this outbreak.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/402251/samoa-measles-epidemic-immunologist-furious-at-nz
As measles reduces the immune response,there are significant risks for an outbreak in both the pacific islands and south auckland.The problem is it is already here.
The land of the free is now censoring Iranian media.
https://www.twitter.com/ASBreakingNews/status/1220911469686030336
Cadet Bonespurs' Space Farce gets their logo.
https://www.vox.com/2020/1/24/21080813/space-force-star-trek-starfleet-logo-trump
Sure looks like a probable copyright violation to me. Even if it's just derivative of a previous copyright violation.
Cohen, Omarosa and Parnas have all secretly recorded tRump.
Anyone think the mobster oligarchs don't have him on tape?
A recording obtained by ABC News appears to capture President Donald Trump telling associates he wanted the then-U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch fired while speaking at a small gathering that included Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman — two former business associates of Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani who have since been indicted in New York.
The recording appears to contradict statements by Trump and support the narrative that has been offered by Parnas during broadcast interviews in recent days. Sources familiar with the recording said the recording was made during an intimate April 30, 2018, dinner at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.
Trump has said repeatedly he does not know Parnas, a Soviet-born American who has emerged as a wild card in Trump’s impeachment trial, especially in the days since Trump was impeached.
"Get rid of her!" is what the voice that appears to be Trump’s is heard saying. "Get her out tomorrow. I don't care. Get her out tomorrow. Take her out. OK? Do it.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/recording-appears-capture-trump-private-dinner-ukraine-ambassador/story?id=68506437