This is what Labour should be doing in the next 3 years.
Only a very small percentage of roofs have solar power (or at least serious solar) in Wanaka yet in South Australia roof solar was able to provide 77% of the state's power on this day and solar farms the other 23%.
It's bizarre beyond belief that NZ hasn't taken up various solar tech. I can only assume it's part of the rort that happens in the building industry. Not sure why governments haven't been keen, although I guess 9 Key years are obvious. That and few want to mess with the electricity industry (god knows why, if anything needed reform its that).
Is the market regulator tilting against feed-ins, or is the regulator abdicating responsibility and failing to regulate, leaving it all up to the retailer's beneficence in offering anything at all for power fed back in from home systems?
The electricity market should be competitive and deliver affordable, clean electricity
And that's the Greens not understanding economics.
Of course, its what everyone else believes as well despite all the evidence showing competition and the profit motive doesn't bring about the desired results of a better society.
Never mind, I guess I’ll have to ask a member of the Greens to confirm your view of them and interpretation of their path to implementation of their policies.
Shareholders of privatised electricity companies now have a vested interest in resisting change. Dealing with them will be a good test of this government's resolve. Or lack of it.
solar panels and rain water collection should be mandatory for new home builds. gov also needs to get serious about tyre recycling. private industry is a bust with that. ltsa needs to mandate a recycled tyre component into new road resealing. leaving things like this up to private industry is a nonsense.
Me too – and what would stop local governments from setting an example?
Wairarapa where I live has four district councils that already work together on some issues. Any region has a community of interests. Every region is concerned about solar power and water use among all the other issues. Let's see regions like mine develop good plans 'pour encourager les autres', which the government is likely to consider supporting.
As our PM has said, leadership is about taking the people with you. If we're to achieve the best of the changes our new world needs, doesn't that responsibility have to work both ways?
to woodart at 3.2 : absolutely agree re solar panels and water reticulation . I with others tried to get compulsory instalment of rain water storage built in to the then beginning explosion of housing around Gulf Harbour instead of bringing piped water along Peninsula.. We had 10.000 gallons under our deck in a modest house.
Big business prevailed even though Rodney and Auckland well aware and concerned about availability of supply.
I also remember discussion probably from a remit at a Labour conference some decades ago in favour of making cheap solar panels available.
Comment starts in the name field and people forget and simply start typing. Once they realise then they switch to the comment field but often forget to fix the name field.
Would probably be best to have it start in the comment field if the plugin supports it.
It's almost beyond depressing the disincentives toward solar and local generation in New Zealand. Most lines companies are reluctant at best, but they have a problem with networks that were designed to deliver in one direction and that can take a bit of changing. There's also systemic / structural difficulties where the electricity system has been turned from an essential social and economic service to a profit generating industry.
There's a couple of significant regions, Gisborne and Queenstown, that have only one feed from the Grid too, a loss of that feed is a big problem. Gisborne was without power for three days when a topdressing plane took out the line and the consequences of a span or pylon coming down on the Queenstown feed don't bear thinking about. Adequate embedded generation capacity is really handy on so many counts.
A program of dealing with the infrastructure and systematic barriers, and providing financial pathways to household solar, preferably with batteries, would have paybacks in so many areas. Unfortunately this could be a bit tricky as will mean a comprehensive reform of the sector.
It wouldn't need a 'big' quake to cause problems on either of those lines. In Gisborne's case they were lucky it was just a span down, if it had taken a pylon as well it would have been a lot longer.
In both situations there's multiple faults that could cause trouble, and quite unstable geology. But the loss of the line for a week would have an impact to a quake, but without the physical damage. We'd still be evacuating a large part of the district.
We haven't got time in between weather and other traumas in the precarious 21st century, to refit all the houses that would have been built to 20th century standards. Get the right practical designs (with good drainage sytems – no mediterranean-styled roofs) and systems, now under Labour before the wicked witch or wizard of the west gets back in power by casting a spell over the country!
As woodart says up near 3 – solar panels and rain water collection should be mandatory for new home builds.
"Solar power in New Zealand is on the rise, but operates in an entirely free market with no form of subsidies or intervention from the New Zealand Government."
Solar is good, but I'm more interested in household wind turbines.
I did a little research and found small turbines, which could be attached to a roof, can generate around 3kw per hour. Living in a windy area that's quite enticing, but there are planning regulations and hoops to jump through, and make it probably not worth the hassle and added costs to the original outlay.
With a smart meter, I see I use on average about 7kw per day, so likely I would not only be energy neutral, but be adding to the national grid. Multiply that by tens of thousands and that's plenty more renewables going in to the system.
What's the deal with being a contributor as far as the power companies are concerned? How much do they still try to milk you for, ie line costs etc…?
Wind mills can be made from smart drive washing machine motors for less than $20.But you will need an electrician to wire it up as it generates 240 volts .
yep…but thought you were talking about ridge line systems…have thought they might be a viable option as standard installation on new builds but havnt come across much about them and thought you may have.
The big commercial wind farms? Not to me. I'd rather see them all over than coal fired power stations belching carbon. When there's a better way of doing it, they can be taken down.
In an urban setting they're no more unsightly than rusting out satellite dishes.
Its not an entirely free-market as the its owned by profiteering schmucks and they pretty much have veto power over it. Considering that having solar power from private residential premises would cut their profits then they do everything they can to prevent people taking up solar up to, and including, blaming solar installations for rising power price for everyone else (yeah, can't find that article now – was from when National were in power).
It's worse than that Draco as solar power from private residential premises exported is sold next door, or wherever it ends up as Electrons go with the flow at full retail.
The solar export residence get's about 20% of retail and the power industry takes profit from infrastructure it neither owns, maintains and spreads BS about it being bad for the network.
An added kicker is when the grid is down the panels shut down as a safety feature so we get screwed over again.
Hydro involves modifying/wrecking the landscape way too much, as does onshore wind-power, though offshore is much better. (A single wind-farm would wreck the unsullied and wonderful 360 degree views in the Maniototo from near Ophir or from the rail-trail.)
Ideally when we have 8 million people in NZ in 2068 (link below) electricity needs will be 100% met from existing hydro, more efficient use of power, solar and, if necessary, additional wind-farms, but offshore only.
That's a very complicated question with a lot of variables for both PV and hydro.
Wikipedia quotes IPCC 2014 for a range (in grams CO2 eq/ kWhr) for PV of 18 to 180, for hydro it's 1.0 to 2200 (compared to coal at 740 to 910). I've seen a lot of stuff indicating producing PV panels has improved dramatically since 2014, so using 2014 figures makes PV look worse than it really is now.
Factors affecting hydro include how much land with vegetation is flooded that then releases methane from the lake, whether the scheme uses a huge dam and stored water or is run of the river through a tunnel or canal, whether dams and canals are concrete or earth construction, how long before reservoirs are silted up, the albedo of the reservoir compared to what was there before (forest, grassland, desert) etc.
Factors affecting PV include how efficient the manufacturing process is, how clean the energy used for production is, the previous albedo of where the PV panels are installed, lifetime of the panels etc.
Big picture takeaway still remains being careful about getting more efficient in necessary uses of energy, and reducing wastage wherever possible is the only emissions-free lunch. Otherwise, all energy supply involves some emissions, it's just a question of how much. In that big picture, for New Zealand, adding PV may well be one of our lower emissions paths.
Personally I'd rather do PV than new hydro, excepting the Onslow-Manorburn proposal which is a storage scheme rather than a new generation scheme.
Beat me to it! Pretty much agree with your above comment here.
The other factor involved in the environmental effects of solar, is the longevity of the technology, and the impacts of the materials used.
IIRC the early PV cells became useless after a few years, but the later silicon cells could last around 25 years. Now the newest technology involves spray on coatings which although cheap and quick to manufacture and replicate are less efficient than the silicon and don't last as long and worse are plastic based.
Unlike silicon solar cells, cells made from plastic require far less energy. However as a material plastic cannot generate electricity as efficiently as silicon. Not only that, solar panels made from silicon have a life expectancy of 25 years. While it’s doubtful that plastic solar cells would ever be able to compete, scientists are claiming that if energy costs can be lowered sufficiently plastic solar cells could potentially become more effective over their life cycle, compared to silicon cells. Scientists are currently working on increasing the energy conversion efficiency and the life cycle of plastic solar cells.
Andre-I notice adverse landscape effects don't figure in your world. Now I can see it wasn’t just the WT that put you off the Greens.
Fortunately we have people like Anton Oliver (ex-AB) in the community who helped to stop a wind-farm monstrosity in Central Otago in 2006.
I have driven several times through Spain over the past few years and seen plenty of landscape massively degraded by wind-farms.
Other energy-related highly invasive landscape effects include proposed small-scale hydro that destroy important wild rivers on the West Coast. From memory I think the coalition quashed one such proposal in the last term (ministers Parker/Sage?).
Gabby's question was specifically about how green, which generally means emissions. Hence my answer was focused on emissions.
If any forms of generation that have visible landscape effects are off the table, what is left? Idiot knee-jerk opposition to changes like that are what has kept a lot of coal and gas burning around the world.
I'll limit my comment about your driving around Spain multiple times recently to noting that behaviour like that is a significant contributor to the climate crisis we're dealing with right now.
None of it is green. Some of it is less impactful than others (which is what I think you were asking), but until we move to steady state (including population) we will continue to be driven by over-extraction and climate disrupting tech.
All developed nations could now be mandating passive tech in new builds, thus lowering power consumption. High tech, esp large scale power generation shouldn't be the starting point, it should come after we've used passive tech and reduced demand.
those materials have to be extracted from somewhere. Theoretically at some point we might reach some kind of close to equilibrium with recycling and manufacture, but not if we keep perpetual growth as our main driver of economics.
There are printable solar panels/coatings now starting to be produced I believe. I've looked at it quite hard and with interest rates where they are just investing in panels using it to cut the daytime use of power out is starting to look better. Any storage is the expensive bit
It's reaching the point where the cost of the panels is becoming less and less of the cost, while regulatory costs, installation, inverters etc are staying high. Storage costs are coming down too, again it's the other associated bits keeping package costs high.
For me, I've got my electricity cost down to $600 – $700 year, so I really don't see value in adding a PV system. Let alone the overhanging trees regularly dropping stuff big enough to damage panels. If I were doing a new build however, getting a new lines connection is so fkn expensive that going off-grid might be close to the same initial cost.
But going on grid would be more beneficial to society especially if it was well planned and maintained.
In other words, going back to a state monopoly that includes the solar panels on private rooves is the only viable option because it would then remove the individualist decision making that fails to do what's needed for society.
+100 the solution is returning it to the people and running it as a single network not the dysfunctional club it currently is.
Bradfords reforms were all about creating a gravy train for the club members and obfuscation so the average punter gives up before they realise it's a con job.
Yes, returning power generation and supply to full public ownership would clear the way for sustainable electricity that most could afford including solar.
Compensation to the current gougers and their captive artificial market could be made over the next 50 years!
I don't know, but I've noticed that sometimes you can get more energy out of them than you put in, depending on how they're wound up. Could be a profitable line of research for someone. I'd be willing to put myself forward as a research subject if required.
One of the enlightened Stuart M thanks, and one of the Pillar Group who want to enable the country to conserve its good things, and prepare for the future known problems. 2002-2020 have we changed, have we any more agency than earlier, or just to be ignored or teased with schemes to keep us quiet? And our politicians, we must bring in a maximum of three terms or we have fat-necked pussies who 'know better' manipulating their electorate or constituency so they manage to stay and stay with dwindling returns to the citizens.
I'll just shove in here some words from Elton John's Song For You because I think they need to be our nation's theme song going further into the 21st century and spell out the way we all need to try to value each other.
"Your Song"
("Elton John" Version)
It's a little bit funny, this feeling inside
I'm not one of those who can easily hide
I don't have much money, but boy if I did
I'd buy a big house where we both could live
If I was a sculptor, but then again, no
Or a man who makes potions in a traveling show
I know it's not much, but it's the best I can do
My gift is my song, and this one's for you
And you can tell everybody this is your song
It may be quite simple, but now that it's done
I hope you don't mind, I hope you don't mind that I put down in words
How wonderful life is while you're in the world
I sat on the roof and kicked off the moss
Well, a few of the verses, well, they've got me quite cross
But the sun's been quite kind while I wrote this song
It's for people like you that keep it turned on…
Mmm – I did use to listen to a bit of Elton John back in the day. But when it comes to the political culture of doing nothing, it's maybe more like Warren Zevon:
You're supposed to sit on your ass and nod at stupid things.
Man, that's hard to do. And if you don't, they'll screw you.
And if you do, they'll screw you, too…
MmmmI guess the thing is to enter into politics and planning with goodwill, go on a quest for the most effective and practical outcomes, and get something done as a result of each plan, even something small!
"The second is cost – NZ pays extraordinary prices for everything, and that weighs the cost benefit equation against solar installation."
and that is exactly why I after doing the sums did not go ahead. Also battery storage technology is still evolving and I would not put in a solar power system without the ability to store the surplus. Instead I bought a hybrid car which is saving me a huge % on my annual car runnin costs – and the car's batteries, when they are not effcient enough for the car, can be recycled to be solar storage batteries. But that is years away.
“A $9.5 million house is being built in Christchurch. Shaped like the letter Z, swimming pool and tennis court. When completed, it’s going to be one of the biggest and priciest properties in town. The owner? A director at Foodstuffs South Island and owner of Pak 'n Save Wainoni, one of Christchurch’s poorest areas.”
Everything that is wrong with our economy encapsulated here.
…One property in Havelock has been found using 33,000 litres of water a day, while another is going through 28,000 litres of water a day. The test results from Renwick showed a house leaking 67,200 litres of water a day.
The council notified owners "as a courtesy" when there was evidence of a significant leak, but it was up to property owners to find and repair them, she said. Some of the 62 properties with leaks were zoned commercial….
Under the new system, residents on water meters could be charged a flat fee of $200 for their first 200 cubic metres of water (200,000 litres). After that, Havelock residents could be charged $1.60 per 1000 litres used….
Properties with "large" leaks of more than 72 litres a day would therefore use at least 92 percent of their base water allocation if they continued without fixing the leak. Havelock residents paid an annual $510 fee at present….
Renwick dealt with water restrictions most summers and salt water could get into Havelock's water if demand jumped and water supplies dropped, as it had three years ago. Climate change was expected to put more pressure on the aquifer which supplied its water. A sea level rise could see salt entering Havelock's water more often, and higher temperatures could encourage higher water use…
Meters for commercial properties are fine, but not for dwellings. Because it enables right wing councils to charge for water on a policy change without requiring massive infrastructure investment.
Meters also enable landlords to evade costs by making the water bill the tenants' problem, like power or internet.
Why should domestic water wastrels and those too careless to look after their plumbing get to shift the cost of their profligacy onto all the other ratepayers?
IIRC, the law for costs where there are meters is the landlord pays for the fixed parts of the bill and the tenant pays for the variable usage parts of the bill. Here in Dorkland my bill is a fixed wastewater charge of $18.35/month, and because of the drought I've pared my water use down to somewhere around 30 litres/day (1 unit per month). My variable charge is $1.59/month to supply the water and $2.16/month to take it away again after I've filled it with piss and shit.
But we know there are constant efforts to privatise water supplies and stuff it up as royally as every other monopoly that gets privatised.
If regular flow monitoring shows a block or suburb is disproportionately using water, use the regular leak detection protocols to hone in on the cause. But routine monitoring of each household will result in privatisation of water supply, which means more people with skin infections in poor neighbourhoods, sometimes to the point of hospitalisation.
It has never been closely examined whether what ratepayers save in water gets paid by taxpayers via the health system.
All of Orcland is metered and charged by usage, so usage data should be available for any intrepid researcher that wants it.
Do you know of any studies around skin infections or other health problems in NZ being correlated with people feeling they need to not use water because of its cost? It's not something I can recall even hearing a whisper of.
Hell, even Penny Bright (R.I.P.) didn't try that as one of her arguments, and I was always quite impressed at how inventive she could get.
edit: meanwhile, that Auckland is universally metered is usually credited as one of the reasons Aucklanders are claimed to have the lowest per capita water usage of all population centers in NZ.
Watercare is about to take over the whole of Northland's supply as well.
So, together with the Waikato catchment they already supply, they are heading for about 2/5ths of New Zealand on metered and chlorinated and flourided happiness.
I can't understand why Councils don't look after their own water as part of their services. There should be no separate entity, just a department within the purview of the Council. This splitting up under I suppose neolib disruption just muddies the water, perhaps literally.
The way things are going, it won't be long before Watercare is the water department for all of the north island. Then all of New Zealand. Nationalisation by another route. Bwahahahaha, universal domination.
The best reason for a big organisation like Watercare to do it for the small councils is small councils are often really crap at it. Either they don't spend the money for the equipment and expertise, and produce lousy water quality (for trips around NZ I tend to bring along enough drinking water for my whole trip), or they do spend the money to do it properly and it ends up really expensive because those costs are spread over a small base.
We might speculate about that all day, but lowering flow rates to people who can't afford their bill could have something to do with their access to hygiene. The connection is plausible enough that I don't want to touch it with a bargepole.
All of auckland might be metred, but many other towns aren't, and frankly metering is only a precursor to attempted sell-offs.
Not to mention the concept that water is a right, not a commodity.
There are other ways to find heavy water users, if it's a problem. But metering is simply a way to disguise rate hikes for most people.
Catchment boards soon realised that a whole-farm approach was needed when several methods were in use. The farmer had to adopt a mutually agreed ‘farm plan’ over a set period, normally five years.
A farm plan was based on a land capability survey. This divided farmland into eight classes – four arable (crop-growing) and four non-arable. The surveys were first done in 1952.
Engineers vs conservators
The Soil Conservation and Rivers Control Act 1941 linked erosion with flooding. Catchment board staff were river engineers and soil conservators, who often disagreed on how to control flooding.
Some engineers believed that works such as stop banks and stone gabions (rocks inside wire mesh) would control flooding, whereas soil conservators considered that the upper parts of a river catchment should be the focus. Eventually both viewpoints were included in flood control programmes.
Pat I noticed that the article finished with a query. And this piece I have copied has relevance now as the RMA is under change. I am not sure what the effect of that will be. Do you know? People seem approving but will things be no holds barred? The idea of agencies run on business lines such as Watercare doesn't seem to be an automatic outcome of the previous legislation.
Regional councils as we know them today were established in 1989, under the Local Government Amendment Act. Regional council boundaries approximately followed river catchment boundaries. This legislation rationalised the bodies carrying out functions at a regional and local level – reducing the catchment boards and other government bodies that had proliferated over the last century from more than 800 to 86.
The newly created regional councils inherited a range of resource management responsibilities from the existing boards and councils, including for flood and erosion control functions transferred from the catchment boards and planning functions under the Town and Country Planning Act 1977, as well as transport and civil defense functions.
But it was not until 1991, with the enactment of the Resource Management Act, that responsibilities under a cohesive and integrated resource management regime were delegated to regional councils.
But what of the significant challenges that regional councils face, and their ability to fulfill their natural resource management responsibilities in an increasingly challenging environmental landscape? These outstanding questions will be explored in an upcoming post.
"A second irony is evident in the way the Resource Management Bill evolved. The Bill was first developed in the late 1980s under a Labour Government, with Geoffrey Palmer as Minister for the Environment. The Bill was underpinned by the concept of “sustainable development”, based on a concept of balancing economic objectives against environmental objectives (otherwise known as “trade-offs”). However in 1990, before the Bill could be enacted, the Labour government lost power, and a National government took office, with Simon Upton assuming the environmental portfolio. To the surprise of many, Upton decided not to abandon the Bill but instead to review it. As a result of the review, there was a shift from balancing economic and environmental objectives, to that of economic objectives being “constrained” by environmental ones; a shift encompassed in the concept of “sustainable management”, which is fundamental to the purpose of the law (Section 5). As a result, when the Act was passed in 1991, it was, according long-time environmentalist and then-government advisor Guy Salmon, “greener” conceptually than the Bill originally conceived by the more left-leaning Labour government."
And i'm not sure I agree with that assessment….the old catchment boards had a more holistic view and a more environmentally focused response IMO….mind you they operated in a significantly different environment with far less pressure
Why people give any credence toward the USA beats me. What has the US done for the benefit of peace or peaceful co-existence, the only country to unleash a nuclear bomb x 2 murdering millions of civilians.
North Korea, flattened by them in 1950s, did that bring peace?. Vietnam, where the US used chemical weapons manufactured in NZ by Watkins/ Dow and mercenary fighters from around the globe including NZ. Still there are malformed births from Agent Orange. Peace?.
Iraqi, a once A grade country with a stable democracy where people were still alive and had jobs and infrastructure. What a mess. Peace there?. Libya, a democratic country that owed no foreign debt and had a better democracy than most. What another mess. Peace there?.
Left out many other atrocities against other lands by the war-virus that is the USA. a blight on humanity. What has changed, nothing, and nothing will change whilst people give support to this truly evil military regime. Do you?
You've a good example in Iraq, and a lousy one in Korea. Korea asked for US help to avoid the Japanese annexation before 1910, and having been abandoned by the retreating Japanese was only too pleased to resist Stalin's puppet regime. Had the North made a decent country of itself, you'd have a case – but they chose to be despots – deserving even less sympathy than Saddam Hussein. South Korea, in no small part through the sacrifice of Kim Jae-gyu, is a lively independent democracy today.
Brigid I don't know that Stuart was that positive about the USA. Why are you dissing him?
And Stuart – going to the Wikipedia link you put up on Kim Jae-gyu (it is important to get the latter name right! – many Kims), it is a great example of the awful competitive problems all countries can have, with people trying to gain or control power and turn it up or down.
Park was a patriot and a reformer who gradually became a dictator. The man who assassinated him was his old friend, who had no illusions of surviving the act. So Korea survived as neither a US puppet nor a nasty militarized regime – quite an achievement considering the pattern for US-backed strongmen.
Perhaps NZ parliamentarians need to be faced with a sign over the main doors – 'We don't promise you a rose garden'. Or with the malevolent sarcasm of the Nazi use of 'Work will set you free' a notice that 'Serving your country whether in the army or as a politician may cost you your life'.
I don't think that NZ pollies, especially from the right side, expect to front up to such ideological traumas as the South Korean you referred to. Having the ability to change pollies, and their civil service heads, prevents power concreting to the absolute corruption level.
Finding balance is the task it seems, between constant change with no long term responsibility for good planning and decisions, and the ability of the agile villain to appeal long-term to the infantile, lurking dissenter inside many, who will accept corruption as smart organising if the PR is plausible.
Yes, dead right – the abiding virtue of democracy, from a political science point of view, is that is allows peaceful transfers of power.
When democracy becomes as distorted as it has in the US under Trump however, it is no longer certain that this is possible, or that a peaceful process that accommodates Trumpism is preferable to a Heimlich manoeuvre that expels him forcefully from America's political throat.
Assassination has removed much better presidents than Trump.
It was the North that attacked however, first on their own, then, after they were repulsed, with Chinese support. The world is awash in examples of unjustified US interventions – but Korea is not one of them – which is why NZ troops were there to teach the locals this, which they call yeon ga.
One must be extraordinarily undiscriminating to endorse the North Korean regime.
When will you learn to make a compelling argument that goes beyond simple adjectives and mere reckons? None of your comments today contains any original input from you, no thought, no argument, no reason(ing) except for adjectives such as “absurd”, “repulsive”, or “brilliant”. Wow!
What are you going to ‘enlighten’ us with next, a GIF?
I have written on this forum many, many carefully argued critiques of radio dramas, TV shows, films, political speeches, political campaigns, etc. If you think that that extreme right wing racist casino billionaire who funds Trump's campaign is anything other than "repulsive", then you can enlighten us as to exactly why.
Do you think Evo Morales's performance on the Daily Show was not brilliant? Why not? The audience and the host were obviously deeply impressed by him. Was I wrong to point out that extremely rare quality in a political leader?
Your point about my use of the word "absurd" to dismiss Stuart's post is well taken. I apologise to Stuart and everyone else for my lazy and reductive putdown.
A well-written critique is more than a few adjectives leading to a superficial judgement.
When you use certain adjectives to describe your view of people without stating the reason, it becomes a shallow throwaway comment that offers no insight(s) and no point of connection with others who might read your comment. You might as well say that you hated Brussels sprouts when you were young, which may be 100% true, but it does not make for debate because we cannot discuss personal taste; all it does is saying something about you.
I hope you’re getting it because asking me to argue with you why those adjectives may not apply is putting the onus on me and asking me about my taste. For the record, I love Brussels sprouts, but I don’t know why.
Iraqi, a once A grade country with a stable democracy where people were still alive and had jobs and infrastructure.
Apart from those poor sods who were gassed by the dictator who ruled through fear and violence
Libya, a democratic country that owed no foreign debt and had a better democracy than most. What another mess.
Yeah, 'cause the brotherly leader Gadaffy Duck's third international theory wasn't brought down by widespread corruption and unemployment, by the people who were no longer fooled by cults of personality.
Don't know what you're talking about with the 'no' and 'yes' thing – I just pointed out a couple of gaping holes in your claims of Iraqi and Libyan peaceful democracies nonsense, but if you want to attribute something else you think I meant with that correction, so be it.
Libya was the most secular of the arab states…women had full equality of access to the education that was free to post-graduate level… there was universal free healthcare…when couples married they were given a house to live in..and $40,000 u.s. to help them on their way…gaddaffi was wiped out because he was setting up a new pan arab/african bank….this was obamas' war-crime..it is now a fundamentalist hellhole..
I am not saying gaddaffi was perfect…but everything I said about life in Libya for libyans is true..and also the reason for his overthrow…is all true….u CD google that….and life in Libya is better now..is it..?..that was good that obama did..?..was it..?…to give h.clark her due in this..she refused to play along with the charade…
That was how the trams used to be in Auckland. I rode on them when small. There was a narrow island platform which you crossed the road to stand on, they trundled along according to their timetable, you got on and paid the conductor – sitting on simple slat wooden seats. At certain points, the driver had to change his power pole to travel on another line, pulling down against a spring, and swinging it to connect onto the new line. Then off we would go, and at the other end the pole would be pulled down and the one at the other end would drive back retracing the route. (It was probably the same as the Christchurch one reinstalled on the initiative of John Britten.)
Thanks for the memory greywarshark. I remember the trams as a kid too. In the school holidays mums took us kids into Queen St. for a few hours on the roof of Farmers in Albert St., where we were left careering around in toy cars and crashing into one another as often as we could while said mums went off to do their shopping on the lower floors. Then it was sandwiches and cream buns for lunch in the cafetaria and back down to Queen St to catch the tram home. Good days them.
Edit: Maybe that is why we’re such a car obsessed nation. 😉
Thomas your story is incorrect as my office has tried to tell you. The NZ Super Fund option is no longer on the table. It is our policy to press ahead with Auckland Light Rail based on the advice the new Govt will receive from the Ministry of Transport.
We'll all get updated once there's a Cabinet meeting with a new Cabinet.
From Twyford's answer to the Stuff article they already have the MoT advice they need and are just waiting for a chance to ratify at Cabinet: "It is our policy to press ahead…"
Very weird that Twyford is being quoted before the new Cabinet positions are set. At minimum it means either PM and Min Finance are totally on board, or the sources in the article are stale.
Or Stuff is being used to apply pressure by other players. The business case will be interesting reading, especially if Twyford has prioritised a fast trip to the airport for politicians and executives over frequent street-level connections and lower cost.
There are interesting anomalies in how women and men get treated FTTT. I hope sex-change aspirants and wannabes understand that. This is a new variant.
Two passengers from QR908 both told the ABC they had no idea what was happening to them when all women on the plane were asked to get off after a three-hour delay on 2 October….
It had been due to leave Hamad International Airport (HIA) in Doha at 8:30pm local time but was delayed for three hours after a premature baby was found in a bathroom at the terminal – a detail confused passengers said was not communicated to them…
One of the women said all adult females were removed from the plane by authorities and taken to two ambulances waiting outside the airport.
"No-one spoke English or told us what was happening. It was terrifying," she said.
"There were 13 of us and we were all made to leave. A mother near me had left her sleeping children on the plane.
"There was an elderly woman who was vision impaired and she had to go too. I'm pretty sure she was searched."
…"Medical professionals expressed concern to officials about the health and welfare of a mother who had just given birth and requested she be located prior to departing [the airport]."
Qatar Airways have not yet responded to a request for comment.
The mother of the baby has not been located…
…"When I got in there, and there was a lady with a mask on and then the authorities closed the ambulance behind me and locked it," she said.
"They never explained anything.
"She told me to pull my pants down and that I needed to examine my vagina.
"I said 'I'm not doing that' and she did not explain anything to me. She just kept saying, 'we need to see it we need to see it'."
The woman said she took her clothes off and was inspected, and touched, by the female nurse….
Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne confirmed today that the women had contacted the Australian government at the time of the incident and that the government has formally raised concerns with Qatar….
"The advice that has been provided indicates that the treatment of the women concerned was offensive, grossly inappropriate, and beyond circumstances in which the women could give free and informed consent.
"It is not something I have ever heard of occurring in my life, in any context.
A very mild comment from the Australian government when this was an assault on their nationals.
There is the problem in Australia where the uptake on solar is large. It means the costs of maintaining the wider system is borne by a smaller and less moneyed section of the community. As more become self sufficient on energy the more the poorer sections of the community bear the cost of the network.
DanS This should be up with the solar thread, which is about No.7 and pressing a Reply button there would have put it by the other solar comments.
It seems after reading your comment that falling profit and fewer numbers will result in companies selling out, and a monopoly left which would be the opposite to the governments intention to provide competition. The govt will have to buy back the electricity company/ies so government can run them with reasonable charges concentrating on a cost-recovery basis.
Some compromises are needed here I think. The elderly have more time and energy than those working and with family and care responsibilities, to think about and demand what they want and continue in the same vein. We have the same people writing to the paper here for many decades mostly with complaints.
"I make no apologies for being persistent," Millar said, noting he was a marina berth-holder at the time.
He had been emailing the council over a reduction in car parking at the inner harbour, and said he was stopped from further alerting councillors to "pertinent issues".
"This was just a smokescreen to cover the stuff that I had been trying to portray."
89 pages of correspondence
However, GDC internal partnerships director James Baty said it had 89 pages worth of correspondence with Millar about the inner harbour, dating back to 2011, and despite being advised he was an unreasonable complainant on 14 February, and being blocked from the council's Facebook page, Millar continued making contact with elected members and staff for another two months.
"At this point his email address was blocked," Baty said.
Interesting about the USA deporting Marshall Islanders back home and why.
Sounds like Australians deporting NZs home.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/429192/us-deportations-likely-up-in-fy2020 [Marshall Islands Attorney-General] Hickson said US authorities had requested the 33 be given an exemption to return to the Marshalls.
But he said local authorities informed the US that the border remained closed until further notice because of the Covid-19 pandemic. A total of 202 Marshallese were deported from the US during the seven-year period from FY2013 to FY2019, an average of 29 per year. Crimes for which Marshallese are deported include violence such as sexual assault and murder as well as fraud involving money theft or failing to appear for scheduled court hearings.
Suspect Labour will end up closer to 51% than 50% after Specials … acknowledged expert Graeme Edgler guesses 49.9% … I think that’s too low.
(Only proviso … that no-one has mentioned afaik … is the uncertain implications arising from the unique disparity in 2020 between Advanced & Election Day Party Support)
Do you think the disparity between advanced party votes and Election Day party votes is due to the demographic differences? Older more conservative voters with longstanding election habits voting on polling day while other voters were happy to vote early?
.
Possibly … but bear in mind that if that demographic rationale is correct then it should've applied in 2017 too … and yet the Advance vs Election Day differences were minimal in that Election.
Just over 1 million Advanced Votes in 2017 (compared to just under 1.7 m in 2020):
Labour 1.7 points higher in Advance Voting vs Election Day(2017) but a massive 6 points higher in Advance Voting2020.
National 1.1 lower in Advance compared to Election Day(2017) but a significant 5 points down (2020).
The extra 700k Advanced Votes in 2020 can’t account for that massively increased disparity …
Sir Roger Penrose: 'The Big Bang was not the beginning. There was something before, and that something is what we will have in our future'
Isn't that great. The scientists and world-moulders have even more reasons to not look around them. Our planet is so boring, they've seen all they want to they say peevishly and in their blase' way they leave us coping with our own filth and bacteria and fungi which we now find are at the basis of life and death. So let's wallow in earth and leave the elevated minds to destroy themselves in space, as long as they leave our earth to us.
In the year 2525 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izQB2-Kmiic
(The song was recorded primarily in one take in 1968, at a studio in a cow pasture in Odessa, Texas. Members of the Odessa Symphony also participated in the recording.
Artists: Denny Zager & Rick Evans – acoustic guitars & vocals (It went to No.1 on both sides of the Atlantic and they never had another near hit. Outer space man.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Year_2525
Faith In The Essentials: Fenced-in, almost literally, by motorways. Located, seemingly permanently, at the bottom of politicians’ priority-lists. Heaped with praise for their cultural vibrancy, but not rewarded for it by the presence of white pupils in their public schools, South Aucklanders (like people of colour everywhere) provide their paler ...
Image credit:POLITICAL BLOG I notice a few regulars no longer allow public access to the site counters. This may happen accidentally when the blog format is altered. If your blog is unexpectedly missing or the numbers seem very low please check this out. After correcting send me the URL ...
Since the pandemic began, the UK government has restricted protests in an effort to contain the plague. But of course, they're plotting to make these restrictions permanent: Concern over the government’s limitation of the right to protest during lockdown continues to mount after it emerged that the home secretary, ...
Completed reads for February: The Dream of Scipio, by CiceroThe Dragon Masters, by Jack Vance The Dream of Scipio is Pearman’s translation. A very quiet month in the reading department… but a truly excellent one in the writing department. Better yet, this was not merely short stories, but solid ...
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh (Colombia, 18 February 2020) Two soldiers, Jhony Andrés Castillo Ospino and Jesús Alberto Muñoz Segovia, fell into the hands of the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN; National Liberation Army). Their capture produced the usual reactions that they had been kidnapped when in fact they were prisoners ...
As much of the world is still implementing lockdowns, including New Zealand, it is a good time to see how Sweden has fared. After being demonised for a year for having relatively moderate restrictions the Swedish death toll is rather much in line with other years. Sweden followed the standard ...
Under The Influence Of The "Governance" Kool-Aid: The furore surrounding Mayor Andy Foster's "review" of the Wellington City Council's "governance" is but the latest example of the quite conscious delegitimization, and sinister re-framing, of spirited political opposition and debate as irresponsible, immature and “dysfunctional”. It shows how very far from ...
Hello there everybody. I’ve been asked by Mr Thinks to come on his blog today and speak my mind about stuff. The government has a lot to answer for. I was sitting there last week as Auckland came out of it’s latest lockdown and I knew the government was making ...
There are times when tikanga needs to be broken for tikanga to survive.I recently gave a presentation on Māori economic history based on my Not in Narrow Seas. Its most important message was that Māori proved to be a very adaptable people continually evolving as new opportunities arose. The European ...
Some of you may remember our blog post "A conundrum: our continued presence on Facebook" in which we detailed our misgivings about and decision to stick with Facebook for the time being. So these latest developments - reposted from the Cranky Uncle homepage - might come as a bit of surprise! ...
Image credit:Quick Data Lessons: Data Dredging Oh dear – another scientific paper claiming evidence of toxic effects from fluoridation. But a critical look at the paper shows evidence of p-hacking, data dredging and motivated reasoning to derive their conclusions. And it was published in a journal shown to be ...
We've had a housing crisis for the past decade, and successive governments have done nothing to solve it. Why not? Bernard Hickey gets it right when he says its all about protecting the rich: The Government is reluctant to push down house prices fearing they'll loses the support of ...
There’s more of the Obama legacy here and Deporter in Chief: Obama chucks out 2,000,000 and Can Trump really deport more people than Obama? and Obama, gay rights and the killing drones ...
My Department Right Or Wrong: Far from “politicians involving themselves in some Corrections matters” being a bad thing, their involvement – along with that of the Ombudsman – constitutes a necessary check upon the unreasonable and unlawful exercise of authority over prison inmates by prison staff. A Corrections Minister who ...
New Zealand is supposed to have a progressive tax system, which taxes people according to their ability to pay. But it turns out that the rich are cheating: The wealthiest New Zealanders pay just 12 per cent of their total income in tax on average, according to research from ...
Ground truths on warming When we think about rapid climate change of the kind we've accidentally unleashed and the warming of Earth systems inherent in the process, we tend to focus on phenomena in order of their immediate tangibility, their drama. Sea ice loss in the Arctic, atmospheric and ocean ...
by Daphna Whitmore The Department of Corrections has called in the police over a pamphlet that supports protests at Waikeria Prison, saying the material might incite another riot. The group People Against Prisons Aotearoa denies it advocates for riots and has said it “encourages persistent, peaceful protest action such as striking from ...
One theme in the literature dedicated to democratic theory is the notion of a “tyranny of the minority.” This is where the desire to protect the interests of and give voice to electoral minorities leads to a tail wagging the dog syndrome whereby minorities wind up having disproportionate influence in ...
I've just lodged my fourth complaint to the Ombudsman for deemed refusal of an OIA request by police this year. That brings their total to four for four - every request I have sent them has not been answered within the legal timeframe, even when they extend it to give ...
Will the health reforms proposed for the Labour Government make the system better or worse? Health commentator Ian Powell (formerly the Executive Director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists) gives his analysis of what change is most necessary, and what should be avoided. The review of the Health ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections An off-course polar vortex meandered toward the Mexican border, bringing with it frigid Arctic air rarely seen as far south as Texas. Frozen equipment rendered power generation systems in the state inoperable, forcing grid operators to begin rolling blackouts to customers then left to fend ...
Just as National once produced a “rock star economy” that Grant Robertson rejected as being only for the rich, the Labour Government has produced an economic “bounce back” that leaves out the poor. Branko Marcetic argues for a rise in benefit levels to give the poor a real bounce back. ...
Virginia has voted to abolish the death penalty: State lawmakers gave final approval on Monday to a bill that will end capital punishment in Virginia, a dramatic turnaround for a state that has executed more people than any other. The legislation repealing the death penalty now heads to the ...
Yesterday a New Zealand Judge issued a formal finding that the Department of Corrections had treated prisoners in a cruel, degrading and inhumane manner, illegally detaining them, using excessive force, denying them basic necessities unless they performed degrading rituals of submission first. Some of the conduct appears to be criminal: ...
The Herald reports that there is a "storm brewing for the Climate Change Commission". The "problem"? Polluters are unhappy with its economic projections saying that action will not be as costly as they have previously claimed: Last week a coalition of over a dozen New Zealand business and industry ...
You're Move: What would a genuinely powerful Maori Caucus do? What policies would it insist upon? More to the point, since the single most important question in politics is always “Or you’ll what?”, does the Maori Caucus possess the wherewithal to enforce its demands?THAT LABOUR’S MAORI CAUCUS is potentially powerful ...
This post is a mix of a few recent reports on trends, recent discoveries or developments. Topics covered are the future of work, the geopolitical shift from oil to semiconductors, transition to low carbon futures, disappearing Artic sea ice, and AI in health care. Yesterday’s Gone A Canadian report ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Bob Henson One of the hottest years in U.S. history, 2020 was besieged by a record number of billion-dollar disasters, led by two of the most dangerous phenomena with links to climate change: wildfires and hurricanes. In its initial U.S. climate summary for 2020, ...
Just because something is bad, doesn’t mean it’s easy to criminalise. Graham Adams argues that the proposed ban on gay conversion therapy is messier than many realise, and he delves into some of the difficulties facing the Government in their promise to legislate. A highly successful petition has inadvertently ...
Story of the Week... Editorial of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Claim Review... SkS Week in Review... Poster of the Week... Story of the Week... ‘Absolutely ridiculous’: top scientist slams UK government over coalmineExclusive:Prof Sir Robert Watson says backing of ...
Over the weekend we learned that Turkey plans to deport a New Zealand woman and her children who had fled Syria after previously joing the Islamic State. Which means that Andrew Little's tyrannical Terrorism Suppression (Control Orders) Act 2019 - rammed through under all-stages urgency on the basis of an ...
While it has made a lot of noise about inequality, Labour has resolutely avoided reversing the 1990 benefit cuts and improving living standards for the poorest in our society. Meanwhile, 70% of kiwis think they should: A survey has found seven out of 10 New Zealanders believe the government ...
Anti-Philosopher President? Emmanuel Macron and his party’s reaction to the terrorist atrocities committed on French soil targets the very same philosophical movements excited and emboldened by New Zealand’s own terrifying tragedy.IT IS NOT the sort of thought experiment New Zealanders are encouraged to conduct in these culturally sensitive times. Even ...
If Jacinda Ardern or ay of her Auckland-based cabinet ministers stepped outside this weekend, they would have realised that this afternoon’s cabinet decision on whether to move Auckland back to Level 1 has already been made. The residents of our biggest city have voted with their feet.While some places where ...
According to epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker, the decision to end the second Auckland lockdown after just three days was a ‘calculated risk’. The possibility of undetected community transmission cannot be ruled out. In the United States, modelling by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has found that the ...
As I rose for the first time to speak from the Despatch Box in the House of Commons, I had the comfort of seeing that the Despatch Box had on it the inscription “A Gift from the People of New Zealand”. But I was also a little daunted, like so ...
This article is by Laura Biggs, from the Marxist-Feminist blog On the Woman Question. The term ‘sex work’ has come to replace the word ‘prostitution’ in contemporary discussions on the subject. This is not accidental. The phrase ‘sex work’ has been adopted by liberal feminists and powerful lobbyists in a ...
Sometimes it’s smaller, intensive studies that shed light on issues. Just reported results of daily sampling of COVID-19 patients indicate patients with the B.1.1.7 variant first observed in Kent, UK may have a longer infection compared to patients infected with non-B.1.1.7 variants. This is the variant seen in NZ’s most ...
Redline has just passed one million views – as I start writing this we have reached 1,000,015 views. It took us nearly seven years to reach our first 500,000 and just three months short of three years to reach our second 500,000, with 2019 being our best year, with over ...
. . As the rest of the world was perceived to be “going to hell in a handbasket with an out-of-control pandemic; ructions in Europe as Britain copes with “Brexit” chaos; Trumpism in the United States climaxing with the 6 January mob-led coup attempt in Washington’s Capitol; a deadly ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Feb 14, 2021 through Sat, Feb 20, 2021Editor's ChoiceQ&A: Is Elizabeth Kolbert’s New Book a Hopeful Look at the Promise of Technology, or a Cautionary Tale?The Pulitzer Prize-winning ...
Session Thirty-Five. We have had some in-game and out-of-game indication that we are drawing to the end of the Dreamland adventure… which has lasted since the fourth session. Getting back to the Waking World will require some mental adjustment, especially considering that Annalax has spent thirty-odd sessions not ...
A Friend In Need: I have grown up, and grown old, within earshot of New Zealand’s public broadcaster. Through times of peace and plenty, through days of tumult and recrimination, it has been a constant and reliable presence. The calm and authoritative voices of Radio New Zealand kept their fellow ...
This article, authored by Dr Lisa Schipper, Dr Morgan Scoville-Simonds, Dr Katharine Vincent and Prof Siri Eriksen, was originally published on the Carbon Brief website on Feb 10, 2021. It is reposted below in its entirety. Click here to access the original article and comments posted on Carbon Brief. Photo by ...
. . As the rest of the world was perceived to be “going to hell in a handbasket with an out-of-control pandemic; ructions in Europe as Britain copes with “Brexit” chaos; Trumpism in the United States climaxing with the 6 January mob-led coup attempt in Washington’s Capitol; a deadly resurgent ...
by Georgina Blackmore Instead ask the government to separate the two issues caught under the heading of “Conversion Therapy”. 1) Gay Conversion Therapy which is what 99.9% of people believe this petition is about. It is a ban I personally support. 2) Gender Identity Conversion Therapy which doesn’t have any ...
The burning of books has a long history. That it no reason why we should add to it.If you want to get Burning of the Books: A History of Knowledge Under Attack from the National Library you may have to hurry. It is in the overseas nonfiction section; many books ...
by Daphna Whitmore After promising to tackle poverty, housing, transport, and climate issues in 2017, and failing on all these measures, Labour has moved to a Helen Clark “promise little and disappoint less” style of government. Poverty – perversely called “child poverty” by Ardern – has worsened under Labour. Much ...
This is one of those subject matters better suited to a thesis than a blog post, and far smarter people than I have tackled the question in a more detailed and accurate manner. But it’s a question that’s been running around in my brain for a fortnight or so. ...
Chris Fogwill, Keele University; Alan Hogg, University of Waikato; Chris Turney, UNSW, and Zoë Thomas, UNSWThe world experienced a few centuries of apocalyptic conditions 42,000 years ago, triggered by a reversal of the Earth’s magnetic poles combined with changes in the Sun’s behaviour. That’s the key finding of our ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jan Ellen Spiegel Colorado is no stranger to drought. The current one is closing in on 20 years, and a rainy or snowy season here and there won’t change the trajectory. This is what climate change has brought. “Aridification” is what ...
Sweet Surrender: By 1933, Adolf Hitler was the last political leader left standing, and his Nazis the only party Germany had yet to try. It was ever thus. Dictators and dictatorships succeed by being the only medicine a desperately sick nation hasn’t swallowed; the only strength that hasn’t failed.NOT ALL ...
"I know what you're not thinking!" Thanks to their polling agency and the participants in its focus-groups, the Labour leadership possesses a great deal more information about the Kiwis clamouring for action on the housing and inequality fronts than most journalists and lobbyists.ACCORDING TO PEOPLE “in the know”, Labour is ...
James Higham, University of OtagoThe Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’s second tourism report urges the government to take advantage of the disruption caused by COVID-19 to transform the tourism industry. Titled “Not 100% – but four steps closer to sustainable tourism”, it builds on commissoner Simon Upton’s 2019 “Pristine, ...
My column over at Newsroom this week points out the fairly obvious. The government can add daily saliva testing for everyone at the border to the existing testing regimen. If daily testing winds up proving the swab tests to be redundant, ditch the swab tests when we find that out. ...
Geoengineering heats up Sorry, that was irresistible. By chance in this edition of New Research are two intriguing papers including different perspectives on the subject of geoengineering, a topic increasingly arousing emotions. Happily both of these papers are open access and free to read. A third article underlines that enthusiasm ...
Tamra Burns Loeb, University of California, Los Angeles; AJ Adkins-Jackson, Harvard University, and Arleen F. Brown, University of California, Los AngelesRacial and ethnic minority communities that lack internet access have been left behind in the race to get a COVID-19 vaccine. The average monthly cost of internet access, about ...
Zach St. GeorgeThe first and only time Steve Jackson spoke to Bill Critchfield was in the late 1980s. Critchfield, an authority on the conifers of North America, was at home recovering from a heart attack. Jackson, then a postdoctoral researcher at Brown University, had called looking for advice on how ...
Richelle Butcher, Massey University; Britta Denise Hardesty, CSIRO, and Lauren Roman, CSIROPlastic in the ocean can be deadly for marine wildlife and seabirds around the globe, but our latest study shows single-use plastics are a bigger threat to endangered albatrosses in the southern hemisphere than we previously thought. You ...
On Monday, the US Congress failed to hold former President Donald Trump accountable for inciting an attempted coup against the US constitution. So now someone is doing it privately, in the traditional American way: suing him: Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani, the former president’s personal lawyer, have been accused ...
We know that when our rural communities do well, all of New Zealand benefits. Labour is committed to supporting our regions so that, together, we can achieve even more. Here are just some of the ways we’re backing rural communities. ...
Government data today shows that the wealthiest New Zealanders aren’t paying their fair share of tax, whilst everyone else chips in, Green Party spokesperson on Finance Julie Anne Genter said today. ...
The Green Party welcomes the change in the Reserve Bank’s remit to consider the impacts on housing when making financial decisions, but housing affordability shouldn’t be left to the Reserve Bank, Green Party Co-leader and Housing spokesperson Marama Davidson said today. ...
The Green Party welcomes the passing of the Local Electorate Act Māori Wards Amendment Bill which ensures Māori have a say on local issues across Aotearoa New Zealand. ...
New UMR research reveals that 69 percent of New Zealanders agree that the government should increase the amount if income support paid to those on low incomes or not in paid work. ...
The Green Party are celebrating the Labour Government bringing forward the timeline to ban conversion therapy, and will push to ensure any draft bill properly protects all of our Rainbow communities. ...
The Green Party is joining the call for ‘brave policy action’ to address rapidly increasing inequality in New Zealand, which is likely to be exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. ...
Green MPs currently in Auckland, Marama Davidson, Chlöe Swarbrick and Golriz Ghahraman, will remain in Auckland for the next 72 hours. Those in Auckland today for Big Gay Out who have flown home will self-isolate for 72 hours. These decisions will be subject to any new information that may arise ...
It’s Pride month, and as we celebrate our LGBTIA+ community, we’re taking the next steps towards a more inclusive Aotearoa. From investing in mental health services to banning harmful conversion therapy, we’re building a New Zealand where everyone can be safe, healthy and happy. ...
I acknowledge our whānau overseas, joining us from Te Whenua Moemoeā, and I wish to pay respects to their elders past, present, and emerging. Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you all today. I am very pleased to be part of the conversation on Indigenous business, and part ...
Social Development and Employment Minister Carmel Sepuloni announced today that main benefits will increase by 3.1 percent on 1 April, in line with the rise in the average wage. The Government announced changes to the annual adjustment of main benefits in Budget 2019, indexing main benefit increases to the average ...
A Deed of Settlement has been signed between Ngāti Maru and the Crown settling the iwi’s historical Treaty of Waitangi claims, Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Andrew Little announced today. The Ngāti Maru rohe is centred on the inland Waitara River valley, east to the Whanganui River and its ...
With a suite of Government income support packages available, Minister for Social Development and Employment Carmel Sepuloni is encouraging people, and businesses, connected to the recent Auckland COVID-19 cases to check the Work and Income website if they’ve been impacted by the need to self-isolate. “If you are required to ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has expressed her condolences at the passing of long-serving former Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare. “Our thoughts are with Lady Veronica Somare and family, Prime Minister James Marape and the people of Papua New Guinea during this time of great ...
The Government is backing a new project to use drone technology to transform our understanding and protection of the Māui dolphin, Aotearoa’s most endangered dolphin. “The project is just one part of the Government’s plan to save the Māui dolphin. We are committed to protecting this treasure,” Oceans and Fisheries ...
Major water reform has taken a step closer with the appointment of the inaugural board of the Taumata Arowai water services regulator, Hon Nanaia Mahuta says. Former Director General of Health and respected public health specialist Dame Karen Poutasi will chair the inaugural board of Crown agency Taumata Arowai. “Dame ...
The newly completed Hibiscus Coast Bus Station will help people make better transport choices to help ease congestion and benefit the environment, Transport Minister Michael Wood and Auckland Mayor Phil Goff said today. Michael Wood and Phil Goff officially opened the Hibiscus Coast Bus Station which sits just off the ...
New funding announced by Conservation Minister Kiri Allan today will provide work and help protect the unique values of Northland’s Te Ārai Nature Reserve for future generations. Te Ārai is culturally important to Te Aupōuri as the last resting place of the spirits before they depart to Te Rerenga Wairua. ...
Today the Government has taken a key step to support Pacific people to becoming Community Housing providers, says the Minister for Pacific Peoples, Aupito William Sio. “This will be great news for Pacific communities with the decision to provide Pacific Financial Capability Grant funding and a tender process to ...
Conservation Minister Kiri Allan is encouraging New Zealanders to have their say on a proposed marine mammal sanctuary to address the rapid decline of bottlenose dolphins in Te Pēwhairangi, the Bay of Islands. The proposal, developed jointly with Ngā Hapū o te Pēwhairangi, would protect all marine mammals of the ...
Attorney-General David Parker today announced the appointment of three new District Court Judges. Two of the appointees will take up their roles on 1 April, replacing sitting Judges who have reached retirement age. Kirsten Lummis, lawyer of Auckland has been appointed as a District Court Judge with jury jurisdiction to ...
Government announces list of life-shortening conditions guaranteeing early KiwiSaver access The Government changed the KiwiSaver rules in 2019 so people with life-shortening congenital conditions can withdraw their savings early The four conditions guaranteed early access are – down syndrome, cerebral palsy, Huntington’s disease and fetal alcohol spectrum disorder An alternative ...
The Reserve Bank is now required to consider the impact on housing when making monetary and financial policy decisions, Grant Robertson announced today. Changes have been made to the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee’s remit requiring it to take into account government policy relating to more sustainable house prices, while working ...
The Labour Government will invest $6 million for 70 additional adult cochlear implants this year to significantly reduce the historical waitlist, Health Minister Andrew Little says. “Cochlear implants are life changing for kiwis who suffer from severe hearing loss. As well as improving an individual’s hearing, they open doors to ...
The Local Electoral (Māori Wards and Māori Constituencies) Amendment Bill passed its third reading today and will become law, Minister of Local Government Hon Nanaia Mahuta says. “This is a significant step forward for Māori representation in local government. We know how important it is to have diversity around ...
The Government has added 1,000 more transitional housing places as promised under the Aotearoa New Zealand Homelessness Action Plan (HAP), launched one year ago. Minister of Housing Megan Woods says the milestone supports the Government’s priority to ensure every New Zealander has warm, dry, secure housing. “Transitional housing provides people ...
A second batch of Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines arrived safely yesterday at Auckland International Airport, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says. “This shipment contained about 76,000 doses, and follows our first shipment of 60,000 doses that arrived last week. We expect further shipments of vaccine over the coming weeks,” Chris Hipkins said. ...
The Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Carmel Sepuloni has today announced $18 million to support creative spaces. Creative spaces are places in the community where people with mental health needs, disabled people, and those looking for social connection, are welcomed and supported to practice and participate in the arts ...
Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Minister Andrew Little today welcomed Moriori to Parliament to witness the first reading of the Moriori Claims Settlement Bill. “This bill is the culmination of years of dedication and hard work from all the parties involved. “I am delighted to reach this significant milestone today,” Andrew ...
22,400 fewer children experiencing material hardship 45,400 fewer children in low income households on after-housing costs measure After-housing costs target achieved a year ahead of schedule Government action has seen child poverty reduce against all nine official measures compared to the baseline year, Prime Minister and Minister for Child Poverty ...
It’s time to recognise the outstanding work early learning services, kōhanga reo, schools and kura do to support children and young people to succeed, Minister of Education Chris Hipkins says. The 2021 Prime Minister’s Education Excellence Awards are now open through until April 16. “The past year has reminded us ...
Three new Jobs for Nature projects will help nature thrive in the Bay of Plenty and keep local people in work says Conservation Minister Kiri Allan. “Up to 30 people will be employed in the projects, which are aimed at boosting local conservation efforts, enhancing some of the region’s most ...
The Government has accepted all of the Holidays Act Taskforce’s recommended changes, which will provide certainty to employers and help employees receive their leave entitlements, Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Michael Wood announced today. Michael Wood said the Government established the Holidays Act Taskforce to help address challenges with the ...
The Government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and faster than expected economic recovery has been acknowledged in today’s credit rating upgrade. Credit ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) today raised New Zealand’s local currency credit rating to AAA with a stable outlook. This follows Fitch reaffirming its AA+ rating last ...
Tena koutou e nga Maata Waka Ngai Tuahuriri, Ngai Tahu whanui, Tena koutou. Nau mai whakatau mai ki tenei ra maumahara i te Ru Whenua Apiti hono tatai hono, Te hunga mate ki te hunga mate Apiti hono tatai hono, Te hunga ora ki te hunga ora Tena koutou, Tena ...
The Minister of Justice has reaffirmed the Government’s urgent commitment, as stated in its 2020 Election Manifesto, to ban conversion practices in New Zealand by this time next year. “The Government has work underway to develop policy which will bring legislation to Parliament by the middle of this year and ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage and Social Development Hon Carmel Sepuloni today launched a new Creative Careers Service, which is expected to support up to 1,000 creatives, across three regions over the next two years. The new service builds on the most successful aspects of the former Pathways to ...
Overseas consumers eager for natural products in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic have helped boost honey export revenue by 20 percent to $425 million in the year to June 30, 2020, Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor says. “The results from the latest Ministry for Primary Industries’ 2020 Apiculture Monitoring ...
Thanks to more than $10-million in new services from the Government, more rangatahi will be able to access mental health and addiction support in their community. Minister of Health Andrew Little made the announcement today while visiting Odyssey House Christchurch and acknowledged that significant events like the devastating earthquakes ten ...
Two month automatic visitor visa extension for most visitor visa holders Temporary waiver of time spent in New Zealand rule for visitor stays Visitor visa holders will be able to stay in New Zealand a little longer as the Government eases restrictions for those still here, the Minister of Immigration ...
The Tourism and Conservation Ministers say today’s report by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (PCE) adds to calls to overhaul the tourism model that existed prior to COVID19. “The PCE tourism report joins a chorus of analysis which has established that previous settings, which prioritised volume over value, are ...
The Government is providing certainty for the dietary supplements industry as we work to overhaul the rules governing the products, Minister for Food Safety Dr Ayesha Verrall said. Dietary supplements are health and wellness products taken orally to supplement a traditional diet. Some examples include vitamin and mineral supplements, echinacea, ...
The Government is joining the Council of Europe Convention on Cybercrime (the Budapest Convention), Justice Minister Kris Faafoi and Minister for the Digital Economy and Communications Dr David Clark announced today. The decision progresses a recommendation by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Christchurch terror attack to accede to ...
Attorney-General David Parker announced today that an appointment round for Queen’s Counsel will take place in 2021. Appointments of Queen’s Counsel are made by the Governor-General on the recommendation of the Attorney-General and with the concurrence of the Chief Justice. The Governor-General retains the discretion to appoint Queen’s Counsel in ...
The new Resurgence Support Payment passed by Parliament this week will be available to eligible businesses now that Auckland will be in Alert Level 2 until Monday. “Our careful management of the Government accounts means we have money aside for situations like this. We stand ready to share the burden ...
A dry run of the end-to-end process shows New Zealand’s COVID-19 vaccination programme is ready to roll from Saturday, when the first border workers will receive the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says. “The trial run took place in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch yesterday afternoon, ahead of the ...
From June this year, all primary, intermediate, secondary school and kura students will have access to free period products, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Associate Education Minister Jan Tinetti announced today. The announcement follows a successful Access to Period Products pilot programme, which has been running since Term 3 last ...
The latest update shows the Government’s books are again in better shape than forecast, meaning New Zealand is still in a strong position to respond to any COVID-19 resurgence. The Crown Accounts for the six months to the end of December were better than forecast in the Half-year Economic and ...
The Department of Conservation’s (DOC) new Heritage and Visitor Strategy is fully focused on protecting and enhancing the value of New Zealand’s natural, cultural and historic heritage, while also promoting a sustainable environmental experience, Conservation Minister Kiri Allan says. “It has been a quarter of a century since DOC first developed ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ananish Chaudhuri, Professor of Behavioural and Experimental Economics, University of Auckland When National MP Simon Bridges called Police Commissioner Andrew Coster a “wokester” recently, his intention was apparently to suggest the police are too soft on crime. Debating the concept of “policing ...
COMMENTARY:By Graham Davis Last month, I wrote on Facebook that the resumption of my blog Grubsheet for 2021 was being postponed out of consideration for the national effort to assist the victims of tropical cyclones Yasa and Ana. I made the observation that it was not the time for ...
Today, 1 March, is Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific Day - the 67th anniversary of the 'Bravo' nuclear bomb detonation by the United States close to the surface of Bikini Atoll, in the Marshall Islands, which blasted out a crater more than 200 ...
Another lockdown, another round of recriminations, but, as Justin Latif reports, the very region being blamed has also been at the forefront of keeping the virus at bay. Our Covid-19 coverage is funded by The Spinoff Members. To help our journalists stay on top of this and other vital ...
By RNZ News Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says she gets that everyone is angry over the latest New Zealand community covid-19 cases after it emerged there was contact between two families, but the important thing is to fix the situation. Contact between the families was not disclosed to contact tracers ...
What are you going to be watching in March? With thanks to our friends at Nando‘s, we round up everything that’s coming to streaming services this month, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, Neon and TVNZ on Demand.The biggiesScratched: Aotearoa’s Lost Sporting Legends (on TVNZ on Demand from March ...
Why are people - particularly young people - not obeying isolation orders? Dr Celia Lie examines the behaviours behind compliance to Covid guidelines. We have woken up today with New Zealand in varying states of lockdown (Level 3 for Auckland, and Level 2 for the rest of New Zealand) due to ...
Our Beehive Bulletin … Good news flowed from the Beehive at the weekend for Ngāti Maru treaty claimants and – affecting significantly more people – welfare beneficiaries. Social Development and Employment Minister Carmel Sepuloni announced that main benefits will increase by 3.1 percent on 1 April, in line with the ...
Stuck in another gloomy London lockdown and missing home, five New Zealand friends decided to bring a pastry-bound piece of Aotearoa to the people.A group of Kiwi mates were tucking into a steak pie in their London flat when it struck them that the British equivalent of the New Zealand ...
Tuariki Delamere’s sensational long jump technique could have been a game changer, writes track and field historian Grant Birkinshaw. He’s calling for the ban to be revoked. At a college track and field championships meet in 1974, a New Zealand long jumper representing Washington State University did something that had never ...
The Climate Change Commission’s report is trying to stop our ship from sinking. Nadine Anne Hura goes in search of its whakapapa and a story to try to make sense of it.I was 20 in 1998 and working at the New Zealand embassy in Buenos Aires. It was an unlikely ...
Jacinda Ardern says she gets that everyone is angry over the latest community cases after it emerged there was contact between two families, but the important thing is to fix the situation. ...
Te Uru Rākau - Forestry New Zealand is seeking feedback on proposed amendments to the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) Forestry Regulations that it hopes will encourage new planting of both indigenous and exotic forest. These latest proposals ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Toole, Professor of International Health, Burnet Institute As of February 25, a total of 221.7 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine had been administered around the world. Well over one-third of these doses were in just two countries — the United States ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nick Bradsworth, PhD Candidate, Deakin University Picture this: you’re in your backyard gardening when you get that strange, ominous feeling of being watched. You find a grey oval-shaped ball about the size of a thumb, filled with bones and fur — a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Abu Barkat ullah, Associate Professor of Cyber Security, University of Canberra Cyber criminals are very persistent and the daily numbers of cyber attacks show no sign of decreasing. The latest reported attack on an Australian university has disrupted the start of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Saul Karnovsky, Lecturer & Bachelor of Education (Secondary) Course Coordinator, Curtin University Australian universities enrol thousands of people to become teachers. Some who choose to study education are motivated by a desire to make a difference to the lives of young people, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Catherine Speck, Professorial Fellow (Honorary), The University of Melbourne Review: Clarice Beckett — The Present Moment, Art Gallery of South Australia Featuring the artist’s luscious and distinctive soft focus, the Art Gallery of South Australia’s newly opened Clarice Beckett exhibition, curated by ...
All the latest developments as the restrictions kick in and the search for a source of the latest infection continues. Auckland is now at alert level three, NZ at level two. Get in touch at stewart@thespinoff.co.nz Our Members make The Spinoff happen. Every dollar contributed directly funds our editorial team – ...
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: How did we end up back in lockdown, employers accused of not offering wage-subsidy pay to staff, and disgust at Uyghur impersonation at Chinese New Year festivities.If you haven’t checked the news, or got the phone alert, or talked to ...
28 February “The Government needs to explain why people are being blocked from going IN to Auckland,” says ACT Leader David Seymour "People are beside themselves and ambulances have been reported rescuing people caught in a monumental traffic ...
The Local Electoral (Māori Wards and Māori Constituencies) Amendment Bill has now passed through parliament. While there are many things that have caused consternation with people, like previously held referenda being disregarded, the process this bill ...
A personal essay from University of Otago academic Amanda Barusch on living in a United States that has lost more than half a million people to Covid-19 Half a million. Half a million Americans are dead from Covid-19. Early this year, the Public Broadcasting System started running stories of the ...
In a well-researched and evidence-based submission, the Federation of Islamic Association of NZ which is the umbrella national Muslim organisation, has set the timeframe and work scope parameters for the implementation of the Royal Commission recommendations. ...
Business & Investing: The effect of Auckland's fourth lockdown will today be seen on the already-pressured NZX, Plus, global markets wobble in February ...
In part five of our video series Hīkoi: Long Shadow of the March we talk to Deirdre Nehua. Her decision to join Dame Whina Cooper on her epic land march in 1975 led Deirdre, now 70 years old, into lifetime of activism that involved protesting at Bastion Point and Pākaitore. Born ...
If we want casual contacts of Covid-19 cases to stay home in the future, we have to pay them to do so, Marc Daalder writes After a person infected with Covid-19 and able to spread the virus worked two shifts at Kmart Botany late last week, more than 1,800 customers ...
New research into the wellbeing of New Zealand's top sportswomen has some surprising revelations, that should help lead a change in culture for happier, healthier, better performing female athletes. Ashley Stanley reports. Almost three quarters of New Zealand’s top female athletes in a new national survey feel elite sport is putting them under pressure to ...
The seizing and jailing of a Palestinian dancer is part of the silencing of cultural critics in Israel, writes the University of Auckland's Associate Professor Nicholas Rowe At 4am on February 2, Palestinian dancer and choreographer Ata Khatab was awoken roughly by Israeli soldiers in his home in the West Bank city ...
South Auckland councillor Fa’anana Efeso Collins says talk of a tough crackdown on those who don’t comply with Covid rules will only be counterproductive, particularly when so much has already been asked of his region in response to the pandemic.Following reports that the latest community Covid-19 case went to the ...
Modelling expert Shaun Hendy tells Toby Manhire which factors will be instrumental in the next big decision.Auckland begins its second of a scheduled seven days in alert level three today, with the rest of the country in level two, but it won’t be until the middle of the week that ...
A glamorous face in Nadia Lim, a delicious product - but how tempting really is the My Food Bag IPO? Since exploding on the scene in 2012, My Food Bag has become a classic Kiwi success story. Cashing in on the fame of public face Nadia Lim after she won ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Scott Morrison has received a great deal of criticism over the government’s handling of then Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins’ allegation she was raped by a colleague in a minister’s office. Now, if it’s possible, he ...
A year ago, on February 28 2020, the first positive test for Covid-19 was recorded. As part of the country goes into a lockdown for the fourth time, you’d be forgiven for blurry recollections. This timeline, compiled by RNZ, lays it out day by day.While a historic ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Plank, Professor in Applied Mathematics, University of Canterbury As expected, genome sequencing has now confirmed the new community COVID-19 case in Auckland is linked to the Papatoetoe cluster, and is the more infectious B.1.1.7 variant. When the first cases in this ...
Covid kills people. That's the message the Prime Minister is ramming home as Auckland battens down the hatches for a seven-day lockdown. Putting the fear of death in people is the latest tool the Government is using as compliance whittles away, writes political editor Jo Moir. While the rest of the ...
Since February 14, New Zealand has had to escalate alert levels twice. Marc Daalder examines how the outbreak has panned out so far Four families, 14 cases. The Valentine's Day cluster looks small, but it has now forced Auckland into lockdown twice in two weeks as officials struggle to manage an ...
Siouxsie Wiles explains what’s concerning about the new case, and urges a moment’s pause on today’s anniversary of the first case, to reflect on what could have been. Auckland woke this morning to another week at alert level three, with the rest of the country at alert level two, after ...
The New Zealand Union of Students' Associations is calling for increased student support to ensure that students can continue to study amid fluctuating Alert Levels. "With this morning’s increase in COVID Alert Levels, students face yet more ...
BusinessDesk‘s Rebecca Stevenson on how to access the Resurgence Support Payment and other Covid-19 response provisions.With Auckland thrown back into level three as the Papatoetoe cluster spreads and the rest of New Zealand now in level two, the government has activated the Covid-19 Resurgence Support Payment (RSP).Alongside the resurgence payment ...
Analysis - Tokelau may have no prisons or court buildings, but that hasn't stopped New Zealand from leading a sweeping overhaul of its justice system, writes Mackenzie Smith. ...
27 February “Unfortunately ACT predicted tonight’s plunge back into Level 3 lockdown for Auckland and the rest of New Zealand into Level 2,” says ACT Leader David Seymour. “ I said yesterday the South Auckland cluster wasn’t under control ...
All the latest developments as the restrictions kick in and the search for a source of the latest infection continues. Get in touch at info@thespinoff.co.nz Our Members make The Spinoff happen. Every dollar contributed directly funds our editorial team – click here to learn more about how you can support us ...
Alexander Stronach interviews the person he’s been friends with the longest, a Wellington science fiction and fantasy writer on the brink of world domination. Casey Lucas is a Swiss army knife. Casey Lucas is six feet tall and extremely bisexual. Casey Lucas is back from the dead (again). Casey Lucas is ...
Fatigue, depression, pain, puking – Mark Graham explains how life is still impacted by his concussion, over a year later.A friend of mine wrote a wonderful piece on his life being “shattered by two punches” and his attempts to piece it back together again.It made me cry.Timothy Giles described his ...
Mānuka honey producers have been reaping the profits of selling pots of gold in recent years, but now there’s a surplus of non-mānuka varieties as beekeepers stockpile, hoping prices will recover. The NZ Herald’s Jane Phare looks at why the country is oozing with honey, in this Herald Premium article.It ...
Report by Dr David Robie – Café Pacific. – Author Margaret Mills speaking at the launch of The Nine Lives of Kitty K at Waiheke Library today. IMAGE: David Robie Introduction for the book launch of The Nine ...
Analysis: One new case was enough to force Auckland back into lockdown less than a week after it returned to Level 1. Marc Daalder explains why New Zealand has dealt with nearly a dozen border failures and minor community outbreaks of Covid-19. Only a couple have resulted in an alert ...
Auckland returns to level three lockdown for seven days as of 6am Sunday February 28, with the rest of the country going to level two. Here’s what the experts are saying, via the Science Media Centre.Shaun HendyWith new cases detected in the family of a Papatoetoe High School student, Auckland ...
A new community case in Auckland today has prompted the announcement that the city is to return to alert level three, and the rest of the country level two, from 6am on Sunday. Here’s the latest.What’s happening?Auckland is to move to alert level three from 6am on Sunday, February 28. ...
As of 6am on Sunday February 28, Auckland moves to level three, with the rest of the country going to level two, for seven days. For the latest official advice see here.What happened?A new case, known as “case M”, is a sibling of a student at Papatoetoe High School, which is ...
The discovery of a new community case that can't be definitively linked to existing cases has forced Auckland back to Level 3, Marc Daalder reports Auckland is returning to Level 3 for seven days and the rest of New Zealand will escalate to Level 2 for the same period from ...
Analysis: Certain traits of SARS-CoV-2 make it an unusually "tricky" virus and a challenging disease to respond to, Marc Daalder reports By now, the Government's slogan that Covid-19 is a "tricky virus" has become something of a cliche. Whenever an infection slips through the border, Jacinda Ardern, Chris Hipkins and ...
In deciding to move Auckland out of lockdown, Jacinda Ardern has decided to take on more risk than she might have previously, Marc Daalder writes New Zealand's approach to the pandemic so far has been a conservative, risk-averse one. Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson has previously spelled out the ideology of ...
Businesses with workers needing to cross the Alert Level boundary near Auckland will need evidence of permitted activity or an exemption. Travel documents that were issued earlier this month remain valid. Any business with workers that have lost ...
Another cased of COVID-19 in the community was not the news anyone wanted to hear on a Saturday evening, Mayor Goff said tonight. “I understand Aucklanders’ frustration at having to return to Level 3 lockdown, with the disruption it causes to everyone’s ...
Last weekend at the sun-drenched soundshell in the Botanic Gardens, Wellington, The Spinoff joined Verb Wellington to present the Garden Party and it was heaps of fun.Photography by Rebecca McMillan On February 20 and 21, a brand new summer festival sprung into life. Held at Wellington Botanic Gardens ki Paekākā, The ...
Our Beehive Bulletin … With the Maori wards issue taken care of through legislation rushed egregiously into law under urgency, control of the country’s water supply is high on the agenda for action by champions of the treaty “partnership”. Ngāti Kahungunu and Ngāi Tahu have joined forces in proceedings against ...
What’s the best way to get adults reading? Get them reading when they’re children – and there’s no better place to start than the Unity Children’s Bestseller Chart.AUCKLAND1 Sapiens: A Graphic History, Volume 1, The Birth of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari and David Vandermeulen, and illustrator Daniel Casanave (Jonathon ...
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Rebecca Wadey used to love the wellness industry. Now she doesn’t know who to trust.This story was first published on Ensemble. I love a bit of woo woo.As a former wellbeing editor, I’ve interviewed countless experts on how to achieve a work-life balance and live a life of optimal energy. I’ve ...
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Linda Burgess, who has just spent a fortune on a ball of fluff, reflects on the animals who have left paw prints on her heart.Childhood pets?I don’t come from a particularly animal-loving family and when I was five or six I had to argue persuasively, plead even, to adopt Rastus ...
By Scott Waide in Lae, Papua New Guinea Sir Michael was a man of many titles. He was father, grandfather and chief. As a tribal leader, he was Sana, the peacemaker. His influence and his reputation extended beyond Papua New Guinea’s border to the Pacific and other parts of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anna Howe, Honorary Professor, Department of Sociology, Macquarie University, Macquarie University The Governor General was handed the report of the aged care royal commission on Friday. It will be made public in the coming week. Overlaying its considerations has been Australia’s 909 ...
Another landslide election victory for the left. British Columbia NDP premier John Hogan has won big after calling a snap election.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/bc-election-results-2020-1.5776058
The Greens got and excellent 15.3% in BC, and got 3 seats.
Your link to the results Scott said it was a bad night for the Greens but they came second in many races.
Under MMP the Greens would have got 13 seats.
Labour Day. Lest we forget.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Duncan_Parnell
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism
This is what Labour should be doing in the next 3 years.
Only a very small percentage of roofs have solar power (or at least serious solar) in Wanaka yet in South Australia roof solar was able to provide 77% of the state's power on this day and solar farms the other 23%.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-10-25/all-sa-power-from-solar-for-first-time/12810366
Central government really needs to step up here.
It's bizarre beyond belief that NZ hasn't taken up various solar tech. I can only assume it's part of the rort that happens in the building industry. Not sure why governments haven't been keen, although I guess 9 Key years are obvious. That and few want to mess with the electricity industry (god knows why, if anything needed reform its that).
+100
Market regulator tilts the new home owner against feed-ins.
Is the market regulator tilting against feed-ins, or is the regulator abdicating responsibility and failing to regulate, leaving it all up to the retailer's beneficence in offering anything at all for power fed back in from home systems?
Little difference in practise.
EA has just subbed out the whole idea of sustainable electricity to EECA, and buried it.
It's just on no policy radar anywhere so far as I can tell.
https://www.greens.org.nz/energy_policy
And that's the Greens not understanding economics.
Of course, its what everyone else believes as well despite all the evidence showing competition and the profit motive doesn't bring about the desired results of a better society.
Are you saying that the Greens believe that the path to and for progress and transformation is through market competition?
That does seem to be what they've stated – on many occasions IIRC.
Never mind, I guess I’ll have to ask a member of the Greens to confirm your view of them and interpretation of their path to implementation of their policies.
The whole electricity structure is weighted towards the corporate generators and transmitters.
With the transmitters,the bias is against both small generators (including households) and local generation.
Its a big f/up.
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO2009/S00254/labours-clean-energy-policy-promotes-predatory-investment.htm
Shareholders of privatised electricity companies now have a vested interest in resisting change. Dealing with them will be a good test of this government's resolve. Or lack of it.
solar panels and rain water collection should be mandatory for new home builds. gov also needs to get serious about tyre recycling. private industry is a bust with that. ltsa needs to mandate a recycled tyre component into new road resealing. leaving things like this up to private industry is a nonsense.
Weka and Woodart…..couldn't agree more.
Me too – and what would stop local governments from setting an example?
Wairarapa where I live has four district councils that already work together on some issues. Any region has a community of interests. Every region is concerned about solar power and water use among all the other issues. Let's see regions like mine develop good plans 'pour encourager les autres', which the government is likely to consider supporting.
As our PM has said, leadership is about taking the people with you. If we're to achieve the best of the changes our new world needs, doesn't that responsibility have to work both ways?
to woodart at 3.2 : absolutely agree re solar panels and water reticulation . I with others tried to get compulsory instalment of rain water storage built in to the then beginning explosion of housing around Gulf Harbour instead of bringing piped water along Peninsula.. We had 10.000 gallons under our deck in a modest house.
Big business prevailed even though Rodney and Auckland well aware and concerned about availability of supply.
I also remember discussion probably from a remit at a Labour conference some decades ago in favour of making cheap solar panels available.
please fix your user name on next comment.
Is that comment form field focus problem still not fixed?
Comment starts in the name field and people forget and simply start typing. Once they realise then they switch to the comment field but often forget to fix the name field.
Would probably be best to have it start in the comment field if the plugin supports it.
it used to do that but changed sometime this year I think.
It is standard for WordPress sites to focus on the comment field. No idea why it was changed here.
apparently not, although we seem to go through spates of name typos and then not as many.
It's almost beyond depressing the disincentives toward solar and local generation in New Zealand. Most lines companies are reluctant at best, but they have a problem with networks that were designed to deliver in one direction and that can take a bit of changing. There's also systemic / structural difficulties where the electricity system has been turned from an essential social and economic service to a profit generating industry.
There's a couple of significant regions, Gisborne and Queenstown, that have only one feed from the Grid too, a loss of that feed is a big problem. Gisborne was without power for three days when a topdressing plane took out the line and the consequences of a span or pylon coming down on the Queenstown feed don't bear thinking about. Adequate embedded generation capacity is really handy on so many counts.
A program of dealing with the infrastructure and systematic barriers, and providing financial pathways to household solar, preferably with batteries, would have paybacks in so many areas. Unfortunately this could be a bit tricky as will mean a comprehensive reform of the sector.
Depressing but not surprising. People generating their own power would cut the profits of the shareholders.
Yet another proof that the profit motive brings about the worst possible result as far as society is concerned.
we really should be designing systems with a big quake in mind too.
It wouldn't need a 'big' quake to cause problems on either of those lines. In Gisborne's case they were lucky it was just a span down, if it had taken a pylon as well it would have been a lot longer.
In both situations there's multiple faults that could cause trouble, and quite unstable geology. But the loss of the line for a week would have an impact to a quake, but without the physical damage. We'd still be evacuating a large part of the district.
Yep.
Start off with installing on state housing and then on to those most in need. If those most in need are renting then buy the bloody house.
But can you imagine the complaints from the new private owners of our power grid as their profits go down?
South Australia has much more sunlight than Wanaka.
True-according to the net, which is never wrong, Adelaide has 2774 hours per year compared with Wanaka 2100. But London has only about 1500.
2100 is masses of hours, and solar power is generated even when it is cloudy.
The Labour government needs to make sure first that people actually have roofs over their heads. Solar on the roof is a luxury.
We haven't got time in between weather and other traumas in the precarious 21st century, to refit all the houses that would have been built to 20th century standards. Get the right practical designs (with good drainage sytems – no mediterranean-styled roofs) and systems, now under Labour before the wicked witch or wizard of the west gets back in power by casting a spell over the country!
As woodart says up near 3 – solar panels and rain water collection should be mandatory for new home builds.
I've linked this before…
"Solar power in New Zealand is on the rise, but operates in an entirely free market with no form of subsidies or intervention from the New Zealand Government."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_New_Zealand
"Entirely free market" …that should end.
We should start (as i've said before) Solar Panel Factories…and train Tradies/Apprentices to fit Solar. NOW
Solar is good, but I'm more interested in household wind turbines.
I did a little research and found small turbines, which could be attached to a roof, can generate around 3kw per hour. Living in a windy area that's quite enticing, but there are planning regulations and hoops to jump through, and make it probably not worth the hassle and added costs to the original outlay.
With a smart meter, I see I use on average about 7kw per day, so likely I would not only be energy neutral, but be adding to the national grid. Multiply that by tens of thousands and that's plenty more renewables going in to the system.
What's the deal with being a contributor as far as the power companies are concerned? How much do they still try to milk you for, ie line costs etc…?
got any links for those micro turbines?
Good info page about home wind power, with faq down page
https://www.smarterhomes.org.nz/smart-guides/power-lighting-and-energy-saving/wind-power/
A couple of links
https://www.futureenergy.nz/products/wind_turbines_tecnico.htm
https://www.powerhousewind.co.nz/residential-wind-turbines-off-grid-homes/
Wind mills can be made from smart drive washing machine motors for less than $20.But you will need an electrician to wire it up as it generates 240 volts .
yep…but thought you were talking about ridge line systems…have thought they might be a viable option as standard installation on new builds but havnt come across much about them and thought you may have.
Does the engine have a built in windmill thing..?….I live off-grid so could use one…
Aren't they noisy and a blot on the landscape Al1en?
The big commercial wind farms? Not to me. I'd rather see them all over than coal fired power stations belching carbon. When there's a better way of doing it, they can be taken down.
In an urban setting they're no more unsightly than rusting out satellite dishes.
Its not an entirely free-market as the its owned by profiteering schmucks and they pretty much have veto power over it. Considering that having solar power from private residential premises would cut their profits then they do everything they can to prevent people taking up solar up to, and including, blaming solar installations for rising power price for everyone else (yeah, can't find that article now – was from when National were in power).
It's worse than that Draco as solar power from private residential premises exported is sold next door, or wherever it ends up as Electrons go with the flow at full retail.
The solar export residence get's about 20% of retail and the power industry takes profit from infrastructure it neither owns, maintains and spreads BS about it being bad for the network.
An added kicker is when the grid is down the panels shut down as a safety feature so we get screwed over again.
Not if you run a 12 volt system .
Here are some pics and advice on what is good/bad. From Canada or the USA.
https://greensunnj.com/solar-hall-of-shame/
google keywords that bring up numbers of entries – solar ridge line roof power systems
Which bit?
How green are solar panels over their usable lifetime, compared with hydro?
Hydro involves modifying/wrecking the landscape way too much, as does onshore wind-power, though offshore is much better. (A single wind-farm would wreck the unsullied and wonderful 360 degree views in the Maniototo from near Ophir or from the rail-trail.)
Ideally when we have 8 million people in NZ in 2068 (link below) electricity needs will be 100% met from existing hydro, more efficient use of power, solar and, if necessary, additional wind-farms, but offshore only.
http://archive.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/population/estimates_and_projections/NationalPopulationProjections_MR2016.aspx#gsc.tab=0
That's a very complicated question with a lot of variables for both PV and hydro.
Wikipedia quotes IPCC 2014 for a range (in grams CO2 eq/ kWhr) for PV of 18 to 180, for hydro it's 1.0 to 2200 (compared to coal at 740 to 910). I've seen a lot of stuff indicating producing PV panels has improved dramatically since 2014, so using 2014 figures makes PV look worse than it really is now.
Factors affecting hydro include how much land with vegetation is flooded that then releases methane from the lake, whether the scheme uses a huge dam and stored water or is run of the river through a tunnel or canal, whether dams and canals are concrete or earth construction, how long before reservoirs are silted up, the albedo of the reservoir compared to what was there before (forest, grassland, desert) etc.
Factors affecting PV include how efficient the manufacturing process is, how clean the energy used for production is, the previous albedo of where the PV panels are installed, lifetime of the panels etc.
Big picture takeaway still remains being careful about getting more efficient in necessary uses of energy, and reducing wastage wherever possible is the only emissions-free lunch. Otherwise, all energy supply involves some emissions, it's just a question of how much. In that big picture, for New Zealand, adding PV may well be one of our lower emissions paths.
Personally I'd rather do PV than new hydro, excepting the Onslow-Manorburn proposal which is a storage scheme rather than a new generation scheme.
Beat me to it! Pretty much agree with your above comment here.
The other factor involved in the environmental effects of solar, is the longevity of the technology, and the impacts of the materials used.
IIRC the early PV cells became useless after a few years, but the later silicon cells could last around 25 years. Now the newest technology involves spray on coatings which although cheap and quick to manufacture and replicate are less efficient than the silicon and don't last as long and worse are plastic based.
https://www.solarguide.co.uk/latest-developments-in-solar-photovoltaics#/
Andre-I notice adverse landscape effects don't figure in your world. Now I can see it wasn’t just the WT that put you off the Greens.
Fortunately we have people like Anton Oliver (ex-AB) in the community who helped to stop a wind-farm monstrosity in Central Otago in 2006.
I have driven several times through Spain over the past few years and seen plenty of landscape massively degraded by wind-farms.
Other energy-related highly invasive landscape effects include proposed small-scale hydro that destroy important wild rivers on the West Coast. From memory I think the coalition quashed one such proposal in the last term (ministers Parker/Sage?).
Idiot.
Gabby's question was specifically about how green, which generally means emissions. Hence my answer was focused on emissions.
If any forms of generation that have visible landscape effects are off the table, what is left? Idiot knee-jerk opposition to changes like that are what has kept a lot of coal and gas burning around the world.
I'll limit my comment about your driving around Spain multiple times recently to noting that behaviour like that is a significant contributor to the climate crisis we're dealing with right now.
None of it is green. Some of it is less impactful than others (which is what I think you were asking), but until we move to steady state (including population) we will continue to be driven by over-extraction and climate disrupting tech.
All developed nations could now be mandating passive tech in new builds, thus lowering power consumption. High tech, esp large scale power generation shouldn't be the starting point, it should come after we've used passive tech and reduced demand.
solar panels mostly made up from aluminium and glass, two easily recyclable materials. bloody site greener than flooding land forever.
those materials have to be extracted from somewhere. Theoretically at some point we might reach some kind of close to equilibrium with recycling and manufacture, but not if we keep perpetual growth as our main driver of economics.
Hydro is getting more and more expensive while Wind and Solar are getting cheaper.
There are printable solar panels/coatings now starting to be produced I believe. I've looked at it quite hard and with interest rates where they are just investing in panels using it to cut the daytime use of power out is starting to look better. Any storage is the expensive bit
It's reaching the point where the cost of the panels is becoming less and less of the cost, while regulatory costs, installation, inverters etc are staying high. Storage costs are coming down too, again it's the other associated bits keeping package costs high.
For me, I've got my electricity cost down to $600 – $700 year, so I really don't see value in adding a PV system. Let alone the overhanging trees regularly dropping stuff big enough to damage panels. If I were doing a new build however, getting a new lines connection is so fkn expensive that going off-grid might be close to the same initial cost.
But going on grid would be more beneficial to society especially if it was well planned and maintained.
In other words, going back to a state monopoly that includes the solar panels on private rooves is the only viable option because it would then remove the individualist decision making that fails to do what's needed for society.
+100 the solution is returning it to the people and running it as a single network not the dysfunctional club it currently is.
Bradfords reforms were all about creating a gravy train for the club members and obfuscation so the average punter gives up before they realise it's a con job.
Yes, returning power generation and supply to full public ownership would clear the way for sustainable electricity that most could afford including solar.
Compensation to the current gougers and their captive artificial market could be made over the next 50 years!
storage of energy has always been the $$$ bit. maybe store energy in whingers, always plenty of them!
lol
How would that work?
I don't know, but I've noticed that sometimes you can get more energy out of them than you put in, depending on how they're wound up. Could be a profitable line of research for someone. I'd be willing to put myself forward as a research subject if required.
On AC-DC or something like that.
There are two principle barriers to solar uptake.
The biggest is the housing crisis. Tenants aren't about to put panels on the landlord's house.
The second is cost – NZ pays extraordinary prices for everything, and that weighs the cost benefit equation against solar installation.
I was writing to Pete Hodgson about strategies to lower the entry cost back in 2002 – but he of course thought he knew much better.
One of the enlightened Stuart M thanks, and one of the Pillar Group who want to enable the country to conserve its good things, and prepare for the future known problems. 2002-2020 have we changed, have we any more agency than earlier, or just to be ignored or teased with schemes to keep us quiet? And our politicians, we must bring in a maximum of three terms or we have fat-necked pussies who 'know better' manipulating their electorate or constituency so they manage to stay and stay with dwindling returns to the citizens.
I'll just shove in here some words from Elton John's Song For You because I think they need to be our nation's theme song going further into the 21st century and spell out the way we all need to try to value each other.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSLQnBbA3k0
Mmm – I did use to listen to a bit of Elton John back in the day. But when it comes to the political culture of doing nothing, it's maybe more like Warren Zevon:
You're supposed to sit on your ass and nod at stupid things.
Man, that's hard to do. And if you don't, they'll screw you.
And if you do, they'll screw you, too…
MmmmI guess the thing is to enter into politics and planning with goodwill, go on a quest for the most effective and practical outcomes, and get something done as a result of each plan, even something small!
"The second is cost – NZ pays extraordinary prices for everything, and that weighs the cost benefit equation against solar installation."
and that is exactly why I after doing the sums did not go ahead. Also battery storage technology is still evolving and I would not put in a solar power system without the ability to store the surplus. Instead I bought a hybrid car which is saving me a huge % on my annual car runnin costs – and the car's batteries, when they are not effcient enough for the car, can be recycled to be solar storage batteries. But that is years away.
From, https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/123193640/govt-needs-to-target-our-soaring-cost-of-living
“A $9.5 million house is being built in Christchurch. Shaped like the letter Z, swimming pool and tennis court. When completed, it’s going to be one of the biggest and priciest properties in town. The owner? A director at Foodstuffs South Island and owner of Pak 'n Save Wainoni, one of Christchurch’s poorest areas.”
Everything that is wrong with our economy encapsulated here.
Boris given the Spitting Image treatment.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aDmaWP1tEg
Water meters are good provided that water rates are kept reasonable.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/429175/water-meter-test-runs-in-marlborough-continue-to-throw-up-eye-watering-results
…One property in Havelock has been found using 33,000 litres of water a day, while another is going through 28,000 litres of water a day.
The test results from Renwick showed a house leaking 67,200 litres of water a day.
The council notified owners "as a courtesy" when there was evidence of a significant leak, but it was up to property owners to find and repair them, she said. Some of the 62 properties with leaks were zoned commercial….
Under the new system, residents on water meters could be charged a flat fee of $200 for their first 200 cubic metres of water (200,000 litres). After that, Havelock residents could be charged $1.60 per 1000 litres used….
Properties with "large" leaks of more than 72 litres a day would therefore use at least 92 percent of their base water allocation if they continued without fixing the leak. Havelock residents paid an annual $510 fee at present….
Renwick dealt with water restrictions most summers and salt water could get into Havelock's water if demand jumped and water supplies dropped, as it had three years ago.
Climate change was expected to put more pressure on the aquifer which supplied its water. A sea level rise could see salt entering Havelock's water more often, and higher temperatures could encourage higher water use…
Meters for commercial properties are fine, but not for dwellings. Because it enables right wing councils to charge for water on a policy change without requiring massive infrastructure investment.
Meters also enable landlords to evade costs by making the water bill the tenants' problem, like power or internet.
Why should domestic water wastrels and those too careless to look after their plumbing get to shift the cost of their profligacy onto all the other ratepayers?
IIRC, the law for costs where there are meters is the landlord pays for the fixed parts of the bill and the tenant pays for the variable usage parts of the bill. Here in Dorkland my bill is a fixed wastewater charge of $18.35/month, and because of the drought I've pared my water use down to somewhere around 30 litres/day (1 unit per month). My variable charge is $1.59/month to supply the water and $2.16/month to take it away again after I've filled it with piss and shit.
But we know there are constant efforts to privatise water supplies and stuff it up as royally as every other monopoly that gets privatised.
If regular flow monitoring shows a block or suburb is disproportionately using water, use the regular leak detection protocols to hone in on the cause. But routine monitoring of each household will result in privatisation of water supply, which means more people with skin infections in poor neighbourhoods, sometimes to the point of hospitalisation.
It has never been closely examined whether what ratepayers save in water gets paid by taxpayers via the health system.
All of Orcland is metered and charged by usage, so usage data should be available for any intrepid researcher that wants it.
Do you know of any studies around skin infections or other health problems in NZ being correlated with people feeling they need to not use water because of its cost? It's not something I can recall even hearing a whisper of.
Hell, even Penny Bright (R.I.P.) didn't try that as one of her arguments, and I was always quite impressed at how inventive she could get.
edit: meanwhile, that Auckland is universally metered is usually credited as one of the reasons Aucklanders are claimed to have the lowest per capita water usage of all population centers in NZ.
Watercare is about to take over the whole of Northland's supply as well.
So, together with the Waikato catchment they already supply, they are heading for about 2/5ths of New Zealand on metered and chlorinated and flourided happiness.
Interesting. Do you have any links about that.
You'll have to wait.
But not too long into 2021.
I can't understand why Councils don't look after their own water as part of their services. There should be no separate entity, just a department within the purview of the Council. This splitting up under I suppose neolib disruption just muddies the water, perhaps literally.
The way things are going, it won't be long before Watercare is the water department for all of the north island. Then all of New Zealand. Nationalisation by another route. Bwahahahaha, universal domination.
The best reason for a big organisation like Watercare to do it for the small councils is small councils are often really crap at it. Either they don't spend the money for the equipment and expertise, and produce lousy water quality (for trips around NZ I tend to bring along enough drinking water for my whole trip), or they do spend the money to do it properly and it ends up really expensive because those costs are spread over a small base.
This is back-door way Labour crushes Federated Farmers and Fonterra.
Plenty of public health reasons officially.
But no more fucking around with those morons.
The target is clear.
We are already metered in Whangarei but at 40% more cost than Auckland last time i compared. Hopefully they can pull the price down.
Skin infections are definitely correlated to deprivation index.
We might speculate about that all day, but lowering flow rates to people who can't afford their bill could have something to do with their access to hygiene. The connection is plausible enough that I don't want to touch it with a bargepole.
All of auckland might be metred, but many other towns aren't, and frankly metering is only a precursor to attempted sell-offs.
Not to mention the concept that water is a right, not a commodity.
There are other ways to find heavy water users, if it's a problem. But metering is simply a way to disguise rate hikes for most people.
Mahuta has made a guarantee that there will be no public water privatisation under the reforms.
I think she's trustworthy.
She's also very clear that there aren't many good water providers, so many of them will be amalgamated.
I wrote on this a while back.
Water reforms of all kinds are really kicking off in this new term.
She might be trustworthy, but the next lot? Metering makes it easier for them.
Metering makes sure our common water isn't wasted.
No, it just enables the rich to waste it. Because they can pay for it.
If you want to detect water wastage on the house side of the tap, follow the same procedures for if the pipe leaks on the street side of the tap.
https://envirohistorynz.com/2010/04/17/a-short-history-of-regional-government-in-nz/#more-2188
Whole-farm plans
Catchment boards soon realised that a whole-farm approach was needed when several methods were in use. The farmer had to adopt a mutually agreed ‘farm plan’ over a set period, normally five years.
A farm plan was based on a land capability survey. This divided farmland into eight classes – four arable (crop-growing) and four non-arable. The surveys were first done in 1952.
Engineers vs conservators
The Soil Conservation and Rivers Control Act 1941 linked erosion with flooding. Catchment board staff were river engineers and soil conservators, who often disagreed on how to control flooding.
Some engineers believed that works such as stop banks and stone gabions (rocks inside wire mesh) would control flooding, whereas soil conservators considered that the upper parts of a river catchment should be the focus. Eventually both viewpoints were included in flood control programmes.
https://teara.govt.nz/en/soil-erosion-and-conservation/page-5
Germany continues to be a hostile environment for humane and considerate Jewish people
https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/article/berlin-art-college-withdraws-funding-to-israelis-seeking-to-unlearn-zionism/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=today-on-the-jvl-blog-newsletter-total-articles-for-you_1
Pat I noticed that the article finished with a query. And this piece I have copied has relevance now as the RMA is under change. I am not sure what the effect of that will be. Do you know? People seem approving but will things be no holds barred? The idea of agencies run on business lines such as Watercare doesn't seem to be an automatic outcome of the previous legislation.
Regional councils as we know them today were established in 1989, under the Local Government Amendment Act. Regional council boundaries approximately followed river catchment boundaries. This legislation rationalised the bodies carrying out functions at a regional and local level – reducing the catchment boards and other government bodies that had proliferated over the last century from more than 800 to 86.
The newly created regional councils inherited a range of resource management responsibilities from the existing boards and councils, including for flood and erosion control functions transferred from the catchment boards and planning functions under the Town and Country Planning Act 1977, as well as transport and civil defense functions.
But it was not until 1991, with the enactment of the Resource Management Act, that responsibilities under a cohesive and integrated resource management regime were delegated to regional councils.
But what of the significant challenges that regional councils face, and their ability to fulfill their natural resource management responsibilities in an increasingly challenging environmental landscape? These outstanding questions will be explored in an upcoming post.
"A second irony is evident in the way the Resource Management Bill evolved. The Bill was first developed in the late 1980s under a Labour Government, with Geoffrey Palmer as Minister for the Environment. The Bill was underpinned by the concept of “sustainable development”, based on a concept of balancing economic objectives against environmental objectives (otherwise known as “trade-offs”). However in 1990, before the Bill could be enacted, the Labour government lost power, and a National government took office, with Simon Upton assuming the environmental portfolio. To the surprise of many, Upton decided not to abandon the Bill but instead to review it. As a result of the review, there was a shift from balancing economic and environmental objectives, to that of economic objectives being “constrained” by environmental ones; a shift encompassed in the concept of “sustainable management”, which is fundamental to the purpose of the law (Section 5). As a result, when the Act was passed in 1991, it was, according long-time environmentalist and then-government advisor Guy Salmon, “greener” conceptually than the Bill originally conceived by the more left-leaning Labour government."
https://envirohistorynz.com/2010/03/20/resource-management-law-in-nz-a-potted-history/
And i'm not sure I agree with that assessment….the old catchment boards had a more holistic view and a more environmentally focused response IMO….mind you they operated in a significantly different environment with far less pressure
Why people give any credence toward the USA beats me. What has the US done for the benefit of peace or peaceful co-existence, the only country to unleash a nuclear bomb x 2 murdering millions of civilians.
North Korea, flattened by them in 1950s, did that bring peace?. Vietnam, where the US used chemical weapons manufactured in NZ by Watkins/ Dow and mercenary fighters from around the globe including NZ. Still there are malformed births from Agent Orange. Peace?.
Iraqi, a once A grade country with a stable democracy where people were still alive and had jobs and infrastructure. What a mess. Peace there?. Libya, a democratic country that owed no foreign debt and had a better democracy than most. What another mess. Peace there?.
Left out many other atrocities against other lands by the war-virus that is the USA. a blight on humanity. What has changed, nothing, and nothing will change whilst people give support to this truly evil military regime. Do you?
You've a good example in Iraq, and a lousy one in Korea. Korea asked for US help to avoid the Japanese annexation before 1910, and having been abandoned by the retreating Japanese was only too pleased to resist Stalin's puppet regime. Had the North made a decent country of itself, you'd have a case – but they chose to be despots – deserving even less sympathy than Saddam Hussein. South Korea, in no small part through the sacrifice of Kim Jae-gyu, is a lively independent democracy today.
That's a No then.
You've missed the bit between 1910 and when South Korea was declared a 'lively independent democracy'.
You know the period when more bombs were dropped on North Korea by the US than during the entire World War II Pacific campaign.
For those who are interested in the facts Stuart has conveniently omitted read this.
https://asiatimes.com/2020/06/us-destruction-of-north-korea-must-not-be-forgotten/
Yes, true. First time ever Korea has not been as one.
Brigid I don't know that Stuart was that positive about the USA. Why are you dissing him?
And Stuart – going to the Wikipedia link you put up on Kim Jae-gyu (it is important to get the latter name right! – many Kims), it is a great example of the awful competitive problems all countries can have, with people trying to gain or control power and turn it up or down.
Park was a patriot and a reformer who gradually became a dictator. The man who assassinated him was his old friend, who had no illusions of surviving the act. So Korea survived as neither a US puppet nor a nasty militarized regime – quite an achievement considering the pattern for US-backed strongmen.
Perhaps NZ parliamentarians need to be faced with a sign over the main doors – 'We don't promise you a rose garden'. Or with the malevolent sarcasm of the Nazi use of 'Work will set you free' a notice that 'Serving your country whether in the army or as a politician may cost you your life'.
I don't think that NZ pollies, especially from the right side, expect to front up to such ideological traumas as the South Korean you referred to. Having the ability to change pollies, and their civil service heads, prevents power concreting to the absolute corruption level.
Finding balance is the task it seems, between constant change with no long term responsibility for good planning and decisions, and the ability of the agile villain to appeal long-term to the infantile, lurking dissenter inside many, who will accept corruption as smart organising if the PR is plausible.
Yes, dead right – the abiding virtue of democracy, from a political science point of view, is that is allows peaceful transfers of power.
When democracy becomes as distorted as it has in the US under Trump however, it is no longer certain that this is possible, or that a peaceful process that accommodates Trumpism is preferable to a Heimlich manoeuvre that expels him forcefully from America's political throat.
Assassination has removed much better presidents than Trump.
Greywarshark please pull your head in. Your attempts at peace keeper are uninvited and arrogant.
Oh dear did I step on your toes. I don't want to see things misrepresented by people with a bias and quick fingers on the keys.
Yes, a lot of bombs were dropped.
It was the North that attacked however, first on their own, then, after they were repulsed, with Chinese support. The world is awash in examples of unjustified US interventions – but Korea is not one of them – which is why NZ troops were there to teach the locals this, which they call yeon ga.
One must be extraordinarily undiscriminating to endorse the North Korean regime.
The world is awash in examples of unjustified US interventions – but Korea is not one of them
???
That is an absurd statement.
Because …?
When will you learn to make a compelling argument that goes beyond simple adjectives and mere reckons? None of your comments today contains any original input from you, no thought, no argument, no reason(ing) except for adjectives such as “absurd”, “repulsive”, or “brilliant”. Wow!
What are you going to ‘enlighten’ us with next, a GIF?
I have written on this forum many, many carefully argued critiques of radio dramas, TV shows, films, political speeches, political campaigns, etc. If you think that that extreme right wing racist casino billionaire who funds Trump's campaign is anything other than "repulsive", then you can enlighten us as to exactly why.
Do you think Evo Morales's performance on the Daily Show was not brilliant? Why not? The audience and the host were obviously deeply impressed by him. Was I wrong to point out that extremely rare quality in a political leader?
Your point about my use of the word "absurd" to dismiss Stuart's post is well taken. I apologise to Stuart and everyone else for my lazy and reductive putdown.
A well-written critique is more than a few adjectives leading to a superficial judgement.
When you use certain adjectives to describe your view of people without stating the reason, it becomes a shallow throwaway comment that offers no insight(s) and no point of connection with others who might read your comment. You might as well say that you hated Brussels sprouts when you were young, which may be 100% true, but it does not make for debate because we cannot discuss personal taste; all it does is saying something about you.
I hope you’re getting it because asking me to argue with you why those adjectives may not apply is putting the onus on me and asking me about my taste. For the record, I love Brussels sprouts, but I don’t know why.
Well said. A palpable hit, sir!
It wasn’t a hit, it was a challenge to you to lift your game here. Why do you act like a recalcitrant and petulant child?
Apart from those poor sods who were gassed by the dictator who ruled through fear and violence
Yeah, 'cause the brotherly leader Gadaffy Duck's third international theory wasn't brought down by widespread corruption and unemployment, by the people who were no longer fooled by cults of personality.
That's a No then.
Of course, I meant a Yes then.
Don't know what you're talking about with the 'no' and 'yes' thing – I just pointed out a couple of gaping holes in your claims of Iraqi and Libyan peaceful democracies nonsense, but if you want to attribute something else you think I meant with that correction, so be it.
Libya was the most secular of the arab states…women had full equality of access to the education that was free to post-graduate level… there was universal free healthcare…when couples married they were given a house to live in..and $40,000 u.s. to help them on their way…gaddaffi was wiped out because he was setting up a new pan arab/african bank….this was obamas' war-crime..it is now a fundamentalist hellhole..
I'm guessing you know what democracy means, so you'll also know that
Political parties were banned in Libya from 1972 until the removal of Gaddafi's government, and all elections were nonpartisan under law
doesn't really fit in to any definition of the word.
It's a simple google search for Libyan democracy and located in the first hit. Basic stuff really.
I am not saying gaddaffi was perfect…but everything I said about life in Libya for libyans is true..and also the reason for his overthrow…is all true….u CD google that….and life in Libya is better now..is it..?..that was good that obama did..?..was it..?…to give h.clark her due in this..she refused to play along with the charade…
It is hard to know what you are saying when having to guess the bits you have cut out of your reply.
Whether you're right, or not, about life in the jamahiriya is up for debate, but fair democracy happening in Libya under Gaddafi's just isn't.
Latest Pie
Where is that rail link when you want it?
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/429166/project-forces-main-road-to-auckland-airport-to-temporarily-shut
The main road to Auckland Airport will be shut for five consecutive nights this week, from Tuesday to Sunday.
Right down the middle of that road if there was any justice.
That was how the trams used to be in Auckland. I rode on them when small. There was a narrow island platform which you crossed the road to stand on, they trundled along according to their timetable, you got on and paid the conductor – sitting on simple slat wooden seats. At certain points, the driver had to change his power pole to travel on another line, pulling down against a spring, and swinging it to connect onto the new line. Then off we would go, and at the other end the pole would be pulled down and the one at the other end would drive back retracing the route. (It was probably the same as the Christchurch one reinstalled on the initiative of John Britten.)
Indeedly. Auckland is still not back up to the number of public transit trips per year before the trams were ripped out. https://www.greaterauckland.org.nz/2015/06/01/aucklands-old-tram-maps-modernised/
Thanks for the memory greywarshark. I remember the trams as a kid too. In the school holidays mums took us kids into Queen St. for a few hours on the roof of Farmers in Albert St., where we were left careering around in toy cars and crashing into one another as often as we could while said mums went off to do their shopping on the lower floors. Then it was sandwiches and cream buns for lunch in the cafetaria and back down to Queen St to catch the tram home. Good days them.
Edit: Maybe that is why we’re such a car obsessed nation. 😉
And Hector. 🙂
Oh yes, beloved Hector the parrot. When one carked it, they would replace with another that looked the same. We kids were none the wiser.
That sounds lovely Anne. I went up to the glassed in? Farmers top lounge or whatever too. And rode in the Farmers bus.
Nostalgic childhood events. You might like this.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AN3QPt0eMVc
Twyford in Stuff says NZInfra decision immanent.
Though I suspect we should wait until an actual government is formed again.
Link please. There was a premature article about that last week.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/local-democracy-reporting/300139063/twyford-denies-claims-government-is-backing-nz-infras-light-rail-proposal
That is the follow-up article the day after Stuff's initial one, yes. Both many days ago now.
Interested to hear which one Ad was referring to.
Ad is well connected; it might not be in MSM yet.
That link is only 5 days old.
When I see someone write "Twyford in Stuff says" I expect it means in that publication – and today, not 5 or 6 days ago.
Here is the initial article, for completeness: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300137382/election-2020-nz-super-fund-closes-in-on-billiondollar-auckland-light-rail-deal
And Twyford's response:
If Ad is well-connected, then no doubt we will hear an update.
We'll all get updated once there's a Cabinet meeting with a new Cabinet.
From Twyford's answer to the Stuff article they already have the MoT advice they need and are just waiting for a chance to ratify at Cabinet: "It is our policy to press ahead…"
Note the commentary from NZTA's CE that their head of light rail has left.
https://eminetra.co.nz/2020-elections-nz-super-fund-closes-to-1-billion-auckland-light-rail-contract/52242/
Very weird that Twyford is being quoted before the new Cabinet positions are set. At minimum it means either PM and Min Finance are totally on board, or the sources in the article are stale.
Latter is v unlikely.
Or Stuff is being used to apply pressure by other players. The business case will be interesting reading, especially if Twyford has prioritised a fast trip to the airport for politicians and executives over frequent street-level connections and lower cost.
No other players are being invited.
And given this procurement is such a mess, no others would want to.
Players within agencies, or parties.
There are interesting anomalies in how women and men get treated FTTT. I hope sex-change aspirants and wannabes understand that. This is a new variant.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/429187/australia-demands-answers-after-passengers-strip-searched-at-doha-airport
Two passengers from QR908 both told the ABC they had no idea what was happening to them when all women on the plane were asked to get off after a three-hour delay on 2 October….
It had been due to leave Hamad International Airport (HIA) in Doha at 8:30pm local time but was delayed for three hours after a premature baby was found in a bathroom at the terminal – a detail confused passengers said was not communicated to them…
One of the women said all adult females were removed from the plane by authorities and taken to two ambulances waiting outside the airport.
"No-one spoke English or told us what was happening. It was terrifying," she said.
"There were 13 of us and we were all made to leave. A mother near me had left her sleeping children on the plane.
"There was an elderly woman who was vision impaired and she had to go too. I'm pretty sure she was searched."
…"Medical professionals expressed concern to officials about the health and welfare of a mother who had just given birth and requested she be located prior to departing [the airport]."
Qatar Airways have not yet responded to a request for comment.
The mother of the baby has not been located…
…"When I got in there, and there was a lady with a mask on and then the authorities closed the ambulance behind me and locked it," she said.
"They never explained anything.
"She told me to pull my pants down and that I needed to examine my vagina.
"I said 'I'm not doing that' and she did not explain anything to me. She just kept saying, 'we need to see it we need to see it'."
The woman said she took her clothes off and was inspected, and touched, by the female nurse….
Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne confirmed today that the women had contacted the Australian government at the time of the incident and that the government has formally raised concerns with Qatar….
"The advice that has been provided indicates that the treatment of the women concerned was offensive, grossly inappropriate, and beyond circumstances in which the women could give free and informed consent.
"It is not something I have ever heard of occurring in my life, in any context.
A very mild comment from the Australian government when this was an assault on their nationals.
There is the problem in Australia where the uptake on solar is large. It means the costs of maintaining the wider system is borne by a smaller and less moneyed section of the community. As more become self sufficient on energy the more the poorer sections of the community bear the cost of the network.
DanS This should be up with the solar thread, which is about No.7 and pressing a Reply button there would have put it by the other solar comments.
It seems after reading your comment that falling profit and fewer numbers will result in companies selling out, and a monopoly left which would be the opposite to the governments intention to provide competition. The govt will have to buy back the electricity company/ies so government can run them with reasonable charges concentrating on a cost-recovery basis.
Some compromises are needed here I think. The elderly have more time and energy than those working and with family and care responsibilities, to think about and demand what they want and continue in the same vein. We have the same people writing to the paper here for many decades mostly with complaints.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/ldr/429190/gisborne-district-council-lifts-block-on-prolific-writer-of-emails
"I make no apologies for being persistent," Millar said, noting he was a marina berth-holder at the time.
He had been emailing the council over a reduction in car parking at the inner harbour, and said he was stopped from further alerting councillors to "pertinent issues".
"This was just a smokescreen to cover the stuff that I had been trying to portray."
89 pages of correspondence
However, GDC internal partnerships director James Baty said it had 89 pages worth of correspondence with Millar about the inner harbour, dating back to 2011, and despite being advised he was an unreasonable complainant on 14 February, and being blocked from the council's Facebook page, Millar continued making contact with elected members and staff for another two months.
"At this point his email address was blocked," Baty said.
Interesting about the USA deporting Marshall Islanders back home and why.
Sounds like Australians deporting NZs home.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/429192/us-deportations-likely-up-in-fy2020
[Marshall Islands Attorney-General] Hickson said US authorities had requested the 33 be given an exemption to return to the Marshalls.
But he said local authorities informed the US that the border remained closed until further notice because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
A total of 202 Marshallese were deported from the US during the seven-year period from FY2013 to FY2019, an average of 29 per year.
Crimes for which Marshallese are deported include violence such as sexual assault and murder as well as fraud involving money theft or failing to appear for scheduled court hearings.
About the Islands:
There is a population of around 50,000.
The Compact of Free Association allows them to freely relocate to the United States and obtain work there. A large concentration of about 4,300 Marshall Islanders have relocated to Springdale, Arkansas,.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Islands#Demographics
The Republic of the Marshall Islands is now a sovereign state in free association with the United States….
During World War II, the United States took control of the islands from Japan (which governed them as part of the South Pacific Mandate) in the 1944 Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign. The US military conducted nuclear testing on Bikini Atoll in 1946 through 1958.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Islands%E2%80%93United_States_relations
Chileans gone cool on their constitution.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/429195/chileans-vote-to-tear-up-constitution
Proper rejection of neoliberalism at last.
Suspect Labour will end up closer to 51% than 50% after Specials … acknowledged expert Graeme Edgler guesses 49.9% … I think that’s too low.
(Only proviso … that no-one has mentioned afaik … is the uncertain implications arising from the unique disparity in 2020 between Advanced & Election Day Party Support)
Graeme Edgeler put some meat on the bone for us to chew on.
https://publicaddress.net/legalbeagle/election-20-the-special-votes/
@swordfish 20
Do you think the disparity between advanced party votes and Election Day party votes is due to the demographic differences? Older more conservative voters with longstanding election habits voting on polling day while other voters were happy to vote early?
.
Possibly … but bear in mind that if that demographic rationale is correct then it should've applied in 2017 too … and yet the Advance vs Election Day differences were minimal in that Election.
Just over 1 million Advanced Votes in 2017 (compared to just under 1.7 m in 2020):
Labour 1.7 points higher in Advance Voting vs Election Day (2017) but a massive 6 points higher in Advance Voting 2020.
National 1.1 lower in Advance compared to Election Day (2017) but a significant 5 points down (2020).
The extra 700k Advanced Votes in 2020 can’t account for that massively increased disparity …
So, there's probably something else going on.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/10/06/earlier-universe-existed-big-bang-can-observed-today/An earlier universe existed before the Big Bang, and can still be observed today, says Nobel winner
Sir Roger Penrose: 'The Big Bang was not the beginning. There was something before, and that something is what we will have in our future'
Isn't that great. The scientists and world-moulders have even more reasons to not look around them. Our planet is so boring, they've seen all they want to they say peevishly and in their blase' way they leave us coping with our own filth and bacteria and fungi which we now find are at the basis of life and death. So let's wallow in earth and leave the elevated minds to destroy themselves in space, as long as they leave our earth to us.
In the year 2525 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izQB2-Kmiic
(The song was recorded primarily in one take in 1968, at a studio in a cow pasture in Odessa, Texas. Members of the Odessa Symphony also participated in the recording.
Artists: Denny Zager & Rick Evans – acoustic guitars & vocals (It went to No.1 on both sides of the Atlantic and they never had another near hit. Outer space man.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Year_2525