Open mike 28/03/2023

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 28th, 2023 - 256 comments
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256 comments on “Open mike 28/03/2023 ”

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  1. Ed1 1
    27 March 2023 at 6:11 pm

    A neighbouring property (rental, operated through a property manager) that has a tree on the boundary that is infested with Old Mans Beard, which spreads to neighbouring properties. Some years ago I complained to the Regional Council who were going to send a notice requiring work to be done to remove it. I understand that this inconsistent with maximising profit on rental properties, and that a past government removed the ability to require large infestations to be removed. It seems to me that local Councils should be in a good position to either require removal or pay for it being removed. Would this need legislation to enable it to happen?

    [TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]

    • Barfly 1.1
      28 March 2023 at 3:07 pm

      Move this to open mike?

    • Belladonna 1.2
      28 March 2023 at 7:04 pm

      In Auckland, if something is listed as a noxious weed, the Council will automatically notify the home-owner to have it removed. And, if it's not done, remove it themselves, and charge the home-owner.

      It’s under the by-laws IIRC.

      Amusingly, I've had to report the Council to itself on several occasions, for noxious weed infestations…..

  2. SPC 2
    28 March 2023 at 6:30 am

    After Brexit and the withdrawal of the UK from the EU – post empire European entanglement, it was supposed to begin a new era for the island, going it alone.

    However it seems to be re-discovering its imperial roots – it's as if the empire granted citizenship to the empire. The FTA's with Oz and Enzed and a base for its nuclear subs in Perth and Queensland.

    So the empire refuses to sunset, and it's now Urdu in the north and Hindi in the south of Britain.

    In 2016, Yousaf took his oath of allegiance in the Scottish parliament in Urdu while wearing a kilt, and he has referred to himself as coming from a bhangra and bagpipes heritage.

    Scotland voted against independence by 55 percent to 45 percent in 2014. Britain's vote to leave the EU two years later when most Scots wanted to stay, and Scotland's handling of the coronavirus pandemic, brought new support for independence.

    However, an opinion poll this month showed the backing for independence dropped to 39 percent, or 46 percent when don't knows are excluded. That compares with a record 58 percent in 2020.

    Asked if the British government would grant permission for Yousaf to hold an independence referendum, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's spokesperson said its position had not changed, and people's priorities were healthcare and the economy rather than a new vote on secession.

    https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2023/03/humza-yousaf-wins-race-to-be-scotland-s-next-leader-vowing-to-revive-independence.html

    Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said: We encourage him to govern for all of Scotland and abandon his divisive plans to push independence relentlessly as the self-styled First Activist

    As the main opposition party, we will hold Humza Yousaf to account when he lets the Scottish people down.

    Unfortunately, we have serious concerns about his ability. For the good of Scotland, we hope he does not lurch from failure to failure as he did when he was Nicola Sturgeon's health secretary, justice secretary and transport minister.

    https://www.holyrood.com/news/view,humza-yousaf-wins-snp-leadership

  3. roblogic 3
    28 March 2023 at 7:40 am

    In two minds about this one. Seems that Auckland Council have chickened out after seeing the mobs of last weekend. I don't support Julian Batchelor by any means but he has a right to express his (wrong) opinions.

    IMO this would have been a much more positive protest – ref. the footage from Orewa

    https://twitter.com/AotearoaLib/status/1640254611809517568?s=20

    • arkie 3.1
      28 March 2023 at 8:26 am

      Mr Bachelor could do with learning our history. Here Hayward Romana attempts to educate him on the partnership written into te Tiriti:

      https://twitter.com/AotearoaLib/status/1640204141816610817

      • RedLogix 3.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 9:28 am

        From the govts own site:

        Article the first [Article 1]

        The Chiefs of the Confederation of the United Tribes of New Zealand and the separate and independent Chiefs who have not become members of the Confederation cede to Her Majesty the Queen of England absolutely and without reservation all the rights and powers of Sovereignty which the said Confederation or Individual Chiefs respectively exercise or possess, or may be supposed to exercise or to possess over their respective Territories as the sole sovereigns thereof.

        Article the second [Article 2]

        Her Majesty the Queen of England confirms and guarantees to the Chiefs and Tribes of New Zealand and to the respective families and individuals thereof the full exclusive and undisturbed possession of their Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties which they may collectively or individually possess so long as it is their wish and desire to retain the same in their possession; but the Chiefs of the United Tribes and the individual Chiefs yield to Her Majesty the exclusive right of Preemption over such lands as the proprietors thereof may be disposed to alienate at such prices as may be agreed upon between the respective Proprietors and persons appointed by Her Majesty to treat with them in that behalf.

        Article the third [Article 3]

        In consideration thereof Her Majesty the Queen of England extends to the Natives of New Zealand Her royal protection and imparts to them all the Rights and Privileges of British Subjects.

        If indeed "partnership (is) written into te Tiriti" you have to admit it is not explicit.

        It is a matter of record that the first use of the word "partnership" arises from Lord Robin Cooke in 1987:

        In 1987, Cooke delivered the judgment of the Court of Appeal in the landmark case of New Zealand Maori Council v Attorney-General, which sought to clarify what Parliament meant by section 9 of the State Owned Enterprises Act 1986. The Act stated "Nothing in this act shall permit the Crown to act in a manner that is inconsistent with the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi", but what those principles might be was left to the courts to decide. The principles elicited by President Cooke gave legal recognition to the special relationship between the Crown and Maori. Cooke held that "the Treaty created an enduring relationship of a fiduciary nature akin to a partnership, each party accepting a positive duty to act in good faith, fairly, reasonably and honourably towards the other". This principle of partnership continues to shape the legal relations between the Crown and Maori to this day.

        (Emphasis mine).

        Now while the duty of the Crown and Maori "to act in a spirit of good faith, fairly and reasonably toward each other is unquestionably a good one – it is not clear this somehow rises to the idea that both parties are equals.

        As a citizen of NZ I might expect the State to act toward me in good faith, reasonably and fairly. There is clearly some kind of relationship between us, maybe even akin to a partnership with both parties having different rights and responsibilities – but I am certainly not a sovereign individual with whom the Crown must negotiate as an equal.

        Nor is it clear exactly who the parties in a hypothetical Crown – Maori partnership might actually be. In the case of the Crown it is obvious, but exactly who are "Maori"? It cannot mean individual Maori, for this would instantly degenerate into the notion of the sovereign citizen and I am fairly sure no-one sane wants to go there. In practice it seems to mean the the various tribal iwis whose leaders – largely unelected and hereditary roles – are now each and every one being treated as equals to the New Zealand State. Sovereign citizens again, but only for a tiny select few.

        And if instead if by Maori you mean the iwis as tribal collectives and corporations does this mean Maori are effectively subjects (or employees) of their ancestoral iwi and not the New Zealand state? Or can a Maori claim both citizenship of both the NZ state and an iwi – or indeed several iwis? From a structural perspective treating a democratic nation state and a multiplicity of tribal iwi as equal sovereigns – all of whom get to negotiate with each other as equals all the while taking into consideration the interests of the remaining 85% or more of the population – seems a messy proposition at best.

        Safe to say that while the idea of a 'partnership between equals' and thus restoring at least some their pre-European power and status might well appeal to the iwi chiefs and elites – the claim this revolutionary constitutional change should be imposed on everyone else with No Debate seems – familiar somehow.

        • SPC 3.1.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 9:46 am

          Robin Cooke was later a member of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The only Commonwealth judge in the past century to sit in the Appellate Committee of the House of Lords on United Kingdom appeals.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Cooke,_Baron_Cooke_of_Thorndon

          A proponent of natural law (in public law matters) – common law and equitable doctrines

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equity_(law)

          Perhaps the issue is that the courts are to see the Crown and Maori as partners. Thus the government of the day and the Maori of the time (and or those making legal claim on their behalf) are the active representatives of these two parties.

        • arkie 3.1.1.2
          28 March 2023 at 9:49 am

          Te Tiriti o Waitangi is the first immigration document of Aotearoa, enabling non-Māori to settle in this country. A partnership between the two races was formed on February 6, 1840, when rangatira from some (but not all) iwi and representatives of the Crown signed the foundational document.

          Rangatira Māori signed Te Tiriti o Waitangi with the aspirational vision of a partnership where they would continue to self-govern and maintain mana over their lands and people. Instead of cohabitation, the Crown opted to conquer and usurp iwi and hapū, and for generations since, Māori have been calling on the Crown to hold up their side of the deal.

          https://thespinoff.co.nz/atea/06-02-2022/what-does-it-mean-to-be-tangata-tiriti

          This is clearly stated in your quote:

          Her Majesty the Queen of England confirms and guarantees to the Chiefs and Tribes of New Zealand and to the respective families and individuals thereof the full exclusive and undisturbed possession of their Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties which they may collectively or individually possess so long as it is their wish and desire to retain the same in their possession.

          The Chiefs and Tribes of New Zealand and respective families and individuals are one party, and the Queen of England is the other.

          The Tribunal was setup to remedy the decades and decades of the state ignoring it's obligations in the Tiriti. That it is relatively recent is to our shame and not a reason to deny the responsibilities of the state had to guarantee to Māori the full exclusive and undisturbed possession of their Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties which they may collectively or individually possess.

          • RedLogix 3.1.1.2.1
            28 March 2023 at 9:54 am

            I am a member of an iwi. Does this make me an equal partner with the Crown?

            • arkie 3.1.1.2.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 9:59 am

              The Crown has an obligation to guarantee you the full exclusive and undisturbed possession of [your] Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties which [you] may collectively or individually possess. If that hasn't been done, you have a claim for the Waitangi Tribunal. In that case you would be considered an equal partner with the Crown.

              • SPC …
                28 March 2023 at 10:18 am

                The other party in any court case. Others, not Maori can be in the same circumstance.

                In consideration thereof Her Majesty the Queen of England extends to the Natives of New Zealand Her royal protection and imparts to them all the Rights and Privileges of British Subjects.

              • RedLogix …
                28 March 2023 at 10:18 am

                Let's go back to Robin Cooke's words – which unlike a media article – is the actual source of this 'partnership' notion:

                an enduring relationship of a fiduciary nature akin to a partnership, each party accepting a positive duty to act in good faith, fairly, reasonably and honourably towards the other.

                Te Runanga and Wharekauri Rekohu v Attorney-General [1993]

                I think we might agree that while this are fine sentiments, why would they apply to the Crown Maori relationship only? Surely this should also describe the relationship the Crown has with all of it's subjects?

                Why do I get to be treated as a special class of sovereign equal to the Crown? And how do we square away the strong inference that a special relationship between the Crown and one class of citizens – makes all other citizens second class?

                • SPC …
                  28 March 2023 at 10:26 am

                  The second is connected to the third

                  In consideration thereof Her Majesty the Queen of England extends to the Natives of New Zealand Her royal protection and imparts to them all the Rights and Privileges of British Subjects.

                  The distinction in the second in regard to iwi was because they had chieftainship over their lands in 1840.

                • arkie …
                  28 March 2023 at 10:31 am

                  Because Māori already had full exclusive and undisturbed possession of their Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties which they may collectively or individually possess before the arrival of the Crown. Prior to te Tiriti Māori had immense trouble with settlers: British law did not extend to controlling unruly British subjects in New Zealand. (https://teara.govt.nz/en/treaty-of-waitangi/page-1). Part of the purpose of te Tiriti was to bring these subjects under the Crowns control.

                  There's not a strong inference of second class citizenship; there could only be a treaty between the original owner/occupiers of the land and the Crown.

                  • SPC …
                    28 March 2023 at 10:33 am

                    Did Maori have any concept/recognition of individual ownership of

                    Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries (and other) property

                    in 1840?

                    Thus the use of the words “and other”.

                    • arkie …
                      28 March 2023 at 10:38 am

                      collectively or individually

                    • SPC …
                      28 March 2023 at 10:51 am

                      In areas of iwi chieftainship there was no concept of individual land ownership.

                      Individual property would have been in other areas.

                      Would that not have been covered under article 3?

                      On from Article 2

                      Article 3

                      In consideration thereof Her Majesty the Queen of England extends to the Natives of New Zealand Her royal protection and imparts to them all the Rights and Privileges of British Subjects.

                    • arkie …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:10 am

                      Article 2 has two interpretations, in the accepted Māori version practices and customs (all treasured things) were protected:

                      Article Two

                      Māori: confirmed and guaranteed the chiefs ‘te tino rangatiratanga’ – the exercise of chieftainship – over their lands, villages and ‘taonga katoa’ – all treasured things. Māori agreed to give the Crown a right to deal with them over land transactions.

                      English: confirmed and guaranteed to the chiefs ‘exclusive and undisturbed possession of their lands and estates, forests, fisheries, and other properties’. The Crown sought an exclusive right to deal with Māori over land transactions.

                      https://teara.govt.nz/en/treaty-of-waitangi/page-2

                      An interesting paper on the pre-1940 conceptions:

                      The notion of law does not fit well with pre-1840 Māori customs, rules, values and ideologies. Law is fundamentally expressed in written form and is designed to be certain and rigid. It is often linked to the state and enforced by an external authority. These characteristics of law were not present in pre-1840 Māori day-to-day life.

                      …

                      Before defining the core values underpinning tikanga, it must be noted that a perfect picture will never be painted when trying to give Māori concepts an English definition.

                      Rangatira had chieftanship over a territory; sounds like individual ownership of a sort:

                      Hapū lived under the influence of a ruling or principal rangatira and several less influential rangatira. The mana of a principal rangatira could lie over his territory (ancestral lands), and in some instances over other hapū living within his territory.

                      https://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-Bid001Kahu-t1-g1-t1.html

                    • SPC …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:18 am

                      Well, the recognition of rangitira having individual ownership of collective iwi/hapu property did Maori no good.

                    • arkie …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:26 am

                      It may not have been had the Crown upheld it's responsibilities:

                      Occasionally the government chose to ignore the treaty altogether. For example, the government succumbed to pressure from the New Zealand Company and validated its dubious purchases of Māori land to found the city of Wellington.

                      Māori views of the treaty

                      Many Māori doubted that the Crown would uphold its obligations under the treaty. Those doubts were confirmed in the first decade after the treaty was signed. A ‘protector of aborigines’, appointed by the government to defend Māori interests, became compromised by acting as a land-purchase negotiator. The position was abolished in 1846. In 1847 concerns that the Crown might seize uncultivated Māori land prompted an appeal from Waikato chief Te Wherowhero to Queen Victoria. Her assurance that treaty guarantees would be honoured was delivered to Māori by Governor George Grey.

                      https://teara.govt.nz/en/treaty-of-waitangi/page-3

                      Governor Thomas Gore Browne hoped to convince Māori leaders to support his actions in Taranaki and reject the Māori King movement. He called a conference of chiefs at Kohimarama, Auckland, in mid-1860. Over three weeks Te Tiriti o Waitangi was presented and explained to at least 200 chiefs, including many who had signed it. The chiefs discovered that they had differing understandings of the treaty. Finally they passed a unanimous resolution, the Kohimarama covenant, which both recognised the Crown’s sovereignty and confirmed chiefly rangatiratanga.

                      The Kohimarama resolution was similar to a formal ratification of the treaty. The government promised to hold further conferences to discuss sharing power, but no more were held. The chiefs who attended the conference expected to play a greater part in decision-making, but they were to be disappointed.

                      …

                      The treaty’s promised protection of Māori land rights was ignored by successive governments. By 1870 almost the entire South Island had been alienated from Māori. The Native Land Court (later the Māori Land Court) converted tribally owned Māori land rights into Crown-granted titles, making the land easier to sell. By the early 1890s around two-thirds of the North Island had also been alienated, and land loss continued through the 19th and 20th centuries.

                      https://teara.govt.nz/en/treaty-of-waitangi/page-4

                    • RedLogix …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:38 am

                      The reason why Maori had no sense of individual title was simply because they only occupied it collectively by right of iwi conquest – or local warlords to give them a more accurate historic description.

                      There was literally no practical sense in which an individual Maori could lay claim to land and hope defend it against the next waka that paddled around the headland.

                      This being the common state of affairs for much of human history.

                    • arkie …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:51 am

                      Māori entered into a treaty with the international warlord who sailed round the world and then the headland, seeking to conquer by ignoring said treaty. Such is the way of colonisation.

                    • RedLogix …
                      28 March 2023 at 6:28 pm

                      @arkie

                      Well said international warlord also brought an end to the local warlords slaughtering each other, and ultimately imposed a new system of legal land title – hitherto unknown to Maori – that gave them for the first time in their history, security of occupancy and the right to buy and sell land without resort to bloodshed. I see that as a fairly good deal in the grand scheme of things.

                      That like all things human and politic, this process fell short of ideal is a matter of history, and is the reason why the Treaty Settlement process has been broadly accepted across NZ society.

                      It is the relitigating the Treaty into something it never was, into the pursuing the claim of iwi as independent separate sovereignties – each one of them a partner with the NZ state is something quite different again.

            • SPC 3.1.1.2.1.2
              28 March 2023 at 10:05 am

              No. The term partner would only apply as such, to individuals and families, as part of an iwi with recognised chieftainship – with the collective of those iwi as the Treaty partner.

              Thus the iwi settlement process since the 1990’s.

              • RedLogix …
                28 March 2023 at 10:39 am

                OK so that is more reasonable – but now places the spotlight on the nature of what an iwi is.

                For a start how do we determine it's membership? What about Maori who might lay claim to several iwi – or if they are the descendents of the slave classes – none at all? How do we square away the reality that iwi chiefs are largely hereditary roles bequeathed by whakapapa with only the most opaque means of democratic accountability?

                And taking your next logical step, where you have characterised the Maori partner as the 'collective of all iwi' seems reasonable – yet conspicuously the Waitangi Tribunal rarely operates in this manner – all of it's negotiations and settlements have to my knowledge been with individual iwi and hapu.

                Nor is it clear the iwi chiefs would agree with your interpretation here. Yes pan-tribal entities like the NZ Maori Council have long existed – but I see no sign that iwi leaders have ceded anything to them.

                The question of whether the Maori 'partner' might be granular to the level of the individual, hapu, iwi or some collective of iwi has created for the Waitangi Tribunal a great deal of procedural and legal delay in sorting out exactly who they should be negotiating with. Especially with overlapping claims.

                In the political arena it seems to create an entirely unworkable tribal tangle.

                • SPC …
                  28 March 2023 at 11:07 am

                  all of it's negotiations and settlements have to my knowledge been with individual iwi and hapu.

                  Well Article 2 was as per iwi having chieftainship over their lands. Thus now iwi representatives acting with chieftainship.

                  The collective is in how they each operate in relationship with government in the same way. Currently a Waitangi Tribunal process.

                  The Crown is now represented, not by a Governor, but by a representative government (these come and go). Things change.

                  The question of whether the Maori 'partner' might be granular to the level of the individual, hapu, iwi or some collective of iwi has created for the Waitangi Tribunal a great deal of procedural and legal delay in sorting out exactly who they should be negotiating with. Especially with overlapping claims.

                  And there are periods in which election contests are held and then parties talk about coalition government. The process is messy. In our system we operate based on precedent and then legislative adjustment and new precedent …

                  In the political arena it seems to create an entirely unworkable tribal tangle.

                  The WT process and MMP are preparing us for compliance with UN Rights of Indigenous Peoples

                  The Australians have worked out to grant the indigenous sovereign status

                  the right to be consulted and to give advice on matters of government

                  • RedLogix …
                    28 March 2023 at 11:19 am

                    I can understand the parallel with MMP negotiations, but those are between democratically elected parties that are ultimately accountable to Parliament and the people who elect them. The situation is not quite the same with hereditary iwi.

                    I think we can rule out individuals as the "Maori partner" as simply unworkable in any political sense. If nothing else it degenerates into ‘sovereign citizens’. The same for hapu – just far too many of them. Equally I think we can rule out assimilating iwi into a singular political entity. So we safely conclude the Maori partner is the iwi and their leadership. All thirteen or so of them – each one a singular and equal partner with the Crown and all other iwi.

                    So now we are talking about a political structure that consists of at least fourteen separate sovereign entities, all with equal status and power – the vast majority of which are not obviously democratically accountable. Does that cover it off?

                    • SPC …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:25 am

                      So we safely conclude the Maori partner is the iwi and their leadership. All thirteen or so of them – each one a singular and equal partner with the Crown and all other iwi.

                      So now we are talking about a political structure that consists of at least fourteen separate sovereign entities, all with equal status and power – the vast majority of which are not obviously democratically accountable. Does that cover it off?

                      Sure, except they would be consulted via a singular forum (to create the concept of together being a partner) and then able to provide feedback either individually or collectively. It's not about power, it's about mana.

        • adam 3.1.1.3
          28 March 2023 at 5:31 pm

          All your arguments are pretty close to TPM, position Red Logix.

          Nicely laid out.

          Working class Māori are in the position of being no better off, and possibly worse off, if the current mind set and approach carries on the way it is.

          • RedLogix 3.1.1.3.1
            28 March 2023 at 5:36 pm

            I am always a little surprised when anyone wades through my often turgid prose. devil

            This would be a good moment to add that I still firmly believe the Treaty was a remarkable and excellent document for it's time. And I accept that over time it is inevitable it will need interpretation to suit changing circumstance.

            At its core is the requirement for both the Crown and Maori – however we might define both parties – to act reasonably and in good faith toward each other. As a broad principle I do not think anyone would quibble with this. But as with all of these matters, the devil truly lies in the details.

      • Sanctuary 3.1.2
        28 March 2023 at 10:31 am

        Mr. Bachelor doesn't seem a very Christian fellow.

      • Blade 3.1.3
        28 March 2023 at 8:27 pm

        Partnership? You mean implied partnership?

        ''This 68yo Ngāti Kuri and Ngāpuhi descendent was rudely shouted down and abused by Julian and his supporters during the Q+A session.''

        I must admit that looks like disrespectful behaviour towards Mr Romana. But as I didn't hear the kupapa for the meeting as set by Mr Bachelor it's hard for me to make a call.

        I will say two things:

        1- Mr Romana was allowed to say a few words and didn't get anything thrown in his face.

        2- If a European broke kawa on a marae as Julian seem to imply Mr Romana did at this meeting, he would be dragged off the marae. If he resisted he would be beaten.

    • Visubversa 3.2
      28 March 2023 at 8:31 am

      Speak Up for Women had to go to the High Court to get the ability to book a room to discuss changes to the BDMRR legislation which was then going through Parliament. The initial booking of a room at the Library was cancelled because one Council staff member – who did not even work at the Library, said that it made them feel unsafe.

      The Judge found in favour of the women's organisation and said that there was no evidence that it was a "hate group". The meeting eventually went ahead in a room at the Town Hall.

    • SPC 3.3
      28 March 2023 at 9:17 am

      Maybe his comms people told him Aucklanders have had too much of a certain sort of Northland male in their city

  4. roblogic 4
    28 March 2023 at 8:15 am

    The word "woman" was not even mentioned once in all this. Hipkins got Marama Davidson to walk back her comments about men. Not a word spoken about the violence committed by TRAs. Nor any questions about Police failures.

    A dereliction of duty by the media and a betrayal of women voters by the PM. (Newshub has turned off comments on their video. Can’t have any inconvenient truth out there)

    • SPC 4.1
      28 March 2023 at 8:41 am

      From Newshub

      Hipkins said "violence shouldn't come into it" and no one should use it to convey their views.

      "I don't believe people should throw things at a protest, whether what they're throwing is a soup or a brick," he told reporters during his post-Cabinet press conference.

      "Ultimately, the right to free speech does not extend to the right to physical violence, and so I would condemn that, regardless of who's engaging in that type of activity."

      On the matter of the police response (have you heard about the Cabinet manual on the independence of police)

      Hipkins didn't go into detail on what he thought of the police response, saying this isn't something ministers should give direction on.

      I can note – there is video evidence of women being assaulted. One of a woman being punched, another (a counter-protester) pulled to the ground and held down (the video of the incident ends at point) AND KJK having tomato juice being poured over her by an inter-sex person – who claims to have later been assaulted (not on video).

      https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2023/03/chris-hipkins-condemns-physical-violence-at-protest-after-posie-parker-doused-in-red-juice.html

      • weka 4.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 11:27 am

        there was also the mob stopping KJK, her security and marshalls from leaving the area. In that melee there was additional violence and sometimes its hard to tell who is on what side, or how it started. It was a very dangerous situations. It's mindblowing that Hipkins hasn't talked about this.

        Also, the event was Let Women Speak. He has spoken up for the right to protest against that. He still hasn't said anything about the right of women to speak in public.

        • SPC 4.1.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 11:36 am

          The people had surrounded the rotunda before KJK decided to leave. There was no deliberate effort to stop them from leaving.

          This overview makes that clear – they probably needed loud hailers to ask people to clear a pathway before they tried.



          • weka 4.1.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 11:56 am

            your own video evidence clearly shows that the crowd was just standing there making noise until they tried to leave, and then all the pushing and shoving started and intensity increased. People a bit further out stepped back, those close in got closer. There is clearly enough room between protestors for them to clear a path, they didn't.

            • SPC 4.1.1.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 12:17 pm

              It's the overview video evidence. As the rotunda was surrounded on all sides there was pushing, it happens when trying to scrum through a crowd.

              Early on a group tried to push in and get close to KJK (the KJK video shows this time), but otherwise it was the normal problem of getting through a crowd. A path through a crowd is created by direction of those going through.

              • weka …
                28 March 2023 at 12:34 pm

                again, people were pushing in against them trying to leave. When they come down the steps you can see a lot of the crowd moving back. Those closest then choose to get closer. There was plenty of room for the group to leave without having to scrum, if the protestors had let.

          • Shanreagh 4.1.1.1.2
            28 March 2023 at 12:14 pm

            And they would have done that? You don't seem to get this and are determined to minimise it.

            There were protestors trying to leap over the security guards to get at KJM.

            Less biased people have viewed the videos.

            UK Home Office Minister seems to get it

            'Home Office Minister Chris Philp says the attack on women's rights advocate Kellie-Jay Keen by New Zealand trans activists "was unacceptable". “The way women’s rights have been threatened by the trans movement is concerning. She has every right to express her views."

            https://twitter.com/NewshubPolitics/status/1640480843998306305

            Meanwhile our PM does a on the one hand this or that, followed a few steps forwards, backwards and a little twirl about as he thinks he is dancing away from the issue.

            I would have been satisfied with what the UK Minister seems able to say. This is an issue that has no politically separate sphere or spin. Violence is violence.

            Newshub still not framing it as a women’s rights issue. They have been doing this since early and are part of the problem.

            #The whole world is watching

    • coge 4.2
      28 March 2023 at 10:28 am

      Chris Hipkins has done a commendable job so far, in regaining much of the centre vote for Labour. If he doesn't get this one right, he'll risk losing that. I believe he knows it too. Margins are slim, and beyond ideology, realpolitik considerations matter in 2023. The longer this remains in the domain, the more damage it will do.

      • Shanreagh 4.2.1
        28 March 2023 at 11:57 am

        This is so true.

        That is the reason I am starting the daily countdown noting the action from the PM to condemn the violence against KJM and the exercising of the thugs veto to prevent she & fellow women's rights supporters from speaking on 25/3.

        I want to be a one woman band to keep this in the public eye until this government faces the action fair & square, which they have not done yet.

      • weka 4.2.2
        28 March 2023 at 11:58 am

        I really want to write a post asking whether the PM supports women's right to speak in public (because it's appalling that he wasn't addressed this), but I fear that the culture war will intensify and this does put the election at risk, as well as creating a culture of violence during NZ elections.

        • Shanreagh 4.2.2.1
          28 March 2023 at 12:23 pm

          So with only the very slightest exaggeration you could say that women's views have been silenced, if we stand back with our issues in case they 'rock the boat'

          My view is that the PM needs to step up

          The PM also could be advised that velvet gloves are being twitched and if something constructive is not done and soon the ability for Labour to lead coming out of the October election will be minimised. This will be the PM's choice.

          The longer he leaves it the more skilful he will need to be, and I don't think he has that quick stepping political nous on 'social' issues.

          The time to have condemned it was about 1.00pm on 25/3.

          • weka 4.2.2.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 12:31 pm

            a culture war that gifts Nact the election isn't rocking the boat. It's political suicide.

            I'm talking about me writing a post as throwing fuel on the fire, and why I won't do it. There are lots of other things to be said about what has happened without going hard at Hipkins today. He's actually in an impossible situation. If he speaks in support of women's right to speak and LWS, he will be both immolated by the liberals and attacked by the right for being a hypocrite for his statements before the event. Real politik.

            Do you think none of that will affect the election, or do you think this issue is more important than whether Nact get to be government?

            • Shanreagh 4.2.2.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 1:26 pm

              You know I do not wish the NActs to get in . Neither do I think that my rights need to be thrown away either. If I throw them away is there any guarantee that this anti women madness will stop.

              The time for Hipkins to say 'I condemn violence' was about 3 days ago. The longer he leaves it the harder it will get to make a simple statement. The longer he leaves the longer people will say, 'hang on I saw what happened on Saturday, why is he not condemning violence. Are they soft on violence against with different views. Are they soft on violence against women'.

              The time for actual action against climate change and a path expires soon as well……..

              In the meantime we waffle around on many fronts because people believe there is a political aspect to condemning violence against women.

              • weka …
                28 March 2023 at 1:28 pm

                that doesn't answer my question. I'm asking you if you believe that the women's rights issues are more important than Labour/GP winning the election.

                Or, if you don't believe the culture war puts the election at risk.

                • Cricklewood …
                  28 March 2023 at 5:10 pm

                  I'd say at this junction woman's rights and the conversations around them are more important, once lost they're likely gone forever and it's mostly likely they'll be lost under a Lab + Greens govt at this moment in time.

                  • weka …
                    28 March 2023 at 11:02 pm

                    I think we've already lost parts of that war with the self ID legislation. The fights will now be around whether women can demand and have single sex services and spaces, and that will most likely require court cases. I don't know if we are more likely to win under Lab or Nact.

                    I know that women do badly under Nact including at the activist level, because many women are forced on the back foot just to pay the bills.

                    And always, climate. If we lose the election, can we win women's right to speak and if we do but lose on climate, is that worth it? Women will do very badly in climate collapse under right wing governments.

                    My current fear on that is the narrative that we are just about out of time. In a few years, will we have all given up, and then what will happen?

                    • weka …
                      28 March 2023 at 11:03 pm

                      I don't know if I am right about all of that btw (apart from the bit about how seriously bad it will be if we don't do climate action). But it occurs to me how that perhaps they are the same thing. The root of the suppression of women's rights is how much we hate nature and embodiment.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      30 March 2023 at 3:08 pm

                      "embodiment"?

                      Please explain (said supportively).

        • Hanswurst 4.2.2.2
          28 March 2023 at 7:25 pm

          It seems to me that the appropriateness of your take hinges on the trans-rights demonstrators' aims being to silence women because the latter are women. I don't think that that's established at all. What makes you so certain of that interpretation, rather than the explanation that the demonstrators are motivated by a belief (justified or not) that the rights of transgender people are being threatened?

          If the trans-rights demonstrators' cause were the latter, then there would be no cause for Hipkins to address the question of women's rights to speak, since he would have no reason to consider that it might be at issue.

          • Robert Guyton 4.2.2.2.1
            28 March 2023 at 8:43 pm

            I'm with you and your view expressed here, Hanswurst. I hope you receive a reply that addresses exactly what your are asking about.

          • roblogic 4.2.2.2.2
            28 March 2023 at 8:48 pm

            I think the question of motives is secondary to the criminal behaviour

          • weka 4.2.2.2.3
            28 March 2023 at 11:21 pm

            I don't think that the protestors are standing there thinking oh we will shut women down. It's more that it was an event that was literally about letting women speak, whose voices have been suppressed, and they were stopped from speaking.

            The protestors will call them terfs and nazis, which dehumanises them and then they don't have to worry about being misogynistic because everyone knows it's ok to hate and punch nazis.

            The other way to look at it is that they are saying good women can speak and evil women can't.

            Helen Joyce has said this, in response to TRAs surrounding LWS women in the UK.

            … because if women cannot stand in a public place and say in any ordinary words they like "men cannot be women and if you say they can be women then you are destroying women's rights", then we do not have any women's rights.

            .https://youtu.be/HGlLYHC5-AM?t=1144

            Either way, an elderly women was punched, hard, in the face, several times. This is dangerous because as a woman she is distinctly physically vulnerable.

            https://twitter.com/LynnW192/status/1640066831116537856

            I don't think men should be punched either, but this tendency to sex blindness is dangerous for women. I've yet to see any of the anti-terf crowd condemn this assualt, I've seen several say she provoked it. Women getting the bash asked for it eh.

            We also know there were signs at the protest saying 'suck my dick', and calling women cunts. These are just outright misogynistic messages designed to put women in their place.

            There's been a disappearing of the women that wanted to speak by the protestors and MSM, who are all focused on KJK. I've talked with one liberal who didn't seem to even know what LWS is, but had strong opinions about it all.

            On and on. None of this is new, we've seen it all before.

            So yes, Hipkins and Davidson should both have addressed the issues that specifically affect women, because women were the ones putting themselves at risk to stand up and talk about their rights.

    • Leighton 4.3
      28 March 2023 at 10:42 am

      Judging from Twitter, the activists seem to have absolutely no idea how much damage has been done to the "Joe Average" public perception of LGBT+ causes and the political left generally over the last week or two. It is extremely concerning. If the Prime Minister doesn't do something fast to right the ship then all the good political work he has done since taking over could be undone (and more).

      • SPC 4.3.1
        28 March 2023 at 11:14 am

        The LWS campaign reminds one of the get Corbyn campaign. If the left/Labour does not equate criticism of Israel with anti-semitism, if the left does not … then … .

        • weka 4.3.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 11:59 am

          What do you mean by the LWS campaign there?

          I wish you'd finish you sentence, because it doesn't make sense otherwise.

          • SPC 4.3.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 8:12 pm

            Note the move from Marama Davidson to Chloe Swarbrick. KJK did say that she would annhihilate any woman/those women in the way of the way of LWS goals (it's not arrogance, she knows the political right will weaponise it and its the way of a group identifying women's ID/class enemies – a pile on effect).

        • roblogic 4.3.1.2
          28 March 2023 at 8:34 pm

          Ahh the Trojan Horse theory… Let Women Speak is responsible for splitting the Left… blame the womenfolk!

          • SPC 4.3.1.2.1
            28 March 2023 at 9:10 pm

            The decision to hold events in public spaces where counter-protest can occur is deliberate – to associate their opposition as trying to silencing women trying to have a voice.

            Thus the naivety of MSM and politicians giving the event publicity.

            KJK boasts she would annihilate (left wing) women who oppose her campaign – that is marginalise them as on the side of those trying to “suppress women” by siding with the transgender.

            She poses the left as a threat to women to get right wing support. She also uses an image of a blonde barbie doll in Nazi garb on social media to provoke antifa action.

            https://spinster.xyz/@PosieParker

            • left for dead 4.3.1.2.1.1
              29 March 2023 at 6:44 am

              You're a fool and wasting our time,I had a look at that image..

              Head shake !

            • Molly 4.3.1.2.1.2
              29 March 2023 at 10:19 am

              What's the information you are trying to communicate with your link?

              (As for the rest:

              "KJK boasts she would annihilate (left wing) women who oppose her campaign – that is marginalise them as on the side of those trying to “suppress women” by siding with the transgender."

              I can post the link that you have failed to provide, but this was in context of a response to self proclaimed feminists defaming her. She was talking about them getting out of the way of the #LetWomenSpeak events and movement.

              "She poses the left as a threat to women to get right wing support. "

              That's your opinion, which is shared by others but not necessarily a fact. Many supporters are left wing, and IIRC she was a paid member of the Labour party in the UK before they forgot what a woman was. The #LetWomenSpeak kaupapa acknowledges that all women are affected across political spectrums, religions and classes.

              "She also uses an image of a blonde barbie doll in Nazi garb on social media to provoke antifa action."

              After months of being called a Nazi Barbie she posted that picture on her profile. I recognise it as a similar sense of humour to my own. Even if I didn't share her sense of humour, your interpretation is not really in line with her personality or approach.)

              • SPC …
                30 March 2023 at 4:18 pm

                The use of the term "annihilate" is not helpful.

                There is saying, she was no Nazi blonde barbie doll and there is using the image on one of the social media sites she is on, and without the context. That takes it out of the humour sphere – more Prince Harry wearing a Nazi outfit to a public event.

                • Molly …
                  30 March 2023 at 6:38 pm

                  I agree that without knowledge of the background – the extent, intensity and duration of Nazi associations and quite demeaning and public personal denouncing by established feminists – this would get taken at face value.

                  Bad PR or ill-considered form of stress relief? I don't know?

            • Robert Guyton 4.3.1.2.1.3
              30 March 2023 at 3:13 pm

              I support your view, SPC.

            • weka 4.3.1.2.1.4
              30 March 2023 at 4:42 pm

              She also uses an image of a blonde barbie doll in Nazi garb on social media to provoke antifa action.

              Please post a direct link that shows the image and the context it is being used in. Your link just goes to her spinster account.

              • SPC …
                30 March 2023 at 4:46 pm

                Yup and she has changed the image to one with a blonde with an umbrella – and it's about time.

  5. arkie 5
    28 March 2023 at 8:30 am

    Assessment of Labour's climate action:

    During the 2017 election campaign, then-Labour leader Jacinda Ardern made a bold statement: "We will take climate change seriously. This is my generation's nuclear free moment".

    But almost six years later, has Labour's action on climate change while in government lived up to those words?

    "I don't think that the action we've seen from the government over the past two terms, or over any term of parliament ever, has been consistent with Jacinda Ardern's proclamation," Newsroom sernior political reporter Marc Daalder says.

    "If you think about the radical and drastic action that we took in relation to nuclear free, we haven't seen that on climate change and there's still a lot more to go before you can reach that level of dedication."

    …

    Is New Zealand pulling its weight?

    Climate scientist Professor James Renwick says while Aotearoa has achieved a lot at the policy level, it's a different story when it comes to action on the ground.

    "We haven't seen emissions of greenhouse gases reduce at all in this country and in fact, carbon dioxide, which is the most important greenhouse gas, emissions of that have gone up quite a lot in the last 20 or 30 years," he says.

    "A lot of that is from you and me driving our cars – the transport sector has really blossomed since the early 1990s and we're emitting heaps more carbon dioxide."

    Daalder says a more reliable public transport network could be good for both the climate and cost of living, but it could take a while to implement.

    "Making a more reliable public transport system – that takes a real long time … it takes a while to really reach the scale where the emissions reductions are significant as, say the sort of stuff you're going to get out of the biofuel mandate. So on the list of policies that can really reduce emissions sharply in the short term, I don't see that many options that also address cost of living concerns."

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/the-detail/story/2018883474/assessing-labour-s-record-on-climate-action

    If we want them to take more action then we must elect more Greens and Te Pāti Māori MPs.

    • Ad 5.1
      28 March 2023 at 8:49 am

      Even if you got more Greens into parliament you would have the same climate minister.

      It is Minister James Shaw of the Green Party who leads this policy area, so he is the accountable minister.

      • arkie 5.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 8:54 am

        Except he isn't in cabinet, so has no decision-making ability, that's entirely on Labour:

        The Government’s new farmgate emissions pricing scheme, He Waka Eke Noa, was the subject of disagreement around the Cabinet table, with Climate Change Minister James Shaw’s favoured proposal for a cap and trade scheme for methane rejected by Labour ministers.

        …

        Under the Greens cooperation agreement with Labour, Shaw is a minister outside of Cabinet, but comes to the Cabinet table when discussing issues germane to his portfolio.

        The minute “noted the Minister of Climate Change’s concerns regarding uncapped emissions, a low marginal price, and the risk of emissions reduction targets being traded off against other considerations when prices are set.”

        Shaw was much keener on having a cap and trade scheme – similar to the emissions trading scheme –running in the agricultural sector because it would put a cap on allowable emissions and let the market set the price.

        https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/130132909/cabinet-overruled-climate-change-minister-james-shaw-on-agriculture-emissions-pricing-plan

        The tone of texts and emails between ministers and lobbyists is telling. ‘Hi mate,’ writes a minister to a forestry lobbyist who is pleading with him not to exclude pine plantations from the ‘Permanent Forest’ category of the ETS. Sure enough, soon afterwards a declared policy preference for restricting this category to native forests is overturned, and pine plantations are included, a decision ratified by [the Labour] Cabinet. They should all be ashamed.

        https://www.newsroom.co.nz/greenwashing-and-the-forestry-industry-in-nz

        • weka 5.1.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 11:34 am

          it's tedious that this has to be continually re-explained.

          • Ad 5.1.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 2:44 pm

            Only to those who don't understand what Ministerial portfolio responsibility is.

            • weka 5.1.1.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 2:45 pm

              mate, you're the one that keeps pretending Shaw is formally in cabinet and that he has a magic wand that could force Labour to take more climate action but for some strange reason he doesn't use it.

              • Ad …
                28 March 2023 at 3:18 pm

                Labour are rebuilding the north and east of the entire country, and hold responsibility for every other portfolio (outside of homelessness which also lies with the Greens).

                So, mate, climate change is the centrepiece policy area of the Green Party. No other party.

                If climate change was that important to them, the Greens would have walked out of the government by now and given the portfolios back.

                Instead the Green MPs hang in there with very little to show for it, and an NZ climate movement that is withering for lack of Green Party leadership.

                There is only 1 month to go before budget and the start of the campaign for 2023. Chop chop.

                • weka …
                  28 March 2023 at 3:21 pm

                  or, the GP understand the changes they can make within the system from the limited power they have, which is what they are doing.

                  Meanwhile, Shaw cannot make Labour to anything. Walking out would lessen climate action not increase it. Because it would leave it wholly with Labour.

                  Labour hold the power to change NZ's response to climate change, the global GHG budget is already gone, the window for action is shrinking. Chop chop.

                  • hetzer …
                    28 March 2023 at 4:31 pm

                    Agree Weka re the greens influence, that it terms of outcomes, has been abysmal.

                    Not sure if its the lure of salaries etc, but I cant help feeling they would have ( and had ) way more influence if they had not joined with Labour but stayed outside and were free to state and pursue Green objectives.

                    • weka …
                      28 March 2023 at 10:40 pm

                      I've argued for the Greens to move to the cross benches myself, but I suspect we would have been way more behind on climate had they done that. Labour are a majority government, who would have been their Climate Minister, what would they have done?

                      The influence of the Greens on government departments via having a Minister is very important too.

                • Robert Guyton …
                  30 March 2023 at 3:16 pm

                  I agree with weka, being in a similar situation to James 🙂

                  "If climate change was that important to them…"

                  Good to have a laugh every now and then, to lighten the load…

            • Sanctuary 5.1.1.1.1.2
              28 March 2023 at 3:31 pm

              Got to wonder why Shaw bothers, he is the minister responsible for climate change who has zero power in the cabinet mid-size EV – so he is accountable for the driving and the destination but has neither the keys or a seat, or indeed is he even allowed in the vehicle or is told when it leaves and where the actual driver is going.

              Perfect for Labour!

  6. arkie 6
    28 March 2023 at 10:45 am

    Today is the last day to have a say on the Auckland Council Budget proposal:

    https://akhaveyoursay.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/hub-page/annual-budget-2023-2024

    Among the most contentious proposals are plans to reduce regional, community and social services by $20m and regional contestable grants by $3m in the areas of arts, culture and events.

    It is proposed to cut funding for things like Music in Parks, CultureFest and Botanic Garden events, $2m to Citizens Advice Bureau offices in Auckland, and stop funding for homelessness initiatives.

    Tataki Auckland Unlimited, the CCO that oversees major events, cultural activities and economic development also loses $27.5m of funding leaving it with no ratepayer money for major events after 2024 and very little for economic development.

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/485023/aucklanders-to-have-a-say-on-cutting-costs-to-plug-295m-hole-in-brown-s-first-budget

  7. Shanreagh 7
    28 March 2023 at 11:29 am

    Day 3

    No condemnation by the Prime Minster of the violence to shown Kellie-Jae Keen Minshull and the women hurt by the anti women's rights activists on Saturday 25/3/23

    No condemnation of the cancelling of a peaceful gathering by anti women's rights activists exercising the thugs veto.

    #The Whole World is Watching

    # Let Women Speak

    # Speak Up for Women.

    • Robert Guyton 7.1
      28 March 2023 at 12:32 pm

      Were they "anti women's rights activists exercising the thugs veto", or were they supporters of the trans community?

      Is Marama Davidson an "anti women's rights activist exercising the thugs veto."?
      Apologies for my lack of finesse/nuance/depth of experience on these issues; I seek to learn.

      • weka 7.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 12:47 pm

        both.

        Lots of people at the protest with good intentions but relatively ignorant about the issues and acting from ignorance. Some people actively suppressing women's right to speak (only the women they agree with are allowed). Some people thinking trans rights are supreme and any criticism makes you a terf nazi and nazis should be punched kind of thing.

        MD is in a different position because she is an MP and an anti-violence Minister. She should have spoken for trans rights, but she should also have condemned the violence and named the violence against women and she didn't (to me this is as much of a problem as the white/cis/male blunder).

        A 70 year old woman was punched repeatedly in the face, on video. MD must know this. KJK and her largely female marshall team were terrorised at an event called Let Women Speak. The women who were to speak have been disappeared from the debate by the MSM, gender ideologists and MD herself. Hipkins too.

        • Robert Guyton 7.1.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 12:53 pm

          Thanks.

          "At this point, Keen-Minshull’s only protecters were a handful of burly security guards who surrounded their client "

          Did she (and her backers) "play" the situation, knowing some would overstep the mark, in order to smear the whole trans community?
          https://www.interest.co.nz/public-policy/120494/chris-trotter-assesses-what-happened-saturday-aucklands-albert-park-and-what

          • Francesca 7.1.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 1:18 pm

            Oh my goodness

            They welcomed the violence,even though Kelly Minshull was clearly in fear of her life?

            Much the same as girls in miniskirts ask for the violence of rapists?

            So then they can say all men are rapists?

            Really Robert,victim blaming is so far beneath you

            • Robert Guyton 7.1.1.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 1:56 pm

              It certainly is, Francesca and I'm surprised you think I'm doing that.

              I could though, conceive of a scenario where someone might be willing to attract shouting, in order to further an agenda of reducing the progress of a particular community they don't support.

              I don't suppose anyone would willingly provoke physical harm to themselves, nor do I condone pushing and shoving, dousing with sauce or whatever. Having engaged security though, indicates preparedness for possible rough stuff, doesn't it?

              • Shanreagh …
                28 March 2023 at 2:23 pm

                Up until Auckland she had about 2-3 security staff. At Hobart the police did an abysmal job, but at least they were there. KJM was advised prior to leaving for NZ that she had been recommended to up her own personal people to 10. There was urgent fundraising prior to the day to pay for these.

                While well known people often travel with or hire their own security I don't think that our society, up until now, ever expected that in occasions such as these it would be necessary for public figures to hire their own police force.

                In Hobart the private security stood near KJM with eyes on the crowd, often elevated and have a good view of people who may provide a direct threat to their employer. Police have traditionally looked for breaches of the peace within the crowd, prevent surging etc. .

                Speakers often get police protection from the point of ensuring that breaches of the peace do not occur. In the end this did not happen on Saturday and KJM was left with the security staff & marshalls that she had paid for.

                They were clearly very experienced and used the close guarding techniques I have seen before. This professionalism was the only thing stopping such a small person from being mugged, slipping or worse. Even with this there were people climbing over & on top of others to get to her with someone throwing something at her plus water bottles being emptied

                This was a shocking situation and unlike anything I have seen before, and I've participated in a few protests.

              • Francesca …
                28 March 2023 at 2:43 pm

                Why do you think the security was engaged?

                I'll tell you Robert, because you seem very new to this .There is a history of violent protest against events where women speak about their rights and wanting the provision of women only spaces to be maintained.I'm surprised you're in the dark about that

                there's endless examples, here's a couple.

              • Liberty Belle …
                28 March 2023 at 3:00 pm

                "in order to further an agenda of reducing the progress of a particular community they don't support."

                Well that depends on what you mean by 'progress'. KJK has focused on issues where transgender activists are seeking 'rights' that directly impinge on the rights and/or safety of women. Some examples are:

                1. Allowing trans women (by which I refer to sexually intact biological males) to use women's bathrooms, changing rooms and other similar spaces.
                2. The inclusion of trans women in sports where there is a clear and obvious advantage to them.
                3. Allowing trans women to be housed in prisons and other spaces with biological women.

                There are other issues KJK raises, including genital mutilation of young people, but the point is this: When the 'progress' of one group impacts on the rights of another group, we need to check ourselves and have the debate. On Saturday in Auckland, an angry and violent mob prevented that debate happening, and put a number of women in harm's way. And a large part of the main-stream media, and a significant number of senior Green party representatives, were at least in part responsible.

                • psych nurse …
                  28 March 2023 at 4:44 pm

                  The numbers of transwomen is so low as a population percentage you would have to spend days hanging around public toilets in the hope of bumping into one. Even then you wouldn't realize who they were going on the appearance of the transwomen I know. From my long observation of Human behavior I believe that the most homophobic people are closet homosexuals or cross dressers too scared to reveal their true sexuality.

                  • Liberty Belle …
                    28 March 2023 at 6:31 pm

                    "The numbers of transwomen is so low as a population percentage you would have to spend days hanging around public toilets in the hope of bumping into one."

                    Yes I've heard that argument before. And yet these things are happening. To women.

                  • Liberty Belle …
                    28 March 2023 at 10:58 pm

                    "Where , when and who said so ?."

                    "Where, when" about what? Which specific part of my comment above are you wanting evidence of?

                    Meanwhile, here's an example of how an inclusivity and equality strategy led to women having to walk past urinating men to reach a cubicle in a gender neutral toilet. And here's two examples of sexual assaults by a transgender woman on young girls in a toilet. BTW, that same perpetrator was transferred to a female only jail in 2022, despite being a convicted sex offender. There are plenty more examples.

          • weka 7.1.1.1.2
            28 March 2023 at 1:22 pm

            what do you mean by 'her backers' Robert?

            I don't think she was playing the situation in the way you mean. She's smart and strategic and usually very good at what she does, but in this case I think she had no idea what she was arriving too and that she completely misjudged the NZ situation. The local women organising LWS did too.

            • Robert Guyton 7.1.1.1.2.1
              28 March 2023 at 2:14 pm

              Okay. I haven't followed the issue closely, so accept your view. I wonder though, why she had engaged security, if she had no idea what might transpire.

              Winston Peters says, if you don't like what's being said, don't listen, but my response is, what if someone's inciting hatred toward your Whānau? Block your ears? Hope for the best?

              • weka …
                28 March 2023 at 2:35 pm

                she engaged security because there has been violence against women at other LWS events. Afaik, it was also a requirement of the permit that they organised security.

                Peters is an opportunistic arse, jumping on the culture war to try and get back into parliament. In what ways do you think that Kellie Jay Keen was inciting hatred towards trans people?

                • Robert Guyton …
                  28 March 2023 at 3:06 pm

                  Yes, that's a good question, weka (and Francesca). As I said, I haven't been following closely, but was under the impression that this was the case. It's interesting to find myself in that space where on other matters, I have some more detail to wrap my thoughts around. Hence my questions.

                  Was she not attacking trans people? Was she not travelling under an anti-trans banner (looking for link, will edit).
                  Edit: “Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, who self-identifies as Posie Parker … is conducting a tour beneath the slogan “2023 is the year of the TERF [trans exclusionary radical feminist]”,”

                  https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/28-03-2023/how-nz-fringe-groups-latched-on-to-the-posie-parker-controversy

                  • weka …
                    28 March 2023 at 3:28 pm

                    I posted this in another thread the other day,

                    Please have an in depth look at this so that you understand why the word terf is a pejorative.

                    https://terfisaslur.com/

                    If you didn't already understand that some of the worst misogyny we've seen has been coming from trans identified males and trans allies, now you do.

                    Golriz Ghahraman tweeted yesterday calling Tamaki's motorcylists TERFs. Terf is an acronym for trans exclusionary radical feminist. Rarely does anyone supporting gender ideology use the term in that way anymore. They use the term to mean anyone they consider anti-trans. I was told by lw men this week that terf basically equals nazi sympathiser.

                    That is the context in which it is being use widely. It's a weaponised word used to stop women from talking about our sex based rights.

                    Gender critical person (GC), or gender critical feminist (if referring to actual GCFs), are both useful terms (assuming you are not simply using them as synonyms for anti-trans. If you mean anti-trans then please use that term, because then everyone knows what you mean).

                    I would further say now,

                    Some women, including KJK have reclaimed the word terf, in much the same way as black Amercians have reclaimed nigger, or LGBTQI use the word queer. But terf doesn't mean anti-trans, it's a signifier of a woman talking about women's rights.

                    If you believe that KJK is anti-trans, then please say how. She uses a lot of brazen language and rhetoric that many interpret as anti-trans, and some of what she says is callous and inflammatory. But it's not true to say she isn't a women's rights campaigner or that her primary objective is to eliminate trans people

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 3:35 pm

                      Because the banner she's (I read) travelling under is “2023 is the year of the TERF [trans exclusionary radical feminist]”,”

                      If TERF is pejorative, her using it (if she does) must concern you?

                      "Trans exclusionary" doesn't sound very … inclusive, or accepting of another communities core beliefs, does it? Does her tour involve undermining/attacking the choices of others?

                      Hence my confusion.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 3:38 pm

                      "If you believe that KJK is anti-trans, then please say how."

                      She uses a lot of brazen language and rhetoric that many interpret as anti-trans, and some of what she says is callous and inflammatory.

                      "But it's not true to say she isn't a women's rights campaigner or that her primary objective is to eliminate trans people"

                      I don't say that. She's, amongst other things, a woman's rights campaigner. She seems, according to what you've written, to be anti-trans and actively promoting an anti-trans message, using brazen language, callous and inflammatory.

                    • weka []
                      28 March 2023 at 3:58 pm

                      please show me the anti-trans messages you think she makes.

                    • Shanreagh …
                      28 March 2023 at 4:02 pm

                      Terf is a word used against women by the trans activist community by the Trans communities; Many women are using it as irony or reclaiming it to describe what they are. ..

                      'Those who voice gender-critical views are often labelled as transphobic or as TERFs (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist")by the Trans communities;

                      https://libguides.ufv.ca/c.php?g=724801&p=5233401

                      A better term here is GCF

                      In the olden days back on the 1970s a radical feminist was one who moved beyond the minima that more moderate feminsts were seeking….some wanted to have the ability to use Ms as the salutation from Govt depts (get away from the idea of women carting around their marital identity), others wanted every part of society opened for women, careers, education, control of their own bodies.

                      Some studied the inherent strucural sexism and the effect of male dominated societies on the lives of women and concluded that until the patriarchy had been controlled women would forever be down trodden.

                      Many studied this with fervour. I know I did with Phillida Bunkle. So I still quite like the term 'radical feminist'.

                      Based on my studies I recognised that what was driving much of the trans movement, part from ignorance of world views outside their own) was the patriarchy (on a structural level) or on an individual/group level, misogyny.

                      Anyway the term I prefer is Gender Critical female

                      Critical of or opposed to the belief that gender identity is more important or significant than biological sex

                      or

                      Gender-critical beliefs include the belief that sex is biological and immutable, people cannot change their sex and sex is distinct from gender-identity.

                      or

                      https://libguides.ufv.ca/c.php?g=724801&p=5233401

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 4:55 pm

                      @weka

                      "please show me the anti-trans messages you think she makes."

                      I haven't looked. I've gone on what you wrote,

                      "She uses a lot of brazen language and rhetoric that many interpret as anti-trans, and some of what she says is callous and inflammatory."

                      and the response from some Green MPs, along with some of the trans community, who seem determined that she is anti-them. I'm not claiming she is anti-trans, I'm asking why, if she's not, so many people believe (passionately) that she is. Perhaps you know of some examples of statements she's made that might cause that belief to be so widespread?

                    • weka []
                      28 March 2023 at 10:57 pm

                      I think it’s more complex than that. I don’t think she is a Nazi or a Nazi sympathiser. No Debate is an intentional, long term strategy that has silenced many GC women and men. KJK is what arose in the vacuum. Many rally behind her because is one of the few people standing up for women’s sex based rights. I’m sure had the left not suppressed debate, she would have been quite happy to have done other things with her life. In this sense I don’t believe she is a grifter or in this because she hates trans people and wants them eradicated. 

                      So yes, I think the protestors were wrong at that level. What should be happening is women get to speak, and people can protest that and argue against it. If it’s transphobic, then it will be made visible. 

                      There is also the issue of what is transphobic or anti-trans. It is anti-trans to say that biological sex is real, and dimorphic? Or that a trans woman by definition is male? Or that women have a right to single sex spaces like toilets, change rooms, prisons? Or that we need a debate about whether it’s ok to give children puberty blockers that lead to cross sex hormones and surgery rather than addressing co-factors to gender dysphoria like depression, sexual abuse, autism, being lesbian in a homophobic family or social set and so on. Why are we not centering detransitioning women in this debate? Detrans women and men who were channelled into surgery and hormones when too young to make an informed consent decisions, who now have lifelong disabilities, pain and sexual and urinary dysfunction as well as lifelong dependency on medical treatment. The protestors deny that this happens, or say it is so rare we can discount it. Why are we not talking about it?

                      Why have people been fired, lost their careers, doxed, abused, had malicious police reporting done for saying the above?

                      The big problem with Saturday was that it’s another in a long line of examples of shutting down discussion of the above. Do when you ask if KJK is anti-trans, and I ask what have you seen that is anti-trans from her, it’s because I don’t know what you mean by anti-trans and I’d like to see that made clear.

                  • Shanreagh …
                    28 March 2023 at 3:37 pm

                    KJM is a women's rights activist. One of the things she is concerned about is the protection of safe spaces for women.

                    Changing rooms, single sex hospital wards, toilets, rape crisis centres, prisons have this concept. They can be areas where women may be under stress & dealing with males there is just one more stressor.

                    Then we have women who want to swim and run fast. If males enter as trans women then opportunities are denied to women to compete, like against like.

                    The facility most used by women are public toilets or toilets in facilities open to the public say in dept stores. She is concerned for women who do not want/expect or feel threatened by men in these places. And they are men if they have men's bodies even if they have a certificate saying they are a women.

                    Looking at the baying crowd & many men doing the assaulting, pushing, taking down of barricades on Saturday will have just crystalised a threat to women by men generally that many may have denied.

                    Women cannot tell a if a man whether transwoman or straight is going to assault us so the concept and practice has laways been to not allow men in women's safe spaces. This does not seem difficult to grasp except for ideologues

                    Crudely 'dicks in (womens) dunnies' are not acceptable)

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 3:40 pm

                      Do trans people feel safe/ are they safe, using men's dunnies, I wonder?

                    • weka []
                      28 March 2023 at 4:07 pm

                      did you mean trans women? If TW don’t feel safe in men’s toilets, what are men doing to change that? Why should women be expected to budge up? Are you aware that trans no longer means post-transition transexuals like Georgina Beyer, but can be any man who says he is a woman at any time?

                    • Shanreagh …
                      28 March 2023 at 4:45 pm

                      @ Robert. To be frank why should this concern women apart from often wanting to make sure that people are happy or comfortable .

                      If there are only two toilets available then my view is that you use the one particular to your sex.

                      If you happen to be a man, dressed as a woman and you are not welcome or feel threatened by other men then surely that is something men could change, by attitudes changing or by leading the move to have toilets appropriate for them

                      The fact that a man no matter how he is dressed wants to use our safe spaces does not & should not mean that women have any need in logic to let them. Men are men. Male bodies don't use women facilities.

                      Clearly the logic is groups of spaces where all feel safe, perhaps in threes.

                      But that is been ignored by the trans community because at the heart of this is the biology contrary view that males (mainly) can change their sex from male to female and having done so then use the female toilets.

                      Depending on the jurisdiction you live in there have been changes to the BDM legislation to say that yes you can change the sex that is recorded on your birth certificate. (this is important phrasing)

                      There is no way to change the sex you were born with.

                      1 Some don't require anything other than a desire to wear woman's clothes

                      2 while others like NZ require partial chemical transition (does this need to be maintained?)

                      3 some others still require full chemical transition plus surgical transition.

                      (the ostensible reason put forward for why this is not suitable in NZ was on the grounds of cost)

                      This is spurious in my view as there are men who do not wish to transition in whole or part but do wish to wear women's clothes & gain access to female toilets.

                      These are called Autogynephiliacs – sexual arousal of a biological male in response to the image of themselves as female.

                      The reason Robert that I wanted to go to a meeting where she was speaking was to hear her and also to be part, if I was brave enough, to tell my story. Of course I was worried for my safety knowing Wellington was going to be big and that many of the same anti vaxxers names from the protest were mobilising.

                      Looking back over the past few years women as a class have been made invisible, we know that sexism is happening etc. We see that the trans movement would caste us into invisibility, if male bodies can say they are female bodies where does that leave females?

                      KJM/PP is a sparkling. no nonsense speaker who is used to heckling back at the anti women rights activists who inevitably heckle and harass.

                      I like women who are not afraid to dress in bright colours, say what they think. She is incredibly respectful of the testimony that is given at her gatherings by often older women. These women are getting older and many were absolutely firecrackers themselves in marches. By shouting them down we may have lost an opportunity to hear them speak…..sure we can read them but to hear them would have been marvelous

                      Of course we would be mobilising at the latest attempt to silence women. Younger women are often put off from being involved by ageism, not to mention sexism by other younger people. PP rallies did call to younger and older and that was a gift.

                      This chance of course was denied to women young and old here in NZ by people who did not want to allow anyone that they feared wouldn't agree with them, speak.

                      Sorry for length

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 5:02 pm

                      Thanks for that pithy response, Shanreagh :-). I learned a great deal. I (believe) I feel the anxiety all this creates for you and others. It seems very nuanced and complex, for someone not immersed in the discussion/debate/lived experience.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 5:05 pm

                      "If TW don’t feel safe in men’s toilets, what are men doing to change that? Why should women be expected to budge up?"

                      Well, they shouldn't be expected to do anything. It was just a question.

                      As to "what are men doing to change that?", I despair.

              • Francesca …
                28 March 2023 at 2:45 pm

                Some examples please Robert , from the horse's mouth not wikipedia

                • Shanreagh …
                  29 March 2023 at 10:06 am

                  Of course I was worried for my safety knowing Wellington was going to be big and that many of the same anti vaxxers names from the protest were mobilising.

                  You may have thought I was getting mixed up.

                  My twitter feed was 'alive' with those offering spaces for the anti women protestors to assemble posters, write signs, have food etc. As I had kept these 'alive' on my feed was probably inertia from the parliamentary protest.

                  On a very small sample, based on the Wellington anti vaxxers helping the parliamentary protest I observed a link with the anti women’s right to speak 25/3 protest.

                  It will be multi faceted. My thought is that it may be a continuation of the anti Ardern stuff except that they have moved it from anti one women to anti all women.

      • Molly 7.1.2
        28 March 2023 at 12:58 pm

        Were they "anti women's rights activists exercising the thugs veto", or were they supporters of the trans community?

        Looked like a mixture of both.

        Is Marama Davidson an "anti women's rights activist exercising the thugs veto."?

        Appears that she is more accurately anti a certain women's rights activist.

        Do you understand a thug's veto? You are required to be a thug to exercise it. Are you suggesting that Marama Davidson be considered one? For my part, I think given her public utterings on this event, we can coin a new phrase: "smug's veto".

        Apologies for my lack of finesse/nuance/depth of experience on these issues; I seek to learn.

        I feel you are more than capable of doing that. (However, your questions do show repeated attempts to redirect and an inability to focus so – maybe not.)

        For your erudition, here's what Melbourne women got the opportunity to say, despite the close proximity of Neo-Nazis:

        https://twitter.com/EdgeWatching/status/1637296808622985216?s=20

    • Molly 7.2
      28 March 2023 at 12:42 pm

      A bit of light relief for those dealing with the persistent downplaying of violence:

      https://twitter.com/DertySesh/status/1640232256903213056?s=20

      • weka 7.2.1
        28 March 2023 at 1:31 pm

        that's why we get called anti-trans.

        I didn't watch it all but he calls Swarbrick unstable. This is propaganda.

        • Molly 7.2.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 1:36 pm

          It's comedy weka… hence the light-hearted proviso.

          Green’s comms could take note of his suggestion, but it is not usually a source from which PR takes advice. I would be very surprised if they did.

          • Robert Guyton 7.2.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 3:10 pm

            Calling Chloe, with her acknowledged neurodiverse ways, "unstable" is light-hearted and acceptable, Molly?

            • Molly 7.2.1.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 3:35 pm

              I am also neurodivergent, and possess a sense of humour.

              If Chloe is unable to maintain the appropriate demeanour of a responsible representative on national media, (which is not necessarily attributable to her neurodivergence BTW), it is due to a decision made by Green PR to allow it.

              • Robert Guyton …
                28 March 2023 at 3:42 pm

                Was Chloe's demeanour inapropriate during that interview, do you think?

                How so?

                • Molly …
                  28 March 2023 at 3:53 pm

                  Chloe, was being Chloe. Friends absolutely adore her manner and she is one of the reasons they are staunchly Green voters.

                  I agree with the comedian, that she doesn't address the issue that was being spoken about, and appealed to emotion.

                  Does that approach seem appropriate to me for this conversation? No, because it goes off the topic of free speech, and entry to the country. Does it seem appropriate to you, or members of the Green Party media team – perhaps not.

                  It is the contrast that is pointed out for comedic effect.

                  • Robert Guyton …
                    28 March 2023 at 3:55 pm

                    That's a softening of your, … "Chloe is unable to maintain the appropriate demeanour of a responsible representative on national media" comment.

                    I don't believe her demeanour was inappropriate.

                    • Molly …
                      28 March 2023 at 4:01 pm

                      Yes, but Robert. I don't think she sticks to the topic at hand. No great analyses or information is imparted by her.

                      For me, that is inappropriate given the reasons for the joint interview.

                      You – may think it is a clever political strategy.

                      Result:

                      I still think it is inappropriate. However, I'm just a voter, not a PR firm.

                      You think it is appropriate.

                      We don't have to agree. And your view may be the one that results in better support for the Greens.

                      Once again, it is the contrast of the responses that is being highlighted for comedic effect.

                  • weka …
                    28 March 2023 at 3:59 pm

                    if you're going to talk about an MP in the middle of major culture shit storm, please put up the video of the interview you are referring to.

            • Shanreagh 7.2.1.1.1.2
              28 March 2023 at 4:52 pm

              What 'acknowledged neurodiverse ways'?

              What do these have to do with how she presented at this interview, some of her actions were the equivalent of eye rolling & whispered 'OMGs or sighs at some of the sentences Brooke was saying.

              I suffer from a hidden disability, bi lateral deafness. I would hope that I have enough control as a speaker not to give in to to grimacing, sighs and other things. I have not noticed these things before with her, in fact have admired her when she has been talking to Wayne Brown.

        • left for dead 7.2.1.2
          29 March 2023 at 8:05 am

          Edited…@ Robert..

          As a fellow, we need too listen,please get up to speed on this important subject or stand down please.

          Excuse this reply being so far down the list,no reply button,a bit like No Debate.

          not sure why this has happened,missing text.

          • weka 7.2.1.2.1
            29 March 2023 at 9:59 am

            You seem to have pressed some tags in the edit box, which made some of your words not display. I've removed the tags now.

      • Shanreagh 7.2.2
        28 March 2023 at 1:35 pm

        Thanks Molly I saw it last night and there are a few laughs and quite a few sensible messages. He is Mike King's son.

        I watched the interview that he comments on, with Chloe Swarbrick, and as soon as he said she has the ability to lose the election and she is not dealing with the questions or comment I knew there was some thing a little odd.

        I was reminded of seeing that tragic long film with Liz Gunn at the beginning of the anti vax issues. The sense of a woman losing her grasp of the issues was palpable.

        • Robert Guyton 7.2.2.1
          28 March 2023 at 3:01 pm

          I found it curious, him being Mike King's son'n'll, that he was so disparaging of people suffering mental health issues; the scathing references to "just thinking about suicide" and Chloe's "emotional", rapid-fire ADHD delivery?

          Did that make an impression on you, Shanreagh?

          • Molly 7.2.2.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 3:43 pm

            Chloe repeated the suicidal ideations – despite this being against ALL suicide prevention guidelines.

            I've read the Counting Ourselves survey and looked at the methodology and it seems to me that it is a poor document to base legislative and policy decisions on yet we did. I've also read many of the published academic papers on the transgender community and suicide and they do not reflect the current narrative. (Of course, they might soon, given how often the suicidal ideation is repeated whenever the transgender community is mentioned.)

            Mental health issues with our young people are through the roof, and we haven’t got a grasp on why or how. So being part of the transgender community may not be the sole contributor to distress.
            People with various neurodivergent diagnoses, are capable of full engagement in life. But like anyone else, they should be put in the place where their skills are best suited.

            The critique holds whether or not Chloe is neurodivergent. The ACT politician was discussing the issue, the Green approach was to react with emotive calls for understanding. That may have put people off, but it may appeal to others. The contrast made for humour.

            • Robert Guyton 7.2.2.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 3:48 pm

              The ACT politician was dispassionate, Chloe was passionate.

              • Molly …
                28 March 2023 at 3:56 pm

                Well, for you the Green Party approach is the right one.

                A Green Party comedian might now take the same interview, and point out that dispassionate demeanor out in a humorous way:

                https://youtu.be/2IPAOxrH7Ro

                • Robert Guyton …
                  28 March 2023 at 4:38 pm

                  I didn't say the Green Party approach was the right one, I said I didn't agree with you where you said Chloe's demeanour was not appropriate.

                  • Molly …
                    28 March 2023 at 4:59 pm

                    Cool. We disagree.

                    (I thought we'd realised that a while back. But good to have it confirmed that now we both agree on our disagreement.)

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 7:22 pm

                      Phew! Good news!

                    • gsays …
                      28 March 2023 at 7:26 pm

                      Hey Molly, FWIW, thanks for posting the clip covering Peter Parker's visit, and the segment with Brooke Van Helden and Chloe Swarbrick.

                      Its helped settle a few things for me. The idea of daytime tele gives me a shiver down my spine, so would never have seen it otherwise.

                      The unnecessary violence that occurred at Albert Park, and now a couple of sleeps later, the cognitive dissonance displayed by the Greens make me think of beams and motes.

                      Ironically I was first drawn to the Greens because of their social justice side. Now, the only way I could give my vote to 'em was if they split the party into an Environmental party, call it 'Green Party' and the social justice side, call it …..

                    • Molly …
                      28 March 2023 at 7:39 pm

                      @gsays

                      Thanks.

          • Shanreagh 7.2.2.1.2
            28 March 2023 at 5:14 pm

            One of the comments on his production said 'often it is left to comedians to tell it like it is'

            That made me think. I agree. Comedians often scalpel cut through the (precious) dope that surrounds issues. Billy TK did that by sending up all sorts of figures and authority figures.

            Laughter, they say uses different pathways. Having opened them we can see things differently.

            His routine is pretty standard and that is to find gaps between what is being said and what is happening, work his way in and wriggle around.

            Kudos for him to say he had done research and had seen the issue was women's issues & rights,

            Kudos to him to say a message that relies on people shouting, yahooing and waving large placards a metre away from an elderly person trying to speak to someone else is not a message he agrees with.

            I am not au fait with the rulings about suicide but I felt Chloe was what they called over egging it, and I am not sure anyway about the stats she was using. Gays, people with disabilities, men who have lost lifelong partners have had concerning suicide stats and to discuss suicide in a casual unmoored way seemed a bit disrespectful.

            Shotgun style humour where comedians say so many things so quickly is a staple of Comedy clubs/standup comedy. …..so fast, so funny you've barely time to digest it. I am not sure why you would say this is ADHD. Are we now not to accept this rapid fire delivery?

            I had seen him once before and was not impressed. I was this time by his take down of the very serious OTT way that some of this material has been delivered.

            Actually I thought he was funny.

            The clip with Chloe in it did give me concern. She did give me the impression as someone like Liz Gunn and her video was tragic. It just about makes me cry thinking she may have had no-one to say…..Hey Liz is this a good video to put out?

            • Robert Guyton 7.2.2.1.2.1
              28 March 2023 at 7:25 pm

              His humour wasn't "rapid-fire" – he had cut/paused/edited heavily.

              Oh, that we could do the same 🙂

        • Molly 7.2.2.2
          28 March 2023 at 3:35 pm

          Thought he looked familiar – that makes sense.

      • joe90 7.2.3
        28 March 2023 at 2:45 pm

        Yeah, he's a funny guy alright.

        /

        The vicious misogyny of this video is staggering. We watch the protagonist stalk, hunt, gag and drag a screaming woman into a room, where the threat of rape is explicit.

        We listen to him brag about how he’s going to be with her “forever, forever, forever”. We see her blood dripping from plastic coating. We see him stabbing her repeatedly. We see bits of her body cut up. We see, over and over again, the knife in his hand and on a table.

        https://ludditejourno.wordpress.com/2010/03/26/dirty-sesh-misogyny-supported-by-nz-on-air/

        • Molly 7.2.3.1
          28 March 2023 at 3:46 pm

          That's sounds horrible. Not going to watch it because it is nothing to do with the topic.

          Can only talk about what I posted, because I did watch that.

          Just curious joe90, do you know all this background, or do you go and investigate every link before commenting?

          • Robert Guyton 7.2.3.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 3:51 pm

            Probably not the same guy … at all…

            Probably just having a laff!

            • Molly 7.2.3.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 3:57 pm

              "Probably not the same guy … at all…"

              @joe90 said it was. Take it up with him.

              • Robert Guyton …
                28 March 2023 at 4:41 pm

                Sure, it's the same hilarious fella. Surprised, I am, that you don't want to see more of his work, given your support for the video that we have been discussing. Should be some commonality in his work and world-view, I expect.

                • Molly …
                  28 March 2023 at 4:56 pm

                  "Surprised, I am, that you don't want to see more of his work, given your support for the video that we have been discussing."

                  I'm not looking to become a patron of the arts, Robert.

                  After three days engaging with people on here downplaying the violence that occurred, and the very real and significant issue regarding the protection of free speech someone provided a link to me that I watched and – despite the odd crude expression – I found funny. Because the seriousness with which people have been excusing violence against women, I have found particularly unfunny.

                  I will watch and read a work on its own without doing the purity test.

                  As a stand alone – not only did it give some relief to the unrelenting excuses being trotted out ad nauseum here and elsewhere – it also hit quite accurately on recognising the violence that took place and the importance of free speech.

                  Consider my approach, is similar to that of a substitute teacher, marking homework presented too me as I find, without reference to previous work or bias.

                  Therefore, I could quite conceivably watch all the videos of this person and get a pattern like this: Liked it, hated it, hated it, really hated it, hated this also.

                  But this one – for reasons stated above – I liked.

                  • Robert Guyton …
                    28 March 2023 at 5:17 pm

                    I despaired at the violence, Molly.

                    • Molly …
                      28 March 2023 at 5:19 pm

                      But Robert, you are not the only one on here.

                      Many others spent hours excusing or diminishing it, here and elsewhere.

                      (Also forgot to point out why it appealed at the start because he actually accurately defined her perspective and the event, which many others failed to do.)

                  • Shanreagh …
                    28 March 2023 at 5:25 pm

                    But this one – for reasons stated above – I liked.

                    As I said up thread there was one I did not so I stopped watching him. Subscribed again and will take each one as it comes.

                    His research and no nonsense approach to the harassment of the elderly woman had me hooked.

    • Ad 7.3
      28 March 2023 at 3:28 pm

      Women spoke up just fine, especially Green MP women.

      MP Golriz Ghahraman tweeted on her way to the rally: “So ready to fight N*zis”.

      Co-leader and Government Minister Marama Davidson put out a video to say that she was “so proud” of the protesters. Wearing her hat of Minister for Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence she used the event to declare that only “white cis men” commit violence.

      This is what the Green Party MPs are fighting for. I'm sure it will be good for their base of 6-8% but it's lost on those who want to see progress on climate change.

      There is now a very high chance that the Greens will have the same loss of internal control that cost them with Turei in 2017. That needs to change quickly.

      • weka 7.3.1
        28 March 2023 at 3:34 pm

        I will have zero amounts of surprise if the next polls shows a drop in their support. I cannot believe they are so blind to the real politik of the situation.

        • Robert Guyton 7.3.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 4:48 pm

          weka, do you believe the trans community and supporters who turned out for the protest, along with the Green MPs who did likewise, are wrong in believing that the woman at the centre of the protest was planning to broadcast/ has been broadcasting a harmful anti-trans message?

          • Anker 7.3.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 5:27 pm

            Robert No. She is a woman's rights activist. She is stating the truth when she says you can't change your sex and women don't have penises. To say that women can and do have penises is pure gas lighting.

            even if in some people's mind that is anti trans, she still has the right to say these things cause of free speech and also both of these statements are factually correct.

            What the trans rights activists have demonstrated very clearly is they will use violence, threats, intimidation and harrasement to shut women up.

            Of course not all women agree with what she says. We are not a hive mind.

            Some women appear to want to prioritise men who identify as women over the rights of women, which I find hard to fathom

            • Robert Guyton 7.3.1.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 6:01 pm

              I celebrate the expression of thought, as opposed to its repression.

              • Liberty Belle …
                30 March 2023 at 3:37 pm

                Then you will condemn the actions of the trans activists on Saturday who violently shut KJK's free speech down?

                • Robert Guyton …
                  30 March 2023 at 4:35 pm

                  I don't support the hitting of people. Who did that hitting?

                  • Liberty Belle …
                    30 March 2023 at 4:51 pm

                    Molly has posted two videos of people being punched by the trans activists. And then there's this person.

                  • Shanreagh …
                    30 March 2023 at 4:52 pm

                    If you are referring to the 70 year old with the skull fracture who was waiting to speak at PP event then this was a male on the Rainbow community side of the barricades who gave her a real pounding.

                    Though a couple of nights ago there were a few claims on SM that anyone who did anything concerning were agent provocateurs, quite how they wriggled this when one was a known drag artist in Auckland pictured shaking. pulling a person who looked like they were making their way up to the band rotunda I do not know.

                    Your naivety is getting a little draining Robert.

                    Surely you have seen and read the multitude of threads and seen the several Youtube videos about 25/3.

          • weka 7.3.1.1.2
            28 March 2023 at 10:46 pm

            the comment of mine you are replying to is about real politik. Do you think the protest was worth it if it costs the left the election?

            • Robert Guyton 7.3.1.1.2.1
              30 March 2023 at 3:24 pm

              Has it?

              • weka …
                30 March 2023 at 4:21 pm

                too soon to say, but the usefulness of the word if is that it allows us to think ahead.

                • Robert Guyton …
                  30 March 2023 at 4:36 pm

                  Speculation?

                  I hope the election isn't lost as a result of the weekend's upset. I doubt that it is.

                  • weka …
                    30 March 2023 at 4:51 pm

                    did you follow what happened to the SNP and Nicola Sturgeon? They spearheaded trans rights, got called out on putting a rapist in a women's prison, she gave an interview where she struggled to reconcile TWAW with keeping rapists who self ID as women out of women's prisons. Afterwards SNP's polling tanked, and she ended up resigning. For complex reasons no doubt, but this was her tipping point.

                    The first part of this piece is worth watching too, it includes and interview with the interviewer in the first video.

      • Sanctuary 7.3.2
        28 March 2023 at 3:36 pm

        Labour has identified the issues that matter and Hipkins is resolutely refusing to go down the rabbit hole of identity politics and culture wars. He is positioning Labour as the sole serious party in an ocean of unserious culture war rancour.

        The Greens however are infested with tedious identity politics and they think being culture warriors who can't resist taking the bait of the politics of distraction will resonate with the public.

        The angry and fearful dolts out there already have the ACT party that will happily dupe them with misinformation and angry culture war, while the TRA/”Left” culture war constituency is tiny and largely doesn’t vote.

        • Robert Guyton 7.3.2.1
          28 March 2023 at 3:46 pm

          "can't resist taking the bait"

          My point also, Sanctuary.

          Passionate people are sitting ducks for those who seek to fracture their communities. That's the feel of the whole debacle, imo, not just for the Green MPs, but for the wider transitional community. Who might seek to scuttle transitionalists?

          Status quo r us.

        • RedLogix 7.3.2.2
          28 March 2023 at 3:49 pm

          while the TRA/”Left” culture war constituency is tiny and largely doesn’t vote.

          I can think of plenty of examples of 'marginal' issues with tiny constituencies suddenly spilling over into the mainstream.

          • Robert Guyton 7.3.2.2.1
            28 March 2023 at 6:16 pm

            "How much better a respectful protest would have been. Instead, those shrilly protesting her were played.

            She never expected an audience of thousands supporting her, but she sure knew she’d bring out the opposition."

            https://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/131620080/the-bullying-hypocrisy-unleashed-over-posie-parker

            • RedLogix 7.3.2.2.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 6:43 pm

              I would respectfully suggest you might want to consider what a few others are saying to you here. Bottom line the pro-trans protesters behaved appallingly, and intimidated a group of women into silence. There is no excusing this, no claims of provocation or underhand strategies can hand wave this off.

              Personally I do not want to be dragged into the gender politics debate for a whole bunch of reasons – but the free speech aspect is crystal clear to me. If you do not believe in free speech for those you do not agree with, then you do not believe in it at all.

              Anything else and you are just competing for who gets to be Chief Censor.

  8. Beverly 8
    28 March 2023 at 11:56 am

    Who's down the rabbit hole? Is it me for believing that women don't have penises or is the Green party MP's who believe the counter protest showed love and joy?

    It's doing my head in – Ive voted green for many decades and I don't know if I can do it anymore.

    • weka 8.1
      28 March 2023 at 12:15 pm

      Most of the protest does appear to be a coming together around a common cause and people feeling good about it. As distinct from what happened at the rotunda, or the misogynistic signs that liberal gender rights activists are turning a blind eye to.

      There's some serious propaganda going on around the protest instead of honesty. I think we need to be careful to not do the same thing.

      As for voting Green, they still have a range of very good policies and we need a centre left government with strong GP representation if we want to make useful change.

      The right aren't much better on gender ideology, so it's not like letting them into govt will solve things. I think it will make things much worse for women generally.

      I see voting as strategy rather than personal gratification. I will continue to vote GP unless a better option appears.

    • Leighton 8.2
      28 March 2023 at 1:12 pm

      I'm with you Beverly. I've been a regular Green voter for over 15 years. I am not going to suddenly change my worldview overnight and start voting for Act or National, but I certainly couldn't look at myself in the mirror and vote Green based on the current state of affairs. I'm thinking I might give TOP a try. With the number of progressive-minded people who are disaffected by the current state of the usual suspect left-wing parties, they might have an opportunity to gain some traction in 2023.

    • Stuart Munro 9.1
      28 March 2023 at 1:30 pm

      Of the many things that can be drawn from this instance, one is the surprising degree to which gender theories have been allowed to colonize unrelated arts disciplines. An English student ought to be in greater danger of encountering Trollope or Smollet than the third rate fictions of contemporary moralisers.

  10. SPC 10
    28 March 2023 at 12:36 pm

    An interview of Professor Stock.

    start What's your view on the distinction made between sex and gender?

    4 min Would separating biological sex from gender expression be the way

    7 min How does fixtion come to be invovled in the transgender discussion?

    14 min How do we ensure the safety of women and trans women in public facilities?

    19 min What is the core driving force of violence against women?

  11. arkie 11
    28 March 2023 at 1:15 pm

    The housing crisis needs solving and this can only be achieved by a government committed to it:

    Queenstown's deputy mayor says the district needs help from government to solve its housing crisis.

    …

    He said the housing crisis was particularly serious in Queenstown because it has some of the highest property prices in the country and very high demand for short-term tourist accommodation combined with a relatively low wage economy centred on tourism.

    "It creates a bit of a perfect storm – the low wages, high [priced] rentals and low availability."

    He used the example of an average house in the Shotover Country subdivision that could charge a weekly rent of $1300.

    "For an average wage or a minimum wage that's an unbelievable amount of money."

    He agreed Airbnbs were helping to drive the shortage of rental properties as well as high rents.

    More than 1000 properties in the town were listed as Airbnbs.

    …

    The Queenstown Community Housing Trust was doing some great work in providing some housing but had a waiting list of 800-900.

    A new development in Arrowtown would provide 66 affordable houses.

    "There is some really great work being done but it certainly doesn't come close to meeting the problem."

    …

    Meeting organiser Hannah Sullivan says last night's protest was only the start, and central government needs to step in before the rental housing crisis gets even worse.

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/486869/queenstown-council-looks-to-govt-for-answers-as-pressure-grows-for-housing-action

    • Visubversa 11.1
      28 March 2023 at 1:33 pm

      When I was a young person I worked during the Uni holidays at a resort. There was very little local rental accommodation available, so the business actually provided board and lodging for its staff. It was basic but comfortable, clean and cheap. That business owner was not holding out their hand to Government – the staff were happy, and came back every year.

      • arkie 11.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 1:37 pm

        There's a lot of things that once were expected of an employer to provide, it is due to loss of labour power that these requirements were made either the individual potential employee's responsibility or the governments. An example is apprenticeships or on the job training.

      • Shanreagh 11.1.2
        28 March 2023 at 1:59 pm

        I worked in a food factory (Crest Bird's Eye in Hastings) with lots of uni students there. I already had board in Napier but the factory did have a welfare office where if you were having problems getting accommodation or wanted to change they had lists of good people who would give full board or allow students to use part of their homes.

        They also had buses, free of charge, that picked up workers and brought them to Hasting to start shifts starting at 7.00am & 4.00pm and took us home. Somehow I lucked onto this firm, its reputation was better than Watties and they were smaller.

        They kept an eye on all their staff and by the time I left the first year I had been promoted from on the line to chargehand.

        I also worked for Bristol Meyers in Akl. I lived close so no need for a bus but if we were working late and needed transport (male or female) they paid taxis for us to share so we did not have to walk or take late night buses.

        Funny how these were both British firms and I guess there was a fair bit of class consciousness but no matter how the concern for their people had got there, it was present.

        Looking back, and it is probably a product of the times, there was an acceptance of unions, good pay scales with regular reviews, after care for workers with the buses and taxis. Large Govt Depts like MOW, Forestry & to an extent Lands & Survey on its farms & national Parks took on summer wage workers and often provided modest accommodation in huts, shepherds huts

      • RedLogix 11.1.3
        28 March 2023 at 3:43 pm

        Off the top of my head I can think of a few business types that routinely provide board and accommodation for their workers – out of a similar necessity; shearers, mine workers, merchant navy, and military would be some of the obvious ones.

        So it is not unheard of or unusual. But like so many things it can have downsides; the old American practice of 'Company Towns' eventually fell by the wayside, as did the Soviet cities planned along the same lines. (I briefly got to visit the remains of one in 2001 – the once great Uralmash on the northern side of Ekaterinburg).

        The concept of employer provided accommodation seems to work well enough in some specific circumstances, especially when it is transient or short-term. But longer term it tends to entangle the private lives of employees too closely with the fate of the business. Bad enough losing your job, but losing your home or being stranded in a dead or dying city with no economic opportunity to move only compounds matters.

        On balance I can see the idea working for Queenstown hospitality workers, but there would need to be some careful safeguards put in place. These arrangements might initially look good, but can readily become exploitative.

        • Belladonna 11.1.3.1
          28 March 2023 at 6:08 pm

          One obvious risk (which was highlighted in the discussion around the Sleepyhead town being built around the factory in the Waikato.

          https://mthobsonproperties.co.nz/sleepytown-are-new-towns-the-solution/

          When your employer provides housing, you have a *lot* less freedom to just leave and change your job. Leaving your job, also leaves you homeless.

          I'd say that would be a very significant factor in Queenstown – where employers are desperate for workers, and would love to have an additional string to tie them to the job.

          • RedLogix 11.1.3.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 6:15 pm

            That's an unexpected find – I would not have suspected a contemporary example from NZ.

  12. Macro 12
    28 March 2023 at 2:40 pm

    Now for something completely different! But addressing the very issue of what women world wide should be really concerned about.

    There’s no greater feminist cause than the climate fight – and saving each other

    Setting the scene

    Last summer, a third of Pakistan was underwater. My country, the fifth most populous in the world, was submerged. Two million homes were destroyed, thousands of acres of agricultural land were flooded and 90% of the crops in Sindh, a food belt, were damaged. Thousands of kilometres of roads were rendered unusable, a million livestock killed, hospitals and schools obliterated, and 30 to 50 million people – a number as large as the population of Canada or Spain – were displaced and dispossessed.

    Why women should be concerned

    There is no more urgent fight for women right now than that of climate. The crisis will affect women more than everything else in the world – more than abortion rollbacks, more than oppressive governments, more than lower pay grades. Already, 80% of people displaced by the climate crisis globally are women. Climate justice is a global feminist issue. There is no greater feminist cause today than saving the planet and each other.

    …

    Nearly 700,000 pregnant women in Pakistan were deprived of maternal healthcare during the floods. They had no support for themselves and their newborns, no food, no security, no basic medical care. Miscarriages rose drastically during the floods. Besides anxiety and trauma, girls with their periods had no menstrual care, and an estimated 70% of women in flood-affected areas suffered UTIs from lack of access to bathrooms and from using dirty fabric in the place of clean pads. The climate emergency will affect the rich, the poor, the educated, the illiterate, the urban, the rural, the beautiful, the brave, the lonely, but it will be women and girls across the global south who will bear the biggest burden.

    Women and children are 14 times more likely to die during a disaster, according to at least one study. One reason is that they are often the group with the most limited resources at hand during an emergency. But besides that, the threat of sexual violence shoots up during extreme weather events – the United Nations found that with drought in Uganda came rising rates of domestic violence and sexual abuse. Floods in Pakistan and cyclones in Bangladesh brought not only maternal health crises but also increased violence towards women. And yet 0.01% of global funding is spent on initiatives that touch women and climate change.

    Now is not the time to be diverted upon side issues whilst we live in the midst of 6th great extinction, and a world under growing climate instability. The future of humanity, and the greatest crisis facing women world wide, lies in the balance and what we do now, and it much more than being afraid of the possibility of some deviant exposing himself in a public toilet.

    • Visubversa 12.1
      28 March 2023 at 4:13 pm

      You know, most of us women can walk and chew gum at the same time.

    • Anne 12.2
      28 March 2023 at 4:53 pm

      Macro @ 11
      yes yes yes

      As an oldie I lost count years ago the number of times someone exposed themselves to me and twice it was women. Only once did I report the exposure to the police because I knew where he lived and guessed I was not the only target. The other occasions I simply looked at them with contempt because I knew them to be inadequate human beings and cowards to boot.

      Looking back, my generation should not have put up with the inconvenience these individuals posed to us, but nowadays it seems to me the pendulum as swung too far in the other direction. Some errant young adult takes on a dare and exposes himself to someone. Next minute its plastered all over the internet and beyond as if WW3 has started – a slight exaggeration to accentuate the point Macro is making. That is:

      there is an infinitely more insidious future ahead us, and women across the planet will be the biggest victims.

      • Macro 12.2.1
        28 March 2023 at 5:26 pm

        Thank you Anne. I'm sorry to hear that you have had to suffer these indignities in the past. But you sum up what I have been trying to say with the Op Ed posted on the same day as the PP kerfuffle by a young woman Fatima Bhutto.

        there is an infinitely more insidious future ahead us, and women across the planet will be the biggest victims

  13. aj 13
    28 March 2023 at 2:44 pm

    The irony of having Uffindell in the background in Parliament as Davidson was being questioned about her cis white men comments.

  14. tsmithfield 14
    28 March 2023 at 3:04 pm

    Just wondering. Are trans groups protesting against that dreadful Nazi organisation, World Athletics?

    • Nic the NZer 14.1
      28 March 2023 at 3:43 pm

      They are, yes. I posted near the bottom of the savage Nazi post yesterday, with a link.

  15. Robert Guyton 15
    28 March 2023 at 5:10 pm

    Why not ask them?

    • RedLogix 16.1
      28 March 2023 at 5:31 pm

      Yes – way too late for the families but an important move nonetheless.

      As a rule of thumb more transparency is always better than less, except in a small minority of cases where it might reasonably cause more harm than good, or have a chilling effect on sources or whistleblowers.

      If this case becomes a solid precedent it will have been worth the wait.

      • adam 16.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 5:32 pm

        If this case becomes a solid precedent it will have been worth the wait.

        Could not agree more

        And big ups to the families for following this through. They are the true heroes in this mess.

    • Molly 16.2
      28 March 2023 at 5:36 pm

      That's good news.

      Do you know when the information is likely to be available? – I couldn't see it referenced in the article.

      And is there a distinction between the families' access and release to the public?

      • adam 16.2.1
        28 March 2023 at 6:21 pm

        I think we need to give the families some time to digest it, then it will be made public.

  17. pat 17
    28 March 2023 at 5:36 pm

    A question

    If Marama Davidson had wished to speak at the 'event' at the weekend would she had been given the opportunity?

    Surely a political party co leader would seek to demonstrate leadership (not to mention seizing a public platform and any potential media coverage) by calling for decorum and taking the opportunity to debate PP, or any speaker who's views she thought were 'hateful'…the fact she chose to remain part of a feral mob and didnt seek to allow purposeful debate demonstrates both a lack of leadership and judgement.

    • Robert Guyton 17.1
      28 March 2023 at 5:50 pm

      Meh. She was struck by a motorcycle on the way to the event. Enough to knock the confidence/focus of even the most practiced of us.

      What were you expecting?

      • pat 17.1.1
        28 March 2023 at 6:15 pm

        Was MD knocked down on 3 seperate occasions?…so far I have heard she was knocked down before the event, after the event , but before the 'interview' and after both.

    • bwaghorn 17.2
      28 March 2023 at 5:50 pm

      Yeah bit , she's brown and female so 2 box's ticked for green voters,

    • Anne 17.3
      28 March 2023 at 6:03 pm

      Why do you say… the fact she chose to remain part of a feral mob and didnt seek to allow purposeful debate demonstrates both a lack of leadership and judgement. ?

      Someone will correct me if I have got it wrong, but I understood the motor-bike that ran her down was in Queen St. not Albert Park. There was – coincidently of course – a Destiny Church organised protest occurring in Queen St. at the same time.

      I also presume she was there in a private capacity and not as a politician.

      • pat 17.3.1
        28 March 2023 at 6:10 pm

        A political party co leader does nothing in public in 'a private capacity'….that is the choice they make.

        I was thinking that "leaders" would have sought to diffuse the situation and take the opportunity to create something positive …maybe I have an old fashioned view of what leadership is.

        The question remains…if M D had sought to speak would she have been given the opportunity?…I suspect so.

        • Robert Guyton 17.3.1.1
          28 March 2023 at 6:27 pm

          Hard to speak dispassionately, after being struck by a motorcycle ridden by a Destiny Church member (if that was, in fact, the case).

          Being struck by a vehicle induces shock (I know) 🙂

          • pat 17.3.1.1.1
            28 March 2023 at 7:00 pm

            when was she struck Robert…before the event or after?

            I note you claim you havnt been following the event.

            • Robert Guyton 17.3.1.1.1.1
              28 March 2023 at 7:02 pm

              Good question, pat; I don't know the answer. I've not been following the issue closely. The incident is only vaguely visible to me…

              • pat …
                28 March 2023 at 7:05 pm

                Then perhaps you should refrain…especially when you claim MD was struck before the event.

                Up to you, but it may be wise.

                • Robert Guyton …
                  28 March 2023 at 7:12 pm

                  True, but it seems to me she was struck before she was interviewed by the annoying Counterspin person. Reasonable assumption? I think so 🙂

                  • pat …
                    28 March 2023 at 7:19 pm

                    If she was struck before the interview…and I dont know whrther she was or not…she was none the worse for wear.

                    She has spent considerable time within a volatile crowd and didnt see any need to depart early and appeared quite cheerful as she exited …hardly the demeanor or action of someone compromised by a recent trauma.

                    Strangely she didnt see any need to display leadership…go figure.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      28 March 2023 at 7:27 pm

                      "she was none the worse for wear."

                      You're a doctor, yes, capable of distance-diagnosis from fast-moving video coverage – respect!

                    • pat …
                      28 March 2023 at 7:34 pm

                      Your welcome….and video diagnosis is typical for the medical profession post covid…sadly.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      28 March 2023 at 8:07 pm

                      If she was struck before the interview…and I don't know whether she was or not…she was none the worse for wear.

                      Yep, telediagnosis took off during the pandemic – everyone's at it wink

                      If the Green co-leaders don't look after themselves, their fellow MPs may start blaming them for increases in ACC levies!

                      Let's be (more) careful out there.

      • Belladonna 17.3.2
        28 March 2023 at 6:26 pm

        This initial report says that she was on Princes St (top of Albert Park, next to the University), rather than Queen St (adjacent to Aotea Square)

        https://thespinoff.co.nz/live-updates/25-03-2023/greens-co-leader-marama-davidson-struck-by-motorcycle-at-protest

        She was on her way to the anti-PP protest, and the motorcycle riders were on the way to the protest at Aotea Sequare – driving past the Albert Park protest.

  18. Robert Guyton 18
    28 March 2023 at 6:03 pm

    Ordinary pedestrian.

    Ho hum.

  19. Corey 19
    28 March 2023 at 6:10 pm

    The absolute state of the left in New Zealand is heartbreaking, we are experiencing extreme hardship with insane food prices, we're spending $1 mill a day cramming poor people into unsafe motels, rents are skyrocketing, gp wait times are on average six weeks, surgeries are dangerously backlogged, our education and health systems are collapsing, we're experiencing multiple climate emergencies…

    And what are the left arguing about?? Oh as usual race, gender, sexuality and trying to shut down anyone who disagrees with them, now with added and celebrated violence.

    Then there's our media, look at Stuffs disgusting puff piece celebrating political violence and tell me what this story would be like if it was Parker Posey or whoever throwing liquids on this trans activist? The article would be very different. Celebrating violence against our political opponents instead of debating our political opponents. The degradation of NZ politics and media.

    I can't believe this, we are experiencing extreme economic hardship, food insecurity, climate emergencies a crumbling health system and an apocalyptic housing crisis with fellow kiwis in slum hotels

    And the left are busy fighting themselves over fucking gender and race and shutting down people they disagree with and resorting to proudly using violence.

    Disgusting! A class war is going on, where the fuck is the left? MIA to busy trying to shut down left wing women who disagree with other left wing people and having debates about a nearly 200 year old document while people starve and families rot in dangerous accomodation and listing excuses for why it's better for the state to spend a million a day putting people in motels rather than ditching the neoliberal consensus and having the state actually build fuckin houses.

    Five and a half fucking years and everything has just gotten worse and fucking worse for poor people and the whole time the left has been having these identity based arguments while suffer.

    The NZ left is a god damned pathetic embarrassment that doesn't even have the debating skills to pass a piddly little capital gains or to stop sanctioning people for being in a relationship on fucking dole.

    77 left wing seats in a 120 seat parliament and the best the left can do is argue over identity for six years and raise main benefits while deducting the increases from other benefits.

    Why would anyone be inspired to vote for this lot of incompetent visionless arrogant hateful anti free speech bunch of upper middle class wankers.

    If the left think we're angry now wait till food insecurity picks up. We can't eat debates on gender and debates on race won't build a single house but carry on.

    Last rant ever I'm done. I wish you all the best in pushing these bastards to deliver for the poor and working class. Good luck

    • RedLogix 19.1
      28 March 2023 at 6:49 pm

      Nah – I'd wager you have at least a few more first class rants like that one in you.

      Keep'em coming.devil

  20. Drowsy M. Kram 20
    28 March 2023 at 6:44 pm

    77 left wing seats in a 120 seat parliament…

    @Corey: The pandemic and the 2020 election result are anomalies. ‘Normal transmission’ (fewer left-wing 'bastards' and fewer women in Parliament) will resume in October.

    A new age of democratic extremes [4 November 2022]
    In this edition, we address the sharp polarisation between conservatives and progressive forces that is degrading democracy and creating a new age of extremes.

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    Open access notables Could an extremely cold central European winter such as 1963 happen again despite climate change?, Sippel et al., Weather and Climate Dynamics: Here, we first show based on multiple attribution methods that a winter of similar circulation conditions to 1963 would still lead to an extreme seasonal ...
    Skeptical Science
    2 days ago
  • First they came for the Māori

    Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    2 days ago
  • Join us for the weekly Hoon on YouTube Live

    Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 days ago
  • Will the real PM Luxon please stand up?

    Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    2 days ago
  • Will debt reduction trump abuse in care redress?

    Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Care report in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 days ago
  • Olywhites and Time Bandits

    About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 days ago
  • Why were the 1930s so hot in North America?

    This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jeff Masters and Bob Henson Those who’ve trawled social media during heat waves have likely encountered a tidbit frequently used to brush aside human-caused climate change: Many U.S. states and cities had their single hottest temperature on record during the 1930s, setting incredible heat marks ...
    Skeptical Science
    2 days ago
  • Throwback Thursday – Thinking about Expressways

    Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
    Greater AucklandBy Greater Auckland
    2 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Pick 'n' Mix for Thursday, July 25

    TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 days ago
  • The Possum: Demon or Friend?

    Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
    David FarrierBy David Farrier
    2 days ago
  • Not a story

    Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Journal of Record for Thursday, July 25

    TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquiry published its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    2 days ago
  • A tougher line on “proactive release”?

    The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    3 days ago
  • 'Let's build a motorway costing $100 million per km, before emissions costs'

    TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    3 days ago
  • Lester's Prescription – Positive Bleeding.

    I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    3 days ago
  • Casey Costello gaslights Labour in the House

    Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone icon on the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    3 days ago
  • Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?

    This is a re-post from the Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler Headline from 2021 The Texas grid, run by ERCOT, has had a rough few years. In 2021, winter storm Uri blacked out much of the state for several days. About a week ago, Hurricane Beryl knocked out ...
    Skeptical Science
    3 days ago
  • Gordon Campbell on a textbook case of spending waste by the Luxon government

    Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
    WerewolfBy lyndon
    3 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Pick 'n' Mix for Wednesday, July 24

    TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    3 days ago
  • LXR Takaanini

    As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
    Greater AucklandBy Patrick Reynolds
    3 days ago
  • Four kilograms of pain

    Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    3 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Journal of Record for Wednesday, July 24

    TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive: Transport Minister Simeon Brown announced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    3 days ago
  • Luxon gets caught out

    NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    3 days ago
  • A worrying sign

    Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    4 days ago
  • Are we fine with 47.9% home-ownership by 2048?

    Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloitte report for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • Let's Win This

    You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    4 days ago
  • Waimahara: The Singing Spirit of Water

    There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
    Greater AucklandBy Connor Sharp
    4 days ago
  • A major milestone: Global climate pollution may have just peaked

    This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
    Skeptical Science
    4 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Pick 'n' Mix for Tuesday, July 23

    TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’s Oliver LewisScoop: Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Journal of Record for Tuesday, July 23

    TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announced the Board of Te Whatu Ora- Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • HealthNZ and Luxon at cross purposes over budget blowout

    Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    4 days ago
  • 2500-3000 more healthcare staff expected to be fired, as Shane Reti blames Labour for a budget defic...

    Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    4 days ago
  • Might Kamala Harris be about to get a 'stardust' moment like Jacinda Ardern?

    As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
    PunditBy Tim Watkin
    5 days ago
  • Solutions Interview: Steven Hail on MMT & ecological economics

    TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
    The KakaBy Steven Hail
    5 days ago
  • Reported back

    The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    5 days ago
  • Vandrad the Viking, Christopher Coombes, and Literary Archaeology

    Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
    A Phuulish FellowBy strda221
    5 days ago
  • Gordon Campbell On The Biden Withdrawal

    History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
    WerewolfBy lyndon
    5 days ago
  • Joe Biden's withdrawal puts the spotlight back on Kamala and the USA's complicated relatio...

    This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    5 days ago
  • Why we have to challenge our national fiscal assumptions

    A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • Existential Crisis and Damaged Brains

    What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    5 days ago
  • A speed limit is not a target, and yet…

    This is a guest post from longtime supporter Mr Plod, whose previous contributions include a proposal that Hamilton become New Zealand’s capital city, and that we should switch which side of the road we drive on. A recent Newsroom article, “Back to school for the Govt’s new speed limit policy“, ...
    Greater AucklandBy Guest Post
    5 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Pick 'n' Mix for Monday, July 22

    TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • The Kākā’s Journal of Record for Monday, July 22

    TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29

    A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
    Skeptical Science
    6 days ago
  • I'd like to share what I did this weekend

    This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    6 days ago
  • For the children – Why mere sentiment can be a misleading force in our lives, and lead to unex...

    National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Order image, ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    6 days ago
  • A friend in uncertain times

    Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    6 days ago
  • The Chaotic World of Male Diet Influencers

    Hi,We’ll get to the horrific world of male diet influencers (AKA Beefy Boys) shortly, but first you will be glad to know that since I sent out the Webworm explaining why the assassination attempt on Donald Trump was not a false flag operation, I’ve heard from a load of people ...
    David FarrierBy David Farrier
    6 days ago
  • It's Starting To Look A Lot Like… Y2K

    Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    1 week ago
  • Bernard’s Saturday Soliloquy for the week to July 20

    Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 week ago
  • Pharmac Director, Climate Change Commissioner, Health NZ Directors – The latest to quit this m...

    Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
    Mountain TuiBy Mountain Tui
    1 week ago
  • Flooding Housing Policy

    The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
    PunditBy Brian Easton
    1 week ago
  • A Voyage Among the Vandals: Accepted (Again!)

    As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
    A Phuulish FellowBy strda221
    1 week ago
  • The Kākā's Chorus for Friday, July 19

    An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 week ago
  • The Kākā’s Pick 'n' Mix for Friday, July 19

    TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 week ago
  • Weekly Roundup 19-July-2024

    Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
    Greater AucklandBy Greater Auckland
    1 week ago
  • Weekly Climate Wrap: A market-led plan for failure

    TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 week ago
  • Tobacco First

    Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    1 week ago
  • Trump’s Adopted Son.

    Waiting In The Wings: For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
    Bowalley Road
    1 week ago
  • The Kākā’s Journal of Record for Friday, July 19

    TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSA announced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 week ago
  • The Hoon around the week to July 19

    TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 week ago
  • Skeptical Science New Research for Week #29 2024

    Open access notables Improving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society: To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
    Skeptical Science
    1 week ago

  • Joint statement from the Prime Ministers of Canada, Australia and New Zealand

    Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue.  We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    17 hours ago
  • AG reminds institutions of legal obligations

    Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    20 hours ago
  • More young people learning about digital safety

    Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views.  “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    20 hours ago
  • Speech to the Conference for General Practice 2024

    Tēnā tātou katoa,  Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    22 hours ago
  • Employers and payroll providers ready for tax changes

    New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts.  “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    24 hours ago
  • Experimental vineyard futureproofs wine industry

    An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Funding confirmed for regions affected by North Island Weather Events

    The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Indonesian Foreign Minister to visit

    Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced.   “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Strengthening partnership with Ngāti Maniapoto

    He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    2 days ago
  • Transport Minister thanks outgoing CAA Chair

    Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    2 days ago
  • Test for Customary Marine Title being restored

    The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says.  “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    2 days ago
  • Opposition united in bad faith over ECE sector review

    Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet.  “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    2 days ago
  • Kiwis having their say on first regulatory review

    After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks.  “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    2 days ago
  • Government upgrading Lower North Island commuter rail

    The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    2 days ago
  • Government moves to ensure flood protection for Wairoa

    Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 days ago
  • PM speech to Parliament – Royal Commission of Inquiry’s Report into Abuse in Care

    Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care.  At the heart of this report are the ...
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  • Grant Illingworth KC appointed as transitional Commissioner to Royal Commission

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  • Backing mental health services on the West Coast

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    Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum.  While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation.  “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
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  • Climate Change Minister to attend climate action meeting in China

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    Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
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    7 days ago
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    Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
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    New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says.    “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says.    “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
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  • New infrastructure energises BOP forestry towns

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  • 'Pacific Futures'

    President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests.    Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone.    Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
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    1 week ago

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