Almost all of the extra heat that humans have captured by adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere over the last few centuries has wound up warming the deep oceans. But in the fine balance that runs between the ocean depths and the atmosphere, the effects of centuries of dissipated industrial living, we are seeing the beginnings of the the next couple of centuries of extreme weather. We’re now starting to feel the effects of that excess heat.
The Guardian has had several articles detailing the downstream effects of warming the oceans.
The temperature at the ocean’s surface – like on land – is being pushed higher by global heating but can jump around from one year to the next as weather systems come and go.
But in the 2km below the surface, that variability is almost nowhere to be seen. The rising heat down there has been on a relentless climb for decades, thanks to burning fossil fuels.
“The heat-holding capacity of the ocean is mammoth,” says Dr Paul Durack, a research scientist specialising in ocean measurements and modelling at the US Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
“The ocean captures more than 90% of the imbalance of energy that we’re creating because of anthropogenic climate change.”
The ocean is much less reflective than the land and soaks up more of the direct energy from sunlight.
But as greenhouse gases trap more of the energy that’s reflected back – allowing less to escape to space – the ocean tries to balance itself with the heat in the atmosphere above.
A technical chart in a chapter of the latest UN climate assessment laid out the unfathomable heat gain. Between 1971 and 2018, the ocean had gained 396 zettajoules of heat.
How much heat is that? Scientists have calculated it is the equivalent energy of more than 25bn Hiroshima atomic bombs. And that heat gain is accelerating.
A study in January found the ocean gained 10 ZJ more in 2022 than the year before – enough heat to boil 700m kettles every second.
Compared with the ocean, according to a study in January the atmosphere has held on to about 2% of the extra heat caused by global heating since 2006.
To understand what’s happening below the ocean surface, out of sight of satellites, scientists look at a vast network of thousands of thermometers on buoys, ships, underwater gliders and permanent moorings.
Durack says it wasn’t until the early 2000s that a view of the changes in the ocean – long-predicted by climate scientists – started to become clear as more and more data became available.
We have heated the oceans enough now that we’re getting very strong climatic shifts not merely predicted, but now thoroughly measured at the surface of the oceans and into the atmosphere. Not just the wind and rain that has been shaking my top story ridge apartment since October.
In Asia the tropics are getting quite extreme heat.
Asia is experiencing weeks of “endless record heat”, with sweltering temperatures causing school closures and surges in energy use.
Record April temperatures have been recorded at monitoring stations across Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, as well as in China and South Asia.
On Tuesday, four weather stations in Myanmar hit or matched record monthly temperatures, with Theinzayet, in eastern Mon state, reaching the highest, at 43C (109.4F). On Wednesday, Bago, north-east of Yangon, reached 42.2C, matching an all-time record previously recorded in May 2020 and April 2019, according to Maximiliano Herrera, a climatologist and weather historian.
“The poorest of the poor are going to [suffer] the most. Especially, it is devastating for the farming community, the people who are dependent on agriculture or fishing,” said Dr Fahad Saeed, regional lead for South Asia and the Middle East at Climate Analytics, a climate science policy institute.
“The heat is not foreign to this part of land,” he said, but added that temperatures were rising beyond the limits of people’s adaptability.
Note the emphasis on farming, agriculture and fishing. These are the underpinnings of our societies worldwide. They are extremely sensitive to weather and climatic shifts. Our food gathering technology systems worldwide are inherently dependent on having predicable weather and climatic patterns. Not something that has been noticeable in NZ this year, or in Australia over their last decade of drought and floods, or in large parts of Asia this yera.
A lot of that is directly related to shifts in the El Niño and La Niña climatic pattern in the Pacific. The recent changes since 1960 in the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) are now definitely attributable to the greenhouse gas emissions.
A new study led by researchers at CSIRO set out to determine the impact of greenhouse gas emissions on the major climate driver, known as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO).
Up until now there had been limited understanding about the role climate change has already played on ENSO, with research primarily looking at future projections.
Lead researcher Wenju Cai said their research yielded significant results, with evidence that El Niño and La Niña events had become more frequent and intense due to increasing emissions of greenhouse gases.
“Previous research projected how El Niño and La Niña will change in the future but was unable to tell whether human-caused climate change has already affected [them],” he said.
“The current paper provides modelling evidence that climate change has already made El Niño and La Niña more frequent and more extreme.”
The swinging pendulum of ENSO plays a major part in year-to-year climate, with recent La Niña and El Niño events having played a hand in devastating flooding and drought events in Australia.
On a global scale, no other single phenomenon yields a bigger influence on whether a year will be warmer, cooler, wetter, or drier than average.
It is a climate pattern that has been operating for millions of years, according to palaeoclimatic evidence.
The CSIRO study, published in the journal Nature Reviews Earth and Environment, examined extensive outputs from models without greenhouse warming, each for hundreds to over thousands-of-year time scales, to examine how unusual the last 60 years have been.
To understand the change, they then compared ENSO in the 60 years pre- and post-1960.
They found that strong El Niños increased from two events in the pre-1960 to four events in the post-1960, and strong La Niñas from one event to nine events.
Dr Cai said the observed strength was extremely unusual if climate change had not had an impact.
Even without changes to ENSO itself, Dr Cai said the impacts of El Niño and La Niña were expected to be more intense because of climate change.
“Global warming makes their impact more extreme because a warmer atmosphere holds more water, so when it rains it rains harder, and evaporation is higher making droughts more severe, their onsets earlier and harder to get out,” he said.
But Dr Cai said with the changes to the frequency and strength of ENSO the impacts were likely to be even stronger.
The recent years of overheated surface waters around NZ, probably as a result of the last 3 years in a La Niña pattern tend to drive home just how extreme this is likely to be – even here. New Zealand is an island nation, well separated and ocean buffered from any disturbing continental land mass. But the ocean heatwaves around us have been devastating to our marine ecosystems, and to the large fishing and aquaculture industries.
New figures provided to the Guardian by scientists studying ocean temperature shifts show that on average, over the year to April 2023, New Zealand’s coastal waters sat stewing in marine heatwave conditions for 208 days. Some southern regions experienced marine heatwave conditions for more than 270 days during the period. In the north island’s Bay of Plenty, the waters remained in heatwave for an entire year.
With little respite for species to recover between the waves of heat, scientists warn that some ecosystems are reaching tipping points under the surface, with effects that will be felt years into the future. No one yet knows what it will mean for the fish, seabirds, whales, dolphins, and New Zealand’s multi-billion dollar fishing industry.
As scientists and communities begin to reckon with the impact, the conditions hitting Aotearoa provide a preview of the future of the world’s oceans under climate change: waters around the world are projected to rise by about 4C on average by 2100, if the world maintains its course on global heating. Heatwaves around New Zealand are already seeing spikes that high, giving a glimpse of what it can do to species under the surface.
Some of the examples provided are pretty gruesome, with massive wash ups of dead fish, starving penguins, sea sponges bleaching in Fiordland as their algae cooks off, plus fish species and whales disappearing to more benign ocean climates. But it also affects our economy.
The changes in the ocean are so stark they have been noticed outside scientific circles.
In the hills above Blenheim, between the wineries and pine plantations, trucks rumbled through January along the narrow road. They would make the journey 160 times over, through the hot summer months, winding from the coast to the hill and back again. Their cargo was tonnes upon tonnes of fish: king or “chinook” salmon, the most expensive variety of the salmon family, prized enough that a single large fish can sell for up to $1,700.
Usually, it would be sliced into sashimi, or smoked and laid atop hors d’oeuvres. Instead, it lay rotting in the truckbeds, more than 1,300 tonnes of it, carried to be dumped in a pit in the hills.
In Marlborough’s fish farms last year, the fish had died in their thousands, unable to survive the rising temperatures around them. In warmer areas, about 42% of total fish stock died. The country’s largest salmon producer, NZ King Salmon, announced it would have to shut down some of its farms as the climate heated waters around the sounds.
“When I joined this company, I never heard of the term ‘marine heatwave’,” said CEO Grant Rosewarne, as the company reckoned with the losses. “Recently, there’s been three of them.
“We thought we had more time,” he said. “Climate change is a slow process. But faster than many people think.”
New Zealand’s seafood industry plays a key role in the economy, contributing around $2bn in export earnings and employing more than 13,000 people. As sea temperatures warm, they are wreaking havoc with some of the most profitable sections of that industry.
“There’s been definitely changes with marine fisheries – with a lot more warmer water fish being caught further south,” Langlands says. “I really do feel fear. And feel for the price of seafood in New Zealand.”
That stored ocean heat isn’t just going to affect the ocean. What happens in the oceans directly affects what happens on land and especially in New Zealand. Farmers and urbanites can expect to feel the effects in the short-term over the next decade or so.
This has been easy to observe in the tail end of our last few years of a strong La Niña and its associated devastation in the upper North Island down to Hawke’s Bay, East Cape and Poverty Bay. It included my car getting written off after traversing the St Georges Bay Road River in downtown Auckland. That was rather surreal as the storm water system started blowing its access lids and the rapidly rising waters.
As well as drowning cities, towns, and farmlands, it also demonstrated that our infrastructure was built for a different era – that of the climate we used to have. This plaintive article in the wake of the devastating Cyclone Gabrielle flooding in February was pointing to the once in 250 year flood in Napier in 2020.
It was meant to be a one-in-250-year deluge but the last big floods in Napier, and the recommendations that followed, were a little more than two years ago.
“In the context of climate change, events such as the November flood may become more common, and Napier should expect and prepare for extreme weather events in the future with changing weather patterns meaning extreme weather events will return on a shorter cycle than they once did,” a Napier City Council 2021 report said.
Nobody died in the November 2020 floods but a report to the council a year later shows it resulted in 173 evacuees, 115 homes deemed uninhabitable, and 2680 homes losing power.
The rainfall was a one-in-250-year event, the report said, but warned “events of this nature, and subsequent flooding, may occur more often”. Other reports downgraded it to once in a century.
Fast-forward 827 days to Valentine’s Day, February 2023 and Cyclone Gabrielle delivered what Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said was “the most severe weather event this century”, submerging a Hawke’s Bay power station, flooding homes to their roofs, killing at least seven in Hawke’s Bay, and creating thousands of evacuees and many unaccounted for.
Multiply that by every city, town, and farmland region in NZ. Look at all of the roads, rail, water systems, power and telecoms and buildings that were and often still are being built for the climate of the last more benign century. Like Napier, instead of all of that infrastructure being tested by weather to see if it fit for purpose every few centuries, now with a changing climate it is likely to be tested within a decade.
This makes it easier to understand why this years infrastructure budget (and the budgets over the last 5 years) have been so enormous. We’re not only having to catch up for the later 50 odd years of laggard investment in infrastructure, mostly by the conservative governments and councils, we’re having to build for ever-more likely devastating weather events.
National and Act of course are vaguely hand-waving that they may have policies to deal with this. None of which appear to have any more substance or detail than simpleton slogans. The reality is that they are both solidly stuck in ideologies of the 20th century – because they’re conservative, obsessed by making sure that the wealthy aren’t taxed, inefficiently chasing the poor with punitive and inefficient policies guided more by slogans than intelligence, and generally pretty damn stupid about dealing with any kind of change. You’d think that they never left the last century when you listen to them.
Quite unlike the budget yesterday. Like the 3 Waters programme, it probably isn’t enough. But at least it is a step in the right kind of direction to deal with the already existing build up of heat in the oceans.
Don’t forget that El Niño is currently slated to become dominant and active in 2023/2024. Based on what has happened in recent El Niño events it will arrive early, bigger and more destructive than expected, and cause more but different events than La Niña. Instead of just heat, wind and rain we get more atmospheric cooling from the south (quite different effects than most of the world). It will probably take a year or two to really hit here. But it is likely to be much more extreme that previous events.
A big part of the government’s recovery and resilience thrust is its focus on infrastructure.
Robertson said: “The government has taken significant steps to address New Zealand’s infrastructure deficit. We have committed $71 billion of infrastructure investment over the next five years in addition to the $45 billion we have spent on infrastructure in the past five years. This is the funding that builds our schools, hospitals, public housing, [and] rail and road networks.
“In the last term of government we set up the Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga, which developed the New Zealand Infrastructure Strategy, identifying the challenges New Zealand is facing over the next 30 years. We know we need to change how we think about infrastructure planning and resourcing.
“Alongside this Budget, we have released our Infrastructure Action Plan, which supports our response to the strategy and which is crucial to continuing to deliver the infrastructure transformation required while providing certainty to the construction sector.”
The Minister pointed to the need to future-proof the infrastructure in New Zealand for the country’s growing and changing population, climate change events, and to make use of the available developing technology.
“The North Island weather events added a level of urgency to our infrastructure investment planning and highlighted the importance of resilience in the face of climate change and increasing extreme weather events,” Robertson said.
“Today I am announcing a major change in how we address our infrastructure deficit and build a more resilient nation. Through Budget 2023 we are investing $6 billion in the initial phase of a National Resilience Plan. This will support medium- and long-term infrastructure investment and focus in the first instance on building back better from the recent weather events.”
According to the Minister, the initial focus of investments will likely be on road, rail, and local resilience. Additionally, telecommunications and electricity transmission investment is high on the agenda as well.
Robertson said: “As indicated at Budget 2022, the change to the fiscal rules means we can use our balance sheet more effectively to support long-term productive investments such as this programme.
“For too long governments have kicked the can down the road when it comes to investing in resilient and essential infrastructure investment. Today we embark on the long-term nation-building that I believe a responsible government must do.”
Outside this morning, I hear the Auckland Central fire-engines, police, and probably ambulances sirens going their way past, as they were doing through the evening and this morning. Presumably dealing with the consequences of last nights weather…. It was certainly shaking my apartment when I was writing the start of this post last night
BTW: Please keep the dystopian fantasies down to a dullards quiet roar. I've been hearing them for nearly 50 years. As long-term science fiction addict and historian geek, I almost certainly know the scenarios better than most.
This is a post about a upcoming and steadily increasing problem with a little bit about measures that will need to be taken for living with the heat already stored in the oceans. Regardless of future attempts to curb future emissions, the already stored heat will keep coming out of the oceans and affecting our climate and weather for next few centuries. Rapidly building up over the next two decades.
The problem is that we don't exactly have a resilient infrastructure in this country to cope with that. Most of the politics from the right to deal with this as an issue can only be described as chicken-shit and rather stupid. Certainly none that I have heard so far have the vaguest idea about the science or the economics of dealing with this kind of issue. Essentially incompetent to run a government to deal with our responde.
You only have to listen to Seymour or Luxon for a few minutes to realise that they have absolutely no frigging ideas. Both sound like old mean wanting the world to change back to something that they vaguely remember as being a better world for them.
Certainly neither seem to have a clue about how to deal with changing world. Nor do their fawning acolytes.
Labour has been making a start and looks to be continuing that process.
"But air passenger travel is ramping up, anticipating a surge in demand. That translates to thousands more aircraft and new pilots. Boeing estimates that the world will need more than 600,000 new pilots between 2022 and 2041, and the biggest requirement is in Asia. Pilot training is a huge new growth industry, it seems. Aircraft manufacturers are salivating."
the other is acidification of the world's oceans by carbon dioxide absorption
Sure and your point is ????????
FFS my first degree was in Earth Sciences. It isn't exactly rocket science to understand how weak carbonic acid forms.
You really just need to get a sense of scale.
At various times over the last half billion years on Earth, we've had much higher CO2, methane, and other greenhouse gases. Far far higher high ocean heat due to greenhouse gases and much more acidic oceans.
Earths living organism genotypes and ecosystems are perfectly capable of moving into vacant habitats and doing it at a rapid pace. Think of what happened during an after every glacial/interglacial within the recent history since Antarctica started form its deep freeze icecap about 35-40 mya. Colonisation happens within decades. Evolution to ecological niches happens within very very short (for a earth scientist) periods
The present atmospheric concentration of CO2 is the highest for 14 million years.[15] Concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere were as high as 4,000 ppm during the Cambrian period about 500 million years ago, and as low as 180 ppm during the Quaternary glaciation of the last two million years.[4] Reconstructed temperature records for the last 420 million years indicate that atmospheric CO2 concentrations peaked at approximately 2,000 ppm during the Devonian (400 Ma) period, and again in the Triassic (220–200 Ma) period and was four times current levels during the Jurassic period (201–145 Ma).[16][17]
My point is that I'm not concerned that Earth's biosphere will survive. Or even the small minority of it lives in the oceans and on land surfaces (the ancestral forms in the lithosphere far outweigh the rest). I can't think of anything that humans are capable of, or possibly capable of doing in the very near term that could kill off Earth. There simply isn't enough fossil carbon geologically sequestered to do that.
I'm concerned that our societies and maybe our species survives in something like its current form. Especially if it is relatively easy to do. The decarbonising of the economies is happening at a very rapid pace. It means that we may be able to prevent taking the CO2 ppm up over 600 over the rest of the century. 450 is a pipedream. 500ppm may be possible.
But we're at about 412 now. So some adaption is going to be required both by us and the species who share this world.
So species are already having to adapt back into other and often older forms latent in their genotype. Shellfish start dropping their shells or start using different compositions. Warm loving algae will eventually colonise vacated reefs. FFS we still have algae strains around from both the Cambrian and the peak Quarternary glaciations for the really hot and acidic and freezing cold.
You don't have to look far to see this happening. After all we are the weird bald species that sweats to maintain heat dissipation. A absolute rarity in the animal kingdom.
As I commented at the top. When it comes to dystopian speculation I don't need much assistance. I could run through dystopian scenarios that you'd be unlikely to even be aware of as possibilities.
My point is that acidification of the oceans means a whole lot of marine organisms, particularly shellfish will probably die out because they won't be able to form shells. That is less food for the higher predators and they will die out in turn.
You can spout out all the science you like to try and impress people but the simple facts that everyone can understand are there: species die out leads to other species dying out.
The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) is part of a global thermohaline circulation in the oceans and is the zonally integrated component of surface and deep currents in the Atlantic Ocean. It is characterized by a northward flow of warm, salty water in the upper layers of the Atlantic, and a southward flow of colder, deep waters. These "limbs" are linked by regions of overturning in the Nordic and Labrador Seas and the Southern Ocean, although the extent of overturning in the Labrador Sea is disputed.[1][2] The AMOC is an important component of the Earth's climate system, and is a result of both atmospheric and thermohaline drivers.
Climate change has the potential to weaken the AMOC through increases in ocean heat content and elevated freshwater flows from the melting ice sheets.
For what it's worth in 1983 I spent 10 weeks on HMNZS Tui with an oceanographic team plotting out parts of the Southern Ocean segment of this astonishing current. Not a lot was known about it then, and still most people have no idea just how much energy it shifts around the planet.
I look back with nothing but gratitude and respect for all the really interesting people I have been privileged to either meet or work with along the way.
All that is happening here is that I'm a little more willing to be open about my life than most contributors here – because if there is one thing I have learned is almost everyone has an interesting life and something they can teach you. They just fail to see it that way.
I'm no scientist but I love to fish and can clearly see the effect of the rising sea temperatures in my area.
The marlin fishing season is extended by almost 3 months as temperatures stay above 18 degrees longer and we are now regularly catching the beautiful mahimahi- a sub tropical species.
Kingfish are prolific and are breeding on a shallow reef 3 to 4 metres deep which can be reached in 5 minutes by kayak.
I'm enjoying it at the moment but realise it will probably end badly if the oceans continue to warm
We have been getting kingfish down here in coastal Otago occasionally, due to the marine heatwaves. Nice fish to eat sure, but it will end badly. It's not "probably" and "if"
Fish have central nervous systems very similar to humans..
So if you can imagine going about your business..and suddenly a hook in the mouth.. protruding out of your cheek..then being dragged into the water to drown…to be hauled into a vessel..and either left to die.. drowning in oxygen…or to be bashed on the skull..
These are the cruel realities of fishing/eating fish…
Plus fishers…both commercial and recreational..are committing the environmental crime…of fishing species to extinction..
My fishing was done in the bay of islands…when I was a boy…and the ocean then was teeming with fish..
It ain't teeming no more..
This is what fishers/those who eat them…are doing..
And really… it is the only argument you can muster against what I am talking about/living…eh..?
(Tho' I must say… Kathryn ryan interviewed a scientist who works in the field of animal communication…and she had some amazing stories to tell..
And her grand finale was playing a recording of plants communicating with each other…not screaming…but mind-blowing all the same…it sounded like electrical impulses..with a hint of firing up old school landline modem..
So your screaming carrot argument may have some heft..after all
If that is the case my argument will come down to causing least damage/suffering..
But as far as dedicated carnivores are concerned…that other death knell of our export-driven animal exploitation industries..the lab-grown meat…will soon see them sorted..
Looks like the oceans are the main drivers of weather patterns and we are in a downward spiral that will be hard to arrest.
Recent news items showed forest fires in Alberta forcing thousands to evacuate, while northern Italy has suffered extensive flooding (this after months of drought).
Yet international air travel is reported to be at 84.90% of Feb 2019 levels. Go figure.
Yet international air travel is reported to be at 84.90% of Feb 2019 levels. Go figure.
Many people are now aware (on some level) that we're in a "Last Chance to See" spiral – but there's still time (just) to tick off bucket list items, and bolster BAU into the bargain.
GLOBAL TOTAL SEATS (DOMESTIC + INTERNATIONAL)
The air travel data is plotted by week from the beginning of 2019 to w/c 15th May 2023.
The total number of seats in the market is now 3.1% below where it was in the same week in 2019, and 18% above where it was this time last year. https://www.oag.com/coronavirus-airline-schedules-data
yeah but we all got jetskis, chainsaws, hardly davisons, angle grinders, trips to outer mongolia and makoo peekoo and you name it to distract us from the basically aimless infantile consumerist existence we have created
If you were thinking about voting for act or anyone else who has their heads in the clouds on this issue.
Please go back and re-read this post.
We have no choice, we actually have to be decisive leadership now, and whilst you may not like labour (me either) – they do not have their heads up their asses on this. And are offering leadership, albeit a bit slow.
My only issue with you post lprent and it's minor, is that any exploitation of any new gas and coal needs to be stopped – to quote brother Malcolm X – by any means necessary.
If someone is considering voting ACT, then your advice is good. If someone is considering voting Labour, then the advice needs to be to vote Green. It's the Greens who have been leading on this for a very long time, and it's long past time for NZ to empower them. Labour will still form government, but having 15 – 20 Green MPs in government with them would be a game changer on climate and transition.
Unfortunately looking to Wellington and the wee parade of political options isn't where the solution lies. While touting infrastructure budgets and paying lip service to mitigation, they are still chasing trade deals that keep the global merry-go-round going round.
Sure, there are a few things that must be imported. However, there is no need, as an example, for American or Belgian potato products on our supermarket shelves.
You and I need to make the changes that matter. Transition Towns are a good example of building resilience and moving to a low carbon lifestyle.
Thank you Lprent, I read this over and over with huge sadness. So much damage done by our species. I agree that our choice of who we vote for has never been more stark.
Local and personal resilience could slow things, but we have already made recovery difficult and dangerous. Our behaviour over water shows the problems ahead.
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Gaming laptops represent a significant investment for passionate gamers, offering portability and powerful performance for immersive gaming experiences. However, a common concern among potential buyers is their lifespan. Unlike desktop PCs, which allow for easier component upgrades, gaming laptops have inherent limitations due to their compact and integrated design. This ...
The annual inventory report of New Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions has been released, showing that gross emissions have dropped for the third year in a row, to 78.4 million tons: All-told gross emissions have decreased by over 6 million tons since the Zero Carbon Act was passed in 2019. ...
Experiencing a locked computer can be frustrating, especially when you need access to your files and applications urgently. The methods to unlock your computer will vary depending on the specific situation and the type of lock you encounter. This guide will explore various scenarios and provide step-by-step instructions on how ...
While the world has largely transitioned to digital communication, faxing still holds relevance in certain industries and situations. Fortunately, gone are the days of bulky fax machines and dedicated phone lines. Today, you can easily send and receive faxes directly from your computer, offering a convenient and efficient way to ...
In our increasingly digital world, home computers have become essential tools for work, communication, entertainment, and more. However, this increased reliance on technology also exposes us to various cyber threats. Understanding these threats and taking proactive steps to protect your home computer is crucial for safeguarding your personal information, finances, ...
In the ever-evolving world of technology, server-based computing has emerged as a cornerstone of modern digital infrastructure. This article delves into the concept of server-based computing, exploring its various forms, benefits, challenges, and its impact on the way we work and interact with technology. Understanding Server-Based Computing: At its core, ...
The absolute brass neck of this guy.We want more medical doctors, not more spin doctors, Luxon was saying a couple of weeks ago, and now we’re told the guy has seven salaried adults on TikTok duty. Sorry, doing social media. The absolute brass neck of it. The irony that the ...
Buzz from the Beehive Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones relishes spatting and eagerly takes issue with environmentalists who criticise his enthusiasm for resource development. He relishes helping the fishing industry too. And so today, while the media are making much of the latest culling in the public service to ...
Having written, taught and worked for the US government on issues involving unconventional warfare and terrorism for 30-odd years, two things irritate me the most when the subject is discussed in public. The first is the Johnny-come-lately academics-turned-media commentators who … Continue reading → ...
Eric Crampton writes – Kainga Ora is the government’s house building agency. It’s been building a lot of social housing. Kainga Ora has its own (but independent) consenting authority, Consentium. It’s a neat idea. Rather than have to deal with building consents across each different territorial authority, Kainga Ora ...
Muriel Newman writes – The Coalition Government says it is moving with speed to deliver campaign promises and reverse the damage done by Labour. One of their key commitments is to “defend the principle that New Zealanders are equal before the law.” To achieve this, they have pledged they “will not advance ...
Chris Trotter writes – The absence of anything resembling a fightback from the public servants currently losing their jobs is interesting. State-sector workers’ collective fatalism in the face of Coalition cutbacks indicates a surprisingly broad acceptance of impermanence in the workplace. Fifty years ago, lay-offs in the thousands ...
Mariupol, on the Azov Sea coast, was one of the first cities to suffer almost complete destruction after the start of the Ukraine War started in late February 2022. We remember the scenes of absolute destruction of the houses and city structures. The deaths of innocent civilians – many of ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – Ten years ago, I wrote the following in a Listener column: Every year around one in five new-born babies will be reliant on their caregivers benefit by Christmas. This pattern has persisted from at least 1993. For Maori the number jumps to over one in three. ...
Climate change is expected to generate more and more extreme events, delivering a sort of structural shock to inflation that central banks will have to react to as if they were short-term cyclical issues. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s ...
It’s a simple deal. We pay taxes in order to finance the social services we want and need. The carnage now occurring across the public sector though, is breaking that contract. Over 3,000 jobs have been lost so far. Many are in crucial areas like Education where the impact of ...
Hi,A friend had their 40th over the weekend and decided to theme it after Curb Your Enthusiasm fashion icon Susie Greene. Captured in my tiny kitchen before I left the house, I ending up evoking a mix of old lesbian and Hillary Clinton — both unintentional.Me vs Hillary ClintonIf you’re ...
This is a re-post from Andrew Dessler at the Climate Brink blogIn 2023, the Earth reached temperature levels unprecedented in modern times. Given that, it’s reasonable to ask: What’s going on? There’s been lots of discussions by scientists about whether this is just the normal progression of global warming or if something ...
The schools are on holiday and the sun is shining in the seaside village and all day long I have been seeing bunches of bikes; Mums, Dads, teens and toddlers chattering, laughing, happy, having a bloody great time together. Cheers, AT, for the bits of lane you’ve added lately around the ...
Today in our National-led authoritarian nightmare: Shane Jones thinks Ministers should be above the law: New Zealand First MP Shane Jones is accusing the Waitangi Tribunal of over-stepping its mandate by subpoenaing a minister for its urgent hearing on the Oranga Tamariki claim. The tribunal is looking into the ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Politicians across the political spectrum are implicated in the New Zealand media’s failing health. Either through neglect or incompetent interventions, successive governments have failed to regulate, foster, and allow a healthy Fourth Estate that can adequately hold politicians and the powerful to account. ...
Citizen Science writes – Last week saw two significant developments in the debate over the treatment of trans-identifying children and young people – the release in Britain of the final report of Dr Hilary Cass’s review into gender healthcare, and here in New Zealand, the news that the ...
One night while sleeping in my bed I had a beautiful dreamThat all the people of the world got together on the same wavelengthAnd began helping one anotherNow in this dream, universal love was the theme of the dayPeace and understanding and it happened this wayAfter such an eventful day ...
This is a guest post by Oscar Simms who is a housing activist, volunteer for the Coalition for More Homes, and was the Labour Party candidate for Auckland Central at the last election. ...
Turning what Labour called the “holiday highway” into a four-lane expressway from Auckland to Whangarei could bring at least an economic benefit of nearly two billion a year for Northland each year. And it could help bring an end to poverty in one of New Zealand’s most deprived regions. The ...
Tonight’s six-stack includes: launching his substack with a bunch of his previous documentaries, including this 1992 interview with Dame Whina Cooper. and here crew give climate activists plenty to do, including this call to submit against the Fast Track Approvals bill. writes brilliantly here on his substack ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
You're in the mall when you hear it: some kind of popping sound in the distance, kids with fireworks, maybe. But then a moment of eerie stillness is followed by more of the fireworks sound and there’s also screaming and shrieking and now here come people running for their lives.Does ...
Karl du Fresne writes – There’s a crisis in the news media and the media are blaming it on everyone except themselves. Culpability is being deflected elsewhere – mainly to the hapless Minister of Communications, Melissa Lee, and the big social media platforms that are accused of hoovering ...
I don’t normally send out two newsletters in a day but I figured I’d say something about… the news. If two newsletters is a bit much then maybe just skip one, I don’t want to overload people. Alternatively if you’d be interested in sometimes receiving multiple, smaller updates from me, ...
Buzz from the Beehive David Seymour and Winston Peters today signalled that at least two ministers of the Crown might be in Wellington today. Seymour (as Associate Minister of Education) announced the removal of more red tape, this time to make it easier for new early learning services to be ...
Politicians across the political spectrum are implicated in the New Zealand media’s failing health. Either through neglect or incompetent interventions, successive governments have failed to regulate, foster, and allow a healthy Fourth Estate that can adequately hold politicians and the powerful to account. Our political system is suffering from the ...
David Farrar writes – The Broadcasting Standards Authority ruled: Comments by radio host Kate Hawkesby suggesting Māori and Pacific patients were being prioritised for surgery due to their ethnicity were misleading and discriminatory, the Broadcasting Standards Authority has found. It is a fact such patients are prioritised. ...
PRC and its proxies in Solomons have been preparing for these elections for a long time.A lot of money, effort and intelligence have gone into ensuring an outcome that won’t compromise Beijing’s plans. Cleo Paskall writes – On April 17th the Solomon Islands, a country of ...
Is speeding up the trip to and from Wellington airport by 12 minutes worth spending up more than $10 billion? Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The six news items that stood out to me in the last day to 8:26 am today are:The Lead: Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced ...
You're a fraud, and you know itBut it's too good to throw it all awayAnyone would do the sameYou've got 'em goingAnd you're careful not to show itSometimes you even fool yourself a bitIt's like magicBut it's always been a smoke and mirrors gameAnyone would do the sameForty six billion ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections The June general election in Mexico could mark a turning point in ensuring that the country’s climate policies better reflect the desire of its citizens to address the climate crisis, with both leading presidential candidates expressing support for renewable energy. Mexico is the ...
2024, it feels, keeps presenting us with ever more challenges, ever more dismay.Do you give up yet? It seems to ask.No? How about this? Or this?How about this?When I say 2024 I really mean the state of humanity in 2024.Saturday night, we watched Civil War because that is one terrifying cliff we've ...
Buzz from the Beehive A pet project and governmental tunnel vision jump out from the latest batch of ministerial announcements. The government is keen to assure us of its concern for the wellbeing of our pets. It will be introducing pet bonds in a change to the Residential Tenancies Act ...
A recent report generated from a Growing Up in New Zealand (GUiNZ) survey of 1,224 rangatahi Māori aged 11-12 found: Cultural connectedness was associated with fewer depression symptoms, anxiety symptoms and better quality of life. That sounds cut and dry. But further into the report the following appears: Cultural connectedness is ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: From the gory details of job-cuts news, you’d think the public service was being eviscerated. While the media’s view of the cuts is incomplete, it’s also true that departments have been leaking the particulars faster than a Wellington ...
Remember the good old days, back when New Zealand had a PM who could think and speak calmly and intelligently in whole sentences without blustering? Even while Iran’s drones and missiles were still being launched, Helen Clark was live on TVNZ expertly summing up the latest crisis in the Middle ...
Costello did not pass on analysis of the benefits of the smokefree reforms to Cabinet, emphasising instead the extra tax revenues of repealing them. Photo: Hagen Hopkins, Getty Images TL;DR: The six news items that stood out to me at 7:26 am today are:The Lead: Casey Costello never passed on ...
True loveYou're the one I'm dreaming ofYour heart fits me like a gloveAnd I'm gonna be true blueBaby, I love youI’ve written about the job cuts in our news media last week. The impact on individuals, and the loss to Aotearoa of voices covering our news from different angles.That by ...
While commentators, including former Prime Minister Helen Clark, are noting a subtle shift in New Zealand’s foreign policy, which now places more emphasis on the United States, many have missed a key element of the shift. What National said before the election is not what the government is doing now. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Government’s newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealand’s urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey and his Government colleagues have made a meal of their mental health commitments, showing how flimsy their efforts to champion the issue truly are, says Labour Mental Health spokesperson Ingrid Leary. ...
Māori are yet to see anything from this Government except cuts, reversals and taking our people backwards, Māori Development spokesperson Willie Jackson said. ...
The Coalition Government’s refusal to commit to ongoing funding for social housing is seeing the sector pull back on developments and families watch their dreams of securing a home fade away, says Labour Housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty. ...
Changes to minimum wage and benefit indexation means many New Zealanders will get less this year, as the Government gives a big tax break to landlords instead. ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has made further appointments to the Board of Antarctica New Zealand as part of a continued effort to ensure the Scott Base Redevelopment project is delivered in a cost-effective and efficient manner. The Minister has appointed Neville Harris as a new member of the Board. Mr ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis will travel to the United States on Tuesday to attend a meeting of the Five Finance Ministers group, with counterparts from Australia, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. “I am looking forward to meeting with our Five Finance partners on how we can work ...
The coalition Government has today announced purrfect and pawsitive changes to the Residential Tenancies Act to give tenants with pets greater choice when looking for a rental property, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Pets are important members of many Kiwi families. It’s estimated that around 64 per cent of New ...
State Highway 1 (SH1) through Wellington City is heavily congested at peak times and while planning continues on the duplicate Mt Victoria Tunnel and Basin Reserve project, the Government has also asked NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) to consider and provide advice on a Long Tunnel option, Transport Minister Simeon Brown ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters have condemned Iran’s shocking and illegal strikes against Israel. “These attacks are a major challenge to peace and stability in a region already under enormous pressure," Mr Luxon says. "We are deeply concerned that miscalculation on any side could ...
Hundreds of people in little over a week have turned out in Northland to hear Regional Development Minister Shane Jones speak about plans for boosting the regional economy through infrastructure. About 200 people from the infrastructure and associated sectors attended an event headlined by Mr Jones in Whangarei today. Last ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti has today thanked outgoing Health New Zealand – Te Whatu Ora Chair Dame Karen Poutasi for her service on the Board. “Dame Karen tendered her resignation as Chair and as a member of the Board today,” says Dr Reti. “I have asked her to ...
The NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has signalled their proposed delivery approach for the Government’s 15 Roads of National Significance (RoNS), with the release of the State Highway Investment Proposal (SHIP) today, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Boosting economic growth and productivity is a key part of the Government’s plan to ...
New Zealand is renewing its connections with a world facing urgent challenges by pursuing an active, energetic foreign policy, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “Our country faces the most unstable global environment in decades,” Mr Peters says at the conclusion of two weeks of engagements in Egypt, Europe and the United States. “We cannot afford to sit back in splendid ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has announced the Australian Governor-General, His Excellency General The Honourable David Hurley and his wife Her Excellency Mrs Linda Hurley, will make a State visit to New Zealand from Tuesday 16 April to Thursday 18 April. The visit reciprocates the State visit of former Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced that Medsafe has approved 11 cold and flu medicines containing pseudoephedrine. Pharmaceutical suppliers have indicated they may be able to supply the first products in June. “This is much earlier than the original expectation of medicines being available by 2025. The Government recognised ...
New Zealand and the United States have recommitted to their strategic partnership in Washington DC today, pledging to work ever more closely together in support of shared values and interests, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The strategic environment that New Zealand and the United States face is considerably more ...
April 11, 2024 Joint Declaration by United States Secretary of State the Honorable Antony J. Blinken and New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs the Right Honourable Winston Peters We met today in Washington, D.C. to recommit to the historic partnership between our two countries and the principles that underpin it—rule ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced further New Zealand cooperation with the United States in the Pacific Islands region through $16.4 million in funding for initiatives in digital connectivity and oceans and fisheries research. “New Zealand can achieve more in the Pacific if we work together more urgently and ...
Kia Ora Gaza A passionate haka reverberated through Auckland International Airport as a medical team of three New Zealand doctors received an emotional farewell from a big crowd of supporters before flying to Turkey to join the international Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. The doctors, who left Auckland yesterday, hope to ...
With submissions closing today, Macassey-Pickard says groups around the country have been supporting a huge range of people to make their submissions. ...
Our response to the new legislation is informed by targeted conversations with practitioners working in the system and through an implementation lens. ...
The new ‘Fast-track Approvals Bill’ would give just three Ministers the power to approve or deny development projects. They would avoid the usual checks and balances that are in place to protect rivers, land, the ocean, and communities. ...
COMMENTARY:By Eugene Doyle Helen Clark, how I miss you. The former New Zealand Prime Minister — the safest pair of hands this country has had in living memory — gave a masterclass on the importance of maintaining an independent foreign policy when she spoke at an AUKUS symposium held ...
The government's released the list of organisations provided with information on how to apply - just hours before public submissions on the bill close. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milton Speer, Visiting Fellow, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney Before climate change really got going, eastern Australia’s flash floods tended to concentrate on our coastal regions, east of the Great Dividing Range. But that’s changing. Now ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elizabeth Finkel, Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow, La Trobe University Sia Duff / South Australian Museum In February, the South Australian Museum “re-imagined” itself. In the face of rising costs and inadequate government funds, CEO David Gaimster, who took the reins last June, declared ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, School of Allied Heath, Human Services & Sport, La Trobe University, La Trobe University This week, Collingwood AFL player Nathan Murphy announced his retirement, brought on by his concussion history and ongoing issues. The 24-year-old’s seemingly sudden retirement, ...
The Mental Health Foundation provides support and resources for those facing the loss of their job, so it’s wrong in the very week the Government adds another 1000 jobs to its tally of cuts, that this is happening. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Howard, Senior Lecturer, Discipline of English and Writing, University of Sydney Daniel Boud/Sydney Theatre Company Decay, terror, revulsion. These are three of the central themes of Thomas Bernhard’s rarely performed play The President. The Austrian is one of the greatest ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says threats by ministers Shane Jones and David Seymour to reform or close down the Waitangi Tribunal were “ill-considered”, as legal experts say the ministers may have breached Cabinet Manual conventions. “I think those comments are ill-considered and we expect all ministers to actually exercise good ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ye In (Jane) Hwang, Postdoctoral Research Associate at School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney Shutterstock You’d be hard pressed to find any aspect of daily life that doesn’t require some form of digital literacy. We need only to look back ten ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Newton, Professor of Exercise Medicine, Edith Cowan University Pexels/RDNE stock project You’re not in your 20s or 30s anymore and you know regular health checks are important. So you go to your GP. During the appointment they measure your waist. ...
A new poem by Evangeline Riddiford Graham. Mitochondrial Problem I. It was long drive to Kansas for the man and his dog but you have to understand he said She doesn’t fly. Which calls to mind not carsick shitting barking or whining but a dog who chooses not to as ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)Hot off the press, this debut ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Wajnryb McDonald, PhD candidate in Criminology, University of Sydney Less than 24 hours after Ashlee Good was murdered in Bondi Junction, her family released a statement requesting the media take down photographs they had reproduced of Ashlee and her family without ...
Chief executive Shaun Robinson said it has not had any government funding cut, but government-funded contracts have not kept pace with rising costs. ...
The Ministry of Health has delayed the release of its evidence brief on the safety, reversibility and mental health and wellbeing outcomes for puberty blockers. While we wait, Julia de Bres speaks to those with firsthand experience. Best practice gender-affirming healthcare is based on trans people’s self-determination and agency. The ...
Barcelona’s city streets have gone from traffic-clogged to pedestrian-friendly. How? Superblocks. Ellen Rykers explains. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week I read a great interview with renowned urbanist Janette Sadik-Khan by The Spinoff’s Wellington editor Joel MacManus: “You can reimagine streets, ...
Student groups ‘Climate Action VUW’, Schools Strike 4 Climate and VUWSA will be on the street in Wellington today, the last day for submissions on the Fast-track Approvals Bill, with a message that the fight against the Government’s ‘War on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sofia Ammassari, Research Fellow, Griffith University Since 2014, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity has grown exponentially – and so has the formidable organisational machine of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). These two factors will be key to delivering the BJP a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Associate Professor of Education (Adjunct) & Senior Manager (BCE), Charles Sturt University During COVID almost all Australian students and their families experienced online learning. But while schools have long since gone back to in-person teaching, online learning has not gone ...
Yes, they’re better for the environment. No, that’s not a good enough reason for me to use them. Once every 26 days or so, my period arrives, and if struck by an act of God, I am caught red-crotched without products. How, after 17 years of this, do I still ...
“It will cause significant harm to our environment and communities. It is completely at odds with New Zealanders’ relationship with nature and our need for a low-carbon, sustainable economic future." ...
The Chair of the National Maori Authority, Matthew Tukaki, has warned a Parliamentary Select Committee that fast-tracking legislation is a perilous practice that undermines the core tenets of democracy, transparency, and accountability. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Tenbensel, Associate Professor, Health Policy, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Getty Images Since coming into power, the coalition government has adopted a simple but shrewd see-how-fast-we-can-move political strategy. However, in the health sector this need for speed entails ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Hronis, Clinical Psychologist, University of Technology Sydney Darya Sannikova/Pexels Whether you’re watching TV, attending a footy game, or eating a meal at your local pub, gambling is hard to escape. Although the rise of gambling is not unique to Australia, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Wong, Forrest Fellow, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Western Australia Have you ever wondered if there are more insects out at night than during the day? We set out to answer this question by combing through the scientific ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carol T Kulik, Research Professor, University of South Australia IR Stone/Shutterstock In Australia, it’s not the done thing to know – let alone ask – what our colleagues are paid. Yet, it’s easy to see how pay transparency can make pay ...
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) is sounding a warning to migrants, that running foul of the law may see them leaving the country prematurely. ...
The government’s plan to get 50,000 people off jobseeker support by 2030 has had a rocky start, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. Beneficiary numbers are up – and so are ...
Raglan Roast is a staple of Wellington coffee culture. But with five branches across the capital, which one is the best? I am a die-hard Raglan Roast fan. It’s consistently the most affordable cafe in Wellington, and one of the only places you can get a coffee after 3pm. So, ...
Residents of University of Auckland halls are being urged to withhold their accommodation fees from May 1, in a bid to force the university to take student concerns over rent hikes seriously.The University of Auckland is facing a strike from students over the cost of on-campus accommodation. The Students ...
New Zealand and the Philippines have signed a new maritime security agreement and stated their concerns over activity in the South China Sea, as Chinese vessels continue to flout international law. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Philippines President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos committed to signing a Mutual Logistics Supporting Arrangement by ...
The thousands of government “back-office” job cuts are causing widespread pain in the capital city. In today’s episode of The Detail, we speak to three journalists and a think tank researcher, looking at the larger picture around the cuts and what effect it will have on Wellington, a city that’s ...
Opinion: The famed American architect and urban designer Daniel Burnham once said, “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood!” Burnham wouldn’t have been referring to the transport plans in Aotearoa New Zealand over the past five years; projects so big they hadn’t the credibility to ...
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Opinion: With maths understanding at 42 percent for Year 8 students, there’s no doubt something has to be done. But how? The post Financial literacy should be on all of us appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Hineaupounamu ‘Missy’ Nuku has been scaling mountains in Canada for her college basketball team, the Lakeland Rustlers. Alberta is currently home for the 20-year-old point guard, who is in her first year of a scholarship at Lakeland College, where she is studying for a business degree. She has certainly made ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra When ASIO boss Mike Burgess delivered his annual threat assessment earlier this year, he stressed the rising danger posed by espionage and foreign interference. “In 2024, threats to our way of life have surpassed ...
The Tribunal had called on Minister for Children Karen Chhour to provide evidence at an urgent inquiry into the repeal of Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By T.J. Thomson, Senior Lecturer in Visual Communication & Digital Media, RMIT University Midjourney image by T.J. Thomson As more than half of Australian office workers report using generative artificial intelligence (AI) for work, we’re starting to see this technology affect every ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa Nicole Sharwood, Injury epidemiologist | Expert Witness, UNSW Sydney Sergey Novikov/Shutterstock Injuries are the leading cause of disability and death among Australian children and adolescents. At least a quarter of all emergency department presentations during childhood are injury-related. Injuries can ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Di Winkler, Adjunct Associate Professor, Living with Disability Research Centre, La Trobe University Shutterstock/Ground PictureMany Australians with disability feel on the edge of a precipice right now. Recommendations from the disability royal commission and the NDIS review were released late ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Salman Shooshtarian, Senior Lecturer, School of Property, Construction and Project Management, RMIT University Salman Shooshtarian Asbestos has been found in mulch used for playgrounds, schools, parks and gardens across Sydney and Melbourne. Local communities naturally fear for the health of their ...
Family First says that the latest abortion statistics make grim and upsetting reading, with a 25% increase in abortions since the decriminalisation of abortion in March 2020. According to an Official Information Act request received by Right to Life ...
Ipsos New Zealand's inaugural participation in a global study on populism reveals a pervasive sense of societal and economic decline among New Zealanders. MORE DETAILS AND FULL REPORT HERE Ipsos New Zealand's inaugural participation in a global study ...
Our heat battery in the oceans 
Graham Adams writes about the $55m media fund — When Patrick Gower was asked by Mike Hosking last week what he would say to the many Newstalk ZB callers who allege the Labour government bribed media with $55 million of taxpayers’ money via the Public Interest Journalism Fund — and ...13 mins ago
Note: this blog post has been put together over the course of the week I followed the happenings at the conference virtually. Should recordings of the Great Debates and possibly Union Symposia mentioned below, be released sometime after the conference ends, I'll include links to the ones I participated in. ...2 hours ago
The following was my submission made on the “Fast Track Approvals Bill”. This potential law will give three Ministers unchecked powers, un-paralled since the days of Robert Muldoon’s “Think Big” projects.The submission is written a bit tongue-in-cheek. But it’s irreverent because the FTAB is in itself not worthy of respect. ...3 hours ago
One Could Reduce Child Poverty At No Fiscal CostFollowing the Richardson/Shipley 1990 ‘redesign of the welfare state’ – which eliminated the universal Family Benefit and doubled the rate of child poverty – various income supplements for families have been added, the best known being ‘Working for Families’, introduced in 2005. ...4 hours ago
Submissions on National's corrupt Muldoonist fast-track law are due today (have you submitted?), and just hours before they close, Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop has been forced to release the list of companies he invited to apply. I've spent the last hour going through it in an epic thread of bleats, ...6 hours ago
Buzz from the Beehive A few days ago, Point of Order suggested the media must be musing “on why Melissa is mute”. Our article reported that people working in the beleaguered media industry have cause to yearn for a minister as busy as Melissa Lee’s ministerial colleagues and we drew ...7 hours ago
1. What was The Curse of Jim Bolger?a. Winston Peters b. Soon after shaking his hand, world leaders would mysteriously lose office or shuffle off this mortal coilc. Could never shake off the Mother of All Budgetsd. Dandruff2. True or false? The Chairman of a Kiwi export business has asked the ...8 hours ago
Jack Vowles writes – New Zealand is said to be suffering from ‘serious populist discontent’. An IPSOS MORI survey has reported that we have an increasing preference for strong leaders, think that the economy is rigged toward the rich and powerful, and political elites are ignoring ‘hard-working people’. ...10 hours ago
I like to keep an eye on what’s happening in places like the UK, the US, and over the ditch with our good mates the Aussies. Let’s call them AUKUS, for want of a better collective term. More on that in a bit.It used to be, not long ago, that ...13 hours ago
It’s Friday again. Here’s some of the things that caught our attention this week. This Week on Greater Auckland On Tuesday Matt covered at the government looking into a long tunnel for Wellington. On Wednesday we ran a post from Oscar Simms on some lessons from Texas. AT’s ...15 hours ago
New Zealand is said to be suffering from ‘serious populist discontent’. An IPSOS MORI survey has reported that we have an increasing preference for strong leaders, think that the economy is rigged toward the rich and powerful, and political elites are ignoring ‘hard-working people’. The data is from February this ...16 hours ago
Foreign Minister Winston Peters is understood to be planning a major speech within the next fortnight to clear up the confusion over whether or not New Zealand might join the AUKUS submarine project. So far, there have been conflicting signals from the Government. RNZ reported the Prime Minister yesterday in ...18 hours ago
How to Retrieve Deleted Call Log on iPhone Without a Computer: A Step–by–Step Guide Losing your iPhone call history can be frustrating, especially when you need to find a specific number or recall an important conversation. But before you panic, know that there are ways to retrieve deleted call logs on your iPhone, even without a computer. This guide will explore various methods, ranging from simple checks to utilizing iCloud backups and third–party applications. So, let‘s dive in and recover those lost calls! 1. Check Recently Deleted Folder: Apple understands that accidental deletions happen. That‘s why they introduced the “Recently Deleted“ folder for various apps, including the Phone app. This folder acts as a safety net, storing deleted call logs for up to 30 days before permanently erasing them. Here‘s how to check it: Open the Phone app on your iPhone. Tap on the “Recents“ tab at the bottom. Scroll to the top and tap on “Edit“. Select “Show Recently Deleted“. Browse the list to find the call logs you want to recover. Tap on the desired call log and choose “Recover“ to restore it to your call history. 2. Restore from iCloud Backup: If you regularly back up your iPhone to iCloud, you might be able to retrieve your deleted call log from a previous backup. However, keep in mind that this process will restore your entire phone to the state it was in at the time of the backup, potentially erasing any data added since then. Here‘s how to restore from an iCloud backup: Go to Settings > General > Reset. Choose “Erase All Content and Settings“. Follow the on–screen instructions. Your iPhone will restart and show the initial setup screen. Choose “Restore from iCloud Backup“ during the setup process. Select the relevant backup that contains your deleted call log. Wait for the restoration process to complete. 3. Explore Third–Party Apps (with Caution): ...19 hours ago
The absolute brass neck of this guy.We want more medical doctors, not more spin doctors, Luxon was saying a couple of weeks ago, and now we’re told the guy has seven salaried adults on TikTok duty. Sorry, doing social media. The absolute brass neck of it. The irony that the ...1 day ago
Having written, taught and worked for the US government on issues involving unconventional warfare and terrorism for 30-odd years, two things irritate me the most when the subject is discussed in public. The first is the Johnny-come-lately academics-turned-media commentators who … Continue reading ...1 day ago
Mariupol, on the Azov Sea coast, was one of the first cities to suffer almost complete destruction after the start of the Ukraine War started in late February 2022. We remember the scenes of absolute destruction of the houses and city structures. The deaths of innocent civilians – many of ...1 day ago
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The top six news links I’ve seen elsewhere in the last 24 hours, as of 9:16 am on Thursday, April 18 are:Housing: Tauranga residents living in boats, vans RNZ Checkpoint Louise TernouthHousing: Waikato councillor says wastewater plant issues could hold up Sleepyhead building a massive company town Waikato Times Stephen ...2 days ago
Hi,A friend had their 40th over the weekend and decided to theme it after Curb Your Enthusiasm fashion icon Susie Greene. Captured in my tiny kitchen before I left the house, I ending up evoking a mix of old lesbian and Hillary Clinton — both unintentional.Me vs Hillary ClintonIf you’re ...2 days ago
The schools are on holiday and the sun is shining in the seaside village and all day long I have been seeing bunches of bikes; Mums, Dads, teens and toddlers chattering, laughing, happy, having a bloody great time together. Cheers, AT, for the bits of lane you’ve added lately around the ...2 days ago
One night while sleeping in my bed I had a beautiful dreamThat all the people of the world got together on the same wavelengthAnd began helping one anotherNow in this dream, universal love was the theme of the dayPeace and understanding and it happened this wayAfter such an eventful day ...2 days ago
The top six news links I’ve seen elsewhere in the last 24 hours as of 6:06 am on Wednesday, April 17 are:Must read: Secrecy shrouds which projects might be fast-tracked RNZ Farah HancockScoop: Revealed: Luxon has seven staffers working on social media content - partly paid for by taxpayer Newshub ...3 days ago
Tonight’s six-stack includes: launching his substack with a bunch of his previous documentaries, including this 1992 interview with Dame Whina Cooper. and here crew give climate activists plenty to do, including this call to submit against the Fast Track Approvals bill. writes brilliantly here on his substack ...3 days ago
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You're in the mall when you hear it: some kind of popping sound in the distance, kids with fireworks, maybe. But then a moment of eerie stillness is followed by more of the fireworks sound and there’s also screaming and shrieking and now here come people running for their lives.Does ...3 days ago
I don’t normally send out two newsletters in a day but I figured I’d say something about… the news. If two newsletters is a bit much then maybe just skip one, I don’t want to overload people. Alternatively if you’d be interested in sometimes receiving multiple, smaller updates from me, ...3 days ago
You're a fraud, and you know itBut it's too good to throw it all awayAnyone would do the sameYou've got 'em goingAnd you're careful not to show itSometimes you even fool yourself a bitIt's like magicBut it's always been a smoke and mirrors gameAnyone would do the sameForty six billion ...4 days ago
2024, it feels, keeps presenting us with ever more challenges, ever more dismay.Do you give up yet? It seems to ask.No? How about this? Or this?How about this?When I say 2024 I really mean the state of humanity in 2024.Saturday night, we watched Civil War because that is one terrifying cliff we've ...4 days ago
True loveYou're the one I'm dreaming ofYour heart fits me like a gloveAnd I'm gonna be true blueBaby, I love youI’ve written about the job cuts in our news media last week. The impact on individuals, and the loss to Aotearoa of voices covering our news from different angles.That by ...5 days ago
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...6 hours ago
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...6 hours ago
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...6 hours ago
Kia Ora Gaza A passionate haka reverberated through Auckland International Airport as a medical team of three New Zealand doctors received an emotional farewell from a big crowd of supporters before flying to Turkey to join the international Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. The doctors, who left Auckland yesterday, hope to ...20 mins ago
With submissions closing today, Macassey-Pickard says groups around the country have been supporting a huge range of people to make their submissions. ...2 hours ago
The government's released the list of organisations provided with information on how to apply - just hours before public submissions on the bill close. ...4 hours ago
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says threats by ministers Shane Jones and David Seymour to reform or close down the Waitangi Tribunal were “ill-considered”, as legal experts say the ministers may have breached Cabinet Manual conventions. “I think those comments are ill-considered and we expect all ministers to actually exercise good ...9 hours ago
A new poem by Evangeline Riddiford Graham. Mitochondrial Problem I. It was long drive to Kansas for the man and his dog but you have to understand he said She doesn’t fly. Which calls to mind not carsick shitting barking or whining but a dog who chooses not to as ...9 hours ago
BTW: Please keep the dystopian fantasies down to a dullards quiet roar. I've been hearing them for nearly 50 years. As long-term science fiction addict and historian geek, I almost certainly know the scenarios better than most.
This is a post about a upcoming and steadily increasing problem with a little bit about measures that will need to be taken for living with the heat already stored in the oceans. Regardless of future attempts to curb future emissions, the already stored heat will keep coming out of the oceans and affecting our climate and weather for next few centuries. Rapidly building up over the next two decades.
The problem is that we don't exactly have a resilient infrastructure in this country to cope with that. Most of the politics from the right to deal with this as an issue can only be described as chicken-shit and rather stupid. Certainly none that I have heard so far have the vaguest idea about the science or the economics of dealing with this kind of issue. Essentially incompetent to run a government to deal with our responde.
You only have to listen to Seymour or Luxon for a few minutes to realise that they have absolutely no frigging ideas. Both sound like old mean wanting the world to change back to something that they vaguely remember as being a better world for them.
Certainly neither seem to have a clue about how to deal with changing world. Nor do their fawning acolytes.
Labour has been making a start and looks to be continuing that process.
well, fuck.
Excellent post Lynn.
Brilliant summation. I wonder of our main stream media channels will pick it up and run with it. Well, it costs nothing to dream.
Meanwhile…
"But air passenger travel is ramping up, anticipating a surge in demand. That translates to thousands more aircraft and new pilots. Boeing estimates that the world will need more than 600,000 new pilots between 2022 and 2041, and the biggest requirement is in Asia. Pilot training is a huge new growth industry, it seems. Aircraft manufacturers are salivating."
https://www.interest.co.nz/business/121293/us-data-better-except-house-sales-australian-jobless-rate-rises-freight-rates-ease
The line must go up!
Just ask any airline CEO (or ex-airline CEO).
na its the cows i tell ya
lol….so some say
The heat problem in the oceans is not the only problem, the other is acidification of the world's oceans by carbon dioxide absorption.
Sure and your point is ????????
FFS my first degree was in Earth Sciences. It isn't exactly rocket science to understand how weak carbonic acid forms.
You really just need to get a sense of scale.
At various times over the last half billion years on Earth, we've had much higher CO2, methane, and other greenhouse gases. Far far higher high ocean heat due to greenhouse gases and much more acidic oceans.
Earths living organism genotypes and ecosystems are perfectly capable of moving into vacant habitats and doing it at a rapid pace. Think of what happened during an after every glacial/interglacial within the recent history since Antarctica started form its deep freeze icecap about 35-40 mya. Colonisation happens within decades. Evolution to ecological niches happens within very very short (for a earth scientist) periods
FYI: Wikipedia
My point is that I'm not concerned that Earth's biosphere will survive. Or even the small minority of it lives in the oceans and on land surfaces (the ancestral forms in the lithosphere far outweigh the rest). I can't think of anything that humans are capable of, or possibly capable of doing in the very near term that could kill off Earth. There simply isn't enough fossil carbon geologically sequestered to do that.
I'm concerned that our societies and maybe our species survives in something like its current form. Especially if it is relatively easy to do. The decarbonising of the economies is happening at a very rapid pace. It means that we may be able to prevent taking the CO2 ppm up over 600 over the rest of the century. 450 is a pipedream. 500ppm may be possible.
But we're at about 412 now. So some adaption is going to be required both by us and the species who share this world.
So species are already having to adapt back into other and often older forms latent in their genotype. Shellfish start dropping their shells or start using different compositions. Warm loving algae will eventually colonise vacated reefs. FFS we still have algae strains around from both the Cambrian and the peak Quarternary glaciations for the really hot and acidic and freezing cold.
You don't have to look far to see this happening. After all we are the weird bald species that sweats to maintain heat dissipation. A absolute rarity in the animal kingdom.
As I commented at the top. When it comes to dystopian speculation I don't need much assistance. I could run through dystopian scenarios that you'd be unlikely to even be aware of as possibilities.
/sarc
My point is that acidification of the oceans means a whole lot of marine organisms, particularly shellfish will probably die out because they won't be able to form shells. That is less food for the higher predators and they will die out in turn.
You can spout out all the science you like to try and impress people but the simple facts that everyone can understand are there: species die out leads to other species dying out.
Sure, but eventually other species come along and fill the ecological niche(s).
I can't recall the book I read, which looked at the effect on the oceanic pump system that regularly recalibrated, but there's a good precis here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_meridional_overturning_circulation
For what it's worth in 1983 I spent 10 weeks on HMNZS Tui with an oceanographic team plotting out parts of the Southern Ocean segment of this astonishing current. Not a lot was known about it then, and still most people have no idea just how much energy it shifts around the planet.
You appear to have led a very interesting life, RedLogix.
I look back with nothing but gratitude and respect for all the really interesting people I have been privileged to either meet or work with along the way.
All that is happening here is that I'm a little more willing to be open about my life than most contributors here – because if there is one thing I have learned is almost everyone has an interesting life and something they can teach you. They just fail to see it that way.
I'm no scientist but I love to fish and can clearly see the effect of the rising sea temperatures in my area.
The marlin fishing season is extended by almost 3 months as temperatures stay above 18 degrees longer and we are now regularly catching the beautiful mahimahi- a sub tropical species.
Kingfish are prolific and are breeding on a shallow reef 3 to 4 metres deep which can be reached in 5 minutes by kayak.
I'm enjoying it at the moment but realise it will probably end badly if the oceans continue to warm
We have been getting kingfish down here in coastal Otago occasionally, due to the marine heatwaves. Nice fish to eat sure, but it will end badly. It's not "probably" and "if"
Fish have central nervous systems very similar to humans..
So if you can imagine going about your business..and suddenly a hook in the mouth.. protruding out of your cheek..then being dragged into the water to drown…to be hauled into a vessel..and either left to die.. drowning in oxygen…or to be bashed on the skull..
These are the cruel realities of fishing/eating fish…
Plus fishers…both commercial and recreational..are committing the environmental crime…of fishing species to extinction..
My fishing was done in the bay of islands…when I was a boy…and the ocean then was teeming with fish..
It ain't teeming no more..
This is what fishers/those who eat them…are doing..
Think on..!…eh..?
Philip I realise meat is off the menu but if carrots scream when cut and fish are gone then what shall we eat?
Aah..!…the screaming vegetable argument..
The last/only resort of the defensive carnivore…
And really… it is the only argument you can muster against what I am talking about/living…eh..?
(Tho' I must say… Kathryn ryan interviewed a scientist who works in the field of animal communication…and she had some amazing stories to tell..
And her grand finale was playing a recording of plants communicating with each other…not screaming…but mind-blowing all the same…it sounded like electrical impulses..with a hint of firing up old school landline modem..
So your screaming carrot argument may have some heft..after all
If that is the case my argument will come down to causing least damage/suffering..
But as far as dedicated carnivores are concerned…that other death knell of our export-driven animal exploitation industries..the lab-grown meat…will soon see them sorted..
Animal flesh with no animal suffering..
What's not to love about that…?
Looks like the oceans are the main drivers of weather patterns and we are in a downward spiral that will be hard to arrest.
Recent news items showed forest fires in Alberta forcing thousands to evacuate, while northern Italy has suffered extensive flooding (this after months of drought).
Yet international air travel is reported to be at 84.90% of Feb 2019 levels. Go figure.
Many people are now aware (on some level) that we're in a "Last Chance to See" spiral – but there's still time (just) to tick off bucket list items, and bolster BAU into the bargain.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Allwood
yeah but we all got jetskis, chainsaws, hardly davisons, angle grinders, trips to outer mongolia and makoo peekoo and you name it to distract us from the basically aimless infantile consumerist existence we have created
If you were thinking about voting for act or anyone else who has their heads in the clouds on this issue.
Please go back and re-read this post.
We have no choice, we actually have to be decisive leadership now, and whilst you may not like labour (me either) – they do not have their heads up their asses on this. And are offering leadership, albeit a bit slow.
My only issue with you post lprent and it's minor, is that any exploitation of any new gas and coal needs to be stopped – to quote brother Malcolm X – by any means necessary.
If someone is considering voting ACT, then your advice is good. If someone is considering voting Labour, then the advice needs to be to vote Green. It's the Greens who have been leading on this for a very long time, and it's long past time for NZ to empower them. Labour will still form government, but having 15 – 20 Green MPs in government with them would be a game changer on climate and transition.
Very sobering.There is a lot to digest.
Unfortunately looking to Wellington and the wee parade of political options isn't where the solution lies. While touting infrastructure budgets and paying lip service to mitigation, they are still chasing trade deals that keep the global merry-go-round going round.
Sure, there are a few things that must be imported. However, there is no need, as an example, for American or Belgian potato products on our supermarket shelves.
You and I need to make the changes that matter. Transition Towns are a good example of building resilience and moving to a low carbon lifestyle.
The solutions are local.
Thank you Lprent, I read this over and over with huge sadness. So much damage done by our species. I agree that our choice of who we vote for has never been more stark.
Local and personal resilience could slow things, but we have already made recovery difficult and dangerous. Our behaviour over water shows the problems ahead.