Revealed – Standard bloggers paid by Labour

Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, April 1st, 2016 - 50 comments
Categories: Satire, The Standard - Tags: ,

There has been some media focus this week on the matter of “highly paid political operatives”. In the interests of transparency and click-farming, we the writers of The Standard have decided to come clean on how much we are paid by Labour.

It is our hope that revealing this previously top-secret information will both contribute to an atmosphere of open and honest politics, and also satisfy the obsessions of dirty politics insiders Farrar, Slater and Hooton before they either expire from chronic wrist sprain or try to have us hacked again*.

Obviously The Standard is a heavily unionised workforce, and through our solidarity and the strength of our bargaining position we have secured a base remuneration package for each writer which includes:

• $10,000 per week or $7.50 per word, whichever is higher
• $25,000 annual wardrobe allowance
• $100 bonus for every deranged attack on Key
• $100 bonus for every favourable mention of Marx, Lenin or Stalin
• 1 case of Chardonnay per month
• Vouchers for all we can eat at Bellamy’s

In addition, on 1st of April each year, Andrew Little pops round to read to us from the Communist Manifesto and give each and every one of us a back-rub.


* That part is true.

50 comments on “Revealed – Standard bloggers paid by Labour ”

  1. Incognito 1

    Whatever. It is always the guys ‘at the top’ that get the limelight & perks on top of a very healthy remuneration. I’m thoroughly pissed off that the commenters get completely ignored; we’re the lifeblood of this site. The least Labour could do is to give us a $10 petrol voucher for every 1,000 comments we make. What a crap start to the day!

    • miravox 1.1

      Ah – your problem incognito, is in your name. It’s not what you know, it’s who you know, and no-one can figure out who you are.

      A free breakfast at the Backbenchers is the least you should expect per 500 comments.

  2. Tiger Mountain 2

    heh, more than a few tory hearts will beat faster for a mili second out there today!

    the ultimate “laugh” is that the Penguin and the Whale, and Nat HQ people and a whole coterie of sleaze bags on the bosses time DO actually get paid for blogging and infesting comments sections

  3. The lost sheep 3

    1 case of Chardonnay per month

    That’s the really damning revelation. The Standard writers are about as working class as a Garden Party in Fendalton. When they are not producing Labour propaganda, I bet they spend more time discussing exactly which Chardonnay they should be drinking than they spend discussing the plight of the poor and downtrodden who still have to swill Beer.
    Beer! You elitist intellectual poseurs would choke on it!

    • r0b 3.1

      According to Google, “beer” is made from fermented hops. “Hops” is not any kind of grape that I’ve ever heard of, so I’m not quite sure what’s going on here. I’ll try to look in to it further, but I have to scoot away now for my manicure. Laters!

      • left for dead 3.1.1

        That last box of Chardonnay seems suspiciously like Donkeys brand, what do ya wreck-en BM.
        Anyway we all have to donate it back to the party.
        What goes around, comes around.

        edit: or is it the other way round

        double edit: tea towel,. anybody

      • Anne 3.1.2

        I’ve heard about your exquisite manicures r0b. Could you send me the name and email address of your beauty therapist because I’m not satisfied with mine. Money’s no object of course.

    • AB 3.2

      Of course – entire Labour Party branch meetings are consumed by the relative merits of oaked versus unoaked.
      Personally I abominate unoaked – it’s trying to turn a noble grape into nasty, grassy, green, fruit-cooler, much like the totally appalling sauvignon blanc from which I avoid my eyes in the supermarket

    • Rosie 3.3

      Oh do keep up Baa Baa. The proletariat can pick up a decent bottle of chardonnay for $12. It’s craft beer that’s the drink of the wealthy and influential these days.

    • Stuart Munro 3.4

      The people’s wine is bloody red – slightly purpled with the blue-tinged blood of crushed autocrats.

    • Colonial Viper 3.5

      I recommend Emersons. Made right around the corner.

  4. Peter 4

    Happy April Fools Day!

    • RedLogix 4.1

      All the more fool you taxpayers out there. I get my blogging income paid via a shell company into a tax-free ‘blind trust’, that only owns a couple of small wineries.

      Still if you’d care to let me know your preferred poison I’m sure I can arrange a nice case or two to head your way to help you feel better about it.

  5. pat 5

    I hope your payroll has been audited and you have complied with the Holidays Act…..are we owed back pay?

  6. MindPilot 6

    Let them eat cake!

    • greywarshark 6.1

      That cake, liberally strewn with them poppy seeds, opium you know, after all they are lefties and who knows what they get up to at their gatherings. Not a decent whisky drinker among them.

  7. Jenny Kirk 7

    If the writers are getting such a generous wardrobe allowance, how come they’re not up there in the best dressed lists the Herald highlights every so often ?

    • r0b 7.1

      It’s a plot of course. The crypto-fascist right-wing so called “mainstream” media is determined to hide the truth! Plus of course, we are so damn hot, there would be a risk of newspapers spontaneously combusting.

      • Rosie 7.1.1

        Whoar!

      • Anne 7.1.2

        Ooohee, I really do want the name of your b therapist and quick………………

      • greywarshark 7.1.3

        They are not in the gossip columns in The Hairy because their teeth aren’t perfect and white. Probably they chew betel nut. which my sources advise is the next thing that is going to be raised as a public danger and done by terrorists, the media release to come about three months before Te Election.

  8. adam 8

    Silly question, if everyone thinks the labour party is rich, then why do the right wing trolls even make comments on this site.

    They know money corrupts, they just have to be patient and the labour party will be corrupted by, lets say, next Thursday…

    • Nick 8.1

      Unfortunately the Labour party was corrupted a while ago…..

      • Kate 8.1.1

        And for every right-wing comment, a free meal at Dunedin public hospital. Yummy. Don’t get sick Nick.

        • Nick 8.1.1.1

          I was referring to Rogernomics Kate…..

          • greywarshark 8.1.1.1.1

            Reading Kate reminds me, as a safety precaution for all and especially Labour adherents, free eye tests and prescription glasses supplied/ This is so that people can see and read about what is going on round them, or has been, or will be. Then they can be fully informed – a prerequisite for Neo Liberalism – which proceeds along that supposition, and then they can make reasoned comments on TS.

  9. mac1 9

    Time and a half for overtime, on Saturday time and a half for the first four hours and double time thereafter, with double time on Sundays!

    And dirt money, gumboot money, overalls and gloves supplied, subsidised milk in the canteen, and subsidised protective footwear.

    And we should have a sign at the top of the opening page, enumerating the days that have been accident free.

    And goggles for members of the Wise Owls Club who have to deal with the flying matter, and a scraper in the little side pocket. And an individual locker, that’s lockable.

    These were, seriously, the conditions under which I worked in my first union. Those men taught me a lot. The holiday job as it was paid my way through Uni for four years.

  10. Jones 10

    This is a truly shocking revelation. Had I known this I would’ve put my snout in the trough and signed up as a writer ages ago. I can derangely attack John Key all day long and Marx is a mate of mine… top bloke… and he’s written some pretty decent songs.

    • greywarshark 10.1

      Marx – sharp bloke. His jokes are great. He should stand for PM, that friendly, jokey approach appeals. Well it did for Ronald Reagan I understand, and then look at John Key. Okay, well I’m not saying you have to, it’s a free country.

      How’s this from Marx.
      Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies…
      I worked my way up from nothing to a state of extreme poverty….
      I have a mind to join a club and beat you over the head with it….
      The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made….
      Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others….
      (and with a reflective thought): The first thing which I can record concerning myself
      is, that I was born. These are wonderful words. This life, to which neither time nor eternity
      can bring diminution – this everlasting living soul, began. My mind loses itself in these depths.

      Read more at: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/g/groucho_marx.html

      There’s lots more. What a wonderful little thinker. Better than Aristotle who was a b.gger for the bottle. And Descarte who was a fart who said ‘I drink, therefore I am’.
      (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtgKkifJ0Pw

  11. greywarshark 11

    Did Little give you only a backrub??

  12. Rosie 12

    I’m out of work, and this sounds like a grand scheme, where do I apply?

    I would however like to change some of the conditions. The chardonnay can stay, I’m drinking that again now that it’s no longer considered unfashionable to drink and the break away pinot noir socialists group say it’s ok. They have accepted their old school chardonnay brothers and sisters back into the fold, so I’ve been told.

    It’s the back rub I want to renegotiate. Does the back rub occur before or after the reading? Is a nice cup of tea involved? Can I please stipulate that David Cunliffe be the provider of the back rub? And I do insist on organic coconut lavender scented massage wax.

  13. r0b 13

    Ahh – would love to reply to some of the above, but I have to go, far from data coverage, for 3 days. (Not a joke, I’m off, bye all….)

  14. Christine Small 14

    Bwahahha Happy April Fools! As if Labour has any real money behind it while it is peddling tea towels to try and raise election funding, unlike the National Party who has no worries about BUYING media due to big business funding it.

  15. swordfish 15

    Those of us with far less grandiose blogs have to make do with a $25 annual wardrobe allowance and a yearly backrub from which ever Backbencher happens to be available at the time. Always seem to get bloody Clayton Crosgrove, never Jacinda Ardern.

  16. Macro 16

    Yeah but what about the Maserati parked in the driveway I saw you vacuuming the other day! You forgot to mention that.

  17. Puckish Rogue 17

    Pfft is that all you get, no wonder I never joined a union. Going freelance is the best decision I ever made.

  18. BLiP 18

    Ummm. . . about my holiday pay

  19. The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell 19

    How much do they pay Colonial Viper?

  20. Planet Earth 20

    And I thought each of the authors subsisted happily on the UBI!

  21. Smilin 21

    I should be holidaying in Hawaii with Key if the rates are that good ,are you sure weve got this right cheers ?Has someone hijacked this paper thru the GCSB on behalf of Natcorp and this site is only a clone, you know like those fictitious HSBC etc sites with all the astounding give away millions ,all you got to do is fill in your name and address and the cheques in the mail.Or have the Nats really lost it ? Hopefully the latter. Im a day too late anyway.

  22. Where do I sign up!!!!!

    Oh, wait, 1 April… Bugger. 🙁

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