Chopper chops science education
National’s Anne Tolley, our education minister who thought that taking a ‘helicopter view’ of something meant taking a ride in a chopper, is […]
Marty G
Govt tax advisor told Westpac how to cheat on taxes
John Shewan is a member of the Government’s Tax Working Group. A decade ago he was advising Westpac what minimal amount of tax […]
Key’s divide and rule to cut wages
John Key says that if school support staff want pay-rises then teachers should sacrifice the ones they bargained for. Tell him to get […]
Labour Day, a time to celebrate
Next Monday, you have a paid day off. Do you know why? Because workers organised themselves into unions and fought for better pay and […]
Battle to keep MMP set to heat up
It’s a pretty special situation where you get praise just for not cheating but John Armstrong heaps it on Simon Power today. Power […]
Maori Party supports foreign business over working Maori
It is a reflection of the schizophrenic nature of the Maori Party that one day they’re professing to care about poor Maori who […]
Farrar says: carpe diem National
An interesting post from David Farrar calling for National to implement radical rightwing policies while it still has the support to get away […]
Big bucks for Aussie insurers in ACC privatisation
It seems certain National will begin the privatisation of ACC starting with opening the work account to private competition. As happened in 1998, […]
Told you so: Right pushes ACC privatisation
Last Thursday, Colin Espiner was mocking all of us who said that National and other rightwing groups were trying to create a sense […]
Smith still lying with numbers
Last week, David Parker asked Nick Smith what the “whole-of-life cost to ACC of all new claims” for the last year were. Smith’s […]
Woodhouse: ACC not in crisis
A fascinating interview with the Sir Owen Woodhouse in the Herald today. Sir Owen has led an amazing life – after helping supply Yugoslav partisans […]
Don’t let State Houses become private slums
The other day on Red Alert, Chris Hipkins related an interesting story about how National’s last round of State House sales went awry: […]
ACC a good investor
The other day, John Key said “ACC’s investment portfolio had not been working well”. Now, if there’s one golden rule regarding people with […]
It’s called politics, Colin
Colin, I think we need to discuss your work: the conspiracy theory peddled by Labour and the EPMU (i.e. Labour) that somehow this […]
Spin-busting: ACC rises and cuts
The Herald’s editorial today largely reads like it was written by Nick Smith and John Judge, so let’s use it as the basis […]
One law for all?
Over on g.blog, toad has noticed something: If you or I steal money, it is theft. We get taken to court, and get […]
National’s subsidies for polluters to cost $73 billion
A newly released government paper shows that by 2050 government debt will be $54-$73 billion higher than it otherwise would be due to […]
Oldest trick in the book
How do you get someone to change their mind about something they like? Simple, find one negative element to it (nothing is perfect) […]
Flat tax: works for Lithuania and Albania, eh?
Predictably, the ideological vanguardists at Treasury are rolling out the flat tax argument again. For some unknown reason Radio NZ hasn’t published the […]
We still pay, ACC or no ACC
Labour’s David Parker has been a bit slow reacting to National’s latest attack on ACC but now he’s in play he has a […]
Why no punishment for Westpac?
You would have seen that Westpac was found to have undertaken the largest theft of tax money in New Zealand history. From 1998 […]
Paula, honestly, put away the champagne
So, in the week to October 2, 1950 people signed up to the dole and 2040 went off it. Time to celebrate according […]
First, manufacture a crisis…
The first thing you need to understand is ACC is not spending more money than it is taking in through levies. It is […]
Shame on you, TVNZ
I’ve just seen in the Herald that TVNZ has been using one of their TV ‘psychics’ in the Aisling Symes case. It’s bad […]
Time to wake up from the neolib nightmare
Back in the 1980s, some people who had read too much Milton Friedman and had drunk too much whiskey at Backbone Club meetings, […]
Beyond GDP
Back in 1934, when Gross Domestic Product was first being developed in the States, the economist in charge, Simon Kuznets, wrote “…the welfare of […]
Up in smoke
When the Tui oil-field was opened last year, the operators (AWE New Zealand, 87.5% foreign-owned, ironically) were given permission to burn off 10 […]
Put away the champagne, Paula
Paula Bennett: “The number of people needing an Unemployment Benefit has slowed significantly over the last month, says the Minister for Social Development […]
Bill vs Greens
I love that, after studiously ignoring Bill English’s housing rort, Farrar’s now got unending questions for the Greens. Pretty desperate stuff too – ‘sure, […]
English could learn from the Greens
The Greens have a superannuation fund. That’s fine. It has investments in a couple of houses. That’s fine. The Green MPs have to […]
The walking dead
Fran O’Sullivan has laid out the business elite’s preferred successors to Bill English: At this stage English is not mortally wounded. But his […]
Corruption must never be tolerated
I have to disagree with my comrade Zetetic’s post arguing that it’s best if Bill English stays in office. Yes, this scandal has […]
Crime leaps along with unemployment
The Police statistics out today show the crime rate continues to follow the unemployment rate. With unemployment on the rise, so is crime. […]
Carter, do your job
One area where I agree with Fran O’Sullivan is the dairy industry. Today she covers the Crafars: CraFarms’ bankers should do the decent […]
McGovernment
This increasingly ramshackle government continues to astound. They’ve basically done nothing in a year when the country has been dealing with the worst […]
Who would replace Bill?
There’s a grim irony to Bill English’s career. Despite being regarded as competent and having a Cullen-like role as the heavy-lifter in this […]