If you want to change the Government …
It is crunch time. The next five days may determine who is the next Government.
Environment
The Opportunity National Courtship
National has softened some policy positions, bringing it closer to meeting some of Opportunity’s five bottom lines. Is Luxon preparing to pull off the post-election flip-flop to end all flip-flops?
Coalition’s problem: bullshit doesn’t conceal poor performance
I had a look at the New Zealand Election Survey for the 2023 election at what voters issues were in 2023. It looks very similar in the major issues today. Economy and cost of living predominating, then health, climate change and crime. That has to be problem for the conservative coalition and especially for National. They haven’t moved the needle to anything except worse.
Green Party policy: Reconnecting Aotearoa
The Greens’ transport policy introduces a quantum leap on climate and public good.
How Could Labour Pay for Transport Without Raising Fuel Taxes?
Labour has promised it will not raise fuel taxes across the next Parliamentary term. That’s a basic cost-of-living politics move. But it’s going to hurt the transport system.
National’s pro climate change obsession
Despite the Iranian war threatening supplies, the Methanex plant closure creating an LNG surplus for the foreseeable future, and enabling legislation still pending, National wants to rush through a construction contract for the LNG terminal before the next election.
To frigate or not to frigate
The NZ Initiative, who gave us neoliberalism, says we need to buy four to keep one at sea. Just Defence says there are a lot better uses for the money. I’m with them.
City Rail Link Is Really About Workers
Plenty of politicians will seek credit when it opens, but none of them will have lifted a spade. The reason New Zealand’s largest infrastructure project exists is because over 1700 workers actually built it.
The robots are coming to get us
AI techies are sound the alarm on where AI is going and how dangerous it will be. We can and should act now to prevent that.
Labour to accelerate climate action
“Labour is fully committed to the Paris Agreement and will put New Zealand on course to meet its targets…. Walking away from it, as National and its mates are planning to do, would be giving up on our kids’ future and impose huge costs on our economy.”
The Right is winning the bullshit media narrative
Last weekend saw a continuation of right wing parties coming out with inane policy announcements that make a media splash without any hard questions being asked.
Greens launch plan to break up the supermarket duopoly and bring down the price of food
“The Green Party has today announced a plan to break up the supermarket duopoly by creating a publicly owned supermarket chain called KiwiMart, as part of its Affordable Kai election policy”
New Zealand’s Gas Panic Was Entirely Lies
Anyone remember it was just a year ago that businesses and government politicians were crying about the loss of natural gas availability?
Greenpeace: Why the 1.5°C overshoot report must be an urgent call to action on climate change
The UNEP’s new report ‘Limiting Overshoot’ outlines a pathway called “overshoot, peak and decline” to minimise and adapt to the impacts of an exceedance and an eventual return to 1.5°C.
The Government suddenly wants to limit the damage it has caused to our climate response
After spending all term undermining the Country’s climate change response the Government now wants to improve the country’s ability to meet the Country’s Paris Accord obligations.
Elon Musk would be pleased with Opportunity Party’s Data Centre policy
The Opportunities Party wishes to enrich Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Larry Ellison by giving them tax breaks to establish data centres in Aotearoa.
Vote Climate
When voting this year vote Climate.
The mythological climate saviour
Carbon capture and storage is bullshit, another lie from the fossil fuel industries so they can keep making money instead of reducing emissions
Fuck this shit
It’s not enough to say fuck this shit, but it’s necessary to start with. We then have to tell a different story, one that people want, that inspires hope, and opens the door to something better than denial or doom.
Labour: Solar without the Upfront Cost
This is a very impressive policy from Labour
This Government’s war on the homeless and the young
In a land of milk and honey you would think that every kiwi would have plenty to eat and somewhere to live. But this week has shown the Government wants to refuse emergency to some poor people and feed young children inadequate school lunches.
The cut to Total Mobility doesn’t add up
7 days after petitioning parliament seeking proper funding for Total Mobility, the government instead cut the funds.
With friends like NZ First …
This week Tama Potaka announced the Government will backtrack on a proposal that would have allowed for the sale of up to 60% of the country’s conservation land. But Shane Jones then completely undermined the announcement by talking about using Conservation land for mining.
New Zealand pushes ahead with selling / exchanging 60% of its precious conservation estate
New Zealand pushes ahead to privatise conservation land, opening up almost 5 million hectares for sale and/or exchange
Local Bodies: The myth of New Zealand’s economic backbone
If the farming sector is the ‘backbone of the economy’ then why is it that we are struggling to stand upright economically at the moment? Is it because agriculture is a economic drain on the rest of NZ. It provides 85% of our export revenue. But contributes just 5% of GDP, 5% of the workforce, and 1-3% of tax revenue – which effectively measures the profit to NZ.
National intends to proceed with the LNG terminal and welch on the country’s Kyoto Protocol obligations
National, a party of supposed economic geniuses, will spend billions on an LNG terminal that is not needed, billions on roads of National significance whose business cases are appalling, and attack Labour for a policy that is cheap, will help ordinary people, reduce fuel dependancy and greenhouse gas emissions.
The Fast Track Legislation Really is This Bad
There is growing local opposition to the prospect of open cast mining in the Central Otago approved by the Fast Track process.
More fishy than a bait shop
Christopher Luxon has implied that a junior staffer met major polluters and received submissions urging him to sink Mike Smith’s bid to hold them to account which were then hidden. But it was his Chief Policy Advisor.
Doing their master’s bidding
Briefing papers from two of the corporates being sued by Mike Smith for damaging the environment urging the Government to change the law to stop the case were received but allegedly lost by Luxon’s office.
Stop This Madness
Why is Chris Bishop wanting to review the cost of the City Rail Link while at the same time is happy to proceed with roads of national signficance that are very expensive but provide limited financial return?
Constitutional outrage
The Government’s plans to retrospectively change the law to stop a case seeking damages for climate damage caused by heavy emitters is a constitutional outrage and shows not only contempt for the rule of law but also contempt for any action taken by a citizen against climate change.
Smash Left populism, get Right populism
That’s Starmer’s achievement, as the local elections show. He always was a muppet puppet; his string-pullers are much more sinister.
“Interest rates, oil and gold”
That RNZ tricolon has always been infuriating fluff. In the real world, analysts warn we are heading for a cliff.
Uncertain Futures and Political Change
The world is turned upside down and challenges progressive politics to change gear.
Luxon is toast
Any time a political leader has to put their position to a vote, they become a dead pigeon. David Lange knew winning the vote didn’t end the matter.
Greens’ State Of The Planet Calls For National Electrification Plan
“The plan would electrify homes, transport and industry, ending New Zealand’s dependence on unpredictable global fossil fuel markets, cutting household power bills, and building real energy security at home.”