Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, September 15th, 2009 - 29 comments
By Rob Salmond It sounds like Phil G did a great job at Labour’s conference setting out where the party should go from here. Unfortunately, his KISS message didn’t get to all attendees. Labour apparently now wants to propose modifications to MMP, including more electorate MPs, fewer list MPs, a lower threshold, and getting rid […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:16 am, September 15th, 2009 - 22 comments
Hot Topic has obtained a copy of a draft memorandum of understanding for a meeting on the ETS that was meant to take place today. It shows that Labour was prepared to do more to help compensate polluters for the costs they would have faced while still paying a price for polluting, thereby still incentivising reductions […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, September 14th, 2009 - 36 comments
Have to disagree with Zet’s call for Labour to ‘just put it away‘ on the remit to conference calling for subsidised condoms in shops to help reduce unplanned pregnancies and our high rate of sexually transmitted diseases. Sure, if Labour were putting it up as a policy priority there might be an argument. I’m completely […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, September 14th, 2009 - 30 comments
I am heartened that Phil Goff is trying to work with the Government to address over-investment in residential property. However, I think a capital gains tax is the wrong way to go about it. In my view, the rush to get on the rental property bandwagon is the single biggest problem facing the New Zealand […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:30 pm, September 13th, 2009 - 25 comments
Finance Minister Bill English has told doctors, teachers, and other public servants that they will not be getting pay-raises when their collective contracts come up for renewal. That is constitutionally outrageous and a big political mistake. Ministers are not allowed to direct public sector pay negotiations. It is clearly against the rules of the State Sector […]
Written By: - Date published: 2:24 pm, September 13th, 2009 - 32 comments
I know this free condoms idea is just a remit, not Labour Party policy, but it’s exactly the kind of thing that the right has used to drive a wedge between Labour and it’s working-class base. It is a liberal idea that conservatives on the left and right will be repelled by and it creates […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:00 am, September 12th, 2009 - 107 comments
Goff is using Labour’s national conference to swallow some dead rats, distancing himself and the party from the social reform agenda of the previous Labour government. Good. People like the socialist element of Labour’s agenda – retention of public assets, nationalisation of important infrastructure (Kiwirail), intervention in failing markets (eg Kiwibank), redistribution of wealth, stronger […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:24 pm, September 11th, 2009 - 20 comments
The most interesting feature of the Labour conference so far has been from Jim Anderton. It looks like the Progressives are now able to have dual membership with Labour. However he also talking about better organisation of the party towards campaign planning. Some of his ideas are a bit dated (well at least to me). […]
Written By: - Date published: 3:27 pm, September 11th, 2009 - 44 comments
Phil Goff is quoted today as saying “we made mistakes” with policies that were perceived as “nanny state”: Asked if he would apologise to the conference for the nanny state policies, Mr Goff replied: “I think we want to draw a line under the past and say, yes, we made mistakes, we didn’t listen.” Mr […]
Written By: - Date published: 3:55 pm, September 10th, 2009 - 40 comments
No Right Turn and Frogblog both have pieces up on Labour’s decision to vote in support of the Government’s moves to gut the RMA last night. It’s disappointing to say the least. I’d be interested to hear from some Labour MPs why they voted this way, either in the comments section of this post or […]
Written By: - Date published: 1:15 pm, September 10th, 2009 - 24 comments
The Labour party conference is on in Rotorua this weekend, so I’ll be heading there Friday morning. If the writers and readers want to catch up then I’ll generally be around the Mt Albert delegation – they can direct you towards my grey hairs. I’m particularly interested in people who think that they can write […]
Written By: - Date published: 9:20 am, September 2nd, 2009 - 64 comments
Remember FART (Farmers Against Ridiculous Taxes)? Shane Arden driving Myrtle the Tractor up the steps of Parliament? Bill English with his poster carrying the sexist attack on Helen Clark: “the mad cow shouldn’t have signed”? (actually, it was Jenny Shipley who signed us on to Kyoto) All that wailing and gnashing of teeth, all […]
Written By: - Date published: 10:36 pm, August 27th, 2009 - 20 comments
I was shocked but not surprised to hear that National are considering opening our National Parks up for mining. At the same time, I can’t help but feel an unfortunate sense of deja vu. Labour’s Conservation spokesperson David Parker is quoted by 3News today as saying: We were certainly not told this before the election […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, August 24th, 2009 - 24 comments
I don’t know what it is about the word “Labour” that the right finds so hard to understand. David Farrar has a piece up today attacking the Labour Party for backing the Telecom lines engineers, who are members of the EPMU. The crux of his argument is that Labour should keep politics out of industrial […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:40 am, August 20th, 2009 - 27 comments
Good on Chris Hipkins. The other day, he wrote: “National won the last election quite comfortably. Kiwis are fair minded people and will be willing to give them a fair go at the job before they pass judgment. I expect that will be reflected in the opinion polls for most of the current parliamentary term. […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:43 am, August 15th, 2009 - 40 comments
John Armstrong quotes a man who ran into Phil Goff during Labour’s reconnection tour last week: “Listen, mate. You know we voted these guys in seven months ago. You don’t expect us to come up and say we did the wrong thing yet, do you?” Now, Armstrong takes that as dooming Labour but look at […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:59 am, August 12th, 2009 - 5 comments
Two cool fundraisers coming up for the Greens and Labour. The Greens are holding a screening of Kiwi ‘s The Age of Stupid, a movie set in 2055 looking back at today and asking the painful, obvious question – ‘if we could see all these problems of resource exhaustion, pollution, cliamte change, and over-population coming, […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, August 4th, 2009 - 47 comments
Then: Labour Minister David Parker accused of financial wrongdoing (filing incorrect returns). He resigns Ministerial portfolios and as Attorney General while the Companies Office investigates. Cleared of all wrongdoing (the returns were correct) and later reinstated as a Minister. Now: National Minister Richard Worth accused of financial wrongdoing (using Ministerial position to seek personal gain). […]
Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, July 31st, 2009 - 89 comments
I’ve been thinking about the different ways ministers from the Left and the Right approach governing. I think it goes back to where they come from, where their ideological roots are. Ministers from Labour and other leftwing parties tend to have backgrounds in serving a wider community. Teachers, professors, union officials, public servants. Those roles […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:35 am, July 26th, 2009 - 84 comments
Bill Ralston quotes me and some other Left bloggers on the Burgess debacle suggesting it means Goff’s neck is on the line and a leadership challenge might be coming. Well, sorry, but that’s just an old Tory’s daydream. Goff’s leadership is secure. There is no prospect of him being overthrown. His support in Labour is […]
Written By: - Date published: 2:45 pm, July 23rd, 2009 - 13 comments
Good interview with Labour’s Justice spokesperson, Lianne Dalziel this morning on her private members Bill in the ballot that would remove the defence of provocation (audio on the rnz site, including an mp3 version). It looks like there is a real momentum for change with ‘the Crimes (Abolition of Defence of Provocation) Amendment Bill’ going into the member’s […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:00 am, July 23rd, 2009 - 41 comments
Phil Goff. Please get your shit together. This latest fiasco of running up a guy who owns several properties as a case of a Kiwi hurt by the recession is just inexcusable. I don’t doubt the dude’s having cashflow problems. But using him as your poster boy was only ever going to backfire. There are […]
Written By: - Date published: 4:20 pm, July 20th, 2009 - 48 comments
Labour leader Phil Goff has called for a temporary relaxation of the rules for getting the dole. Too many Kiwis on low and middle incomes are losing their jobs but are not able to get any assistance from the Government (despite having paid taxes for years) because their partner has a modest income. John Key […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:48 am, July 20th, 2009 - 16 comments
Labour General Secretary Mike Smith has announced he will retire at the party’s national conference in September. He’s the last of the four – Helen and the three Mikes – who led the parliamentary and party wings during the fifth Labour Government to step down. While Mike Williams ran fundraising, Smith concentrated more on organisation […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:17 am, July 19th, 2009 - 87 comments
After 9 months of watching the rich get richer, with their triple dip cuts, first in taxes, then in private school fees, and now in getting subsidies to upgrade insulation in rental homes, and the poor getting poorer with no wage rises and tax cuts cancelled for the next two years, where are Labour? Phil’s […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, July 16th, 2009 - 44 comments
It was disappointing to hear Phil Goff defending the Fourth Labour Government on National Radio the other morning. This was a government whose policies put hundreds of thousands of Kiwis out of work, introduced regressive taxation through GST, began the firesale of our national assets and drove record numbers of our young people to suicide. […]
Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, July 14th, 2009 - 30 comments
I just don’t see why medicating an entire population to prevent a handful of spina bifida cases, which will only work if women eat far more bread than they do, is a good idea. It’s such a grossly untargeted and unsophisticated approach. Saying ‘well many women don’t get enough folic acid and many pregnancies are […]
Written By: - Date published: 2:57 pm, July 13th, 2009 - 16 comments
You may have noticed that we’ve taken to offering Labour a little unsolicited comms advice of late. Irish recently told them to get some decent key lines. I asked them (as have many others) to start talking about their vision, and when they do, to keep it simple. Phil Goff’s latest video (below) looks like a step […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, July 9th, 2009 - 72 comments
Here’s some advice I’d give Labour if I was Crosby Textor: You need three negative values you want associated with National (for example: arrogant, “out of touch”, corrupt ;)) You need three positive values you want associated with Labour (for example: democracy, justice, vision). Pick them using focus groups (for god’s sake don’t use UMR […]
Written By: - Date published: 9:42 am, July 9th, 2009 - 12 comments
Some worthwhile questions raised by Vernon Small in today’s Dom Post: Eight months ago to the day Labour awoke to find itself out of power for the first time this century….Now, the cliched wisdom is that an electoral trouncing prescribes that an opposition take its medicine, learn its lessons, stay focused and constructive, avoid being […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:50 am, July 4th, 2009 - 19 comments
I have to disagree with my comrade ayb on his post calling for Labour to come up with a more detailed program. Though I understand the desire to see Labour come up some new and inspiring left-wing agenda, now is not the time. Sure, maybe Phil Goff should come out with his own version of […]
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