Please advise
Government ministers seem blind to the most obvious of issues because they have “received no advice”. Remember back in the dark ages when Ministers had some initiative? Remember when we elected leaders to lead?
political parties
national
Caption Contest
Economy
The economy, shall we say politely, is facing some difficulties. With a National government there was no plan as to how to weather the economic storm, we just got tax cuts for the rich and an economy that just can’t get growing.
Brownlee wrong for Christchuch
Gerry Brownlee is making a mess of the rebuilding of Christchurch. In the latest fiasco, the person Brownlee tapped to head the new earthquake recovery authority apparently can’t face the prospect of working with him.
Flat as a pancake
The economy grew just 0.2% in the December quarter, enough to avoid the technical definition of recession but did it feel like that […]
Informed consent
Owners of businesses in the red zone CBD want brief access to their premises to retrieve items and data that are vital to whatever remaining chance they have of keeping their enterprises alive. The government is refusing access on the grounds of safety. There’s right on both sides of the issue, but whatever happened to informed consent?
Cuts! Cuts! Cuts!
There was already going to be too little money in Budget 2011 for maintenance of public services. Now what little there was is being further slashed in the name of Christchurch. An Earthquake Levy is not an option, rather we’ll all pay through increased borrowing and 25% cuts in services like police, transport, justice and social services.
Hartevelt swipes Nats’ elitism
The SST’s John Hartevelt is shocked by National’s decision to pay out millions for Christchurch rugby business while ordinary people live in shattered homes and lose their jobs with meager support. He asks whether the Nats have lost their moral-political bearings. In fact, this is a perfect example of National’s elitist philosophy.
Labour exposes planless Key
There’s been increasing concern over the past week or two that not only has the government failed to communicate its plan for the Christchurch recovery, it doesn’t actually have one, and isn’t particularly worried about getting one. Yesterday in the House, Labour took Key to task on this important issue. And he was found terribly wanting.
No faith in Nats’ economic ‘plan’
So, how are you enjoying your brighter future? Not too flash, eh? GST up. Wages down. No jobs. More crime. Earthquakes. Oil and food shocks. No bloody cycleway. Discretionary income (after tax, housing, food, transport) is down about 15%. No wonder Kiwis don’t believe Key and National can deliver on their promises.
Government reneges on Pike River
Gerry Brownlee promised the West Coast a stimulus package. The government has now ruled that out. Those with whom John Key so public sympathised will not get what they were promised; they’ll be left to pick up the tab, whilst he works on his next PR opportunity.
Auckland: a sprawling car future?
National will reject Auckland Council and Aucklanders’ view on what their future city should look like. Instead they propose One ever more sprawling city, with ever more sprawling motorways, ever more cars clogging its veins, ever less community, and ever less government money.
Mergers & Schisms
Last National government: split Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. This National government: merge Agriculture and Fisheries. In times of economic recession and disaster National know the really important things to focus on. Just as long as they keep those civil servants busy and away from helping the public we’ll all be fine.
National continues ECE assault
National are to allow battery farming style early childhood education. From July the government will allow 75 stressed under-2 year-olds in one room, unable to form a relationship with any one teacher.
Some free advice for National
Hey National – stop lying and inventing dodgy stats to try and prove that we’re all better off. The tax cut received by most people was derisory, and the cost of living is shooting up fast. Even the Kiwiblog heartland isn’t buying the lies. If you can’t convince them, you can’t convince anyone…
Quake used as foreshore cover
Today Parliament sits in full for the first time since the second earthquake. There’s lots to attend to: the government is required to explain the state of national emergency, change the census law, create a one-off provincial holiday, and alter the law on school zoning. But it looks like the Nats are more concerned with slipping through their foreshore and seabed bill.
National hates Public Broadcasting
TVNZ7, and New Zealand public service television as a whole, looks to be coming to an end in June next year. TVNZ has been told their only responsibility is to return to the government a 9% return on investment per annum; their response is that they see pay-TV as their future. Sky is now “a frenemy”.
Embarrassing result for Nats in Botany
So another corrupt Nat minister has gone and Jami-Lee Ross has taken her seat in Botany. What an embarrassing resulting. The majority reduced […]
Farrar illustrates WfF folly
John Key has tidied up the confusion he caused yesterday and says that the quakes will cost the government $5 billion in rebuilding and $5 billion in lost revenue over the next 4 years. Big bikkies but easily covered by an emergency levy and canning the white elephant motorways. So, why are the Nats obsessed with tinkering with Working for Families?
Powerless
The man tipped to be National’s next leader, Simon Power, has announced he will not be standing at the next election. The reasons are obvious. As a decent man and an old fashioned caring Tory, Power has no heart for the direction National want to take New Zealand. His resignation is a sign that within the party, the dry right have finally taken total control the idealogical reigns and there is no longer a place for liberal wets like Power.
Tax policy for economic stimulus and growth
Last week, Treasury issued a press statement saying it had commissioned research on the impact of governments’ fiscal stimulus packages, now published in the influential publication the Economic Journal. One article, “Tax policy for economic stimulus and growth”, had this to say:
Bashing benes no solution to joblessness
National’s grand plan for the economy in the age of peak, peak food, and climate change: give tax cuts to the rich and take from the poor. It’s classic Nat class war. They want to force 100,000 people off the benefit in the ludicrously long time-frame of 10 years. But they won’t be creating any jobs so other workers will be displaced and wages will be forced down.
Compare and contrast
Idiot/Savant at No Right Turn compares the bailout of SCF investors with the Nats’ threat to change the law to deny some workers the minimum wage.
What do you think Righty – a perfect score?
Even the most optimistic lefty can’t deny that National are continuing to dominate the opinion polls. That must be quite a source of […]
Nats bully bulldozer still running
The Nats regard parliamentary process as an inconvenience to which they must pay lip service, but nothing more. They started as soon as they took office, with repeated abuse of urgency. The current disgraceful process over the foreshore & seabed legislation is just the latest instalment.
You can’t mix oil and water
Every new party faces an inevitable conflict between the ‘realos’ and the ‘fundis’ over how much principle can be compromised to make some gains through coalitions. The Maori Party made it far worse by supporting a party that is anathema to everything it stands for. That big mistake is at the root of collapse we’re now witnessing.
Waitangi Day
Is there any other country in the world with such a complex and contentious national holiday? As an annual barometer of Maori political opinion, this year is already looking much more turbulent than the last. Events surrounding Key’s welcome yesterday show a high level of tension and dissatisfaction with the Maori Party’s support for the government.
Nats drop 6% on privatisation announcement
OK, that title is pure spin. National has dropped from 55% to 49% in the latest Roy Morgan, and Labour’s up from 29% to 34.5%. But that just shows the last poll was a rogue. Now, normal transmission, and National’s decline, has resumed. When you look at the Nat/ACT and Lab/Green/New Zealand First potential coalitions – the race is tight and closing fast.
Economic recovery despite the Nats
Pundits looking to talk up the economy are hopeful that things will improve in 2011. National have done more harm than good, but there some encouraging signs too, arising from external factors such as high food prices, and returns on old investments such as NZ Super. The NZ economy will eventually recover. Not because of the Nats, but in spite of them.
Time for the Goffice to step up to the plate
We face a stark choice this year: a Labour-led government, which will create fairer tax and invest in jobs and innovation, or National-led government, which will govern for the kleptocracy, giving them tax cuts, then selling our assets and slashing our public services to pay for them. So why is the Goffice doing such a bad job making the case?
Contact Energy: A Case Study
We could look at bailed-out TranzRail and Air NZ, with privatisation leading to risk-free pay-outs for the temporary owners of infrastructure that couldn’t be allowed to fail. Or Telecom that doesn’t look out for NZers interests, and needs us to pay for it to build us a fibre network. But let’s look at the “success” story of Contact, the closest privatisation to National’s new plans.
National’s Impending Swingeing Cuts
Whilst John Key’s raising of privatisation is the first focus of his State of the Nation speech, perhaps equally as important is his intention for swingeing cuts to public services. Health and Education will have to pay higher wages from the same budget, but the likes of Police, Justice, Conservation and Social Services can expect cuts of more than 10%.
States of the nation
It’s not radical, it’s not revolutionary but Phil Goff has laid out a positive, progressive, and affordable vision that contrasts with John Key’s directionless, lazy leadership. It seems to be popular. The PM’s state of the nation is expected to contain an interesting savings policy but always the question is: cue bono?
Why are Turia & Sharples cuddling up to Key?
At this stage in the electoral cycle, government support parties are usually looking to try to differentiate themselves from the main governing party. They need to do this to show they still hold true to their own values and have a separate identity that is worth voting for. The Maori Party is doing to opposite.
Nats’ Botany Selections
The National Party head office have culled the eight people they don’t like and left five to contest Botany.
It’s Maggie Barry vs Jami-Lee Ross and three others.
Privatising Infrastructure by Stealth
Government IT projects are easy to take aim at, but this isn’t a hit at their lack of thinking or actions on UFB.
This is about them privatising their entire computing systems, preferably without being noticed; paying the least they can to a corporation to take care of your most personal data.