The Wellington Mayoralty is shaping up to be a contest between the incumbent Andy Foster, Labour candidate Paul Eagle who will be a direct challenge to Foster’s support base and Tory Whanau who is standing on a policy basis strong on sustainability including the construction of a comprehensive connected bike network.
National’s media spin team is at it again claiming that removing interest rate deductibility for landlords is a “tenant tax” when it is neither a new tax nor for tenants.
But the past week has been a week of sideshows. One international as elements of the right try to smear Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin for dancing. And one local where rogue Labour MP Gaurav Sharma is running out of excuses for not backing up the extraordinary claims he has made about the Labour Party.
The polls are out and the internal revolt last month to remove James Shaw as Greens co leader hasn’t made a ripple.
The Labour Caucus will meet this afternoon to discuss what to do about Gaurav Sharma.
“Along with public ownership and better wages and conditions for people working on public transport, if we can get the Government to focus nearly all transport investments on making it easier for people to walk, bike, or hop on a bus, train, or ferry we can create a world-class transport system that works for everyone. The best way to do that is to get more Green MPs into Parliament,” – Julie Anne Genter.
Recent incidents involving Labour MP Gaurav Sharma are evidence of poor relationships with staff and not anything more sinister.
This post was written before Gaurav Sharma’s Herald article and should not be taken as validation of his comments. There are necessary bastards in political life, and in developed democracies compared to everywhere else ours are gentle as lambs
Eugenie Sage’s Members Bill has been drawn.
“We call on the Labour Government to back the Bill so it can finally fulfil its promise to ban new mining projects on public conservation land”
The three strikes legislation, the brainchild of dead baby identity stealing former ACT MP David Garrett, is no more.
Radio New Zealand has published new allegations of bullying by National MP Sam Uffindell this time by a female flatmate who flatted with Uffindell while at University.
National MP Sam Uffindell has today been engaged in a media wide mea culpa after allegations that he bullied a young student and was expelled from Kings College have been publicised.
The Government’s release of the National Adaption Plan to deal with climate change has been met by National with an insistence that who should pay for potentially hundreds of billions of costs should have already been identified.
Remember when National’s Chris Bishop thought that Labour was not being staunch enough of mandates? He now thinks that Labour is being too staunch.
The latest attempt to construct a sensible political donations regime will likely again prove to be full of holes. Going back to basics would be much better. The good news is that the basics were comprehensively assessed 36 years ago by the 1986 Royal Commission on Electoral Reform. It recommended state funding.
Judge Jagose’s decision to acquit two persons linked to New Zealand First charged with obtaining control over $750,000 has opened up rather large holes in the obligations of political parties to report donations.
Labour announced earlier in the year that it would give a $350 cash transfer to all New Zealanders earning less than $70,000.
Except beneficiaries.
The kicker in Andrea Vance’s Blue Blood, her insider’s view of the splatter-movie that has been the National Party since John Key stepped down, is that the best yet is in production. She chronicles treachery that has become the modus operandi of the vacuous vipers inhabiting the caucus. Details of the dirty work induce you to turn the page for more. It doesn’t look like Luxon is the redeemer.
The question of what has happened to Christopher Luxon was answered yesterday in a shambolic messy way that must have National operatives in despair.
There have been some spectacularly bad takes on Green Party leadership issues by voices on the right and academia which were all shown to be spectacularly wrong after Chloe Swarbrick announced that she was not seeking the Green Party leadership.
Andrea Vance’s book Blood Bath provides an insider’s view of the carnage that erupted in the National Party from 2017 to 2021. And while things have calmed down under Christopher Luxon’s his weaknesses, including his glossing over the importance of policy detail and his tendency to bag businesses has been noted.
The tension in the Green Party is between pragmatism and the need for urgent system change.
For the public, there’s no need to panic. Dissent is valuable and healthy in politics. It sits alongside trusting that the Greens know how to manage their internal processes even if the public at large doesn’t understand them well.
Brian Tamaki and Vision New Zealand supporters sought to improve levels of support by causing significant congestion in Auckland city yesterday.
Although we still compare favourably to the vast majority of Western nations in terms of our Covid response our performance has been eclipsed by Japan and Singapore, two nations which strong mask mandates and cultural norms supporting the wearing of masks.
During January of this year Christopher Luxon described the traffic light system as confusing. This week he described it as “very, very confusing”. It is of concern that he appears not to have learned about what the rules require in the meantime.
At the very time that the United Kingdom Conservative Government is imploding National leader Chris Luxon is visiting to get new ideas on how to run a country.
Right now Labour is preparing the ground for its run at 2023’s election with new policy. New policy must be wildly popular. What could make Labour popular enough to them back leading a third term in government?
Remember Steven Joyce who claimed there was a $11.7 billion dollar hole in Labour’s alternative budget? Another example of his negotiation prowess has recently received media attention and the only conclusion that can be drawn is that his ability to analyse crown accounts is matched by his ability to negotiate.
Someone should send out the free speech police. Simon O’Connor has been muzzled and is being stopped from saying what he thinks.
National leader Christopher Luxon who has been previously reported as believing that abortion is murder, issued three public statements over the weekend trying to distance himself from the controversy caused by the US Supreme Court overturning of Rowe v Wade.
Plenty of experts will tell you about what Matariki ‘means to us’. Here’s what it means to Ardern.
This morning on Morning Report Christopher Luxon was well and truly Susied as Susie Ferguson asked him how can we have tax cuts yet improved public services.
It’s pretty commonplace now to observe that Prime Minister Ardern is doing well overseas but tanking at home.
The Tauranga by election has been one of the most low key by elections held in some time. The polls are now closed. If Labour get within 25 points of National they can regard this as a victory.
Christopher Luxton has proposed that social media posts showing gang members wearing bling should be censored. And in the United Kingdom Boris Johnson has railed against a ECHR decision which has upset his efforts to illegally extradite refugee status applicants to Rwanda. These are different examples of something the right is finessing, culture wars against minorities in breach of their rights for political advantage.
There was some drama yesterday in the Beehive where Kris Faafoi and Trevor Mallard announced that they will be resigning from Parliament and Jacinda Ardern took the opportunity to reshuffle the Cabinet.
