More excellent reporting from Newsroom: “Long overdue pay rate increases affecting 55,000 New Zealand care and support workers kick in on July 1. But the Government’s failure to fully fund the changes is threatening to derail service providers”
Shane Jones will seek to reenter Parliament and has been selected as the candidate for the Whangarei seat. But for New Zealand First.
The debarclay rumbles on. The Nat’s deploy the Game of Hats gambit. The vultures circle over the remains of Todd B in Clutha-Southland while his zombie vote is exploited to squeak through legislation. It could all have been so very different if the electorate had chosen the best candidate in 2014. Their loss is Invercargill’s gain – Liz Craig in 2017!
Labour: “After nine years of National, working people’s share of the economy is falling. Less than 40 per cent of economic growth under National has gone into working people’s wages. If working people’s slice of the economy hadn’t shrunk under National, workers’ pay packets would have been $23 billion larger.”
Following an intervention by the Ombudsman the Government has been obliged to disclose the number of days that Peter Thiel spent in New Zealand in the five years leading up to his grant of citizenship. The answer is very few.
On 20 June after Melanie Read’s Newsroom interview Andrew Geddis blogged about possible obstruction of justice by a National Party Board member. That was based on new information in the Barclay case, and may be why the Police have since re-interviewed Glenys Dickson.
That’s a mish-mash of Nat soundbites past and present. For the reality underlying it all, check out the excellent RNZ series “Is this the Brighter Future?”
Upon what basis do they feel confident in suggesting to the public that Barclay’s – alleged – victim had been so unprofessional and out-of-control as to be accusing Barclay of being a drug dealer?
Julie Fairey raises a plethora of unanswered issues.
Newsroom with more revelations: “Intercepted discussions in the Clutha-Southland MP’s electorate office included talk of “sex and drugs”, a source tells Newsroom”. How dismally predictable. Eeeew.
Police has commenced a re-investigation of allegations that the private communications of an individual were intercepted by Mr Todd Barclay MP.
English is trying, many days too late, to shut up about the scandal in his old electorate and hope that it will blow over. It won’t – too many loose ends. In particular, Patrick Gower is right, the police must now re-open the Barclay investigation.
Getting very bloody angry and speaking truth to power.
Through his never ending changing of the description of what happened in the Todd Barclay issue Bill English has kept the story prominently placed for six days in a row.
Newsroom has another investigative piece on the Barclay debacle. This is not only about a single MP and a lying Prime Minister. It’s also about the governing structure of the political party in charge of running the country, and who was involved in the coverup and dishonesty.
“We remain committed to setting a resource rental for large water take for irrigation at a fair and affordable price.”
National’s conference was supposed to be a tour de force, setting them up for the home stretch to the election. Instead it was empty of policy or vision, and coverage was drowned in a rising tide of Billshit.
Heather du Plessis-Allan asks why Barclay is taking the fall alone, when – just as with dirty politics – the rot goes to the top of the National Party.
New Zealand First could have a pivotal role in the next Government. What are their principles and what are they committed to?
Team Nat were desperate to try and divert some attention from their floundering leader, and to a certain extent they succeeded. But compare and contrast Labour and National’s handling of the issues, front up and fix vs lie harder.
Burying the last shred of his credibility in a deep hole forever, Bill claims that nobody realised Todd Barclay recording of secretary might be a crime. It’s like the events of 2008 and 2011 never happened.
Nelson city councillor Matt Lawrey is to run a two tick campaign with the full backing of the party.
Ex Nat leader Don Brash, of racist Orewa speech and Iwi/Kiwi fame, is still out there fanning the flames of division in NZ.
Labour and Peters have both made complaints over English’s lie to Parliament. Peters is calling on English to step down. That’s going to make any post-election NZF/Nat coalition a bit tricky.
Bill English’s texted electorate chair Stuart Davie on 21st February 2016 saying Glenys Dickson was given an extra payout from the Leader’s fund “to avoid potential legal action.” It was the only source available for an extra payout for confidentiality. English said today no-one in February knew there was any issue of illegality. Then what legal action and why an extra payment?
A 21st century city simply has to have integrated, multi-modal public transport at its heart.
During Dirty Politics John Key was able to stand in front of a group of reporters and with complete confidence make a series of statements the veracity of which was dubious. Bill English has shown this week that he does not have that ability.
Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.
From twitter, Holy shit, someone in NZ did some journalism and all hell breaks loose.
Newsroom has released details about how National handled the police investigation into Todd Barclay’s alleged illegal wiretapping suggesting that Bill English thought it had occurred and that the complaint was dealt with in part by a payment from John Key’s Prime Minister’s fund.
Max Rasbrooke has done an analysis of donations to political parties, and raises the concern that donations buy influence. There is a solution to this problem.
RNZ: The Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment ignored advice from the Reserve Bank over its new housing affordability measure, and made houses appear to be more affordable than they actually were.
How not to be a twit.
The Minister for Disability Issues would rather be sailing.
The Nation did good work on the housing crisis yesterday. This is the Brighter Future that Bill English warned of in 2010.
Simon Bridges tried to block the release of a report on a Kiwirail proposal. The Ombudsman warns against flouting the Official Information Act. But it’s a well established pattern of behaviour with this government.
