Teachers will be dancing in the streets at the latest Education announcement
Chris Hipkins has announced that significant changes will be made to testing regimes for Primary and Secondary schools.
Social issues
Free Education – how to pay for it
I am a New Zealander living in Norway lecturing at NTNU, Norway’s largest University. For the last few months I have been thinking about the challenges of providing free post-secondary education. Norway offers free education for all students including international students.
No Right Turn: Here’s hoping
Julie Anne Genter as the new Minister for Women is likely to revisit a private members bill that would advance pay equity in NZ.
The mess that the new government inherits
This post is too long to read. Its purpose is to serve as reference material, a “one stop” snapshot of where we are as a country. The mess that the new government inherits. The consequences of the nine long wasted years of National. The magnitude of the challenge ahead of us.
Labour Day
Extra sweet this year.
Happy Birthday Ursula Le Guin
An unsung hero of the civilised burn.
Books but no beds
Most viewed story on the Guardian website today: “New Zealand library cracks case of missing books.” Turns out some of Auckland’s 23,000 homeless were hiding bookmarked books in odd places so they wouldn’t lose their place. The library will now keep their books safe. Good on them. Finding homes for homeless must be a high priority for Aotearoa’s next government.
A letter to my middle-class, well meaning, professional, liberal friends and family
A post about the responsibility to advocate for change in a visible way.
“Reporters”.
“Once upon a time, in a world far away” we had these people called “reporters”.
An honourable profession, who considered it their job to keep the public accurately and completely informed.
Happy Oompa Loompas?
Dunedin hosts a celebratory graduation ceremony for discarded labour.
Industrial dairying and blue babies
When you run an economy that sees harm to babies as acceptable risks that can be mitigated, then you are approaching society’s end game.
Donkey Dick Duncan
Gross political incompetence, not immigration, is what lies behind and beneath New Zealand’s infra-structure problems. Only a excited donkey’s dick waving in a stiff breeze might point accusingly towards immigrants and immigration as the problem.
The education mess
The complete mess that National has made of our health system got plenty of airtime during the election campaign. While it received less coverage, the education system is a mess too.
If it’s not gay, it’s not gay
The Rainbow Youth video that went viral.
There is hope
Anarchism and democracy.
WINZ: where hope and dignity go to die
“It is not okay that nearly everyone I have advocated for at WINZ, has broken down in tears during appointments and have often been close to a panic attack. Most people I advocate for at WINZ unanimously tell me it is a humiliating and utterly defeating experience.” – political writer and community activist Chloe King.
Guns
Another gun massacre has occurred in the United States. And the well worn excuses and justifications by the right and the gun lobby are again being used.
Reduce Poverty – Climate Change – Clean Rivers
Why the Greens can sit outside Government…
Today is the last day to enroll – and you should
Today is the last day you can enroll to vote in the election. Historically far too many people in the 18-24 age group have not enrolled. The same again would suit the Nats very well indeed.
Update: Newsroom: “A record turnout of early voters suggests a youthquake in action – and the polls might be wrong.”
Update: If you are trying to enrol and the queues are long, here are the other ways you can do it, including online!
Update: you can enrol up until midnight Friday online, and then vote at a polling station on Saturday. Details here.
Daily Review 21/09/2017
Daily review is also your post. This provides Standardistas the opportunity to review events of the day. The usual rules of good behaviour […]
Vote for compassion and competence
National has created the perception that it is a better manager of Government than Labour and is suggesting that it is more compassionate. Neither claim is true.
Gower – Nats the biggest liars
Sure would be good if some other media called the Nats out on this too.
Malnutrition – in NZ FFS
Stunningly depressing piece by Kirsty Johnston in The Herald yesterday – Number of New Zealand children hospitalised with malnutrition doubles as food costs bite.
Proud of your legacy, National?
The failure of TOP’s Youth UBI policy
Safety nets should be for all people and the best way to ensure that is to design them for social need not as economic tools. Despite Gareth Morgan’s assertion that policy is everything, The Opportunities Party has managed to create a youth policy that is discriminatory.
“The Green Party is committed to reforming renting so that every house is a home”
People who rent should have security so they can put down roots and benefit from being able to participate in their community.
Women readers of the site
Apart from the usual election year rise of the readership, the demographics on this site have been moving a lot earlier this election. The most noticeable statistic in the recent months has been to do with gender. Most of it appears to me to have been associated with female interest in Metiria Turei. There is a lot more interest by women in this election than in 2014.
Green Party announces a better deal for students
“Students are the only group in society expected to borrow just to get by. We believe that students should be supported so that they can focus on learning the skills they need to contribute to a smart, innovative economy and a fairer society”
Labour’s families package
Under Labour’s Families Package 70% of families with kids do better than they do under National’s tax plan. Labour launched their online calculator yesterday…
Bryan Bruce’s documentary ‘Who Owns NZ Now?’
Reviewed on Stuff: “Who owns New Zealand now? The NZ On Air-funded documentary that screened on Three on Tuesday, September 12 confronts the housing crisis head on and it’s an eye-opener.”
Guest Post: The Spectre of the Bloody Fetus Placard
Reprinted with permission from Julia Schiller’s blog Enough is Enough. Julia analyses Abortion politics in New Zealand and details a recent interaction she had with National MP Simon O’Connor.
After nine long years National discovers there is child poverty in New Zealand
Bill English has finally committed the Government to doing something about Child poverty. But why has he and National taken so long?
Stupid myths on immigrant construction workers
One of the dafter myths about the current burgeoning immigration industry is that we need skilled immigrants for the construction industry. As usual the talkback idiots are wrong. We don’t get many. We need more. We need to get rid of the migrant dross to get them. A Kiwibuild quota is a good idea.
National enters panic mode and goes tough on beneficiaries
National has tried to divert attention from the budget hole fiasco by promising to get even tougher on beneficiaries.
Excitement mounting for Part 2 of Audrey Young’s analysis of Parties financial promises
After the first in her series of articles inviting a bank economist to analyse and comment upon Labour’s spending promises, tomorrow she turns to the second in the series with a close analysis of National’s promises.
I will resign before raising Super beyond 65
John Key and Jacinda Ardern have some things in common it seems. She has a pony tail and he likes pony tails (I […]
National plays the lauranorda card
National is panicking and Paula Bennett has gone full dog whistle in claiming that gang members should have less rights than others.