You might have heard of this new TV series called The Block, where they get 4 couples to compete to do up dilapidated houses. It's the most expensive non-fiction programme ever made in New Zealand. It's vacuous, contentless garbage. But what gets my goat is…
Remember back in February 2010 when John Key announced that he had a super-secret plan to end whaling? I'm sure there's some real clever strategy behind why nothing has come of it so far and Key never mentions it. But I think, now that he's…
Private prisons still failing When the government introduced private prisons, they promised us that it would lead to better performance. But six months on, Serco's Mt Eden Corrections Facility is still failing to meet basic performance targets: Private prison operator Serco has failed to meet…
You know how the Government is so skint, and absolutely much get back into surplus by 2014/15, that it has cut education at every level, cut conservation, cut home insulation, cut Kiwisaver, cut Working for Families .. etc etc. They even created a new super-ministry…
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The Police have concluded their investigation into John Banks' declaration that he did not know that Kim Dotcom and Sky City had made significant donations to his 2010 mayoral campaign, so recorded them as anonymous. If he can be shown beyond reasonable doubt to have…
Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here. Russel Norman, Green Party This is the worst news imaginable. The Green Party are absolutely opposed to the reckless smashing up of…
The angle of this DomPost article ("Police pay may be next on political hit list") is very interesting. Instead of just running with David Farrar's latest lines ("Unionist Scum Police paid too much!"), they are seeing through a ploy National have been using with great…
What exactly do we mean by "progress"? I'm moved to ask the question because of the following recent article: Price of progress hurts Kiwis The rampant cost of living means two-income families are increasingly worse off than single-income families were a generation ago – and…
There's a new member in the 'sphere, a cheeky little blog called Twisted Hive that appears to be a member of what you might call the Labour Ulterior, that great mass of Labour people who are unhappy with and feel excluded by the way things…
The median household has $1700 in the bank - you couldn't really term that savings, it's operating cash. The Nats want us to fork out at least a grand a time to participate in each share float. That just doesn't add up. Labour and the…
We've all seen the headlines: Fail a drugs test and lose your benefit, job seekers warned. Here's a summary: The Government is preparing legislation to strip beneficiaries of their welfare payments if they miss out on jobs because they won't take a drug test, or…
Yesterday National pollster David Farrar excitedly quoted from a George Monbiot article saying peak oil isn't happening. Two problems: 1) Farrar omitted to quote the bits of the article, including the title, saying that the flipside of no peak oil would be runaway climate change.…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike...
Back in February John Key said: "But there are plenty of jobs out there for people if they look really hard." 312 people looked really hard for this job: One bar job advertised, 312 applicants A Whangarei bar owner got more than he expected when…
$20 million. That's how much Paul Reynolds pocketed during his disastrous 5 years as CEO of Telecom. You could have employed dozens of teachers and nurses over that period for that money. Instead, it all went to one man as the company he headed went…
Key has dismissed calls for an inquiry into the Police's actions in the Dotcom affair. He says that the Greens call for inquiries every week. In fact, they've called for 19 in the past year and a half. Is that too many? Well, the Auditor-General…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike...
There's some very wrong with the Police. A second murder trial in a month ending in acquittal (the Qwaze case wasn't even a homicide). A case based on evidence that was never going to make it past reasonable doubt. This comes on top of the…
Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here. It's behind an NBR paywall, but I'm told this is how Trade Minister Tim Groser described the threat to our "100% Pure"…
Bob Jones may be a facetious old bugger but he knows a rort when he sees one. And asset sales are a rort: "Since the advent of the industrial revolution every business has sought the bliss of a monopoly. The competitive market economy denies that, except…
All the evidence (eg) shows that increasing the price of harmful substances is the best way to decrease their use and, particularly, their abuse. Minimum pricing is one effective measure to do that for alcohol. But John Key disagrees. Based on ... nothing. He hasn't…
The only remaining possible legal threat to the Nats' plans to sell off our power companies is a Treaty based claim to water rights or riverbeds: Maori party co-leader Tariana Turia is calling on iwi to investigate claiming the ownership of riverbeds around the country.…
As many of us expected, National has no intention of ever enforcing the ETS in the area where it makes the most difference to NZ emissions - agriculture. Key likes to spin our "all sectors all gasses" scheme when he's posing overseas, but it's not…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike...
As usual, Alex puts his finger on the problem. Regulatory compliance is not high on the agenda for interest-rate rigging banks in England, who even after being caught rigging interest rates are still resisting any further regulation. Tapu Misa has the full story, and the…
A speech from the CEO of Exxon Mobil made quite a splash recently: Exxon CEO: Fossil fuels will warm planet, but humans can adapt ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson says fears about climate change, drilling, and energy dependence are overblown. In a speech Wednesday, Tillerson acknowledged…