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On Thursday I linked to a piece in the NBR that suggested Simon Power's appointment of Dr Mark Berry to replace Paula Rebstock at the Commerce Commission hinted at a radical shakeup of the consumer watchdog. Today John Drinnan has an in-depth piece in the…
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Earlier this week the Prime Minister announced $2.5 million for tourism advertising in Australia. New Zealand is not alone in trying to increase tourism as a solution to the recession. Australia is trying to get tourists from here and other countries with wall-to-wall TV advertising…
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Imagine two incidents when a person is at home and they hear someone outside their house. In the first incident, they grab a knife and head outside. In the second incident, they grab an air rifle and go outside. In the first incident, they see…
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In a speech to the International Fiscal Association Conference today, Revenue Minister Peter Dunne said the Government's goal over the next 18 months is to start moving towards a top personal tax rate of 30%. This would be a whopping 9% cut from the current…
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The preliminary results of a drill by the ANDRILL (Antarctic Geological Drilling) were published in the print edition of Nature this week. It has shown a history of the previous retreat and collapses of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS). The WAIS melt with its…
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I'd always thought Westies were the type to do things their own way, so this seems more appropriate in light of today's RNZ interview discussed in the following story from Tane...
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Paula Bennett's performance on Morning Report today didn't just bring home how completely out of her depth she is as a Minister, it also exposed the limits of National's strategy of government-by-PR. If you haven't heard the interview yet, download it now. You won't be…
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The Government is taking nearly half a billion dollars out of public transport, cycling, walking, road maintance, and traffic policing to pay for more state highways. Transport Minister Steven Joyce's reasoning for this - '86% of people go to work by car'. Doesn't he get…
climate change economy Environment honeymoon Media national/act government spin transport
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The National Business Review has an interesting article online that suggests Simon Power's recommendation of Dr Mark Berry to take over from Paula Rebstock as chair of the Commerce Commission is a sign the government is planning a radical deregulation of the competition landscape. The…
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The Service and Food Workers Union is organising a rally and march in Nelson on Saturday (21 March) in support of Sealord workers and other workers in the community who are losing their jobs through restructuring. Sealord recently announced it planned to axe 180 jobs…
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The Electoral Commission has released the third party spending returns for the 2008 election campaign and it looks like for all National and ACT's fears that the $120,000 third party cap would stop groups from being able to express themselves, only the Council of Trade…
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Another reason to watch Campbell Live: cycleway updates. John Campbell announced last night he'd be doing regular (nightly?) updates on the number of jobs created by the cycleway and how many kilometers of it have been built. The top to bottom national cycleway is one…
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According to the Herald John Key has declared people should spend their tax-cuts on charities and wants an American "culture of giving" to the needy. I'm just stunned. His plan is to take money out of the pockets of low income New Zealanders to create…
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Key's speech to the CTU today showed an interesting inight into how he thinks you lift wages. NZPA reports: He said it was not good enough for New Zealand to be in the bottom third of the OECD for per-capita incomes, but was cautious about…
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This morning I spotted a poignant example of the inequalities inherent in tackling climate change. The Maldives have announced they'll go carbon neutral by 2020. Newly elected President Mohamed Nasheed says his small archipelago nation will hereby spurn fossil fuels - opting instead for wind…
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Over the weekend I pointed out that National's plans to review the Overseas Investment Act would lead to even more foreign control of New Zealand and, ultimately, even more of our national wealth sucked offshore to pay the dividends of overseas shareholders. Murray Horton from…
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John Key in the NBR*: There is more chance in this decade than the last one of New Zealand moving up the OECD league table because other countries are moving backwards. So, it's OK if we're getting poorer because other countries are getting poorer even…
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Patrick's sure got DL Wellington humming along. Next Wednesday at the Southern Cross they've got Andrew Little, national sec of the EPMU and the new Labour Party president along to talk about mobilising the labour movement. Should be plenty to discuss and debate. Here's the…
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Well I'll be, it seems Labour is finally starting to act like an opposition. They've set up a campaign website on home insulation - Healthy Homes, Healthy Kiwis - and have started a petition calling on the Government to commit to a home-insulation retrofitting programme.…
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Jonathan Coleman on TVNZ. Parliament, 10 May 2007. Dr Jonathan Coleman When the Minister says that the Government is committed to the core objective of building national identity and will do so through television, does he not realise that New Zealanders do not want to…
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From Tapu Misa's latest column: National thinks that... [t]hrough the magic of "competition" we'll get a first rate penal system, and private providers will make a profit without our having to spend any more money. Given the lack of strong evidence for this proposition, this…
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Before the election National promised that the public service would be capped, not cut. That promise was betrayed a long time ago, but what hasn't been known up til now is the extent to which they are cutting it. You'll recall a month back Consumer…
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Fancy a restful island holiday? If the Cateret Island was your chosen destination you might want to travel sooner rather than later according to CNN: There is one holiday destination that should shake the faith of even the most vehement climate change skeptic: the Carteret…
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Sadly, I couldn't find Colin Espiner's excellent piece in The Press today online. It's good. Colin's thoughtful observations derail the government's PR spin about That Nice Man Mr Key and his commonsense centrist approach. He wonders whether the National government is taking advantage of the…
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In what's turning out to be the gift that just keeps on giving for National, the Recession Bogeyman is now being blamed for a need to axe 90 staff from TVNZ. The Minister for Broadcasting reckons the cuts are necessary to make sure TVNZ keeps…
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The government's first hundred days are up and they've decided that this signals the start to a multi-pronged political offensive. They are now moving rapidly to make a slew of legislative and policy changes that were either not announced or mentioned only briefly before the…
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It is always interesting watching people and organizations jumping on bandwagons of popular movements. In the case of the section 92A of the new Copyright Act, there was a genuine movement by the denizens of the local net and artist communities that we participated in.…
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A conversation that seems to be occuring more and more frequently is asking what's the future of our newspapers? It's a global question and is examined in some depth in this interesting article from The American which says: Speculation about the future of the newspaper…
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Last week, Tane pointed out that the private prison industry had been involved in corrupting the political process in the US by funding 'tough on crime' groups that call for longer sentences (and bigger profits for private prisons). He wondered if the same could be…
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Poor old Nick Smith. Not only is he stuck peddling long-disproved lies about ACC but now it seems he can't even get a simple procedure like sacking Ross Wilson right. According to the Sunday Star Times Smith hadn't managed to properly sack Wilson by midday…