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6:00 am, March 18th, 2026 - 47 comments
Categories: open mike -
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Open mike is your post.
For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.
The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).
Step up to the mike …
"The government essentially wipes their hands and say, your partner is your welfare system"
People are now finding out the very hard way about this particular 'feature' of the welfare system. In my cynicism, I have to wonder how many of these people ever bothered to learn about the reality before it suddenly affected them. Or maybe I'm just at the point where I can't be empathetic anymore, which isn't a great headspace to be in.
The flip side of the 'relationship' rule, is how many people on long-term benefits have to stay single, because most people aren't going to take on a new partner if they're obliged to fully support them finacially.
But of course, getting everyone into work that is not there is so much easier than forcing the State to take responsibility for it's (in)actions.
Minister for Social Development Louise Upston said the thresholds were a long-standing feature of the welfare system.
"Raising the threshold is not something I am looking at right now, my focus is on getting people off the jobseeker benefit and into work." (No mention how this with apply to people on SLP also affected by the rule).
RNZ asked further questions of Upston on Monday including what advice she had for people who could not get work, nor a benefit.
Her office said the minister had nothing further to add.
Coward. But rest assured, Labour won't make it a priority either.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/589877/your-partner-is-your-welfare-system-coupled-up-with-not-enough
The Green Party has this
Otherwise a minimum income policy.
https://assets.nationbuilder.com/beachheroes/pages/9612/attachments/original/1754443009/Policy-Greens_Livelihoods_Policy_2025.pdf?1754443009
For mine, they should add a policy of individual support eligibility, moderated down to a combined figure if both are on income support, as we do with Super.
We currently use the WFF tax credits where there are children and a parent loses their job.
Why not for couples without children?
Otherwise the income support system does not work for them.
Long term beneficiaries always laugh in dark cynicism. My edge is not feeling sorry for couples, because at least you have a partner. Imaging being disabled on that income and you don't have anyone to do all the things that need to be done. Agree with it not being a good headspace, I find politics keeps me out of it mostly. I will always argue for fairness for all.
I assume the original design was done at a time when not as many women had full time jobs and households functioned on 1 or 1.5 incomes. Also a time when people's double income wasn't maxxed out by the mortgage payments. Bizarre we still use that.
The Upper Socio-Economic Groups in New Zealand aligned with the COC Government do not give a rat's an*s about anyone apart from themselves. I'm alright Jack, Tax Cuts for Landlord's and the Fat Cat's Around Town ???
Hipkins considered quitting after the hit-job from his ex.
Now sure he's not my cup of tea but a full revenge move using the children is unbelievably low.
Hang in there leader we need all your fighting energy focused on November.
Cookers win.
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Helen Clark
@HelenClarkNZ
NZ rejects new #IHR. “We’re in fringe territory. This is not what people expect of NZ. We’ve been seen as a good international citizen. We adopt conventions, we play by the rules. This is reputation-wrecking. People will think that we’ve lost our mind.”
https://xcancel.com/HelenClarkNZ/status/2033968209523560901
https://newsroom.co.nz/2026/03/18/nz-aligns-with-fringe-rfk-jr-in-rejecting-who-pandemic-rule-changes/
Yes, but those cookers vote, for Winston Peters …
NZF attracts the big donors around town in return for political favours.
What is the connection between those donors and cookers voting for WP?
https://thespinoff.co.nz/the-bulletin/18-03-2026/deja-vu-at-the-beehive-how-the-fuel-crisis-might-transform-the-governments-fortunes
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and bias is a blessing.
Arguably, NZ is not experiencing an oil crisis, at least not yet; there are no real supply issues, at least not yet, only perceived ones.
However, NZ is in a crisis that has been handled very badly by the Coalition and, in fact, worsened by the Coalition’s austerity measures.
Quiz for Luke Malpass and BusinessDesk’s Dileepa Fonseka: what crisis is NZ currently experiencing?
Winston and his Voices for Freedom, Winston and his reckons (this Gulf problem will just go away in time).
All we have from the Hon Minister of Finance is a perspective related to inflation and budgetary management (all within her ball park).
No real response plan but reference to that put in place by the last government (general contingency), but taking away the wider Labour plan to diminish reliance on oil on our roads.
Talking of crisis responses, I googled how many deaths have been due to the Covid jab for 12-17 year olds in NZ. The result: NIL (but possibly 1)
I know that this is AI-based, but I'm guessing it is correct. I wonder if Luke Malpass has praised Jacinda's Covid response? More likely he has been burning her book. As for Winston, read this and correct the record in parliament.
"Official New Zealand data has confirmed no deaths solely attributed to the COVID-19 vaccine in the 12 to 17 age group. However, a coroner's inquiry found one teenage boy's death could not definitively rule out the vaccine as a possible cause for the myocarditis he developed."
Did the government really give funding to Robbie Williams' tour? Or is this badly written and they mean they paid for the stadium?
https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/rock-nz-robbie-williams-goes-global-kiwis
Who knows? Probably just the government funding which was agreed in 2020, due to open in April, and according to Gemini summarising from somewhere (no obvious links)
"…is a $683 million, 30,000-seat multi-use arena scheduled to open in April 2026. It is funded through a partnership between the Crown ($220M–$300M, including land) and the Christchurch City Council ($253M–$453M), with significant ratepayer funding for the latter portion."
Ouch… It is going take a lot of concerts to make recover that last portion.
Personally I've lived about 2km from Eden Park (in a staight line on Grey Lynn ridge) for decades and it was been confounded nuisance since they started doing concerts there. The lights are obnoxious, the sounds reverberates up to us, and we wind up with cars and busses clogging our roads on any large event.
Not exactly a benefit to the local community.
The last time I went to Eden Park was when I was about 14 when I was still playing Rugby for the Eden rugby club down at Gribblehurst park (aka Cabbage Tree Swamp).
I have lived 800m from Eden Park for 45 years. Even before they got concerts the Park Management showed nothing but contempt for the local communities. Any sort of mitigation for traffic, access, noise etc has had to be forced upon them through conditions of various Resource consents,
I remember a Jehovah's Witness convention there in the early 2000's which gummed up traffic and parking for kilometers around the Park. There was no traffic management, no car pool or bus requirements, just large nuclear families in large vehicles, all trying to park within walking distance. Auckland City Council did not even know about it until it started getting phone calls from local residents and businesses about the congestion and the bad parking.
The concerts are noisy by design and the closing of bus stops on New North Rd and Sandringham Rod mean that locals cant even get on a bus to escape the racket. The Edinburgh Tattoo involved fireworks at 10.30 pm every night for 3 nights.
Now, the Park Board's mates in the NACTFirst Government are going to allow the Park considerably more opportunities to maximise the economic value of the Park by granting rights for an increase in the number of night events.
Yes they gave money for the tour
So we a funding Rock Stars but we can't afford to feed and cloth lower socio-economic groups children here in New Zealand ???
I can't tell if that's what it means or if it's just badly worded. Was hoping someone would know how to look it up
That is what it means.
The unknown is how much of the $70M is for any specific event
https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/amped-max-first-boost-kiwi-events
ok, but what is the money spent on exactly?
One can only guess they are sharing promoters costs and or the cost of taking the show here.
They will claim commercial confidence, we may just get the total spent out of the $70M.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/590090/robbie-williams-shows-touch-and-go-without-government-funding-says-frontier-touring
ta. Still very vague.
As usual, it’s as clear as mud when the Coalition doles out taxpayers’ money feigning largesse.
https://www.mbie.govt.nz/immigration-and-tourism/tourism/tourism-funding/events-attraction-package
This package has a total of $40 million allocated. So far, only 5 events have been announced, so one wonders how much of the $40 million has already been given away.
hopefully someone will go digging to find out.
Yes, it would take a carefully worded OIA request or two by a professional journalist, I reckon. They may hide [parts] behind commercial sensitivity, as usual.
Robbie Williams is going to be easier to defend than the State of Origin match they are bringing this way.
Robbie Williams doesn't need to be paid to come to NZ. I suspect it's more to do with the organisers, but even reading this RNZ piece it still doesn't make sense.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/589966/promoters-accused-of-holding-government-to-ransom-over-big-events
Gangster state runs extortion racket.
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The State Department is considering withholding lifesaving assistance to people with H.I.V. in Zambia as a negotiating tactic to force the government of the southern African country to sign a deal giving the United States more access to its critical minerals.
“We will only secure our priorities by demonstrating willingness to publicly take support away from Zambia on a massive scale,” a draft of a memo prepared for Secretary of State Marco Rubio by the department’s Africa Bureau staff says. A copy of the memo was obtained by The New York Times.
Some 1.3 million people in Zambia rely on daily H.I.V. treatment that is provided through the decades-old U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (known as PEPFAR) and on tuberculosis and malaria medications that save tens of thousands of Zambian lives each year. The Trump administration is considering whether to “significantly cut assistance” as soon as May, to increase pressure on Zambia, the memo says.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/16/health/zambia-hiv-aid-minerals-trump.html
Talbot Mills poll today:
Lab 35 Gre 11 TPM 2=48
Nat 32 NZF 11 ACT 7=50
Close, and a TPM overhang might see a draw. So good to see ACT consistently around 7.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/national-higher-in-new-poll-but-labour-still-ahead/PVSDXHUKRBFFHN5Y2VK3TIJAHI/
This is all pre Gulf War.
The job market, school leavers and graduates, mid-level staff now looking for a job and those over 50. Same story.
Conclusion. If able to move apply for an Australian job.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360952255/absolutely-brutal-how-todays-job-market-destroying-ordinary-kiwi
…. and apply for Residency ASAP.
MBIE provides some information
Shane Jones reassures
Correct. Yet if we use less now the normal supply will last much longer than the 50 days (fuel in system level, on the water or stored here) .
We are impacted when unrefined oil does not leave the Gulf to parts where our oil is refined (or earlier if they start to retain rather than ship refined oil onto us).
https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360952707/new-figures-show-nz-has-49-days-worth-fuel
but, but the war will end soon!
anyone know what police powers are to stop this women from standing where she wants?
https://youtu.be/eOtBywMR4Ds?si=dhuQndEmNBtABqdy
Context: pro-Palestine march (presumably), she had a sign saying "“SELECTIVE CONDEMNATION OF GENOCIDE IS EVIL” and wanted to stand so the marchers could see the sign.
FSU is taking a case against the police.
https://www.fsu.nz/donation-pages/the-right-to-peacefully-protest-is-under-attack
IPCA.
https://www.police.govt.nz/news/release/police-respond-ipca-review-policing-public-protests
There is this account of the IPCA process (third incident in above).
https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2026/03/pros_and_cons_of_the_ipcas_non-adversarial_fact-finding_system_actually_just_cons.html
can you please explain it to me?
Ms Rogers FA and now she's FO that refusing to obey a lawful instruction from a police officer is a criminal offence.
the police can tell people where they're allowed to stand in public and arrest people that don't obey?
…. and if that doesn't stand up, there's always that good old catch-all "conduct liable to cause a breach of the peace", or whatever its equivalent is in NZ.
It was an unlawful instruction from a police officer (see SPC's comment at 9.1, spccifically the third incident in this document: https://www.police.govt.nz/news/release/police-respond-ipca-review-policing-public-protests). The police offers involved will of course suffer no FO as a result of their FA.
Lucy Rogers stands guard over protestors interested in a peaceful Middle East. She's also one of four authors at Kiwiblog. They are:
David Farrar (Corrupt pollster, right wing and Zionist activist)
Alwyn Poole (charter school founder and activist)
Lucy Rogers (Lawyer, Zionist activist and counter protester)
Kokila Patel (Admin)
It’s worth going back to the restructure of Kiwiblog immediately after the Christchurch massacre at the hands of an Australian visitor and Islamophobe. Kiwiblog was forced to introduce moderation on all posts and that policy survives today.
Please at least try to consider the possibility that whether you agree with the political opinions of any individual involved or not is completely irrelevant to the principles involved.
Providing some much needed background to the commenter @9.
A powerful essay from a bereaved daughter. A watchful victim of institutionalised hatred and distrust of the Islamic community:
https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/15-03-2026/march-15-taught-me-how-to-read-the-world
This happened on Kiwiblog in the years leading up the Mosque shootings. But the whispers continue there loudly, and here more softly…
FYI, https://thestandard.nz/open-mike-15-03-2026/#comment-2057533.