The Greens have revealed that National has spent $26m on asset sales so far. They haven’t even sold anything yet! They haven’t even really begun the sales process! And they’ve wasted $26m of our money. The bill’s going to get a whole lot longer if the sales actually go ahead. There’s $106m budgeted for the sales and huge unbudgeted costs like the looters’ bonus
I wasn’t initially impressed with Ed Miliband, but I am impressed with his success, and with his latest policies he’s re-establishing British Labour’s credentials on the left. What are the lessons for us in NZ?
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There have been various Kiwi taxonomies – attempts to label and describe social types in NZ. In comments Ad proposed this interesting one, highlighting the tensions created by inequality. Thanks for permission to post it…
Welcome to Poverty Watch, a weekly update on National’s lack of response to the urgent and growing issue of poverty in NZ. This week, more from the Children’s Social Health Monitor 2012 Update Report, the government gets a ‘D’ on child poverty from the Salvation Army, instead of acting the Nats are keen to bury such evidence…
There’s a book I’ve heard about that I’m hoping helps push the inequality awareness barrow a little further this year.
Yesterday I rather shamelessly threadjacked one of Irish’s posts on a Colin Espiner column in the direction of the Universal Basic Income idea. […]
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So Aaron Gilmore returns as ex-speaker Lockwood Smith heads to London. His Prime Ministerial ambitions can finally continue…
Scott thinks Richard Prosser’s done us a favour.
Weekend social is for non political chat. What’s on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no […]
Don’t you love hearing the rich say the working poor can’t have more pay? The faux concern that higher wages cost jobs from the same people who support huge executive pay packets and tax cuts? If you really believed higher wages meant fewer jobs, you would cut the CEO’s pay in half, not dick around over a few dollars an hour for real workers.
I/S at No Right turn writes on the Ombudsman’s report which finds some of the Nats’ plans for charter schools to be unconstitutional and dangerous.
Why are Treasury and Reserve Bank presenting clearly trumped up numbers to pretend the economy is doing better than it is? They’ve been caught out lying that the banks weren’t excessively profitable by international standards, that private electricity suppliers aren’t more expensive, and that we’re not unequal by OECD standards. Now, the Reserve Bank is telling blatant lies about the manufacturing sector.
Irony meters everywhere pegged their meters as Bill English accused some bosses of being “greedy”, and not paying their staff enough. Hey Double Dipton – those greedy bosses? – they’re just following your example…
For those of you who’ve missed it Colin Espiner is back on the NZ interwebz with a new Stuff blog, the (rather earthily titled) Bull-Dust. Colin was a bit of a pioneer of journalist blogging in New Zealand. He was, I believe, the first Gallery journalist to run a proper blog and certainly the first to get in amongst it in the comments sections.
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The Herald reports that the Supreme Court will not meet the Government’s timetable for its decision on the Maori Council’s challenge to Asset Sales.
Forest and Bird need you to get out and count Kereru.
Stargazer at The Hand Mirror has a unique take on the Prosser affair. Prosser claims to have been motivated by concerns for his daughters’ rights and freedoms – which raises some interesting questions…
The first State of the Union of Obama’s second term was widely anticipated. As many hoped, Obama made a strong statement on climate change. Good start – now let’s see words become actions – please…
The Living Wage Coalition has released the results of their research, calculating that a wage of $18.40 is needed for workers and their families to have a decent life and participate in society. About 40% of workers currently earn less. The pressure is now on bosses of businesses and public bodies to pay the living wage or explain why they deserve a decent life but their workers don’t.
Yesterday’s Roy Morgan poll looks good for Labour, but individual polls are noisy. Much more importantly, better measures such as the Pundit poll of polls are also looking good for the political Left. Let’s see Labour and the Greens extend their lead to establish a clear majority, without NZF or any other party holding the balance of power…
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Child Poverty, a high exchange rate and suppression of free speech. It’s that National Government again.
White collar crime – fraud and tax evasion – is in the news again with a new report on the impact. The costs are estimated as several Billion per year. Meanwhile the Nats put all their energy into demonising and chasing $22 Million in welfare fraud.
The Salavation Army “State of the Nation” report is out today, and, as Metiria Turei says, it makes depressing reading. It describes a nation of increasing inequalities, with those on low incomes, and their children, being hit particularly hard.
It’s not often I agree with Judith Collins but when she describes Richard Prosser’s racist filth as an “international embarrassment” I couldn’t agree more.
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Good for Damien O’Connor. He’s calling for an enquiry into possible mis-selling of interest rate swaps to farmers. Good for Fairfax’s Rob Stock too, who has written extensively about this issue in the Sunday Star-Times. In Britain, it’s a huge story; their Financial Services Authority has said that more than 90% of these interest rate derivatives could have been mis-sold. Compensation is going to be paid; the only question is whether it will be in the millions or billions.
Prosser, just f*cken resign. There’s no place for the likes of you. You’ve been elected purely to make up numbers for Peters. And you couldn’t even do that without being a disgusting bigot. You’re not the only rightwinger playing up race fears. Hooton claims Indonesia will invade due to climate change. Key tells scary stories of made-up boat people. But you’re the worst. Just go.
The concept of a living wage is one that just makes good sense to me. A wage should be enough to live on, right? Because it’s a wage? Because what’s the point if it doesn’t?
Bomber Bradbury today steals The Pope’s limelight by announcing that he is stepping down from Tumeke. But fear not Lefties – it’s for a good cause…
Never mind Valentines Day. This February 14 is One Billion Rising…
Bad jobs numbers and a succession of collapses of major businesses weighing your government down? You need: distraction! How about an old classic from the New Zealand politician’s playbook – the Yellow Peril! Passed on by Seddon and Peters, Yellow Peril’s now being wielded by John Key as he talks of vague, unsubstantiated threats that boatloads of Indonesians are heading for our shores.
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