On mandates
The National/ACT line in defending pushing through legislation like the Fire at Will Bill under urgency, without any select committee process, without any […]
Arrogant and out of touch
The Manawatu Standard has a good op-ed piece today on how National has squandered its honeymoon with its arrogant and out-of-touch behaviour on […]
All I want for Christmas
This viral email from the Council of Trade Unions is doing the rounds. Make sure you click on through and tell John all […]
Tough law for tough times
Against the backdrop of tough new employment laws there’re predictions that “35,000 jobs could be lost in the construction sector.” No wonder that there […]
HRC calls for consultation on fire at will
This just in: the Human Rights Commission has called for the fire at will bill to be put to select committee: The Human […]
The prideful cowards
So far, the Maori Party has refused to take its opportunities to contribute to the debate on the tax bill before Parliament. They […]
Incompetent or just undemocratic or both?
No Right Turn points out in What’s in the urgency motion? exactly how much of shambles the NACT government is. At present they […]
F*ck Democracy II
This from Lew in the comments section of my last post: Shortly after the House resumed at 0900, Darren Hughes requested that the […]
Guest post: those Euro bright sparks follow us
Have you heard the sad news that the EU may be next to join the international communist nanny-state conspiracy against incandescent bulbs? It […]
Caching Fixes
There has been a on-going issue with some readers not getting updates through in a timely fashion in the sidebars when posts and […]
Will Hone keep his oath?
Yesterday, the MPs were sworn in. After the section ‘pledge true allegiance to Queen Elizabeth the Second, her heirs and successors, according to […]
F*ck democracy
No Right Turn has an excellent post pointing out that National is misusing urgency in a manner unseen since the bad old days […]
Some questions for Kate
Kate Wikinson, John Key’s hapless Minister of Labour, has told NZPA the public shouldn’t get to have their say on the fire at […]
Courting the ethnic vote
I’ve just watched the first part of the Address in Reply debate which included maiden speeches by two new National Party MPs – […]
Oh dear
Rodney Hide on National and ACT’s select committee into the ETS: “I am especially pleased to see that the issue of the scientific […]
Spin-busting: Probationary periods
National has been working hard to push the idea that its fire at will policy introduces a ‘probationary period’ of employment. This is […]
Kia kaha
The Greens have joined in opposing National’s “Fire at Will” Bill which they say puts “jobs and democracy at stake”. They’re calling on […]
Bringing it home
These ads made by the ACTU to oppose John Howard’s removal of unfair dismissal rights sure bring home what National’s fire at will […]
Ramming it through
I’ve just been informed that the National/ACT Government has put its 90 day fire at will bill on the Order Paper and could […]
No longer at the back of the class
Word is National’s David Bennett will be chairing the Transport & Industrial Relations select committee. After his unhinged performance over the youth minimum […]
Work rights? Gone by Xmas
Tracy Watkins reports that the National/Act government will be taking all work rights from anyone in a new job in a firm with […]
Dear John
In case, like me, you tend to mainly read the news online, here’s what was stuck to the Dominion Post this morning:
Kiwisaver changes
NZPA reports that the Government is looking at reviewing its changes to Kiwisaver so that workers who don’t earn enough to get the […]
Urgency
During this morning’s Nine to Noon politics segment Matthew Hooton was saying how he thought the Government’s 100-day action plan would only include […]
Occupy, resist, produce
Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis describe in the New Statesman how: [a]lmost entirely under the media radar, workers in Argentina have been responding […]
The Secret Diary of Prime Minister John Key aged 47 1/3
If someone sent me this to put up as a guest post on The Standard, I would probably reject it as too childish. […]
Unambitious
National/ACT has cancelled the Buy New Zealand Made programme. So, this is that ambitious and positive vision for New Zealand we’ve been hearing so much […]
Playing with rankings
Since the 16th of November, I’ve been running an experiment with the Alexa ranking system to look at the site sensitivity in rankings […]
Taking responsibility, a trait of government
I was looking back at posts from last year to get some idea of traffic patterns over the December period. I found this […]
Hanging up on Barack
According to the BBC: US Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen thought she was being hoaxed when a man who sounded a lot like Barack Obama […]
Off the Agenda
Well, if that was the best they could manage for the final Agenda then we haven’t lost much. There was one decent question […]
The ethical considerations of Christmas trees
Christmas is coming. We want to feel like we’re part of the sustainable, clean and green in action movement. So what sort of Christmas tree […]
Farrar back on the PS payroll?
A mate just pointed out that the metadata of David Farrar’s election analysis document suggests it was authored on a Parliamentary Service computer. […]
The Standard Week 28 Nov – 5 December
At the election, National won a mandate for its platform to review the Work Account of ACC, to see whether privatisation might make […]
What to do with Treasury
It’s good to see Treasury’s extreme right-wing prescription for New Zealand has not been wholly embraced by the National Party – and it’s […]
Govt’s ACC spin working
We’ve covered the National/ACT government’s latest ACC beat-up extensively already. IB spelled out rather well here the techniques being used by the government […]