Westpac Helicopter Trust’s claim that it had not breached privacy rights of Covid sufferers raises some serious questions about why Michelle Boag was provided with sensitive information. And who she has provided it to.
As details emerge about Hamish Walker’s leaking of confidential information of Covid sufferers for political advantage, questions are being asked about Todd Muller’s leadership and if National is actually committed to assisting the country’s response to Covid 19.
National has recently been upping the campaign rhetoric but there is a disturbing lack of policy detail.
National Backbench MP Hamish Walker has claimed that Queenstown is to be invaded by people from India, Pakistan and Korea when the reality is the Government is considering using empty Hotels for quarantining returning kiwis.
Todd Muller had a bad day yesterday with adverse confidential National polling leaked to the media and with Grant Robertson and Winston Peters showing in the house that Muller’s denial that he had proposed opening up the border with China was simply not correct.
A review of recent opinion pieces by Mike Hosking shows that he has adopted a series of contradictory positions with the one common feature that they are critical of the Government’s actions.
National and elements of the media have gone full on attack on the Government’s and Ashley Bloomfield’s Covid 19 performance. Which is unusual given that there is still no examples of community transmission and all recent infections have been picked up through the quarantine system.
National is complaining that a Government Covid19 media account liked Jacinda Ardern’s instagram page. And a National cheerleader wants all Covid 19 response advertising to stop.
Yesterday saw two back bench National MPs unintentionally set National’s position on the Government response to Covid 19 and on Hamilton City’s decision to take down a statute that was repugnant to Waikato Tainui. What has happened to their messaging discipline?
Chris Penk has written a book suggesting that the Government’s Covid 19 response has been terrible. Because it was not quite perfect.
To assist with the emergence from the Covid19 crisis it is time to build firms like Air New Zealand into social institutions of democracy, accountable to citizens and not subject to a takeover by the private interests of capital.
Thanks to clear and decisive leadership, an intelligent government, the decision to go hard and fast, respect for science, and overwhelming commitment to local kiwis we can celebrate a milestone, Aotearoa has no current cases of Covid 19.
The politics of Covid 19 present difficulties for the opposition. They cannot fault execution of the plan so far and have been reduced to complaining that the restrictions are not being loosened quickly enough.
Borrowing heavily from Monty Python’s Life of Brian Labour MP Deborah Russell sets out what the Government is doing for small business in these Covid 19 times.
All sectors of our economy are affected. But how are the post Covid changes affecting your industry and your job?
More than 110 nations have backed a call for the World Health Organisation to investigate the origins of the Covid-19 virus outbreak.
Text of a pre budget speech given yesterday by Jacinda Ardern.
National has decided to play politics with Covid 19 and is opposing the Government’s attempt to pass legislation to secure level 2 arrangements. And has made the extraordinary claim that Jacinda Ardern is just like Rob Muldoon but with slogans.
In this time of uncertainty when mass unemployment beckons you would expect that stock exchanges would be plummeting. But think again. Because they seem to be doing fine.
We are heading towards decision time. Does Aotearoa New Zealand loosen up and head back to a semi normal life?
In a Facebook Live event David Parker has schooled Simon Bridges on basic principles of constitutional law. And it appears that Bridges demand that legally privileged advice be handed over is heading to the Privileges Committee.
Simon Bridges threw two stunts yesterday, firstly threatening to try and summons senior Public Servants to publicise confidential legal advice and then by attacking Dr Ashley Blomfield for not answering emails quickly enough despite the existence of a pandemic which the country appears to be handling pretty well.
The top ten things that the Covid pandemic has taught us as a country.
Roger Douglas has reverted to his socialist roots by going back on his pro market mantra and criticising the economic privilege and inequality that he helped create.
The International Energy Agency is forecasting that disruptions caused by Covid-19 will reduce CO2 output this year by 8%. To avoid the worst excesses of climate change the world has a target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 7.6% for the next decade. How are we going to keep repeating the reductions that we achieved this year for the next decade?
National economics spokesperson Paul Goldsmith has advanced a plan to address the Covid 19 pandemic which includes union bashing and privatisation.
Just as most industries in New Zealand are firing thousands of people to cut costs, local government is getting ready to do the same.
Guest post from former Labour Staffer Clint Smith on the similarities between National’s current predicament and what happened to Labour in 2011 and 2014.
It appears that the National Party is engaged in a bitter discussion of when Simon Bridges should be rolled, not if. Will it be before or after the election?
The Ministry of Health is checking with the GCSB to enable full tracing of people to slow further outbreaks. Should we be afraid?
Richard Branson, who has arranged his affairs so that he pays tax to no government, is upset that Governments are not bailing his empire out. And an idea has been floated to allow billionaires to set up boltholes in New Zealand.
Simon Bridges’s Facebook post criticising the extension of lockdown level 4 has been met with overwhelming opposition, including from people who are clearly National Party supporters.
Guest post by Karl Sinclair on what needs to be addressed before the country can be safely lifted out of lockdown.
Decision day for the Covid-19 lockdown and my personal view is that although the country has done well it is not quite in a position to ease the lockdown.
Even if New Zealand gets out of the immediate Covid-19 infection better than most other countries, the result is still a wrecked world […]
Over the next few days there will be an intense public debate about whether the lockdown should be continued or loosened.
