Open Mike 09/08/25
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6:00 am, August 9th, 2025 - 33 comments
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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).
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Today's Posts (updated through the day):
Willow Jean Prime's slackness in responding to Erica Stanford's invitation to become involved in the proposed Education reforms is surprising but understandable. I suspect she was doubtful any suggestions from her would be taken seriously, and she could find herself being criticised for being "unhelpful". Something like that anyway.
That said, she should have at least responded politely declining the invitation until such a time as she had been able to gauge the response from teachers and parents. I hope she has learnt a lesson.
It’s not slackness, it’s functional stupidity. Prime has been promoted beyond her competence, and she should really consider her options for the future. It’s an unfortunate fact of life, sometimes you have to work with people whose opinions and beliefs are different than yours. Competence relies on challenging your beliefs and opinions. Prime fails to understand that she’s not in government and needs to work with people whose beliefs and opinions differ from hers, or she becomes irrelevant. Labour can’t afford to back her, Stanford, rightfully or wrongly, is becoming to be seen as competent and highly capable education minister, and may well be seen as a future prime minister, thus making it more difficult for labour and the left to get back into government.
Terry, are you going blue in the face? Engaging with a Coalition Minister of the most secretive and closed-minded government ever is an exercise in futility and an opportunity cost (aka a waste of time). It hardly is a ‘sackable’ offence.
Incognito, we elect a range of people to represent us in parliament to do a job. If someone is unable or unwilling to work with others, then what is the point of them being in parliament? All MP’s are earning a salary any number of times greater than the average citizen, the least they can do is work with one another.
My employer expects me to work with other employees, whether or not I like them, surely we should expect our MP’s to do the same? For fuck sake, these people are supposed to be grown adults, not the popular kids in high school. Declining to engage with the minister of education because of differences in political ideology, when you happen to be an elected member of parliament, with a responsibility of representing the opposition for matters pertaining to education should be a sacking offence.
Stanford understands that all 'her' hard work on NCEA changes (to be fully implemented by 2028) will be toast if the CoC don't get their Act together.
Some say it's important to engage with Stanford, but I do not care
Irrelevant red herring.
Emotional outburst followed by another flawed red herring.
False premise.
Very low bar but in perfect agreement with David Seymour; enough said.
Incognito, I’m not sure if you would recognise a red herring if you saw one. I’m not one to normally agree with Seymour, however on this subject I do agree with him.
That should give you pause for thought.
This is a classic MSM gotcha story to hammer Labour with. A storm in the proverbial.
Remember Stanford is the woman who stole $30 milllion from the Re Reo Maori programme and used it for teaching maths instead.
This is the woman who refuses to grant humanitarian visas for Palestinians yet hassled Labour when they didn't do the same for Ukranians (Labour granted humanitarian visas soon after).
This is the woman who used her personal email to send sensitive government material.
This is the woman who introduced swinging changes to NCEA based not on research but on the evidence of chosen Auckland school principals of the "right" ideology. Can you blame Prime for not replying to her when the process had been so crap?
I don't get it. Prime failed to reply before the crap process.
Prime had an opportunity to hinder, counter and report on the process.
Given yr list of actions Stanford has taken, all the more reason to be in the tent than out. Prime is in the opposition. Oppose.
Besides the fact that WJP wanted to consult stakeholders with real skin in the game and who operate at the coalface daily (e.g., teachers) before she met with Government representatives, it may be that she didn’t want to be part of the Coalition narrative and/or play into their hands, gather her own evidence, and follow her own (Labour’s?) strategy.
Stanford has been baiting WJP even in Parliament and she didn’t bite then either.
https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/hansard-debates/rhr/document/HansS_20250506_051720000/11-question-no-11-education [6 May 2025]
The Coalition announcement about the NCEA reform was on the same day as the 6-week consultation period opened (i.e., 4th August).
https://www.education.govt.nz/consultation-ncea
Now the real work for the Opposition starts in earnest.
Erica Stanford is so captured by her right wing advisors.
Why would WJP waste her own time?
Since when has the avocado ever engaged in good faith negotiations?
Stephen D, WJP, may not want to waste her time. She is on the taxpayers dime, the expectations are that she should do the job she is paid to do. If WJP won’t or can’t step up and do the job she was elected to do, because she’s had a fit of pique, she should consider other employment opportunities.
I think we all hold great expectations that all politicians will do the job they are paid to do, but their behaviour suggests that is not going to happen. Why pick on just one of them?
Kay,
“Why just pick on one of them?”
She’s in the news at the moment, the news story is about her, & this thread is about her actions, or lack thereof.
Pathetic lazy and misleading argument. The real story is about yet another attack by the RW of NZ politics on the education sector. Funny how this is turning into a hit job on WJP because she didn’t reply to e-mails and chose a different approach to doing her job.
Incognito, this story is about WJP ignoring repeated invitations to have input. It’s pathetic, lazy and misleading to deflect this back on some imaginary “RW attack on education”. It’s WJP’s job to be involved, if WJP can’t or won’t work with others on the other side of the political aisle, she is of no use in parliament.
It’s a side story to the main story, but the Coalition and its supporters, and you, are dead keen on replacing the main story with the side story.
There are too many premises here that are misguided and you’re parroting yourself. What her job is, as MP or Labour shadow person for Education, how she decides to do it or be involved in matters, how, when & where she decides to engage with others and why, are her business in the first instance. I get that you and others, on both side of the aisle, are less than impressed with her and disagree with her course of action (without knowing what she knows) but to call for her to leave Parliament shows that you’re reacting irrationally and have become detached of reality, i.e., the attack narratives and David Seymour got into you.
Prime probably realises that Stanford's agenda is bollocks and that any effort at constructive engagement is a waste of time that simply lends Stanford a credibility she doesn't deserve. However, if she wasn't going to engage, she should have said why. She could have done this by pointing out the essentially antisocial influences driving what Stanford is doing. To my mind these are:
a.) a desire by affluent parents and the political right generally (Nationals voter base) to maintain and extend social and economic stratification. Spreading the measurement of students' achievement across a wider range, marks some students out as clearly and permanently superior. The idea that everybody has something of value to offer and that we are all more equal than we might imagine, is way too 'levelling' for this crowd to tolerate. The Right loves hierarchies.
b.) the CoC's determination to divert public money away from state schools and into private hands at every opportunity. These could be private schools, charter schools, or tutoring businesses. Just about everything they do is intended as a free gift to business – essentially shoveling cash into their supporter's pockets.
c.) a determination by the CoC to locate educational failure within the education system itself – rather than what happens either prior to it, or outside it. Just don't look at poverty and inequality, don't look at overworked, time-poor parents and housing insecurity, focus instead on how terrible NCEA supposedly is. The myth that equality of opportunity (EoO) really exists must be maintained. Just don't read that section in The Spirit Level (by Wilkinson & Prickett) that correlates the greatest social mobility (a marker of of EoO) with societies that are already the most equal.
And it's an easy con job, because there are always things wrong with an education system, and everybody has been to school and so has an opinion on it.
Really Terry? Please give some examples of her 'lack of competency' – I mean real examples, not just some fanciful 'thinks' of yours. As a Maori woman, she will be well used to her views not being taken too seriously by some Pakehas, especially those in the National and ACT parties. Where she did fail, was not to ensure that she, or perhaps somebody in her office responded on her behalf. Mistake no doubt learnt and it will not happen again.
Ann, Prime’s job, as an highly paid elected MP, is the opposition’s representative for education.
Prime repeatedly ignored invitations from the government minister for education, to have input. This was not an oversight, it was deliberate, and it was unacceptable. She failed to reply to the invitations and she failed to do her job, considering her senior position, it’s serious misconduct. It’s just polite to say that she’s been promoted beyond her level of competency. There is no shame in that, however it is problematic for her to continue to be in parliament. Being in parliament is not bloody “work experience.”
I wasn’t aware that she was a Maori woman, I can’t recall it being part of the story. It has no relevance.
You are an ignorant, arrogant git. 🙄
Good morning Anne,
Thank you, I take your comment as a compliment.
In what parallel universe?
And why should Willow Jean Prime engage in the inevitable cockup that Stanford is making in education?
I wouldn't.
KJT, considering it’s WJP’s job as an opposition MP, with responsibility for education, I believe she has an obligation to be involved.
BTW, to me she appears to be very competent and capable.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/08/trump-says-he-will-meet-putin-very-shortly-to-discuss-end-to-ukraine-war?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Zelensky probably won’t agree to loosing a significant chunk of Ukraine. At which point Trump will says the war is all his fault, and change sides.
I view the Coalition Government as neo-authoritarian and more and more I see stuff that’s consistent if not supportive of my view.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/08/01/whoops-how-not-to-build-an-efficient-and-effective-public-service/
David Seymour’s infamous bot army is probably not marching against this because it’s flying under the radar with zero attention from NZ MSM except in Newsroom.
Submissions close in 22 days and even if you’re not going to submit you should be aware at least of yet another regressive move by the Coalition.
https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/make-a-submission/document/54SCGOA_SCF_426F1977-0722-4148-423F-08DDCD89E002/public-service-amendment-bill
Thanks for the heads up.
I'm getting very weary with doing submissions opposing this govt's nasty, undemocratic, anti- the general public, changes – especially as I suspect the govt, MP's and ministers will take no notice of anything I write. But, at least it'll be on the record.
You may be interested in this aspect of the Amendment Bill:
https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/08/01/collins-to-strip-diversity-pay-equity-rules-from-public-service-law/
This action by the Coalition doesn’t stand on its own, it’s a variation on a theme that is becoming a deafening noise to NZ people.
Thanks. Yes, I am definitely interested in that.
How nice of a woman who is wealthy and sorted to do that, when it is particularly lower income women, and many of them, who will be harmed by it.
A Sudetenland level betrayal of Ukraine.
/
Washington and Moscow are aiming to reach a deal to halt the war in Ukraine that would lock in Russia’s occupation of territory seized during its military invasion, according to people familiar with the matter.
US and Russian officials are working toward an agreement on territories for a planned summit meeting between Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin as early as next week, the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations. The US is working to get buy-in from Ukraine and its European allies on the deal, which is far from certain, the people said.
Putin is demanding that Ukraine cede its entire eastern Donbas area to Russia as well as Crimea, which his forces illegally annexed in 2014. That would require Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to order a withdrawal of troops from parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions still held by Kyiv, handing Russia a victory that its army couldn’t achieve militarily since the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-08-08/us-and-russia-plan-truce-deal-to-cement-putin-s-gains-in-ukraine
https://archive.li/2jwbe
Case studies in poverty.
1. An unemployed man who does not qualify for income support because his wife is working.
Policy is wrong. At least a years support on the JSB as a non working partner.
2. A woman paying back a $40,000 debt to W – leaving her with $60 for food and clothes each week.
Policy is wrong. No debt repaid till they work.
3. and the homeless
On the streets begging for hostel money and caravans in car parks …
… and the government says no one is in a motel, those responsible for their circumstance deserve it and making it hard to access help, so they can fake statistics.
Wandering in the Potak wilderness, landless and homeless.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360785654/they-bought-their-first-home-now-theyre-14k-behind-and-facing-homelessness
The land of service to the power of the aggregate capital of the corporation cries out that it forgot it ever signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.