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Politics

Posts on government and governence at national and local level, political parties,politicians, and political participation

Categories under Politics

State-run food stores anyone? 

Written By: - Date published: 10:31 am, June 30th, 2025 - 26 comments

What if we broke New Zealand’s grocery misery with our own grocery store?

A different way of doing politics

Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, June 29th, 2025 - 56 comments

Hopefully what we witnessed in Parliament this week will return a trend to the politics of kindness that Jacinda Ardern practised. And one holding respect for Te Ao Māori at its core.

National Wants to Increase Retirement Age to 67

Written By: - Date published: 11:10 am, June 28th, 2025 - 75 comments

If Luxon and Willis go ahead with it as a policy platform for the 2026 election, and win, a raise in the age of entitlement for national superation will most likely be implemented.

Oceania: Journey to the Center and other Auckland events

Written By: - Date published: 11:17 am, June 27th, 2025 - Comments Off on Oceania: Journey to the Center and other Auckland events

A few things I will be heading to over the coming 5 days in Auckland. A documentary on climate change on pacific islands. Phil Goff on foreign affairs. And the Inaugural Keith Locke Memorial Debate. Moot is “China is a threat to regional peace”. I kind of got caught up in each of these for one reason or another…

Weasel Winston’s FiveEyes fudge

Written By: - Date published: 4:45 pm, June 25th, 2025 - 22 comments

Winston Peters’ Ministerial statement in Parliament yesterday was a disgrace. Echoing other FiveEyes leaders such as Keir Starmer, unable to distinguish evil from good, he accused those who can of “moral posturing.”

Conduct unbecoming

Written By: - Date published: 9:56 am, June 25th, 2025 - 25 comments

David Seymour has been criticised for breaching the Cabinet Manual when posting Parliamentary Service funded social media attack ads against academic opponents to the Regulatory Standards Bill.

SNAP ACTION – Stop U.S. Aggression

Written By: - Date published: 3:30 pm, June 23rd, 2025 - 8 comments

Snap action outside Ministry of Defence tomorrow 24th 1230. All welcome

NZ should drop reliance on Trumps imperial republic.

Written By: - Date published: 1:35 pm, June 23rd, 2025 - 67 comments

The major problem with the political model of a Republic, from Greek and Roman times to the present, is that eventually they invariably deteriorate into an imperial mess and war mongering. for purely domestic personal and political reasons. Which is exactly what Donald Trump did yesterday.

The mother of the mother of all budgets is unrepentant

Written By: - Date published: 3:07 pm, June 20th, 2025 - 15 comments

Ruth Richardson remains totally convinced that her “mother of all budgets” was appropriate and claims that it was responsible for slaying inflation and promoting a high-growth high-wage high-employment economy.

Was the Cook Islands leak a FiveEyes operation?

Written By: - Date published: 9:28 pm, June 19th, 2025 - 16 comments

The leak appeared in the Cook Islands media, not New Zealand’s. On the day before Christopher Luxon was due to meet Xi Jinping. One has to ask “cui bono?”

Cecilia Robinson’s Tend Health Win

Written By: - Date published: 1:10 pm, June 12th, 2025 - 37 comments

For-profit healthcare continues its acceleration under National as second largest private healthcare provider in Australia shuts down

The other Jacinda Book

Written By: - Date published: 9:14 am, June 12th, 2025 - 79 comments

Shortly after the release of Jacinda Ardern’s autobiography comes news of the release of a new biography for which the funding of and motivation for are not clear.

The Auckland Mayoralty

Written By: - Date published: 11:07 am, June 8th, 2025 - 4 comments

With National aligned Desley Simpson ruling herself out of the Mayoralty race and pledging support for Wayne Brown Auckland’s mayoral contest looks like it will be a two way battle between Brown and Kerrin Leoni.

Trump and Musk: One Big Beautiful Break-up

Written By: - Date published: 8:57 pm, June 7th, 2025 - 5 comments

The world’s richest man has fallen out with the President he helped elect. Elliot Crossan asks: does this mark the beginning of the end for Trump 2.0? And might we hope for the same fate to befall the NZ Coalition Govt? January 2025. The richest man in the world walks into the White House as […]

Homelessness up by 58% in Auckland

Written By: - Date published: 5:35 pm, June 7th, 2025 - 8 comments

$250mn in emergency housing “savings” a year under National, while government increases corrections budget to ~$2b a year, and will surpass NZ’s ”moral and fiscal prison failure prison rate” by 2026

Meta Ardern

Written By: - Date published: 9:26 am, June 6th, 2025 - 54 comments

This is about what’s good and what works and why.

The trouble with using AI bots

Written By: - Date published: 9:05 am, June 5th, 2025 - 16 comments

After David Seymour’s claim that 99.5% of submissions against his Regulatory Standards Bill were generated by AI bots it is relevant to review the time that he was implicated in the purchase of Russian sex bots to bolster his Instagram following.

Louisa Wall – Project 2025 Is Silencing Māori Dissent — and It Didn’t Even Start Here

Written By: - Date published: 3:11 pm, June 4th, 2025 - 3 comments

The attempt to punish Te Pāti Māori MPs for a haka protest is not just an internal matter—it reflects a broader, global effort to suppress dissent, erase cultural expression, and centralise power under the guise of order.

Work will not be so safe

Written By: - Date published: 3:01 pm, June 4th, 2025 - 11 comments

Brooke Van Velden has announced changes to Workplace safety laws that will see prosecutions of Employers decrease but prosecutions of workers start.

Writing in the time of Genocide

Written By: - Date published: 11:09 am, June 2nd, 2025 - 29 comments

I want to share a writer’s journey – of living and writing through the Genocide.  Because my country provides support to Israel and the US, I feel compelled to support Palestine by doing the one thing I know best: writing.  

The existential moment we are in

Written By: - Date published: 10:44 am, June 2nd, 2025 - 26 comments

As the world re-entangles and pushes our interdependence to the foreground, we need a new thesis on freedom.

Shut up you dickhead

Written By: - Date published: 8:26 am, June 1st, 2025 - 13 comments

Chris Bishop has chosen to say loudly and publicly “what a load of crap” during a song celebrating Te Reo Maori performed during the Aotearoa Music Awards ceremony.

Seeing Is Believing

Written By: - Date published: 2:05 pm, May 30th, 2025 - 9 comments

A video post, starring Christopher Luxon, Chris Hipkins, Nicola Willis and Winston Peters. Featuring Debbie Ngarewa-Packer as star prosecutor.

Which animal does Labour resemble?

Written By: - Date published: 9:55 am, May 30th, 2025 - 7 comments

In the United States Republicans have been compared to Apex Predators and Democrats to a deer in headlights. Which animal does Labour resemble and which animal should it aspire to resemble?

Nicola Willis’s Debt Higher Than All 6 Years of Ardern Government

Written By: - Date published: 12:31 pm, May 28th, 2025 - 18 comments

Current & planned debt will surpass Labour’s full term debt in less years. Willis also admitted Budget 2024 had a higher deficit than all of Grant Robertson’s bar Covid.

The Peoples’ Select Committee on Pay Equity

Written By: - Date published: 8:19 am, May 28th, 2025 - 8 comments

In very bad news for the Government former National MP Marilyn Waring has announced that she will be doing something the Government did not do, organise hearings to consider the Government’s sabotaging of Pay Equity.

The weird similarities between the Trump and the Willis budgets

Written By: - Date published: 7:05 am, May 27th, 2025 - 25 comments

A comparison of Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Budget and Nicola Willis’s recent budget disclose remarkable similarities.

Willis’ Roundup Budget will not grow new shoots of the economy

Written By: - Date published: 12:55 pm, May 24th, 2025 - 11 comments

Nicola Willis’ Budget is bad for growth and a Big throwback unfit for NZ.

Our growing stress is everywhere

Written By: - Date published: 9:38 am, May 24th, 2025 - 22 comments

We don’t know where this country is going and it’s getting worse. 

Liam Hehir needs to relearn his civics

Written By: - Date published: 7:30 am, May 22nd, 2025 - 17 comments

Generally I like reading Liam Hehir over at the The Blue Review. He is usually interesting despite his position. However he asserted that “Parliament Must Rule Itself”. Of course parliament must control itself. But rule itself – no! Voters do that. Parliamentary rules are mainly there to keep a low profile to voters looking at their poor performance. Right now that is inside the privileges committee.

The Government blinks

Written By: - Date published: 9:35 am, May 21st, 2025 - 15 comments

Faced with the threat of an impassioned filibuster against the Priviliges Committee extreme recommendations the Government yesterday abruptly stopped debate on the committee report by voting to adjourn the debate.