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Politics

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

Categories under Politics

Colmar Brunton poll: Labour still way ahead

Written By: - Date published: 6:04 pm, September 22nd, 2020 - 90 comments

Judith will not enjoy this poll result.

How low can National go?

Written By: - Date published: 7:44 am, September 22nd, 2020 - 43 comments

With news of a second mistake in National’s draft budget its campaign is in trouble and support for other right wing parties appears to be surging.  Update:  Stuff is reporting a further $3.9 billion dollar mistake …

Paora Goldsmith is National’s $4 billion dollar man

Written By: - Date published: 4:17 pm, September 20th, 2020 - 116 comments

Paul Goldsmith has blighted National’s campaign launch by making a $4 billion dollar mistake in National’s budget costings.

The Auckland Central Poll

Written By: - Date published: 9:08 am, September 20th, 2020 - 33 comments

A Reid Research poll has suggested that Helen White is well ahead of Emma Mellow and Chloe Swarbrick and that Labour’s support is still sky high.

Why Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Death Matters Here

Written By: - Date published: 8:28 am, September 20th, 2020 - 27 comments

RBG’s death was an important event for women here because it happened on the anniversary of Women’s Suffrage Day 126 years ago.  On this day in New Zealand we celebrate women being able to vote, the women who won further victories of political liberation, and many got together to recount our female heroes enabled by that right and all those rights that followed.

National’s lolly scramble tax cuts

Written By: - Date published: 8:34 am, September 19th, 2020 - 55 comments

Despite claiming that the PREFU figures were catastrophic and despite stating a month ago that it would not do this National has come out with a policy of temporary tax cuts favouring the rich.  They must be desperate.

Reti’s running

Written By: - Date published: 7:50 am, September 18th, 2020 - 62 comments

Yesterday Shane Reti ignited leadership rumours after he was asked if he wanted to be National leader and did not pledge support for existing leader Judith Collins.

Greens: expanding living wage beyond public service with Fair Pay Agreements

Written By: - Date published: 9:53 am, September 17th, 2020 - 16 comments

The Green Party welcome Labour’s commitment to extend the living wage to Government contractors, but will push for Fair Pay Agreements across industries in the next Government so more New Zealanders can earn a dignified income.

Grant Robertson’s crisis leadership

Written By: - Date published: 4:45 pm, September 16th, 2020 - 22 comments

Much has rightly been made of the leadership quality of Prime Minister Ardern this year. But the PREFU results announced today shows that Minister of FInance Grant Robertson is by a long way the most effective Minister of Finance we have had since Dr Michael Cullen.

The PREFU is much better than National wanted

Written By: - Date published: 4:33 pm, September 16th, 2020 - 51 comments

The Prefu is out! And it is not as scary as National would have wanted.

What just happened with Israel?

Written By: - Date published: 7:21 am, September 16th, 2020 - 40 comments

Just two months before election day, Donald Trump appears to have won a diplomatic coup in the Middle East. The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have normalised relations with the state of Israel.

Taxpayer’s Union is wasting taxpayers’ money

Written By: - Date published: 9:24 am, September 15th, 2020 - 35 comments

The Taxpayer’s Union, which claims to be opposed to Government waste, is wasting taxpayer’s resources by lodging a spurious complaint with the Broadcasting Standards Authority against Labour’s free apprenticeship policy.

Greenpeace on the Green Party’s Farm for the Future policy

Written By: - Date published: 9:21 am, September 15th, 2020 - 58 comments

“Wildfires are burning across the world and our rivers and lakes have been pushed to the brink. This is no time for half measures. Phasing out the use of PKE is exactly the kind of bold and transformational policy that is needed to deal with the climate and freshwater crises.”

National’s Upper Harbour problem

Written By: - Date published: 8:31 am, September 14th, 2020 - 41 comments

This has been quite a year for National. It is onto its third leader, has lost a slew of experienced MPs, and has had other MPs resign in curious circumstances.  And now it appears that it has a crisis involving its Upper Harbour candidate, Jake Bezzant.

Qanon is here

Written By: - Date published: 7:37 am, September 14th, 2020 - 132 comments

While a few in the media leapt at the opportunity to vilify a small evangelical community at the latest COVID 19 spread, the really big COVID 19-conspiracy story landed by the thousand this weekend. It’s overdue we woke up to QAnon here.

Labour’s social welfare policy

Written By: - Date published: 12:20 pm, September 13th, 2020 - 62 comments

Labour has announced that if elected they will significantly increase abatement levels for beneficiaries and reinstitute the Training Incentive Allowance Scheme, the policy that Paula Bennett famously had the benefit of but then cancelled once she was Minister.

The Greens sticking to their guns (and their values)

Written By: - Date published: 10:57 am, September 11th, 2020 - 157 comments

The Greens just boldly stepped up their election campaign.

National’s infrastructure bank

Written By: - Date published: 7:24 am, September 11th, 2020 - 21 comments

National’s proposed Infrastructure Bank is an accounting trick, with very high risks that the entire power of our political order for anyone affected by these monster projects will weaken citizens’ rights.

Labour voters, if you could vote to keep the Greens in parliament would you?

Written By: - Date published: 9:13 am, September 10th, 2020 - 116 comments

Choices, choices.

Covid, the US President and the Evangelical churches

Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, September 10th, 2020 - 123 comments

There has been disturbing local news that some members of a local evangelical church, influenced by American equivalents, refused to accept the threat posed by the virus. And in America a new book from Bob Woodward suggests strongly that Donald Trump knew how big a threat Covid would be but chose for political reasons to downplay the risk.

How has Conservation Fared Under This Government?

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, September 10th, 2020 - 39 comments

I’m going to give this government just 5 out of 10 on the conservation front.

Labour announces tax policies

Written By: - Date published: 12:55 pm, September 9th, 2020 - 98 comments

Labour and the Greens have both recently announced taxation policies.  Meanwhile there is no sign of any fiscal policy or alternative budget from National.

What did Brownlee know about Southern Response’s misleading and deceptive conduct?

Written By: - Date published: 4:37 pm, September 8th, 2020 - 27 comments

The Court of Appeal has ruled that Southern Response has engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct and has potentially short changed thousands of Cantabrians hundreds of millions of dollars.

Will NZ First make it back into Parliament?

Written By: - Date published: 10:07 am, September 8th, 2020 - 43 comments

One of the most interesting questions about the current election campaign is will New Zealand First make it back into Parliament after the election, with polling and a slew of not dissimilar parties on the right suggesting that Winston’s time may be up.

Landlord lobby group hopes National Government will ditch warm flat requirement

Written By: - Date published: 8:49 am, September 7th, 2020 - 56 comments

The NZ Property Investors Federation has proposed to its members they should hold off on making flats warmer and drier just in case there is a change of government.

Assange’s torture and the death of journalism

Written By: - Date published: 9:28 pm, September 6th, 2020 - 60 comments

On the eve of Assange’s extradition hearing in London, award-winning freelancer Jonathan Cook has written a scathing indictment of corporate journalism’s collusion in ignoring his official torture. I posted an example of that here last year, where Richard Harman denied Assange was a journalist at a panel convened at Parliament by the British High Commissioner.

Covid – New Zealand has similar levels of freedom to Sweden

Written By: - Date published: 1:41 pm, September 6th, 2020 - 83 comments

Simon Thornley is claiming that New Zealand’s covid response is a failure and we should be more like Sweden. But it appears that in more recent times Sweden has toughened its stringency tests so that they are similar to New Zealand’s.

Labour’s two tier welfare plans

Written By: - Date published: 11:17 am, September 5th, 2020 - 74 comments

As the covid crisis deepens Labour appear to be committed to entrenching the underclass and giving a helping hand to the middle class.

Will our cities revive?

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, September 5th, 2020 - 43 comments

Our cities are the nation’s lungs; they recycle and accelerate external goods and transform them internally into faster circulation. Auckland and Christchurch have had tens of billions invested in them over successive local and central governments, but has this improved our strength or wealth as a country at all?

“Reds under the Bed”.

Written By: - Date published: 8:40 am, September 4th, 2020 - 78 comments

Everyone has recently had an education on  “Socialism” working in practice.

And a graphic illustration of the shortcomings, of under regulated “Free market” Capitalism, Globalism, tax cuts for the rich, and the mania for monetising everything in sight, and “running it like a business”.

Will Jacinda Ardern meet her promise to transform?

Written By: - Date published: 6:53 am, September 4th, 2020 - 62 comments

Neoliberalism has run its course and displayed its profound inability to address inequality issues. It makes the poor get ever poorer while the affluent top 10% ticks of society get bloated and increasingly insufferable on untaxed capital gains. In 2017 Jacinda Ardern set a goal of bringing all children out of poverty within six years. So how is that going? And what are the next steps?