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iPredict needs “Next National Minister Resignation”

Written By: Bunji - Date published: 7:13 pm, April 10th, 2014 - 35 comments

Who will it be? Judith? Simon? Hekia? Amy? Or a surprise?

NRT: Is the Minister of Energy a muppet?

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 3:55 pm, April 9th, 2014 - 11 comments

When looking at Simon Bridges – a purported government minister. You have to remember that he is damn sloppy even for a politician. But oh so typical of his usual muppet behaviour is that he wasn’t aware that he was opening up our biggest forest park for oil and gas exploration. Of course it could just be National’s bulldoze anything for a little immediate profit….

Poverty denial – NZ Herald editorial

Written By: karol - Date published: 8:44 am, April 8th, 2014 - 210 comments

Today’s NZ Herald editorial joins Paula Bennett’s beneficiary-bashing stunt, asking for flying privileges to be cut, & denying there is a lot of poverty in NZ- a view from the privileged part of NZ’s inequality gap.

The politics of the Royal Tour

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 7:04 am, April 8th, 2014 - 85 comments

Is it just me or is John Key politicising the Royal Tour in a way that has not occurred before? And is he a Royalist or a Republican or both at the same time but for different parts of the electorate?

Polity: Armstrong on National on Labour

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 1:20 pm, April 7th, 2014 - 13 comments

It isn’t a new ploy from National or its supporters. “Mortgage rate rises under National: Good. Mortgage rate rises under Labour: Dreadful!”. I’ve seen David Farrar argue both that a recession is the perfect time to cut taxes because it stimulates the economy, and a recovery is also the perfect time to cut taxes to provide a dividend. It reminds me of that old chestnut, most recently applied to Don Brash: “The answer is tax cuts. What is the question again?”

Local Bodies: The Great Oil Gamble and Wasted Opportunities

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 8:37 am, April 7th, 2014 - 24 comments

Gamble Big’ rather than ‘Think Big’ should be this National Government’s mantra.Opening up huge areas of our land and territorial waters for open slather oil and gas exploration is a gamble on so many levels. When many countries like Denmark are actively chasing a sustainable, clean energy future, this government is throwing all its hopes on a big strike of fossil fuel.

National preparing for November election?

Written By: Guest post - Date published: 10:01 am, April 4th, 2014 - 36 comments

A guest post concerning apparent confusion on the part of the National Party about when this year’s election is. Stand by for breathless denunciation of the party by Farrar, Slater and the Young Nats for its inability to organise a piss up in a brewery.

Fact checking John Key’s budget speech

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 12:25 pm, April 3rd, 2014 - 144 comments

David Parker has been performing some fact checking on John Key’s recent budget speech and the results are somewhat startling …

Rogernomics, income inequality & gender politics

Written By: karol - Date published: 12:22 pm, April 3rd, 2014 - 22 comments

All of us, in our diversity, can make a big impact this election year. Time to end the “neoliberal” tyranny! Crime stats are celebrated masking the continuing impact of income & social inequalities. Rogernomics fractured gender politics & rape crisis intiatives.

Drill baby drill

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:12 am, April 3rd, 2014 - 40 comments

Two days after the IPCC has warned us of the threat posed by climate change and Simon Bridges has announced a huge block offer of parts of New Zealand and much of its territorial water. This will include the pristine waters off Auckland’s west coast, home of Maui’s dolphin. In a world that has to address its consumption of petroleum you have to question if it is worth the risk.

Patricia Grace takes on RONS

Written By: karol - Date published: 9:29 am, April 1st, 2014 - 48 comments

The Kapiti Expressway is one of the National government’s RONS projects: it makes no sense economically. It is destructive to the environment and the local communities. The NZTA is attempting to run roughshod over ancestral lands, including that of writer, Patricia Grace. She is taking a stand.

NRT: Cash for honours

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 10:44 am, March 28th, 2014 - 17 comments

Yesterday No Right Turn did a post on how Graeme Douglas became Sir Graeme Douglas by looking at his donations donating heavily to the National party after being gonged. But this other post on the same overall subject was more interesting. It is no wonder that National wanted the more lucrative royal honours reinstated.

The struggle over gambling corruption

Written By: karol - Date published: 10:04 am, March 25th, 2014 - 48 comments

There has been a long struggle by the Problem Gambling Foundation & others against SkyCity & the powerful and secretive Pokie Trusts. The government has tended to support the trusts, while maintaining their distance from them. The defunding of the PGF is the latest chapter in the struggle.

Power disconnections increase as hardship grants are cut

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:47 am, March 25th, 2014 - 38 comments

Radio New Zealand has reported that power disconnections have soared at the same time that WINZ hardship grants have plummeted. Simon Bridges has suggested that it is the power companies fault. The Government should be blaming increasing poverty and inadequate WINZ hardship grants instead.

Polity: Buy low, sell high. Except National.

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 1:06 pm, March 24th, 2014 - 27 comments

Rob at Polity points out National’s intensely unstrategic view about investments and asset sales. In a down market where all the indications said “buy,” National sold our assets for a pittance, and refused to invest in the Super Fund. The Super Fund has been making returns of 21%, far exceeding the Crown’s cost of borrowing. And National will only start investing in the Super Fund when equities are expensive again. It is almost as if they wanted to waste taxpayers funds eh?

LocalBodies: National Slumps in Polls As Ministers Struggle

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 9:19 am, March 24th, 2014 - 22 comments

There is danger of reading too much into polls months out from an election. Commentators were claiming that National was too strong to lose the next election based on a rogue poll. Few looked at multiple polls, accounted for the margin of error nor the trends over past months. The last fortnight has seen a National with the latest Roy Morgan Poll plummeting from the Colmar Brunton result of 51% to 45.5%. And it is based on a lack of ministerial performance…

his precious $

Written By: geoff - Date published: 8:20 am, March 22nd, 2014 - 41 comments

As reported on TV3 news a few nights ago, John Key said that “I have a very strong sense of how precious children are…” The children, that is, of Chinese consumers who are buying milk powder… As for kiwi kids, well…how precious are they, John? National cares so much for kiwi kids they were prepared […]

And now for the real news…

Written By: karol - Date published: 10:00 am, March 21st, 2014 - 15 comments

“Rockstar economy”? Let’s hear it for another chorus of,”There is no depression in New Zealand”! Demographia reports on absolute food and housing poverty for too many Kiwis. Simon Collins reports on the ethnic inequality gaps & high rates of Maori imprisonment.

Parata replaces Collins and Adams as National’s weakest link

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 9:20 am, March 20th, 2014 - 57 comments

This week Hekia Parata has achieved what I thought was impossible. She has shown even worse judgment than Judith Collins and is threatening to replace Collins as National’s minister who is most in trouble. Hekia’s days as a Minister must be numbered …

What use is oil extraction here?

Written By: lprent - Date published: 9:10 am, March 20th, 2014 - 26 comments

One of the more irritating traits of National politicians is their bone-headed and short-term obsession about being rentiers selling raw and lightly processed raw materials offshore. Sure it is great in the short-term for the seller of the rights to those raw materials, but it does little to nothing for the other 4+ million people […]

Out of the Loop

Written By: geoff - Date published: 9:49 pm, March 17th, 2014 - 155 comments

As I’ve previously pointed out, John Key’s National government only serves the privileged elite.

But their policy of only favouring the favoured few is not only venal, it’s really stupid economics as well.

Hekia Parata wants to punish poor schools

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 9:43 am, March 17th, 2014 - 46 comments

Yesterday Hekia Parata floated the idea that funding of schools should be based on measuring the periodic change in academic standards. This is a retrograde proposal which almost inevitably would penalise poor schools and worsen educational standards for many. Today she has been trying to dampen down the idea and has emphasised that it will not be considered until after the next election. A better reason to vote this Government out I cannot imagine.

The Genesis share float – or is that share sink?

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 10:03 am, March 14th, 2014 - 24 comments

The Government is continuing with the Genesis share float. Shares with an anticipated yield of 15% are being sold to pay off debt on which interest at 5% is being charged. What sort of economic lunacy is this?

Scandals

Written By: Bunji - Date published: 9:31 am, March 13th, 2014 - 8 comments

Just a wee list to try and keep track of the current scandals our dear friends in the National party are dealing with.

Amy Adams has some explaining to do

Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 12:12 pm, March 12th, 2014 - 33 comments

Amy Adams is now facing questions of conflict of interest after details have been published that land and company shares she owns may increase in value because of the proposed Canterbury Irrigation Scheme.

ImperatorFish: John Key explains to the media

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 8:41 am, March 12th, 2014 - 4 comments

[satire] Let me explain. There has been no breach of Cabinet rules. This has been confirmed by the Cabinet Office. Not the real Cabinet Office, but the one that exists in the deepest recesses of my imagination. That particular Cabinet Office always gives me the advice I want to hear, and the one thing I’ve learned from all my years in this place is to always listen to the voices in my head.

Polity: “Promoting” vs “endorsing”

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 8:22 am, March 12th, 2014 - 16 comments

The Orivida mess smells worse by the day for National. Yesterday, it turned out the Cabinet Office’s advice clearing Judith Collins of any wrongdoing had failed to even look at the most important piece of the evidence – the Chinese text of Orivida’s website. It had to rush out new advice to cover that off, which Key still won’t release. That is why today John Key will spend much of question time dancing on the head of a pin…

National – pissing debt against a wall.

Written By: lprent - Date published: 3:41 pm, March 11th, 2014 - 77 comments

The deficit was $637 million dollars bigger than expected. In fact it was more than double the expected size. Why? Well mostly because of much smaller tax revenues than previously estimated. So much for the mythic recovery that National’s spinners have been pushing over xmas. We just finished paying off the mountain of debt that National gave me back in the 1970’s and early 80s. Now the shifty party of crony business morons are trying to do it to another generation.

Polity: Why announce the election date this week?

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 2:30 pm, March 11th, 2014 - 18 comments

Rob Salmond at Polity has a look at why National surprisingly announced the election date yesterday. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that it was a deflection from something. Rob thinks that National was worried about where a look at donations to National’s campaign would lead. He may be right, as in the past National has had some legally and morally dubious donation regimes

Beltway blues: serving the public interest?

Written By: karol - Date published: 12:00 pm, March 10th, 2014 - 32 comments

Gower’s one-dimensional, distorted, gotcha reporting, highlights the failings of TV3 news & The Nation. Corin Dann and Qu &A are less one-dimensional, but speak within the B-Hive-Media Loop, that speaks for the comfortable middle & Business classes, & manufactured a “problem” week for Cunliffe.