Open Mike 21/08/25
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6:00 am, August 21st, 2025 - 43 comments
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Today's Posts (updated through the day):
No mandate for this
New Post up:
No mandate for this
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360797992/last-week-erica-stanford-decision-was-branded-white-supremacy-really
Well I truly think we have the most racist government in my life time, it's probably unfair to tar Stanford with that brush
I glanced at that article. Honestly, what is wrong with men of his age? Anyone who allows themselves to be photographed in such an execrable jacket whilst affecting jeans and a untucked shirt (bet he is also wearing sneakers more suitable for a man half his age) is displaying such questionable fashion judgement that one is forced to dismiss him entirely as a source any sort of reliable opinion on any matter whatsoever.
I hope this is in jest?
As an "older man" who long gave up fashion for comfort.
Anyone who thinks appearance gives any clue to someone's judgement has seriously suspect judgement themselves.
It is Ian Taylors words that give him away, not his clothing.
One of the advantages of getting older, is that I may never have to wear that ridiculous ensemble, a suit and tie, ever again.
I regard "fashion victims" with derision and amusement.
I do draw the line however, at PJ's in public!
BTW. My son just brought me, bright blue sneakers!
That jacket is exrcecable tho'..
Is he colourblind? LOL.
It looks like something you would buy at (the late/lamented) geoffs emporium..
…for a disco-dress-up-nite…
It proves that wealth does not ensure good taste…
Tho' it does go with his political views ..both tacky… IMHO…
As a man of old white fart of questionable fashion sense,I’ll have to counter that with occasional even we are right, possibly in more ways than 1
Kj never say never, I’ve got to socks and sandals in winter to go to the shop, stage although my sleeping tire would get me arrested
Its Timberlands for me.
@sanctuary,
What have you got against sneakers..?
Brown animal skin lace-ups for you..?
Since I decided some decades ago to stop the primitive practice of wearing dried animal bits on my body…Chuck Taylor has been my friend.
Current iteration black high-tops…
Low cut hiking boots (when walking about), sprint shoes in the gym (or to the pool) or sandals myself.
The Ian Taylor look is known as the “effortless effacing one”, or the Mike Hosking (not necessarily with turmeric tea, or a portable electric vacuum cleaner)
It is adopted by those with a high sense of self worth, one of the gentleman class. Nothing to prove, thus the don't need to wear a suit look.
efface
/ɪˈfeɪs/
verb
gerund or present participle: effacing
while having a public reputation, standing in society.
David Seymour, like a stopped clock, sometimes gets things right.
Mandatory bike helmets may be doing more harm than good.
But as usual Seymour cannot be logically consistent, and also advocate for other measures that increase bike safety. Such as more cycle lanes, jail for motorists that hit cyclists, encouragement of cycling and removing automatic motor vehicle priority over other road users.
Individual rights and personal responsibility, unless you're poor, in which case we're going to micromanage your lives. Seymour would no doubt ban bikes (and all other forms of transport) for the poor, declaring them luxury items.
How are bike helmets doing more harm than good?
RNZ did an interview this week with the head of Bike Auckland proposing that it would be far safer to have fully separated bike lanes than compulsory helmets.
I will admit to having funded and helped construct our most expensive fully separated cycleway, the New Lynn-to-SH16 line. Pleasure was all mine Auckland Ratepayer. So just in that lens there's a logic.
If you were going to spend that kind of money you will certainly have fewer accidents from cyclists. However as soon as you get on the SH16 main cycleway into town you are in such a high volume of cyclists with a fairly high commuting speed, you would do well to have the best helmet money can buy because if you crash you are going to hit at about 25-30km/h.
Ancodote:
I came off my bike a few weeks ago riding down Maungarei. About 4 years ago removable judder bars were installed on the mountain road. I assume this was to slow/eliminate bikes to increase pedestrian safety, but it has increased risk for cyclists at the same time.
Trying to negotiate these obstacles is dangerous particularly at the edges of the road which is often unstable and falling away and unmaintained.
Came off and hit the road on my right shoulder and head. Can't afford time off work and/or ACC so self-assessed the shoulder and it's mostly come right.
But if I had no helmet I would either be in hospital or dead. Not a car in sight.
Once out cycling I was getting ready to avoid some walkers & my back tyre just spun out sideways & suddenly I was facing the other direction & was thrown off my bike & slammed the back of my head on the road. Within seconds.
Thankfully i had my helmet on & buckled up (coz I used to not buckle it up all the time). If I had no helmet on at worst death or injury & at best a wicked headache. Since then I've always worn my helmet.
I've never seen or heard of anyone being fined or whatever for not wearing a helmet, I just wonder if Seymour truly just hates kids.
And the pedestrian you could hit at that speed would not be happy either – with or without a helmet. When the Kingsland part of the North West cycleway was first put in alongside the Motorway, the only protection for pedestrians was a painted line down the middle of the pathway. We used to walk that way regularly, I walked to work that way, we walked home after socialising in the K Rd area and we walked to Nixon Park and sometimes through to Western Springs.
However, it rapidly became unsafe for pedestrians as the volume and velocity of cyclists expanded. The walking school bus stopped using it. We stopped using it, as did many of our neighbours. Council put up a few signs about "share with care" and "use your bell" but these were very speedily vandalised and/or removed.
Fortunately, local pressure resulted in major improvements just after Covid. There is now full separation over most of that part of the route – a paved area for cyclists and a boardwalk for pedestrians.
We have used shared pedestrian and cycle paths in Europe but the ethos is quite different. Cyclists use their bells when approaching pedestrians, who can then move to the side to let them through. Friendly greetings and thanks are exchanged and everybody is safe and respected.
One of the many things we love about Vancouver is the fully separated pedestrian and cycle spaces. Where there are crossing points, there are clearly marked pedestrian priorities which are very much observed so there must be enforcement.
Cycleways are great – cyclists and cars do not mix well but neither do cyclists and pedestrians.
It's not either/or, you know.
This opinion (good comments) provides some background. I gave up cycling in favour of walking about 20 years ago, but not everyone can afford such a ‘time luxury’.
“why isn’t he doing everything in his power to give people a meaningful choice to have the freedom to ride a bike for transport?”
Because there's only certain types of freedom that Dave really likes. In this case, he prioritises the freedom of Auckland ratepayers to not have to part with some of 'their' money to build cycle lanes. For 'libertarians' like Dave, freedom must always work to protect private property. They don't really accept that public goods like cycle lanes or hospitals create freedoms at all. They see them as the violation of freedom – the confiscation of private property through taxes.
In the end, Dave's idea of freedom is a niggardly concept. It's just the freedom to compete against everyone else in the market and then hang onto whatever you can scrape together out of that vicious scramble. No more than that – less a utopia than a sh*t hole.
The issue isn’t helmets per se, it’s the narrative they create.
When policy and public messaging frame safety as an individual responsibility (“just wear a helmet”), it takes pressure off governments to invest in proper cycling infrastructure that actually prevents accidents.
At the same time, helmets can create a false sense of security for both riders and drivers. Drivers tend to be less cautious around helmeted cyclists, and urban planning deprioritises protected bike lanes because “helmets make it safe.”
The result? Fewer resources for infrastructure, worse safety outcomes, and ultimately, fewer people cycling.
It’s a classic case of good intentions producing bad systems.
"helmets can create a false sense of security for both riders "
Don't know a single cyclist, including myself who would take more risk cause they have a helmet on. Also having had to manage a brain damaged staff member back to work after she got hit by a car, but didn't have her helmet done up, resulting in the secondary impact of a bare head hitting the asphalt, I'm acutely aware of how even not a hard impact can cause considerable damage.
Others I know who have come off with no helmet have no chance of living a normal life again – nor their families.
Mandatory is fine.
It has been very noticeable at my work and overall casualty rates.
The sense of invulnerability people have when wearing PPE.
Until I demonstrate that a hard hat is next to useless, when you drop a twistlock on it from 3 metres up.
One of many.
2311_Helmets_Appendix B (2).pdf
Paraphrasing. The health effects of even a small reduction in cycle use, on a population basis, with a helmet law, far outweighs the effects of head injuries saved by wearing helmets".
Those mathematical calculations fail to take into account real-world consequences for individuals.
If compulsory helmets discourage some people from cycling, more people are more obese and less fit than they would have been otherwise. At a population level, that will come with a health cost, yes. However, for the individuals involved there's little impact on their lives.
The same's not true for the costs of not wearing a helmet. If you smack your head on the road because some incompetent NZ driver who can't grasp the idea of sharing the road failed to give way to you, that's quite possibly going to be immediately and permanently life-changing. The costs are not genuinely equivalent.
Heart attacks, diabetes, COPD, shortened lifespans, early aging, dementia.
These are "effects" on an individual, are they not?
It isn't the case, but suppose it were the case that an individual might suffer a heart attack or get diabetes solely because they avoided riding a bike. In that case, just how much of a truculent, self-harming lunatic would that individual have to be to reject riding a bike just because it involved wearing a helmet?
This!
Is why we don't get "evidence based policy.
So far, presented with an example of evidence, we get personal opinions and anecdote in reply.
I get the dislike of anything advocated by Seymour. But ideas shouldn't be dismissed simply because of the origin.
It doesn't look good for the left when Seymour presents evidence for his stance and the left can only come up with "reckons". It is what we, mostly correctly, castigate the right wing for.
After many years being responsible for industrial safety I’ve found the simple answer is rarely the right one.
As far as helmets go the arguments for or against ignore the underlying systematic causes of bike accidents.
I thought exactly that. So I looked up the research and was flabbergasted. Have a look yourself. There seems to be little to be said in favour of helmets.
No, you claim to have looked up the research, so show it. Don't make me do it.
Mandatory till the age 0f 18 then
Paul Conway of the RBNZ sends a very clear message to Nicola Willis, get back in your box:
https://archive.is/9DxkP#selection-4809.0-4825.147
Ironically, the RBNZ used to have a wider remit to consider aspects of the economy other than just price stability, but Willis scrapped it…
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/504643/reserve-bank-dual-mandate-repeal-passes-through-parliament
I would bet a Luxon fortune on the fact that he was NOT invited to the Ukraine call or even told to piss off. His compulsive inability to not be able to tell the truth led to the ridiculous “relentlessly focused 2 Hours sleep a night man” to concoct the story of being too busy . Bullshit, you’re not wanted by them or us.
Willis has returned to literally begging households and employers to ignore reality and their own forecasts, to take enormous risks in order to save her re-election chances.
She's also returned to sticking the boot into ordinary Kiwis who are under ecomonic strain as a result of her policies. Let’s see how that goes:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360798015/ignore-merchants-misery-things-are-going-get-better-willis-says
Meanwhile Carter Holt Harvey are closing their Eves Valley sawmill near Nelson. Those 142 families affected will not be getting out and spending to help Willis out!
Meanwhile we made a purchase with Kitchen Things on Monday and have just lost our deposit as they went into receivership yesterday. We tried Nicola!!!
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/570602/planned-closure-of-eves-valley-sawmill-would-affect-142-jobs-mayor-says
Yep, and Spark fired 1300 workers in the last year alone and still managed a 33.6% drop in profit on the back of their suffering:
https://archive.is/yz7cb#selection-4923.0-4923.211
Those households can also thank Nicola Willis for their situation.
to save her re-election chances.
She cannot be re-elected since she has never been elected in the first place: she is a list MP. She probably will not be elected in 2026, because of boundary changes: Ohariu is becoming part of the new Kenepuru electorate, which takes in Porirua.
That big re-zoning proposal across Auckland is one massive development signal for intensive development around rail and bus nodes.
15 years after the Council amalgamation, finally a proper direction that is good for intensification and public transport use.
Sure hope Auckland Council stops fighting Government on this and gets it done.
This was a very informative interview on RNZ's Morning Report today, about the building industry crisis.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2019000828/tough-market-conditions-makes-life-hard-for-builders
Substruct builder and managing director Steve Brown spoke to Ingrid Hipkiss. He commented that in his more than 30 years experience in construction, it has never been this bad. He works in residential renovation. 18 months to 2 years ago he had 8 to 10 staff and now has 3 to 4 staff.
"What's going to be the next price hike and where….You go back five years ago, you never would have imagined what we pay for groceries now. What's going to be the next thing?…This is probably the worst I've ever seen it…".
A couple of years ago there was constant demand for building/renovation work, but the situation now is dire.
https://www.1news.co.nz/2025/07/17/apprentices-dropped-as-builders-struggle-with-downturn/
"17 Jul 2025 — More than 60% of builders surveyed say it's harder to keep their job lists full compared to a year ago.
Two-thirds of builders are struggling with lower demand as the construction sector faces widespread job losses and new concerns about coming workforce shortages.
A new survey reveals project cancellations now impact more than a third of businesses, while over 60% say it's harder to keep their job lists full compared to a year ago.
NZ Certified Builders' Michael Bottrill said he had "certainly heard of some poor chaps having to shut up shop" with a lot of businesses "coming close".
"Certainly [I've] heard of apprentices being let go … it's fair to say that's because of a lack of work," he said.
Electrical apprenticeship rates were now at their lowest since 2011, and concerns were growing that the workforce wouldn't be able to meet the demand when the industry did bounce back…".
It seems the Government has deliberated added to the severity of the crisis, by cutting apprenticeships and training programmes.
https://waateanews.com/2025/05/27/government-cuts-will-see-apprentice-numbers-fall-further/#
Shannan Halbert May 27, 2025
"The National government’s decision to cut $20 million towards Māori Trades Training in the budget will mean a further drop in apprentice numbers that we desperately need.
In 2024, apprentice numbers declined by a further 11.8%. That’s more than 8,500 apprentices that will not be working here, on top of those that have already left for Australia. This cut only makes this shortage worse, despite national unemployment being at 5.1%…".
Nicola Willis' evident glee and pride in her performance as Minister of Finance is inexplicable.
But "We're saving so much money!"
The NAct1 CoC is government by the sorted, for the sorted – they do not care.