When National bent over backwards for Peter Jackson by handing over millions in corporate welfare to Hollywood and changed our employment law, Labour screamed it was ‘crony capitalism’.
Thank the little baby Jesus that it’s summer and everyone is too focused on littering tourists to notice Labour’s grotesque hypocrisy…
PM Jacinda Ardern canned film subsidy curbs after meeting Peter Jackson
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and economic development minister David Parker met film heavyweight Sir Peter Jackson three weeks before the pair were involved in a decision to reject official advice recommending surging taxpayer support for the sector be curbed.In written statements both Parker and Ardern this week said their decision wasn’t informed by lobbying from Jackson.
“I had already formed the view,” Parker said.
“The decision wasn’t based on that [meeting], but rather my long-standing support” for film subsidies, said Ardern, who was involved in the decision as minister for arts.
…with David Parker frantically cutting deals to keep the LOTR TV series being filmed here and National too disorganised to manufacture the issue into a crisis the way they did first time around, Labour have been able to quietly get away with this with no one noticing, but moves to repeal the Hobbit law could reignite the issue again.
Parker will want to finalise the LOTR TV deal before that and keep Jackson on side with his huge uncapped subsides.
Sure we have a homeless problem and housing crisis and increasing inequality and severe poverty, but we get to subsidise mediocre films so, yay!
Did they ask for his autograph when they met him?
Yes, hugely disappointed – but no longer surprised – if Ardern is going the John Key way and licking the muddy boots of Hollywood which clean themselves by kicking NZ workers.
I was dismayed at Jackson’s involvement with the Gallipoli exhibition. I thought this fancy-camera-tricks chap lacks the stature and the gravitas to be let loose on what – for want of a better word- is a sacred part of our history. A terrible part of our history, and after the employment law changes in which Jackson played a part, I don’t know if he cares about Kiwis except insofar as they enable him to make money or to display himself.
Labour may not know – or may not care – that the ‘independent contractor ‘ status inflicted on film workers is widely known of, and well noted, amongst their once-traditional support base.
Is it possible that the government will receive more back in taxation than they will pay in subsidies? If so the subsidies may be justified, particularly if there is a risk that the movies will not be made here if they are not subsidized.
The film subsidies are a return of a percentage of monies spent within NZ. This ensures billions of dollars do flow in and get spent here that would otherwise go somewhere else. This really isn’t hard to understand so why the constant hatchet jobs, particularly from The Herald.
Oh heavens! How much more of LOTR can one country take? Enough already.
Jackson is no Speilberg, Scorcese or even a Cameron..
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