I know what you are going to say.
I know what you are going to say.
“Fuck Judith’s crocodile tears, she has been more than happy to race bait over Maori, tub thump the tough on crime bullshit and has shown the kind of ethics that your average drug cartel would be embarrassed by.”
Sure, all true.
H-O-W-E-V-E-R
I don’t think Judith was playing politics, I think that was a rare moment of honesty. The Small Business Auckland electorate she represents are freaking the fuck out and classifying their fear as racist by the Woke and the wider Left would be as politically damaging as Hillary calling all Trump supporters ‘deplorable’.
These smal business owners have done all they have been asked, they have double vaxxed up the ying yang, have called for faster tests and are begging for vaccination passports.
They’ve done what has been called of them and yet they still face total ruin over the next few months.
The increase in funds to help business by the Government is an acknowledgment of that pain, but it needs to go further.
The truth is these small business owners are people who for the first time in their lives feel economically vulnerable. They have haemorrhaged cash because of the lockdown and are on the verge of collapse. They are ripe for radicalization.
To mock Judith’s articulation of their pain is to mock them.
Now, I don’t think for one second Judith has any alternative better than the one outlined. All she is promising to do is kill more people than Labour will by opening earlier and to do it with far less competence.
So the solutions to the pain she is articulating are bullshit, but her articulation of the pain is legitimate.
Small Business is really hurting and their pain needs to be respected if we want the same compassion for workers, beneficiaries and the poor.
Kindness means being kind to those you dislike immensely, that’s why kindness isn’t for wimps.
We are all in this together.
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Judith actually is starting to look more sincere than our faux empathy queen
Rubbish. The easiest thing to do would be throw the doors open of businesses. And life would seem good for a while. But when cases skyrocket and hospitals fill up, are you going to put your hand up and say you were wrong and we should have stayed locked down until we hit 90%? Or are you just going to blame the government. Look at today’s Herald. Singapore has 85% fully vaccinated population. They opened up. They had 18 deaths Wednesday – their highest single daily covid death toll. Their population is of a similar size to ours. They reintroduced restrictions where employees worked from home, and social gatherings of only 2 people were allowed (sound familiar, Auckland?). Who’s actually showing the most empathy? Jacinda or Judith? I know who I will pick.
Absolutely spot on Brad. Sucked in badly Martyn by that old crocodile Judith Collins. There is raging pandemic and our behaviour needs to change as it is evolving rapidly and could get much much worse. The government was doing so great for NZ until the bubble opened to Oz, under the same kind of pressure to open Auckland now. So stupid, so shortsighted.
Well you should go to Specsavers then.
Judith’s tears look insincere when you remember it was she and her supporters who howled for the trans-Tasman bubble which is how we got into this particular predicament.
Had National been in govt. last year, it’s debateable whether those same small businesses would have survived the first round of Covid-19. Doing business in the covid environment would have been dicey even without getting sick themselves. Their customer numbers would have dropped considerably even if they themselves had not sickened and died.
If you supported and/or used the trans-Tasman bubble then you were part of the problem.
Instead of always looking to blame someone else, how about accepting your own part in causing the problem.
Spot on joybell.
The Trans-Tasman bubble was doomed to fail. I was against it when it was being mooted.
It was a knee-jerk reaction to the Nat’s pressure to open up, the tourist industry, and entitled tourists who were desperate to be allowed to travel overseas. Why do they have to go overseas? 3.5m tourists came here each year because it’s an ace place to visit.
Support your own tourism industry; don’t import your tourism.
Yes, if the Nats had had control over our Covid response, we would be way over 28 deaths, and the few thousand business deaths.
Well said joybell.
The virus does not play a business model. Those that think business will return to the old normal ehen we open-up haven’t been watching what is happening overseas.
Hear, hear! Joybell
I can just see it now, Judith crying in the Chapel.
If we had opened up fully these small businesses would still be in trouble because people would be afraid to go out . Its about time that instead of tears JC and DS and the Maori party come out and actually support the people that are doing the hard yards, ie. MIQ, the ministry of health workers including the testers, the trackers, the vaccinators the lab workers, the police , the armed forces, the doctors, nurses ,allied health workers . Its about time they were seen supporting these people and supporting the people of all NZ to do the right thing. We are on the edge of a precipice and NZ needs all the help it can get.
For those that missed it here is a link to the talk by JC that Martyn is referring to:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-delta-outbreak-tearful-national-party-leader-judith-collins-heartbroken-for-auckland-businesses/XV4GGEORABZIRNBBKEV26CKHIE/
No. Not going to say or think anything at all about Collins. She’s not worth it.
Does Martyn’s last paragraph apply to you SW.
Absolutely.
As I said previously the stand up of her political career. The best part was the head kick to tone deaf Wellington Jacinda fangirl Jenny Lynch.
The building problem for the left is the smug treatment of Auckland from the Wellington elite. They are treating us up here as ‘beyond the wall’ therefore our views as not important savage speak. Unbelievably right now they are working out between themselves whether the treaty was breached with this plan – talk about the Titanic’s band playing on!
Without Auckland economically the rest of the country is fucked. Its like a 3year old repeatedly punching a pitbull. At some stage the pitbull will bite back and it won’t be pretty. If we had a mayor with a backbone I believe you would have already had the response by now.
The PM’s traffic light plan is something that you would have seen out of Blackadder goes forth and there is a narcissistic element to it. A smug I’m going to have the best vaccination rates in the OECD snigger without realistically evaluating whether it will work or not.
There should be a lesson in what happened to Alec Baldwin yesterday. Karma hunts out and deals with smug most of the time.
OMG! I agree with you Frank! All of it ! what you just said. Phew! well now that I’m over that if any of my offspring hadn’t worked out by the time they were 3 years not to punch ANY dog not even a cattle dog I would have relegated them to the care of IHC at the earliest possible convenience. They knew from very young that pit bulls were the same as possums ….vermin! You shoot them or poison them then feed them to the pigs and the composter. Such idyllic rural dreams of real lives lived daily in NZ are beyond the IQ level of our ruling elite let alone their impoverished life experiences. i.e. we all know they haven’t got a clue BUT they do care ….about their careers.
Phil Goffs MIA in all this tells you it’s all about politics. He certainly isn’t doing any heavy lifting for his city, but toeing the party line. Fucken weak as cats piss. Imagine if Auckland actually had a mayor that cared about their city?
Who would that be then Bg?
“There should be a lesson in what happened to Alec Baldwin yesterday. Karma hunts out and deals with smug most of the time.”
Given that appalling comment Frankie, that must means, yours will be coming soon.
Are the landlords and the Banks in this as well (and Councils) ,or is it all on the tax payer to support all those who despise paying their taxes? If we are all in this together it would be great to see the hardened Capitalists give some leeway for a pandemic.
Like Martyn you also really need to get out and take a good look at the reality small business is facing.
If it was not for our landlord dropping the rent 50% during lockdowns, which they did without any prompting, me and 9 others would be unemployed today.
On the other hand the Govt assistance was so insignificant we said fuck it so didn’t bother with it and slide back to work to get shit done. Sure we were told not too but it’s hard to listen to talking muppets all pulling mega bucks and not suffering in the slightest while they run around looking like headless chooks changing the goal posts every 2 days. Our landlord knows we were back in there but they still dropped the rent as they have been there and one that, unlike the headless chooks who haven’t.
Okay so lets just all go out and do whatever the fuck we like right?
Awesome!
Lockdowns have got nothing to do with ‘Maori’ as Collins asserts, this tyranny belongs to Ardern and her white knights alone. It’s funny how the narrative can swing from saving the indigenous population to blaming them for all of life’s ills. I guess that is what you get from a leader and party on life support.
Bahahahaha life support bahahahaha!
Funny…?
Auckland’s sinking like a stone yet our economy overall’s doing very well so I read…? How is that, do you think?
Are we exporting tourists? Are we selling off the spare babies born of the Auckland riche ?
The 1980’s saw a rapacious greed unleashed upon what were once our state owned assets. Then? We were sold to foreign banks like slaves. Exactly like slaves, in fact. I remember seeing our primary industry fourth generation farming families literally dragged of their family farms by cops acting for new owners after mortgagee sale after mortgagee sale as don brash ratcheted up the OCR. The retail interest rates on mortgages soared to 22% at one time. It was a land grab.
And now? That fucking hideous collins is wringing a tear from her dead eyes and suckers are falling for it?
Yanks worth hundreds of billions can buy AO/NZ citizenship with chump change while a sick and diseased AO/NZ society rots under our feet.
Just wait until the banksters start ratcheting up the retail cost of borrowing?
If riche yanks want to come here they must forfeit 99.9% of their cash wealth into AO/NZ’s new socialist democracy. That’d be a start and the irony would be delightful.
By borrowing a billion dollars a week to cover the shortfall, that’s how! And I can’t help wonder if it’s even more than that.
It would be interesting to take $45mil of the $940mil per fortnight allocated to assist Aucklanders while locked down and offer $1500 per jab to the first 30k that go through the doors. Sure to reach that 90% fully vaxxed then…
Some get a lovely cash top up to spend on Xmas presents and food, and we reduce the eye watering debt that is apparently needed by close to 4 weeks. Businesses go back with a bit more freedom for Xmas trading, and we avoid the Great Uselessnessing that is seeping into the New Zealand psyche. Win/win!
It’s nice to assume all people are altruistic and will do the jab Mahi for the benefit of their fellow citizen.
They aren’t and a certain percentage must be bribed (I mean incentivised) to comply as MB put in his post a few weeks back.
Eerily it does sounds like what a former PM suggested after calling us a smug hermit kingdom tho, so the plan won’t ever see the light of day
I heard an economist explain the good economy like this. Imaging Bunnings closed their store then gave all the staff a $1000 dollar gift from a pool of money they had borrowed then told them to spend it at another Bunnings the result would look great for Bunnings for a short while until they had to find the money to pay back the loan plus interest.
Like +100%
Well articulated Martyn.
I was thinking about the 90% double jab target that the govt has set. That is going to be effing hard to reach in some of regional dhbs. I was chewing over whether it would be better to lower the 2nd dose target. Eg 90/80. So that in Auckland you could open up slightly earlier with vax cert restrictions. I wondered whether this would help crank up the vax numbers faster. It would allow businesses to open a couple of weeks earlier. As long as the border situation remains unchanged I can’t see how it increases risk much.
Businesses big and small feel pain regularly. But none worse than Aucklands current catatonic state that is never ending.
Businesses employ workers, workers lives and their families and futures are intrinsically linked to businesses. As is the greater economy. All stating the bloody obvious.
That is why still furiously trying to run a ellimination strategy for this country with a hybrid suppression model in the economies biggest component, Auckland, cannot possibly succeed. Jacinda does not want to accept that. Her head and most of her being is buried in the sand. It’s like trying to back up the Titanic after it hit the iceberg because of bad decisions made months ago.
Rather than the constant kicking the can down the road that our indecisive PM likes to do, this government are ultimately going to have to face facts, we are one country. Anything else will implode Aucklands economy and by virtue, New Zealand’s.
I do not think a number of Aucklands businesses can last another 6 weeks, let alone the Christmas retail season hoping the government realises the futility what they are doing.
You are delusional, perhaps a mixture of crocodile tears and emotion at imminent disposal.
Lockdowns have got nothing to do with ‘Maori’ as Collins asserts, this tyranny belongs to Ardern and her white knights alone. It’s funny how the narrative can swing from saving the indigenous population to blaming them for all of life’s ills. I guess that is what you get from a leader and party on life support.
Well said Marytn. The courts now need to reflect in punishments handed out to rule breakers the harm they are inflicting on us all, financially and emotionally.
Waiting with bated breath when the gangs members who have broken border restrictions plus covid assembly rules at Tangi’s, will be hauled before the courts. Should be fun.
Somehow think that Ardern and Coster will find that getting gang members charged and prosecuted will be in the too hard basket.
Low hanging fruit consisting of a couple of lawyers going to Wanaka or Tamaki having a picnic in the park is easy. Who will put on the big boys pants and tackle the rule flaunting gang members?
Gerritt, Tamaki is a gang leader.
True that Peter,
Far less competence?
There hasn’t been a government with less competence in NZ since Muldoon.
The entirety of Government including Adern, Labour and the Greens are utterly incompetent without a single redeeming quality.
Jays, are you trying to convince us or yourself? I guess if you keep repeating it to yourself you will believe it – but most of us want substance to back-up such a broad statement.
Well said Martyn. Many on this forum can’t stand the word business. They most likely love a bit of retail therapy at times but the thought of anyone actually making a profit is appalling to them. As quoted by NH 9500 business’s closed in August and know doubt many more have since. Our domestic economic survival relies on the small businesses nation wide. Auckland has been hammered and any respite this government can give them will be gratefully received by them and us. For every business that closes another hole in the footpath will appear. Judith is un ashamedly for business. You might hate Nationals policies and might hate her, but don’t hate her for supporting business.
The people you are speaking for, new view, reject government involvement in business affairs and now, lo and behold, they have suddenly become the biggest proponents of socialism wanting/demanding handouts galore. Let’s just keep some balance. Many of the small ‘hospo’ businesses that were surviving precovid just won’t survive in a postcovid world. Same with many other businesses. We will not be going back to bau. All that is happening in this pandemic is new, and I am still so pleased that National was not in govt for it.
Let’s just keep some balance G. Those hand outs go to paying rent and maintaining their staff. Working class people.
It’s Socialism to the rescue! NV.
Nearly $100b worth of Socialist QE. What? You don’t want any of it?
The nett GDP, you know, minus the $100b of Socialist Bailout QE, is about -7% of GDP.
Other than the QE bailout, it would’ve been be called a market failure and Businesses would have failed.
Yah just can’t have it both ways. Someone has to pay the bill at some stage.
True garibaldi. It’s intersting how handouts to business are labelled ‘support packages’, whilst to the poor they are ‘welfare’.
As soon as the economy is back in action businesses will be back using tax lawyers and complaining about the intrusive IRD audits.
G. The business’s I’m speaking for , pay the wages of the workers in that business. Whether it be a coffee shop a retailer or panel beater whatever. Those jobs may not be important to you but they will be to those people. You say these businesses reject government involvement . Really. I think you’re generalising without any stats or proof. There are no handouts except to cover rent and wages. The reason the government is doing that is so thousands of workers can have a job to go back to.
Fair points New View. There is a huge range of differing circumstances and I stand guilty of generalisation, but I’m not on my own there! I guess my point is more about the volume of “poor me” from the business community is drowning out everyone else. Good luck out there, we’re in the shit.
NV, you have no understanding of how market forces work or capitalism. But anyway. Coffee shops are bottom-feeder employers and we don’t need so many!
The industry gets subsidised by the training scams of an industry for ‘Barista’s’. About $18k per person per course!
Most if not all industries are subsidised directly or indirectly when there are training institutions in place to clip the ticket as the old saying goes.
So I now know that you don’t have a clue about what you say you do.
The ‘Pale Nana’ has finally broken! She’s given up! She’s run out of ideas. Her PR team of a mental case femininazi and QC handbag carrier have failed her. Who didn’t see that coming?
But, hang in there Chrusha. You’ve got an election to lose!
Labour has handed it to you on a plate and you haven’t got the faintest idea of what to do!
Dead Man/Woman/He/She/Him/Her Walking!
You forgot They/Them hahaha brilliant!
Wish someone in the gallery had the guts to ask why the passport system isnt ready and when will it be.
Don’t be ridiculous. There is no point in having it ready until areas are 90% vaccinated. Waste of time and resources before then.
A passport isn’t going to protect you from Delta or any other derivative of Covid.
So are we going to need a new passport for every type of vaccine and covid derivative? Or just another entry in it? How long will these passports be valid for?
How much will it eventually cost? Who’ll have to pay for it and who’ll manage them?
Meanwhile, covid in all its variations will still infect the passport ‘carrier’.
Agree! Passports will just be set to marginalise groups, create an ‘us and them mentality’, and are simply a thin veil of a security blanket for those who like that kind of propaganda to lean on, because they are only as good as the last negative test. A lot of ‘antivaxers’ don’t like the pzifer Mrna vaccines, they can and do cause serious side effects in some and they don’t work for more than six months, and the evidence of the effectiveness of third shot is yet to come in… People want to wait for the ones that didn’t win the race, eg. Novavax…but in studies it looks to be a better protector, without the same side effects. Also, privacy issue. People seem willing to throw that out the window, but up until now it is generally accepted our medical records are a private matter, not for any Tom dick and Harry bizzo to be privy to. And that also creates a burden for the people working the business. Far better to develop a proof of negative test passport.
It seems a slightly cynical move to pass the vaccine target chase onto beleaguered (underfunded, understaffed, burnt out and disengaged) DHBs to coordinate and then hound their “populations” so as to hit the number.
Vaccine drives at the grassroots level under guidance of public health have been successful in the past, but the head of that organisation wasn’t even at the traffic light announcement…
I wonder who the buck will stop with…
I did think assuming the mantle of leadership for directing the covid response and all communications would stay with those who received a mandate to lead from us New Zealanders, but maybe it’s politically disadvantageous to be on that boat.
The DHB’s have been very well funded to do the vaccination drive so there is no excuse for them not to be able to hit their targets. All we hear are excuses about other vaccines , the answer is just get it done , stop making excuses . It makes me laugh that so many people know better than the real health professionals .
Yes, there is little point in putting the slipper into Mrs Collins yet again–she said herself “watch the eyebrows”, and now it seems, the tear ducts.
Regarding members of the NZ petit bourgeoisie however, hopefully this COVID public health emergency may have been educational. “Be your own boss”, “aspirational” vision, “self employed and proud”, “heartland service economy”, SMEs in hock to finance capital in the form of Australian Banks–all amounts to people on the edge taking a punt and believing in the dream.
While Martyn is not wrong in recommending letting these people of the hook gently–I have heard too many of them speak with venom of those displaced initially in the 80s and 90s by Roger and Ruth, and their descendants, as filthy bennies and bludgers to let this slide. The middle classes got a higher second tier COVID benefit which even allowed partners to be working–try that on a job seeker allowance!
So lets have a rebalancing–small business operators do not glow in the dark, or deserve eternal special pleading while working class are largely ignored, they are just like the rest of us and need to accept it.
TM. You don’t seem to get there is no working class without business of any size. Who do you think pays the working class. I’m not a business person.
An old canard that one.
All wealth is created by human labour, intellectual and physical, using the world’s natural resources. Plus in the capitalist era finance capital creates paper and now digital “wealth” in addition.
If all the worlds workers stayed home for a week, and performed no unpaid work also, the place would come to a grinding halt. If all the worlds CEOs an business owners stayed home for the same period few would notice.
TM. You go with what you believe. Yes the workers could carry on for a week or two. The truth is one can’t do without the other. Hate it or not.
Two words ‘essential workers’.
That’s not a law of nature. Businesses have only been in operation for a few thousand years compared to 400,000 years of human history. The claim that the working class can not survive without business is false.
Try it then. Ffs.
Business owners think that they are doing the world a favour by exploiting and profiteering from the efforts of their employees? We all know what they are and who they are in it for. Themselves.
There is no business without consumers. If I start a business selling a product nobody buys, it’s the customers fault right?
Bert my point to TM is that there is nothing without business. No economy no wages no nothing. Unless we want to go back to bartering for goods the working class or wage earners need a business to work for. If we were bartering many would perish simply because of their inability to produce something someone else would want. My suggestion to those who despise business is to look at where their wages or benefit comes from. Sure isn’t the Government. I’m not saying some business owners aren’t miserable shits because they are, but then some workers are lazy useless fucks. There’s good and bad no matter whose side you’re on.
New View – there is no business without a healthy social structure in place to sustain business. You have the cart before the horse.
Regardless of how healthy anything is, for those who don’t grow their own food life stops without the shops to buy it from. Then of course you need the money to buy it!!
And my point is it works both ways.
Bert. Which I have said in my last sentence.
Which was my point, not singling out one or the other.
You forget NV all our manufacturing jobs were gifted to cheap labour workers in China and Bangladesh. NZ workers weren’t considered by their money hungry business owners.
Then the Red Sheds opened nationwide selling more products from cheap overseas labour resulting in more unemployed NZ workers.
Now we have shipping companies charging exorbitant prices to cart these overseas products that we should be manufacturing here in NZ.
Thank goodness I know how to grow my own food, make my own clothes and don’t turn my nose up at 2nd hand goods, and more important know that my favourite instant coffee or teabag will make me a good cuppa whenever I want one.
Totally agree.
Putting the message to one side for a moment.
Clearly her advisors have told her to *try* to appear more human.
The good old “Fake it ’til ya make it” strategy!
Sorry Judith, but if you act like a sociopath, talk like a sociopath, and think like a sociopath……well.
Walking down my main street, lots of empty stores…this started happening 3 weeks ago.
No NK this started happening way back when the Red Sheds started popping up in all the main centres.
This is the Walmart Plan, set up a mega store with cheap prices, then when all the surrounding small businesses fold Walmart takes the cake.
Why do we buy all this “Stuff”.
True…But I noticed it 3 weeks ago.
I noticed it 3 weeks before you did!
I heard an economist explain the good economy like this. Imaging Bunnings closed their store then gave all the staff a $1000 dollar gift from a pool of money they had borrowed then told them to spend it at another Bunnings the result would look great for Bunnings for a short while until they had to find the money to pay back the loan plus interest.
Politics aside, small businesses that can’t trade via the internet must be really suffering big time. There must be a lot of worry and anxiety about their uncertain future. I feel for them. Small businesses make up a huge part of the economy and actually I think most small business owners work dam hard
You are starting to sound inspired
“Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;”
Judith as per usual is desperate for relevance. Her tears are about as authentic and contrived as her kneeling to pray in a church during the 2020 election campaign. No doubt her chief adviser Cameron Slater thought she would gain some traction. If Brian Tamaki can convince a % of people that he’s a decent person and earthquakes really are caused by homosexuality then perhaps Judith can still hoodwink a few to believe she cares more about other people than her own political ambitions.
” The answer is that National have never shown the slightest interest in being bi partisan. For as long as the threat has existed they have sought to attack the Government’s and the country’s effort. It was not enough and too much. The Government should have shut down harder and let more people in to the country quicker. Business restrictions should have been looser, there should have been travel bubbles everywhere. And there should have been lines in the sand and goals. It seemed that as the pandemic developed National’s lines in the sand changed ”
Mickey Savage
https://thestandard.org.nz/wont-someone-think-of-the-business-owners/
NZ would have been a Basket Case if National & ACT had been in power during this COVID outbreak over the past few years, even Labour have managed to F%ck U* the handling of this COVID by opening up the borders too quickly.
Judith is on a hiding to nothing Jacinda being a person of faces daily.
She makes Marcel Marceau look like an amateur.
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