You know it.
I know it.
We are all responsible for the Loafers Lodge Tragedy.
These are the people society has forgotten and contemptuously pushed away.
These are people who don’t qualify for State Housing and proper wrap around services because those services are expensive and we refuse point blank to tax the rich more money to pay for that infrastructure.
It is far cheaper to house them in a squalid block exempt from proper fire regulations because that would cost money and these peoples lives are not worth that investment are they?
We are all responsible for the Loafers Lodge Tragedy.
We refuse to take Golf courses back and build them into affordable and state housing hubs.
We refuse to build more State Houses preferring to kettle beneficiaries into unsafe motels.
We refuse to look at the IRD report that showed NZ Capitalism is rigged for the rich and Bernard Hickey tells us this has cost us $200billion in revenue!
DO NOT DARE PRETEND YOU ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CONSEQUENCES OF THAT FIRE!
There will be the performative art of grief expressed by Politicians and the humble thumbs up from community leaders for the outpouring of good will and how it brings out the best in us and thoughts and prayers and
and
and
and nothing will change until the next multiple death fire.
There are 14 Billionaires in NZ + 3118 ultra-high net worth individuals with over $50million, let’s start by taxing them, then move onto the Banks, then the Property Speculators, the Climate Change polluters and big industry!
Our collective denial over how our underfunded social infrastructure fed a tragedy like Loafers Lodge is beneath the mana of the moment.
Tax. The. Rich.
PS: Liam Hockings was a Facebook Comrade of mine. He deserved much better than this.
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We’re any of the victim’s politicians?
How many so far have had a photo shoot there?
Will anything change?
How many people there were dumped there by MSD for accommodation? How much were they indebted for, for that privilege?
How long will lame stream media milk this tragedy?
Tane. Yep, some really good photo shoots, about how diversity rules, and how courageous the firefighters are, and oh what a terrible disaster, from the privileged politicians who enable bad stuff to happen to other people.
Too bloody true.
We know who’s going to be blamed for this. Some poor bugger who fell asleep on a couch while having a smoke.
Was he a parolee with no family ties (at least that Corrections said were alright for him to live with) to go to? A crazy fella who should have been in a mental health facility, not confined 24 hours a day but with a bit of an eye on him? Or an older bloke with nowhere to go after the divorce?
Either way, that man bears far, far less responsibility than the we, the people responsible for this society that failed to provide real social housing and physical and mental health care, and the bastards who owned Loafers Lodge who were happy to kick out a guy who complained about flea infestation but wouldn’t have done a damned thing if one of their so-valued ‘customers’ complained about smoke alarms (which should have been wired and monitred) being disconnected.
+
Building warrant of fitness?
The interviews that I listened to tell me that the WCC will be sweating.
I suggest that all councils and other authorities go back and review their responsibilities in terms of the building act.
I will be surprised if many councils are compliant with the regulations that were in place in 2005-07. If these regulations are still in place…….
They will be and the guy that gave the WOF for loafers lodge I would not want to be in his shoes right now. Good luck to the council.
“These are the people society has forgotten and contemptuously pushed away.”
To the point that we have never pushed back against the neoliberal mentality that led to this, then sure, we are to blame….but this is just the tip of the iceberg.
We, the people are no longer, perhaps never have been, politically minded, hence why economic inequality is continuously rising, public services are perennially underfunded, and the very wealthiest among us, including the vehicles that helps create their wealth, are grossly under taxed.
It all starts with political engagement, that’s what places like this should be for, but forever barking more taxes on the rich instead of pushing back against the political system that has got us to where we are, is not the right type of political engagement in my book.
I know a tragedy should not be a wasted opportunity, but there is no way this happened because we aren’t taxing the rich enough. The individuals that allowed this building to operate as accommodation without fire alarms (a residential new or commercial build couldn’t do that) when at the cost of a few hundred dollars the owners could go to a hardware shop and purchase off the shelf fire alarms and maintain them (ie test and if necessary change the batteries when the clock change). At least the ones you can buy fairly cheaply would have alerted people to get out quicker although not as effective as sprinkler systems.
They had alarms and so far it looks like arson.
“… nothing will change until the next multiple death fire”…
You have described our situation very well – until this phrase.
But nothing will change even then, when we have the next multiple death fire – or similar!
We – the majority of us – are just too comfortable and smug in our own little world.
It won’t happen until, to use an ancient phrase, someone very brave, or foolish, “upends the money-changers tables in the temple”. Just interpret that for today in A/NZ….
And I doubt very much that will happen as we don’t have anyone brave – or foolish – enough to do it.
They are all just saying stuff endlessly, but total ‘do nothings’, the lot of them.
Last year, after the breakdown of a giant fire fighting ladder truck, FENZ assistant national commander and Wellington region manager Bruce Stubbs told RNZ: “There are no concerns for public safety.
When asked by Morning Report today if having this second truck at Loafers Lodge would have helped the rescue, Stubbs said: “I don’t know.”
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/490052/newtown-hostel-fire-firefighters-pretty-cut-up-they-couldn-t-rescue-more-people-as-second-ladder-truck-unavailable
Sounds like a really bright guy ?
Ngungukai I assume that you are being serious, and I agree. This is probably the only response which an intelligent responsible person could make in these circumstances.
Wrong. This terrible tragedy has to be laid at the feet of the Wellington City Council who inspected the death trap a short time beforehand, and decided that it passed muster. Every inch of their inspection criteria needs to be examined, and not by the monkeys from Wellington Zoo. The council is cute on the woke cosmetics, while tritely sidelining fresh water, and storm water, and costly crappy electricity, and potholes on unlit pavements and roadsides, so let them explain themselves about this night of horror.
Well said, Snow White.
100% Snow White. The first sane comment
The redponsibility is clear. Documented.
” Wrong. This terrible tragedy has to be laid at the feet of the Wellington City Council who inspected the death trap a short time beforehand, and decided that it passed muster. ”
YES agree.
But once again NO ONE WILL BE ACCOUNTABLE yet this is a serious loss of life.
Just watching the wankers from the beehive and parliament coming down for their photo op made me sick.
Then announcing their shock at how these people who died and should have been protected because they paid to live there that they had no idea these people were not entitled to protection and all of a sudden we need a review !!!!.
They , Hipkins , Luxon and the rest of the entitled are so detached and removed from real life that they have no comprehension of the inequality and sheer hell that so many of our people are subjected to until an event like this occurs.
The tragedy is that the servants and MP.s of the neo liberal economic order are so removed from the plight of so many because the ” market economy ” conditions them to be inhuman robots because neo liberalism if you are poor treats you as expendable and your life means nothing.
Well I say POOR LIVES MATTER regardless of ethnicity or skin colour and its time it stopped being an unofficial crime to be impoverished in this billionaires mega profit country.
The mayor of Wellington obviously only had platitudes but could not answer the question put to her ..how many more of these fire traps housing vulnerable people exist in Wellington ? she had no idea.
Mosa Chances are the data doesn’t exist per se, about these sort of building conversions in Wellington, there’s lots of them, going back for at least a couple of decades. With businesses deserting Wellington, they’ll continue.
A truly rotten thing about this tragedy, is that both the Prime Minister and the Wellington Mayor’s initial concern appeared to be the optics of the situation. Both immediately expounded about the diversity of Newtown. This was unnecessary. They were likely trying to sanitise a catastrophe which clearly impacted upon people with brown skins, various immigrants, the overtly poor, and old aged pensioners.
Trevor Mallard’s hosing the Parliamentary protestors shows what Labour politicians think of the voters, and National leader Luxon apparently going out of his way to commend Arden for the way her government behaved, is just as bad. Little kids slept in flimsy tents that cold Saturday night, with water coming from all directions, which Trevor Mallard joked about, and the so-called Minister for Children was nowhere to be seen.
Sheep may safely sleep, but have-nots cannot.
” A truly rotten thing about this tragedy, is that both the Prime Minister and the Wellington Mayor’s initial concern appeared to be the optics of the situation. Both immediately expounded about the diversity of Newtown. This was unnecessary. They were likely trying to sanitise a catastrophe which clearly impacted upon people with brown skins, various immigrants, the overtly poor, and old aged pensioners. ”
Rotten doesn’t begin to acknowledge the third world conditions for so many while privilege and exorbitant managerial salaries and perks insulate you from the horrors just one floor beneath your well numerated lifestyle.
What about Grenville tower in London was that not a similar circumstance to that tragedy here. I would have hoped something was learned from that that would have thought lessons here.
100% Snow White
Yes Snow White so true, but we should note that this council responsibility has been subcontracted to private companies – another failure of privatisation.
Peter Kelly. If it transpires that WCC contractors have been sub-optimal, then it should become an employment issue between them and the council, and I daresay the question of where ultimate responsibility lies, becomes a legal issue.
Every council in NZ better take note and review their procedures. WCC must be sweating.
Government assigned the responsibility to councils resulting in ratepayers having to fund this service. The fees are collected through insurance payments used to fund (underfund) NZ Fire services.
It is not fair to expect ratepayers to pick up the cost because that just means that government uses an indirect regressive tax to fund this service.
Bradbury is right that we should all accept responsibility. These services should be funded from progressive taxes to make up for shortfall in funding from insurance premiums.
They are big n fucking cycle lanes no one wants though.
light touch neo-lib legislation that let’s the dodgy business men thrive
@ MB you write: “Admit it! We are all responsible for Loafers Lodge Tragedy”
“These are the people society has forgotten and contemptuously pushed away.”
Like fuck we did and/or are. I for one loath neoliberals like the toxic substance they are and there’s hardly a day that goes by where I’m not here railing and ranting against their greedy, soulless tyranny but what’s perhaps more worrying is that [here] is the only voice I have within an corrupt and bias all bought and paid for MSM. rnz’s a goner as is The Listener and tvnz’s a laughable dinosaur lumbering towards the tar pits of irrelevancy.
Here are a few names to help us focus on the bastards who did this to us. roger douglas. david seymour. don brash. derek quigly. geoffrey palmer, mike moore. helen clark. jenny shipley. ruth richardson. jim bolger. pig muldoon. trevor de cleene. etc etc etc.
It’s on them. Not us. We don’t like watching powerless, at risk people die in a fire in a flop house.
But they do. Our cowardly, weak politicians who always seem to have their pink little hands out for more, more, more.
The Greed is Good mantra of neoliberal politicians must be bleached from our politics. We just have to figure out how to go about it. I reckon a royal commission of inquiry plus sending an emissary to our farmers to invite them to a big city barbi to unite with the cities our farmers fund to financially choke-hold the multi-billionaires the foreign owned banks into a hollow eyed wheedling few living in a trailer park. Yep. That’s irony.
Countryboy! I’ve missed you!!
The public never, once voted in favor of the neoliberal assault that the 4th national and labour governments inflicted on NZ.
Labour promised a fairer society in 84 and then went against everything in their manifesto.
National promised a return to a “decent society” and rolled out the mother of all budgets without campaigning on any of it.
Helen Clark promised a compassionate society, won three elections and was content to manage the downward spiral of NZ living standards.
Key promised a brighter future and campaigned to get raise up the “underclass” and sold assets and managed the downard spiral of NZ
Ardern promised a transformational government that ended poverty and homelessness and increased each on every metric.
We have never voted for NZ to be a worse place. We have never voted for deregulation or asset sales. We are the victims of it!
Once our living standards and wealth started filling behind Australia the experiment should have ended, instead this country double downed on it.
Our political class hates this country, that’s why our prime ministers skip country the second they leave office.
Helen Clark signing the worlds first free trade agreement with china was a mistake that has seen us overly dependent on an authoritarian power that will punish us if we say boo.
Bolger, Shipley, Clark, Key, English and Arderns refusal to regulate the housing market is criminal and if there is ever a collapse the majority of NZ wealth and property will be in the hands of Australian banks.
Noone in this country ever voted for the scumbag politicians to hoard new Zealanders in dangerous motels we voted for them to build houses for them.
The scum bag politicians hate new Zealanders, they think hoarding kiwis in motels and their new UK style tiny shoe box slum state houses is all we deserve and if we die , so what .
We are the victims of these bastards, who have lied to us, promised us the world and sold off our assets, our superannuation funds (hey piggy), refused to fund infrastructure, shipped our jobs overseas, deregulated our working conditions, sold our soul for milk powder, charged us for an education, inflicted a user pays society on our nation and instead of growing our economy the only answer they have is hyper unsustainable levels of immigration (and we are the only country to allow PR’s to vote!!) to drive wages down and house prices up.
Four decades of dismantling new Zealand is the blame of the politicians, we should hold them accountable, throw them in court (the ones who don’t skip country the second they leave office)
This isn’t on the kiwis, we are the victims of a political class who hate this country but tell us they love us.
Corey. Unfortunately, the ratfink PM’s do not all skip New Zealand, but hang around like bad smells, surfacing regularly in the sycophantic media, offering their opinions about issues where they themselves achieved SFA for the voters who they used, exploited, and did very well out of.
I expected Key to vamoose, but nobody else wanted him; Bill English is still the manipulative small town guy who hit the big smoke and thinks he deserves his knighthood; Clark schooled Ardern in being preachy preachy, and the latter is little more than a spinmeister.
I had dumped the Greens, but when James Shaw showed real anger about the terrible Adelaide Road fire, he was the first politician to have done so, and it did offer some hope that some of these odious bastards are human. Kia kaha.
What on earth does any of that mean? All is Lost but stay strong? You’ve always been a victim haven’t you DD.
Sam. Me ? The biggest virtue signaller south of Singapore a victim ? Never.
Let’s try this another way. Surely, one politician, James Shaw, just one, being angry about this horrendous fire, is better than no politicians being angry about it ? ( Rhetorical question. )
You’re not wrong but… are you organizing to put an end to neoliberalism in New Zealand?
When I say put an end to it… ultimately it should be regarded as what it is, high treason punishable by the most serious punishment, but for a start, we got to start organizing, before we can get rid of the scum in the parties that have constantly advocated neoliberal solutions to problems mainly created by neoliberalism.
I’ve taken part in some protests, I’ve donated, I’ve supported some parties with a day of leafletting. That isn’t enough. It’s time for us all to step it up to enact change (legally).
No WE are not.
WE have demanded that govt build houses, that is what WE elected these goons in suits for.
WE – he tangata have been up in arms to point out the danger that is unregulated Boarding House businesses for as long as I have lived in NZ which is now a few decades.
WE – he tangata have pointed out that emergency housing in Motels is dangerous due to the fact that people try to cook in their rooms, mentally ill unsupervised people in these rooms smoke, etc, and fwiw, fire have broken out in Emergency Motels in Rotorua and presumably elsewhere but they just did not make the news cause no one died. Phew……
WE the people that are volunteers/partners of volunteers have pointed out that the fleet of fire trucks is aging, that the volunteer model is suffering due to bad tenancy laws and unaffordable housing, and that if a big issue where to arise chances are you won’t have enough people and appliances to work the site.
In this case volunteers from everywhere were called to support the paid firefighters in Wellington.
WE the people, have demanded a regulated rental market and voted Labour for that.
We the people have demanded a regulated boarding house market and voted Labour for that.
We the people have demanded that state houses got build and voted Labour for that.
We the people are the ones getting killed in these incidents that arise because no regulations anywhere allowed this conversion to be completed without a sprinkler system (allegedly) and without fire retardant building materials (allegedly) and all that was signed of by a lefty council of a city run by lefty mayors since ages ago and most recently in March 2023.
Leave us people – WE out of this, cause WE are not responsible for this shit.
But Politian’s are, Labour Party MPs cause they are currently the government, National MPs cause they were the government before that, Labour Party MPs cause they came before that…rinse repeat. The great useless purple duopoly of NZ.
We are not responsible for anything else then trying to elect the least offensive shysters that are not worth the money they earn, that should be send packing, that should be publicly called out for not doing their jobs, and the media, that is pussyfooting around trying to not say a single thing that would upset anyone, cause this is Wellington with a lefty mayor and a lefty government and not Auckland with that ‘boomer’ mayor that no one likes.
We – he tangata are utterly and completely over these wankers in media, academia, politics who will never have to stay in such a legal firetrap because they can’t afford anything else.
WE need firetrucks, ambulances, people that are paid to staff these services, proper affordable housing to be build, emergency housing to be properly regulated to provide a safe space for people. And we – the people – needed that years ago.
WE – he tangata are the victims. It is he tangata – the people that does the dying in these unregulated unsafe places.
RB and a little reminder what previous governments have ignored. Tax cuts at the cost of unregulated buildings like this. One wonders who are the landlords, did we see them out on the pavement or are they swanning off in Hawaii or whatever ( maybe they don’t even live here shock horror). You talk about lefty politicians. I bet as we speak the righty politicians are keeping their fingers crossed it won’t happen again to them in their righty domains. You bet your bottom dollar the owners of these buildings who have absolutely no conscience are not lefties. The big question who actually owns this building.
I think the building owner died about 15 months or so ago. It will probably be his estate handling business matters.
The failure to provide affordable housing is bipartisan. Ditto for the tools and staff that we need for proper emergency service. Both Labour and National have failed us on that front for the longest time.
” he tangata … ” means ” nobody” .
I think you want , ” ngā tāngata katoa ” especially when you think you you’re speaking for others !
Thank you for that. I I took it from this He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata he tangata he tangata!
I looked up ‘nobody’ and the translation was: kahore he tangata
I thought ‘he tangata’translates to ‘it is people’
Thanks! On that subject: https://dailytelegraph.co.nz/art-and-entertainment/politically-homeless-nobody-someone-new-song-about-nz-election-2023-released/
The politicians are just a reflection of who we are RB. There is a very good chance NATACT will be voted in and you dam well know they won’t do anything about this. National are so far up the arse of landlord’s and property barons they are not going to introduce regulations to fix things like this situation or provide housing to those that can’t pay a pretty penny.
Yes I am totally behind this comment, the real problem is there are not enough of us to make the difference that could have been made.
BUT who are the owners lets expose them please.
I will be voting Te Pati Maori the only party that has quite rightly already demanded somethings which clearly show what matters in our society.
Well put together RB . We do not need a blame game here .Life is not fair and who ever is in charge Right or Left there will be people for a number of reasons are at the bottom of the heap and will need help which will never be enough ..The best we can do is to put rules in action that protect as many people as possible at the same time as not being so over the top thst places get closed down due to the economy of operation
You might be responsible, you are the one pretending that Labour & the Greens actually care about these people & issues, when all evidence points to the fact that they don’t.
Provide all evidence Helen.
Have you read any of the NZ newspapers .They spell out each day the lawless state of our country is in and the pain business people are in trying to find staff and the storis of poverty and homelessness the evidence is there for those that are not blinkered by their politican leaning
Lawless? The country hasn’t descended into some sort of mad max style post apocalyptic waste land. Perhaps you exaggerate.
I think NSC actually lives in Egypt, somewhere near de Nile.
So that would be a no then to hell n beck, no evidence.
Gun crime is up, armed robberies up & people shot at home or because of road rage, people stabbed to death in road rage incidents etc. Nah, everything is perfectly normal in little old New Zealand. Nothing to see, nothing to fear, we’re all happy & contented. The Government loves & cares for us.
Helen Beck Most people in New Zealand are safe from being harmed by others in their homes, and on the streets and byways. Most people are decent and law abiding; the actions of politicians and criminals are not representative of the majority.
to hell n beck a plethora on innuendo but no stats. I’ll give an example…
Gun crime is down, armed robberies down & people safe at home or because of road courtesy, people supported incidents etc. Yeah, everything is perfectly normal in little old New Zealand. Nothing to see, nothing to fear, we’re all happy & contented. The Government loves & cares for us.
prove me wrong ?
So your “politician” leaning, which is to the right reads the paper but doesn’t go past the negative. Lowest unemployment on record in our “lawless state”. Investment in 1600 more police in our “lawless” state.
What’s criminal is the underinvestment by the Nact government for 9 years where they froze police funding, infrastructure etc, etc, etc.
How much as the total number of active Police officers gone up by? Or has that total number actually gone down?
1600, please keep up.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/67840387/3-million-savings-from-closure-of-30-police-stations
FUCKING APPALLING.
NSC oh dear.
NSC you’ve done it again!!
Sad, but probably true.
Truly disgraceful. Allowing a bank office to be turned into an overcrowded vertical slum, and not even bothering to require sprinklers.
We were told after the fire at the Childers Palace Hotel that such a thing couldn’t happen any more.
You have to wonder how bad things will have to get before people finally become angry and hit the streets.
Obviously someone in the Wellington Council is going to get there arse kicked ???
No one at WCC will lose their job or be named.
They will get free counselling for stress and anxiety.
the next time ANYONE mentions onerous building regulations and wants to ditch them they should think on and luxton and his sidekick who hate life saving regulations had a fuckin cheek making a pr photo op.
Martyn what caused the fire?
Not taxing the Rich apparently.
Imagine taxing the rich appropriately, like the other 99 % of the population, this derelict building would not be required and all those residents would live in modern, affordable or warm dry social homes. Imagine if we taxed the rich appropriate to their income.
Really, or would you just have a gold plated cycle lane across Auckland Harbour?
We really could afford the harbour bridge cycle lanes if the rich paid their way.
Nobody knows but the only thing I heard is that it is suspicious.
doesn’t matter sprinklers would have saved people as would accesable fire escape routes.
Ok let’s get real here.
If some rich bastard lights a couch at the Hilton and causes a fire that kills people, then we’d call him a irresponsible rich cunt murderer.
If a poor bastard lights a couch at a hostel and causes a fire that kills people, then Martyn says we’re all guilty. You must be joking?
I can’t understand why sprinklers were not deemed applicable for this type of setting. And what happened to the smoke alarm s.
And yes , agree they should not be living there in the first place. Ghost House s that have not been used in 12 months by overseas owners should be used.
One of the main reasons these unfortunates are kettled together into multi-room, inner-city transitory lodging is because those run-down buildings are the only place where the government can house them.
NIMBYs in the suburbs fight tooth and nail against having smaller residences in converted houses pepper-potted into the ‘nicer’ suburbs closer to the CBD. Those smaller residences would lower the suburb’s amenity, and most importantly their property values.
Vote Labour for real change.
Haven’t they been the Government for over 5 years now, with over 2 years with an absolute majority?
Vote for labour and continuity.
Wet behind the ears IMHO ????
However there are non-compliance issues at play here ???
I think you will find that local authorities across NZ are reviewing their plans and strategies around building warrant of fitness processes.
WCC will be sweating. Probably worse than the street light fiasco.
Righto commie.
Wasn’t the real Ted Hath a proto fascist?
The blame sits with the Labour Government and more importantly the people who started it.
To blame rich people?
Bob, yours has to be the silliest post on this subject.
You really don’t know what your talking about( again)
If you think this through you will realise that there may well be truth in what he says.
Watch this play out.
Changes to the building act during Helen Clarke era may well have relevance. I recall changes to the act that required councils to manage a building warrant of fitness system.
So Bradbury is probably right that we are all to blame but to blame the wealthy for not paying taxes that was not imposed or legislated for is silly.
“If you think this through you will realise that there may well be truth in what he says.
Watch this play out.”
Factually incorrect but it is always humorous to see people clutching at their right wing straws. In this case, lives were lost so not so funny.
Using a concept like “factually correct” demand a better argument squeaky.
But for the woke slogans and outrage constitute their best response to argument.
They had alarms and so far it looks like arson. Helen Clark lit the fire? Nationals leaky home’s building act more relevant alongside Act supporting cutting the red tape on building standards.
You’ll find the building code of the Clarke era has no relevance since Nact changed it.
Once again. Outrage.
The facts are available, no need to speculate.
The building warrant of fitness has not changed if the council forms that are used is anything to go by. Statement: in compliance with Building Act 2004.
At least try to stick to facts when using terms like “factually incorrect”.
Once again and I appreciate you arrived here in the 2000’s but can I suggest you leave it to those of us born and bred kiwis to understand what are facts and how the building code was established…
The Building Code is contained in Schedule 1 of the Building Regulations 1992. It sets the performance standards that all building work must meet, even if it doesn’t need a building consent.
It covers aspects such as structural stability, fire safety, \\access, moisture control, durability, services and facilities, and energy efficiency.
Your naivety borders on embarrassing.
Seems you and idiot Bob with your incredibly naive attempt to blame Labour have come unstuck with the arrest of an arsonist. My sources tell me he was a disgruntled National supporter. Can you both explain where you were on the night of the fire?
See they’ve charged someone with arson?
By the way NSC I think you are lost,please try harder to be relevant.
Bob the first. No. The blame lies with our inadequate building code which permits awful places like this to function legitimately. Think leaky buildings. Think houses still built on flood- prone ground, not just the then fairly unknown alluvial plains of historic Christchurch.
We are just a bunch of Cowboy’s here in NZ.
Building warrant of fitness 2004 deals with this.
I am glad I am not the building owner or WCC.
But TDB is correct, we all share some blame here.
Whether you voted or not.
So Bob is not really wrong.
Definitely wrong(again)
The 1992 government was The National Party, led by Jim Bolger. National controlled nearly seventy percent of the seats in Parliament.
The Building Code is contained in Schedule 1 of the Building Regulations 1992. It sets the performance standards that all building work must meet, even if it doesn’t need a building consent.
It covers aspects such as structural stability, fire safety, access, moisture control, durability, services and facilities, and energy efficiency.
So Johan, probably not best to align yourself to Bob, he’s factually incorrect.
Building Act 2004. Check any building warrant of fitness.
These are the facts. Sorry, to disappoint you.
1992 sorry to correct and disappoint you son.
Hollyhock truth in what you say.
Best response I have read to this disaster, Bomber. Thank you.
The CTV building.
Pike River.
Loafers Lodge.
A litany of preventable disasters caused by our adherence to neoliberalism.
Well said Ed
In direct contrast to the usual rant by Bob.
Accidents prior to neoliberalism Ed?
Perfect timing Bob
Or we can develop a society where there is less potential for people to get to this point in life therefore have solutions that don’t resemble ambulances at the bottom of the cliff
This would have been impossible during the Full Employment Policy (homelessness didn’t exist)
Well said RB.
In direct contrast to the usual rant by countryboy.
In direct contrast to the usual rant by Bob the troll.
Oh dear
Frank the Tank are u suggesting a UBI.
No I’m suggesting basing welfare on a hand up not a hand out. Intergenerational welfare is kryptonite for Western democracies.
I don’t think you have a right to decide who can eat and who can eat well. And I’m dam well sure the government has no right at all to decide who can and can’t burn in a fucking house fire.
I think a just system would contain at least a floor where basic dignity can be maintained. Y’know house everyone. Nutritious meals. Parents are incentivesed to stay together and supported.
Like if you can’t produce babies then yeah I do think it’s okay to get back to work but the ultimate goal is producing a prosperous nation and I’m not sure how arbitrarly cutting welfare will achieve that.
This has got nothing to do with me. I blame the government for placing the poor in substandard, high density hostels and forgetting about them. I blame the government for unbridled immigration which is compounding the problem with the inability to house our own residents let alone these migrants (no new migrant should be in short term accommodation because they come here on the condition that they can support themselves indefinitely). I blame the government for selling New Zealand out to property speculators who couldn’t care less whether someone has the human right of shelter. I blame the government for their absolute resistance to the fact of our living and housing crisis, for instead spending New Zealand’s wealth on covering up their infrastructure neglect or on expired flu shots or even weapons of mass destruction, all the while boasting about some pathetic surplus, or defeating the climate bogeyman instead of pollution, or even worse, posing with photos with some greasy, unelected war pig UK PM, grinning at the prospect of sending his radioactive bombs to kill kids. And we are to believe our government cares about the homeless at home when we send weapons and support to kill kids abroad?
and who is it that keeps electing this evil Gubmint?
Speak for yourself buddy. Some of us publically advocated to The Govt to mandate for fire sprinklers be installed within all these type of accommodation facilities over twenty five years ago. But they ignored that advice and refused to change Building Codes rules to allow this to occur retrospectively. Anyone remember the New Empire Hotel fire and all the reports written after that?? Govt and Local Body regulators are the ones with the blood on their hands.
WOW ???
I’m on minimum wage, don’t own my own house and I really don’t see how any of this awful tragedy is even remotely my fault
I too have lived in some pretty awful bedsits but you know what, if those bedsits hadn’t been around I would have had nowhere to live :S
If you get rid of awful bedsits where will the poor live?
in places with sprinklers and fire escape routes wouldn’t be a bad start x
Gregory Mein is the owner, where does his responsibility lie.
Making money out of misery no doubt. Anyone know anything else about him?
Michal and raving lefties.
That owner provided accommodation! Not the council or the fucking govt, but him. He developwd that building. He was told by council experts and all authorities that his building was ok and fit for purpose. He even has all the right paperwork I bet. So you tell me where does his responsibility lie? The council could have easily demanded sprinklers or whatever they wanted. “Fit sprinklers or no trading license!” But they didn’t. They being the esteemed revered officially elected council and burocrats and mayor. The ones who look all sad in front of cameras. You wouldn’t do any different, but what you were assured is legal. So don’t sit there and point bloody fingers. Especially now that it’s an arson case! What do we know about you? You’re a righteous that’s what we know.
and now mein is trying to palm it off on his ‘management team’ when HE is the profit taker…rank cowardice and avoidance of responsability…he was cool with his team extracting maximum profits last week.
So where are all those angry trans social justice warriors protesting activists? Oh, it’s not important to them because those victims weren’t their people.
Stop being an egg, piling one pile of bullshit onto a different pile of bullshit is less than helpful.
“standalonecomplex”. I see why. 🙂
Ummmm Martyn, 1 billion extra for mental health and only one extra bed….Little was ‘shocked’ lol
Don’t blame everyone else when the left have been in Govt for 6yrs now.
This is Labours fault just as much as you wish it to be the ‘uncaring’ right of politics.
Labour aren’t ‘left’. They started the neoliberal filth. It’s time to turn back the clock to before Lange.
Asked a mate, a private practise psychologist, where that $1billion had gone. He said he hadn’t seen any of it and he presumed it just went to public sector wage increases. He noted that the Mike King iniative is good but that it can only pay for six sessions which generally isn’t enough treatment.
Let em burn
Did you really just type that? That’s a horrible thing to say.
You got dropped on your head by your mother to didn’t you.
It’s unfortunate. The difference between you and I is I can still get on with my day.
I paid $50k in taxes last year. Aussie welfare is getting a $40 a week boost. And I’ll be able to vote in Australia next election.
I don’t like the AUKUS subs but the equivalent position in NZDF gets half.
You don’t know me. You’re out of bullets, food, ideas now what? You want people like me save New Zealand? I’m standing here with a handfull of matches.
Oh, off your meds again.
Wait. When you say “off your meds again” I just want to clarify what you mean by that that I’m medicated?
I don’t understand your logic. Feel free to concede that your victim mentality lasted one comment before going all woke shame, insult, guilt and need to be right debate tactics.
Nice day sir.
Sir?
To be fair to Sam one can never assume in this day and age?
We did.
Blame…
Who or whatever started the fire.
Then one step removed, IF the place was not up to fire standards, then the owner of the building,
Then the council for not breaching the failures that meant it wasn’t up to standard but only IF it was not at the time of inspection.
And as much as I would like to blame Marama Davidson, Minister for Homelessness, and the smug puritanical Green Party for their duplicitous holier that thou shtick, I cannot. It’s not hers or their fault.
Nor is it the man or woman in the street because unless you want the government deep in everyone’s lives, beyond the worst of the covid laws, beyond North Korean levels of personal freedom interference, being told when to breathe, the rest of mankind cannot dictate to another precisely how to live their lives to not end up in a hostel building fire!
it was up to NZs shithouse standards and as the regime is inspectors for rent….it WILL happen again
Totally agree with Editor Martyn on this one.
NZ economy runs on capital gains from property and a deregulation regime that ensures it is hard to make anyone with power accountable for anything.
So, A) keep Natzos/ACT well away from political office in 2023, and B) build a strong left movement for the future. New gens will trash Rogernomics before the remaining boomers eyes in 2026.
Yes Tiger agree – a strong left movement WILL DEFINITELY stop a nutcase arsonist or a couchburner. Very good. You’re onto it.
You think. The new gens have no idea how egalitarian this country was. I don’t hear them advocating any solutions to the banking/housing system that would even enable them to more easily buy a first home. Born into neoliberalism and accepting of neoliberalism. They are happy to just say ok boomer and eat pronouns.
Hope so. But have not those new generations been brainwashed by previous gens that Neoliberal policies are the only way. It’s a legacy in the higher levels of New Zealand society is my worry.
But it’s never us, it’s always them.
indded tiger until functionaries are sacked and pensions cancelled they will continue to not give a flying fuck about thereal world results of their actions
and if I hear one more ‘it’s a wake up call’ AFTER a disaster Ill fuckin scream..it’s just meaningless drivel..right up there with ‘thoughts and prayers’ and ‘stay strong’
New Zealand is a Joke, both National & Labour MP’s don’t give a pig’s arse about anybody else but themselves and there own ultra-ego’s. The Beehive needs levelling and start off from scratch.
Agree with Mart. But also have to say what a good discussion on here today. Many salient points.
But the truth is this is just the tip of the iceberg. Wellington CC and Winz have been stuffing the vulnerable into backpackers and hostels in their hundreds in Wellington. It has turned the centre of what was a vibrant tourist hub into a moribund and quite dangerous place.
WCC has had endless complaints about the slums it has created (they have bottled up all the addicts in one particular building for example) and as I understand it, people have begged them for a resolution. Suggestions have been made that they turn some of these places into modern vulnerable people’s accommodation and have them staffed 24/7 by people who can keep an eye out and assist the residents. All with good facilities and high safety standards.
Other Govt policies and WCC have killed off both the CBD and the old leisure precinct so it is a particular problem here in Wellington though I am sure this same scenario is playing out across NZ to a lesser extent and no doubt Rotorua has it worse.
Everywhere you look the chickens are coming home to roost but despite Tory Whanau’s tears and many pollies in attendance dont expect anything at all to improve in the short or medium term. Truthfully until we get a change in political system or a coalition of the willing, it wont change in the longer term either.
Fantail. Yes. And if this was an arsonist’s work, chances are he’s a nutter, and should be in a mental hospital, and if we look further back, they were largely closed down with both dangerous and very vulnerable at-risk persons, sent back to be cared for by “ the community”, sometimes compassionate charities and NGO’s, and sometimes scum landlords exploiting them, although I am not suggesting that this was the case here. The reluctance of both major political parties to realistically address the basic issue of housing, may be part of another scenario.
A convicted arsonist frequented the charity shop I volunteered in. We were told not to sell him light bulbs or paraphernalia which he could use to start fires. He repeatedly tried to find out my name. He defecated on the mall floor. Lived in a local half-way house, used to pester people and beg, tried to engage with polite Asian students in the bus shelters, and the last I heard of him he’d relocated to Newtown.
The life of everybody in the Loafers’ Lodge that night has been changed forever, their community disbanded and gone.
Utterly tone deaf.
This from Idiot Savant , No right turn.
This morning a hostel burned down in Wellington, killing ten people. Aotearoa is a small country, and a disaster of this scale is unusual, so every political party leader was asked to comment. What did National Party leader Christopher Luxon have to say? An American-style “thoughts and prayers”:
National’s leader Christopher Luxon said his thoughts were with the victims and responders.
“It’s pretty shocking what we’ve seen here overnight, and our thoughts and prayers are definitely with the people who’ve lost their lives, the families who’ve lost loved ones, and those that are now fighting for their lives in hospital as well as being grateful for our responders.”
Luxons comments were later echoed by ACT leader David Seymour in Parliament.
The problem with this is that that particular phrase is very obviously an American import, used most notoriously by American politicians to pretend to care about the daily mass-murders of schoolchildren by psychopaths with military weapons. I say “pretend” because it is obvious that those politicians do not care – if they did, they’d do something about it (like, you know, having sensible gun laws). While it might sound great to Luxon, to kiwi ears, its pure dismissal, a “fuck you, I don’t care” (and with weirdo religious overtones to boot). And in the context of a disaster, where the building didn’t have sprinklers, where there are already calls for improvements in building regulations to ensure that it doesn’t happen again, Luxon sounds just like one of those American politicians. If he actually does care, he’s made a terrible job of showing it.
http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2023/05/utterly-tone-deaf.html
Mosa, be fair will you!
Hipkins and every other politician used just about the same words. So that makes them all tone deaf or is just Luxon? You’re pretty selective aren’t you. You know full well that Chippie and Robbo don’t give a fuck other than being re-elected. They’re crapping themselves hoping this doesn’t come back on them.
” Hipkins and every other politician used just about the same words. So that makes them all tone deaf or is just Luxon? You’re pretty selective aren’t you ”
Haus keep up !
I was critical of all politicians in the blog I sent through before I added the post from No right turn.
If you actually read what I write then you wouldn’t claim I am selective about any current politician I detest all of them particularly when an appalling event with a major loss of life and express shock that low income people are living in death traps like this !
As for ” crapping themselves ” highly unlikely because these people like so many others in this economic system are expendable and are represented by no one in parliament and Chipkins and Robertson are worse because they claim to be ” Labour ” but they are a long way from what that actually used to mean to be ” Labour ” and the constituency they used to represent.
Here is a being fair for you , at least Luxon doesn’t hide what he is and that is a National politician who represents powerful interests and are hostile to the working poor and his policies reflect that including opposing Fair pay agreements and a ten dollar a week tax cut is going to fix everything like we have had from them in the past.
Now try again.
mosa mosa mosa
Keep up with your own bloody article. Your article focusses on Luxon and the Seymour. Your article refers to Luxon and Seymour – none other. You were NOT critical of ALL politicians – only those from the right.
Try again…here’s your chance to get stuck into Chippie or you’ll lose the little credibility you have left.
Haus get your eyesight and your I.Q tested. I think you will be in for a shock.
Credibility ?
You have just blown yours.
Found the advertisement “ Faldos tips for older golfers” very useful.
“We are all responsible” I get where your coming from but I definitely assumed a 92 bed lodge would be required to have a sprinkler system. Then again if someone had said to me last week, “Can you believe a 92 bed lodge doesn’t have to have a sprinkler system?”, I would have answered yes unfortunately I can believe that.
Two questions. Had the requirement for sprinkler systems in hotels/lodges been downgraded in recent years? Who came up with the name “loafers” lodge?
Also, why don’t buildings have fire escapes on the exterior any more?
There are 14 Billionaires in NZ + 3118 ultra-high net worth individuals with over $50million, let’s start by taxing them, then move onto the Banks, then the Property Speculators, the Climate Change polluters and big industry!
So these extremely rich people will just stick around and let you tax the hell out of them?
Really?
No chance at all that they’ll just bugger off? With their wealth. Perhaps you need another type of tax to stop that: Capital Flight Tax, or perhaps the We’ll Get You Bastards Somehow Tax. I realise this is not going to impress anybody here but…Why taxing US billionaires’ wealth – as Biden tried to do – will never work
But since it won’t affect me I’m game for yet another experiment on the matter.
Really?
What you think they can take the physical source of their wealth with them. If they leave they sell their business and assets to the next opportunity seeker who will in turn pay the tax.
Physical?
Ah, I can see where this is going. Physical/Labour = Wealth, all the rest is just smart scamming.
So their businesses and assets are just mechanised Golden Geese, punching out the same stuff irrespective of who owns them or runs them?
Of course, that’s what communists always thought too, although in their case they didn’t just tax the wealthy but shot them and took their farms and factories. That must be why they’re such dominant global powers nowdays.
yes I agree we should care more for the flotsam and jetsom this society creates but – really – is it too soon to call the bottom on house prices?
No one will do anything about it though.
What do you suggest millsy?
“Do nothing.”
?
Not me, I always voted for 1935 social-democracy — oh, cripes, almost the last 40 years if Muldoon hadn’t called an early election ( where in retrospect I would have voted for him, despite him).
No, it’s you sick wicks, the diverted, diverted, diverted. The divided and ruled. Which goes for the Left and the Right. Not least Martyn and Chris, dissimilar to Bob and Bernie.
As the Green leader expressed, we put the neediest second forever rather than first, like the old NZ.
If All includes council oversight, then I completely agree. We must individually, and collectively/governmentally take responsibility for this tragedy and each other.
NZ of course is not unique like this. We used to care about our people. Neo-liberal/Milton Friedman ideology to which *all* major parties broadly agree prioritises GDP over public welfare. Time to get the pitchforks out?
a ‘responsable’ landlord would have taken steps above and beyond the regs but he wanted to skate by on the legal minimum…it’s a word we hear a lot responsable landlords, responsable gun owners, responsable lenders….it’s just bullshit
One question that is worth asking, is if the people effected weren’t living at the Loafers Lodge, where would they be living?
https://www.loaferslodge.co.nz/
dunno but they wouldn’t be dead would they? comment?
What is the moral ground for not addressing the neediest first? The last 40 years and all. So disgusting, especially to us old NZers, the ones who remember. Most disgusting in my book, this govt, which knows how it is backward and forward. Let alone climate change — 2027 for the 1.5 degree increase.
But they have no talkers, persuaders — they rely on focus group short-termness and democratic short-termness. Lets march direct into the tsunami.
This being NZ I expect we’ve all stayed at hostels and caravan parks, some with long-termers. Know all the folk in the Loafers’ by that, let alone my flatblock. Feel for them.
the arson thing of course lets of the landlord so it’s handy but frankly if a squad of US Marines with flame throwers had attacked the place sprinklers and exits would have saved lives….and that’s the actual point here.
Sadly, true.
Bloody US Marines are so bloody useless these days.
hooooo johan soooo boring
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