5 Candidates For The Seat Of Limerick
The Nats most magnificent troll
Said: “I’ve just found a fiscal black hole
so impossibly big
that Grant cannot dig
Labour out before the next poll!”
Setting the Agenda
Political analysis and commentary shaping the progressive debate in Aotearoa New Zealand, focused on power, policy, and accountability.
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Another forum – another Amy Adams no show
I’m not sure how widespread it is for government ministers to refuse attendance at public meetings when they are asked to front for unpopular policies but in the case of Minister of Social Housing Amy Adams it is certainly true.
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Trust and Taxes: How National Intends To Derail The “Jacinda Train”
If they can convince the waverers; the voters on the point of climbing aboard the “Jacinda Train”; that Labour’s numbers just don’t add up. If they can make them feel that if they’re not very careful, then a bunch of so-called “experts” are going to advise Labour to tax their land, their batch, their business, their petrol, their water, their financial transactions, and even their inheritance. If they can inflame suspicion and build mistrust, then – dammit – they just might win.
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Observations on the 2017 Election campaign thus far… (wha)
The 2017 Pre-Election Fiscal Update (PREFU) revealed that the Nats had achieved a respectable $3.7 billion surplus – contrasting sharply with the $1.6 billion forecasted surplus in the May 2017 Budget. How did National achieve such a remarkable feat, despite reduced revenue from tax cuts in 2009 and 2010 and the re-build after the Christchurch and Kaikoura earthquakes?. One doesn’t have to search far to find one possible answer where cuts were made to achieve their much-vaunted surplus;
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Time to get rid of married/single distinctions
Why do we have big differences between rates of NZ Super? Why does a single sharing pensioner get $ 60 a week more than if their relationship is defined to be in the nature of marriage?
Why does a superannuitant living alone get $90 a week more than a married person?
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Some People: Paula Bennett And National’s Tribal Instincts
The Police Minister knows that the most effective means of breaking the gangs’ power would be to remove the criminal stigma from unwise drug use. But, like all Police Ministers, Paula Bennett knows that the drug laws are not there to end the misuse of drugs. They are there to create a nether world of criminality and addiction against which the situation of “normal” people may be favourably compared.
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Labour and the TPPA – not bloody minded enough!
It is now certain that any decisions on the future of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) minus the US will take place after the election. Last week’s meeting of the negotiators from the remaining 11 TPPA countries rebuffed the National government’s wish to proceed with the agreement basically unchanged aside from new provisions for its entry into force.
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606 Pairs of Shoes – Dave Macpherson
Two days after two hikoi of 579 pairs of shoes (each) set off simultaneously from Cape Reinga and Bluff, bound for Parliament’s hallowed steps, the Chief Coroner announced the latest suicide figures for the 2017 financial year: 606.
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National Party sacrifices human rights to politics
Bill English and Paula Bennett admitted the new powers would stretch human rights laws, but would only apply to serious criminals who had ‘fewer human rights than others’ anyway, clearly misunderstanding human rights. We should be wary when the Prime Minister and his Deputy are prepared to trade off these rights as a pawn in desperate election politics.
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Observations on the 2017 Election campaign thus far… (toru)
The leaking of Winston Peter’s superannuation over-payment is well known. Also known is that Ministers Paula Bennett and Anne Tolley were briefed by Ministry of Social Development and State Services Commission, respectively, on Peters’ private details regarding the over-payment before it was leaked to the media and made public knowledge.