…the chronic underfunding of the social infrastructure of NZ so that National can gerrymander a surplus for tax cuts has to end if we want to be serious about education, hospitals, mental health, superannuation and inequality reduction programs.
This viciousness is not only seen in the spiteful policy of MSD but also in the mass surveillance powers they have given themselves to spy on beneficiaries. Which leads to an interesting question, because MSD spy on social media for welfare fraud, are they following the #IamMetiria social media campaign and will begin secretly investigating anyone who uses the tag?
As we head into this year’s election NZ First has dangled the carrot of a binding referendum on whether the Māori seats should be abolished. Given it has been NZ First policy to abolish the seven Māori electorates for some time the position taken just over two months out from an election is not surprising.
The sad old lies that Winston needs to drag around to appeal to his new redneck provincial Maori hating voter block has made Winston dog whistle a tune so dangerous that if implemented would mean civil war in this country.
That the political double standards and real abuses of power occurring here can be eclipsed by the snarling viciousness at a female politician admitting to breaking the law because of poverty 24 year ago says a lot about us as a juvenile culture.
If we want social and environmental change, punishing is not a helpful or healthy philosophy. We require consultation through well-informed and democratic processes focused on the well-being of all people. Talking about abolishing Māori seats in no way contributes to this. It is a deliberate inflammatory device that has nothing to do with cultural literacy in Aotearoa.
Right now, some multinational corporations aren’t paying their fair share of tax in New Zealand. Many are using complex accountancy schemes to avoid paying hundreds of millions of dollars in tax – and leaving it up to the rest of us to pick up the tab.
Dear Minister of justice, I have a complaint about the IPCA and a few comments to make about them to you as well. I heard on Radio NZ that the Independent Police Conduct Authority (IPCA) of New Zealand has dropped my complaint into MP Todd Barclay. While I have no doubt as a fellow National MP you will be please to hear this given he is a colleague of yours.
I am unhappy about two aspects of the IPCA handling of this.
It’s far easier to ignore the 41 000 homeless, 10 000 in prison, 500 suicides, 305 000 kids in poverty, 550 000 suffering hardship and 1600 dying each year from freezing houses when you don’t know the numbers.
The poor are ground down by a welfare state more befitting the 19th and 20th centuries than today. But there is at last a bright spot. There were two breathtakingly bold policies buried in the depths of the Green’s paper Mending the Safety Net that have scarcely been discussed: