Monthly Archive for September, 2008

Between the lines: Nats’ RMA free-for-all

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 30, 2008
in economy, election 2008, environment and national
. 24 Comments

The RMA is a quick and cheap process in the vast majority of cases, and it is regarded as a world-leading piece of legislation. Few consent applications are refused or appealed. Reforms of the RMA over the years have made it more efficient. The studies show that the delays that do happen in consents being granted are usually due to incomplete applications and lack of resources at councils.

So, what does National want to do the RMA? Basically, it wants to take away our right to have a say about large developments and private use of public resources that affects our communities. Courts would be given the power to demand security for costs when objections meaning only well-funded groups could afford to object. Major projects would not go through the normal local process but will be fast-tracked through central government (National’s ‘Environmental Protection Agency’). It appears it would be harder for communities to object when this process is used, which is where major time savings would theoretically come in (personally, I think it will just end up with more complex cases going through the courts under judicial review, rather than through the environment court). Dealing with central government and more complex legal issues would prevent many local groups having the ability to object that they do currently. Why would National want that? Because public objections get in the way of businesses doing whatever the hell they want. Get rid of the objections, get rid of the hold-ups.

National points to electricity generation and transmission as the kind of major projects this ‘priority consent’ process would speed up. But there is already a call-in power that ministers have used to help fast-track electricity projects. That power, however, is only used for projects of national importance. Given that existing power, National’s ‘priority consenting’ seems (it’s not detailed) intended to remove public say over private developments that are not of national importance.

It really is more of the same from National. Vague policy using innocuous language that thinly veils an intention to give more control to those who have money and power, and less to the rest of us.

Nats: Pay cuts for you, tax cuts for the rich

Published
by
Tane
on September 30, 2008
in education, national, tax and workers' rights
. 15 Comments

Bill English has put out a press release whingeing about Helen Clark’s promise to lift wages for low-paid school support staff, and fearmongering that it might mean Michael Cullen will cancel his tax cuts.

Presumably, English’s statement means National would cancel the planned pay increase to help fund its tax cuts for the rich.

These are people who do things like deal with truancy, handle schools’ information technology and provide teacher aide support for disabled children, and they are paid as little as $12.69 an hour.

Kind of makes a mockery out of all that talk from National about using tax cuts to raise incomes, don’t you think?

When did lying become OK?

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 30, 2008
in election 2008, maori party, media, national and racism
. 43 Comments

On Breakfast this morning, failed National party candidate Paul Henry and Guyon Espiner discussed the possibility of the Maori Party and National working together in a government.

Henry: Do you get the feeling National would do anything for power, they would cut almost any deal at all with the Maori Party to get in?
Espiner: Yes, pretty much

Both seemed sure that National would give up their policy of abolishing the Maori seats in a second. Indeed, they thought National had only put up the policy as a bargaining chip to be given away after the election. Guyon said he detected no personal commitment to abolishing the seats from Key or other senior Nats, despite Key and his fellows being the same people who backed Brash’s racist Orewa speech. Neither seemed to see any problem with this dishonesty and lack of principle.

When did it become OK for a party to espouse policies that they intend to never follow through on?

Fun: Whack a poll

Published
by
Dancer
on September 30, 2008
in humour
. 2 Comments

Need a little respite from election madness? Utilise your keyboard to reach your desired poll result with Whack a Poll…

The Kingmaker but only one potential King

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 30, 2008
in election 2008, greens, labour, maori party and national
. 50 Comments

Let’s get serious about the idea of the Maori Party working with National. Yes, they want to play up the possibility to enhance their bargaining position, just as the Greens were last month, but it’s not going to happen. National and the Maori Party voted together in only a third of votes in the last parliament. The Greens and the Maori Party voted together 70% of the time. Despite their conservative elements, the Maori Party is a left-wing party in practice. Its support base is former Labour party supporters who rejected Labour’s sop to the right over the foreshore and seabed.

Look at National’s constitutional policies. They want to abolish the Maori seats. That’s the death knell of the Maori party right there. Add to that National’s desire to move away from MMP to a less proportional system. MMP has lead to a more diverse Parliament with a proportional Maori presence for the first time. Arguably, the Maori Party itself would not survive without MMP because Maori voters couldn’t split their votes MP candidate/Labour Party.

Or let’s look at National’s ACC policy, its opposition to rising the minimum wage, its tax cuts for the rich paid for by borrowing or spending cuts, and its welfare policy. All would further impoverish the poor, including Maori. National opposed the Emissions Trading Scheme because it wanted it to be weaker, whereas the Maori Party opposed it because they wanted it to be stronger. National wanted us in Iraq and it wants to sell New Zealand assets to foreign investors. It is just not consistent with the Maori Party’s kaupapa to support policies like these that attack the poor, disrespect our environment, and give up our sovereignty.

Yes, there are differences with Labour and the Greens too but they are not as fundamental. National would have to change what it is to be acceptable. A Labour-led coalition is already most of the way there; it would need only a few policy concessions.

Given the choice, the Maori Party would undoubtedly end up supporting a Labour-led government. Even if the MPs would prefer National, they will be taking the decision to their people - people who have never, ever supported a National government.

Nice

Published
by
Tane
on September 30, 2008
in economy and international
. 45 Comments

Ashcroft dealings under spotlight again

Published
by
Dancer
on September 29, 2008
in articles
. 14 Comments

We’ve seen Mr Key look evasive on the topic of Lord Ashcroft, so when his name popped up in the British media over the weekend I had a closer look. It made me wonder exactly what Key and Ashcroft talked about recently - and whether there were any plans for companies to be set up in NZ as described in the story by Tom Parry (from The Mirror). He writes of trying to untangle the paper trail of Lord Ashcroft:

The paper trail that leads from Belize to Tory HQ in London is complex. Since March 2006, the peer has donated £3.1m to the Tories through a company called Bearwood Corporate Services Ltd (BCS).

Although foreign donations to British political parties are banned, the chain of ownership from BCS leads back to the Belize Bank’s main address. However the scheme is legal because the donations have been made by BCS which is registered in this country. BCS is majority owned by Bearwood Holdings, Bearwood Holdings is in turn owned by Astraporta UK - an Ashcroft investment arm - and Astraporta’s main shareholder is Stargate Holdings, based in Belize City.

Astraporta’s UK business address is an anonymous office block in Wokingham, Surrey.

Labour MP John Mann has written to the Electoral Commission calling for an investigation. Under the rules, BCS is required to “carry on business in the UK”.

Continue reading ‘Ashcroft dealings under spotlight again’

More posters and leaflets on the Hub

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 29, 2008
in activism and election 2008
. 10 Comments

We’ve got a range new posters and leaflets up on the Campaign Hub and we’re keen to see more. Some people are printing off two different designs and making doubled-sided leaflets, which is a really good way to get two messages distributed in one go. Best to only do that with designs authorised by the same person - not that anyone is likely to pass the $12,000 limit and have to register as a third party (you can make nearly a million A6 leaflets or 120,000 A3 posters for that money). Below are a few of the new designs on the Hub, there’s a range from the serious to the funny:

Gordon Campbell at Drinking Liberally, Wlgtn

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 29, 2008
in activism and drinking liberally
. 0 Comments

You probably already read him on Scoop Election ‘08 and he’s a former Listener journalist too. The topic of his talk is: ‘Covering the issues - how to escape from the who’s winning, who’s losing style of election coverage’. His recent article Horse race political journalism might give you a taste of what to expect.

What: Drinking Liberally, Wellington
Where: Southern Cross
When: 5:30pm, Thurs, Oct 2
Who: Gordon Campbell, good jokers and jokeresses

[I got up to DL-Palmerston North with a couple of mates on Friday. Good to meet you all and great to see a good number of people active outside a main centre. Bloody good kebabs at that place on the square too.]

Going over to the dark side?

Published
by
Eddie
on September 29, 2008
in humour and interweb
. 19 Comments

Going into business with Farrar was one thing but has Scoop now cast its lot in with National? How else to explain the ‘Hollow N’ National party logo that now appears when you load the site in Internet Explorer?

Take on Key

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 29, 2008
in john key, slippery and youtube
. 6 Comments

Greeenwoman has done it again, another brilliant video on Key using a classic music video:

 

What will you do with your tax cut?

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 29, 2008
in social issues and tax
. 46 Comments

If your annual income is over $14,000, your tax will decrease by $12 to $28 a week from Wednesday. That’s a reduction of up to 26% on the income tax you pay. By 2011, people will be paying up to 31% less income tax (graphs here). With boosts to Working for Families, many people with children will be paying no net tax (already the average tax paid by a single earner family with two kids is only 2%).

Funny, then that the actual amount of cash seems a little underwhelming to those on comfortable middle-class incomes. Funny because we’ve had nearly a decade of National basing its entire political argument around the need for tax cuts. Yet, now we have tax cuts, no-one seriously thinks they will be the panacea that National has made them out to be. National’s argument, of course, is that we just need to cut more, specifically for the wealthy (they have ruled out cutting the bottom rate any further). But if $1.7 billion worth of tax cuts this year, rising to over $3 billion a year by 2011, isn’t the cure to all our woes why would more make all the difference? It wouldn’t, of course. Tax cuts are not a solution to low wages, they are not the difference between people leaving NZ and staying, they are not compensation for inflation, and they never can be. And every dollar spent on tax cuts is a dollar that can’t go on health or education or, in the case of National’s cuts, a dollar that has to be borrowed on the turbulent international credit market.

So, what will you do with your tax cut? I expect all our friends on the Right who claim we don’t need a public welfare system because that’s the role of private charity will be keen to donate to a worthy cause. The Anglican Church’s quirky ‘give it up’ site has a number of good ideas for organisations you can give your tax cut to. For something less Christian-based, how about an environmental group like Forest and Bird, or a local community organisation, or even a political party, so they don’t have to turn to secretive wealthy donors?

Still nothing personal

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 29, 2008
in election 2008, john key, national, slippery and spin
. 15 Comments

National desperately wants to portray any criticism of John Key as a personal attack. Don’t be taken in.

Look, PM is a powerful job. We need to have a thorough examination of anyone contesting for that role. As I’ve always said there are three legitimate questions that need to be answered – what are their policies? are they competent? can they be trusted? If there are issues around any of these points they have to be uncovered by someone; Key is hardly likely to stand up himself and announce that he misused his power as an MP for personal gain. So, who’s going to do the uncovering?

It’s not always going to be the media. First, there is an infatuation with Key on the part of a large number of commentators. As with any infatuation, this manifests as a sub-conscious tendency to see the best in the person and to forgive their flaws (and ,as with any infatuation, pointing out the flaws to the infatuated person does no good). Case in point is the Herald’s ‘unauthorised biography’ of Key, which somehow managed to miss the Tranzrail issue as well as persistent questions over Key’s involvement in speculative attacks on the Kiwi dollar in the 1980s. Secondly, as journalists will consistently tell you, the media does not have the staff or resources to undertake the investigative journalism and ‘CV-checking’ that we require of someone applying for the top job. For two decades, our media has been asset-stripped by foreign owners who are just out for a profit and commercially-orientated local owners. Disgracefully, Fairfax and APN are sacking journalists, including political staff, in election year.

When the media don’t have the motivation or resources to do this kind of work, groups with vested interests in the information becoming public will fill the void. Labour knows that if it doesn’t reveal the unsavory side of Key’s behaviour that make him unsuitable for PM they will never come to light. Don’t think for a moment that National would not also reveal this kind of shady behaviour by Labour if they found it. They would be right to do so.

Attack on democracy

Published
by
IrishBill
on September 28, 2008
in election 2008, maori party and national
. 53 Comments

National have quietly released their policy on electoral law and have promised to abolish the Maori seats once treaty claims are finished, repeal the Electoral Finance Act and run a referendum on MMP.

These all represent substantial changes to the way our democracy operates.

I’ll be very interested to see what the Maori Party make of the abolition of seats. I’d also like to know what kind of electoral law they envisage replacing the EFA because I have a bad feeling it won’t involve transparency and the removal of anonymous donations. I sincerely hope our media push for details about the Nat’s plans for electoral law because it’s too important to see it taken back to the days of the shadowy backrooms.

Regarding the plan to run a referendum on MMP, I can only repeat what I said when the Nat’s intentions for MMP first came to light:

I would imagine we’ll hear a lot about how National just support the democratic right to choose an electoral system while their backers run big money campaigns to push first past the post.

Just in case you missed it the first time around here’s a video showing exactly what that meant

Expect the unexpected

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 28, 2008
in election 2008, helen clark and john key
. 44 Comments

I’m probably going to be at odds with my fellow Standardistas in this but I support having debates featuring just Clark and Key. One of these two people will lead the country after the election and we deserve to see to them in a forum where they go head to head against each other, rather than only appearing in debates where they are just two of eight voices (that said, they should also appear in the broader leaders’ debates).

I think it’s interesting that Key is keen to have these three head-to-head debates. Wise old voices had been saying that Key would shy away from debates, particularly head-to-heads, because he wouldn’t be able to foot it with Clark. But that’s wrong. National is spending a huge amount on media training for Key. Even when caught by surprise, he is noticeably better than the blathering fool that was once ‘Key unspun’. He has become much better at delivering his pat answers in a convincing manner. He doesn’t look horribly out of his depth as he used to. Watch for Key to disappear for days at a time in the run up to the debates as the media training intensifies.

National’s calculation is that Key doesn’t have to best Clark; he just has to beat low expectations of his own performance. They will be putting a lot of stock in a positive outcome from the debates to give them momentum, which they are lacking at the moment and which the their tax package is unlikely to deliver (seeing as it will either be embarrassingly small or will come at the cost of higher debt or large spending cuts). In other words, expect Key to do much better in the debates than you would expect. National wouldn’t have agreed the head-to-head option if they didn’t expect him to do well. 

Nats desperate to silence grassroots activists

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 28, 2008
in activism, election 2008, national and same old national
. 33 Comments

An email from a reader:

“A friend and I were putting up some Vote with Both Eyes Open posters on Lambton Quay the other night. We had just put some up around the intersection by Parliament and crossed the road when a senior National advisor came up to us with one of our recently pasted banners scrunched up in his hand. He handed it to me and said ‘one of yours, I think’. Way to stand up for free speech, National.”

If you walk down around Wellington, you will see quite a number of posters from Both Eyes Open and other groups but you’ll also notice, particularly on Lambton Quay, many corners of posters that remain where the body of the poster has been torn down. I’m told that what happens is as soon as National finds out a poster-run is happening near Parliament, they dispatch a group of Tory-boys, eager to prove their worth, to rip them down. Since people usually poster in the late evening, the Tories must be working late into the night in a desperate bid to make sure ordinary Kiwis don’t see the message when they head to work in the morning.

I just can’t understand the mentality of putting all that effort into tearing down posters. Why don’t they just put up some of their own? That would be the competition of ideas eh? That would be the exercise of free speech so vital to democracy. Maybe they just don’t have anything worth saying.

Of course, the Right has tried to silence us for generations, often employing far more brutal methods than this. But Kiwis won’t be silenced. As the popularity of the Campaign Hub shows, Kiwis are determined to have their voices heard.

Easy to clear up the question

Published
by
Dancer
on September 28, 2008
in john key and slippery
. 9 Comments

An article in yesterday’s Herald raised some more questions over how Key has handled the management of his share portfolio. However it looks like it would be easy enough for him to clear up. According to Paula Oliver:

Eyebrows were raised around Parliament this week when Mr Key said Mr Leggat could buy shares with his money in the trust without first asking him….But Mr Key said his arrangement with Mr Leggat was “informal” and there was no written documentation regarding the arrangement.

Stock exchange rules of the time would appear to suggest there should have been - something Mr Key does not want to elaborate on. Mr Leggat said he could not talk about the issue of discretion because of client confidentiality,

Given Mr Key’s committment to be open and transparent why doesn’t he just give Mr Leggat permission to talk about the arrangement? Or is it because he has once again been slippery with his descriptions? I would suspect after last week, where Mr Key showed considerable ease in his “mis-direction” of the media, that it makes sense to for someone at least ask.

The Standard Week: 19-26 September

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 27, 2008
in standard week
. 20 Comments

Slippery John does it again. Asked a clear question by a reporter, he lied to her face. It was only when Fran Mold revealed to Key that she knew he had owned another packet of Tranz Rail shares (purchased and sold while he was asking questions about Tranz Rail in his position as MP) that he admitted the truth. ‘Sorry’ was he eventual position ‘I stuffed up, again’. Well, it’s one thing to stuff up when you’ve got no actual responsibilities, quite another when you’re PM. Can we trust this chump with power? Because ‘oops’ isn’t good enough when you’re leading a country. Here are our favourite posts of the week:

Hand in the till
The public needs to know what went on during that meeting with Rail America. We also need to know the full details of all Key’s holdings and an investigation needs to be held into whether he has misused his position for financial gain anywhere else….[more]

Go the drivers
we have a problem with low wages in New Zealand and tax cuts are not going to help that. What is going to help that is raising wages and it’s good to see Wellington bus drivers doing what they can to make that happen…[more]

Why National won’t win
Kiwis don’t like National - the people and the policies. The innocuous facades they’ve thrown up are losing crediblity and are failing to adequately disguise what’s behind them….[more]

Both Eyes Open shows activism alive and well
I’ve seen many Both Eyes Open posters around Wellington and I know thousands of leaflets from the Hub have been distributed. But this is just the beginning, we need to get tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of leaflets and posters out there before election day. We need more authorised designs sent in for posting on the Hub to be printed off. Bill English says it can’t be done because of the EFA. Show him how wrong he is….[more]

That meeting
…it seems to me that John Key’s meeting with Rail America needs some more explaining. For a start these kinds of meetings don’t just happen of their own accord… [more]

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Obama wipes the floor with McCain

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on September 27, 2008
in international
. 33 Comments

There’s not much more that needs to be said about the first presidental debate. 

McCain was stiff and boring. His framing was awful: he and Obama both said essentially the same thing on a number of issues but the reaction meter consistently showed that people reacted more positively to Obama than McCain. Post-debate polls show Americans thought Obama won and that they trusted him over McCain by large margins on Iraq and, crucially, on the economy.

But, most importantly, McCain did not present real solutions, just tinkering with the same failed right-wing tools. He was rooted in the past and kept referring to obscure parts of his record in the Senate. Obama presented positive, practical left-wing policies directed at better America, and the people loved it.

That meeting

Published
by
IrishBill
on September 27, 2008
in john key
. 50 Comments

The more I think about it the more it seems to me that John Key’s meeting with Rail America needs some more explaining.

For a start these kinds of meetings don’t just happen of their own accord. Rail America is based, somewhat unsurprisingly, in America. John Key is based in New Zealand. That means someone had to take a 20 hour flight for this meeting to take place.

Then there’s the fact that someone had to think it was a good idea for Key to meet with company reps. The question is who was that person? I assume David Richwhite would have been dealing with Rail America at that time and he has been a big (and controversial) donor to the National Party (and my sources tell me Key is personally acquainted with him) so maybe it was him.

If he was the go-between then the situation gets murkier as insider trading proceedings were filed against David Richwhite in an action that included investigation into “a bid by Rail America for Tranz Rail (in the event not proceeded with)”. What the exact charge around the Rail America sale was we don’t know because that action was stopped when $20 million was payed out by Richwhite but no liability was accepted.

Of course this is only surmise but according to the Labour party Key was at the meeting in his capacity as a representative of New Zealand’s parliament.

If Key did meet with the company in his capacity as our representative then the public has a right to know all of the details surrounding this meeting and pertinent questions would be where did he meet Rail America and, if it was in the US, who picked up the tab for the flights and accommodation?

There may be simple answers to the questions of who set the meeting up, where it was, what was discussed and who, exactly, it was with but unfortunately I don’t think we’ll ever hear them.